"WIVES AND DAUGHTERS.\n\nAn Every-Day Story.\n\nby Mrs. Gaskell\n\nCHAPTER I.\n\nTHE DAWN OF A GALA DAY.\n\n\n[Illustration (untitled)]\n\nTo begin with the old rigmarole of childhood. In a country there was\na shire, and in that shire there was a town, and in that town there\nwas a house, and in that house there was a room, and in that room\nthere was a bed, and in that bed there lay a little girl; wide awake\nand longing to get up, but not daring to do so for fear of the unseen\npower in the next room--a certain Betty, whose slumbers must not\nbe disturbed until six o'clock struck, when she wakened of herself\n\"as sure as clockwork,\" and left the household very little peace\nafterwards. It was a June morning, and early as it was, the room was\nfull of sunny warmth and light.\n\nOn the drawers opposite to the little white dimity bed in which Molly\nGibson lay, was a primitive kind of bonnet-stand on which was hung a\nbonnet, carefully covered over from any chance of dust with a large\ncotton handkerchief, of so heavy and serviceable a texture that if\nthe thing underneath it had been a flimsy fabric of gauze and lace\nand flowers, it would have been altogether \"scomfished\" (again to\nquote from Betty's vocabulary). But the bonnet was made of solid\nstraw, and its only trimming was a plain white ribbon put over the\ncrown, and forming the strings. Still, there was a neat little\nquilling inside, every plait of which Molly knew, for had she not\nmade it herself the evening before, with infinite pains? and was\nthere not a little blue bow in this quilling, the very first bit of\nsuch finery Molly had ever had the prospect of wearing?\n\nSix o'clock now! the pleasant, brisk ringing of the church bells told\nthat; calling every one to their daily work, as they had done for\nhundreds of years. Up jumped Molly, and ran with her bare little feet\nacross the room, and lifted off the handkerchief and saw once again\nthe bonnet; the pledge of the gay bright day to come. Then to the\nwindow, and after some tugging she opened the casement, and let in\nthe sweet morning air. The dew was already off the flowers in the\ngarden below, but still rising from the long hay-grass in the meadows\ndirectly beyond. At one side lay the little town of Hollingford,\ninto a street of which Mr. Gibson's front door opened; and delicate\ncolumns, and little puffs of smoke were already beginning to rise\nfrom many a cottage chimney where some housewife was already up, and\npreparing breakfast for the bread-winner of the family.\n\nMolly Gibson saw all this, but all she thought about it was, \"Oh! it\nwill be a fine day! I was afraid it never, never would come; or that,\nif it ever came, it would be a rainy day!\" Five-and-forty years ago,\nchildren's pleasures in a country town were very simple, and Molly\nhad lived for twelve long years without the occurrence of any event\nso great as that which was now impending. Poor child! it is true\nthat she had lost her mother, which was a jar to the whole tenour of\nher life; but that was hardly an event in the sense referred to; and\nbesides, she had been too young to be conscious of it at the time.\nThe pleasure she was looking forward to to-day was her first share in\na kind of annual festival in Hollingford.\n\nThe little straggling town faded away into country on one side close\nto the entrance-lodge of a great park, where lived my Lord and Lady\nCumnor: \"the earl\" and \"the countess,\" as they were always called by\nthe inhabitants of the town; where a very pretty amount of feudal\nfeeling still lingered, and showed itself in a number of simple ways,\ndroll enough to look back upon, but serious matters of importance\nat the time. It was before the passing of the Reform Bill, but a\ngood deal of liberal talk took place occasionally between two or\nthree of the more enlightened freeholders living in Hollingford;\nand there was a great Tory family in the county who, from time to\ntime, came forward and contested the election with the rival Whig\nfamily of Cumnor. One would have thought that the above-mentioned\nliberal-talking inhabitants would have, at least, admitted the\npossibility of their voting for the Hely-Harrison, and thus trying to\nvindicate their independence. But no such thing. \"The earl\" was lord\nof the manor, and owner of much of the land on which Hollingford was\nbuilt; he and his household were fed, and doctored, and, to a certain\nmeasure, clothed by the good people of the town; their fathers'\ngrandfathers had always voted for the eldest son of Cumnor Towers,\nand following in the ancestral track, every man-jack in the place\ngave his vote to the liege lord, totally irrespective of such\nchimeras as political opinion.\n\nThis was no unusual instance of the influence of the great\nland-owners over humbler neighbours in those days before railways,\nand it was well for a place where the powerful family, who thus\novershadowed it, were of so respectable a character as the Cumnors.\nThey expected to be submitted to, and obeyed; the simple worship of\nthe townspeople was accepted by the earl and countess as a right; and\nthey would have stood still in amazement, and with a horrid memory\nof the French sansculottes who were the bugbears of their youth, had\nany inhabitant of Hollingford ventured to set his will or opinions\nin opposition to those of the earl. But, yielded all that obeisance,\nthey did a good deal for the town, and were generally condescending,\nand often thoughtful and kind in their treatment of their vassals.\nLord Cumnor was a forbearing landlord; putting his steward a little\non one side sometimes, and taking the reins into his own hands now\nand then, much to the annoyance of the agent, who was, in fact, too\nrich and independent to care greatly for preserving a post where his\ndecisions might any day be overturned by my lord's taking a fancy\nto go \"pottering\" (as the agent irreverently expressed it in the\nsanctuary of his own home), which, being interpreted, meant that\noccasionally the earl asked his own questions of his own tenants,\nand used his own eyes and ears in the management of the smaller\ndetails of his property. But his tenants liked my lord all the better\nfor this habit of his. Lord Cumnor had certainly a little time for\ngossip, which he contrived to combine with the failing of personal\nintervention between the old land-steward and the tenantry. But,\nthen, the countess made up by her unapproachable dignity for this\nweakness of the earl's. Once a year she was condescending. She and\nthe ladies, her daughters, had set up a school; not a school after\nthe manner of schools now-a-days, where far better intellectual\nteaching is given to the boys and girls of labourers and work-people\nthan often falls to the lot of their betters in worldly estate; but\na school of the kind we should call \"industrial,\" where girls are\ntaught to sew beautifully, to be capital housemaids, and pretty fair\ncooks, and, above all, to dress neatly in a kind of charity uniform\ndevised by the ladies of Cumnor Towers;--white caps, white tippets,\ncheck aprons, blue gowns, and ready curtseys, and \"please, ma'ams,\"\nbeing _de rigueur_.\n\nNow, as the countess was absent from the Towers for a considerable\npart of the year, she was glad to enlist the sympathy of the\nHollingford ladies in this school, with a view to obtaining their aid\nas visitors during the many months that she and her daughters were\naway. And the various unoccupied gentlewomen of the town responded to\nthe call of their liege lady, and gave her their service as required;\nand along with it, a great deal of whispered and fussy admiration.\n\"How good of the countess! So like the dear countess--always thinking\nof others!\" and so on; while it was always supposed that no strangers\nhad seen Hollingford properly, unless they had been taken to the\ncountess's school, and been duly impressed by the neat little pupils,\nand the still neater needlework there to be inspected. In return,\nthere was a day of honour set apart every summer, when with much\ngracious and stately hospitality, Lady Cumnor and her daughters\nreceived all the school visitors at the Towers, the great family\nmansion standing in aristocratic seclusion in the centre of the large\npark, of which one of the lodges was close to the little town. The\norder of this annual festivity was this. About ten o'clock one of the\nTowers' carriages rolled through the lodge, and drove to different\nhouses, wherein dwelt a woman to be honoured; picking them up by ones\nor twos, till the loaded carriage drove back again through the ready\nportals, bowled along the smooth tree-shaded road, and deposited its\ncovey of smartly-dressed ladies on the great flight of steps leading\nto the ponderous doors of Cumnor Towers. Back again to the town;\nanother picking up of womankind in their best clothes, and another\nreturn, and so on till the whole party were assembled either in the\nhouse or in the really beautiful gardens. After the proper amount of\nexhibition on the one part, and admiration on the other, had been\ndone, there was a collation for the visitors, and some more display\nand admiration of the treasures inside the house. Towards four\no'clock, coffee was brought round; and this was a signal of the\napproaching carriage that was to take them back to their own homes;\nwhither they returned with the happy consciousness of a well-spent\nday, but with some fatigue at the long-continued exertion of behaving\ntheir best, and talking on stilts for so many hours. Nor were\nLady Cumnor and her daughters free from something of the same\nself-approbation, and something, too, of the same fatigue; the\nfatigue that always follows on conscious efforts to behave as will\nbest please the society you are in.\n\nFor the first time in her life, Molly Gibson was to be included among\nthe guests at the Towers. She was much too young to be a visitor at\nthe school, so it was not on that account that she was to go; but it\nhad so happened that one day when Lord Cumnor was on a \"pottering\"\nexpedition, he had met Mr. Gibson, _the_ doctor of the neighbourhood,\ncoming out of the farm-house my lord was entering; and having some\nsmall question to ask the surgeon (Lord Cumnor seldom passed any\none of his acquaintance without asking a question of some sort--not\nalways attending to the answer; it was his mode of conversation), he\naccompanied Mr. Gibson to the out-building, to a ring in the wall of\nwhich the surgeon's horse was fastened. Molly was there too, sitting\nsquare and quiet on her rough little pony, waiting for her father.\nHer grave eyes opened large and wide at the close neighbourhood and\nevident advance of \"the earl;\" for to her little imagination the\ngrey-haired, red-faced, somewhat clumsy man, was a cross between an\narch-angel and a king.\n\n\"Your daughter, eh, Gibson?--nice little girl, how old? Pony wants\ngrooming though,\" patting it as he talked. \"What's your name,\nmy dear? He's sadly behindhand with his rent, as I was saying,\nbut if he's really ill, I must see after Sheepshanks, who is a\nhardish man of business. What's his complaint? You'll come to our\nschool-scrimmage on Thursday, little girl--what's-your-name? Mind you\nsend her, or bring her, Gibson; and just give a word to your groom,\nfor I'm sure that pony wasn't singed last year, now, was he? Don't\nforget Thursday, little girl--what's-your-name?--it's a promise\nbetween us, is it not?\" And off the earl trotted, attracted by the\nsight of the farmer's eldest son on the other side of the yard.\n\nMr. Gibson mounted, and he and Molly rode off. They did not speak\nfor some time. Then she said, \"May I go, papa?\" in rather an anxious\nlittle tone of voice.\n\n\"Where, my dear?\" said he, wakening up out of his own professional\nthoughts.\n\n\"To the Towers--on Thursday, you know. That gentleman\" (she was shy\nof calling him by his title), \"asked me.\"\n\n\"Would you like it, my dear? It has always seemed to me rather a\ntiresome piece of gaiety--rather a tiring day, I mean--beginning so\nearly--and the heat, and all that.\"\n\n\"Oh, papa!\" said Molly, reproachfully.\n\n\"You'd like to go then, would you?\"\n\n\"Yes; if I may!--He asked me, you know. Don't you think I may?--he\nasked me twice over.\"\n\n\"Well! we'll see--yes! I think we can manage it, if you wish it so\nmuch, Molly.\"\n\nThen they were silent again. By-and-by, Molly said,--\n\n\"Please, papa--I do wish to go,--but I don't care about it.\"\n\n\"That's rather a puzzling speech. But I suppose you mean you don't\ncare to go, if it will be any trouble to get you there. I can easily\nmanage it, however, so you may consider it settled. You'll want a\nwhite frock, remember; you'd better tell Betty you're going, and\nshe'll see after making you tidy.\"\n\nNow, there were two or three things to be done by Mr. Gibson, before\nhe could feel quite comfortable about Molly's going to the festival\nat the Towers, and each of them involved a little trouble on his\npart. But he was very willing to gratify his little girl; so the\nnext day he rode over to the Towers, ostensibly to visit some sick\nhousemaid, but, in reality, to throw himself in my lady's way, and\nget her to ratify Lord Cumnor's invitation to Molly. He chose his\ntime, with a little natural diplomacy; which, indeed, he had often\nto exercise in his intercourse with the great family. He rode into\nthe stable-yard about twelve o'clock, a little before luncheon-time,\nand yet after the worry of opening the post-bag and discussing its\ncontents was over. After he had put up his horse, he went in by the\nback-way to the house; the \"House\" on this side, the \"Towers\" at the\nfront. He saw his patient, gave his directions to the housekeeper,\nand then went out, with a rare wild-flower in his hand, to find one\nof the ladies Tranmere in the garden, where, according to his hope\nand calculation, he came upon Lady Cumnor too,--now talking to her\ndaughter about the contents of an open letter which she held in her\nhand, now directing a gardener about certain bedding-out plants.\n\n\"I was calling to see Nanny, and I took the opportunity of bringing\nLady Agnes the plant I was telling her about as growing on Cumnor\nMoss.\"\n\n\"Thank you, so much, Mr. Gibson. Mamma, look! this is the _Drosera\nrotundifolia_ I have been wanting so long.\"\n\n\"Ah! yes; very pretty I daresay, only I am no botanist. Nanny is\nbetter, I hope? We can't have any one laid up next week, for the\nhouse will be quite full of people,--and here are the Danbys waiting\nto offer themselves as well. One comes down for a fortnight of quiet,\nat Whitsuntide, and leaves half one's establishment in town, and as\nsoon as people know of our being here, we get letters without end,\nlonging for a breath of country air, or saying how lovely the Towers\nmust look in spring; and I must own, Lord Cumnor is a great deal to\nblame for it all, for as soon as ever we are down here, he rides\nabout to all the neighbours, and invites them to come over and spend\na few days.\"\n\n\"We shall go back to town on Friday the 18th,\" said Lady Agnes, in a\nconsolatory tone.\n\n\"Ah, yes! as soon as we have got over the school visitors' affair.\nBut it is a week to that happy day.\"\n\n\"By the way!\" said Mr. Gibson, availing himself of the good opening\nthus presented, \"I met my lord at the Cross-trees Farm yesterday, and\nhe was kind enough to ask my little daughter, who was with me, to be\none of the party here on Thursday; it would give the lassie great\npleasure, I believe.\" He paused for Lady Cumnor to speak.\n\n\"Oh, well! if my lord asked her, I suppose she must come, but I wish\nhe was not so amazingly hospitable! Not but what the little girl will\nbe quite welcome; only, you see, he met a younger Miss Browning the\nother day, of whose existence I had never heard.\"\n\n\"She visits at the school, mamma,\" said Lady Agnes.\n\n\"Well, perhaps she does; I never said she did not. I knew there was\none visitor of the name of Browning; I never knew there were two,\nbut, of course, as soon as Lord Cumnor heard there was another, he\nmust needs ask her; so the carriage will have to go backwards and\nforwards four times now to fetch them all. So your daughter can come\nquite easily, Mr. Gibson, and I shall be very glad to see her for\nyour sake. She can sit bodkin with the Brownings, I suppose? You'll\narrange it all with them; and mind you get Nanny well up to her work\nnext week.\"\n\nJust as Mr. Gibson was going away, Lady Cumnor called after him, \"Oh!\nby-the-by, Clare is here; you remember Clare, don't you? She was a\npatient of yours, long ago.\"\n\n\"Clare,\" he repeated, in a bewildered tone.\n\n\"Don't you recollect her? Miss Clare, our old governess,\" said Lady\nAgnes. \"About twelve or fourteen years ago, before Lady Cuxhaven was\nmarried.\"\n\n\"Oh, yes!\" said he. \"Miss Clare, who had the scarlet fever here; a\nvery pretty delicate girl. But I thought she was married!\"\n\n\"Yes!\" said Lady Cumnor. \"She was a silly little thing, and did\nnot know when she was well off; we were all very fond of her, I'm\nsure. She went and married a poor curate, and became a stupid Mrs.\nKirkpatrick; but we always kept on calling her 'Clare.' And now\nhe's dead, and left her a widow, and she is staying here; and we\nare racking our brains to find out some way of helping her to a\nlivelihood without parting her from her child. She's somewhere about\nthe grounds, if you like to renew your acquaintance with her.\"\n\n\"Thank you, my lady. I'm afraid I cannot stop to-day. I have a long\nround to go; I've stayed here too long as it is, I'm afraid.\"\n\nLong as his ride had been that day, he called on the Miss Brownings\nin the evening, to arrange about Molly's accompanying them to the\nTowers. They were tall handsome women, past their first youth, and\ninclined to be extremely complaisant to the widowed doctor.\n\n\"Eh dear! Mr. Gibson, but we shall be delighted to have her with us.\nYou should never have thought of asking us such a thing,\" said Miss\nBrowning the elder.\n\n\"I'm sure I'm hardly sleeping at nights for thinking of it,\" said\nMiss Phoebe. \"You know I've never been there before. Sister has\nmany a time; but somehow, though my name has been down on the\nvisitors' list these three years, the countess has never named me in\nher note; and you know I could not push myself into notice, and go to\nsuch a grand place without being asked; how could I?\"\n\n\"I told Phoebe last year,\" said her sister, \"that I was sure it was\nonly inadvertence, as one may call it, on the part of the countess,\nand that her ladyship would be as hurt as any one when she didn't\nsee Phoebe among the school visitors; but Phoebe has got a delicate\nmind, you see, Mr. Gibson, and all I could say she wouldn't go, but\nstopped here at home; and it spoilt all my pleasure all that day,\nI do assure you, to think of Phoebe's face, as I saw it over the\nwindow-blinds, as I rode away; her eyes were full of tears, if you'll\nbelieve me.\"\n\n\"I had a good cry after you was gone, Dorothy,\" said Miss Phoebe;\n\"but for all that, I think I was right in stopping away from where\nI was not asked. Don't you, Mr. Gibson?\"\n\n\"Certainly,\" said he. \"And you see you are going this year; and last\nyear it rained.\"\n\n\"Yes! I remember! I set myself to tidy my drawers, to string myself\nup, as it were; and I was so taken up with what I was about that\nI was quite startled when I heard the rain beating against the\nwindow-panes. 'Goodness me!' said I to myself, 'whatever will become\nof sister's white satin shoes, if she has to walk about on soppy\ngrass after such rain as this?' for, you see, I thought a deal about\nher having a pair of smart shoes; and this year she has gone and got\nme a white satin pair just as smart as hers, for a surprise.\"\n\n\"Molly will know she's to put on her best clothes,\" said Miss\nBrowning. \"We could perhaps lend her a few beads, or artificials, if\nshe wants them.\"\n\n\"Molly must go in a clean white frock,\" said Mr. Gibson, rather\nhastily; for he did not admire the Miss Brownings' taste in dress,\nand was unwilling to have his child decked up according to their\nfancy; he esteemed his old servant Betty's as the more correct,\nbecause the more simple. Miss Browning had just a shade of annoyance\nin her tone as she drew herself up, and said, \"Oh! very well. It's\nquite right, I'm sure.\" But Miss Phoebe said, \"Molly will look very\nnice in whatever she puts on, that's certain.\"\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER II.\n\nA NOVICE AMONGST THE GREAT FOLK.\n\n\nAt ten o'clock on the eventful Thursday the Towers' carriage began\nits work. Molly was ready long before it made its first appearance,\nalthough it had been settled that she and the Miss Brownings were not\nto go until the last, or fourth, time of its coming. Her face had\nbeen soaped, scrubbed, and shone brilliantly clean; her frills, her\nfrock, her ribbons were all snow-white. She had on a black mode cloak\nthat had been her mother's; it was trimmed round with rich lace, and\nlooked quaint and old-fashioned on the child. For the first time in\nher life she wore kid gloves; hitherto she had only had cotton ones.\nHer gloves were far too large for the little dimpled fingers, but as\nBetty had told her they were to last her for years, it was all very\nwell. She trembled many a time, and almost turned faint once with the\nlong expectation of the morning. Betty might say what she liked about\na watched pot never boiling; Molly never ceased to watch the approach\nthrough the winding street, and after two hours the carriage came\nfor her at last. She had to sit very forward to avoid crushing the\nMiss Brownings' new dresses; and yet not too forward, for fear of\nincommoding fat Mrs. Goodenough and her niece, who occupied the\nfront seat of the carriage; so that altogether the fact of sitting\ndown at all was rather doubtful, and to add to her discomfort, Molly\nfelt herself to be very conspicuously placed in the centre of the\ncarriage, a mark for all the observation of Hollingford. It was far\ntoo much of a gala day for the work of the little town to go forward\nwith its usual regularity. Maid-servants gazed out of upper windows;\nshopkeepers' wives stood on the door-steps; cottagers ran out, with\nbabies in their arms; and little children, too young to know how\nto behave respectfully at the sight of an earl's carriage, huzzaed\nmerrily as it bowled along. The woman at the lodge held the gate\nopen, and dropped a low curtsey to the liveries. And now they were\nin the Park; and now they were in sight of the Towers, and silence\nfell upon the carriage-full of ladies, only broken by one faint\nremark from Mrs. Goodenough's niece, a stranger to the town, as they\ndrew up before the double semicircle flight of steps which led to the\ndoor of the mansion.\n\n\"They call that a perron, I believe, don't they?\" she asked. But\nthe only answer she obtained was a simultaneous \"hush.\" It was very\nawful, as Molly thought, and she half wished herself at home again.\nBut she lost all consciousness of herself by-and-by when the party\nstrolled out into the beautiful grounds, the like of which she\nhad never even imagined. Green velvet lawns, bathed in sunshine,\nstretched away on every side into the finely wooded park; if there\nwere divisions and ha-has between the soft sunny sweeps of grass, and\nthe dark gloom of the forest-trees beyond, Molly did not see them;\nand the melting away of exquisite cultivation into the wilderness\nhad an inexplicable charm to her. Near the house there were walls\nand fences; but they were covered with climbing roses, and rare\nhoneysuckles and other creepers just bursting into bloom. There were\nflower-beds, too, scarlet, crimson, blue, orange; masses of blossom\nlying on the greensward. Molly held Miss Browning's hand very tight\nas they loitered about in company with several other ladies, and\nmarshalled by a daughter of the Towers, who seemed half amused at the\nvoluble admiration showered down upon every possible thing and place.\nMolly said nothing, as became her age and position, but every now and\nthen she relieved her full heart by drawing a deep breath, almost\nlike a sigh. Presently they came to the long glittering range of\ngreenhouses and hothouses, and an attendant gardener was there to\nadmit the party. Molly did not care for this half so much as for\nthe flowers in the open air; but Lady Agnes had a more scientific\ntaste, she expatiated on the rarity of this plant, and the mode of\ncultivation required by that, till Molly began to feel very tired,\nand then very faint. She was too shy to speak for some time; but at\nlength, afraid of making a greater sensation if she began to cry, or\nif she fell against the stands of precious flowers, she caught at\nMiss Browning's hand, and gasped out--\n\n\"May I go back, out into the garden? I can't breathe here!\"\n\n\"Oh, yes, to be sure, love. I daresay it's hard understanding for\nyou, love; but it's very fine and instructive, and a deal of Latin in\nit too.\"\n\nShe turned hastily round not to lose another word of Lady Agnes'\nlecture on orchids, and Molly turned back and passed out of the\nheated atmosphere. She felt better in the fresh air; and unobserved,\nand at liberty, went from one lovely spot to another, now in the open\npark, now in some shut-in flower-garden, where the song of the birds,\nand the drip of the central fountain, were the only sounds, and the\ntree-tops made an enclosing circle in the blue June sky; she went\nalong without more thought as to her whereabouts than a butterfly\nhas, as it skims from flower to flower, till at length she grew\nvery weary, and wished to return to the house, but did not know\nhow, and felt afraid of encountering all the strangers who would be\nthere, unprotected by either of the Miss Brownings. The hot sun told\nupon her head, and it began to ache. She saw a great wide-spreading\ncedar-tree upon a burst of lawn towards which she was advancing, and\nthe black repose beneath its branches lured her thither. There was\na rustic seat in the shadow, and weary Molly sate down there, and\npresently fell asleep.\n\nShe was startled from her slumbers after a time, and jumped to her\nfeet. Two ladies were standing by her, talking about her. They were\nperfect strangers to her, and with a vague conviction that she had\ndone something wrong, and also because she was worn-out with hunger,\nfatigue, and the morning's excitement, she began to cry.\n\n\"Poor little woman! She has lost herself; she belongs to some of the\npeople from Hollingford, I have no doubt,\" said the oldest-looking of\nthe two ladies; she who appeared to be about forty, though she did\nnot really number more than thirty years. She was plain-featured, and\nhad rather a severe expression on her face; her dress was as rich as\nany morning dress could be; her voice deep and unmodulated,--what in\na lower rank of life would have been called gruff; but that was not a\nword to apply to Lady Cuxhaven, the eldest daughter of the earl and\ncountess. The other lady looked much younger, but she was in fact\nsome years the elder; at first sight Molly thought she was the most\nbeautiful person she had ever seen, and she was certainly a very\nlovely woman. Her voice, too, was soft and plaintive, as she replied\nto Lady Cuxhaven,--\n\n\"Poor little darling! she is overcome by the heat, I have no\ndoubt--such a heavy straw bonnet, too. Let me untie it for you, my\ndear.\"\n\nMolly now found voice to say--\"I am Molly Gibson, please. I came here\nwith Miss Brownings;\" for her great fear was that she should be taken\nfor an unauthorized intruder.\n\n\"Miss Brownings?\" said Lady Cuxhaven to her companion, as if\ninquiringly.\n\n\"I think they were the two tall large young women that Lady Agnes was\ntalking about.\"\n\n\"Oh, I daresay. I saw she had a number of people in tow;\" then\nlooking again at Molly, she said, \"Have you had anything to eat,\nchild, since you came? You look a very white little thing; or is it\nthe heat?\"\n\n\"I have had nothing to eat,\" said Molly, rather piteously; for,\nindeed, before she fell asleep she had been very hungry.\n\nThe two ladies spoke to each other in a low voice; then the elder\nsaid in a voice of authority, which, indeed, she had always used in\nspeaking to the other, \"Sit still here, my dear; we are going to the\nhouse, and Clare shall bring you something to eat before you try to\nwalk back; it must be a quarter of a mile at least.\" So they went\naway, and Molly sat upright, waiting for the promised messenger. She\ndid not know who Clare might be, and she did not care much for food\nnow; but she felt as if she could not walk without some help. At\nlength she saw the pretty lady coming back, followed by a footman\nwith a small tray.\n\n\"Look how kind Lady Cuxhaven is,\" said she who was called Clare. \"She\nchose you out this little lunch herself; and now you must try and eat\nit, and you'll be quite right when you've had some food, darling--You\nneed not stop, Edwards; I will bring the tray back with me.\"\n\nThere was some bread, and some cold chicken, and some jelly, and\na glass of wine, and a bottle of sparkling water, and a bunch of\ngrapes. Molly put out her trembling little hand for the water; but\nshe was too faint to hold it. Clare put it to her mouth, and she took\na long draught and was refreshed. But she could not eat; she tried,\nbut she could not; her headache was too bad. Clare looked bewildered.\n\"Take some grapes, they will be the best for you; you must try and\neat something, or I don't know how I shall get you to the house.\"\n\n\"My head aches so,\" said Molly, lifting her heavy eyes wistfully.\n\n\"Oh, dear, how tiresome!\" said Clare, still in her sweet gentle\nvoice, not at all as if she was angry, only expressing an obvious\ntruth. Molly felt very guilty and very unhappy. Clare went on, with a\nshade of asperity in her tone: \"You see, I don't know what to do with\nyou here if you don't eat enough to enable you to walk home. And I've\nbeen out for these three hours trapesing about the grounds till I'm\nas tired as can be, and missed my lunch and all.\" Then, as if a new\nidea had struck her, she said,--\"You lie back in that seat for a few\nminutes, and try to eat the bunch of grapes, and I'll wait for you,\nand just be eating a mouthful meanwhile. You are sure you don't want\nthis chicken?\"\n\nMolly did as she was bid, and leant back, picking languidly at the\ngrapes, and watching the good appetite with which the lady ate up the\nchicken and jelly, and drank the glass of wine. She was so pretty and\nso graceful in her deep mourning, that even her hurry in eating, as\nif she was afraid of some one coming to surprise her in the act, did\nnot keep her little observer from admiring her in all she did.\n\n\"And now, darling, are you ready to go?\" said she, when she had eaten\nup everything on the tray. \"Oh, come; you have nearly finished your\ngrapes; that's a good girl. Now, if you will come with me to the\nside entrance, I will take you up to my own room, and you shall lie\ndown on the bed for an hour or two; and if you have a good nap your\nheadache will be quite gone.\"\n\nSo they set off, Clare carrying the empty tray, rather to Molly's\nshame; but the child had enough work to drag herself along, and was\nafraid of offering to do anything more. The \"side entrance\" was\na flight of steps leading up from a private flower-garden into a\nprivate matted hall, or ante-room, out of which many doors opened,\nand in which were deposited the light garden-tools and the bows and\narrows of the young ladies of the house. Lady Cuxhaven must have seen\ntheir approach, for she met them in this hall as soon as they came\nin.\n\n\"How is she now?\" she asked; then glancing at the plates and glasses,\nshe added, \"Come, I think there can't be much amiss! You're a good\nold Clare, but you should have let one of the men fetch that tray in;\nlife in such weather as this is trouble enough of itself.\"\n\nMolly could not help wishing that her pretty companion would have\ntold Lady Cuxhaven that she herself had helped to finish up the\nample luncheon; but no such idea seemed to come into her mind. She\nonly said,--\"Poor dear! she is not quite the thing yet; has got a\nheadache, she says. I am going to put her down on my bed, to see if\nshe can get a little sleep.\"\n\nMolly saw Lady Cuxhaven say something in a half-laughing manner\nto \"Clare,\" as she passed her; and the child could not keep from\ntormenting herself by fancying that the words spoken sounded\nwonderfully like \"Over-eaten herself, I suspect.\" However, she felt\ntoo poorly to worry herself long; the little white bed in the cool\nand pretty room had too many attractions for her aching head. The\nmuslin curtains flapped softly from time to time in the scented air\nthat came through the open windows. Clare covered her up with a light\nshawl, and darkened the room. As she was going away Molly roused\nherself to say, \"Please, ma'am, don't let them go away without me.\nPlease ask somebody to waken me if I go to sleep. I am to go back\nwith Miss Brownings.\"\n\n\"Don't trouble yourself about it, dear; I'll take care,\" said Clare,\nturning round at the door, and kissing her hand to little anxious\nMolly. And then she went away, and thought no more about it.\nThe carriages came round at half-past four, hurried a little by\nLady Cumnor, who had suddenly become tired of the business of\nentertaining, and annoyed at the repetition of indiscriminating\nadmiration.\n\n\"Why not have both carriages out, mamma, and get rid of them all at\nonce?\" said Lady Cuxhaven. \"This going by instalments is the most\ntiresome thing that could be imagined.\" So at last there had been a\ngreat hurry and an unmethodical way of packing off every one at once.\nMiss Browning had gone in the chariot (or \"chawyot,\" as Lady Cumnor\ncalled it;--it rhymed to her daughter, Lady Hawyot--or Harriet,\nas the name was spelt in the _Peerage_), and Miss Phoebe had been\nspeeded along with several other guests, away in a great roomy family\nconveyance, of the kind which we should now call an \"omnibus.\" Each\nthought that Molly Gibson was with the other, and the truth was, that\nshe lay fast asleep on Mrs. Kirkpatrick's bed--Mrs. Kirkpatrick _née_\nClare.\n\nThe housemaids came in to arrange the room. Their talking aroused\nMolly, who sat up on the bed, and tried to push back the hair from\nher hot forehead, and to remember where she was. She dropped down on\nher feet by the side of the bed, to the astonishment of the women,\nand said,--\"Please, how soon are we going away?\"\n\n\"Bless us and save us! who'd ha' thought of any one being in the bed?\nAre you one of the Hollingford ladies, my dear? They are all gone\nthis hour or more!\"\n\n\"Oh, dear, what shall I do? That lady they call Clare promised to\nwaken me in time. Papa will so wonder where I am, and I don't know\nwhat Betty will say.\"\n\nThe child began to cry, and the housemaids looked at each other\nin some dismay and much sympathy. Just then, they heard Mrs.\nKirkpatrick's step along the passages, approaching. She was singing\nsome little Italian air in a low musical voice, coming to her bedroom\nto dress for dinner. One housemaid said to the other, with a knowing\nlook, \"Best leave it to her;\" and they passed on to their work in the\nother rooms.\n\nMrs. Kirkpatrick opened the door, and stood aghast at the sight of\nMolly.\n\n\"Why, I quite forgot you!\" she said at length. \"Nay, don't cry;\nyou'll make yourself not fit to be seen. Of course I must take the\nconsequences of your over-sleeping yourself, and if I can't manage to\nget you back to Hollingford to-night, you shall sleep with me, and\nwe'll do our best to send you home to-morrow morning.\"\n\n\"But papa!\" sobbed out Molly. \"He always wants me to make tea for\nhim; and I have no night-things.\"\n\n\"Well, don't go and make a piece of work about what can't be helped\nnow. I'll lend you night-things, and your papa must do without your\nmaking tea for him to-night. And another time don't over-sleep\nyourself in a strange house; you may not always find yourself among\nsuch hospitable people as they are here. Why now, if you don't cry\nand make a figure of yourself, I'll ask if you may come in to dessert\nwith Master Smythe and the little ladies. You shall go into the\nnursery, and have some tea with them; and then you must come back\nhere and brush your hair and make yourself tidy. I think it is a very\nfine thing for you to be stopping in such a grand house as this; many\na little girl would like nothing better.\"\n\nDuring this speech she was arranging her toilette for dinner--taking\noff her black morning gown; putting on her dressing-gown; shaking her\nlong soft auburn hair over her shoulders, and glancing about the room\nin search of various articles of her dress,--a running flow of easy\ntalk came babbling out all the time.\n\n\"I have a little girl of my own, dear! I don't know what she would\nnot give to be staying here at Lord Cumnor's with me; but, instead\nof that, she has to spend her holidays at school; and yet you are\nlooking as miserable as can be at the thought of stopping for\njust one night. I really have been as busy as can be with those\ntiresome--those good ladies, I mean, from Hollingford--and one can't\nthink of everything at a time.\"\n\nMolly--only child as she was--had stopped her tears at the mention\nof that little girl of Mrs. Kirkpatrick's, and now she ventured to\nsay,--\n\n\"Are you married, ma'am; I thought she called you Clare?\"\n\nIn high good-humour Mrs. Kirkpatrick made reply:--\"I don't look as\nif I was married, do I? Every one is surprised. And yet I have been\na widow for seven months now: and not a grey hair on my head, though\nLady Cuxhaven, who is younger than I, has ever so many.\"\n\n\"Why do they call you 'Clare?'\" continued Molly, finding her so\naffable and communicative.\n\n\"Because I lived with them when I was Miss Clare. It is a pretty\nname, isn't it? I married a Mr. Kirkpatrick; he was only a curate,\npoor fellow; but he was of a very good family, and if three of his\nrelations had died without children I should have been a baronet's\nwife. But Providence did not see fit to permit it; and we must always\nresign ourselves to what is decreed. Two of his cousins married, and\nhad large families; and poor dear Kirkpatrick died, leaving me a\nwidow.\"\n\n\"You have a little girl?\" asked Molly.\n\n\"Yes: darling Cynthia! I wish you could see her; she is my only\ncomfort now. If I have time I will show you her picture when we come\nup to bed; but I must go now. It does not do to keep Lady Cumnor\nwaiting a moment, and she asked me to be down early, to help with\nsome of the people in the house. Now I shall ring this bell, and when\nthe housemaid comes, ask her to take you into the nursery, and to\ntell Lady Cuxhaven's nurse who you are. And then you'll have tea with\nthe little ladies, and come in with them to dessert. There! I'm sorry\nyou've over-slept yourself, and are left here; but give me a kiss,\nand don't cry--you really are rather a pretty child, though you've\nnot got Cynthia's colouring! Oh, Nanny, would you be so very kind as\nto take this young lady--(what's your name, my dear? Gibson?),--Miss\nGibson, to Mrs. Dyson, in the nursery, and ask her to allow her to\ndrink tea with the young ladies there; and to send her in with them\nto dessert. I'll explain it all to my lady.\"\n\nNanny's face brightened out of its gloom when she heard the name\nGibson; and, having ascertained from Molly that she was \"the\ndoctor's\" child, she showed more willingness to comply with Mrs.\nKirkpatrick's request than was usual with her.\n\nMolly was an obliging girl, and fond of children; so, as long as she\nwas in the nursery, she got on pretty well, being obedient to the\nwishes of the supreme power, and even very useful to Mrs. Dyson, by\nplaying at tricks, and thus keeping a little one quiet while its\nbrothers and sisters were being arrayed in gay attire,--lace and\nmuslin, and velvet, and brilliant broad ribbons.\n\n\"Now, miss,\" said Mrs. Dyson, when her own especial charge were all\nready, \"what can I do for you? You have not got another frock here,\nhave you?\" No, indeed, she had not; nor if she had had one, could it\nhave been of a smarter nature than her present thick white dimity.\nSo she could only wash her face and hands, and submit to the nurse's\nbrushing and perfuming her hair. She thought she would rather have\nstayed in the park all night long, and slept under the beautiful\nquiet cedar, than have to undergo the unknown ordeal of \"going\ndown to dessert,\" which was evidently regarded both by children and\nnurses as the event of the day. At length there was a summons from\na footman, and Mrs. Dyson, in a rustling silk gown, marshalled her\nconvoy, and set sail for the dining-room door.\n\nThere was a large party of gentlemen and ladies sitting round the\ndecked table, in the brilliantly lighted room. Each dainty little\nchild ran up to its mother, or aunt, or particular friend; but Molly\nhad no one to go to.\n\n\"Who is that tall girl in the thick white frock? Not one of the\nchildren of the house, I think?\"\n\nThe lady addressed put up her glass, gazed at Molly, and dropped it\nin an instant. \"A French girl, I should imagine. I know Lady Cuxhaven\nwas inquiring for one to bring up with her little girls, that they\nmight get a good accent early. Poor little woman, she looks wild\nand strange!\" And the speaker, who sate next to Lord Cumnor, made a\nlittle sign to Molly to come to her; Molly crept up to her as to the\nfirst shelter; but when the lady began talking to her in French, she\nblushed violently, and said in a very low voice,--\n\n\"I don't understand French. I'm only Molly Gibson, ma'am.\"\n\n\"Molly Gibson!\" said the lady, out loud; as if that was not much of\nan explanation.\n\nLord Cumnor caught the words and the tone.\n\n\"Oh, ho!\" said he. \"Are you the little girl who has been sleeping in\nmy bed?\"\n\nHe imitated the deep voice of the fabulous bear, who asks this\nquestion of the little child in the story; but Molly had never read\nthe \"Three Bears,\" and fancied that his anger was real; she trembled\na little, and drew nearer to the kind lady who had beckoned her as\nto a refuge. Lord Cumnor was very fond of getting hold of what he\nfancied was a joke, and working his idea threadbare; so all the time\nthe ladies were in the room he kept on his running fire at Molly,\nalluding to the Sleeping Beauty, the Seven Sleepers, and any other\nfamous sleeper that came into his head. He had no idea of the misery\nhis jokes were to the sensitive girl, who already thought herself\na miserable sinner, for having slept on, when she ought to have\nbeen awake. If Molly had been in the habit of putting two and two\ntogether, she might have found an excuse for herself, by remembering\nthat Mrs. Kirkpatrick had promised faithfully to awaken her in time;\nbut all the girl thought of was, how little they wanted her in this\ngrand house; how she must seem like a careless intruder who had no\nbusiness there. Once or twice she wondered where her father was, and\nwhether he was missing her; but the thought of the familiar happiness\nof home brought such a choking in her throat, that she felt she must\nnot give way to it, for fear of bursting out crying; and she had\ninstinct enough to feel that, as she was left at the Towers, the less\ntrouble she gave, the more she kept herself out of observation, the\nbetter.\n\nShe followed the ladies out of the dining-room, almost hoping that\nno one would see her. But that was impossible, and she immediately\nbecame the subject of conversation between the awful Lady Cumnor and\nher kind neighbour at dinner.\n\n\"Do you know, I thought this young lady was French when I first saw\nher? she has got the black hair and eyelashes, and grey eyes, and\ncolourless complexion which one meets with in some parts of France,\nand I know Lady Cuxhaven was trying to find a well-educated girl who\nwould be a pleasant companion to her children.\"\n\n\"No!\" said Lady Cumnor, looking very stern, as Molly thought. \"She\nis the daughter of our medical man at Hollingford; she came with\nthe school visitors this morning, and she was overcome by the heat\nand fell asleep in Clare's room, and somehow managed to over-sleep\nherself, and did not waken up till all the carriages were gone. We\nwill send her home to-morrow morning, but for to-night she must stay\nhere, and Clare is kind enough to say she may sleep with her.\"\n\nThere was an implied blame running through this speech, that Molly\nfelt like needle-points all over her. Lady Cuxhaven came up at this\nmoment. Her tone was as deep, her manner of speaking as abrupt and\nauthoritative, as her mother's, but Molly felt the kinder nature\nunderneath.\n\n\"How are you now, my dear? You look better than you did under the\ncedar-tree. So you're to stop here to-night? Clare, don't you think\nwe could find some of those books of engravings that would interest\nMiss Gibson.\"\n\nMrs. Kirkpatrick came gliding up to the place where Molly stood; and\nbegan petting her with pretty words and actions, while Lady Cuxhaven\nturned over heavy volumes in search of one that might interest the\ngirl.\n\n\"Poor darling! I saw you come into the dining-room, looking so shy;\nand I wanted you to come near me, but I could not make a sign to you,\nbecause Lord Cuxhaven was speaking to me at the time, telling me\nabout his travels. Ah, here is a nice book--_Lodge's Portraits_; now\nI'll sit by you and tell you who they all are, and all about them.\nDon't trouble yourself any more, dear Lady Cuxhaven; I'll take charge\nof her; pray leave her to me!\"\n\nMolly grew hotter and hotter as these last words met her ear. If\nthey would only leave her alone, and not labour at being kind to\nher; would \"not trouble themselves\" about her! These words of Mrs.\nKirkpatrick's seemed to quench the gratitude she was feeling to Lady\nCuxhaven for looking for something to amuse her. But, of course, it\nwas a trouble, and she ought never to have been there.\n\nBy-and-by, Mrs. Kirkpatrick was called away to accompany Lady Agnes'\nsong; and then Molly really had a few minutes' enjoyment. She could\nlook round the room, unobserved, and, sure, never was any place out\nof a king's house so grand and magnificent. Large mirrors, velvet\ncurtains, pictures in their gilded frames, a multitude of dazzling\nlights decorated the vast saloon, and the floor was studded with\ngroups of ladies and gentlemen, all dressed in gorgeous attire.\nSuddenly Molly bethought her of the children whom she had accompanied\ninto the dining-room, and to whose ranks she had appeared to\nbelong,--where were they? Gone to bed an hour before, at some quiet\nsignal from their mother. Molly wondered if she might go, too--if\nshe could ever find her way back to the haven of Mrs. Kirkpatrick's\nbedroom. But she was at some distance from the door; a long way from\nMrs. Kirkpatrick, to whom she felt herself to belong more than to any\none else. Far, too, from Lady Cuxhaven, and the terrible Lady Cumnor,\nand her jocose and good-natured lord. So Molly sate on, turning over\npictures which she did not see; her heart growing heavier and heavier\nin the desolation of all this grandeur. Presently a footman entered\nthe room, and after a moment's looking about him, he went up to Mrs.\nKirkpatrick, where she sate at the piano, the centre of the musical\nportion of the company, ready to accompany any singer, and smiling\npleasantly as she willingly acceded to all requests. She came now\ntowards Molly, in her corner, and said to her,--\n\n\"Do you know, darling, your papa has come for you, and brought your\npony for you to ride home; so I shall lose my little bedfellow, for\nI suppose you must go?\"\n\nGo! was there a question of it in Molly's mind, as she stood up\nquivering, sparkling, almost crying out loud. She was brought to her\nsenses, though, by Mrs. Kirkpatrick's next words.\n\n\"You must go and wish Lady Cumnor good-night, you know, my dear, and\nthank her ladyship for her kindness to you. She is there, near that\nstatue, talking to Mr. Courtenay.\"\n\nYes! she was there--forty feet away--a hundred miles away! All that\nblank space had to be crossed; and then a speech to be made!\n\n\"Must I go?\" asked Molly, in the most pitiful and pleading voice\npossible.\n\n\"Yes; make haste about it; there is nothing so formidable in it, is\nthere?\" replied Mrs. Kirkpatrick, in a sharper voice than before,\naware that they were wanting her at the piano, and anxious to get the\nbusiness in hand done as soon as possible.\n\nMolly stood still for a minute, then, looking up, she said, softly,--\n\n\"Would you mind coming with me, please?\"\n\n\"No! not I!\" said Mrs. Kirkpatrick, seeing that her compliance was\nlikely to be the most speedy way of getting through the affair; so\nshe took Molly's hand, and, on the way, in passing the group at the\npiano, she said, smiling, in her pretty genteel manner,--\n\n\"Our little friend here is shy and modest, and wants me to accompany\nher to Lady Cumnor to wish good-night; her father has come for her,\nand she is going away.\"\n\nMolly did not know how it was afterwards, but she pulled her hand out\nof Mrs. Kirkpatrick's on hearing these words, and going a step or\ntwo in advance came up to Lady Cumnor, grand in purple velvet, and\ndropping a curtsey, almost after the fashion of the school-children,\nshe said,--\n\n\"My lady, papa is come, and I am going away; and, my lady, I wish\nyou good-night, and thank you for your kindness. Your ladyship's\nkindness, I mean,\" she said, correcting herself as she remembered\nMiss Browning's particular instructions as to the etiquette to be\nobserved to earls and countesses, and their honourable progeny, as\nthey were given that morning on the road to the Towers.\n\nShe got out of the saloon somehow; she believed afterwards, on\nthinking about it, that she had never bidden good-by to Lady\nCuxhaven, or Mrs. Kirkpatrick, or \"all the rest of them,\" as she\nirreverently styled them in her thoughts.\n\nMr. Gibson was in the housekeeper's room, when Molly ran in, rather\nto the stately Mrs. Brown's discomfiture. She threw her arms round\nher father's neck. \"Oh, papa, papa, papa! I am so glad you have\ncome;\" and then she burst out crying, stroking his face almost\nhysterically as if to make sure he was there.\n\n\"Why, what a noodle you are, Molly! Did you think I was going to give\nup my little girl to live at the Towers all the rest of her life? You\nmake as much work about my coming for you, as if you thought I had.\nMake haste, now, and get on your bonnet. Mrs. Brown, may I ask you\nfor a shawl, or a plaid, or a wrap of some kind to pin about her for\na petticoat?\"\n\nHe did not mention that he had come home from a long round not half\nan hour before, a round from which he had returned dinnerless and\nhungry; but, on finding that Molly had not come back from the Towers,\nhe had ridden his tired horse round by Miss Brownings', and found\nthem in self-reproachful, helpless dismay. He would not wait to\nlisten to their tearful apologies; he galloped home, had a fresh\nhorse and Molly's pony saddled, and though Betty called after him\nwith a riding-skirt for the child, when he was not ten yards from his\nown stable-door, he refused to turn back for it, but went off, as\nDick the stableman said, \"muttering to himself awful.\"\n\nMrs. Brown had her bottle of wine out, and her plate of cake, before\nMolly came back from her long expedition to Mrs. Kirkpatrick's room,\n\"pretty nigh on to a quarter of a mile off,\" as the housekeeper\ninformed the impatient father, as he waited for his child to come\ndown arrayed in her morning's finery with the gloss of newness worn\noff. Mr. Gibson was a favourite in all the Towers' household, as\nfamily doctors generally are; bringing hopes of relief at times\nof anxiety and distress; and Mrs. Brown, who was subject to gout,\nespecially delighted in petting him whenever he would allow her. She\neven went out into the stable-yard to pin Molly up in the shawl, as\nshe sate upon the rough-coated pony, and hazarded the somewhat safe\nconjecture,--\n\n\"I daresay she'll be happier at home, Mr. Gibson,\" as they rode away.\n\nOnce out into the park Molly struck her pony, and urged him on as\nhard as he would go. Mr. Gibson called out at last:\n\n\"Molly! we're coming to the rabbit-holes; it's not safe to go at such\na pace. Stop.\" And as she drew rein he rode up alongside of her.\n\n\"We're getting into the shadow of the trees, and it's not safe riding\nfast here.\"\n\n\"Oh! papa, I never was so glad in all my life. I felt like a lighted\ncandle when they're putting the extinguisher on it.\"\n\n\"Did you? How d'ye know what the candle feels?\"\n\n\"Oh, I don't know, but I did.\" And again, after a pause she\nsaid,--\"Oh, I am so glad to be here! It is so pleasant riding here in\nthe open, free, fresh air, crushing out such a good smell from the\ndewy grass. Papa! are you there? I can't see you.\"\n\nHe rode close up alongside of her: he was not sure but what she might\nbe afraid of riding in the dark shadows, so he laid his hand upon\nhers.\n\n\"Oh! I am so glad to feel you,\" squeezing his hand hard. \"Papa, I\nshould like to get a chain like Ponto's, just as long as your longest\nround, and then I could fasten us two to each end of it, and when I\nwanted you I could pull, and if you didn't want to come, you could\npull back again; but I should know you knew I wanted you, and we\ncould never lose each other.\"\n\n\"I'm rather lost in that plan of yours; the details, as you state\nthem, are a little puzzling; but if I make them out rightly, I am to\ngo about the country, like the donkeys on the common, with a clog\nfastened to my hind leg.\"\n\n\"I don't mind your calling me a clog, if only we were fastened\ntogether.\"\n\n\"But I do mind you calling me a donkey,\" he replied.\n\n\"I never did. At least I didn't mean to. But it is such a comfort to\nknow that I may be as rude as I like.\"\n\n\"Is that what you've learnt from the grand company you've been\nkeeping to-day? I expected to find you so polite and ceremonious,\nthat I read a few chapters of _Sir Charles Grandison_, in order to\nbring myself up to concert pitch.\"\n\n\"Oh, I do hope I shall never be a lord or a lady.\"\n\n\"Well, to comfort you, I'll tell you this: I'm sure you'll never be a\nlord; and I think the chances are a thousand to one against your ever\nbeing the other, in the sense in which you mean.\"\n\n\"I should lose myself every time I had to fetch my bonnet, or else\nget tired of long passages and great staircases long before I could\ngo out walking.\"\n\n\"But you'd have your lady's-maid, you know.\"\n\n\"Do you know, papa, I think lady's-maids are worse than ladies. I\nshould not mind being a housekeeper so much.\"\n\n\"No! the jam-cupboards and dessert would lie very conveniently to\none's hand,\" replied her father, meditatively. \"But Mrs. Brown tells\nme that the thought of the dinners often keeps her from sleeping;\nthere's that anxiety to be taken into consideration. Still, in every\ncondition of life, there are heavy cares and responsibilities.\"\n\n\"Well! I suppose so,\" said Molly, gravely. \"I know Betty says I wear\nher life out with the green stains I get in my frocks from sitting in\nthe cherry-tree.\"\n\n\"And Miss Browning said she had fretted herself into a headache with\nthinking how they had left you behind. I'm afraid you'll be as bad as\na bill of fare to them to-night. How did it all happen, goosey?\"\n\n\"Oh, I went by myself to see the gardens; they are so beautiful! and\nI lost myself, and sat down to rest under a great tree; and Lady\nCuxhaven and that Mrs. Kirkpatrick came; and Mrs. Kirkpatrick brought\nme some lunch, and then put me to sleep on her bed,--and I thought\nshe would waken me in time, and she didn't; and so they'd all gone\naway; and when they planned for me to stop till to-morrow, I didn't\nlike saying how very, very much I wanted to go home,--but I kept\nthinking how you would wonder where I was.\"\n\n\"Then it was rather a dismal day of pleasure, goosey, eh?\"\n\n\"Not in the morning. I shall never forget the morning in that garden.\nBut I was never so unhappy in all my life, as I have been all this\nlong afternoon.\"\n\nMr. Gibson thought it his duty to ride round by the Towers, and pay\na visit of apology and thanks to the family, before they left for\nLondon. He found them all on the wing, and no one was sufficiently\nat liberty to listen to his grateful civilities but Mrs. Kirkpatrick,\nwho, although she was to accompany Lady Cuxhaven, and pay a visit\nto her former pupil, made leisure enough to receive Mr. Gibson, on\nbehalf of the family; and assured him of her faithful remembrance of\nhis great professional attention to her in former days in the most\nwinning manner.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER III.\n\nMOLLY GIBSON'S CHILDHOOD.\n\n\nSixteen years before this time, all Hollingford had been disturbed\nto its foundations by the intelligence that Mr. Hall, the skilful\ndoctor, who had attended them all their days, was going to take\na partner. It was no use reasoning to them on the subject; so Mr.\nBrowning the vicar, Mr. Sheepshanks (Lord Cumnor's agent), and Mr.\nHall himself, the masculine reasoners of the little society, left\noff the attempt, feeling that the _Che sarà sarà_ would prove more\nsilencing to the murmurs than many arguments. Mr. Hall had told his\nfaithful patients that, even with the strongest spectacles, his\nsight was not to be depended upon; and they might have found out for\nthemselves that his hearing was very defective, although, on this\npoint, he obstinately adhered to his own opinion, and was frequently\nheard to regret the carelessness of people's communication nowadays,\n\"like writing on blotting-paper, all the words running into each\nother,\" he would say. And more than once Mr. Hall had had attacks\nof a suspicious nature,--\"rheumatism\" he used to call them, but he\nprescribed for himself as if they had been gout--which had prevented\nhis immediate attention to imperative summonses. But, blind and deaf,\nand rheumatic as he might be, he was still Mr. Hall the doctor who\ncould heal all their ailments--unless they died meanwhile--and he had\nno right to speak of growing old, and taking a partner.\n\nHe went very steadily to work all the same; advertising in medical\njournals, reading testimonials, sifting character and qualifications;\nand just when the elderly maiden ladies of Hollingford thought that\nthey had convinced their contemporary that he was as young as ever,\nhe startled them by bringing his new partner, Mr. Gibson, to call\nupon them, and began \"slyly,\" as these ladies said, to introduce him\ninto practice. And \"who was this Mr. Gibson?\" they asked, and echo\nmight answer the question, if she liked, for no one else did. No\none ever in all his life knew anything more of his antecedents than\nthe Hollingford people might have found out the first day they saw\nhim: that he was tall, grave, rather handsome than otherwise; thin\nenough to be called \"a very genteel figure,\" in those days, before\nmuscular Christianity had come into vogue; speaking with a slight\nScotch accent; and, as one good lady observed, \"so very trite in\nhis conversation,\" by which she meant sarcastic. As to his birth,\nparentage, and education,--the favourite conjecture of Hollingford\nsociety was, that he was the illegitimate son of a Scotch duke, by\na Frenchwoman; and the grounds for this conjecture were these:--He\nspoke with a Scotch accent; therefore, he must be Scotch. He had\na very genteel appearance, an elegant figure, and was apt--so his\nill-wishers said--to give himself airs; therefore, his father must\nhave been some person of quality; and, that granted, nothing was\neasier than to run this supposition up all the notes of the scale of\nthe peerage,--baronet, baron, viscount, earl, marquis, duke. Higher\nthey dared not go, though one old lady, acquainted with English\nhistory, hazarded the remark, that \"she believed that one or two\nof the Stuarts--hem--had not always been,--ahem--quite correct in\ntheir--conduct; and she fancied such--ahem--things ran in families.\"\nBut, in popular opinion, Mr. Gibson's father always remained a duke;\nnothing more.\n\nThen his mother must have been a Frenchwoman, because his hair was\nso black; and he was so sallow; and because he had been in Paris.\nAll this might be true, or might not; nobody ever knew, or found out\nanything more about him than what Mr. Hall told them, namely, that\nhis professional qualifications were as high as his moral character,\nand that both were far above the average, as Mr. Hall had taken pains\nto ascertain before introducing him to his patients. The popularity\nof this world is as transient as its glory, as Mr. Hall found out\nbefore the first year of his partnership was over. He had plenty of\nleisure left to him now to nurse his gout and cherish his eyesight.\nThe younger doctor had carried the day; nearly every one sent for\nMr. Gibson. Even at the great houses--even at the Towers, that\ngreatest of all, where Mr. Hall had introduced his new partner with\nfear and trembling, with untold anxiety as to his behaviour, and\nthe impression he might make on my lord the Earl, and my lady the\nCountess, Mr. Gibson was received at the end of a twelvemonth with as\nmuch welcome respect for his professional skill as Mr. Hall himself\nhad ever been. Nay--and this was a little too much for even the kind\nold doctor's good temper--Mr. Gibson had even been invited once to\ndinner at the Towers, to dine with the great Sir Astley, the head of\nthe profession! To be sure, Mr. Hall had been asked as well; but he\nwas laid up just then with his gout (since he had had a partner the\nrheumatism had been allowed to develope itself), and he had not been\nable to go. Poor Mr. Hall never quite got over this mortification;\nafter it he allowed himself to become dim of sight and hard of\nhearing, and kept pretty closely to the house during the two winters\nthat remained of his life. He sent for an orphan grand-niece to keep\nhim company in his old age; he, the woman-contemning old bachelor,\nbecame thankful for the cheerful presence of the pretty, bonny Mary\nPearson, who was good and sensible, and nothing more. She formed\na close friendship with the daughters of the vicar, Mr. Browning,\nand Mr. Gibson found time to become very intimate with all three.\nHollingford speculated much on which young lady would become Mrs.\nGibson, and was rather sorry when the talk about possibilities, and\nthe gossip about probabilities, with regard to the handsome young\nsurgeon's marriage, ended in the most natural manner in the world, by\nhis marrying his predecessor's niece. The two Miss Brownings showed\nno signs of going into a consumption on the occasion, although\ntheir looks and manners were carefully watched. On the contrary,\nthey were rather boisterously merry at the wedding, and poor Mrs.\nGibson it was that died of consumption, four or five years after her\nmarriage--three years after the death of her great-uncle, and when\nher only child, Molly, was just three years old.\n\nMr. Gibson did not speak much about the grief at the loss of his\nwife, which it was supposed that he felt. Indeed, he avoided all\ndemonstrations of sympathy, and got up hastily and left the room\nwhen Miss Phoebe Browning first saw him after his loss, and burst\ninto an uncontrollable flood of tears, which threatened to end in\nhysterics. Miss Browning declared she never could forgive him for his\nhard-heartedness on that occasion; but a fortnight afterwards she\ncame to very high words with old Mrs. Goodenough, for gasping out her\ndoubts whether Mr. Gibson was a man of deep feeling; judging by the\nnarrowness of his crape hat-band, which ought to have covered his\nhat, whereas there was at least three inches of beaver to be seen.\nAnd, in spite of it all, Miss Browning and Miss Phoebe considered\nthemselves as Mr. Gibson's most intimate friends, in right of their\nregard for his dead wife, and would fain have taken a quasi-motherly\ninterest in his little girl, had she not been guarded by a watchful\ndragon in the shape of Betty, her nurse, who was jealous of any\ninterference between her and her charge; and especially resentful and\ndisagreeable towards all those ladies who, by suitable age, rank, or\npropinquity, she thought capable of \"casting sheep's eyes at master.\"\n\nSeveral years before the opening of this story, Mr. Gibson's position\nseemed settled for life, both socially and professionally. He was\na widower, and likely to remain so; his domestic affections were\ncentred on little Molly, but even to her, in their most private\nmoments, he did not give way to much expression of his feelings;\nhis most caressing appellation for her was \"Goosey,\" and he took a\npleasure in bewildering her infant mind with his badinage. He had\nrather a contempt for demonstrative people, arising from his medical\ninsight into the consequences to health of uncontrolled feeling. He\ndeceived himself into believing that still his reason was lord of\nall, because he had never fallen into the habit of expression on any\nother than purely intellectual subjects. Molly, however, had her own\nintuitions to guide her. Though her papa laughed at her, quizzed her,\njoked at her, in a way which the Miss Brownings called \"really cruel\"\nto each other when they were quite alone, Molly took her little\ngriefs and pleasures, and poured them into her papa's ears, sooner\neven than into Betty's, that kind-hearted termagant. The child grew\nto understand her father well, and the two had the most delightful\nintercourse together--half banter, half seriousness, but altogether\nconfidential friendship. Mr. Gibson kept three servants; Betty, a\ncook, and a girl who was supposed to be housemaid, but who was under\nboth the elder two, and had a pretty life of it in consequence.\nThree servants would not have been required if it had not been Mr.\nGibson's habit, as it had been Mr. Hall's before him, to take two\n\"pupils\" as they were called in the genteel language of Hollingford,\n\"apprentices\" as they were in fact--being bound by indentures, and\npaying a handsome premium to learn their business. They lived in the\nhouse, and occupied an uncomfortable, ambiguous, or, as Miss Browning\ncalled it with some truth, \"amphibious\" position. They had their\nmeals with Mr. Gibson and Molly, and were felt to be terribly in the\nway; Mr. Gibson not being a man who could make conversation, and\nhating the duty of talking under restraint. Yet something within him\nmade him wince, as if his duties were not rightly performed, when,\nas the cloth was drawn, the two awkward lads rose up with joyful\nalacrity, gave him a nod, which was to be interpreted as a bow,\nknocked against each other in their endeavours to get out of the\ndining-room quickly; and then might be heard dashing along a passage\nwhich led to the surgery, choking with half-suppressed laughter. Yet\nthe annoyance he felt at this dull sense of imperfectly fulfilled\nduties only made his sarcasms on their inefficiency, or stupidity, or\nill manners, more bitter than before.\n\nBeyond direct professional instruction, he did not know what to do\nwith the succession of pairs of young men, whose mission seemed to\nbe, to be plagued by their master consciously, and to plague him\nunconsciously. Once or twice Mr. Gibson had declined taking a fresh\npupil, in the hopes of shaking himself free from the incubus, but his\nreputation as a clever surgeon had spread so rapidly that his fees\nwhich he had thought prohibitory, were willingly paid, in order that\nthe young man might make a start in life, with the prestige of having\nbeen a pupil of Gibson of Hollingford. But as Molly grew to be a\nlittle girl instead of a child, when she was about eight years old,\nher father perceived the awkwardness of her having her breakfasts\nand dinners so often alone with the pupils, without his uncertain\npresence. To do away with this evil, more than for the actual\ninstruction she could give, he engaged a respectable woman, the\ndaughter of a shopkeeper in the town, who had left a destitute\nfamily, to come every morning before breakfast, and to stay with\nMolly till he came home at night; or, if he was detained, until the\nchild's bed-time.\n\n\"Now, Miss Eyre,\" said he, summing up his instructions the day before\nshe entered upon her office, \"remember this: you are to make good tea\nfor the young men, and see that they have their meals comfortably,\nand--you are five-and-thirty, I think you said?--try and make them\ntalk,--rationally, I am afraid is beyond your or anybody's power; but\nmake them talk without stammering or giggling. Don't teach Molly too\nmuch: she must sew, and read, and write, and do her sums; but I want\nto keep her a child, and if I find more learning desirable for her,\nI'll see about giving it to her myself. After all, I'm not sure that\nreading or writing is necessary. Many a good woman gets married\nwith only a cross instead of her name; it's rather a diluting\nof mother-wit, to my fancy; but, however, we must yield to the\nprejudices of society, Miss Eyre, and so you may teach the child to\nread.\"\n\nMiss Eyre listened in silence, perplexed but determined to be\nobedient to the directions of the doctor, whose kindness she and\nher family had good cause to know. She made strong tea; she helped\nthe young men liberally in Mr. Gibson's absence, as well as in his\npresence, and she found the way to unloosen their tongues, whenever\ntheir master was away, by talking to them on trivial subjects in her\npleasant homely way. She taught Molly to read and write, but tried\nhonestly to keep her back in every other branch of education. It was\nonly by fighting and struggling hard, that bit by bit Molly persuaded\nher father to let her have French and drawing lessons. He was always\nafraid of her becoming too much educated, though he need not have\nbeen alarmed; the masters who visited such small country towns as\nHollingford forty years ago, were no such great proficients in their\narts. Once a week she joined a dancing class in the assembly-room\nat the principal inn in the town: the \"George;\" and, being daunted\nby her father in every intellectual attempt, she read every book\nthat came in her way, almost with as much delight as if it had been\nforbidden. For his station in life, Mr. Gibson had an unusually\ngood library; the medical portion of it was inaccessible to Molly,\nbeing kept in the surgery, but every other book she had either read,\nor tried to read. Her summer place of study was that seat in the\ncherry-tree, where she got the green stains on her frock, that have\nalready been mentioned as likely to wear Betty's life out. In spite\nof this \"hidden worm i' th' bud,\" Betty was to all appearance strong,\nalert, and flourishing. She was the one crook in Miss Eyre's lot,\nwho was otherwise so happy in having met with a suitable well-paid\nemployment just when she needed it most. But Betty, though agreeing\nin theory with her master when he told her of the necessity of having\na governess for his little daughter, was vehemently opposed to any\ndivision of her authority and influence over the child who had been\nher charge, her plague, and her delight ever since Mrs. Gibson's\ndeath. She took up her position as censor of all Miss Eyre's sayings\nand doings from the very first, and did not for a moment condescend\nto conceal her disapprobation. In her heart she could not help\nrespecting the patience and painstaking of the good lady,--for\na \"lady\" Miss Eyre was in the best sense of the word, though in\nHollingford she only took rank as a shopkeeper's daughter. Yet Betty\nbuzzed about her with the teasing pertinacity of a gnat, always ready\nto find fault, if not to bite. Miss Eyre's only defence came from the\nquarter whence it might least have been expected--from her pupil; on\nwhose fancied behalf, as an oppressed little personage, Betty always\nbased her attacks. But very early in the day Molly perceived their\ninjustice, and soon afterwards she began to respect Miss Eyre for her\nsilent endurance of what evidently gave her far more pain than Betty\nimagined. Mr. Gibson had been a friend in need to her family, so Miss\nEyre restrained her complaints, sooner than annoy him. And she had\nher reward. Betty would offer Molly all sorts of small temptations to\nneglect Miss Eyre's wishes; Molly steadily resisted, and plodded away\nat her task of sewing or her difficult sum. Betty made cumbrous jokes\nat Miss Eyre's expense; Molly looked up with the utmost gravity, as\nif requesting the explanation of an unintelligible speech; and there\nis nothing so quenching to a wag as to be asked to translate his\njest into plain matter-of-fact English, and to show wherein the\npoint lies. Occasionally Betty lost her temper entirely, and spoke\nimpertinently to Miss Eyre; but when this had been done in Molly's\npresence, the girl flew out into such a violent passion of words\nin defence of her silent trembling governess, that even Betty\nherself was daunted, though she chose to take the child's anger as\na good joke, and tried to persuade Miss Eyre herself to join in her\namusement.\n\n\"Bless the child! one 'ud think I was a hungry pussy-cat, and she\na hen-sparrow, with her wings all fluttering, and her little eyes\naflame, and her beak ready to peck me just because I happened to\nlook near her nest. Nay, child! if thou lik'st to be stifled in a\nnasty close room, learning things as is of no earthly good when they\nis learnt, instead o' riding on Job Donkin's hay-cart, it's thy\nlook-out, not mine. She's a little vixen, isn't she?\" smiling at\nMiss Eyre, as she finished her speech. But the poor governess saw no\nhumour in the affair; the comparison of Molly to a hen-sparrow was\nlost upon her. She was sensitive and conscientious, and knew, from\nhome experience, the evils of an ungovernable temper. So she began to\nreprove Molly for giving way to her passion, and the child thought\nit hard to be blamed for what she considered her just anger against\nBetty. But, after all, these were the small grievances of a very\nhappy childhood.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IV.\n\nMR. GIBSON'S NEIGHBOURS.\n\n\n[Illustration (untitled)]\n\nMolly grew up among these quiet people in calm monotony of life,\nwithout any greater event than that which has been recorded--the\nbeing left behind at the Towers--until she was nearly seventeen. She\nhad become a visitor at the school, but she had never gone again to\nthe annual festival at the great house; it was easy to find some\nexcuse for keeping away, and the recollection of that day was not\na pleasant one on the whole, though she often thought how much she\nshould like to see the gardens again.\n\nLady Agnes was married; there was only Lady Harriet remaining at\nhome; Lord Hollingford, the eldest son, had lost his wife, and was\na good deal more at the Towers since he had become a widower. He\nwas a tall ungainly man, considered to be as proud as his mother,\nthe countess; but, in fact, he was only shy, and slow at making\ncommonplace speeches. He did not know what to say to people whose\ndaily habits and interests were not the same as his; he would have\nbeen very thankful for a handbook of small-talk, and would have\nlearnt off his sentences with good-humoured diligence. He often\nenvied the fluency of his garrulous father, who delighted in talking\nto everybody, and was perfectly unconscious of the incoherence of his\nconversation. But, owing to his constitutional reserve and shyness,\nLord Hollingford was not a popular man although his kindness of\nheart was very great, his simplicity of character extreme, and his\nscientific acquirements considerable enough to entitle him to much\nreputation in the European republic of learned men. In this respect\nHollingford was proud of him. The inhabitants knew that the great,\ngrave, clumsy heir to its fealty was highly esteemed for his wisdom;\nand that he had made one or two discoveries, though in what direction\nthey were not quite sure. But it was safe to point him out to\nstrangers visiting the little town, as \"That's Lord Hollingford--the\nfamous Lord Hollingford, you know; you must have heard of him, he is\nso scientific.\" If the strangers knew his name, they also knew his\nclaims to fame; if they did not, ten to one but they would make as\nif they did, and so conceal not only their own ignorance, but that\nof their companions, as to the exact nature of the sources of his\nreputation.\n\nHe was left a widower with two or three boys. They were at a public\nschool; so that their companionship could make the house in which\nhe had passed his married life but little of a home to him, and he\nconsequently spent much of his time at the Towers; where his mother\nwas proud of him, and his father very fond, but ever so little afraid\nof him. His friends were always welcomed by Lord and Lady Cumnor; the\nformer, indeed, was in the habit of welcoming everybody everywhere;\nbut it was a proof of Lady Cumnor's real affection for her\ndistinguished son, that she allowed him to ask what she called \"all\nsorts of people\" to the Towers. \"All sorts of people\" meant really\nthose who were distinguished for science and learning, without regard\nto rank: and it must be confessed, without much regard to polished\nmanners likewise.\n\nMr. Hall, Mr. Gibson's predecessor, had always been received with\nfriendly condescension by my lady, who had found him established as\nthe family medical man, when first she came to the Towers on her\nmarriage; but she never thought of interfering with his custom of\ntaking his meals, if he needed refreshment, in the housekeeper's\nroom, not _with_ the housekeeper, _bien entendu_. The comfortable,\nclever, stout, and red-faced doctor would very much have preferred\nthis, even if he had had the choice given him (which he never had) of\ntaking his \"snack,\" as he called it, with my lord and my lady, in the\ngrand dining-room. Of course, if some great surgical gun (like Sir\nAstley) was brought down from London to bear on the family's health,\nit was due to him, as well as to the local medical attendant, to ask\nMr. Hall to dinner, in a formal and ceremonious manner, on which\noccasions Mr. Hall buried his chin in voluminous folds of white\nmuslin, put on his black knee-breeches, with bunches of ribbon at\nthe sides, his silk stockings and buckled shoes, and otherwise made\nhimself excessively uncomfortable in his attire, and went forth in\nstate in a post-chaise from the \"George,\" consoling himself in the\nprivate corner of his heart for the discomfort he was enduring with\nthe idea of how well it would sound the next day in the ears of the\nsquires whom he was in the habit of attending: \"Yesterday at dinner\nthe earl said,\" or \"the countess remarked,\" or \"I was surprised to\nhear when I was dining at the Towers yesterday.\" But somehow things\nhad changed since Mr. Gibson had become \"the doctor\" _par excellence_\nat Hollingford. Miss Brownings thought that it was because he had\nsuch an elegant figure, and \"such a distinguished manner;\" Mrs.\nGoodenough, \"because of his aristocratic connections\"--\"the son of a\nScotch duke, my dear, never mind on which side of the blanket.\" But\nthe fact was certain; although he might frequently ask Mrs. Brown\nto give him something to eat in the housekeeper's room--he had no\ntime for all the fuss and ceremony of luncheon with my lady--he was\nalways welcome to the grandest circle of visitors in the house. He\nmight lunch with a duke any day that he chose; given that a duke was\nforthcoming at the Towers. His accent was Scotch, not provincial. He\nhad not an ounce of superfluous flesh on his bones; and leanness goes\na great way to gentility. His complexion was sallow, and his hair\nblack; in those days, the decade after the conclusion of the great\ncontinental war, to be sallow and black-a-vised was of itself a\ndistinction; he was not jovial (as my lord remarked with a sigh, but\nit was my lady who endorsed the invitations), sparing of his words,\nintelligent, and slightly sarcastic. Therefore he was perfectly\npresentable.\n\nHis Scotch blood (for that he was of Scottish descent there could be\nno manner of doubt) gave him just the kind of thistly dignity which\nmade every one feel that they must treat him with respect; so on that\nhead he was assured. The grandeur of being an invited guest to dinner\nat the Towers from time to time, gave him but little pleasure for\nmany years, but it was a form to be gone through in the way of his\nprofession, without any idea of social gratification.\n\nBut when Lord Hollingford returned to make the Towers his home,\naffairs were altered. Mr. Gibson really heard and learnt things that\ninterested him seriously, and that gave fresh flavour to his reading.\nFrom time to time he met the leaders of the scientific world;\nodd-looking, simple-hearted men, very much in earnest about their\nown particular subjects, and not having much to say on any other. Mr.\nGibson found himself capable of appreciating such persons, and also\nperceived that they valued his appreciation, as it was honestly\nand intelligently given. Indeed, by-and-by, he began to send\ncontributions of his own to the more scientific of the medical\njournals, and thus partly in receiving, partly in giving out\ninformation and accurate thought, a new zest was added to his life.\nThere was not much intercourse between Lord Hollingford and himself;\nthe one was too silent and shy, the other too busy, to seek each\nother's society with the perseverance required to do away with the\nsocial distinction of rank that prevented their frequent meetings.\nBut each was thoroughly pleased to come into contact with the other.\nEach could rely on the other's respect and sympathy with a security\nunknown to many who call themselves friends; and this was a source\nof happiness to both; to Mr. Gibson the most so, of course; for\nhis range of intelligent and cultivated society was the smaller.\nIndeed, there was no one equal to himself among the men with whom he\nassociated, and this he had felt as a depressing influence, although\nhe never recognized the cause of his depression. There was Mr.\nAshton, the vicar, who had succeeded Mr. Browning, a thoroughly good\nand kind-hearted man, but one without an original thought in him;\nwhose habitual courtesy and indolent mind led him to agree to every\nopinion, not palpably heterodox, and to utter platitudes in the most\ngentlemanly manner. Mr. Gibson had once or twice amused himself, by\nleading the vicar on in his agreeable admissions of arguments \"as\nperfectly convincing,\" and of statements as \"curious but undoubted,\"\ntill he had planted the poor clergyman in a bog of heretical\nbewilderment. But then Mr. Ashton's pain and suffering at suddenly\nfinding out into what a theological predicament he had been brought,\nhis real self-reproach at his previous admissions, were so great\nthat Mr. Gibson lost all sense of fun, and hastened back to the\nThirty-nine Articles with all the good-will in life, as the only\nmeans of soothing the vicar's conscience. On any other subject,\nexcept that of orthodoxy, Mr. Gibson could lead him any lengths; but\nthen his ignorance on most of them prevented bland acquiescence from\narriving at any results which could startle him. He had some private\nfortune, and was not married, and lived the life of an indolent and\nrefined bachelor; but though he himself was no very active visitor\namong his poorer parishioners, he was always willing to relieve their\nwants in the most liberal, and, considering his habits, occasionally\nin the most self-denying manner, whenever Mr. Gibson, or any one\nelse, made them clearly known to him. \"Use my purse as freely as if\nit was your own, Gibson,\" he was wont to say. \"I'm such a bad one at\ngoing about and making talk to poor folk--I daresay I don't do enough\nin that way--but I am most willing to give you anything for any one\nyou may consider in want.\"\n\n\"Thank you; I come upon you pretty often, I believe, and make very\nlittle scruple about it; but if you'll allow me to suggest, it is,\nthat you shouldn't try to make talk when you go into the cottages;\nbut just talk.\"\n\n\"I don't see the difference,\" said the vicar, a little querulously;\n\"but I daresay there is a difference, and I have no doubt what you\nsay is quite true. I shouldn't make talk, but talk; and as both are\nequally difficult to me, you must let me purchase the privilege of\nsilence by this ten-pound note.\"\n\n\"Thank you. It's not so satisfactory to me; and, I should think, not\nto yourself. But probably the Joneses and Greens will prefer it.\"\n\nMr. Ashton would look with plaintive inquiry into Mr. Gibson's face\nafter some such speech, as if asking if a sarcasm was intended. On\nthe whole, they went on in the most amicable way; only beyond the\ngregarious feeling common to most men, they had very little actual\npleasure in each other's society. Perhaps the man of all others\nto whom Mr. Gibson took the most kindly--at least, until Lord\nHollingford came into the neighbourhood--was a certain Squire Hamley.\nHe and his ancestors had been called squire as long back as local\ntradition extended. But there was many a greater land-owner in the\ncounty, for Squire Hamley's estate was not more than eight hundred\nacres or so. But his family had been in possession of it long before\nthe Earls of Cumnor had been heard of; before the Hely-Harrisons\nhad bought Coldstone Park; no one in Hollingford knew the time when\nthe Hamleys had not lived at Hamley. \"Ever since the Heptarchy,\"\nsaid the vicar. \"Nay,\" said Miss Browning, \"I have heard that there\nwere Hamleys of Hamley before the Romans.\" The vicar was preparing\na polite assent, when Mrs. Goodenough came in with a still more\nstartling assertion. \"I have always heerd,\" said she, with all the\nslow authority of an oldest inhabitant, \"that there was Hamleys of\nHamley afore the time of the pagans.\" Mr. Ashton could only bow, and\nsay, \"Possibly, very possibly, madam.\" But he said it in so courteous\na manner that Mrs. Goodenough looked round in a gratified way, as\nmuch as to say, \"The Church confirms my words; who now will dare\ndispute them?\" At any rate, the Hamleys were a very old family, if\nnot aborigines. They had not increased their estate for centuries;\nthey had held their own, if even with an effort, and had not sold\na rood of it for the last hundred years or so. But they were not\nan adventurous race. They never traded, or speculated, or tried\nagricultural improvements of any kind. They had no capital in any\nbank; nor what perhaps would have been more in character, hoards of\ngold in any stocking. Their mode of life was simple, and more like\nthat of yeomen than squires. Indeed Squire Hamley, by continuing the\nprimitive manners and customs of his forefathers, the squires of the\neighteenth century, did live more as a yeoman, when such a class\nexisted, than as a squire of this generation. There was a dignity in\nthis quiet conservatism that gained him an immense amount of respect\nboth from high and low; and he might have visited at every house\nin the county had he so chosen. But he was very indifferent to the\ncharms of society; and perhaps this was owing to the fact that the\nsquire, Roger Hamley, who at present lived and reigned at Hamley,\nhad not received so good an education as he ought to have done.\nHis father, Squire Stephen, had been plucked at Oxford, and, with\nstubborn pride, he had refused to go up again. Nay, more! he had\nsworn a great oath, as men did in those days, that none of his\nchildren to come should ever know either university by becoming a\nmember of it. He had only one child, the present Squire, and he was\nbrought up according to his father's word; he was sent to a petty\nprovincial school, where he saw much that he hated, and then turned\nloose upon the estate as its heir. Such a bringing up did not do him\nall the harm that might have been anticipated. He was imperfectly\neducated, and ignorant on many points; but he was aware of his\ndeficiency, and regretted it in theory. He was awkward and ungainly\nin society, and so kept out of it as much as possible; and he was\nobstinate, violent-tempered, and dictatorial in his own immediate\ncircle. On the other side, he was generous, and true as steel; the\nvery soul of honour, in fact. He had so much natural shrewdness, that\nhis conversation was always worth listening to, although he was apt\nto start by assuming entirely false premises, which he considered\nas incontrovertible as if they had been mathematically proved; but,\ngiven the correctness of his premises, nobody could bring more\nnatural wit and sense to bear upon the arguments based upon them.\n\nHe had married a delicate fine London lady; it was one of those\nperplexing marriages of which one cannot understand the reasons. Yet\nthey were very happy, though possibly Mrs. Hamley would not have sunk\ninto the condition of a chronic invalid, if her husband had cared a\nlittle more for her various tastes, or allowed her the companionship\nof those who did. After his marriage he was wont to say he had got\nall that was worth having out of the crowd of houses they called\nLondon. It was a compliment to his wife which he repeated until the\nyear of her death; it charmed her at first, it pleased her up to the\nlast time of her hearing it; but, for all that, she used sometimes\nto wish that he would recognize the fact that there might still be\nsomething worth hearing and seeing in the great city. But he never\nwent there again, and though he did not prohibit her going, yet he\nshowed so little sympathy with her when she came back full of what\nshe had done on her visit that she ceased caring to go. Not but what\nhe was kind and willing in giving his consent, and in furnishing her\namply with money. \"There, there, my little woman, take that! Dress\nyourself up as fine as any on 'em, and buy what you like, for the\ncredit of Hamley of Hamley; and go to the park and the play, and show\noff with the best on 'em. I shall be glad to see thee back again, I\nknow; but have thy fling while thou'rt about it.\" Then when she came\nback it was, \"Well, well, it has pleased thee, I suppose, so that's\nall right. But the very talking about it tires me, I know, and I\ncan't think how you have stood it all. Come out and see how pretty\nthe flowers are looking in the south garden. I've made them sow all\nthe seeds you like; and I went over to Hollingford nursery to buy the\ncuttings of the plants you admired last year. A breath of fresh air\nwill clear my brain after listening to all this talk about the whirl\nof London, which is like to have turned me giddy.\"\n\nMrs. Hamley was a great reader, and had considerable literary taste.\nShe was gentle and sentimental; tender and good. She gave up her\nvisits to London; she gave up her sociable pleasure in the company\nof her fellows in education and position. Her husband, owing to the\ndeficiencies of his early years, disliked associating with those\nto whom he ought to have been an equal; he was too proud to mingle\nwith his inferiors. He loved his wife all the more dearly for her\nsacrifices for him; but, deprived of all her strong interests, she\nsank into ill-health; nothing definite; only she never was well.\nPerhaps if she had had a daughter it would have been better for her:\nbut her two children were boys, and their father, anxious to give\nthem the advantages of which he himself had suffered the deprivation,\nsent the lads very early to a preparatory school. They were to go\non to Rugby and Cambridge; the idea of Oxford was hereditarily\ndistasteful in the Hamley family. Osborne, the eldest--so called\nafter his mother's maiden name--was full of taste, and had some\ntalent. His appearance had all the grace and refinement of his\nmother's. He was sweet-tempered and affectionate, almost as\ndemonstrative as a girl. He did well at school, carrying away many\nprizes; and was, in a word, the pride and delight of both father and\nmother; the confidential friend of the latter, in default of any\nother. Roger was two years younger than Osborne; clumsy and heavily\nbuilt, like his father; his face was square, and the expression\ngrave, and rather immobile. He was good, but dull, his schoolmasters\nsaid. He won no prizes, but brought home a favourable report of his\nconduct. When he caressed his mother, she used laughingly to allude\nto the fable of the lap-dog and the donkey; so thereafter he left\noff all personal demonstration of affection. It was a great question\nas to whether he was to follow his brother to college after he\nleft Rugby. Mrs. Hamley thought it would be rather a throwing\naway of money, as he was so little likely to distinguish himself\nin intellectual pursuits; anything practical--such as a civil\nengineer--would be more the kind of life for him. She thought that\nit would be too mortifying for him to go to the same college and\nuniversity as his brother, who was sure to distinguish himself--and,\nto be repeatedly plucked, to come away wooden-spoon at last. But his\nfather persevered doggedly, as was his wont, in his intention of\ngiving both his sons the same education; they should both have the\nadvantages of which he had been deprived. If Roger did not do well at\nCambridge it would be his own fault. If his father did not send him\nthither, some day or other he might be regretting the omission, as\nthe Squire had done himself for many a year. So Roger followed his\nbrother Osborne to Trinity, and Mrs. Hamley was again left alone,\nafter the year of indecision as to Roger's destination, which had\nbeen brought on by her urgency. She had not been able for many years\nto walk beyond her garden; the greater part of her life was spent on\na sofa, wheeled to the window in summer, to the fireside in winter.\nThe room which she inhabited was large and pleasant; four tall\nwindows looked out upon a lawn dotted over with flower-beds, and\nmelting away into a small wood, in the centre of which there was a\npond, filled with water-lilies. About this unseen pond in the deep\nshade Mrs. Hamley had written many a pretty four-versed poem since\nshe lay on her sofa, alternately reading and composing verse. She had\na small table by her side on which there were the newest works of\npoetry and fiction; a pencil and blotting-book, with loose sheets\nof blank paper; a vase of flowers always of her husband's gathering;\nwinter and summer, she had a sweet fresh nosegay every day. Her maid\nbrought her a draught of medicine every three hours, with a glass of\nclear water and a biscuit; her husband came to her as often as his\nlove for the open air and his labours out-of-doors permitted; but\nthe event of her day, when her boys were absent, was Mr. Gibson's\nfrequent professional visits.\n\nHe knew there was real secret harm going on all this time that people\nspoke of her as a merely fanciful invalid; and that one or two\naccused him of humouring her fancies. But he only smiled at such\naccusations. He felt that his visits were a real pleasure and\nlightening of her growing and indescribable discomfort; he knew that\nSquire Hamley would have been only too glad if he had come every day;\nand he was conscious that by careful watching of her symptoms he\nmight mitigate her bodily pain. Besides all these reasons, he took\ngreat pleasure in the Squire's society. Mr. Gibson enjoyed the\nother's unreasonableness; his quaintness; his strong conservatism\nin religion, politics, and morals. Mrs. Hamley tried sometimes to\napologize for, or to soften away, opinions which she fancied were\noffensive to the doctor, or contradictions which she thought too\nabrupt; but at such times her husband would lay his great hand almost\ncaressingly on Mr. Gibson's shoulder, and soothe his wife's anxiety,\nby saying, \"Let us alone, little woman. We understand each other,\ndon't we, doctor? Why, bless your life, he gives me better than he\ngets many a time; only, you see, he sugars it over, and says a sharp\nthing, and pretends it's all civility and humility; but I can tell\nwhen he's giving me a pill.\"\n\nOne of Mrs. Hamley's often-expressed wishes had been, that Molly\nmight come and pay her a visit. Mr. Gibson always refused this\nrequest of hers, though he could hardly have given his reasons for\nthese refusals. He did not want to lose the companionship of his\nchild, in fact; but he put it to himself in quite a different way.\nHe thought her lessons and her regular course of employment would be\ninterrupted. The life in Mrs. Hamley's heated and scented room would\nnot be good for the girl; Osborne and Roger Hamley would be at home,\nand he did not wish Molly to be thrown too exclusively upon them for\nyoung society; or they would not be at home, and it would be rather\ndull and depressing for his girl to be all the day long with a\nnervous invalid.\n\nBut at length the day came when Mr. Gibson rode over, and volunteered\na visit from Molly; an offer which Mrs. Hamley received with the\n\"open arms of her heart,\" as she expressed it; and of which the\nduration was unspecified.\n\nThe cause for the change in Mr. Gibson's wishes just referred to\nwas as follows:--It has been mentioned that he took pupils, rather\nagainst his inclination, it is true; but there they were, a Mr. Wynne\nand Mr. Coxe, \"the young gentlemen,\" as they were called in the\nhousehold; \"Mr. Gibson's young gentlemen,\" as they were termed in the\ntown. Mr. Wynne was the elder, the more experienced one, who could\noccasionally take his master's place, and who gained experience by\nvisiting the poor, and the \"chronic cases.\" Mr. Gibson used to talk\nover his practice with Mr. Wynne, and try and elicit his opinions in\nthe vain hope that, some day or another, Mr. Wynne might start an\noriginal thought. The young man was cautious and slow; he would never\ndo any harm by his rashness, but at the same time he would always be\na little behind his day. Still Mr. Gibson remembered that he had had\nfar worse \"young gentlemen\" to deal with; and was content with, if\nnot thankful for, such an elder pupil as Mr. Wynne. Mr. Coxe was a\nboy of nineteen or so, with brilliant red hair, and a tolerably red\nface, of both of which he was very conscious and much ashamed. He was\nthe son of an Indian officer, an old acquaintance of Mr. Gibson's.\nMajor Coxe was at some unpronounceable station in the Punjaub, at the\npresent time; but the year before he had been in England, and had\nrepeatedly expressed his great satisfaction at having placed his only\nchild as a pupil to his old friend, and had in fact almost charged\nMr. Gibson with the guardianship as well as the instruction of his\nboy, giving him many injunctions which he thought were special in\nthis case; but which Mr. Gibson with a touch of annoyance assured the\nmajor were always attended to in every case, with every pupil. But\nwhen the poor major ventured to beg that his boy might be considered\nas one of the family, and that he might spend his evenings in the\ndrawing-room instead of the surgery, Mr. Gibson turned upon him with\na direct refusal.\n\n\"He must live like the others. I can't have the pestle and mortar\ncarried into the drawing-room, and the place smelling of aloes.\"\n\n\"Must my boy make pills himself, then?\" asked the major, ruefully.\n\n\"To be sure. The youngest apprentice always does. It's not hard\nwork. He'll have the comfort of thinking he won't have to swallow\nthem himself. And he'll have the run of the pomfret cakes, and the\nconserve of hips, and on Sundays he shall have a taste of tamarinds\nto reward him for his weekly labour at pill-making.\"\n\nMajor Coxe was not quite sure whether Mr. Gibson was not laughing\nat him in his sleeve; but things were so far arranged, and the real\nadvantages were so great, that he thought it was best to take no\nnotice, but even to submit to the indignity of pill-making. He was\nconsoled for all these rubs by Mr. Gibson's manner at last when the\nsupreme moment of final parting arrived. The doctor did not say much;\nbut there was something of real sympathy in his manner that spoke\nstraight to the father's heart, and an implied \"you have trusted me\nwith your boy, and I have accepted the trust in full,\" in each of the\nfew last words.\n\nMr. Gibson knew his business and human nature too well to distinguish\nyoung Coxe by any overt marks of favouritism; but he could not help\nshowing the lad occasionally that he regarded him with especial\ninterest as the son of a friend. Besides this claim upon his regard,\nthere was something about the young man himself that pleased Mr.\nGibson. He was rash and impulsive, apt to speak, hitting the nail on\nthe head sometimes with unconscious cleverness, at other times making\ngross and startling blunders. Mr. Gibson used to tell him that his\nmotto would always be \"kill or cure,\" and to this Mr. Coxe once made\nanswer that he thought it was the best motto a doctor could have; for\nif he could not cure the patient, it was surely best to get him out\nof his misery quietly, and at once. Mr. Wynne looked up in surprise,\nand observed that he should be afraid that such putting out of misery\nmight be looked upon as homicide by some people. Mr. Gibson said\nin a dry tone, that for his part he should not mind the imputation\nof homicide, but that it would not do to make away with profitable\npatients in so speedy a manner; and that he thought that as long as\nthey were willing and able to pay two-and-sixpence for the doctor's\nvisit, it was his duty to keep them alive; of course, when they\nbecame paupers the case was different. Mr. Wynne pondered over this\nspeech; Mr. Coxe only laughed. At last Mr. Wynne said,--\n\n\"But you go every morning, sir, before breakfast to see old Nancy\nGrant, and you've ordered her this medicine, sir, which is about the\nmost costly in Corbyn's bill?\"\n\n\"Have you not found out how difficult it is for men to live up to\ntheir precepts? You've a great deal to learn yet, Mr. Wynne!\" said\nMr. Gibson, leaving the surgery as he spoke.\n\n\"I never can make the governor out,\" said Mr. Wynne, in a tone of\nutter despair. \"What are you laughing at, Coxey?\"\n\n\"Oh! I'm thinking how blest you are in having parents who have\ninstilled moral principles into your youthful bosom. You'd go and be\npoisoning all the paupers off, if you hadn't been told that murder\nwas a crime by your mother; you'd be thinking you were doing as you\nwere bid, and quote old Gibson's words when you came to be tried.\n'Please, my lord judge, they were not able to pay for my visits, and\nso I followed the rules of the profession as taught me by Mr. Gibson,\nthe great surgeon at Hollingford, and poisoned the paupers.'\"\n\n\"I can't bear that scoffing way of his.\"\n\n\"And I like it. If it wasn't for the governor's fun, and the\ntamarinds, and something else that I know of, I would run off to\nIndia. I hate stifling rooms, and sick people, and the smell of\ndrugs, and the stink of pills on my hands;--faugh!\"\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER V.\n\nCALF-LOVE.\n\n\nOne day, for some reason or other, Mr. Gibson came home unexpectedly.\nHe was crossing the hall, having come in by the garden-door--the\ngarden communicated with the stable-yard, where he had left his\nhorse--when the kitchen door opened, and the girl who was underling\nin the establishment, came quickly into the hall with a note in her\nhand, and made as if she was taking it upstairs; but on seeing her\nmaster she gave a little start, and turned back as if to hide herself\nin the kitchen. If she had not made this movement, so conscious of\nguilt, Mr. Gibson, who was anything but suspicious, would never have\ntaken any notice of her. As it was, he stepped quickly forwards,\nopened the kitchen door, and called out \"Bethia\" so sharply that she\ncould not delay coming forwards.\n\n\"Give me that note,\" he said. She hesitated a little.\n\n\"It's for Miss Molly,\" she stammered out.\n\n\"Give it to me!\" he repeated more quickly than before. She looked as\nif she would cry; but still she kept the note tight held behind her\nback.\n\n\"He said as I was to give it into her own hands; and I promised as I\nwould, faithful.\"\n\n\"Cook, go and find Miss Molly. Tell her to come here at once.\"\n\nHe fixed Bethia with his eyes. It was of no use trying to escape: she\nmight have thrown it into the fire, but she had not presence of mind\nenough. She stood immovable, only her eyes looked any way rather than\nencounter her master's steady gaze. \"Molly, my dear!\"\n\n\"Papa! I did not know you were at home,\" said innocent, wondering\nMolly.\n\n\"Bethia, keep your word. Here is Miss Molly; give her the note.\"\n\n\"Indeed, miss, I couldn't help it!\"\n\nMolly took the note, but before she could open it, her father\nsaid,--\"That's all, my dear; you needn't read it. Give it to me. Tell\nthose who sent you, Bethia, that all letters for Miss Molly must pass\nthrough my hands. Now be off with you, goosey, and go back to where\nyou came from.\"\n\n\n[Illustration: A LOVE LETTER.]\n\n\n\"Papa, I shall make you tell me who my correspondent is.\"\n\n\"We'll see about that, by-and-by.\"\n\nShe went a little reluctantly, with ungratified curiosity, upstairs\nto Miss Eyre, who was still her daily companion, if not her\ngoverness. He turned into the empty dining-room, shut the door,\nbroke the seal of the note, and began to read it. It was a flaming\nlove-letter from Mr. Coxe; who professed himself unable to go on\nseeing her day after day without speaking to her of the passion she\nhad inspired--an \"eternal passion,\" he called it; on reading which\nMr. Gibson laughed a little. Would she not look kindly at him? would\nshe not think of him whose only thought was of her? and so on, with a\nvery proper admixture of violent compliments to her beauty. She was\nfair, not pale; her eyes were loadstars, her dimples marks of Cupid's\nfinger, &c.\n\nMr. Gibson finished reading it; and began to think about it in his\nown mind. \"Who would have thought the lad had been so poetical? but,\nto be sure, there's a 'Shakspeare' in the surgery library: I'll take\nit away and put 'Johnson's Dictionary' instead. One comfort is the\nconviction of her perfect innocence--ignorance, I should rather\nsay--for it's easy to see it's the first 'confession of his love,' as\nhe calls it. But it's an awful worry--to begin with lovers so early.\nWhy, she's only just seventeen,--not seventeen, indeed, till July;\nnot for six weeks yet. Sixteen and three-quarters! Why, she's quite\na baby. To be sure--poor Jeanie was not so old, and how I did love\nher!\" (Mrs. Gibson's name was Mary, so he must have been referring to\nsome one else.) Then his thoughts wandered back to other days, though\nhe still held the open note in his hand. By-and-by his eyes fell upon\nit again, and his mind came back to bear upon the present time. \"I'll\nnot be hard upon him. I'll give him a hint; he's quite sharp enough\nto take it. Poor laddie! if I send him away, which would be the\nwisest course, I do believe he's got no home to go to.\"\n\nAfter a little more consideration in the same strain, Mr. Gibson went\nand sat down at the writing-table and wrote the following formula:--\n\n   _Master Coxe._\n\n(\"That 'master' will touch him to the quick,\" said Mr. Gibson to\nhimself as he wrote the word.)\n\n\n   Rx. Verecundiæ i oz.\n       Fidelitatis Domesticæ i oz.\n       Reticentiæ gr. iij.\n   M.  Capiat hanc dosim ter die in aquâ purâ.\n\n   R. GIBSON, _Ch._\n\n\nMr. Gibson smiled a little sadly as he re-read his words. \"Poor\nJeanie,\" he said aloud. And then he chose out an envelope, enclosed\nthe fervid love-letter, and the above prescription; sealed it with\nhis own sharply-cut seal-ring, R. G., in old English letters, and\nthen paused over the address.\n\n\"He'll not like _Master Coxe_ outside; no need to put him to\nunnecessary shame.\" So the direction on the envelope was--\n\n   _Edward Coxe, Esq._\n\nThen Mr. Gibson applied himself to the professional business which\nhad brought him home so opportunely and unexpectedly, and afterwards\nhe went back through the garden to the stables; and just as he had\nmounted his horse, he said to the stable-man,--\"Oh! by the way,\nhere's a letter for Mr. Coxe. Don't send it through the women; take\nit round yourself to the surgery-door, and do it at once.\"\n\nThe slight smile upon his face, as he rode out of the gates, died\naway as soon as he found himself in the solitude of the lanes. He\nslackened his speed, and began to think. It was very awkward, he\nconsidered, to have a motherless girl growing up into womanhood in\nthe same house with two young men, even if she only met them at\nmeal-times; and all the intercourse they had with each other was\nmerely the utterance of such words as, \"May I help you to potatoes?\"\nor, as Mr. Wynne would persevere in saying, \"May I assist you to\npotatoes?\"--a form of speech which grated daily more and more upon\nMr. Gibson's ears. Yet Mr. Coxe, the offender in this affair which\nhad just occurred, had to remain for three years more as a pupil in\nMr. Gibson's family. He should be the very last of the race. Still\nthere were three years to be got over; and if this stupid passionate\ncalf-love of his lasted, what was to be done? Sooner or later Molly\nwould become aware of it. The contingencies of the affair were so\nexcessively disagreeable to contemplate, that Mr. Gibson determined\nto dismiss the subject from his mind by a good strong effort. He\nput his horse to a gallop, and found that the violent shaking over\nthe lanes--paved as they were with round stones, which had been\ndislocated by the wear and tear of a hundred years--was the very best\nthing for the spirits, if not for the bones. He made a long round\nthat afternoon, and came back to his home imagining that the worst\nwas over, and that Mr. Coxe would have taken the hint conveyed in\nthe prescription. All that would be needed was to find a safe place\nfor the unfortunate Bethia, who had displayed such a daring aptitude\nfor intrigue. But Mr. Gibson reckoned without his host. It was the\nhabit of the young men to come in to tea with the family in the\ndining-room, to swallow two cups, munch their bread or toast, and\nthen disappear. This night Mr. Gibson watched their countenances\nfurtively from under his long eye-lashes, while he tried against his\nwont to keep up a dégagé manner, and a brisk conversation on general\nsubjects. He saw that Mr. Wynne was on the point of breaking out\ninto laughter, and that red-haired, red-faced Mr. Coxe was redder\nand fiercer than ever, while his whole aspect and ways betrayed\nindignation and anger.\n\n\"He will have it, will he?\" thought Mr. Gibson to himself; and he\ngirded up his loins for the battle. He did not follow Molly and Miss\nEyre into the drawing-room as he usually did. He remained where he\nwas, pretending to read the newspaper, while Bethia, her face swelled\nup with crying, and with an aggrieved and offended aspect, removed\nthe tea-things. Not five minutes after the room was cleared, came\nthe expected tap at the door. \"May I speak to you, sir?\" said the\ninvisible Mr. Coxe, from outside.\n\n\"To be sure. Come in, Mr. Coxe. I was rather wanting to talk to you\nabout that bill of Corbyn's. Pray sit down.\"\n\n\"It is about nothing of that kind, sir, that I wanted--that I\nwished--No, thank you--I would rather not sit down.\" He, accordingly,\nstood in offended dignity. \"It is about that letter, sir--that letter\nwith the insulting prescription, sir.\"\n\n\"Insulting prescription! I am surprised at such a word being applied\nto any prescription of mine--though, to be sure, patients are\nsometimes offended at being told the nature of their illnesses; and,\nI daresay, they may take offence at the medicines which their cases\nrequire.\"\n\n\"I did not ask you to prescribe for me.\"\n\n\"Oh, ho! Then you were the Master Coxe who sent the note through\nBethia! Let me tell you it has cost her her place, and was a very\nsilly letter into the bargain.\"\n\n\"It was not the conduct of a gentleman, sir, to intercept it, and to\nopen it, and to read words never addressed to you, sir.\"\n\n\"No!\" said Mr. Gibson, with a slight twinkle in his eye and a curl on\nhis lips, not unnoticed by the indignant Mr. Coxe. \"I believe I was\nonce considered tolerably good-looking, and I daresay I was as great\na coxcomb as any one at twenty; but I don't think that even then I\nshould quite have believed that all those pretty compliments were\naddressed to myself.\"\n\n\"It was not the conduct of a gentleman, sir,\" repeated Mr. Coxe,\nstammering over his words--he was going on to say something more,\nwhen Mr. Gibson broke in,--\n\n\"And let me tell you, young man,\" replied Mr. Gibson, with a sudden\nsternness in his voice, \"that what you have done is only excusable\nin consideration of your youth and extreme ignorance of what are\nconsidered the laws of domestic honour. I receive you into my house\nas a member of my family--you induce one of my servants--corrupting\nher with a bribe, I have no doubt--\"\n\n\"Indeed, sir! I never gave her a penny.\"\n\n\"Then you ought to have done. You should always pay those who do your\ndirty work.\"\n\n\"Just now, sir, you called it corrupting with a bribe,\" muttered Mr.\nCoxe.\n\nMr. Gibson took no notice of this speech, but went on--\"Inducing one\nof my servants to risk her place, without offering her the slightest\nequivalent, by begging her to convey a letter clandestinely to my\ndaughter--a mere child.\"\n\n\"Miss Gibson, sir, is nearly seventeen! I heard you say so only the\nother day,\" said Mr. Coxe, aged twenty. Again Mr. Gibson ignored the\nremark.\n\n\"A letter which you were unwilling to have seen by her father, who\nhad tacitly trusted to your honour, by receiving you as an inmate of\nhis house. Your father's son--I know Major Coxe well--ought to have\ncome to me, and have said out openly, 'Mr. Gibson, I love--or I fancy\nthat I love--your daughter; I do not think it right to conceal this\nfrom you, although unable to earn a penny; and with no prospect of an\nunassisted livelihood, even for myself, for several years, I shall\nnot say a word about my feelings--or fancied feelings--to the very\nyoung lady herself.' That is what your father's son ought to have\nsaid; if, indeed, a couple of grains of reticent silence wouldn't\nhave been better still.\"\n\n\"And if I had said it, sir--perhaps I ought to have said it,\" said\nMr. Coxe, in a hurry of anxiety, \"what would have been your answer?\nWould you have sanctioned my passion, sir?\"\n\n\"I would have said, most probably--I will not be certain of my exact\nwords in a suppositional case--that you were a young fool, but not\na dishonourable young fool, and I should have told you not to let\nyour thoughts run upon a calf-love until you had magnified it into\na passion. And I daresay, to make up for the mortification I should\nhave given you, I might have prescribed your joining the Hollingford\nCricket Club, and set you at liberty as often as I could on the\nSaturday afternoons. As it is, I must write to your father's agent in\nLondon, and ask him to remove you out of my household, repaying the\npremium, of course, which will enable you to start afresh in some\nother doctor's surgery.\"\n\n\"It will so grieve my father,\" said Mr. Coxe, startled into dismay,\nif not repentance.\n\n\"I see no other course open. It will give Major Coxe some trouble\n(I shall take care that he is at no extra expense), but what I think\nwill grieve him the most is the betrayal of confidence; for I trusted\nyou, Edward, like a son of my own!\" There was something in Mr.\nGibson's voice when he spoke seriously, especially when he referred\nto any feeling of his own--he who so rarely betrayed what was passing\nin his heart--that was irresistible to most people: the change from\njoking and sarcasm to tender gravity.\n\nMr. Coxe hung his head a little, and meditated.\n\n\"I do love Miss Gibson,\" said he, at length. \"Who could help it?\"\n\n\"Mr. Wynne, I hope!\" said Mr. Gibson.\n\n\"His heart is pre-engaged,\" replied Mr. Coxe. \"Mine was free as air\ntill I saw her.\"\n\n\"Would it tend to cure your--well! passion, we'll say--if she wore\nblue spectacles at meal-times? I observe you dwell much on the beauty\nof her eyes.\"\n\n\"You are ridiculing my feelings, Mr. Gibson. Do you forget that you\nyourself were young once?\"\n\n\"Poor Jeanie\" rose before Mr. Gibson's eyes; and he felt a little\nrebuked.\n\n\"Come, Mr. Coxe, let us see if we can't make a bargain,\" said he,\nafter a minute or so of silence. \"You have done a really wrong thing,\nand I hope you are convinced of it in your heart, or that you will\nbe when the heat of this discussion is over, and you come to think a\nlittle about it. But I won't lose all respect for your father's son.\nIf you will give me your word that, as long as you remain a member of\nmy family--pupil, apprentice, what you will--you won't again try to\ndisclose your passion--you see I am careful to take your view of what\nI should call a mere fancy--by word or writing, looks or acts, in any\nmanner whatever, to my daughter, or to talk about your feelings to\nany one else, you shall remain here. If you cannot give me your word,\nI must follow out the course I named, and write to your father's\nagent.\"\n\nMr. Coxe stood irresolute.\n\n\"Mr. Wynne knows all I feel for Miss Gibson, sir. He and I have no\nsecrets from each other.\"\n\n\"Well, I suppose he must represent the reeds. You know the story of\nKing Midas's barber, who found out that his royal master had the ears\nof an ass beneath his hyacinthine curls. So the barber, in default\nof a Mr. Wynne, went to the reeds that grew on the shores of a\nneighbouring lake, and whispered to them, 'King Midas has the ears of\nan ass.' But he repeated it so often that the reeds learnt the words,\nand kept on saying them all day long, till at last the secret was no\nsecret at all. If you keep on telling your tale to Mr. Wynne, are you\nsure he won't repeat it in his turn?\"\n\n\"If I pledge my word as a gentleman, sir, I pledge it for Mr. Wynne\nas well.\"\n\n\"I suppose I must run the risk. But remember how soon a young girl's\nname may be breathed upon, and sullied. Molly has no mother, and for\nthat very reason she ought to move among you all, as unharmed as Una\nherself.\"\n\n\"Mr. Gibson, if you wish it, I'll swear it on the Bible,\" cried the\nexcitable young man.\n\n\"Nonsense. As if your word, if it's worth anything, wasn't enough!\nWe'll shake hands upon it, if you like.\"\n\nMr. Coxe came forward eagerly, and almost squeezed Mr. Gibson's ring\ninto his finger.\n\nAs he was leaving the room, he said, a little uneasily, \"May I give\nBethia a crown-piece?\"\n\n\"No, indeed! Leave Bethia to me. I hope you won't say another word to\nher while she's here. I shall see that she gets a respectable place\nwhen she goes away.\"\n\nThen Mr. Gibson rang for his horse, and went out on the last visits\nof the day. He used to reckon that he rode the world around in the\ncourse of the year. There were not many surgeons in the county who\nhad so wide a range of practice as he; he went to lonely cottages on\nthe borders of great commons; to farm-houses at the end of narrow\ncountry lanes that led to nowhere else, and were overshadowed by the\nelms and beeches overhead. He attended all the gentry within a circle\nof fifteen miles round Hollingford; and was the appointed doctor to\nthe still greater families who went up to London every February--as\nthe fashion then was--and returned to their acres in the early weeks\nof July. He was, of necessity, a great deal from home, and on this\nsoft and pleasant summer evening he felt the absence as a great evil.\nHe was startled at discovering that his little one was growing fast\ninto a woman, and already the passive object of some of the strong\ninterests that affect a woman's life; and he--her mother as well as\nher father--so much away that he could not guard her as he would\nhave wished. The end of his cogitations was that ride to Hamley the\nnext morning, when he proposed to allow his daughter to accept Mrs.\nHamley's last invitation--an invitation that had been declined at the\ntime.\n\n\"You may quote against me the proverb, 'He that will not when he\nmay, when he will he shall have nay.' And I shall have no reason to\ncomplain,\" he had said.\n\nBut Mrs. Hamley was only too much charmed with the prospect of having\na young girl for a visitor; one whom it would not be a trouble to\nentertain; who might be sent out to ramble in the gardens, or told\nto read when the invalid was too much fatigued for conversation; and\nyet one whose youth and freshness would bring a charm, like a waft\nof sweet summer air, into her lonely shut-up life. Nothing could be\npleasanter, and so Molly's visit to Hamley was easily settled.\n\n\"I only wish Osborne and Roger had been at home,\" said Mrs. Hamley,\nin her low soft voice. \"She may find it dull, being with old people,\nlike the squire and me, from morning till night. When can she come?\nthe darling--I am beginning to love her already!\"\n\nMr. Gibson was very glad in his heart that the young men of the house\nwere out of the way; he did not want his little Molly to be passing\nfrom Scylla to Charybdis; and, as he afterwards scoffed at himself\nfor thinking, he had got an idea that all young men were wolves in\nchase of his one ewe-lamb.\n\n\"She knows nothing of the pleasure in store for her,\" he replied;\n\"and I'm sure I don't know what feminine preparations she may think\nnecessary, or how long they may take. You'll remember she is a little\nignoramus, and has had no ... training in etiquette; our ways at\nhome are rather rough for a girl, I'm afraid. But I know I could not\nsend her into a kinder atmosphere than this.\"\n\nWhen the Squire heard from his wife of Mr. Gibson's proposal, he was\nas much pleased as she at the prospect of their youthful visitor;\nfor he was a man of a hearty hospitality, when his pride did not\ninterfere with its gratification; and he was delighted to think of\nhis sick wife's having such an agreeable companion in her hours of\nloneliness. After a while he said,--\"It's as well the lads are at\nCambridge; we might have been having a love-affair if they had been\nat home.\"\n\n\"Well--and if we had?\" asked his more romantic wife.\n\n\"It wouldn't have done,\" said the Squire, decidedly. \"Osborne\nwill have had a first-rate education--as good as any man in the\ncounty--he'll have this property, and he's a Hamley of Hamley; not a\nfamily in the shire is as old as we are, or settled on their ground\nso well. Osborne may marry where he likes. If Lord Hollingford had a\ndaughter, Osborne would have been as good a match as she could have\nrequired. It would never do for him to fall in love with Gibson's\ndaughter--I shouldn't allow it. So it's as well he's out of the way.\"\n\n\"Well! perhaps Osborne had better look higher.\"\n\n\"Perhaps! I say he must.\" The Squire brought his hand down with a\nthump on the table, near him, which made his wife's heart beat hard\nfor some minutes. \"And as for Roger,\" he continued, unconscious of\nthe flutter he had put her into, \"he'll have to make his own way,\nand earn his own bread; and, I'm afraid, he's not getting on very\nbrilliantly at Cambridge. He mustn't think of falling in love for\nthese ten years.\"\n\n\"Unless he marries a fortune,\" said Mrs. Hamley, more by way of\nconcealing her palpitation than anything else; for she was unworldly\nand romantic to a fault.\n\n\"No son of mine shall ever marry a wife who is richer than himself\nwith my good will,\" said the Squire again, with emphasis, but without\na thump.\n\n\"I don't say but what if Roger is gaining five hundred a year by\nthe time he's thirty, he shall not choose a wife with ten thousand\npounds down; but I do say, if a boy of mine, with only two hundred a\nyear--which is all Roger will have from us, and that not for a long\ntime--goes and marries a woman with fifty thousand to her portion,\nI'll disown him--it would be just disgusting.\"\n\n\"Not if they loved each other, and their whole happiness depended\nupon their marrying each other,\" put in Mrs. Hamley, mildly.\n\n\"Pooh! away with love! Nay, my dear, we loved each other so dearly\nwe should never have been happy with any one else; but that's a\ndifferent thing. People aren't like what they were when we were\nyoung. All the love nowadays is just silly fancy, and sentimental\nromance, as far as I can see.\"\n\nMr. Gibson thought that he had settled everything about Molly's going\nto Hamley before he spoke to her about it, which he did not do, until\nthe morning of the day on which Mrs. Hamley expected her. Then he\nsaid,--\"By the way, Molly! you're to go to Hamley this afternoon;\nMrs. Hamley wants you to go to her for a week or two, and it suits me\ncapitally that you should accept her invitation just now.\"\n\n\"Go to Hamley! This afternoon! Papa, you've got some odd reason at\nthe back of your head--some mystery, or something. Please, tell me\nwhat it is. Go to Hamley for a week or two! Why, I never was from\nhome before this without you in all my life.\"\n\n\"Perhaps not. I don't think you ever walked before you put your feet\nto the ground. Everything must have a beginning.\"\n\n\"It has something to do with that letter that was directed to me, but\nthat you took out of my hands before I could even see the writing of\nthe direction.\" She fixed her grey eyes on her father's face, as if\nshe meant to pluck out his secret.\n\nHe only smiled and said,--\"You're a witch, goosey!\"\n\n\"Then it had! But if it was a note from Mrs. Hamley, why might I\nnot see it? I have been wondering if you had some plan in your head\never since that day.--Thursday, wasn't it? You've gone about in a\nkind of thoughtful, perplexed way, just like a conspirator. Tell me,\npapa\"--coming up to him, and putting on a beseeching manner--\"why\nmightn't I see that note? and why am I to go to Hamley all on a\nsudden?\"\n\n\"Don't you like to go? Would you rather not?\" If she had said that\nshe did not want to go he would have been rather pleased than\notherwise, although it would have put him into a great perplexity;\nbut he was beginning to dread the parting from her even for so short\na time. However, she replied directly,--\n\n\"I don't know--I daresay I shall like it when I have thought a little\nmore about it. Just now I'm so startled by the suddenness of the\naffair, I haven't considered whether I shall like it or not. I shan't\nlike going away from you, I know. Why am I to go, papa?\"\n\n\"There are three old ladies sitting somewhere, and thinking about\nyou just at this very minute; one has a distaff in her hands, and is\nspinning a thread; she has come to a knot in it, and is puzzled what\nto do with it. Her sister has a great pair of scissors in her hands,\nand wants--as she always does, when any difficulty arises in the\nsmoothness of the thread--to cut it off short; but the third, who has\nthe most head of the three, plans how to undo the knot; and she it is\nwho has decided that you are to go to Hamley. The others are quite\nconvinced by her arguments; so, as the Fates have decreed that this\nvisit is to be paid, there is nothing left for you and me but to\nsubmit.\"\n\n\"That's all nonsense, papa, and you're only making me more curious to\nfind out this hidden reason.\"\n\nMr. Gibson changed his tone, and spoke gravely now. \"There is a\nreason, Molly, and one which I do not wish to give. When I tell you\nthis much, I expect you to be an honourable girl, and to try and not\neven conjecture what the reason may be,--much less endeavour to put\nlittle discoveries together till very likely you may find out what I\nwant to conceal.\"\n\n\"Papa, I won't even think about your reason again. But then I shall\nhave to plague you with another question. I've had no new gown this\nyear, and I've outgrown all my last summer frocks. I've only three\nthat I can wear at all. Betty was saying only yesterday that I ought\nto have some more.\"\n\n\"That'll do that you have got on, won't it? It's a very pretty\ncolour.\"\n\n\"Yes; but, papa\" (holding it out as if she was going to dance), \"it's\nmade of woollen, and so hot and heavy; and every day it will be\ngetting warmer.\"\n\n\"I wish girls could dress like boys,\" said Mr. Gibson, with a little\nimpatience. \"How is a man to know when his daughter wants clothes?\nand how is he to rig her out when he finds it out, just when she\nneeds them most and hasn't got them?\"\n\n\"Ah, that's the question!\" said Molly, in some despair.\n\n\"Can't you go to Miss Rose's? Doesn't she keep ready-made frocks for\ngirls of your age?\"\n\n\"Miss Rose! I never had anything from her in my life,\" replied Molly,\nin some surprise; for Miss Rose was the great dressmaker and milliner\nof the little town, and hitherto Betty had made the girl's frocks.\n\n\"Well, but it seems people consider you as a young woman now, and\nso I suppose you must run up milliners' bills like the rest of your\nkind. Not that you're to get anything anywhere that you can't pay for\ndown in ready money. Here's a ten-pound note; go to Miss Rose's, or\nMiss anybody's, and get what you want at once. The Hamley carriage\nis to come for you at two, and anything that isn't quite ready, can\neasily be sent by their cart on Saturday, when some of their people\nalways come to market. Nay, don't thank me! I don't want to have the\nmoney spent, and I don't want you to go and leave me: I shall miss\nyou, I know; it's only hard necessity that drives me to send you\na-visiting, and to throw away ten pounds on your clothes. There, go\naway; you're a plague, and I mean to leave off loving you as fast as\nI can.\"\n\n\"Papa!\" holding up her finger as in warning, \"you're getting\nmysterious again; and though my honourableness is very strong, I\nwon't promise that it shall not yield to my curiosity if you go on\nhinting at untold secrets.\"\n\n\"Go away and spend your ten pounds. What did I give it you for but to\nkeep you quiet?\"\n\nMiss Rose's ready-made resources and Molly's taste combined, did not\narrive at a very great success. She bought a lilac print, because\nit would wash, and would be cool and pleasant for the mornings; and\nthis Betty could make at home before Saturday. And for high-days and\nholidays--by which was understood afternoons and Sundays--Miss Rose\npersuaded her to order a gay-coloured flimsy plaid silk, which she\nassured her was quite the latest fashion in London, and which Molly\nthought would please her father's Scotch blood. But when he saw the\nscrap which she had brought home as a pattern, he cried out that the\nplaid belonged to no clan in existence, and that Molly ought to have\nknown this by instinct. It was too late to change it, however, for\nMiss Rose had promised to cut the dress out as soon as Molly left her\nshop.\n\nMr. Gibson had hung about the town all the morning instead of going\naway on his usual distant rides. He passed his daughter once or twice\nin the street, but he did not cross over when he was on the opposite\nside--only gave her a look or a nod, and went on his way, scolding\nhimself for his weakness in feeling so much pain at the thought of\nher absence for a fortnight or so.\n\n\"And, after all,\" thought he, \"I'm only where I was when she comes\nback; at least, if that foolish fellow goes on with his imaginating\nfancy. She'll have to come back some time, and if he chooses to\nimagine himself constant, there's still the devil to pay.\" Presently\nhe began to hum the air out of the \"Beggar's Opera\"--\n\n   I wonder any man alive\n     Should ever rear a daughter.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VI.\n\nA VISIT TO THE HAMLEYS.\n\n\nOf course the news of Miss Gibson's approaching departure had spread\nthrough the household before the one o'clock dinner-time came; and\nMr. Coxe's dismal countenance was a source of much inward irritation\nto Mr. Gibson, who kept giving the youth sharp glances of savage\nreproof for his melancholy face, and want of appetite; which he\ntrotted out, with a good deal of sad ostentation; all of which was\nlost upon Molly, who was too full of her own personal concerns to\nhave any thought or observation to spare from them, excepting once or\ntwice when she thought of the many days that must pass over before\nshe should again sit down to dinner with her father.\n\nWhen she named this to him after the meal was over, and they were\nsitting together in the drawing-room, waiting for the sound of the\nwheels of the Hamley carriage, he laughed, and said,--\n\n\"I'm coming over to-morrow to see Mrs. Hamley; and I daresay I shall\ndine at their lunch; so you won't have to wait long before you've the\ntreat of seeing the wild beast feed.\"\n\nThen they heard the approaching carriage.\n\n\"Oh, papa,\" said Molly, catching at his hand, \"I do so wish I wasn't\ngoing, now that the time is come.\"\n\n\"Nonsense; don't let us have any sentiment. Have you got your keys?\nthat's more to the purpose.\"\n\nYes; she had got her keys, and her purse; and her little box was\nput up on the seat by the coachman; and her father handed her in;\nthe door was shut, and she drove away in solitary grandeur, looking\nback and kissing her hand to her father, who stood at the gate, in\nspite of his dislike of sentiment, as long as the carriage could\nbe seen. Then he turned into the surgery, and found Mr. Coxe had\nhad his watching too, and had, indeed, remained at the window\ngazing, moonstruck, at the empty road, up which the young lady had\ndisappeared. Mr. Gibson startled him from his reverie by a sharp,\nalmost venomous, speech about some small neglect of duty a day or two\nbefore. That night Mr. Gibson insisted on passing by the bedside of a\npoor girl whose parents were worn-out by many wakeful anxious nights\nsucceeding to hard-working days.\n\nMolly cried a little, but checked her tears as soon as she remembered\nhow annoyed her father would have been at the sight of them. It\nwas very pleasant driving quickly along in the luxurious carriage,\nthrough the pretty green lanes, with dog-roses and honeysuckles so\nplentiful and rathe in the hedges, that she once or twice was tempted\nto ask the coachman to stop till she had gathered a nosegay. She\nbegan to dread the end of her little journey of seven miles; the only\ndrawback to which was, that her silk was not a true clan-tartan, and\na little uncertainty as to Miss Rose's punctuality. At length they\ncame to a village; straggling cottages lined the road, an old church\nstood on a kind of green, with the public-house close by it; there\nwas a great tree, with a bench all round the trunk, midway between\nthe church gates and the little inn. The wooden stocks were close to\nthe gates. Molly had long passed the limit of her rides, but she knew\nthis must be the village of Hamley, and that they must be very near\nto the hall.\n\nThey swung in at the gates of the park in a few minutes, and drove up\nthrough meadow-grass, ripening for hay,--it was no grand aristocratic\ndeer-park this--to the old red-brick hall; not three hundred yards\nfrom the high-road. There had been no footman sent with the carriage,\nbut a respectable servant stood at the door, even before they drew\nup, ready to receive the expected visitor, and take her into the\ndrawing-room where his mistress lay awaiting her.\n\nMrs. Hamley rose from her sofa to give Molly a gentle welcome; she\nkept the girl's hand in hers after she had finished speaking, looking\ninto her face, as if studying it, and unconscious of the faint blush\nshe called up on the otherwise colourless cheeks.\n\n\"I think we shall be great friends,\" said she, at length. \"I like\nyour face, and I am always guided by first impressions. Give me a\nkiss, my dear.\"\n\nIt was far easier to be active than passive during this process of\n\"swearing eternal friendship,\" and Molly willingly kissed the sweet\npale face held up to her.\n\n\"I meant to have gone and fetched you myself; but the heat oppresses\nme, and I did not feel up to the exertion. I hope you had a pleasant\ndrive?\"\n\n\"Very,\" said Molly, with shy conciseness.\n\n\"And now I will take you to your room; I have had you put close to\nme; I thought you would like it better, even though it was a smaller\nroom than the other.\"\n\nShe rose languidly, and wrapping her light shawl round her yet\nelegant figure, led the way upstairs. Molly's bedroom opened\nout of Mrs. Hamley's private sitting-room; on the other side of\nwhich was her own bedroom. She showed Molly this easy means of\ncommunication, and then, telling her visitor she would await her in\nthe sitting-room, she closed the door, and Molly was left at leisure\nto make acquaintance with her surroundings.\n\nFirst of all, she went to the window to see what was to be seen.\nA flower-garden right below; a meadow of ripe grass just beyond,\nchanging colour in long sweeps, as the soft wind blew over it; great\nold forest-trees a little on one side; and, beyond them again, to be\nseen only by standing very close to the side of the window-sill, or\nby putting her head out, if the window was open, the silver shimmer\nof a mere, about a quarter of a mile off. On the opposite side to the\ntrees and the mere, the look-out was bounded by the old walls and\nhigh-peaked roofs of the extensive farm-buildings. The deliciousness\nof the early summer silence was only broken by the song of the birds,\nand the nearer hum of bees. Listening to these sounds, which enhanced\nthe exquisite sense of stillness, and puzzling out objects obscured\nby distance or shadow, Molly forgot herself, and was suddenly\nstartled into a sense of the present by a sound of voices in the\nnext room--some servant or other speaking to Mrs. Hamley. Molly\nhurried to unpack her box, and arrange her few clothes in the\npretty old-fashioned chest of drawers, which was to serve her\nas dressing-table as well. All the furniture in the room was as\nold-fashioned and as well-preserved as it could be. The chintz\ncurtains were Indian calico of the last century--the colours almost\nwashed out, but the stuff itself exquisitely clean. There was a\nlittle strip of bedside carpeting, but the wooden flooring, thus\nliberally displayed, was of finely-grained oak, so firmly joined,\nplank to plank, that no grain of dust could make its way into the\ninterstices. There were none of the luxuries of modern days; no\nwriting-table, or sofa, or pier-glass. In one corner of the walls was\na bracket, holding an Indian jar filled with pot-pourri; and that and\nthe climbing honeysuckle outside the open window scented the room\nmore exquisitely than any toilette perfumes. Molly laid out her white\ngown (of last year's date and size) upon the bed, ready for the (to\nher new) operation of dressing for dinner, and having arranged her\nhair and dress, and taken out her company worsted-work, she opened\nthe door softly, and saw Mrs. Hamley lying on the sofa.\n\n\"Shall we stay up here, my dear? I think it is pleasanter than\ndown below; and then I shall not have to come upstairs again at\ndressing-time.\"\n\n\"I shall like it very much,\" replied Molly.\n\n\"Ah! you've got your sewing, like a good girl,\" said Mrs. Hamley.\n\"Now, I don't sew much. I live alone a great deal. You see, both\nmy boys are at Cambridge, and the squire is out of doors all day\nlong--so I have almost forgotten how to sew. I read a great deal. Do\nyou like reading?\"\n\n\"It depends upon the kind of book,\" said Molly. \"I'm afraid I don't\nlike 'steady reading,' as papa calls it.\"\n\n\"But you like poetry!\" said Mrs. Hamley, almost interrupting Molly.\n\"I was sure you did, from your face. Have you read this last poem of\nMrs. Hemans? Shall I read it aloud to you?\"\n\nSo she began. Molly was not so much absorbed in listening but that\nshe could glance round the room. The character of the furniture was\nmuch the same as in her own. Old-fashioned, of handsome material,\nand faultlessly clean, the age and the foreign appearance of it gave\nan aspect of comfort and picturesqueness to the whole apartment. On\nthe walls there hung some crayon sketches--portraits. She thought\nshe could make out that one of them was a likeness of Mrs. Hamley,\nin her beautiful youth. And then she became interested in the poem,\nand dropped her work, and listened in a manner that was after Mrs.\nHamley's own heart. When the reading of the poem was ended, Mrs.\nHamley replied to some of Molly's words of admiration, by saying:\n\n\"Ah! I think I must read you some of Osborne's poetry some day; under\nseal of secrecy, remember; but I really fancy they are almost as good\nas Mrs. Hemans'.\"\n\nTo be nearly as good as Mrs. Hemans' was saying as much to the young\nladies of that day, as saying that poetry is nearly as good as\nTennyson's would be in this. Molly looked up with eager interest.\n\n\"Mr. Osborne Hamley? Does your son write poetry?\"\n\n\"Yes. I really think I may say he is a poet. He is a very brilliant,\nclever young man, and he quite hopes to get a fellowship at Trinity.\nHe says he is sure to be high up among the wranglers, and that\nhe expects to get one of the Chancellor's medals. That is his\nlikeness--the one hanging against the wall behind you.\"\n\nMolly turned round, and saw one of the crayon sketches--representing\ntwo boys, in the most youthful kind of jackets and trousers, and\nfalling collars. The elder was sitting down, reading intently.\nThe younger was standing by him, and evidently trying to call the\nattention of the reader off to some object out of doors--out of\nthe window of the very room in which they were sitting, as Molly\ndiscovered when she began to recognize the articles of furniture\nfaintly indicated in the picture.\n\n\"I like their faces!\" said Molly. \"I suppose it is so long ago now,\nthat I may speak of their likenesses to you as if they were somebody\nelse; may not I?\"\n\n\"Certainly,\" said Mrs. Hamley, as soon as she understood what Molly\nmeant. \"Tell me just what you think of them, my dear; it will amuse\nme to compare your impressions with what they really are.\"\n\n\"Oh! but I did not mean to guess at their characters. I could not do\nit; and it would be impertinent, if I could. I can only speak about\ntheir faces as I see them in the picture.\"\n\n\"Well! tell me what you think of them!\"\n\n\"The eldest--the reading boy--is very beautiful; but I can't quite\nmake out his face yet, because his head is down, and I can't see the\neyes. That is the Mr. Osborne Hamley who writes poetry.\"\n\n\"Yes. He is not quite so handsome now; but he was a beautiful boy.\nRoger was never to be compared with him.\"\n\n\"No; he is not handsome. And yet I like his face. I can see his eyes.\nThey are grave and solemn-looking; but all the rest of his face is\nrather merry than otherwise. It looks too steady and sober, too good\na face, to go tempting his brother to leave his lesson.\"\n\n\"Ah! but it was not a lesson. I remember the painter, Mr. Green, once\nsaw Osborne reading some poetry, while Roger was trying to persuade\nhim to come out and have a ride in the hay-cart--that was the\n'motive' of the picture, to speak artistically. Roger is not much of\na reader; at least, he doesn't care for poetry, and books of romance,\nor sentiment. He is so fond of natural history; and that takes him,\nlike the squire, a great deal out of doors; and when he is in, he is\nalways reading scientific books that bear upon his pursuits. He is a\ngood, steady fellow, though, and gives us great satisfaction, but he\nis not likely to have such a brilliant career as Osborne.\"\n\nMolly tried to find out in the picture the characteristics of the\ntwo boys, as they were now explained to her by their mother; and in\nquestions and answers about the various drawings hung round the room\nthe time passed away until the dressing-bell rang for the six o'clock\ndinner.\n\nMolly was rather dismayed by the offers of the maid whom Mrs. Hamley\nhad sent to assist her. \"I am afraid they expect me to be very\nsmart,\" she kept thinking to herself. \"If they do, they'll be\ndisappointed; that's all. But I wish my plaid silk gown had been\nready.\"\n\nShe looked at herself in the glass with some anxiety, for the first\ntime in her life. She saw a slight, lean figure, promising to be\ntall; a complexion browner than cream-coloured, although in a year or\ntwo it might have that tint; plentiful curly black hair, tied up in a\nbunch behind with a rose-coloured ribbon; long, almond-shaped, soft\ngray eyes, shaded both above and below by curling black eyelashes.\n\n\"I don't think I am pretty,\" thought Molly, as she turned away from\nthe glass; \"and yet I'm not sure.\" She would have been sure, if,\ninstead of inspecting herself with such solemnity, she had smiled her\nown sweet merry smile, and called out the gleam of her teeth, and the\ncharm of her dimples.\n\nShe found her way downstairs into the drawing-room in good time;\nshe could look about her, and learn how to feel at home in her\nnew quarters. The room was forty-feet long or so, fitted up with\nyellow satin at some distant period; high spindle-legged chairs and\npembroke-tables abounded. The carpet was of the same date as the\ncurtains, and was thread-bare in many places; and in others was\ncovered with drugget. Stands of plants, great jars of flowers,\nold Indian china and cabinets gave the room the pleasant aspect\nit certainly had. And to add to it, there were five high, long\nwindows on one side of the room, all opening to the prettiest\nbit of flower-garden in the grounds--or what was considered as\nsuch--brilliant-coloured, geometrically-shaped beds, converging\nto a sun-dial in the midst. The Squire came in abruptly, and in\nhis morning dress; he stood at the door, as if surprised at the\nwhite-robed stranger in possession of his hearth. Then, suddenly\nremembering himself, but not before Molly had begun to feel very hot,\nhe said--\n\n\"Why, God bless my soul, I'd quite forgotten you; you're Miss Gibson,\nGibson's daughter, aren't you? Come to pay us a visit? I'm sure I'm\nvery glad to see you, my dear.\"\n\nBy this time, they had met in the middle of the room, and he was\nshaking Molly's hand with vehement friendliness, intended to make up\nfor his not knowing her at first.\n\n\"I must go and dress, though,\" said he, looking at his soiled\ngaiters. \"Madam likes it. It's one of her fine London ways, and she's\nbroken me into it at last. Very good plan, though, and quite right\nto make oneself fit for ladies' society. Does your father dress for\ndinner, Miss Gibson?\" He did not stay to wait for her answer, but\nhastened away to perform his toilette.\n\nThey dined at a small table in a great large room. There were so few\narticles of furniture in it, and the apartment itself was so vast,\nthat Molly longed for the snugness of the home dining-room; nay,\nit is to be feared that, before the stately dinner at Hamley Hall\ncame to an end, she even regretted the crowded chairs and tables,\nthe hurry of eating, the quick unformal manner in which everybody\nseemed to finish their meal as fast as possible, and to return to the\nwork they had left. She tried to think that at six o'clock all the\nbusiness of the day was ended, and that people might linger if they\nchose. She measured the distance from the sideboard to the table with\nher eye, and made allowances for the men who had to carry things\nbackwards and forwards; but, all the same, this dinner appeared to\nher a wearisome business, prolonged because the Squire liked it, for\nMrs. Hamley seemed tired out. She ate even less than Molly, and sent\nfor fan and smelling-bottle to amuse herself with, until at length\nthe table-cloth was cleared away, and the dessert was put upon a\nmahogany table, polished like a looking-glass.\n\nThe Squire had hitherto been too busy to talk, except about the\nimmediate concerns of the table, and one or two of the greatest\nbreaks to the usual monotony of his days; a monotony in which he\ndelighted, but which sometimes became oppressive to his wife. Now,\nhowever, peeling his orange, he turned to Molly--\n\n\"To-morrow you'll have to do this for me, Miss Gibson.\"\n\n\"Shall I? I'll do it to-day, if you like, sir.\"\n\n\"No; to-day I shall treat you as a visitor, with all proper ceremony.\nTo-morrow I shall send you errands, and call you by your Christian\nname.\"\n\n\"I shall like that,\" said Molly.\n\n\"I was wanting to call you something less formal than Miss Gibson,\"\nsaid Mrs. Hamley.\n\n\"My name is Molly. It is an old-fashioned name, and I was christened\nMary. But papa likes Molly.\"\n\n\"That's right. Keep to the good old fashions, my dear.\"\n\n\"Well, I must say I think Mary is prettier than Molly, and quite as\nold a name, too,\" said Mrs. Hamley.\n\n\"I think it was,\" said Molly, lowering her voice, and dropping her\neyes, \"because mamma was Mary, and I was called Molly while she\nlived.\"\n\n\"Ah, poor thing,\" said the squire, not perceiving his wife's signs\nto change the subject, \"I remember how sorry every one was when she\ndied; no one thought she was delicate, she had such a fresh colour,\ntill all at once she popped off, as one may say.\"\n\n\"It must have been a terrible blow to your father,\" said Mrs. Hamley,\nseeing that Molly did not know what to answer.\n\n\"Ay, ay. It came so sudden, so soon after they were married.\"\n\n\"I thought it was nearly four years,\" said Molly.\n\n\"And four years is soon--is a short time to a couple who look to\nspending their lifetime together. Every one thought Gibson would have\nmarried again.\"\n\n\"Hush,\" said Mrs. Hamley, seeing in Molly's eyes and change of colour\nhow completely this was a new idea to her. But the squire was not so\neasily stopped.\n\n\"Well--I'd perhaps better not have said it, but it's the truth; they\ndid. He's not likely to marry now, so one may say it out. Why, your\nfather is past forty, isn't he?\"\n\n\"Forty-three. I don't believe he ever thought of marrying again,\"\nsaid Molly, recurring to the idea, as one does to that of danger\nwhich has passed by, without one's being aware of it.\n\n\"No! I don't believe he did, my dear. He looks to me just like a man\nwho would be constant to the memory of his wife. You must not mind\nwhat the squire says.\"\n\n\"Ah! you'd better go away, if you're going to teach Miss Gibson such\ntreason as that against the master of the house.\"\n\nMolly went into the drawing-room with Mrs. Hamley, but her thoughts\ndid not change with the room. She could not help dwelling on the\ndanger which she fancied she had escaped, and was astonished at\nher own stupidity at never having imagined such a possibility as\nher father's second marriage. She felt that she was answering Mrs.\nHamley's remarks in a very unsatisfactory manner.\n\n\"There is papa, with the Squire!\" she suddenly exclaimed. There they\nwere coming across the flower-garden from the stable-yard, her father\nswitching his boots with his riding whip, in order to make them\npresentable in Mrs. Hamley's drawing-room. He looked so exactly like\nhis usual self, his home-self, that the seeing him in the flesh was\nthe most efficacious way of dispelling the phantom fears of a second\nwedding, which were beginning to harass his daughter's mind; and the\npleasant conviction that he could not rest till he had come over\nto see how she was going on in her new home, stole into her heart,\nalthough he spoke but little to her, and that little was all in a\njoking tone. After he had gone away, the Squire undertook to teach\nher cribbage, and she was happy enough now to give him all her\nattention. He kept on prattling while they played; sometimes in\nrelation to the cards; at others telling her of small occurrences\nwhich he thought might interest her.\n\n\"So you don't know my boys, even by sight. I should have thought you\nwould have done, for they're fond enough of riding into Hollingford;\nand I know Roger has often enough been to borrow books from your\nfather. Roger is a scientific sort of a fellow. Osborne is clever,\nlike his mother. I shouldn't wonder if he published a book some day.\nYou're not counting right, Miss Gibson. Why, I could cheat you as\neasily as possible.\" And so on, till the butler came in with a solemn\nlook, placed a large prayer-book before his master, who huddled the\ncards away in a hurry, as if caught in an incongruous employment; and\nthen the maids and men trooped in to prayers--the windows were still\nopen, and the sounds of the solitary corncrake, and the owl hooting\nin the trees, mingled with the words spoken. Then to bed; and so\nended the day.\n\nMolly looked out of her chamber window--leaning on the sill, and\nsnuffing up the night odours of the honeysuckle. The soft velvet\ndarkness hid everything that was at any distance from her; although\nshe was as conscious of their presence as if she had seen them.\n\n\"I think I shall be very happy here,\" was in Molly's thoughts, as she\nturned away at length, and began to prepare for bed. Before long the\nSquire's words, relating to her father's second marriage, came across\nher, and spoilt the sweet peace of her final thoughts. \"Who could he\nhave married?\" she asked herself. \"Miss Eyre? Miss Browning? Miss\nPhoebe? Miss Goodenough?\" One by one, each of these was rejected\nfor sufficient reasons. Yet the unsatisfied question rankled in her\nmind, and darted out of ambush to disturb her dreams.\n\nMrs. Hamley did not come down to breakfast; and Molly found out\nwith a little dismay, that the Squire and she were to have it by\nthemselves. On this first morning he put aside his newspapers--one\nan old established Tory journal, with all the local and county\nnews, which was the most interesting to him; the other the _Morning\nChronicle_, which he called his dose of bitters, and which called out\nmany a strong expression and tolerably pungent oath. To-day, however,\nhe was \"on his manners,\" as he afterwards explained to Molly; and he\nplunged about, trying to find ground for a conversation. He could\ntalk of his wife and his sons, his estate, and his mode of farming;\nhis tenants, and the mismanagement of the last county election.\nMolly's interests were her father, Miss Eyre, her garden and pony;\nin a fainter degree Miss Brownings, the Cumnor Charity School, and\nthe new gown that was to come from Miss Rose's; into the midst of\nwhich the one great question, \"Who was it that people thought it was\npossible papa might marry?\" kept popping up into her mouth, like a\ntroublesome Jack-in-the-box. For the present, however, the lid was\nsnapped down upon the intruder as often as he showed his head between\nher teeth. They were very polite to each other during the meal; and\nit was not a little tiresome to both. When it was ended the Squire\nwithdrew into his study to read the untasted newspapers. It was\nthe custom to call the room in which Squire Hamley kept his coats,\nboots, and gaiters, his different sticks and favourite spud, his\ngun and fishing-rods, \"the study.\" There was a bureau in it, and a\nthree-cornered arm-chair, but no books were visible. The greater part\nof them were kept in a large, musty-smelling room, in an unfrequented\npart of the house; so unfrequented that the housemaid often neglected\nto open the window-shutters, which looked into a part of the grounds\nover-grown with the luxuriant growth of shrubs. Indeed, it was a\ntradition in the servants' hall that, in the late squire's time--he\nwho had been plucked at college--the library windows had been boarded\nup to avoid paying the window-tax. And when the \"young gentlemen\"\nwere at home the housemaid, without a single direction to that\neffect, was regular in her charge of this room; opened the windows\nand lighted fires daily, and dusted the handsomely-bound volumes,\nwhich were really a very fair collection of the standard literature\nin the middle of the last century. All the books that had been\npurchased since that time were held in small book-cases between\neach two of the drawing-room windows, and in Mrs. Hamley's own\nsitting-room upstairs. Those in the drawing-room were quite enough to\nemploy Molly; indeed, she was so deep in one of Sir Walter Scott's\nnovels that she jumped as if she had been shot, when an hour or so\nafter breakfast the Squire came to the gravel-path outside one of the\nwindows, and called to ask her if she would like to come out of doors\nand go about the garden and home-fields with him.\n\n\"It must be a little dull for you, my girl, all by yourself, with\nnothing but books to look at, in the mornings here; but you see,\nmadam has a fancy for being quiet in the mornings: she told your\nfather about it, and so did I, but I felt sorry for you all the same,\nwhen I saw you sitting on the ground all alone in the drawing-room.\"\n\nMolly had been in the very middle of the _Bride of Lammermoor_, and\nwould gladly have stayed in-doors to finish it, but she felt the\nsquire's kindness all the same. They went in and out of old-fashioned\ngreenhouses, over trim lawns, the Squire unlocked the great walled\nkitchen-garden, and went about giving directions to gardeners; and\nall the time Molly followed him like a little dog, her mind quite\nfull of \"Ravenswood\" and \"Lucy Ashton.\" Presently, every place near\nthe house had been inspected and regulated, and the Squire was more\nat liberty to give his attention to his companion, as they passed\nthrough the little wood that separated the gardens from the adjoining\nfields. Molly, too, plucked away her thoughts from the seventeenth\ncentury; and, somehow or other, that one question, which had so\nhaunted her before, came out of her lips before she was aware--a\nliteral impromptu,--\n\n\"Who did people think papa would marry? That time--long ago--soon\nafter mamma died?\"\n\nShe dropped her voice very soft and low, as she spoke the last words.\nThe Squire turned round upon her, and looked at her face, he knew not\nwhy. It was very grave, a little pale, but her steady eyes almost\ncommanded some kind of answer.\n\n\"Whew,\" said he, whistling to gain time; not that he had anything\ndefinite to say, for no one had ever had any reason to join Mr.\nGibson's name with any known lady: it was only a loose conjecture\nthat had been hazarded on the probabilities--a young widower, with a\nlittle girl.\n\n\"I never heard of any one--his name was never coupled with any\nlady's--'twas only in the nature of things that he should marry\nagain; he may do it yet, for aught I know, and I don't think it would\nbe a bad move either. I told him so, the last time but one he was\nhere.\"\n\n\"And what did he say?\" asked breathless Molly.\n\n\"Oh: he only smiled and said nothing. You shouldn't take up words so\nseriously, my dear. Very likely he may never think of marrying again,\nand if he did, it would be a very good thing both for him and for\nyou!\"\n\nMolly muttered something, as if to herself, but the Squire might have\nheard it if he had chosen. As it was, he wisely turned the current of\nthe conversation.\n\n\"Look at that!\" he said, as they suddenly came upon the mere, or\nlarge pond. There was a small island in the middle of the glassy\nwater, on which grew tall trees, dark Scotch firs in the centre,\nsilvery shimmering willows close to the water's edge. \"We must get\nyou punted over there, some of these days. I'm not fond of using the\nboat at this time of the year, because the young birds are still in\nthe nests among the reeds and water-plants; but we'll go. There are\ncoots and grebes.\"\n\n\"Oh, look, there's a swan!\"\n\n\"Yes; there are two pair of them here. And in those trees there's\nboth a rookery and a heronry; the herons ought to be here by now, for\nthey're off to the sea in August, but I've not seen one yet. Stay!\nisn't that one--that fellow on a stone, with his long neck bent down,\nlooking into the water?\"\n\n\"Yes! I think so. I have never seen a heron, only pictures of them.\"\n\n\"They and the rooks are always at war, which doesn't do for such near\nneighbours. If both herons leave the nest they are building, the\nrooks come and tear it to pieces; and once Roger showed me a long\nstraggling fellow of a heron, with a flight of rooks after him, with\nno friendly purpose in their minds, I'll be bound. Roger knows a deal\nof natural history, and finds out queer things sometimes. He'd have\nbeen off a dozen times during this walk of ours, if he'd been here:\nhis eyes are always wandering about, and see twenty things where I\nonly see one. Why! I've known him bolt into a copse because he saw\nsomething fifteen yards off--some plant, maybe, which he'd tell me\nwas very rare, though I should say I'd seen its marrow at every turn\nin the woods; and, if we came upon such a thing as this,\" touching\na delicate film of a cobweb upon a leaf with his stick, as he spoke,\n\"why, he could tell you what insect or spider made it, and if it\nlived in rotten fir-wood, or in a cranny of good sound timber, or\ndeep down in the ground, or up in the sky, or anywhere. It's a pity\nthey don't take honours in Natural History at Cambridge. Roger would\nbe safe enough if they did.\"\n\n\"Mr. Osborne Hamley is very clever, is he not?\" Molly asked, timidly.\n\n\"Oh, yes. Osborne's a bit of a genius. His mother looks for great\nthings from Osborne. I'm rather proud of him myself. He'll get a\nTrinity fellowship, if they play him fair. As I was saying at the\nmagistrates' meeting yesterday, 'I've got a son who will make a noise\nat Cambridge, or I'm very much mistaken.' Now, isn't it a queer quip\nof Nature,\" continued the squire, turning his honest face towards\nMolly, as if he was going to impart a new idea to her, \"that I, a\nHamley of Hamley, straight in descent from nobody knows where--the\nHeptarchy, they say--What's the date of the Heptarchy?\"\n\n\"I don't know,\" said Molly, startled at being thus appealed to.\n\n\"Well! it was some time before King Alfred, because he was the\nKing of all England, you know; but, as I was saying, here am I, of\nas good and as old a descent as any man in England, and I doubt\nif a stranger, to look at me, would take me for a gentleman, with\nmy red face, great hands and feet, and thick figure, fourteen\nstone, and never less than twelve even when I was a young man; and\nthere's Osborne, who takes after his mother, who couldn't tell her\ngreat-grandfather from Adam, bless her; and Osborne has a girl's\ndelicate face, and a slight make, and hands and feet as small as a\nlady's. He takes after madam's side, who, as I said, can't tell who\nwas her grandfather. Now, Roger is like me, a Hamley of Hamley, and\nno one who sees him in the street will ever think that red-brown,\nbig-boned, clumsy chap is of gentle blood. Yet all those Cumnor\npeople, you make such ado of in Hollingford, are mere muck of\nyesterday. I was talking to madam the other day about Osborne's\nmarrying a daughter of Lord Hollingford's--that's to say, if he had\na daughter--he's only got boys, as it happens; but I'm not sure if\nI should consent to it. I really am not sure; for you see Osborne\nwill have had a first-rate education, and his family dates from the\nHeptarchy, while I should be glad to know where the Cumnor folk were\nin the time of Queen Anne?\" He walked on, pondering the question of\nwhether he could have given his consent to this impossible marriage;\nand after some time, and when Molly had quite forgotten the subject\nto which he alluded, he broke out with--\"No! I'm sure I should have\nlooked higher. So, perhaps, it's as well my Lord Hollingford has only\nboys.\"\n\nAfter a while, he thanked Molly for her companionship, with\nold-fashioned courtesy; and told her that he thought, by this time,\nmadam would be up and dressed, and glad to have her young visitor\nwith her. He pointed out the deep purple house, with its stone\nfacings, as it was seen at some distance between the trees, and\nwatched her protectingly on her way along the field-paths.\n\n\"That's a nice girl of Gibson's,\" quoth he to himself. \"But what a\ntight hold the wench got of the notion of his marrying again! One had\nneed be on one's guard as to what one says before her. To think of\nher never having thought of the chance of a stepmother. To be sure, a\nstepmother to a girl is a different thing to a second wife to a man!\"\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VII.\n\nFORESHADOWS OF LOVE PERILS.\n\n\n[Illustration (untitled)]\n\nIf Squire Hamley had been unable to tell Molly who had ever been\nthought of as her father's second wife, fate was all this time\npreparing an answer of a pretty positive kind to her wondering\ncuriosity. But fate is a cunning hussy, and builds up her plans as\nimperceptibly as a bird builds her nest; and with much the same kind\nof unconsidered trifles. The first \"trifle\" of an event was the\ndisturbance which Jenny (Mr. Gibson's cook) chose to make at Bethia's\nbeing dismissed. Bethia was a distant relation and protégée of\nJenny's, and she chose to say it was Mr. Coxe the tempter who ought\nto have \"been sent packing,\" not Bethia the tempted, the victim. In\nthis view there was quite enough plausibility to make Mr. Gibson\nfeel that he had been rather unjust. He had, however, taken care to\nprovide Bethia with another situation, to the full as good as that\nwhich she held in his family. Jenny, nevertheless, chose to give\nwarning; and though Mr. Gibson knew full well from former experience\nthat her warnings were words, not deeds, he hated the discomfort, the\nuncertainty,--the entire disagreeableness of meeting a woman at any\ntime in his house, who wore a grievance and an injury upon her face\nas legibly as Jenny took care to do.\n\nDown into the middle of this small domestic trouble came another, and\none of greater consequence. Miss Eyre had gone with her old mother,\nand her orphan nephews and nieces, to the sea-side, during Molly's\nabsence, which was only intended at first to last for a fortnight.\nAfter about ten days of this time had elapsed, Mr. Gibson received a\nbeautifully written, beautifully worded, admirably folded, and most\nneatly sealed letter from Miss Eyre. Her eldest nephew had fallen ill\nof scarlet fever, and there was every probability that the younger\nchildren would be attacked by the same complaint. It was distressing\nenough for poor Miss Eyre--this additional expense, this anxiety--the\nlong detention from home which the illness involved. But she said\nnot a word of any inconvenience to herself; she only apologized with\nhumble sincerity for her inability to return at the appointed time\nto her charge in Mr. Gibson's family; meekly adding, that perhaps it\nwas as well, for Molly had never had the scarlet fever, and even if\nMiss Eyre had been able to leave the orphan children to return to her\nemployments, it might not have been a safe or a prudent step.\n\n\"To be sure not,\" said Mr. Gibson, tearing the letter in two, and\nthrowing it into the hearth, where he soon saw it burnt to ashes. \"I\nwish I'd a five-pound house and not a woman within ten miles of me. I\nmight have some peace then.\" Apparently, he forgot Mr. Coxe's powers\nof making mischief; but indeed he might have traced that evil back\nto the unconscious Molly. The martyr-cook's entrance to take away\nthe breakfast things, which she announced by a heavy sigh, roused Mr.\nGibson from thought to action.\n\n\"Molly must stay a little longer at Hamley,\" he resolved. \"They've\noften asked for her, and now they'll have enough of her, I think. But\nI can't have her back here just yet; and so the best I can do for her\nis to leave her where she is. Mrs. Hamley seems very fond of her, and\nthe child is looking happy, and stronger in health. I'll ride round\nby Hamley to-day at any rate, and see how the land lies.\"\n\nHe found Mrs. Hamley lying on a sofa placed under the shadow of the\ngreat cedar-tree on the lawn. Molly was flitting about her, gardening\naway under her directions; tying up the long sea-green stalks of\nbright budded carnations, snipping off dead roses.\n\n\"Oh! here's papa!\" she cried out, joyfully, as he rode up to the\nwhite paling which separated the trim lawn and trimmer flower-garden\nfrom the rough park-like ground in front of the house.\n\n\"Come in--come here--through the drawing-room window,\" said Mrs.\nHamley, raising herself on her elbow. \"We've got a rose-tree to show\nyou that Molly has budded all by herself. We are both so proud of\nit.\"\n\nSo Mr. Gibson rode round to the stables, left his horse there, and\nmade his way through the house to the open-air summer-parlour under\nthe cedar-tree, where there were chairs, table, books, and tangled\nwork. Somehow, he rather disliked asking for Molly to prolong her\nvisit; so he determined to swallow his bitter first, and then take\nthe pleasure of the delicious day, the sweet repose, the murmurous,\nscented air. Molly stood by him, her hand on his shoulder. He sate\nopposite to Mrs. Hamley.\n\n\"I've come here to-day to ask a favour,\" he began.\n\n\"Granted before you name it. Am not I a bold woman?\"\n\nHe smiled and bowed, but went straight on with his speech.\n\n\"Miss Eyre, who has been Molly's governess, I suppose I must call\nher--for many years, writes to-day to say that one of the little\nnephews she took with her to Newport while Molly was staying here,\nhas caught the scarlet fever.\"\n\n\"I guess your request. I make it before you do. I beg for dear little\nMolly to stay on here. Of course Miss Eyre can't come back to you;\nand of course Molly must stay here!\"\n\n\"Thank you; thank you very much. That was my request.\"\n\nMolly's hand stole down to his, and nestled in that firm compact\ngrasp.\n\n\"Papa!--Mrs. Hamley!--I know you'll both understand me--but mayn't I\ngo home? I am very happy here; but--oh papa! I think I should like to\nbe at home with you best.\"\n\nAn uncomfortable suspicion flashed across his mind. He pulled her\nround, and looked straight and piercingly into her innocent face. Her\ncolour came at his unwonted scrutiny, but her sweet eyes were filled\nwith wonder, rather than with any feeling which he dreaded to find.\nFor an instant he had doubted whether young red-headed Mr. Coxe's\nlove might not have called out a response in his daughter's breast;\nbut he was quite clear now.\n\n\"Molly, you're rude to begin with. I don't know how you're to make\nyour peace with Mrs. Hamley, I'm sure. And in the next place, do\nyou think you're wiser than I am; or that I don't want you at home,\nif all other things were conformable? Stay where you are, and be\nthankful.\"\n\nMolly knew him well enough to be certain that the prolongation of her\nvisit at Hamley was quite a decided affair in his mind; and then she\nwas smitten with a sense of ingratitude. She left her father, and\nwent to Mrs. Hamley, and bent over her and kissed her; but she did\nnot speak. Mrs. Hamley took hold of her hand, and made room on the\nsofa for her.\n\n\"I was going to have asked for a longer visit the next time you came,\nMr. Gibson. We are such happy friends, are not we, Molly? and now,\nthat this good little nephew of Miss Eyre's--\"\n\n\"I wish he was whipped,\" said Mr. Gibson.\n\n\"--has given us such a capital reason, I shall keep Molly for a real\nlong visitation. You must come over and see us very often. There's a\nroom here for you always, you know; and I don't see why you should\nnot start on your rounds from Hamley every morning, just as well as\nfrom Hollingford.\"\n\n\"Thank you. If you hadn't been so kind to my little girl, I might be\ntempted to say something rude in answer to your last speech.\"\n\n\"Pray say it. You won't be easy till you have given it out, I know.\"\n\n\"Mrs. Hamley has found out from whom I get my rudeness,\" said Molly,\ntriumphantly. \"It's an hereditary quality.\"\n\n\"I was going to say that proposal of yours that I should sleep at\nHamley was just like a woman's idea--all kindness, and no common\nsense. How in the world would my patients find me out, seven miles\nfrom my accustomed place? They'd be sure to send for some other\ndoctor, and I should be ruined in a month.\"\n\n\"Couldn't they send on here? A messenger costs very little.\"\n\n\"Fancy old Goody Henbury struggling up to my surgery, groaning at\nevery step, and then being told to just step on seven miles farther!\nOr take the other end of society:--I don't think my Lady Cumnor's\nsmart groom would thank me for having to ride on to Hamley every time\nhis mistress wants me.\"\n\n\"Well, well, I submit. I am a woman. Molly, thou art a woman! Go and\norder some strawberries and cream for this father of yours. Such\nhumble offices fall within the province of women. Strawberries and\ncream are all kindness and no common sense, for they'll give him a\nhorrid fit of indigestion.\"\n\n\"Please speak for yourself, Mrs. Hamley,\" said Molly, merrily.\n\"I ate--oh, such a great basketful yesterday, and the squire went\nhimself to the dairy and brought out a great bowl of cream, when he\nfound me at my busy work. And I'm as well as ever I was, to-day, and\nnever had a touch of indigestion near me.\"\n\n\"She's a good girl,\" said her father, when she had danced out of\nhearing. The words were not quite an inquiry, he was so certain of\nhis answer. There was a mixture of tenderness and trust in his eyes,\nas he awaited the reply, which came in a moment.\n\n\"She's a darling. I cannot tell you how fond the Squire and I are of\nher; both of us. I am so delighted to think she isn't to go away for\na long time. The first thing I thought of this morning when I wakened\nup, was that she would soon have to return to you, unless I could\npersuade you into leaving her with me a little longer. And now she\nmust stay--oh, two months at least.\"\n\nIt was quite true that the Squire had become very fond of Molly. The\ncharm of having a young girl dancing and singing inarticulate ditties\nabout the house and garden, was indescribable in its novelty to him.\nAnd then Molly was so willing and so wise; ready both to talk and to\nlisten at the right times. Mrs. Hamley was quite right in speaking\nof her husband's fondness for Molly. But either she herself chose a\nwrong time for telling him of the prolongation of the girl's visit,\nor one of the fits of temper to which he was liable, but which he\ngenerally strove to check in the presence of his wife, was upon him;\nat any rate, he received the news in anything but a gracious frame of\nmind.\n\n\"Stay longer! Did Gibson ask for it?\"\n\n\"Yes! I don't see what else is to become of her; Miss Eyre away and\nall. It's a very awkward position for a motherless girl like her to\nbe at the head of a household with two young men in it.\"\n\n\"That's Gibson's look-out; he should have thought of it before taking\npupils, or apprentices, or whatever he calls them.\"\n\n\"My dear Squire! why, I thought you'd be as glad as I was--as I am to\nkeep Molly. I asked her to stay for an indefinite time; two months at\nleast.\"\n\n\"And to be in the house with Osborne! Roger, too, will be at home.\"\n\nBy the cloud in the Squire's eyes, Mrs. Hamley read his mind.\n\n\"Oh, she's not at all the sort of girl young men of their age would\ntake to. We like her because we see what she really is; but lads of\none or two and twenty want all the accessories of a young woman.\"\n\n\"Want what?\" growled the Squire.\n\n\"Such things as becoming dress, style of manner. They would not at\ntheir age even see that she is pretty; their ideas of beauty would\ninclude colour.\"\n\n\"I suppose all that's very clever; but I don't understand it. All I\nknow is, that it's a very dangerous thing to shut two young men of\none and three and twenty up in a country-house like this with a girl\nof seventeen--choose what her gowns may be like, or her hair, or her\neyes. And I told you particularly I didn't want Osborne, or either of\nthem, indeed, to be falling in love with her. I'm very much annoyed.\"\n\nMrs. Hamley's face fell; she became a little pale.\n\n\"Shall we make arrangements for their stopping away while she is\nhere; staying up at Cambridge, or reading with some one? going abroad\nfor a month or two?\"\n\n\"No; you've been reckoning this ever so long on their coming home.\nI've seen the marks of the weeks on your almanack. I'd sooner speak\nto Gibson, and tell him he must take his daughter away, for it's not\nconvenient to us--\"\n\n\"My dear Roger! I beg you will do no such thing. It will be so\nunkind; it will give the lie to all I said yesterday. Don't, please,\ndo that. For my sake, don't speak to Mr. Gibson!\"\n\n\"Well, well, don't put yourself in a flutter,\" for he was afraid of\nher becoming hysterical; \"I'll speak to Osborne when he comes home,\nand tell him how much I should dislike anything of the kind.\"\n\n\"And Roger is always far too full of his natural history and\ncomparative anatomy, and messes of that sort, to be thinking of\nfalling in love with Venus herself. He has not the sentiment and\nimagination of Osborne.\"\n\n\"Ah, you don't know; you never can be sure about a young man! But\nwith Roger it wouldn't so much signify. He would know he couldn't\nmarry for years to come.\"\n\nAll that afternoon the Squire tried to steer clear of Molly, to whom\nhe felt himself to have been an inhospitable traitor. But she was so\nperfectly unconscious of his shyness of her, and so merry and sweet\nin her behaviour as a welcome guest, never distrusting him for a\nmoment, however gruff he might be, that by the next morning she had\ncompletely won him round, and they were quite on the old terms again.\nAt breakfast this very morning, a letter was passed from the Squire\nto his wife, and back again, without a word as to its contents; but--\n\n\"Fortunate!\"\n\n\"Yes! very!\"\n\nLittle did Molly apply these expressions to the piece of news Mrs.\nHamley told her in the course of the day; namely, that her son\nOsborne had received an invitation to stay with a friend in the\nneighbourhood of Cambridge, and perhaps to make a tour on the\nContinent with him subsequently; and that, consequently, he would not\naccompany his brother when Roger came home.\n\nMolly was very sympathetic.\n\n\"Oh, dear! I am so sorry!\"\n\nMrs. Hamley was thankful her husband was not present, Molly spoke the\nwords so heartily.\n\n\"You have been thinking so long of his coming home. I am afraid it is\na great disappointment.\"\n\nMrs. Hamley smiled--relieved.\n\n\"Yes! it is a disappointment certainly, but we must think of\nOsborne's pleasure. And with his poetical mind, he will write us such\ndelightful travelling letters. Poor fellow! he must be going into the\nexamination to-day! Both his father and I feel sure, though, that he\nwill be a high wrangler. Only--I should like to have seen him, my own\ndear boy. But it is best as it is.\"\n\nMolly was a little puzzled by this speech, but soon put it out of her\nhead. It was a disappointment to her, too, that she should not see\nthis beautiful, brilliant young man, his mother's hero. From time to\ntime her maiden fancy had dwelt upon what he would be like; how the\nlovely boy of the picture in Mrs. Hamley's dressing-room would have\nchanged in the ten years that had elapsed since the likeness was\ntaken; if he would read poetry aloud; if he would even read his own\npoetry. However, in the never-ending feminine business of the day,\nshe soon forgot her own disappointment; it only came back to her on\nfirst wakening the next morning, as a vague something that was not\nquite so pleasant as she had anticipated, and then was banished as a\nsubject of regret. Her days at Hamley were well filled up with the\nsmall duties that would have belonged to a daughter of the house had\nthere been one. She made breakfast for the lonely squire, and would\nwillingly have carried up madam's, but that daily piece of work\nbelonged to the squire, and was jealously guarded by him. She read\nthe smaller print of the newspapers aloud to him, city articles,\nmoney and corn markets included. She strolled about the gardens with\nhim, gathering fresh flowers, meanwhile, to deck the drawing-room\nagainst Mrs. Hamley should come down. She was her companion when she\ntook her drives in the close carriage; they read poetry and mild\nliterature together in Mrs. Hamley's sitting-room upstairs. She was\nquite clever at cribbage now, and could beat the squire if she took\npains. Besides these things, there were her own independent ways of\nemploying herself. She used to try to practise an hour daily on\nthe old grand piano in the solitary drawing-room, because she had\npromised Miss Eyre she would do so. And she had found her way into\nthe library, and used to undo the heavy bars of the shutters if the\nhousemaid had forgotten this duty, and mount the ladder, sitting on\nthe steps, for an hour at a time, deep in some book of the old\nEnglish classics. The summer days were very short to this happy girl\nof seventeen.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VIII.\n\nDRIFTING INTO DANGER.\n\n\nOn Thursday, the quiet country household was stirred through all\nits fibres with the thought of Roger's coming home. Mrs. Hamley had\nnot seemed quite so well, or quite in such good spirits for two or\nthree days before; and the squire himself had appeared to be put out\nwithout any visible cause. They had not chosen to tell Molly that\nOsborne's name had only appeared very low down in the mathematical\ntripos. So all that their visitor knew was that something was out of\ntune, and she hoped that Roger's coming home would set it to rights,\nfor it was beyond the power of her small cares and wiles.\n\nOn Thursday, the housemaid apologized to her for some slight\nnegligence in her bedroom, by saying she had been busy scouring\nMr. Roger's rooms. \"Not but what they were as clean as could be\nbeforehand; but mistress would always have the young gentlemen's\nrooms cleaned afresh before they came home. If it had been Mr.\nOsborne, the whole house would have had to be done; but, to be sure,\nhe was the eldest son, so it was but likely.\" Molly was amused at\nthis testimony to the rights of heirship; but somehow she herself had\nfallen into the family manner of thinking that nothing was too great\nor too good for \"the eldest son.\" In his father's eyes, Osborne was\nthe representative of the ancient house of Hamley of Hamley, the\nfuture owner of the land which had been theirs for a thousand years.\nHis mother clung to him because they two were cast in the same\nmould, both physically and mentally--because he bore her maiden name.\nShe had indoctrinated Molly with her faith, and, in spite of her\namusement at the housemaid's speech, the girl visitor would have\nbeen as anxious as any one to show her feudal loyalty to the heir,\nif indeed it had been he that was coming. After luncheon, Mrs. Hamley\nwent to rest, in preparation for Roger's return; and Molly also\nretired to her own room, feeling that it would be better for her to\nremain there until dinner-time, and so to leave the father and mother\nto receive their boy in privacy. She took a book of MS. poems with\nher; they were all of Osborne Hamley's composition; and his mother\nhad read some of them aloud to her young visitor more than once.\nMolly had asked permission to copy one or two of those which were\nher greatest favourites; and this quiet summer afternoon she took\nthis copying for her employment, sitting at the pleasant open window,\nand losing herself in dreamy out-looks into the gardens and woods,\nquivering in the noon-tide heat. The house was so still, in its\nsilence it might have been the \"moated grange;\" the booming buzz of\nthe blue flies, in the great staircase window, seemed the loudest\nnoise in-doors. And there was scarcely a sound out-of-doors but the\nhumming of bees, in the flower-beds below the window. Distant voices\nfrom the far-away fields where they were making hay--the scent of\nwhich came in sudden wafts distinct from that of the nearer roses\nand honeysuckles--these merry piping voices just made Molly feel the\ndepth of the present silence. She had left off copying, her hand\nweary with the unusual exertion of so much writing, and she was\nlazily trying to learn one or two of the poems off by heart.\n\n   I asked of the wind, but answer made it none,\n   Save its accustomed sad and solitary moan--\n\nshe kept saying to herself, losing her sense of whatever meaning the\nwords had ever had, in the repetition which had become mechanical.\nSuddenly there was the snap of a shutting gate; wheels crackling on\nthe dry gravel, horses' feet on the drive; a loud cheerful voice\nin the house, coming up through the open windows, the hall, the\npassages, the staircase, with unwonted fulness and roundness of tone.\nThe entrance-hall downstairs was paved with diamonds of black and\nwhite marble; the low wide staircase that went in short flights\naround the hall, till you could look down upon the marble floor from\nthe top story of the house, was uncarpeted--uncovered. The Squire\nwas too proud of his beautifully-joined oaken flooring to cover this\nstair-case up unnecessarily; not to say a word of the usual state of\nwant of ready money to expend upon the decorations of his house. So,\nthrough the undraperied hollow square of the hall and staircase every\nsound ascended clear and distinct; and Molly heard the Squire's glad\n\"Hallo! here he is,\" and madam's softer, more plaintive voice; and\nthen the loud, full, strange tone, which she knew must be Roger's.\nThen there was an opening and shutting of doors, and only a distant\nbuzz of talking. Molly began again--\n\n   I asked of the wind, but answer made it none.\n\nAnd this time she had nearly finished learning the poem, when she\nheard Mrs. Hamley come hastily into her sitting-room that adjoined\nMolly's bedroom, and burst out into an irrepressible half-hysterical\nfit of sobbing. Molly was too young to have any complication of\nmotives which should prevent her going at once to try and give what\ncomfort she could. In an instant she was kneeling at Mrs. Hamley's\nfeet, holding the poor lady's hands, kissing them, murmuring soft\nwords; which, all unmeaning as they were of aught but sympathy with\nthe untold grief, did Mrs. Hamley good. She checked herself, smiling\nsadly at Molly through the midst of her thick-coming sobs.\n\n\"It's only Osborne,\" said she, at last. \"Roger has been telling us\nabout him.\"\n\n\"What about him?\" asked Molly, eagerly.\n\n\"I knew on Monday; we had a letter--he said he had not done so well\nas we had hoped--as he had hoped himself, poor fellow! He said he had\njust passed, but was only low down among the _junior optimes_, and\nnot where he had expected, and had led us to expect. But the Squire\nhas never been at college, and does not understand college terms, and\nhe has been asking Roger all about it, and Roger has been telling\nhim, and it has made him so angry. But the squire hates college\nslang;--he has never been there, you know; and he thought poor\nOsborne was taking it too lightly, and he has been asking Roger about\nit, and Roger--\"\n\nThere was a fresh fit of the sobbing crying. Molly burst out,--\"I\ndon't think Mr. Roger should have told; he had no need to begin so\nsoon about his brother's failure. Why, he hasn't been in the house an\nhour!\"\n\n\"Hush, hush, love!\" said Mrs. Hamley. \"Roger is so good. You don't\nunderstand. The squire would begin and ask questions before Roger had\ntasted food--as soon as ever we had got into the dining-room. And all\nhe said--to me, at any rate--was that Osborne was nervous, and that\nif he could only have gone in for the Chancellor's medals, he would\nhave carried all before him. But Roger said that after failing like\nthis, he is not very likely to get a fellowship, which the Squire had\nplaced his hopes on. Osborne himself seemed so sure of it, that the\nsquire can't understand it, and is seriously angry, and growing more\nso the more he talks about it. He has kept it in two or three days,\nand that never suits him. He is always better when he is angry about\na thing at once, and doesn't let it smoulder in his mind. Poor, poor\nOsborne! I did wish he had been coming straight home, instead of\ngoing to these friends of his; I thought I could have comforted him.\nBut now I'm glad, for it will be better to let his father's anger\ncool first.\"\n\nSo talking out what was in her heart, Mrs. Hamley became more\ncomposed; and at length she dismissed Molly to dress for dinner, with\na kiss, saying,--\n\n\"You're a real blessing to mothers, child! You give one such pleasant\nsympathy, both in one's gladness and in one's sorrow; in one's\npride (for I was so proud last week, so confident), and in one's\ndisappointment. And now your being a fourth at dinner will keep\nus off that sore subject; there are times when a stranger in the\nhousehold is a wonderful help.\"\n\nMolly thought over all that she had heard, as she was dressing\nand putting on the terrible, over-smart plaid gown in honour of\nthe new arrival. Her unconscious fealty to Osborne was not in the\nleast shaken by his having come to grief at Cambridge. Only she was\nindignant--with or without reason--against Roger, who seemed to have\nbrought the reality of bad news as an offering of first-fruits on his\nreturn home.\n\nShe went down into the drawing-room with anything but a welcome to\nhim in her heart. He was standing by his mother; the Squire had not\nyet made his appearance. Molly thought that the two were hand in hand\nwhen she first opened the door, but she could not be quite sure. Mrs.\nHamley came a little forwards to meet her, and introduced her in so\nfondly intimate a way to her son, that Molly, innocent and simple,\nknowing nothing but Hollingford manners, which were anything but\nformal, half put out her hand to shake hands with one of whom she had\nheard so much--the son of such kind friends. She could only hope he\nhad not seen the movement, for he made no attempt to respond to it;\nonly bowed.\n\nHe was a tall powerfully-made young man, giving the impression\nof strength more than elegance. His face was rather square,\nruddy-coloured (as his father had said), hair and eyes brown--the\nlatter rather deep-set beneath his thick eyebrows; and he had a trick\nof wrinkling up his eyelids when he wanted particularly to observe\nanything, which made his eyes look even smaller still at such times.\nHe had a large mouth, with excessively mobile lips; and another trick\nof his was, that when he was amused at anything, he resisted the\nimpulse to laugh, by a droll manner of twitching and puckering up\nhis mouth, till at length the sense of humour had its way, and\nhis features relaxed, and he broke into a broad sunny smile; his\nbeautiful teeth--his only beautiful feature--breaking out with a\nwhite gleam upon the red-brown countenance. These two tricks of\nhis--of crumpling up the eyelids, so as to concentrate the power\nof sight, which made him look stern and thoughtful; and the odd\ntwitching of the lips that was preliminary to a smile, which made\nhim look intensely merry--gave the varying expressions of his face\na greater range \"from grave to gay, from lively to severe,\" than is\ncommon with most men. To Molly, who was not finely discriminative\nin her glances at the stranger this first night, he simply appeared\n\"heavy-looking, clumsy,\" and \"a person she was sure she should never\nget on with.\" He certainly did not seem to care much what impression\nhe made upon his mother's visitor. He was at that age when young men\nadmire a formed beauty more than a face with any amount of future\ncapability of loveliness, and when they are morbidly conscious of the\ndifficulty of finding subjects of conversation in talking to girls\nin a state of feminine hobbledehoyhood. Besides, his thoughts were\nfull of other subjects, which he did not intend to allow to ooze out\nin words, yet he wanted to prevent any of that heavy silence which\nhe feared might be impending--with an angry and displeased father,\nand a timorous and distressed mother. He only looked upon Molly as\na badly-dressed, and rather awkward girl, with black hair and an\nintelligent face, who might help him in the task he had set himself\nof keeping up a bright general conversation during the rest of the\nevening; might help him--if she would, but she would not. She thought\nhim unfeeling in his talkativeness; his constant flow of words upon\nindifferent subjects was a wonder and a repulsion to her. How could\nhe go on so cheerfully while his mother sat there, scarcely eating\nanything, and doing her best, with ill-success, to swallow down the\ntears that would keep rising to her eyes; when his father's heavy\nbrow was deeply clouded, and he evidently cared nothing--at first at\nleast--for all the chatter his son poured forth? Had Mr. Roger Hamley\nno sympathy in him? She would show that she had some, at any rate. So\nshe quite declined the part, which he had hoped she would have taken,\nof respondent, and possible questioner; and his work became more\nand more like that of a man walking in a quagmire. Once the Squire\nroused himself to speak to the butler; he felt the need of outward\nstimulus--of a better vintage than usual.\n\n\"Bring up a bottle of the Burgundy with the yellow seal.\"\n\nHe spoke low; he had no spirit to speak in his usual voice. The\nbutler answered in the same tone. Molly sitting near them, and silent\nherself, heard what they said.\n\n\"If you please, sir, there are not above six bottles of that seal\nleft; and it is Mr. Osborne's favourite wine.\"\n\nThe Squire turned round with a growl in his voice.\n\n\"Bring up a bottle of the Burgundy with the yellow seal, as I said.\"\n\nThe butler went away wondering. \"Mr. Osborne's\" likes and dislikes\nhad been the law of the house in general until now. If he had liked\nany particular food or drink, any seat or place, any special degree\nof warmth or coolness, his wishes were to be attended to; for he\nwas the heir, and he was delicate, and he was the clever one of\nthe family. All the out-of-doors men would have said the same.\nMr. Osborne wished a tree cut down, or kept standing, or had\nsuch-and-such a fancy about the game, or desired something unusual\nabout the horses; and they had all to attend to it as if it were\nlaw. But to-day the Burgundy with the yellow seal was to be brought;\nand it was brought. Molly testified with quiet vehemence of action;\nshe never took wine, so she need not have been afraid of the man's\npouring it into her glass; but as an open mark of fealty to the\nabsent Osborne, however little it might be understood, she placed the\npalm of her small brown hand over the top of the glass, and held it\nthere, till the wine had gone round, and Roger and his father were in\nfull enjoyment of it.\n\nAfter dinner, too, the gentlemen lingered long over their dessert,\nand Molly heard them laughing; and then she saw them loitering\nabout in the twilight out-of-doors; Roger hatless, his hands in his\npockets, lounging by his father's side, who was now able to talk in\nhis usual loud and cheerful way, forgetting Osborne. _Væ victis!_\n\n\n[Illustration: VÆ VICTIS!]\n\n\nAnd so in mute opposition on Molly's side, in polite indifference,\nscarcely verging upon kindliness on his, Roger and she steered\nclear of each other. He had many occupations in which he needed no\ncompanionship, even if she had been qualified to give it. The worst\nwas, that she found he was in the habit of occupying the library,\nher favourite retreat, in the mornings before Mrs. Hamley came down.\nShe opened the half-closed door a day or two after his return home,\nand found him busy among books and papers, with which the large\nleather-covered table was strewn; and she softly withdrew before he\ncould turn his head and see her, so as to distinguish her from one\nof the housemaids. He rode out every day, sometimes with his father\nabout the outlying fields, sometimes far away for a good gallop.\nMolly would have enjoyed accompanying him on these occasions, for\nshe was very fond of riding; and there had been some talk of sending\nfor her habit and grey pony when first she came to Hamley; only the\nSquire, after some consideration, had said he so rarely did more\nthan go slowly from one field to another, where his labourers were\nat work, that he feared she would find such slow work--ten minutes\nriding through heavy land, twenty minutes sitting still on horseback,\nlistening to the directions he should have to give to his men--rather\ndull. Now, when if she had had her pony here she might have ridden\nout with Roger, without giving him any trouble--she would have taken\ncare of that--nobody seemed to think of renewing the proposal.\n\nAltogether it was pleasanter before he came home.\n\nHer father rode over pretty frequently; sometimes there were long\nunaccountable absences, it was true; when his daughter began to\nfidget after him, and to wonder what had become of him. But when\nhe made his appearance he had always good reasons to give; and the\nright she felt that she had to his familiar household tenderness;\nthe power she possessed of fully understanding the exact value of\nboth his words and his silence, made these glimpses of intercourse\nwith him inexpressibly charming. Latterly her burden had always been,\n\"When may I come home, papa?\" It was not that she was unhappy, or\nuncomfortable; she was passionately fond of Mrs. Hamley, she was a\nfavourite of the Squire's, and could not as yet fully understand\nwhy some people were so much afraid of him; and as for Roger, if he\ndid not add to her pleasure, he scarcely took away from it. But she\nwanted to be at home once more. The reason why she could not tell;\nbut this she knew full well. Mr. Gibson reasoned with her till\nshe was weary of being completely convinced that it was right and\nnecessary for her to stay where she was. And then with an effort she\nstopped the cry upon her tongue, for she saw that its repetition\nharassed her father.\n\nDuring this absence of hers Mr. Gibson was drifting into matrimony.\nHe was partly aware of whither he was going; and partly it was\nlike the soft floating movement of a dream. He was more passive\nthan active in the affair; though, if his reason had not fully\napproved of the step he was tending to--if he had not believed that\na second marriage was the very best way of cutting the Gordian knot\nof domestic difficulties, he could have made an effort without any\ngreat trouble, and extricated himself without pain from the mesh\nof circumstances. It happened in this manner:--Lady Cumnor having\nmarried her two eldest daughters, found her labours as a chaperone to\nLady Harriet, the youngest, considerably lightened by co-operation;\nand, at length, she had leisure to be an invalid. She was, however,\ntoo energetic to allow herself this indulgence constantly; only she\npermitted herself to break down occasionally after a long course of\ndinners, late hours, and London atmosphere: and then, leaving Lady\nHarriet with either Lady Cuxhaven or Lady Agnes Manners, she betook\nherself to the comparative quiet of the Towers, where she found\noccupation in doing her benevolence, which was sadly neglected in\nthe hurly-burly of London. This particular summer she had broken\ndown earlier than usual, and longed for the repose of the country.\nShe believed that her state of health, too, was more serious than\npreviously; but she did not say a word of this to her husband or\ndaughters; reserving her confidence for Mr. Gibson's ears. She\ndid not wish to take Lady Harriet away from the gaieties of town\nwhich she was thoroughly enjoying, by any complaint of hers, which\nmight, after all, be ill-founded; and yet she did not quite like\nbeing without a companion in the three weeks or a month that might\nintervene before her family would join her at the Towers, especially\nas the annual festivity to the school visitors was impending; and\nboth the school and the visit of the ladies connected with it, had\nrather lost the zest of novelty.\n\n\"Thursday the 19th, Harriet,\" said Lady Cumnor, meditatively; \"what\ndo you say to coming down to the Towers on the 18th, and helping me\nover that long day. You could stay in the country till Monday, and\nhave a few days' rest and good air; you would return a great deal\nfresher to the remainder of your gaieties. Your father would bring\nyou down, I know: indeed, he is coming naturally.\"\n\n\"Oh, mamma!\" said Lady Harriet, the youngest daughter of the\nhouse--the prettiest, the most indulged; \"I cannot go; there's the\nwater-party up to Maidenhead on the 20th, I should be so sorry to\nmiss it: and Mrs. Duncan's ball, and Grisi's concert; please, don't\nwant me. Besides, I should do no good. I can't make provincial\nsmall-talk; I'm not up in the local politics of Hollingford. I should\nbe making mischief, I know I should.\"\n\n\"Very well, my dear,\" said Lady Cumnor, sighing, \"I had forgotten the\nMaidenhead water-party, or I would not have asked you.\"\n\n\"What a pity it isn't the Eton holidays, so that you could have had\nHollingford's boys to help you to do the honours, mamma. They are\nsuch affable little prigs. It was the greatest fun to watch them last\nyear at Sir Edward's, doing the honours of their grandfather's house\nto much such a collection of humble admirers as you get together at\nthe Towers. I shall never forget seeing Edgar gravely squiring about\nan old lady in a portentous black bonnet, and giving her information\nin the correctest grammar possible.\"\n\n\"Well, I like those lads,\" said Lady Cuxhaven; \"they are on the way\nto become true gentlemen. But, mamma, why shouldn't you have Clare to\nstay with you? You like her, and she is just the person to save you\nthe troubles of hospitality to the Hollingford people, and we should\nall be so much more comfortable if we knew you had her with you.\"\n\n\"Yes, Clare would do very well,\" said Lady Cumnor; \"but isn't it her\nschool-time or something? We must not interfere with her school so\nas to injure her, for I am afraid she is not doing too well as it is;\nand she has been so very unlucky ever since she left us--first her\nhusband died, and then she lost Lady Davies' situation, and then Mrs.\nMaude's, and now Mr. Preston told your father it was all she could\ndo to pay her way in Ashcombe, though Lord Cumnor lets her have the\nhouse rent-free.\"\n\n\"I can't think how it is,\" said Lady Harriet. \"She's not very wise,\ncertainly; but she is so useful and agreeable, and has such pleasant\nmanners, I should have thought any one who wasn't particular about\neducation would have been charmed to keep her as a governess.\"\n\n\"What do you mean by not being particular about education? Most\npeople who keep governesses for their children are supposed to be\nparticular,\" said Lady Cuxhaven.\n\n\"Well, they think themselves so, I've no doubt; but I call you\nparticular, Mary, and I don't think mamma was; but she thought\nherself so, I'm sure.\"\n\n\"I can't think what you mean, Harriet,\" said Lady Cumnor, a good deal\nannoyed at this speech of her clever, heedless, youngest daughter.\n\n\"Oh dear, mamma, you did everything you could think of for us; but\nyou see you'd ever so many other engrossing interests, and Mary\nhardly ever allows her love for her husband to interfere with her\nall-absorbing care for the children. You gave us the best of masters\nin every department, and Clare to dragonize and keep us up to\nour preparation for them, as well as ever she could; but then you\nknow, or rather you didn't know, some of the masters admired our\nvery pretty governess, and there was a kind of respectable veiled\nflirtation going on, which never came to anything, to be sure; and\nthen you were often so overwhelmed with your business as a great\nlady--fashionable and benevolent, and all that sort of thing--that\nyou used to call Clare away from us at the most critical times of\nour lessons, to write your notes, or add up your accounts, and the\nconsequence is, that I'm about the most ill-informed girl in London.\nOnly Mary was so capitally trained by good awkward Miss Benson, that\nshe is always full to overflowing with accurate knowledge, and her\nglory is reflected upon me.\"\n\n\"Do you think what Harriet says is true, Mary?\" asked Lady Cumnor,\nrather anxiously.\n\n\"I was so little with Clare in the school-room. I used to read French\nwith her; she had a beautiful accent, I remember. Both Agnes and\nHarriet were very fond of her. I used to be jealous for Miss Benson's\nsake, and perhaps--\" Lady Cuxhaven paused a minute--\"that made me\nfancy that she had a way of flattering and indulging them--not quite\nconscientious, I used to think. But girls are severe judges, and\ncertainly she had had an anxious enough lifetime. I am always so glad\nwhen we can have her, and give her a little pleasure. The only thing\nthat makes me uneasy now is the way in which she seems to send her\ndaughter away from her so much; we never can persuade her to bring\nCynthia with her when she comes to see us.\"\n\n\"Now that I call ill-natured,\" said Lady Harriet; \"here is a poor\ndear woman trying to earn her livelihood, first as a governess, and\nwhat could she do with her daughter then, but send her to school? and\nafter that, when Clare is asked to go visiting, and is too modest\nto bring her girl with her--besides all the expense of the journey,\nand the rigging out--Mary finds fault with her for her modesty and\neconomy.\"\n\n\"Well, after all, we are not discussing Clare and her affairs, but\ntrying to plan for mamma's comfort. I don't see that she can do\nbetter than ask Mrs. Kirkpatrick to come to the Towers--as soon as\nher holidays begin, I mean.\"\n\n\"Here is her last letter,\" said Lady Cumnor, who had been searching\nfor it in her escritoire, while her daughters were talking. Holding\nher glasses before her eyes, she began to read, \"'My wonted\nmisfortunes appear to have followed me to Ashcombe'--um, um, um;\nthat's not it--'Mr. Preston is most kind in sending me fruit and\nflowers from the Manor-house, according to dear Lord Cumnor's kind\ninjunction.' Oh, here it is! 'The vacation begins on the 11th,\naccording to the usual custom of schools in Ashcombe; and I must\nthen try and obtain some change of air and scene, in order to fit\nmyself for the resumption of my duties on the 10th of August.' You\nsee, girls, she would be at liberty, if she has not made any other\narrangement for spending her holidays. To-day is the 15th.\"\n\n\"I'll write to her at once, mamma,\" Lady Harriet said. \"Clare and I\nare always great friends; I was her confidant in her loves with poor\nMr. Kirkpatrick, and we've kept up our intimacy ever since. I know of\nthree offers she had besides.\"\n\n\"I sincerely hope Miss Bowes is not telling her love-affairs to Grace\nor Lily. Why, Harriet, you could not have been older than Grace when\nClare was married!\" said Lady Cuxhaven, in maternal alarm.\n\n\"No; but I was well versed in the tender passion, thanks to novels.\nNow I daresay you don't admit novels into your school-room, Mary; so\nyour daughters wouldn't be able to administer discreet sympathy to\ntheir governess in case she was the heroine of a love-affair.\"\n\n\"My dear Harriet, don't let me hear you talking of love in that way;\nit is not pretty. Love is a serious thing.\"\n\n\"My dear mamma, your exhortations are just eighteen years too late.\nI've talked all the freshness off love, and that's the reason I'm\ntired of the subject.\"\n\nThis last speech referred to a recent refusal of Lady Harriet's,\nwhich had displeased Lady Cumnor, and rather annoyed my lord; as\nthey, the parents, could see no objection to the gentleman in\nquestion. Lady Cuxhaven did not want to have the subject brought up,\nso she hastened to say,--\n\n\"Do ask the poor little daughter to come with her mother to the\nTowers; why, she must be seventeen or more; she would really be a\ncompanion to you, mamma, if her mother was unable to come.\"\n\n\"I was not ten when Clare married, and I'm nearly nine-and-twenty,\"\nadded Lady Harriet.\n\n\"Don't speak of it, Harriet; at any rate you are but eight-and-twenty\nnow, and you look a great deal younger. There is no need to be always\nbringing up your age on every possible occasion.\"\n\n\"There was need of it now, though. I wanted to make out how old\nCynthia Kirkpatrick was. I think she can't be far from eighteen.\"\n\n\"She is at school at Boulogne, I know; and so I don't think she can\nbe as old as that. Clare says something about her in this letter:\n'Under these circumstances' (the ill-success of her school), 'I\ncannot think myself justified in allowing myself the pleasure of\nhaving darling Cynthia at home for the holidays; especially as the\nperiod when the vacation in French schools commences differs from\nthat common in England; and it might occasion some confusion in my\narrangements if darling Cynthia were to come to Ashcombe, and occupy\nmy time and thoughts so immediately before the commencement of my\nscholastic duties as the 8th of August, on which day her vacation\nbegins, which is but two days before my holidays end.' So, you see,\nClare would be quite at liberty to come to me, and I daresay it would\nbe a very nice change for her.\"\n\n\"And Hollingford is busy seeing after his new laboratory at the\nTowers, and is constantly backwards and forwards. And Agnes wants to\ngo there for change of air, as soon as she is strong enough after\nher confinement. And even my own dear insatiable 'me' will have had\nenough of gaiety in two or three weeks, if this hot weather lasts.\"\n\n\"I think I may be able to come down for a few days too, if you will\nlet me, mamma; and I'll bring Grace, who is looking rather pale and\nweedy; growing too fast, I'm afraid. So I hope you won't be dull.\"\n\n\"My dear,\" said Lady Cumnor, drawing herself up, \"I should be ashamed\nof feeling dull with my resources; my duties to others and to\nmyself!\"\n\nSo the plan in its present shape was told to Lord Cumnor, who highly\napproved of it; as he always did of every project of his wife's. Lady\nCumnor's character was perhaps a little too ponderous for him in\nreality, but he was always full of admiration for all her words and\ndeeds, and used to boast of her wisdom, her benevolence, her power\nand dignity, in her absence, as if by this means he could buttress up\nhis own more feeble nature.\n\n\"Very good--very good, indeed! Clare to join you at the Towers!\nCapital! I couldn't have planned it better myself! I shall go down\nwith you on Wednesday in time for the jollification on Thursday. I\nalways enjoy that day; they are such nice, friendly people, those\ngood Hollingford ladies. Then I'll have a day with Sheepshanks, and\nperhaps I may ride over to Ashcombe and see Preston--Brown Jess can\ndo it in a day, eighteen miles--to be sure! But there's back again to\nthe Towers!--how much is twice eighteen--thirty?\"\n\n\"Thirty-six,\" said Lady Cumnor, sharply.\n\n\"So it is; you're always right, my dear. Preston's a clever, sharp\nfellow.\"\n\n\"I don't like him,\" said my lady.\n\n\"He takes looking after; but he's a sharp fellow. He's such a\ngood-looking man, too, I wonder you don't like him.\"\n\n\"I never think whether a land-agent is handsome or not. They don't\nbelong to the class of people whose appearance I notice.\"\n\n\"To be sure not. But he is a handsome fellow; and what should make\nyou like him is the interest he takes in Clare and her prospects. He\nis constantly suggesting something that can be done to her house, and\nI know he sends her fruit, and flowers, and game just as regularly as\nwe should ourselves if we lived at Ashcombe.\"\n\n\"How old is he?\" said Lady Cumnor, with a faint suspicion of motives\nin her mind.\n\n\"About twenty-seven, I think. Ah! I see what is in your ladyship's\nhead. No! no! he's too young for that. You must look out for some\nmiddle-aged man, if you want to get poor Clare married; Preston won't\ndo.\"\n\n\"I'm not a match-maker, as you might know. I never did it for my own\ndaughters. I'm not likely to do it for Clare,\" said she, leaning back\nlanguidly.\n\n\"Well! you might do a worse thing. I'm beginning to think she'll\nnever get on as a schoolmistress, though why she shouldn't, I'm sure\nI don't know; for she's an uncommonly pretty woman for her age, and\nher having lived in our family, and your having had her so often with\nyou, ought to go a good way. I say, my lady, what do you think of\nGibson? He would be just the right age--widower--lives near the\nTowers?\"\n\n\"I told you just now I was no match-maker, my lord. I suppose we had\nbetter go by the old road--the people at those inns know us?\"\n\nAnd so they passed on to speaking about other things than Mrs.\nKirkpatrick and her prospects, scholastic or matrimonial.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IX.\n\nTHE WIDOWER AND THE WIDOW.\n\n\nMrs. Kirkpatrick was only too happy to accept Lady Cumnor's\ninvitation. It was what she had been hoping for, but hardly daring to\nexpect, as she believed that the family were settled in London for\nsome time to come. The Towers was a pleasant and luxurious house in\nwhich to pass her holidays; and though she was not one to make deep\nplans, or to look far ahead, she was quite aware of the prestige\nwhich her being able to say she had been staying with \"dear Lady\nCumnor\" at the Towers, was likely to give her and her school in\nthe eyes of a good many people; so she gladly prepared to join her\nladyship on the 17th. Her wardrobe did not require much arrangement;\nif it had done, the poor lady would not have had much money to\nappropriate to the purpose. She was very pretty and graceful; and\nthat goes a great way towards carrying off shabby clothes; and it was\nher taste more than any depth of feeling, that had made her persevere\nin wearing all the delicate tints--the violets and grays--which, with\na certain admixture of black, constitute half-mourning. This style of\nbecoming dress she was supposed to wear in memory of Mr. Kirkpatrick;\nin reality because it was both lady-like and economical. Her\nbeautiful hair was of that rich auburn that hardly ever turns gray;\nand partly out of consciousness of its beauty, and partly because the\nwashing of caps is expensive, she did not wear anything on her head;\nher complexion had the vivid tints that often accompany the kind\nof hair which has once been red; and the only injury her skin had\nreceived from advancing years was that the colouring was rather more\nbrilliant than delicate, and varied less with every passing emotion.\nShe could no longer blush; and at eighteen she had been very proud\nof her blushes. Her eyes were soft, large, and china-blue in colour;\nthey had not much expression or shadow about them, which was perhaps\nowing to the flaxen colour of her eyelashes. Her figure was a little\nfuller than it used to be, but her movements were as soft and sinuous\nas ever. Altogether, she looked much younger than her age, which\nwas not far short of forty. She had a very pleasant voice, and read\naloud well and distinctly, which Lady Cumnor liked. Indeed, for some\ninexplicable reason, she was a greater, more positive favourite with\nLady Cumnor than with any of the rest of the family, though they all\nliked her up to a certain point, and found it agreeably useful to\nhave any one in the house who was so well acquainted with their ways\nand habits; so ready to talk, when a little trickle of conversation\nwas required; so willing to listen, and to listen with tolerable\nintelligence, if the subjects spoken about did not refer to serious\nsolid literature, or science, or politics, or social economy. About\nnovels and poetry, travels and gossip, personal details, or anecdotes\nof any kind, she always made exactly the remarks which are expected\nfrom an agreeable listener; and she had sense enough to confine\nherself to those short expressions of wonder, admiration, and\nastonishment, which may mean anything, when more recondite things\nwere talked about.\n\nIt was a very pleasant change to a poor unsuccessful schoolmistress\nto leave her own house, full of battered and shabby furniture (she\nhad taken the good-will and furniture of her predecessor at a\nvaluation, two or three years before), where the look-out was as\ngloomy, and the surrounding as squalid, as is often the case in the\nsmaller streets of a country town, and to come bowling through the\nTowers Park in the luxurious carriage sent to meet her; to alight,\nand feel secure that the well-trained servants would see after her\nbags, and umbrella, and parasol, and cloak, without her loading\nherself with all these portable articles, as she had had to do\nwhile following the wheelbarrow containing her luggage in going to\nthe Ashcombe coach-office that morning; to pass up the deep-piled\ncarpets of the broad shallow stairs into my lady's own room, cool and\ndeliciously fresh, even on this sultry day, and fragrant with great\nbowls of freshly gathered roses of every shade of colour. There were\ntwo or three new novels lying uncut on the table; the daily papers,\nthe magazines. Every chair was an easy-chair of some kind or other;\nand all covered with French chintz that mimicked the real flowers in\nthe garden below. She was familiar with the bedroom called hers, to\nwhich she was soon ushered by Lady Cumnor's maid. It seemed to her\nfar more like home than the dingy place she had left that morning;\nit was so natural to her to like dainty draperies, and harmonious\ncolouring, and fine linen, and soft raiment. She sate down in the\narm-chair by the bed-side, and wondered over her fate something in\nthis fashion--\n\n\"One would think it was an easy enough thing to deck a looking-glass\nlike that with muslin and pink ribbons; and yet how hard it is to\nkeep it up! People don't know how hard it is till they've tried as\nI have. I made my own glass just as pretty when I first went to\nAshcombe; but the muslin got dirty, and the pink ribbons faded, and\nit is so difficult to earn money to renew them; and when one has got\nthe money one hasn't the heart to spend it all at once. One thinks\nand one thinks how one can get the most good out of it; and a new\ngown, or a day's pleasure, or some hot-house fruit, or some piece of\nelegance that can be seen and noticed in one's drawing-room, carries\nthe day, and good-by to prettily decked looking-glasses. Now here,\nmoney is like the air they breathe. No one even asks or knows how\nmuch the washing costs, or what pink ribbon is a yard. Ah! it would\nbe different if they had to earn every penny as I have! They would\nhave to calculate, like me, how to get the most pleasure out of it.\nI wonder if I am to go on all my life toiling and moiling for money?\nIt's not natural. Marriage is the natural thing; then the husband\nhas all that kind of dirty work to do, and his wife sits in the\ndrawing-room like a lady. I did, when poor Kirkpatrick was alive.\nHeigho! it's a sad thing to be a widow.\"\n\nThen there was the contrast between the dinners which she had to\nshare with her scholars at Ashcombe--rounds of beef, legs of mutton,\ngreat dishes of potatoes, and large batter-puddings, with the tiny\nmeal of exquisitely cooked delicacies, sent up on old Chelsea china,\nthat was served every day to the earl and countess and herself at\nthe Towers. She dreaded the end of her holidays as much as the most\nhome-loving of her pupils. But at this time that end was some weeks\noff, so Clare shut her eyes to the future, and tried to relish the\npresent to its fullest extent. A disturbance to the pleasant, even\ncourse of the summer days came in the indisposition of Lady Cumnor.\nHer husband had gone back to London, and she and Mrs. Kirkpatrick had\nbeen left to the very even tenor of life, which was according to my\nlady's wish just now. In spite of her languor and fatigue, she had\ngone through the day when the school visitors came to the Towers, in\nfull dignity, dictating clearly all that was to be done, what walks\nwere to be taken, what hothouses to be seen, and when the party were\nto return to the \"collation.\" She herself remained indoors, with\none or two ladies who had ventured to think that the fatigue or the\nheat might be too much for them, and who had therefore declined\naccompanying the ladies in charge of Mrs. Kirkpatrick, or those other\nfavoured few to whom Lord Cumnor was explaining the new buildings\nin his farm-yard. \"With the utmost condescension,\" as her hearers\nafterwards expressed it, Lady Cumnor told them all about her married\ndaughters' establishments, nurseries, plans for the education of\ntheir children, and manner of passing the day. But the exertion tired\nher; and when every one had left, the probability is that she would\nhave gone to lie down and rest, had not her husband made an unlucky\nremark in the kindness of his heart. He came up to her and put his\nhand on her shoulder.\n\n\"I'm afraid you're sadly tired, my lady?\" he said.\n\nShe braced her muscles, and drew herself up, saying coldly,--\n\n\"When I am tired, Lord Cumnor, I will tell you so.\" And her fatigue\nshowed itself during the rest of the evening in her sitting\nparticularly upright, and declining all offers of easy-chairs or\nfoot-stools, and refusing the insult of a suggestion that they\nshould all go to bed earlier. She went on in something of this\nkind of manner as long as Lord Cumnor remained at the Towers. Mrs.\nKirkpatrick was quite deceived by it, and kept assuring Lord Cumnor\nthat she had never seen dear Lady Cumnor looking better, or so\nstrong. But he had an affectionate heart, if a blundering head; and\nthough he could give no reason for his belief, he was almost certain\nhis wife was not well. Yet he was too much afraid of her to send for\nMr. Gibson without her permission. His last words to Clare were--\n\n\"It's such a comfort to leave my lady to you; only don't you be\ndeluded by her ways. She'll not show she's ill till she can't help\nit. Consult with Bradley\" (Lady Cumnor's \"own woman,\"--she disliked\nthe new-fangledness of \"lady's-maid\"); \"and if I were you, I'd send\nand ask Gibson to call--you might make any kind of a pretence,\"--and\nthen the idea he had had in London of the fitness of a match\nbetween the two coming into his head just now, he could not help\nadding,--\"Get him to come and see you, he's a very agreeable man;\nLord Hollingford says there's no one like him in these parts: and he\nmight be looking at my lady while he was talking to you, and see if\nhe thinks her really ill. And let me know what he says about her.\"\n\nBut Clare was just as great a coward about doing anything for Lady\nCumnor which she had not expressly ordered, as Lord Cumnor himself.\nShe knew she might fall into such disgrace if she sent for Mr. Gibson\nwithout direct permission, that she might never be asked to stay at\nthe Towers again; and the life there, monotonous in its smoothness of\nluxury as it might be to some, was exactly to her taste. She in her\nturn tried to put upon Bradley the duty which Lord Cumnor had put\nupon her.\n\n\"Mrs. Bradley,\" she said one day, \"are you quite comfortable about\nmy lady's health? Lord Cumnor fancied that she was looking worn and\nill?\"\n\n\"Indeed, Mrs. Kirkpatrick, I don't think my lady is herself. I can't\npersuade myself as she is, though if you was to question me till\nnight I couldn't tell you why.\"\n\n\"Don't you think you could make some errand to Hollingford, and see\nMr. Gibson, and ask him to come round this way some day, and make a\ncall on Lady Cumnor?\"\n\n\"It would be as much as my place is worth, Mrs. Kirkpatrick. Till my\nlady's dying day, if Providence keeps her in her senses, she'll have\neverything done her own way, or not at all. There's only Lady Harriet\nthat can manage her the least, and she not always.\"\n\n\"Well, then--we must hope that there is nothing the matter with her;\nand I daresay there is not. She says there is not, and she ought to\nknow best herself.\"\n\nBut a day or two after this conversation took place, Lady Cumnor\nstartled Mrs. Kirkpatrick, by saying suddenly,--\"Clare, I wish you'd\nwrite a note to Mr. Gibson, saying I should like to see him this\nafternoon. I thought he would have called of himself before now. He\nought to have done so, to pay his respects.\"\n\nMr. Gibson had been far too busy in his profession to have time for\nmere visits of ceremony, though he knew quite well he was neglecting\nwhat was expected of him. But the district of which he may be said to\nhave had medical charge was full of a bad kind of low fever, which\ntook up all his time and thought, and often made him very thankful\nthat Molly was out of the way in the quiet shades of Hamley.\n\nHis domestic \"rows\" had not healed over in the least, though he\nwas obliged to put the perplexities on one side for the time. The\nlast drop--the final straw, had been an impromptu visit of Lord\nHollingford's, whom he had met in the town one forenoon. They had had\na good deal to say to each other about some new scientific discovery,\nwith the details of which Lord Hollingford was well acquainted,\nwhile Mr. Gibson was ignorant and deeply interested. At length Lord\nHollingford said suddenly,--\n\n\"Gibson, I wonder if you'd give me some lunch; I've been a good\ndeal about since my seven-o'clock breakfast, and am getting quite\nravenous.\"\n\nNow Mr. Gibson was only too much pleased to show hospitality to one\nwhom he liked and respected so much as Lord Hollingford, and he\ngladly took him home with him to the early family dinner. But it was\njust at the time when the cook was sulking at Bethia's dismissal--and\nshe chose to be unpunctual and careless. There was no successor to\nBethia as yet appointed to wait at the meals. So, though Mr. Gibson\nknew well that bread-and-cheese, cold beef, or the simplest food\navailable, would have been welcome to the hungry lord, he could not\nget either these things for luncheon, or even the family dinner, at\nanything like the proper time, in spite of all his ringing, and as\nmuch anger as he liked to show, for fear of making Lord Hollingford\nuncomfortable. At last dinner was ready, but the poor host saw\nthe want of nicety--almost the want of cleanliness, in all its\naccompaniments--dingy plate, dull-looking glass, a table-cloth that,\nif not absolutely dirty, was anything but fresh in its splashed and\nrumpled condition, and compared it in his own mind with the dainty\ndelicacy with which even a loaf of brown bread was served up at\nhis guest's home. He did not apologize directly, but, after dinner,\njust as they were parting, he said,--\"You see a man like me--a\nwidower--with a daughter who cannot always be at home--has not the\nregulated household which would enable me to command the small\nportions of time I can spend there.\"\n\nHe made no allusion to the comfortless meal of which they had both\npartaken, though it was full in his mind. Nor was it absent from Lord\nHollingford's as he made reply,--\n\n\"True, true. Yet a man like you ought to be free from any thought of\nhousehold cares. You ought to have somebody. How old is Miss Gibson?\"\n\n\"Seventeen. It's a very awkward age for a motherless girl.\"\n\n\"Yes; very. I have only boys, but it must be very awkward with\na girl. Excuse me, Gibson, but we're talking like friends. Have\nyou never thought of marrying again? It wouldn't be like a first\nmarriage, of course; but if you found a sensible, agreeable woman of\nthirty or so, I really think you couldn't do better than take her to\nmanage your home, and so save you either discomfort or worry; and,\nbesides, she would be able to give your daughter that kind of tender\nsupervision which, I fancy, all girls of that age require. It's a\ndelicate subject, but you'll excuse my having spoken frankly.\"\n\nMr. Gibson had thought of this advice several times since it was\ngiven; but it was a case of \"first catch your hare.\" Where was the\n\"sensible and agreeable woman of thirty or so?\" Not Miss Browning,\nnor Miss Phoebe, nor Miss Goodenough. Among his country patients\nthere were two classes pretty distinctly marked: farmers, whose\nchildren were unrefined and uneducated; squires, whose daughters\nwould, indeed, think the world was coming to a pretty pass, if they\nwere to marry a country surgeon.\n\nBut the first day on which Mr. Gibson paid his visit to Lady Cumnor,\nhe began to think it possible that Mrs. Kirkpatrick was his \"hare.\"\nHe rode away with slack rein, thinking over what he knew of her,\nmore than about the prescriptions he should write, or the way he was\ngoing. He remembered her as a very pretty Miss Clare: the governess\nwho had the scarlet fever; that was in his wife's days, a long time\nago; he could hardly understand Mrs. Kirkpatrick's youthfulness\nof appearance when he thought how long. Then he had heard of her\nmarriage to a curate; and the next day (or so it seemed, he could not\nrecollect the exact duration of the interval), of his death. He knew,\nin some way, that she had been living ever since as a governess in\ndifferent families; but that she had always been a great favourite\nwith the family at the Towers, for whom, quite independent of their\nrank, he had a true respect. A year or two ago he had heard that she\nhad taken the good-will of a school at Ashcombe; a small town close\nto another property of Lord Cumnor's, in the same county. Ashcombe\nwas a larger estate than that near Hollingford, but the old\nManor-house there was not nearly so good a residence as the Towers;\nso it was given up to Mr. Preston, the land-agent for the Ashcombe\nproperty, just as Mr. Sheepshanks was for that at Hollingford.\nThere were a few rooms at the Manor-house reserved for the\noccasional visits of the family, otherwise Mr. Preston, a handsome\nyoung bachelor, had it all to himself. Mr. Gibson knew that Mrs.\nKirkpatrick had one child, a daughter, who must be much about the\nsame age as Molly. Of course she had very little, if any, property.\nBut he himself had lived carefully, and had a few thousands well\ninvested; besides which, his professional income was good, and\nincreasing rather than diminishing every year. By the time he had\narrived at this point in his consideration of the case, he was at the\nhouse of the next patient on his round, and he put away all thought\nof matrimony and Mrs. Kirkpatrick for the time. Once again, in the\ncourse of the day, he remembered with a certain pleasure that Molly\nhad told him some little details connected with her unlucky detention\nat the Towers five or six years ago, which had made him feel at the\ntime as if Mrs. Kirkpatrick had behaved very kindly to his little\ngirl. So there the matter rested for the present, as far as he was\nconcerned.\n\nLady Cumnor was out of health; but not so ill as she had been\nfancying herself during all those days when the people about her\ndared not send for the doctor. It was a great relief to her to have\nMr. Gibson to decide for her what she was to do; what to eat, drink,\navoid. Such decisions _ab extra_, are sometimes a wonderful relief\nto those whose habit it has been to decide, not only for themselves,\nbut for every one else; and occasionally the relaxation of the strain\nwhich a character for infallible wisdom brings with it, does much to\nrestore health. Mrs. Kirkpatrick thought in her secret soul that she\nhad never found it so easy to get on with Lady Cumnor; and Bradley\nand she had never done singing the praises of Mr. Gibson, \"who always\nmanaged my lady so beautifully.\"\n\nReports were duly sent up to my lord, but he and his daughters were\nstrictly forbidden to come down. Lady Cumnor wished to be weak\nand languid, and uncertain both in body and mind, without family\nobservation. It was a condition so different to anything she had\never been in before, that she was unconsciously afraid of losing her\nprestige, if she was seen in it. Sometimes she herself wrote the\ndaily bulletins; at other times she bade Clare do it, but she would\nalways see the letters. Any answers she received from her daughters\nshe used to read herself, occasionally imparting some of their\ncontents to \"that good Clare.\" But anybody might read my lord's\nletters. There was no great fear of family secrets oozing out in his\nsprawling lines of affection. But once Mrs. Kirkpatrick came upon a\nsentence in a letter from Lord Cumnor, which she was reading out loud\nto his wife, that caught her eye before she came to it, and if she\ncould have skipped it and kept it for private perusal, she would\ngladly have done so. My lady was too sharp for her, though. In her\nopinion \"Clare was a good creature, but not clever,\" the truth\nbeing that she was not always quick at resources, though tolerably\nunscrupulous in the use of them.\n\n\"Read on. What are you stopping for? There is no bad news, is there,\nabout Agnes?--Give me the letter.\"\n\nLady Cumnor read, half aloud,--\n\n\"'How are Clare and Gibson getting on? You despised my advice to help\non that affair, but I really think a little match-making would be a\nvery pleasant amusement now that you are shut up in the house; and I\ncannot conceive any marriage more suitable.'\"\n\n\"Oh!\" said Lady Cumnor, laughing, \"it was awkward for you to come\nupon that, Clare: I don't wonder you stopped short. You gave me a\nterrible fright, though.\"\n\n\"Lord Cumnor is so fond of joking,\" said Mrs. Kirkpatrick, a little\nflurried, yet quite recognizing the truth of his last words,--\"I\ncannot conceive any marriage more suitable.\" She wondered what Lady\nCumnor thought of it. Lord Cumnor wrote as if there was really a\nchance. It was not an unpleasant idea; it brought a faint smile out\nupon her face, as she sat by Lady Cumnor, while the latter took her\nafternoon nap.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER X.\n\nA CRISIS.\n\n\n[Illustration (untitled)]\n\nMrs. Kirkpatrick had been reading aloud till Lady Cumnor fell asleep,\nthe book rested on her knee, just kept from falling by her hold. She\nwas looking out of the window, not seeing the trees in the park, nor\nthe glimpses of the hills beyond, but thinking how pleasant it would\nbe to have a husband once more;--some one who would work while she\nsate at her elegant ease in a prettily-furnished drawing-room; and\nshe was rapidly investing this imaginary breadwinner with the form\nand features of the country surgeon, when there was a slight tap\nat the door, and almost before she could rise, the object of her\nthoughts came in. She felt herself blush, and she was not displeased\nat the consciousness. She advanced to meet him, making a sign towards\nher sleeping ladyship.\n\n\"Very good,\" said he, in a low voice, casting a professional eye on\nthe slumbering figure; \"can I speak to you for a minute or two in the\nlibrary?\"\n\n\"Is he going to offer?\" thought she, with a sudden palpitation, and\na conviction of her willingness to accept a man whom an hour before\nshe had simply looked upon as one of the category of unmarried men to\nwhom matrimony was possible.\n\nHe was only going to make one or two medical inquiries; she found\nthat out very speedily, and considered the conversation as rather\nflat to her, though it might be instructive to him. She was not aware\nthat he finally made up his mind to propose, during the time that\nshe was speaking--answering his questions in many words, but he was\naccustomed to winnow the chaff from the corn; and her voice was so\nsoft, her accent so pleasant, that it struck him as particularly\nagreeable after the broad country accent he was perpetually hearing.\nThen the harmonious colours of her dress, and her slow and graceful\nmovements, had something of the same soothing effect upon his nerves\nthat a cat's purring has upon some people's. He began to think\nthat he should be fortunate if he could win her, for his own sake.\nYesterday he had looked upon her more as a possible stepmother\nfor Molly; to-day he thought more of her as a wife for himself.\nThe remembrance of Lord Cumnor's letter gave her a very becoming\nconsciousness; she wished to attract, and hoped that she was\nsucceeding. Still they only talked of the countess's state for some\ntime: then a lucky shower came on. Mr. Gibson did not care a jot for\nrain, but just now it gave him an excuse for lingering.\n\n\"It's very stormy weather,\" said he.\n\n\"Yes, very. My daughter writes me word, that for two days last week\nthe packet could not sail from Boulogne.\"\n\n\"Miss Kirkpatrick is at Boulogne, is she?\"\n\n\"Yes, poor girl; she is at school there, trying to perfect herself\nin the French language. But, Mr. Gibson, you must not call her Miss\nKirkpatrick. Cynthia remembers you with so much--affection, I may\nsay. She was your little patient when she had the measles here four\nyears ago, you know. Pray call her Cynthia; she would be quite hurt\nat such a formal name as Miss Kirkpatrick from you.\"\n\n\"Cynthia seems to me such an out-of-the-way name, only fit for\npoetry, not for daily use.\"\n\n\"It is mine,\" said Mrs. Kirkpatrick, in a plaintive tone of reproach.\n\"I was christened Hyacinth, and her poor father would have her called\nafter me. I'm sorry you don't like it.\"\n\nMr. Gibson did not know what to say. He was not quite prepared to\nplunge into the directly personal style. While he was hesitating, she\nwent on--\n\n\"Hyacinth Clare! Once upon a time I was quite proud of my pretty\nname; and other people thought it pretty, too.\"\n\n\"I've no doubt--\" Mr. Gibson began; and then stopped.\n\n\"Perhaps I did wrong in yielding to his wish, to have her called by\nsuch a romantic name. It may excite prejudice against her in some\npeople; and, poor child! she will have enough to struggle with. A\nyoung daughter is a great charge, Mr. Gibson, especially when there\nis only one parent to look after her.\"\n\n\"You are quite right,\" said he, recalled to the remembrance of Molly;\n\"though I should have thought that a girl who is so fortunate as to\nhave a mother could not feel the loss of her father so acutely as one\nwho is motherless must suffer from her deprivation.\"\n\n\"You are thinking of your own daughter. It was careless of me to say\nwhat I did. Dear child! how well I remember her sweet little face as\nshe lay sleeping on my bed. I suppose she is nearly grown-up now. She\nmust be near my Cynthia's age. How I should like to see her!\"\n\n\"I hope you will. I should like you to see her. I should like you to\nlove my poor little Molly,--to love her as your own--\" He swallowed\ndown something that rose in his throat, and was nearly choking him.\n\n\"Is he going to offer? _Is_ he?\" she wondered; and she began to\ntremble in the suspense before he next spoke.\n\n\"Could you love her as your daughter? Will you try? Will you give\nme the right of introducing you to her as her future mother; as my\nwife?\"\n\nThere! he had done it--whether it was wise or foolish--he had done\nit! but he was aware that the question as to its wisdom came into his\nmind the instant that the words were said past recall.\n\nShe hid her face in her hands.\n\n\"Oh! Mr. Gibson,\" she said; and then, a little to his surprise, and a\ngreat deal to her own, she burst into hysterical tears: it was such\na wonderful relief to feel that she need not struggle any more for a\nlivelihood.\n\n\"My dear--my dearest,\" said he, trying to soothe her with word and\ncaress; but, just at the moment, uncertain what name he ought to\nuse. After her sobbing had abated a little, she said herself, as if\nunderstanding his difficulty,--\n\n\"Call me Hyacinth--your own Hyacinth. I can't bear 'Clare,' it does\nso remind me of being a governess, and those days are all past now.\"\n\n\"Yes; but surely no one can have been more valued, more beloved than\nyou have been in this family at least.\"\n\n\"Oh, yes! they have been very good. But still one has always had to\nremember one's position.\"\n\n\"We ought to tell Lady Cumnor,\" said he, thinking, perhaps, more of\nthe various duties which lay before him in consequence of the step he\nhad just taken, than of what his future bride was saying.\n\n\"You'll tell her, won't you?\" said she, looking up in his face with\nbeseeching eyes. \"I always like other people to tell her things, and\nthen I can see how she takes them.\"\n\n\"Certainly! I will do whatever you wish. Shall we go and see if she\nis awake now?\"\n\n\"No! I think not. I had better prepare her. You will come to-morrow,\nwon't you? and you will tell her then.\"\n\n\"Yes; that will be best. I ought to tell Molly first. She has the\nright to know. I do hope you and she will love each other dearly.\"\n\n\"Oh, yes! I'm sure we shall. Then you'll come to-morrow and tell Lady\nCumnor? And I'll prepare her.\"\n\n\"I don't see what preparation is necessary; but you know best, my\ndear. When can we arrange for you and Molly to meet?\"\n\nJust then a servant came in, and the pair started apart.\n\n\"Her ladyship is awake, and wishes to see Mr. Gibson.\"\n\nThey both followed the man upstairs; Mrs. Kirkpatrick trying hard\nto look as if nothing had happened, for she particularly wished\n\"to prepare\" Lady Cumnor; that is to say, to give her version of Mr.\nGibson's extreme urgency, and her own coy unwillingness.\n\nBut Lady Cumnor had observant eyes in sickness as well as in health.\nShe had gone to sleep with the recollection of the passage in her\nhusband's letter full in her mind, and, perhaps, it gave a direction\nto her wakening ideas.\n\n\"I'm glad you're not gone, Mr. Gibson. I wanted to tell you-- What's\nthe matter with you both? What have you been saying to Clare? I'm\nsure something has happened.\"\n\nThere was nothing for it, in Mr. Gibson's opinion, but to make a\nclean breast of it, and tell her ladyship all. He turned round, and\ntook hold of Mrs. Kirkpatrick's hand, and said out straight, \"I have\nbeen asking Mrs. Kirkpatrick to be my wife, and to be a mother to my\nchild; and she has consented. I hardly know how to thank her enough\nin words.\"\n\n\"Umph! I don't see any objection. I daresay you'll be very happy.\nI'm very glad of it! Here! shake hands with me, both of you.\" Then\nlaughing a little, she added, \"It does not seem to me that any\nexertion has been required on my part.\"\n\nMr. Gibson looked perplexed at these words. Mrs. Kirkpatrick\nreddened.\n\n\"Did she not tell you? Oh, then, I must. It's too good a joke to be\nlost, especially as everything has ended so well. When Lord Cumnor's\nletter came this morning--this very morning--I gave it to Clare to\nread aloud to me, and I saw she suddenly came to a full stop, where\nno full stop could be, and I thought it was something about Agnes,\nso I took the letter and read--stay! I'll read the sentence to you.\nWhere's the letter, Clare? Oh! don't trouble yourself, here it is.\n'How are Clare and Gibson getting on? You despised my advice to help\non that affair, but I really think a little match-making would be a\nvery pleasant amusement, now that you are shut up in the house; and\nI cannot conceive any marriage more suitable.' You see, you have my\nlord's full approbation. But I must write, and tell him you have\nmanaged your own affairs without any interference of mine. Now we'll\njust have a little medical talk, Mr. Gibson, and then you and Clare\nshall finish your tête-à-tête.\"\n\nThey were neither of them quite as desirous of further conversation\ntogether as they had been before the passage out of Lord Cumnor's\nletter had been read aloud. Mr. Gibson tried not to think about it,\nfor he was aware that if he dwelt upon it, he might get to fancy all\nsorts of things, as to the conversation which had ended in his offer.\nBut Lady Cumnor was imperious now, as always.\n\n\"Come, no nonsense. I always made my girls go and have tête-à-têtes\nwith the men who were to be their husbands, whether they would or no:\nthere's a great deal to be talked over before every marriage, and you\ntwo are certainly old enough to be above affectation. Go away with\nyou.\"\n\nSo there was nothing for it but for them to return to the library;\nMrs. Kirkpatrick pouting a little, and Mr. Gibson feeling more like\nhis own cool, sarcastic self, by many degrees, than he had done when\nlast in that room.\n\nShe began, half crying,--\n\n\"I cannot tell what poor Kirkpatrick would say if he knew what I have\ndone. He did so dislike the notion of second marriages, poor fellow!\"\n\n\"Let us hope that he doesn't know, then; or that, if he does, he\nis wiser--I mean, that he sees how second marriages may be most\ndesirable and expedient in some cases.\"\n\nAltogether, this second tête-à-tête, done to command, was not so\nsatisfactory as the first; and Mr. Gibson was quite alive to the\nnecessity of proceeding on his round to see his patients before very\nmuch time had elapsed.\n\n\"We shall shake down into uniformity before long, I've no doubt,\"\nsaid he to himself, as he rode away. \"It's hardly to be expected that\nour thoughts should run in the same groove all at once. Nor should I\nlike it,\" he added. \"It would be very flat and stagnant to have only\nan echo of one's own opinions from one's wife. Heigho! I must tell\nMolly about it: dear little woman, I wonder how she'll take it? It's\ndone, in a great measure, for her good.\" And then he lost himself in\nrecapitulating Mrs. Kirkpatrick's good qualities, and the advantages\nto be gained to his daughter from the step he had just taken.\n\nIt was too late to go round by Hamley that afternoon. The Towers and\nthe Towers' round lay just in the opposite direction to Hamley. So it\nwas the next morning before Mr. Gibson arrived at the Hall, timing\nhis visit as well as he could so as to have half-an-hour's private\ntalk with Molly before Mrs. Hamley came down into the drawing-room.\nHe thought that his daughter would require sympathy after receiving\nthe intelligence he had to communicate; and he knew there was no one\nmore fit to give it than Mrs. Hamley.\n\nIt was a brilliantly hot summer's morning; men in their shirtsleeves\nwere in the fields getting in the early harvest of oats; as Mr.\nGibson rode slowly along, he could see them over the tall hedge-rows,\nand even hear the soothing measured sound of the fall of the long\nswathes, as they were mown. The labourers seemed too hot to talk; the\ndog, guarding their coats and cans, lay panting loudly on the other\nside of the elm, under which Mr. Gibson stopped for an instant to\nsurvey the scene, and gain a little delay before the interview that\nhe wished was well over. In another minute he had snapped at himself\nfor his weakness, and put spurs to his horse. He came up to the Hall\nat a good sharp trot; it was earlier than the usual time of his\nvisits, and no one was expecting him; all the stable-men were in\nthe fields, but that signified little to Mr. Gibson; he walked his\nhorse about for five minutes or so before taking him into the stable,\nand loosened his girths, examining him with perhaps unnecessary\nexactitude. He went into the house by a private door, and made his\nway into the drawing-room, half expecting, however, that Molly would\nbe in the garden. She had been there, but it was too hot and dazzling\nnow for her to remain out of doors, and she had come in by the open\nwindow of the drawing-room. Oppressed with the heat, she had fallen\nasleep in an easy-chair, her bonnet and open book upon her knee, one\narm hanging listlessly down. She looked very soft, and young, and\nchildlike; and a gush of love sprang into her father's heart as he\ngazed at her.\n\n\"Molly!\" said he, gently, taking the little brown hand that was\nhanging down, and holding it in his own. \"Molly!\"\n\nShe opened her eyes, that for one moment had no recognition in them.\nThen the light came brilliantly into them and she sprang up, and\nthrew her arms round his neck, exclaiming,--\n\n\"Oh, papa, my dear, dear papa! What made you come while I was asleep?\nI lose the pleasure of watching for you.\"\n\nMr. Gibson turned a little paler than he had been before. He still\nheld her hand, and drew her to a seat by him on a sofa, without\nspeaking. There was no need; she was chattering away.\n\n\"I was up so early! It is so charming to be out here in the fresh\nmorning air. I think that made me sleepy. But isn't it a gloriously\nhot day? I wonder if the Italian skies they talk about can be bluer\nthan that--that little bit you see just between the oaks--there!\"\n\nShe pulled her hand away, and used both it and the other to turn her\nfather's head, so that he should exactly see the very bit she meant.\nShe was rather struck by his unusual silence.\n\n\"Have you heard from Miss Eyre, papa? How are they all? And this\nfever that is about? Do you know, papa, I don't think you are looking\nwell? You want me at home to take care of you. How soon may I come\nhome?\"\n\n\"Don't I look well? That must be all your fancy, goosey. I feel\nuncommonly well; and I ought to look well, for-- I have a piece of\nnews for you, little woman.\" (He felt that he was doing his business\nvery awkwardly, but he was determined to plunge on.) \"Can you guess\nit?\"\n\n\"How should I?\" said she; but her tone was changed, and she was\nevidently uneasy, as with the presage of an instinct.\n\n\"Why, you see, my love,\" said he, again taking her hand, \"that you\nare in a very awkward position--a girl growing up in such a family\nas mine--young men--which was a piece of confounded stupidity on my\npart. And I am obliged to be away so much.\"\n\n\"But there is Miss Eyre,\" said she, sick with the strengthening\nindefinite presage of what was to come. \"Dear Miss Eyre, I want\nnothing but her and you.\"\n\n\"Still there are times like the present when Miss Eyre cannot be with\nyou; her home is not with us; she has other duties. I've been in\ngreat perplexity for some time; but at last I've taken a step which\nwill, I hope, make us both happier.\"\n\n\"You're going to be married again,\" said she, helping him out, with a\nquiet dry voice, and gently drawing her hand out of his.\n\n\"Yes. To Mrs. Kirkpatrick--you remember her? They call her Clare at\nthe Towers. You recollect how kind she was to you that day you were\nleft there?\"\n\nShe did not answer. She could not tell what words to use. She\nwas afraid of saying anything, lest the passion of anger,\ndislike, indignation--whatever it was that was boiling up in her\nbreast--should find vent in cries and screams, or worse, in raging\nwords that could never be forgotten. It was as if the piece of solid\nground on which she stood had broken from the shore, and she was\ndrifting out to the infinite sea alone.\n\nMr. Gibson saw that her silence was unnatural, and half-guessed at\nthe cause of it. But he knew that she must have time to reconcile\nherself to the idea, and still believed that it would be for her\neventual happiness. He had, besides, the relief of feeling that the\nsecret was told, the confidence made, which he had been dreading\nfor the last twenty-four hours. He went on recapitulating all the\nadvantages of the marriage; he knew them off by heart now.\n\n\"She's a very suitable age for me. I don't know how old she is\nexactly, but she must be nearly forty. I shouldn't have wished to\nmarry any one younger. She's highly respected by Lord and Lady Cumnor\nand their family, which is of itself a character. She has very\nagreeable and polished manners--of course, from the circles she has\nbeen thrown into--and you and I, goosey, are apt to be a little\nbrusque, or so; we must brush up our manners now.\"\n\nNo remark from her on this little bit of playfulness. He went on,--\n\n\"She has been accustomed to housekeeping--economical housekeeping,\ntoo--for of late years she has had a school at Ashcombe, and has had,\nof course, to arrange all things for a large family. And last, but\nnot least, she has a daughter--about your age, Molly--who, of course,\nwill come and live with us, and be a nice companion--a sister--for\nyou.\"\n\nStill she was silent. At length she said,--\n\n\"So I was sent out of the house that all this might be quietly\narranged in my absence?\"\n\nOut of the bitterness of her heart she spoke, but she was roused\nout of her assumed impassiveness by the effect produced. Her\nfather started up, and quickly left the room, saying something to\nhimself--what, she could not hear, though she ran after him, followed\nhim through dark stone passages, into the glare of the stable-yard,\ninto the stables--\n\n\"Oh, papa, papa--I'm not myself--I don't know what to say about this\nhateful--detestable--\"\n\nHe led his horse out. She did not know if he heard her words. Just as\nhe mounted, he turned round upon her with a grey grim face--\n\n\"I think it's better for both of us, for me to go away now. We\nmay say things difficult to forget. We are both much agitated. By\nto-morrow we shall be more composed; you will have thought it over,\nand have seen that the principal--one great motive, I mean--was your\ngood. You may tell Mrs. Hamley--I meant to have told her myself. I\nwill come again to-morrow. Good-by, Molly.\"\n\nFor many minutes after he had ridden away--long after the sound of\nhis horse's hoofs on the round stones of the paved lane, beyond the\nhome-meadows, had died away--Molly stood there, shading her eyes,\nand looking at the empty space of air in which his form had last\nappeared. Her very breath seemed suspended; only, two or three times,\nafter long intervals, she drew a miserable sigh, which was caught up\ninto a sob. She turned away at last, but could not go into the house,\ncould not tell Mrs. Hamley, could not forget how her father had\nlooked and spoken--and left her.\n\nShe went out through a side-door--it was the way by which the\ngardeners passed when they took the manure into the garden--and the\nwalk to which it led was concealed from sight as much as possible by\nshrubs and evergreens and over-arching trees. No one would know what\nbecame of her--and, with the ingratitude of misery, she added to\nherself, no one would care. Mrs. Hamley had her own husband, her own\nchildren, her close home interests--she was very good and kind, but\nthere was a bitter grief in Molly's heart, with which the stranger\ncould not intermeddle. She went quickly on to the bourne which she\nhad fixed for herself--a seat almost surrounded by the drooping\nleaves of a weeping-ash--a seat on the long broad terrace walk on\nthe other side of the wood, that overlooked the pleasant slope of\nthe meadows beyond. The walk had probably been made to command this\nsunny, peaceful landscape, with trees, and a church spire, two or\nthree red-tiled roofs of old cottages, and a purple bit of rising\nground in the distance; and at some previous date, when there might\nhave been a large family of Hamleys residing at the Hall, ladies\nin hoops, and gentlemen in bag-wigs with swords by their sides,\nmight have filled up the breadth of the terrace, as they sauntered,\nsmiling, along. But no one ever cared to saunter there now. It was a\ndeserted walk. The squire or his sons might cross it in passing to a\nlittle gate that led to the meadow beyond; but no one loitered there.\nMolly almost thought that no one knew of the hidden seat under the\nash-tree but herself; for there were not more gardeners employed upon\nthe grounds than were necessary to keep the kitchen-gardens and such\nof the ornamental part as was frequented by the family, or in sight\nof the house, in good order.\n\nWhen she had once got to the seat she broke out with suppressed\npassion of grief. She did not care to analyze the sources of her\ntears and sobs--her father was going to be married again--her father\nwas angry with her; she had done very wrong--he had gone away\ndispleased; she had lost his love; he was going to be married--away\nfrom her--away from his child--his little daughter--forgetting her\nown dear, dear mother. So she thought in a tumultuous kind of way,\nsobbing till she was wearied out, and had to gain strength by being\nquiet for a time, to break forth into her passion of tears afresh.\nShe had cast herself on the ground--that natural throne for violent\nsorrow--and leant up against the old moss-grown seat; sometimes\nburying her face in her hands; sometimes clasping them together, as\nif by the tight painful grasp of her fingers she could deaden mental\nsuffering.\n\nShe did not see Roger Hamley returning from the meadows, nor hear the\nclick of the little white gate. He had been out dredging in ponds and\nditches, and had his wet sling-net, with its imprisoned treasures of\nnastiness, over his shoulder. He was coming home to lunch, having\nalways a fine midday appetite, though he pretended to despise the\nmeal in theory. But he knew that his mother liked his companionship\nthen; she depended much upon her luncheon, and was seldom downstairs\nand visible to her family much before the time. So he overcame his\ntheory, for the sake of his mother, and had his reward in the hearty\nrelish with which he kept her company in eating.\n\nHe did not see Molly as he crossed the terrace-walk on his way\nhomewards. He had gone about twenty yards along the small wood-path\nat right angles to the terrace, when, looking among the grass and\nwild plants under the trees, he spied out one which was rare, one\nwhich he had been long wishing to find in flower, and saw it at last,\nwith those bright keen eyes of his. Down went his net, skilfully\ntwisted so as to retain its contents, while it lay amid the herbage,\nand he himself went with light and well-planted footsteps in search\nof the treasure. He was so great a lover of nature that, without any\nthought, but habitually, he always avoided treading unnecessarily on\nany plant; who knew what long-sought growth or insect might develop\nitself in that which now appeared but insignificant?\n\nHis steps led him in the direction of the ash-tree seat, much less\nscreened from observation on this side than on the terrace. He\nstopped; he saw a light-coloured dress on the ground--somebody\nhalf-lying on the seat, so still just then, he wondered if the\nperson, whoever it was, had fallen ill or fainted. He paused to\nwatch. In a minute or two the sobs broke out again--the words. It was\nMiss Gibson crying out in a broken voice,--\n\n\"Oh, papa, papa! if you would but come back!\"\n\nFor a minute or two he thought it would be kinder to leave her\nfancying herself unobserved; he had even made a retrograde step or\ntwo, on tip-toe; but then he heard the miserable sobbing again. It\nwas farther than his mother could walk, or else, be the sorrow what\nit would, she was the natural comforter of this girl, her visitor.\nHowever, whether it was right or wrong, delicate or obtrusive, when\nhe heard the sad voice talking again, in such tones of uncomforted,\nlonely misery, he turned back, and went to the green tent under the\nash-tree. She started up when he came thus close to her; she tried to\ncheck her sobs, and instinctively smoothed her wet tangled hair back\nwith her hands.\n\nHe looked down upon her with grave, kind sympathy, but he did not\nknow exactly what to say.\n\n\"Is it lunch-time?\" said she, trying to believe that he did not see\nthe traces of her tears and the disturbance of her features--that he\nhad not seen her lying, sobbing her heart out there.\n\n\"I don't know. I was going home to lunch. But--you must let me\nsay it--I couldn't go on when I saw your distress. Has anything\nhappened?--anything in which I can help you, I mean; for, of course,\nI've no right to make the inquiry, if it is any private sorrow, in\nwhich I can be of no use.\"\n\nShe had exhausted herself so much with crying, that she felt as if\nshe could neither stand nor walk just yet. She sate down on the seat,\nand sighed, and turned so pale, he thought she was going to faint.\n\n\"Wait a moment,\" said he,--quite unnecessarily, for she could not\nhave stirred,--and he was off like a shot to some spring of water\nthat he knew of in the wood, and in a minute or two he returned with\ncareful steps, bringing a little in a broad green leaf, turned into\nan impromptu cup. Little as it was, it did her good.\n\n\"Thank you!\" she said: \"I can walk back now, in a short time. Don't\nstop.\"\n\n\"You must let me,\" said he: \"my mother wouldn't like me to leave you\nto come home alone, while you are so faint.\"\n\nSo they remained in silence for a little while; he, breaking off and\nexamining one or two abnormal leaves of the ash-tree, partly from the\ncustom of his nature, partly to give her time to recover.\n\n\"Papa is going to be married again,\" said she, at length.\n\nShe could not have said why she told him this; an instant before she\nspoke, she had no intention of doing so. He dropped the leaf he held\nin his hand, turned round, and looked at her. Her poor wistful eyes\nwere filling with tears as they met his, with a dumb appeal for\nsympathy. Her look was much more eloquent than her words. There was\na momentary pause before he replied, and then it was more because he\nfelt that he must say something than that he was in any doubt as to\nthe answer to the question he asked.\n\n\"You are sorry for it?\"\n\nShe did not take her eyes away from his, as her quivering lips formed\nthe word \"Yes,\" though her voice made no sound. He was silent again\nnow; looking on the ground, kicking softly at a loose pebble with his\nfoot. His thoughts did not come readily to the surface in the shape\nof words; nor was he apt at giving comfort till he saw his way clear\nto the real source from which consolation must come. At last he\nspoke,--almost as if he was reasoning out the matter with himself.\n\n\"It seems as if there might be cases where--setting the question of\nlove entirely on one side--it must be almost a duty to find some one\nto be a substitute for the mother. . . I can believe,\" said he, in\na different tone of voice, and looking at Molly afresh, \"that this\nstep may be greatly for your father's happiness--it may relieve him\nfrom many cares, and may give him a pleasant companion.\"\n\n\"He had me. You don't know what we were to each other--at least, what\nhe was to me,\" she added, humbly.\n\n\"Still he must have thought it for the best, or he wouldn't have done\nit. He may have thought it the best for your sake even more than for\nhis own.\"\n\n\"That is what he tried to convince me of.\"\n\nRoger began kicking the pebble again. He had not got hold of the\nright end of the clue. Suddenly he looked up.\n\n\"I want to tell you of a girl I know. Her mother died when she was\nabout sixteen--the eldest of a large family. From that time--all\nthrough the bloom of her youth--she gave herself up to her father,\nfirst as his comforter, afterwards as his companion, friend,\nsecretary--anything you like. He was a man with a great deal of\nbusiness on hand, and often came home only to set to afresh to\npreparations for the next day's work. Harriet was always there, ready\nto help, to talk, or to be silent. It went on for eight or ten years\nin this way; and then her father married again,--a woman not many\nyears older than Harriet herself. Well--they are just the happiest\nset of people I know--you wouldn't have thought it likely, would\nyou?\"\n\nShe was listening, but she had no heart to say anything. Yet she was\ninterested in this little story of Harriet--a girl who had been so\nmuch to her father, more than Molly in this early youth of hers could\nhave been to Mr. Gibson. \"How was it?\" she sighed out at last.\n\n\"Harriet thought of her father's happiness before she thought of her\nown,\" Roger answered, with something of severe brevity. Molly needed\nthe bracing. She began to cry again a little.\n\n\"If it were for papa's happiness--\"\n\n\"He must believe that it is. Whatever you fancy, give him a chance.\nHe cannot have much comfort, I should think, if he sees you fretting\nor pining,--you who have been so much to him, as you say. The lady\nherself, too--if Harriet's stepmother had been a selfish woman, and\nbeen always clutching after the gratification of her own wishes; but\nshe was not: she was as anxious for Harriet to be happy as Harriet\nwas for her father--and your father's future wife may be another of\nthe same kind, though such people are rare.\"\n\n\"I don't think she is, though,\" murmured Molly, a waft of\nrecollection bringing to her mind the details of her day at the\nTowers long ago.\n\nRoger did not want to hear Molly's reasons for this doubting speech.\nHe felt as if he had no right to hear more of Mr. Gibson's family\nlife, past, present, or to come, than was absolutely necessary for\nhim, in order that he might comfort and help the crying girl, whom he\nhad come upon so unexpectedly. And besides, he wanted to go home, and\nbe with his mother at lunch-time. Yet he could not leave her alone.\n\n\"It is right to hope for the best about everybody, and not to expect\nthe worst. This sounds like a truism, but it has comforted me before\nnow, and some day you'll find it useful. One has always to try to\nthink more of others than of oneself, and it is best not to prejudge\npeople on the bad side. My sermons aren't long, are they? Have they\ngiven you an appetite for lunch? Sermons always make me hungry, I\nknow.\"\n\nHe appeared to be waiting for her to get up and come along with him,\nas indeed he was. But he meant her to perceive that he should not\nleave her; so she rose up languidly, too languid to say how much she\nshould prefer being left alone, if he would only go away without her.\nShe was very weak, and stumbled over the straggling root of a tree\nthat projected across the path. He, watchful though silent, saw\nthis stumble, and putting out his hand held her up from falling. He\nstill held her hand when the occasion was past; this little physical\nfailure impressed on his heart how young and helpless she was, and\nhe yearned to her, remembering the passion of sorrow in which he had\nfound her, and longing to be of some little tender bit of comfort to\nher, before they parted--before their tête-à-tête walk was merged in\nthe general familiarity of the household life. Yet he did not know\nwhat to say.\n\n\"You will have thought me hard,\" he burst out at length, as they\nwere nearing the drawing-room windows and the garden-door. \"I\nnever can manage to express what I feel--somehow I always fall to\nphilosophizing--but I am sorry for you. Yes, I am; it's beyond my\npower to help you, as far as altering facts goes, but I can feel for\nyou, in a way which it's best not to talk about, for it can do no\ngood. Remember how sorry I am for you! I shall often be thinking of\nyou, though I daresay it's best not to talk about it again.\"\n\nShe said, \"I know you are sorry,\" under her breath, and then she\nbroke away, and ran indoors, and upstairs to the solitude of her own\nroom. He went straight to his mother, who was sitting before the\nuntasted luncheon, as much annoyed by the mysterious unpunctuality\nof her visitor as she was capable of being with anything; for she\nhad heard that Mr. Gibson had been, and was gone, and she could not\ndiscover if he had left any message for her; and her anxiety about\nher own health, which some people esteemed hypochondriacal, always\nmade her particularly craving for the wisdom which might fall from\nher doctor's lips.\n\n\"Where have you been, Roger? Where is Molly?--Miss Gibson, I mean,\"\nfor she was careful to keep up a barrier of forms between the young\nman and young woman who were thrown together in the same household.\n\n\"I've been out dredging. (By the way, I left my net on the terrace\nwalk.) I found Miss Gibson sitting there, crying as if her heart\nwould break. Her father is going to be married again.\"\n\n\"Married again! You don't say so.\"\n\n\"Yes, he is; and she takes it very hardly, poor girl. Mother, I think\nif you could send some one to her with a glass of wine, a cup of tea,\nor something of that sort--she was very nearly fainting--\"\n\n\"I'll go to her myself, poor child,\" said Mrs. Hamley, rising.\n\n\"Indeed you must not,\" said he, laying his hand upon her arm. \"We\nhave kept you waiting already too long; you are looking quite pale.\nHammond can take it,\" he continued, ringing the bell. She sate down\nagain, almost stunned with surprise.\n\n\"Whom is he going to marry?\"\n\n\"I don't know. I didn't ask, and she didn't tell me.\"\n\n\"That's so like a man. Why, half the character of the affair lies in\nthe question of who it is that he is going to marry.\"\n\n\"I daresay I ought to have asked. But somehow I'm not a good one\non such occasions. I was as sorry as could be for her, and yet I\ncouldn't tell what to say.\"\n\n\"What did you say?\"\n\n\"I gave her the best advice in my power.\"\n\n\"Advice! you ought to have comforted her. Poor little Molly!\"\n\n\"I think that if advice is good it's the best comfort.\"\n\n\"That depends on what you mean by advice. Hush! here she is.\"\n\nTo their surprise, Molly came in, trying hard to look as usual. She\nhad bathed her eyes, and arranged her hair; and was making a great\nstruggle to keep from crying, and to bring her voice into order.\nShe was unwilling to distress Mrs. Hamley by the sight of pain and\nsuffering. She did not know that she was following Roger's injunction\nto think more of others than of herself--but so she was. Mrs. Hamley\nwas not sure if it was wise in her to begin on the piece of news she\nhad just heard from her son; but she was too full of it herself to\ntalk of anything else. \"So I hear your father is going to be married,\nmy dear? May I ask whom it is to?\"\n\n\"Mrs. Kirkpatrick. I think she was governess a long time ago at the\nCountess of Cumnor's. She stays with them a great deal, and they call\nher Clare, and I believe they are very fond of her.\" Molly tried to\nspeak of her future stepmother in the most favourable manner she knew\nhow.\n\n\"I think I've heard of her. Then she's not very young? That's as it\nshould be. A widow too. Has she any family?\"\n\n\"One girl, I believe. But I know so little about her!\"\n\nMolly was very near crying again.\n\n\"Never mind, my dear. That will all come in good time. Roger, you've\nhardly eaten anything; where are you going?\"\n\n\"To fetch my dredging-net. It's full of things I don't want to lose.\nBesides, I never eat much, as a general thing.\" The truth was partly\ntold, not all. He thought he had better leave the other two alone.\nHis mother had such sweet power of sympathy, that she would draw the\nsting out of the girl's heart when she had her alone. As soon as he\nwas gone, Molly lifted up her poor swelled eyes, and, looking at Mrs.\nHamley, she said,--\"He was so good to me. I mean to try and remember\nall he said.\"\n\n\"I'm glad to hear it, love; very glad. From what he told me, I was\nafraid he had been giving you a little lecture. He has a good heart,\nbut he isn't so tender in his manner as Osborne. Roger is a little\nrough sometimes.\"\n\n\"Then I like roughness. It did me good. It made me feel how\nbadly--oh, Mrs. Hamley, I did behave so badly to papa this morning!\"\n\nShe rose up and threw herself into Mrs. Hamley's arms, and sobbed\nupon her breast. Her sorrow was not now for the fact that her father\nwas going to be married again, but for her own ill-behaviour.\n\nIf Roger was not tender in words, he was in deeds. Unreasonable and\npossibly exaggerated as Molly's grief had appeared to him, it was\nreal suffering to her; and he took some pains to lighten it, in his\nown way, which was characteristic enough. That evening he adjusted\nhis microscope, and put the treasures he had collected in his\nmorning's ramble on a little table; and then he asked his mother to\ncome and admire. Of course Molly came too, and this was what he had\nintended. He tried to interest her in his pursuit, cherished her\nfirst little morsel of curiosity, and nursed it into a very proper\ndesire for further information. Then he brought out books on the\nsubject, and translated the slightly pompous and technical language\ninto homely every-day speech. Molly had come down to dinner,\nwondering how the long hours till bedtime would ever pass away:\nhours during which she must not speak on the one thing that would\nbe occupying her mind to the exclusion of all others; for she was\nafraid that already she had wearied Mrs. Hamley with it during their\nafternoon tête-à-tête. But prayers and bedtime came long before she\nexpected; she had been refreshed by a new current of thought, and she\nwas very thankful to Roger. And now there was to-morrow to come, and\na confession of penitence to be made to her father.\n\nBut Mr. Gibson did not want speech or words. He was not fond of\nexpressions of feeling at any time, and perhaps, too, he felt that\nthe less said the better on a subject about which it was evident that\nhis daughter and he were not thoroughly and impulsively in harmony.\nHe read her repentance in her eyes; he saw how much she had suffered;\nand he had a sharp pang at his heart in consequence. And he stopped\nher from speaking out her regret at her behaviour the day before, by\na \"There, there, that will do. I know all you want to say. I know my\nlittle Molly--my silly little goosey--better than she knows herself.\nI've brought you an invitation. Lady Cumnor wants you to go and spend\nnext Thursday at the Towers!\"\n\n\"Do you wish me to go?\" said she, her heart sinking.\n\n\"I wish you and Hyacinth to become better acquainted--to learn to\nlove each other.\"\n\n\"Hyacinth!\" said Molly, entirely bewildered.\n\n\"Yes; Hyacinth! It's the silliest name I ever heard of; but it's\nhers, and I must call her by it. I can't bear Clare, which is\nwhat my lady and all the family at the Towers call her; and 'Mrs.\nKirkpatrick' is formal and nonsensical too, as she'll change her name\nso soon.\"\n\n\"When, papa?\" asked Molly, feeling as if she were living in a\nstrange, unknown world.\n\n\"Not till after Michaelmas.\" And then, continuing on his own\nthoughts, he added, \"And the worst is, she's gone and perpetuated her\nown affected name by having her daughter called after her. Cynthia!\nOne thinks of the moon, and the man in the moon with his bundle of\nfaggots. I'm thankful you're plain Molly, child.\"\n\n\"How old is she--Cynthia, I mean?\"\n\n\"Ay, get accustomed to the name. I should think Cynthia Kirkpatrick\nwas about as old as you are. She's at school in France, picking up\nairs and graces. She's to come home for the wedding, so you'll be\nable to get acquainted with her then; though, I think, she's to go\nback again for another half-year or so.\"\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XI.\n\nMAKING FRIENDSHIP.\n\n\nMr. Gibson believed that Cynthia Kirkpatrick was to return to England\nto be present at her mother's wedding; but Mrs. Kirkpatrick had\nno such intention. She was not what is commonly called a woman\nof determination; but somehow what she disliked she avoided, and\nwhat she liked she tried to do, or to have. So although in the\nconversation, which she had already led to, as to the when and the\nhow she was to be married, she had listened quietly to Mr. Gibson's\nproposal that Molly and Cynthia should be the two bridesmaids, still\nshe had felt how disagreeable it would be to her to have her young\ndaughter flashing out her beauty by the side of the faded bride, her\nmother; and as the further arrangements for the wedding became more\ndefinite, she saw further reasons in her own mind for Cynthia's\nremaining quietly at her school at Boulogne.\n\nMrs. Kirkpatrick had gone to bed that first night of her engagement\nto Mr. Gibson, fully anticipating a speedy marriage. She looked to\nit as a release from the thraldom of keeping school--keeping an\nunprofitable school, with barely pupils enough to pay for house\nrent and taxes, food, washing, and the requisite masters. She saw\nno reason for ever going back to Ashcombe, except to wind up her\naffairs, and to pack up her clothes. She hoped that Mr. Gibson's\nardour would be such that he would press on the marriage, and urge\nher never to resume her school drudgery, but to relinquish it now and\nfor ever. She even made up a very pretty, very passionate speech for\nhim in her own mind; quite sufficiently strong to prevail upon her,\nand to overthrow the scruples which she felt she ought to have, at\ntelling the parents of her pupils that she did not intend to resume\nschool, and that they must find another place of education for their\ndaughters, in the last week but one of the midsummer holidays.\n\nIt was rather like a douche of cold water on Mrs. Kirkpatrick's\nplans, when the next morning at breakfast Lady Cumnor began to decide\nupon the arrangements and duties of the two middle-aged lovers.\n\n\"Of course you can't give up your school all at once, Clare. The\nwedding can't be before Christmas, but that will do very well. We\nshall all be down at the Towers; and it will be a nice amusement for\nthe children to go over to Ashcombe, and see you married.\"\n\n\"I think--I am afraid--I don't believe Mr. Gibson will like waiting\nso long; men are so impatient under these circumstances.\"\n\n\"Oh, nonsense! Lord Cumnor has recommended you to his tenants, and\nI'm sure he wouldn't like them to be put to any inconvenience. Mr.\nGibson will see that in a moment. He's a man of sense, or else he\nwouldn't be our family doctor. Now, what are you going to do about\nyour little girl? Have you fixed yet?\"\n\n\"No. Yesterday there seemed so little time, and when one is agitated\nit is so difficult to think of anything. Cynthia is nearly eighteen,\nold enough to go out as a governess, if he wishes it, but I don't\nthink he will. He is so generous and kind.\"\n\n\"Well! I must give you time to settle some of your affairs to-day.\nDon't waste it in sentiment, you're too old for that. Come to a clear\nunderstanding with each other; it will be for your happiness in the\nlong run.\"\n\nSo they did come to a clear understanding about one or two things.\nTo Mrs. Kirkpatrick's dismay, she found that Mr. Gibson had no more\nidea than Lady Cumnor of her breaking faith with the parents of her\npupils. Though he really was at a serious loss as to what was to\nbecome of Molly till she could be under the protection of his new\nwife at her own home, and though his domestic worries teased him more\nand more every day, he was too honourable to think of persuading Mrs.\nKirkpatrick to give up school a week sooner than was right for his\nsake. He did not even perceive how easy the task of persuasion would\nbe; with all her winning wiles she could scarcely lead him to feel\nimpatience for the wedding to take place at Michaelmas.\n\n\"I can hardly tell you what a comfort and relief it will be to me,\nHyacinth, when you are once my wife--the mistress of my home--poor\nlittle Molly's mother and protector; but I wouldn't interfere with\nyour previous engagements for the world. It wouldn't be right.\"\n\n\"Thank you, my own love. How good you are! So many men would think\nonly of their own wishes and interests! I'm sure the parents of\nmy dear pupils will admire you--will be quite surprised at your\nconsideration for their interests.\"\n\n\"Don't tell them, then. I hate being admired. Why shouldn't you say\nit is your wish to keep on your school till they've had time to look\nout for another?\"\n\n\"Because it isn't,\" said she, daring all. \"I long to be making you\nhappy; I want to make your home a place of rest and comfort to you;\nand I do so wish to cherish your sweet Molly, as I hope to do, when\nI come to be her mother. I can't take virtue to myself which doesn't\nbelong to me. If I have to speak for myself, I shall say, 'Good\npeople, find a school for your daughters by Michaelmas,--for after\nthat time I must go and make the happiness of others.' I can't bear\nto think of your long rides in November--coming home wet at night\nwith no one to take care of you. Oh! if you leave it to me, I shall\nadvise the parents to take their daughters away from the care of one\nwhose heart will be absent. Though I couldn't consent to any time\nbefore Michaelmas--that wouldn't be fair or right, and I'm sure you\nwouldn't urge me--you are too good.\"\n\n\"Well, if you think that they will consider we have acted uprightly\nby them, let it be Michaelmas with all my heart. What does Lady\nCumnor say?\"\n\n\"Oh! I told her I was afraid you wouldn't like waiting, because of\nyour difficulties with your servants, and because of Molly--it would\nbe so desirable to enter on the new relationship with her as soon as\npossible.\"\n\n\"To be sure; so it would. Poor child! I'm afraid the intelligence of\nmy engagement has rather startled her.\"\n\n\"Cynthia will feel it deeply, too,\" said Mrs. Kirkpatrick, unwilling\nto let her daughter be behind Mr. Gibson's in sensibility and\naffection.\n\n\"We will have her over to the wedding! She and Molly shall be\nbridesmaids,\" said Mr. Gibson, in the unguarded warmth of his heart.\n\nThis plan did not quite suit Mrs. Kirkpatrick: but she thought it\nbest not to oppose it, until she had a presentable excuse to give,\nand perhaps also some reason would naturally arise out of future\ncircumstances; so at this time she only smiled, and softly pressed\nthe hand she held in hers.\n\nIt is a question whether Mrs. Kirkpatrick or Molly wished the most\nfor the day to be over which they were to spend together at the\nTowers. Mrs. Kirkpatrick was rather weary of girls as a class. All\nthe trials of her life were connected with girls in some way. She was\nvery young when she first became a governess, and had been worsted\nin her struggles with her pupils, in the first place she ever went\nto. Her elegance of appearance and manner, and her accomplishments,\nmore than her character and acquirements, had rendered it easier\nfor her than for most to obtain good \"situations;\" and she had been\nabsolutely petted in some; but still she was constantly encountering\nnaughty or stubborn, or over-conscientious, or severe-judging, or\ncurious and observant girls. And again, before Cynthia was born, she\nhad longed for a boy, thinking it possible that if some three or\nfour intervening relations died, he might come to be a baronet; and\ninstead of a son, lo and behold it was a daughter! Nevertheless, with\nall her dislike to girls in the abstract as \"the plagues of her life\"\n(and her aversion was not diminished by the fact of her having kept\na school for \"young ladies\" at Ashcombe), she really meant to be as\nkind as she could be to her new step-daughter, whom she remembered\nprincipally as a black-haired, sleepy child, in whose eyes she had\nread admiration of herself. Mrs. Kirkpatrick accepted Mr. Gibson\nprincipally because she was tired of the struggle of earning her own\nlivelihood; but she liked him personally--nay, she even loved him in\nher torpid way, and she intended to be good to his daughter, though\nshe felt as if it would have been easier for her to have been good to\nhis son.\n\nMolly was bracing herself up in her way too. \"I will be like Harriet.\nI will think of others. I won't think of myself,\" she kept repeating\nall the way to the Towers. But there was no selfishness in wishing\nthat the day was come to an end, and that she did very heartily. Mrs.\nHamley sent her thither in the carriage, which was to wait and bring\nher back at night. Mrs. Hamley wanted Molly to make a favourable\nimpression, and she sent for her to come and show herself before she\nset out.\n\n\"Don't put on your silk gown--your white muslin will look the nicest,\nmy dear.\"\n\n\"Not my silk? it is quite new! I had it to come here.\"\n\n\"Still, I think your white muslin suits you the best.\" \"Anything but\nthat horrid plaid silk\" was the thought in Mrs. Hamley's mind; and,\nthanks to her, Molly set off for the Towers, looking a little quaint,\nit is true, but thoroughly lady-like, if she was old-fashioned. Her\nfather was to meet her there; but he had been detained, and she had\nto face Mrs. Kirkpatrick by herself, the recollection of her last\nday of misery at the Towers fresh in her mind as if it had been\nyesterday. Mrs. Kirkpatrick was as caressing as could be. She held\nMolly's hand in hers, as they sate together in the library, after the\nfirst salutations were over. She kept stroking it from time to time,\nand purring out inarticulate sounds of loving satisfaction, as she\ngazed in the blushing face.\n\n\n[Illustration: THE NEW MAMMA.]\n\n\n\"What eyes! so like your dear father's! How we shall love each\nother--shan't we, darling? For his sake!\"\n\n\"I'll try,\" said Molly, bravely; and then she could not finish her\nsentence.\n\n\"And you've just got the same beautiful black curling hair!\" said\nMrs. Kirkpatrick, softly lifting one of Molly's curls from off her\nwhite temple.\n\n\"Papa's hair is growing grey,\" said Molly.\n\n\"Is it? I never see it. I never shall see it. He will always be to me\nthe handsomest of men.\"\n\nMr. Gibson was really a very handsome man, and Molly was pleased with\nthe compliment; but she could not help saying,--\n\n\"Still he will grow old, and his hair will grow grey. I think he will\nbe just as handsome, but it won't be as a young man.\"\n\n\"Ah! that's just it, love. He'll always be handsome; some people\nalways are. And he is so fond of you, dear.\" Molly's colour flashed\ninto her face. She did not want an assurance of her own father's love\nfrom this strange woman. She could not help being angry; all she\ncould do was to keep silent. \"You don't know how he speaks of you;\n'his little treasure,' as he calls you. I'm almost jealous\nsometimes.\"\n\nMolly took her hand away, and her heart began to harden; these\nspeeches were so discordant to her. But she set her teeth together,\nand \"tried to be good.\"\n\n\"We must make him so happy. I'm afraid he has had a great deal to\nannoy him at home; but we will do away with all that now. You must\ntell me,\" seeing the cloud in Molly's eyes, \"what he likes and\ndislikes, for of course you will know.\"\n\nMolly's face cleared a little; of course she did know. She had not\nwatched and loved him so long without believing that she understood\nhim better than any one else: though how he had come to like Mrs.\nKirkpatrick enough to wish to marry her, was an unsolved problem that\nshe unconsciously put aside as inexplicable. Mrs. Kirkpatrick went\non,--\"All men have their fancies and antipathies, even the wisest.\nI have known some gentlemen annoyed beyond measure by the merest\ntrifles; leaving a door open, or spilling tea in their saucers, or\na shawl crookedly put on. Why,\" continued she, lowering her voice,\n\"I know of a house to which Lord Hollingford will never be asked\nagain because he didn't wipe his shoes on both the mats in the hall!\nNow you must tell me what your dear father dislikes most in these\nfanciful ways, and I shall take care to avoid it. You must be my\nlittle friend and helper in pleasing him. It will be such a pleasure\nto me to attend to his slightest fancies. About my dress, too--what\ncolours does he like best? I want to do everything in my power with a\nview to his approval.\"\n\nMolly was gratified by all this, and began to think that really,\nafter all, perhaps her father had done well for himself; and that\nif she could help towards his new happiness, she ought to do it. So\nshe tried very conscientiously to think over Mr. Gibson's wishes and\nways; to ponder over what annoyed him the most in his household.\n\n\"I think,\" said she, \"papa isn't particular about many things; but I\nthink our not having the dinner quite punctual--quite ready for him\nwhen he comes in, fidgets him more than anything. You see, he has\noften had a long ride, and there is another long ride to come, and he\nhas only half-an-hour--sometimes only a quarter--to eat his dinner\nin.\"\n\n\"Thank you, my own love. Punctuality! Yes; it's a great thing in a\nhousehold. It's what I've had to enforce with my young ladies at\nAshcombe. No wonder poor dear Mr. Gibson has been displeased at his\ndinner not being ready, and he so hard-worked!\"\n\n\"Papa doesn't care what he has, if it's only ready. He would take\nbread-and-cheese, if cook would only send it in instead of dinner.\"\n\n\"Bread-and-cheese! Does Mr. Gibson eat cheese?\"\n\n\"Yes; he's very fond of it,\" said Molly, innocently. \"I've known\nhim eat toasted cheese when he has been too tired to fancy anything\nelse.\"\n\n\"Oh! but, my dear, we must change all that. I shouldn't like to\nthink of your father eating cheese; it's such a strong-smelling,\ncoarse kind of thing. We must get him a cook who can toss him up an\nomelette, or something elegant. Cheese is only fit for the kitchen.\"\n\n\"Papa is very fond of it,\" persevered Molly.\n\n\"Oh! but we will cure him of that. I couldn't bear the smell of\ncheese; and I'm sure he would be sorry to annoy me.\"\n\nMolly was silent; it did not do, she found, to be too minute in\ntelling about her father's likes or dislikes. She had better leave\nthem for Mrs. Kirkpatrick to find out for herself. It was an awkward\npause; each was trying to find something agreeable to say. Molly\nspoke at length. \"Please! I should so like to know something about\nCynthia--your daughter.\"\n\n\"Yes, call her Cynthia. It's a pretty name, isn't it? Cynthia\nKirkpatrick. Not so pretty, though, as my old name, Hyacinth Clare.\nPeople used to say it suited me so well. I must show you an acrostic\nthat a gentleman--he was a lieutenant in the 53rd--made upon it. Oh!\nwe shall have a great deal to say to each other, I foresee!\"\n\n\"But about Cynthia?\"\n\n\"Oh, yes! about dear Cynthia. What do you want to know, my dear?\"\n\n\"Papa said she was to live with us! When will she come?\"\n\n\"Oh, was it not sweet of your kind father? I thought of nothing\nelse but Cynthia's going out as a governess when she had completed\nher education; she has been brought up for it, and has had great\nadvantages. But good dear Mr. Gibson wouldn't hear of it. He said\nyesterday that she must come and live with us when she left school.\"\n\n\"When will she leave school?\"\n\n\"She went for two years. I don't think I must let her leave before\nnext summer. She teaches English as well as learning French. Next\nsummer she shall come home, and then shan't we be a happy little\nquartette?\"\n\n\"I hope so,\" said Molly. \"But she is to come to the wedding, isn't\nshe?\" she went on timidly, not knowing how far Mrs. Kirkpatrick would\nlike the allusion to her marriage.\n\n\"Your father has begged for her to come; but we must think about it a\nlittle more before quite fixing it. The journey is a great expense!\"\n\n\"Is she like you? I do so want to see her.\"\n\n\"She is very handsome, people say. In the bright-coloured\nstyle,--perhaps something like what I was. But I like the dark-haired\nforeign kind of beauty best--just now,\" touching Molly's hair, and\nlooking at her with an expression of sentimental remembrance.\n\n\"Does Cynthia--is she very clever and accomplished?\" asked Molly, a\nlittle afraid lest the answer should remove Miss Kirkpatrick at too\ngreat a distance from her.\n\n\"She ought to be; I've paid ever so much money to have her taught by\nthe best masters. But you will see her before long, and I'm afraid we\nmust go now to Lady Cumnor. It has been very charming having you all\nto myself, but I know Lady Cumnor will be expecting us now, and she\nwas very curious to see you,--my future daughter, as she calls you.\"\n\nMolly followed Mrs. Kirkpatrick into the morning-room, where Lady\nCumnor was sitting--a little annoyed, because, having completed her\ntoilette earlier than usual, Clare had not been aware by instinct\nof the fact, and so had not brought Molly Gibson for inspection a\nquarter of an hour before. Every small occurrence is an event in\nthe day of a convalescent invalid, and a little while ago Molly\nwould have met with patronizing appreciation, where now she had to\nencounter criticism. Of Lady Cumnor's character as an individual she\nknew nothing; she only knew she was going to see and be seen by a\nlive countess; nay, more, by \"_the_ countess\" of Hollingford.\n\nMrs. Kirkpatrick led her into Lady Cumnor's presence by the hand, and\nin presenting her, said,--\"My dear little daughter, Lady Cumnor!\"\n\n\"Now, Clare, don't let me have nonsense. She is not your daughter\nyet, and may never be,--I believe that one-third of the engagements\nI have heard of, have never come to marriages. Miss Gibson, I am very\nglad to see you, for your father's sake; when I know you better, I\nhope it will be for your own.\"\n\nMolly very heartily hoped that she might never be known any better\nby the stern-looking lady who sate so upright in the easy chair,\nprepared for lounging, and which therefore gave all the more effect\nto the stiff attitude. Lady Cumnor luckily took Molly's silence for\nacquiescent humility, and went on speaking after a further little\npause of inspection.\n\n\"Yes, yes, I like her looks, Clare. You may make something of her.\nIt will be a great advantage to you, my dear, to have a lady who has\ntrained up several young people of quality always about you just at\nthe time when you are growing up. I'll tell you what, Clare!\"--a\nsudden thought striking her,--\"you and she must become better\nacquainted--you know nothing of each other at present; you are not\nto be married till Christmas, and what could be better than that\nshe should go back with you to Ashcombe! She would be with you\nconstantly, and have the advantage of the companionship of your young\npeople, which would be a good thing for an only child! It's a capital\nplan; I'm very glad I thought of it!\"\n\nNow it would be difficult to say which of Lady Cumnor's two hearers\nwas the most dismayed at the idea which had taken possession of\nher. Mrs. Kirkpatrick had no fancy for being encumbered with a\nstep-daughter before her time. If Molly came to be an inmate of her\nhouse, farewell to many little background economies, and a still\nmore serious farewell to many little indulgences, that were innocent\nenough in themselves, but which Mrs. Kirkpatrick's former life\nhad caused her to look upon as sins to be concealed: the dirty\ndog's-eared delightful novel from the Ashcombe circulating library,\nthe leaves of which she turned over with a pair of scissors; the\nlounging-chair which she had for use at her own home, straight and\nupright as she sate now in Lady Cumnor's presence; the dainty morsel,\nsavoury and small, to which she treated herself for her own solitary\nsupper,--all these and many other similarly pleasant things would\nhave to be foregone if Molly came to be her pupil, parlour-boarder,\nor visitor, as Lady Cumnor was planning. One--two things Clare was\ninstinctively resolved upon: to be married at Michaelmas, and not\nto have Molly at Ashcombe. But she smiled as sweetly as if the plan\nproposed was the most charming project in the world, while all the\ntime her poor brains were beating about in every bush for the reasons\nor excuses of which she should make use at some future time. Molly,\nhowever, saved her all this trouble. It was a question which of the\nthree was the most surprised by the words which burst out of her\nlips. She did not mean to speak, but her heart was very full, and\nalmost before she was aware of her thought she heard herself\nsaying,--\n\n\"I don't think it would be nice at all. I mean, my lady, that I\nshould dislike it very much; it would be taking me away from papa\njust these very few last months. I will like you,\" she went on,\nher eyes full of tears; and, turning to Mrs. Kirkpatrick, she put\nher hand into her future stepmother's with the prettiest and most\ntrustful action. \"I will try hard to love you, and to do all I can\nto make you happy; but you must not take me away from papa just this\nvery last bit of time that I shall have him.\"\n\nMrs. Kirkpatrick fondled the hand thus placed in hers, and was\ngrateful to the girl for her outspoken opposition to Lady Cumnor's\nplan. Clare was, however, exceedingly unwilling to back up Molly\nby any words of her own until Lady Cumnor had spoken and given the\ncue. But there was something in Molly's little speech, or in her\nstraightforward manner, that amused instead of irritating Lady Cumnor\nin her present mood. Perhaps she was tired of the silkiness with\nwhich she had been shut up for so many days.\n\nShe put up her glasses, and looked at them both before speaking. Then\nshe said--\"Upon my word, young lady! Why, Clare, you've got your work\nbefore you! Not but what there is a good deal of truth in what she\nsays. It must be very disagreeable to a girl of her age to have a\nstepmother coming in between her father and herself, whatever may be\nthe advantages to her in the long run.\"\n\nMolly almost felt as if she could make a friend of the stiff old\ncountess, for her clearness of sight as to the plan proposed being\na trial; but she was afraid, in her new-born desire of thinking for\nothers, of Mrs. Kirkpatrick being hurt. She need not have feared as\nfar as outward signs went, for the smile was still on that lady's\npretty rosy lips, and the soft fondling of her hand never stopped.\nLady Cumnor was more interested in Molly the more she looked at her;\nand her gaze was pretty steady through her gold-rimmed eye-glasses.\nShe began a sort of catechism; a string of very straightforward\nquestions, such as any lady under the rank of countess might have\nscrupled to ask, but which were not unkindly meant.\n\n\"You are sixteen, are you not?\"\n\n\"No; I am seventeen. My birthday was three weeks ago.\"\n\n\"Very much the same thing, I should think. Have you ever been to\nschool?\"\n\n\"No, never! Miss Eyre has taught me everything I know.\"\n\n\"Umph! Miss Eyre was your governess, I suppose? I should not have\nthought your father could have afforded to keep a governess. But of\ncourse he must know his own affairs best.\"\n\n\"Certainly, my lady,\" replied Molly, a little touchy as to any\nreflections on her father's wisdom.\n\n\"You say 'certainly!' as if it was a matter of course that every\none should know their own affairs best. You are very young, Miss\nGibson--very. You'll know better before you come to my age. And I\nsuppose you've been taught music, and the use of globes, and French,\nand all the usual accomplishments, since you have had a governess? I\nnever heard of such nonsense!\" she went on, lashing herself up. \"An\nonly daughter! If there had been half-a-dozen, there might have been\nsome sense in it.\"\n\nMolly did not speak, but it was by a strong effort that she kept\nsilence. Mrs. Kirkpatrick fondled her hand more perseveringly than\never, hoping thus to express a sufficient amount of sympathy to\nprevent her from saying anything injudicious. But the caress had\nbecome wearisome to Molly, and only irritated her nerves. She took\nher hand out of Mrs. Kirkpatrick's, with a slight manifestation of\nimpatience.\n\nIt was, perhaps, fortunate for the general peace that just at this\nmoment Mr. Gibson was announced. It is odd enough to see how the\nentrance of a person of the opposite sex into an assemblage of either\nmen or women calms down the little discordances and the disturbance\nof mood. It was the case now; at Mr. Gibson's entrance my lady took\noff her glasses, and smoothed her brow; Mrs. Kirkpatrick managed\nto get up a very becoming blush, and as for Molly, her face glowed\nwith delight, and the white teeth and pretty dimples came out like\nsunlight on a landscape.\n\nOf course, after the first greeting, my lady had to have a private\ninterview with her doctor; and Molly and her future stepmother\nwandered about in the gardens with their arms round each other's\nwaists, or hand in hand, like two babes in the wood; Mrs. Kirkpatrick\nactive in such endearments, Molly passive, and feeling within herself\nvery shy and strange; for she had that particular kind of shy modesty\nwhich makes any one uncomfortable at receiving caresses from a person\ntowards whom the heart does not go forth with an impulsive welcome.\n\nThen came the early dinner; Lady Cumnor having hers in the quiet of\nher own room, to which she was still a prisoner. Once or twice during\nthe meal, the idea crossed Molly's mind that her father disliked his\nposition as a middle-aged lover being made so evident to the men in\nwaiting as it was by Mrs. Kirkpatrick's affectionate speeches and\ninnuendos. He tried to banish every tint of pink sentimentalism from\nthe conversation, and to confine it to matter of fact; and when Mrs.\nKirkpatrick would persevere in referring to such things as had a\nbearing on the future relationship of the parties, he insisted upon\nviewing them in the most matter-of-fact way; and this continued even\nafter the men had left the room. An old rhyme Molly had heard Betty\nuse, would keep running in her head and making her uneasy,--\n\n   Two is company,\n   Three is trumpery.\n\nBut where could she go to in that strange house? What ought she to\ndo? She was roused from this fit of wonder and abstraction by her\nfather's saying--\"What do you think of this plan of Lady Cumnor's?\nShe says she was advising you to have Molly as a visitor at Ashcombe\nuntil we are married.\"\n\nMrs. Kirkpatrick's countenance fell. If only Molly would be so good\nas to testify again, as she had done before Lady Cumnor! But if the\nproposal was made by her father, it would come to his daughter from\na different quarter than it had done from a strange lady, be she\never so great. Molly did not say anything; she only looked pale, and\nwistful, and anxious. Mrs. Kirkpatrick had to speak for herself.\n\n\"It would be a charming plan, only--Well! we know why we would rather\nnot have it, don't we, love? And we won't tell papa, for fear of\nmaking him vain. No! I think I must leave her with you, dear Mr.\nGibson, to have you all to herself for these last few weeks. It would\nbe cruel to take her away.\"\n\n\"But you know, my dear, I told you of the reason why it does not do\nto have Molly at home just at present,\" said Mr. Gibson, eagerly. For\nthe more he knew of his future wife, the more he felt it necessary\nto remember that, with all her foibles, she would be able to stand\nbetween Molly and any such adventures as that which had occurred\nlately with Mr. Coxe; so that one of the good reasons for the step he\nhad taken was always present to him, while it had slipped off the\nsmooth surface of Mrs. Kirkpatrick's mirror-like mind without leaving\nany impression. She now recalled it, on seeing Mr. Gibson's anxious\nface.\n\nBut what were Molly's feelings at these last words of her father's?\nShe had been sent from home for some reason, kept a secret from her,\nbut told to this strange woman. Was there to be perfect confidence\nbetween these two, and she to be for ever shut out? Was she, and what\nconcerned her--though how she did not know--to be discussed between\nthem for the future, and she to be kept in the dark? A bitter pang\nof jealousy made her heart-sick. She might as well go to Ashcombe,\nor anywhere else, now. Thinking more of others' happiness than\nof her own was very fine; but did it not mean giving up her very\nindividuality, quenching all the warm love, the true desires, that\nmade her herself? Yet in this deadness lay her only comfort; or so it\nseemed. Wandering in such mazes, she hardly knew how the conversation\nwent on; a third was indeed \"trumpery,\" where there was entire\nconfidence between the two who were company, from which the other was\nshut out. She was positively unhappy, and her father did not appear\nto see it; he was absorbed with his new plans and his new wife that\nwas to be. But he did notice it; and was truly sorry for his little\ngirl: only he thought that there was a greater chance for the future\nharmony of the household, if he did not lead Molly to define her\npresent feelings by putting them into words. It was his general plan\nto repress emotion by not showing the sympathy he felt. Yet, when he\nhad to leave, he took Molly's hand in his, and held it there, in such\na different manner to that in which Mrs. Kirkpatrick had done; and\nhis voice softened to his child as he bade her good-by, and added the\nwords (most unusual to him), \"God bless you, child!\"\n\nMolly had held up all the day bravely; she had not shown anger, or\nrepugnance, or annoyance, or regret; but when once more by herself in\nthe Hamley carriage, she burst into a passion of tears, and cried her\nfill till she reached the village of Hamley. Then she tried in vain\nto smooth her face into smiles, and do away with the other signs of\nher grief. She only hoped she could run upstairs to her own room\nwithout notice, and bathe her eyes in cold water before she was seen.\nBut at the Hall-door she was caught by the squire and Roger coming in\nfrom an after-dinner stroll in the garden, and hospitably anxious to\nhelp her to alight. Roger saw the state of things in an instant, and\nsaying,--\n\n\"My mother has been looking for you to come back for this last hour,\"\nhe led the way to the drawing-room. But Mrs. Hamley was not there;\nthe Squire had stopped to speak to the coachman about one of the\nhorses; they two were alone. Roger said,--\n\n\"I'm afraid you've had a very trying day. I have thought of you\nseveral times, for I know how awkward these new relations are.\"\n\n\"Thank you,\" said she, her lips trembling, and on the point of crying\nagain. \"I did try to remember what you said, and to think more of\nothers, but it is so difficult sometimes; you know it is, don't you?\"\n\n\"Yes,\" said he, gravely. He was gratified by her simple confession\nof having borne his words of advice in mind, and tried to act up to\nthem. He was but a very young man, and he was honestly flattered;\nperhaps this led him on to offer more advice, and this time it was\nevidently mingled with sympathy. He did not want to draw out her\nconfidence, which he felt might very easily be done with such a\nsimple girl; but he wished to help her by giving her a few of the\nprinciples on which he had learnt to rely. \"It is difficult,\" he went\non, \"but by-and-by you will be so much happier for it.\"\n\n\"No, I shan't!\" said Molly, shaking her head. \"It will be very dull\nwhen I shall have killed myself, as it were, and live only in trying\nto do, and to be, as other people like. I don't see any end to it.\nI might as well never have lived. And as for the happiness you speak\nof, I shall never be happy again.\"\n\nThere was an unconscious depth in what she said, that Roger did not\nknow how to answer at the moment; it was easier to address himself\nto the assertion of the girl of seventeen, that she should never be\nhappy again.\n\n\"Nonsense: perhaps in ten years' time you will be looking back on\nthis trial as a very light one--who knows?\"\n\n\"I daresay it seems foolish; perhaps all our earthly trials will\nappear foolish to us after a while; perhaps they seem so now to\nangels. But we are ourselves, you know, and this is _now_, not some\ntime to come, a long, long way off. And we are not angels, to be\ncomforted by seeing the ends for which everything is sent.\"\n\nShe had never spoken so long a sentence to him before; and when she\nhad said it, though she did not take her eyes away from his, as they\nstood steadily looking at each other, she blushed a little; she could\nnot have told why. Nor did he tell himself why a sudden pleasure came\nover him as he gazed at her simple expressive face--and for a moment\nlost the sense of what she was saying, in the sensation of pity for\nher sad earnestness. In an instant more he was himself again. Only\nit is pleasant to the wisest, most reasonable youth of one or two\nand twenty to find himself looked up to as a Mentor by a girl of\nseventeen.\n\n\"I know, I understand. Yes: it is _now_ we have to do with. Don't let\nus go into metaphysics.\" Molly opened her eyes wide at this. Had she\nbeen talking metaphysics without knowing it? \"One looks forward to\na mass of trials, which will only have to be encountered one by one,\nlittle by little. Oh, here is my mother! she will tell you better\nthan I can.\"\n\nAnd the _tête-à-tête_ was merged in a trio. Mrs. Hamley lay down; she\nhad not been well all day--she had missed Molly, she said,--and now\nshe wanted to hear of all the adventures that had occurred to the\ngirl at the Towers. Molly sate on a stool close to the head of the\nsofa, and Roger, though at first he took up a book and tried to read\nthat he might be no restraint, soon found his reading all a pretence:\nit was so interesting to listen to Molly's little narrative, and,\nbesides, if he could give her any help in her time of need, was it\nnot his duty to make himself acquainted with all the circumstances of\nher case?\n\nAnd so they went on during all the remaining time of Molly's stay\nat Hamley. Mrs. Hamley sympathized, and liked to hear details; as\nthe French say, her sympathy was given _en détail_, the Squire's\n_en gros_. He was very sorry for her evident grief, and almost felt\nguilty, as if he had had a share in bringing it about, by the mention\nhe had made of the possibility of Mr. Gibson's marrying again, when\nfirst Molly came on her visit to them. He said to his wife more than\nonce,--\n\n\"'Pon my word, now, I wish I'd never spoken those unlucky words that\nfirst day at dinner. Do you remember how she took them up? It was\nlike a prophecy of what was to come, now, wasn't it? And she looked\npale from that day, and I don't think she has ever fairly enjoyed her\nfood since. I must take more care what I say for the future. Not but\nwhat Gibson is doing the very best thing, both for himself and her,\nthat he can do. I told him so only yesterday. But I'm very sorry for\nthe little girl, though. I wish I'd never spoken about it, that I do!\nbut it was like a prophecy, wasn't it?\"\n\nRoger tried hard to find out a reasonable and right method of\ncomfort, for he, too, in his way, was sorry for the girl, who bravely\nstruggled to be cheerful, in spite of her own private grief, for his\nmother's sake. He felt as if high principle and noble precept ought\nto perform an immediate work. But they do not, for there is always\nthe unknown quantity of individual experience and feeling, which\noffer a tacit resistance, the amount incalculable by another, to all\ngood counsel and high decree. But the bond between the Mentor and his\nTelemachus strengthened every day. He endeavoured to lead her out\nof morbid thought into interest in other than personal things; and,\nnaturally enough, his own objects of interest came readiest to hand.\nShe felt that he did her good, she did not know why or how; but after\na talk with him, she always fancied that she had got the clue to\ngoodness and peace, whatever befell.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XII.\n\nPREPARING FOR THE WEDDING.\n\n\n[Illustration (untitled)]\n\nMeanwhile the love-affairs between the middle-aged couple were\nprospering well, after a fashion; after the fashion that they liked\nbest, although it might probably have appeared dull and prosaic to\nyounger people. Lord Cumnor had come down in great glee at the news\nhe had heard from his wife at the Towers. He, too, seemed to think he\nhad taken an active part in bringing about the match by only speaking\nabout it. His first words on the subject to Lady Cumnor were,--\n\n\"I told you so. Now didn't I say what a good, suitable thing this\naffair between Gibson and Clare would be! I don't know when I've been\nso much pleased. You may despise the trade of match-maker, my lady,\nbut I am very proud of it. After this, I shall go on looking out\nfor suitable cases among the middle-aged people of my acquaintance.\nI shan't meddle with young folks, they are so apt to be fanciful;\nbut I've been so successful in this, that I do think it's good\nencouragement to go on.\"\n\n\"Go on--with what?\" asked Lady Cumnor, drily.\n\n\"Oh, planning,--you can't deny that I planned this match.\"\n\n\"I don't think you are likely to do either much good or harm by\nplanning,\" she replied, with cool, good sense.\n\n\"It puts it into people's heads, my dear.\"\n\n\"Yes, if you speak about your plans to them, of course it does. But\nin this case you never spoke to either Mr. Gibson or Clare, did you?\"\n\nAll at once the recollection of how Clare had come upon the passage\nin Lord Cumnor's letter flashed on his lady, but she did not say\nanything about it, but left her husband to flounder about as best he\nmight.\n\n\"No! I never spoke to them; of course not.\"\n\n\"Then you must be strongly mesmeric, and your will acted upon theirs,\nif you are to take credit for any part in the affair,\" continued his\npitiless wife.\n\n\"I really can't say. It's no use looking back to what I said or\ndid. I'm very well satisfied with it, and that's enough, and I mean\nto show them how much I'm pleased. I shall give Clare something\ntowards her rigging out, and they shall have a breakfast at Ashcombe\nManor-house. I'll write to Preston about it. When did you say they\nwere to be married?\"\n\n\"I think they'd better wait till Christmas, and I have told them so.\nIt would amuse the children, going over to Ashcombe for the wedding;\nand if it's bad weather during the holidays I'm always afraid of\ntheir finding it dull at the Towers. It's very different if it's a\ngood frost, and they can go out skating and sledging in the park. But\nthese last two years it has been so wet for them, poor dears!\"\n\n\"And will the other poor dears be content to wait to make a holiday\nfor your grandchildren? 'To make a Roman holiday.' Pope, or somebody\nelse, has a line of poetry like that. 'To make a Roman holiday,'\"--he\nrepeated, pleased with his unusual aptitude at quotation.\n\n\"It's Byron, and it's nothing to do with the subject in hand. I'm\nsurprised at your lordship's quoting Byron,--he was a very immoral\npoet.\"\n\n\"I saw him take his oaths in the House of Lords,\" said Lord Cumnor,\napologetically.\n\n\"Well! the less said about him the better,\" said Lady Cumnor. \"I have\ntold Clare that she had better not think of being married before\nChristmas: and it won't do for her to give up her school in a hurry\neither.\"\n\nBut Clare did not intend to wait till Christmas; and for this once\nshe carried her point against the will of the countess, and without\nmany words, or any open opposition. She had a harder task in setting\naside Mr. Gibson's desire to have Cynthia over for the wedding,\neven if she went back to her school at Boulogne directly after the\nceremony. At first she had said that it would be delightful, a\ncharming plan; only she feared that she must give up her own wishes\nto have her child near her at such a time, on account of the expense\nof the double journey.\n\nBut Mr. Gibson, economical as he was in his habitual expenditure,\nhad a really generous heart. He had already shown it, in entirely\nrelinquishing his future wife's life-interest in the very small\nproperty the late Mr. Kirkpatrick had left, in favour of Cynthia;\nwhile he arranged that she should come to his home as a daughter as\nsoon as she left the school she was at. The life-interest was about\nthirty pounds a year. Now he gave Mrs. Kirkpatrick three five-pound\nnotes, saying that he hoped they would do away with the objections\nto Cynthia's coming over to the wedding; and at the time Mrs.\nKirkpatrick felt as if they would, and caught the reflection of his\nstrong wish, and fancied it was her own. If the letter could have\nbeen written and the money sent off that day while the reflected\nglow of affection lasted, Cynthia would have been bridesmaid to\nher mother. But a hundred little interruptions came in the way of\nletter-writing; and by the next day maternal love had diminished;\nand the value affixed to the money had increased: money had been\nso much needed, so hardly earned in Mrs. Kirkpatrick's life; while\nthe perhaps necessary separation of mother and child had lessened\nthe amount of affection the former had to bestow. So she persuaded\nherself, afresh, that it would be unwise to disturb Cynthia at her\nstudies; to interrupt the fulfilment of her duties just after the\n_semestre_ had begun afresh; and she wrote a letter to Madame Lefevre\nso well imbued with this persuasion, that an answer which was almost\nan echo of her words was returned, the sense of which being conveyed\nto Mr. Gibson, who was no great French scholar, settled the vexed\nquestion, to his moderate but unfeigned regret. But the fifteen\npounds were not returned. Indeed, not merely that sum, but a\ngreat part of the hundred which Lord Cumnor had given her for her\ntrousseau, was required to pay off debts at Ashcombe; for the school\nhad been anything but flourishing since Mrs. Kirkpatrick had had it.\nIt was really very much to her credit that she preferred clearing\nherself from debt to purchasing wedding finery. But it was one of the\nfew points to be respected in Mrs. Kirkpatrick that she had always\nbeen careful in payment to the shops where she dealt; it was a little\nsense of duty cropping out. Whatever other faults might arise from\nher superficial and flimsy character, she was always uneasy till she\nwas out of debt. Yet she had no scruple in appropriating her future\nhusband's money to her own use, when it was decided that it was not\nto be employed as he intended. What new articles she bought for\nherself, were all such as would make a show, and an impression upon\nthe ladies of Hollingford. She argued with herself that linen, and\nall under-clothing, would never be seen; while she knew that every\ngown she had, would give rise to much discussion, and would be\ncounted up in the little town.\n\nSo her stock of underclothing was very small, and scarcely any of it\nnew; but it was made of dainty material, and was finely mended up\nby her deft fingers, many a night long after her pupils were in bed;\ninwardly resolving all the time she sewed, that hereafter some one\nelse should do her plain-work. Indeed, many a little circumstance of\nformer subjection to the will of others rose up before her during\nthese quiet hours, as an endurance or a suffering never to occur\nagain. So apt are people to look forward to a different kind of life\nfrom that to which they have been accustomed, as being free from care\nand trial! She recollected how, one time during this very summer at\nthe Towers, after she was engaged to Mr. Gibson, when she had taken\nabove an hour to arrange her hair in some new mode carefully studied\nfrom Mrs. Bradley's fashion-book--after all, when she came down,\nlooking her very best, as she thought, and ready for her lover, Lady\nCumnor had sent her back again to her room, just as if she had been\na little child, to do her hair over again, and not to make such a\nfigure of fun of herself! Another time she had been sent to change\nher gown for one in her opinion far less becoming, but which suited\nLady Cumnor's taste better. These were little things; but they were\nlate samples of what in different shapes she had had to endure for\nmany years; and her liking for Mr. Gibson grew in proportion to her\nsense of the evils from which he was going to serve as a means of\nescape. After all, that interval of hope and plain-sewing, intermixed\nthough it was with tuition, was not disagreeable. Her wedding-dress\nwas secure. Her former pupils at the Towers were going to present her\nwith that; they were to dress her from head to foot on the auspicious\nday. Lord Cumnor, as has been said, had given her a hundred pounds\nfor her trousseau, and had sent Mr. Preston a carte-blanche order for\nthe wedding-breakfast in the old hall in Ashcombe Manor-house. Lady\nCumnor--a little put out by the marriage not being deferred till\nher grandchildren's Christmas holidays--had nevertheless given Mrs.\nKirkpatrick an excellent English-made watch and chain; more clumsy\nbut more serviceable than the little foreign elegance that had hung\nat her side so long, and misled her so often.\n\nHer preparations were thus in a very considerable state of\nforwardness, while Mr. Gibson had done nothing as yet towards any new\narrangement or decoration of his house for his intended bride. He\nknew he ought to do something. But what? Where to begin, when so much\nwas out of order, and he had so little time for superintendence?\nAt length he came to the wise decision of asking one of the Miss\nBrownings, for old friendship's sake, to take the trouble of\npreparing what was immediately requisite; and resolved to leave all\nthe more ornamental decorations that he proposed, to the taste of his\nfuture wife. But before making his request to the Miss Brownings, he\nhad to tell them of his engagement, which had hitherto been kept a\nsecret from the townspeople, who had set down his frequent visits\nat the Towers to the score of the countess's health. He felt how he\nshould have laughed in his sleeve at any middle-aged widower who\ncame to him with a confession of the kind he had now to make to Miss\nBrownings, and disliked the idea of the necessary call: but it was to\nbe done, so one evening he went in \"promiscuous,\" as they called it,\nand told them his story. At the end of the first chapter--that is to\nsay, at the end of the story of Mr. Coxe's calf-love, Miss Browning\nheld up her hands in surprise.\n\n\"To think of Molly, as I have held in long-clothes, coming to have a\nlover! Well, to be sure! Sister Phoebe--\" (she was just coming into\nthe room), \"here's a piece of news! Molly Gibson has got a lover!\nOne may almost say she's had an offer! Mr. Gibson, may not one?--and\nshe's but sixteen!\"\n\n\"Seventeen, sister,\" said Miss Phoebe, who piqued herself on\nknowing all about dear Mr. Gibson's domestic affairs. \"Seventeen, the\n22nd of last June.\"\n\n\"Well, have it your own way. Seventeen, if you like to call her so!\"\nsaid Miss Browning, impatiently. \"The fact is still the same--she's\ngot a lover; and it seems to me she was in long-clothes only\nyesterday.\"\n\n\"I'm sure I hope her course of true love will run smooth,\" said Miss\nPhoebe.\n\nNow Mr. Gibson came in; for his story was not half told, and he\ndid not want them to run away too far with the idea of Molly's\nlove-affair.\n\n\"Molly knows nothing about it. I haven't even named it to any one\nbut you two, and to one other friend. I trounced Coxe well, and did\nmy best to keep his attachment--as he calls it--in bounds. But I\nwas sadly puzzled what to do about Molly. Miss Eyre was away, and I\ncouldn't leave them in the house together without any older woman.\"\n\n\"Oh, Mr. Gibson! why did you not send her to us?\" broke in Miss\nBrowning. \"We would have done anything in our power for you; for your\nsake, as well as her poor dear mother's.\"\n\n\"Thank you. I know you would, but it wouldn't have done to have had\nher in Hollingford, just at the time of Coxe's effervescence. He's\nbetter now. His appetite has come back with double force, after the\nfasting he thought it right to exhibit. He had three helpings of\nblack-currant dumpling yesterday.\"\n\n\"I am sure you are most liberal, Mr. Gibson. Three helpings! And, I\ndaresay, butcher's meat in proportion?\"\n\n\"Oh! I only named it because, with such very young men, it's\ngenerally see-saw between appetite and love, and I thought the third\nhelping a very good sign. But still, you know, what has happened\nonce, may happen again.\"\n\n\"I don't know. Phoebe had an offer of marriage once--\" said Miss\nBrowning.\n\n\"Hush! sister. It might hurt his feelings to have it spoken about.\"\n\n\"Nonsense, child! It's five-and-twenty years ago; and his eldest\ndaughter is married herself.\"\n\n\"I own he has not been constant,\" pleaded Miss Phoebe, in\nher tender, piping voice. \"All men are not--like you, Mr.\nGibson--faithful to the memory of their first-love.\"\n\nMr. Gibson winced. Jeannie was his first love; but her name had never\nbeen breathed in Hollingford. His wife--good, pretty, sensible, and\nbeloved as she had been--was not his second; no, nor his third love.\nAnd now he was come to make a confidence about his second marriage.\n\n\"Well, well,\" said he; \"at any rate, I thought I must do something to\nprotect Molly from such affairs while she was so young, and before I\nhad given my sanction. Miss Eyre's little nephew fell ill of scarlet\nfever--\"\n\n\"Ah! by-the-by, how careless of me not to inquire. How is the poor\nlittle fellow?\"\n\n\"Worse--better. It doesn't signify to what I've got to say now; the\nfact was, Miss Eyre couldn't come back to my house for some time, and\nI cannot leave Molly altogether at Hamley.\"\n\n\"Ah! I see now, why there was that sudden visit to Hamley. Upon my\nword, it's quite a romance.\"\n\n\"I do like hearing of a love-affair,\" murmured Miss Phoebe.\n\n\"Then if you'll let me get on with my story, you shall hear of mine,\"\nsaid Mr. Gibson, quite beyond his patience with their constant\ninterruptions.\n\n\"Yours!\" said Miss Phoebe, faintly.\n\n\"Bless us and save us!\" said Miss Browning, with less sentiment in\nher tone; \"what next?\"\n\n\"My marriage, I hope,\" said Mr. Gibson, choosing to take her\nexpression of intense surprise literally. \"And that's what I came to\nspeak to you about.\"\n\nA little hope darted up in Miss Phoebe's breast. She had often said\nto her sister, in the confidence of curling-time (ladies wore curls\nin those days), \"that the only man who could ever bring her to think\nof matrimony was Mr. Gibson; but that if he ever proposed, she\nshould feel bound to accept him, for poor dear Mary's sake;\" never\nexplaining what exact style of satisfaction she imagined she should\ngive to her dead friend by marrying her late husband. Phoebe played\nnervously with the strings of her black silk apron. Like the Caliph\nin the Eastern story, a whole lifetime of possibilities passed\nthrough her mind in an instant, of which possibilities the question\nof questions was, Could she leave her sister? Attend, Phoebe, to\nthe present moment, and listen to what is being said before you\ndistress yourself with a perplexity which will never arise.\n\n\"Of course it has been an anxious thing for me to decide who I should\nask to be the mistress of my family, the mother of my girl; but I\nthink I've decided rightly at last. The lady I have chosen--\"\n\n\"Tell us at once who she is, there's a good man,\" said\nstraight-forward Miss Browning.\n\n\"Mrs. Kirkpatrick,\" said the bridegroom elect.\n\n\"What! the governess at the Towers, that the countess makes so much\nof?\"\n\n\"Yes; she is much valued by them--and deservedly so. She keeps a\nschool now at Ashcombe, and is accustomed to housekeeping. She has\nbrought up the young ladies at the Towers, and has a daughter of her\nown, therefore it is probable she will have a kind, motherly feeling\ntowards Molly.\"\n\n\"She's a very elegant-looking woman,\" said Miss Phoebe, feeling it\nincumbent upon her to say something laudatory, by way of concealing\nthe thoughts that had just been passing through her mind. \"I've seen\nher in the carriage, riding backwards with the countess: a very\npretty woman, I should say.\"\n\n\"Nonsense, sister,\" said Miss Browning. \"What has her elegance or\nprettiness to do with the affair? Did you ever know a widower marry\nagain for such trifles as those? It's always from a sense of duty of\none kind or another--isn't it, Mr. Gibson? They want a housekeeper;\nor they want a mother for their children; or they think their last\nwife would have liked it.\"\n\nPerhaps the thought had passed through the elder sister's mind that\nPhoebe might have been chosen, for there was a sharp acrimony in\nher tone; not unfamiliar to Mr. Gibson, but with which he did not\nchoose to cope at this present moment.\n\n\"You must have it your own way, Miss Browning. Settle my motives for\nme. I don't pretend to be quite clear about them myself. But I am\nclear in wishing heartily to keep my old friends, and for them to\nlove my future wife for my sake. I don't know any two women in the\nworld, except Molly and Mrs. Kirkpatrick, I regard as much as I do\nyou. Besides, I want to ask you if you will let Molly come and stay\nwith you till after my marriage?\"\n\n\"You might have asked us before you asked Madam Hamley,\" said Miss\nBrowning, only half mollified. \"We are your old friends; and we were\nher mother's friends, too; though we are not county folk.\"\n\n\"That's unjust,\" said Mr. Gibson. \"And you know it is.\"\n\n\"I don't know. You are always with Lord Hollingford, when you can\nget at him, much more than you ever are with Mr. Goodenough, or Mr.\nSmith. And you are always going over to Hamley.\"\n\nMiss Browning was not one to give in all at once.\n\n\"I seek Lord Hollingford as I should seek such a man, whatever his\nrank or position might be: usher to a school, carpenter, shoemaker,\nif it were possible for them to have had a similar character of mind\ndeveloped by similar advantages. Mr. Goodenough is a very clever\nattorney, with strong local interests and not a thought beyond.\"\n\n\"Well, well, don't go on arguing, it always gives me a headache, as\nPhoebe knows. I didn't mean what I said, that's enough, isn't it?\nI'll retract anything sooner than be reasoned with. Where were we\nbefore you began your arguments?\"\n\n\"About dear little Molly coming to pay us a visit,\" said Miss\nPhoebe.\n\n\"I should have asked you at first, only Coxe was so rampant with his\nlove. I didn't know what he might do, or how troublesome he might be\nboth to Molly and you. But he has cooled down now. Absence has had\na very tranquillizing effect, and I think Molly may be in the same\ntown with him, without any consequences beyond a few sighs every time\nshe's brought to his mind by meeting her. And I've got another favour\nto ask of you, so you see it would never do for me to argue with you,\nMiss Browning, when I ought to be a humble suppliant. Something must\nbe done to the house to make it all ready for the future Mrs. Gibson.\nIt wants painting and papering shamefully, and I should think some\nnew furniture, but I'm sure I don't know what. Would you be so very\nkind as to look over the place, and see how far a hundred pounds\nwill go? The dining-room walls must be painted; we'll keep the\ndrawing-room paper for her choice, and I've a little spare money for\nthat room for her to lay out; but all the rest of the house I'll\nleave to you, if you'll only be kind enough to help an old friend.\"\n\nThis was a commission which exactly gratified Miss Browning's love\nof power. The disposal of money involved patronage of trades people,\nsuch as she had exercised in her father's lifetime, but had had very\nlittle chance of showing since his death. Her usual good-humour was\nquite restored by this proof of confidence in her taste and economy,\nwhile Miss Phoebe's imagination dwelt rather on the pleasure of a\nvisit from Molly.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XIII.\n\nMOLLY GIBSON'S NEW FRIENDS.\n\n\nTime was speeding on; it was now the middle of August,--if anything\nwas to be done to the house, it must be done at once. Indeed, in\nseveral ways Mr. Gibson's arrangements with Miss Browning had not\nbeen made too soon. The squire had heard that Osborne might probably\nreturn home for a few days before going abroad; and, though the\ngrowing intimacy between Roger and Molly did not alarm him in the\nleast, yet he was possessed by a very hearty panic lest the heir\nmight take a fancy to the surgeon's daughter; and he was in such a\nfidget for her to leave the house before Osborne came home, that his\nwife lived in constant terror lest he should make it too obvious to\ntheir visitor.\n\nEvery young girl of seventeen or so, who is at all thoughtful, is\nvery apt to make a Pope out of the first person who presents to\nher a new or larger system of duty than that by which she has been\nunconsciously guided hitherto. Such a Pope was Roger to Molly; she\nlooked to his opinion, to his authority on almost every subject, yet\nhe had only said one or two things in a terse manner which gave them\nthe force of precepts--stable guides to her conduct--and had shown\nthe natural superiority in wisdom and knowledge which is sure to\nexist between a highly educated young man of no common intelligence,\nand an ignorant girl of seventeen, who yet was well capable of\nappreciation. Still, although they were drawn together in this very\npleasant relationship, each was imagining some one very different for\nthe future owner of their whole heart--their highest and completest\nlove. Roger looked to find a grand woman, his equal, and his empress;\nbeautiful in person, serene in wisdom, ready for counsel, as was\nEgeria. Molly's little wavering maiden fancy dwelt on the unseen\nOsborne, who was now a troubadour, and now a knight, such as he wrote\nabout in one of his own poems; some one like Osborne, perhaps, rather\nthan Osborne himself, for she shrank from giving a personal form\nand name to the hero that was to be. The squire was not unwise in\nwishing her well out of the house before Osborne came home, if he was\nconsidering her peace of mind. Yet, when she went away from the hall\nhe missed her constantly; it had been so pleasant to have her there\nfulfilling all the pretty offices of a daughter; cheering the meals,\nso often tête-à-tête betwixt him and Roger, with her innocent wise\nquestions, her lively interest in their talk, her merry replies to\nhis banter.\n\nAnd Roger missed her too. Sometimes her remarks had probed into his\nmind, and excited him to the deep thought in which he delighted; at\nother times he had felt himself of real help to her in her hours of\nneed, and in making her take an interest in books, which treated of\nhigher things than the continual fiction and poetry which she had\nhitherto read. He felt something like an affectionate tutor suddenly\ndeprived of his most promising pupil; he wondered how she would go\non without him; whether she would be puzzled and disheartened by the\nbooks he had lent her to read; how she and her stepmother would get\nalong together? She occupied his thoughts a good deal those first\nfew days after she left the hall. Mrs. Hamley regretted her more,\nand longer than did the other two. She had given her the place of\na daughter in her heart; and now she missed the sweet feminine\ncompanionship, the playful caresses, the never-ceasing attentions;\nthe very need of sympathy in her sorrows, that Molly had shown so\nopenly from time to time; all these things had extremely endeared her\nto the tender-hearted Mrs. Hamley.\n\nMolly, too, felt the change of atmosphere keenly; and she blamed\nherself for so feeling even more keenly still. But she could not\nhelp having a sense of refinement, which had made her appreciate the\nwhole manner of being at the Hall. By her dear old friends the Miss\nBrownings she was petted and caressed so much that she became ashamed\nof noticing the coarser and louder tones in which they spoke, the\nprovincialism of their pronunciation, the absence of interest in\nthings, and their greediness of details about persons. They asked her\nquestions which she was puzzled enough to answer about her future\nstepmother; her loyalty to her father forbidding her to reply fully\nand truthfully. She was always glad when they began to make inquiries\nas to every possible affair at the Hall. She had been so happy there;\nshe had liked them all, down to the very dogs, so thoroughly, that it\nwas easy work replying: she did not mind telling them everything,\neven to the style of Mrs. Hamley's invalid dress; nor what wine the\nsquire drank at dinner. Indeed, talking about these things helped\nher to recall the happiest time in her life. But one evening, as\nthey were all sitting together after tea in the little upstairs\ndrawing-room, looking into the High Street--Molly discoursing away on\nthe various pleasures of Hamley Hall, and just then telling of all\nRoger's wisdom in natural science, and some of the curiosities he had\nshown her, she was suddenly pulled up by this little speech,--\n\n\"You seem to have seen a great deal of Mr. Roger, Molly!\" said Miss\nBrowning, in a way intended to convey a great deal of meaning to her\nsister and none at all to Molly. But--\n\n   The man recovered of the bite;\n   The dog it was that died.\n\nMolly was perfectly aware of Miss Browning's emphatic tone, though at\nfirst she was perplexed as to its cause; while Miss Phoebe was just\nthen too much absorbed in knitting the heel of her stocking to be\nfully alive to her sister's nods and winks.\n\n\"Yes; he was very kind to me,\" said Molly, slowly, pondering over\nMiss Browning's manner, and unwilling to say more until she had\nsatisfied herself to what the question tended.\n\n\"I daresay you will soon be going to Hamley Hall again? He's not\nthe eldest son, you know, Phoebe! Don't make my head ache with your\neternal 'eighteen, nineteen,' but attend to the conversation. Molly\nis telling us how much she saw of Mr. Roger, and how kind he was to\nher. I've always heard he was a very nice young man, my dear. Tell\nus some more about him! Now, Phoebe, attend! How was he kind to you,\nMolly?\"\n\n\"Oh, he told me what books to read; and one day he made me notice how\nmany bees I saw--\"\n\n\"Bees, child! What do you mean? Either you or he must have been\ncrazy!\"\n\n\"No, not at all. There are more than two hundred kinds of bees in\nEngland, and he wanted me to notice the difference between them and\nflies. Miss Browning, I can't help seeing what you fancy,\" said\nMolly, as red as fire, \"but it is very wrong; it is all a mistake. I\nwon't speak another word about Mr. Roger or Hamley at all, if it puts\nsuch silly notions into your head.\"\n\n\"Highty-tighty! Here's a young lady to be lecturing her elders! Silly\nnotions indeed! They are in your head, it seems. And let me tell you,\nMolly, you are too young to let your mind be running on lovers.\"\n\nMolly had been once or twice called saucy and impertinent, and\ncertainly a little sauciness came out now.\n\n\"I never said what the 'silly notion' was, Miss Browning; did I now,\nMiss Phoebe? Don't you see, dear Miss Phoebe, it is all her own\ninterpretation, and according to her own fancy, this foolish talk\nabout lovers?\"\n\nMolly was flaming with indignation; but she had appealed to the\nwrong person for justice. Miss Phoebe tried to make peace after the\nfashion of weak-minded people, who would cover over the unpleasant\nsight of a sore, instead of trying to heal it.\n\n\"I'm sure I don't know anything about it, my dear. It seems to me\nthat what Dorothy was saying was very true--very true indeed; and I\nthink, love, you misunderstood her; or, perhaps, she misunderstood\nyou; or I may be misunderstanding it altogether; so we'd better not\ntalk any more about it. What price did you say you were going to give\nfor the drugget in Mr. Gibson's dining-room, sister?\"\n\nSo Miss Browning and Molly went on till evening, each chafed and\nangry with the other. They wished each other good-night, going\nthrough the usual forms in the coolest manner possible. Molly went\nup to her little bedroom, clean and neat as a bedroom could be, with\ndraperies of small delicate patchwork--bed-curtains, window-curtains,\nand counterpane; a japanned toilette-table, full of little boxes,\nwith a small looking-glass affixed to it, that distorted every face\nthat was so unwise as to look in it. This room had been to the child\none of the most dainty and luxurious places ever seen, in comparison\nwith her own bare, white-dimity bedroom; and now she was sleeping in\nit, as a guest, and all the quaint adornments she had once peeped at\nas a great favour, as they were carefully wrapped up in cap-paper,\nwere set out for her use. And yet how little she had deserved this\nhospitable care; how impertinent she had been; how cross she had felt\never since! She was crying tears of penitence and youthful misery\nwhen there came a low tap to the door. Molly opened it, and there\nstood Miss Browning, in a wonderful erection of a nightcap, and\nscantily attired in a coloured calico jacket over her scrimpy and\nshort white petticoat.\n\n\"I was afraid you were asleep, child,\" said she, coming in and\nshutting the door. \"But I wanted to say to you we've got wrong\nto-day, somehow; and I think it was perhaps my doing. It's as well\nPhoebe shouldn't know, for she thinks me perfect; and when there's\nonly two of us, we get along better if one of us thinks the other\ncan do no wrong. But I rather think I was a little cross. We'll not\nsay any more about it, Molly; only we'll go to sleep friends,--and\nfriends we'll always be, child, won't we? Now give me a kiss,\nand don't cry and swell your eyes up;--and put out your candle\ncarefully.\"\n\n\"I was wrong--it was my fault,\" said Molly, kissing her.\n\n\"Fiddlestick-ends! Don't contradict me! I say it was my fault, and\nI won't hear another word about it.\"\n\nThe next day Molly went with Miss Browning to see the changes going\non in her father's house. To her they were but dismal improvements.\nThe faint grey of the dining-room walls, which had harmonized well\nenough with the deep crimson of the moreen curtains, and which\nwhen well cleaned looked thinly coated rather than dirty, was now\nexchanged for a pink salmon-colour of a very glowing hue; and the\nnew curtains were of that pale sea-green just coming into fashion.\n\"Very bright and pretty,\" Miss Browning called it; and in the first\nrenewing of their love Molly could not bear to contradict her. She\ncould only hope that the green and brown drugget would tone down the\nbrightness and prettiness. There was scaffolding here, scaffolding\nthere, and Betty scolding everywhere.\n\n\"Come up now, and see your papa's bedroom. He's sleeping upstairs in\nyours, that everything may be done up afresh in his.\"\n\nMolly could just remember, in faint clear lines of distinctness, the\nbeing taken into this very room to bid farewell to her dying mother.\nShe could see the white linen, the white muslin, surrounding the\npale, wan wistful face, with the large, longing eyes, yearning for\none more touch of the little soft warm child, whom she was too feeble\nto clasp in her arms, already growing numb in death. Many a time when\nMolly had been in this room since that sad day, had she seen in vivid\nfancy that same wan wistful face lying on the pillow, the outline\nof the form beneath the clothes; and the girl had not shrunk from\nsuch visions, but rather cherished them, as preserving to her the\nremembrance of her mother's outward semblance. Her eyes were full of\ntears, as she followed Miss Browning into this room to see it under\nits new aspect. Nearly everything was changed--the position of the\nbed and the colour of the furniture; there was a grand toilette-table\nnow, with a glass upon it, instead of the primitive substitute of the\ntop of a chest of drawers, with a mirror above upon the wall, sloping\ndownwards; these latter things had served her mother during her short\nmarried life.\n\n\"You see, we must have all in order for a lady who has passed so\nmuch of her time in the countess's mansion,\" said Miss Browning, who\nwas now quite reconciled to the marriage, thanks to the pleasant\nemployment of furnishing that had devolved upon her in consequence.\n\"Cromer, the upholsterer, wanted to persuade me to have a sofa and a\nwriting-table. These men will say anything is the fashion, if they\nwant to sell an article. I said, 'No, no, Cromer: bedrooms are for\nsleeping in, and sitting-rooms are for sitting in. Keep everything to\nits right purpose, and don't try and delude me into nonsense.' Why,\nmy mother would have given us a fine scolding if she had ever caught\nus in our bedrooms in the daytime. We kept our out-door things in\na closet downstairs; and there was a very tidy place for washing\nour hands, which is as much as one wants in the daytime. Stuffing\nup a bedroom with sofas and tables! I never heard of such a thing.\nBesides, a hundred pounds won't last for ever. I sha'n't be able to\ndo anything for your room, Molly!\"\n\n\"I'm right down glad of it,\" said Molly. \"Nearly everything in it was\nwhat mamma had when she lived with my great-uncle. I wouldn't have\nhad it changed for the world; I am so fond of it.\"\n\n\"Well, there's no danger of it, now the money is run out. By the way,\nMolly, who's to buy you a bridesmaid's dress?\"\n\n\"I don't know,\" said Molly; \"I suppose I am to be a bridesmaid; but\nno one has spoken to me about my dress.\"\n\n\"Then I shall ask your papa.\"\n\n\"Please, don't. He must have to spend a great deal of money just now.\nBesides, I would rather not be at the wedding, if they'll let me stay\naway.\"\n\n\"Nonsense, child. Why, all the town would be talking of it. You must\ngo, and you must be well dressed, for your father's sake.\"\n\nBut Mr. Gibson had thought of Molly's dress, although he had said\nnothing about it to her. He had commissioned his future wife to get\nher what was requisite; and presently a very smart dressmaker came\nover from the county-town to try on a dress, which was both so simple\nand so elegant as at once to charm Molly. When it came home all ready\nto put on, Molly had a private dressing-up for the Miss Brownings'\nbenefit; and she was almost startled when she looked into the glass,\nand saw the improvement in her appearance. \"I wonder if I'm pretty,\"\nthought she. \"I almost think I am--in this kind of dress I mean, of\ncourse. Betty would say, 'Fine feathers make fine birds.'\"\n\nWhen she went downstairs in her bridal attire, and with shy blushes\npresented herself for inspection, she was greeted with a burst of\nadmiration.\n\n\"Well, upon my word! I shouldn't have known you.\" (\"Fine feathers,\"\nthought Molly, and checked her rising vanity.)\n\n\"You are really beautiful--isn't she, sister?\" said Miss Phoebe.\n\"Why, my dear, if you were always dressed, you would be prettier than\nyour dear mamma, whom we always reckoned so very personable.\"\n\n\"You're not a bit like her. You favour your father, and white always\nsets off a brown complexion.\"\n\n\"But isn't she beautiful?\" persevered Miss Phoebe.\n\n\"Well! and if she is, Providence made her, and not she herself.\nBesides, the dressmaker must go shares. What a fine India muslin it\nis! it'll have cost a pretty penny!\"\n\nMr. Gibson and Molly drove over to Ashcombe, the night before the\nwedding, in the one yellow post-chaise that Hollingford possessed.\nThey were to be Mr. Preston's, or, rather, my lord's guests at the\nManor-house. The Manor-house came up to its name, and delighted Molly\nat first sight. It was built of stone, had many gables and mullioned\nwindows, and was covered over with Virginian creeper and late-blowing\nroses. Molly did not know Mr. Preston, who stood in the doorway\nto greet her father. She took standing with him as a young lady\nat once, and it was the first time she had met with the kind of\nbehaviour--half complimentary, half flirting--which some men think\nit necessary to assume with every woman under five-and-twenty. Mr.\nPreston was very handsome, and knew it. He was a fair man, with\nlight-brown hair and whiskers; grey, roving, well-shaped eyes, with\nlashes darker than his hair; and a figure rendered easy and supple by\nthe athletic exercises in which his excellence was famous, and which\nhad procured him admission into much higher society than he was\notherwise entitled to enter. He was a capital cricketer; was so good\na shot, that any house desirous of reputation for its bags on the\n12th or the 1st, was glad to have him for a guest. He taught young\nladies to play billiards on a wet day, or went in for the game in\nserious earnest when required. He knew half the private theatrical\nplays off by heart, and was invaluable in arranging impromptu\ncharades and tableaux. He had his own private reasons for wishing\nto get up a flirtation with Molly just at this time; he had amused\nhimself so much with the widow when she first came to Ashcombe, that\nhe fancied that the sight of him, standing by her less polished, less\nhandsome, middle-aged husband, might be too much of a contrast to be\nagreeable. Besides, he had really a strong passion for some one else;\nsome one who would be absent; and that passion it was necessary for\nhim to conceal. So that, altogether, he had resolved, even had \"the\nlittle Gibson-girl\" (as he called her) been less attractive than she\nwas, to devote himself to her for the next sixteen hours.\n\nThey were taken by their host into a wainscoted parlour, where a\nwood fire crackled and burnt, and the crimson curtains shut out the\nwaning day and the outer chill. Here the table was laid for dinner;\nsnowy table-linen, bright silver, clear sparkling glass, wine and an\nautumnal dessert on the sideboard. Yet Mr. Preston kept apologizing\nto Molly for the rudeness of his bachelor home, for the smallness of\nthe room, the great dining-room being already appropriated by his\nhousekeeper, in preparation for the morrow's breakfast. And then he\nrang for a servant to show Molly to her room. She was taken into a\nmost comfortable chamber; a wood fire on the hearth, candles lighted\non the toilette-table, dark woollen curtains surrounding a snow-white\nbed, great vases of china standing here and there.\n\n\"This is my Lady Harriet's room when her ladyship comes to the\nManor-house with my lord the earl,\" said the housemaid, striking\nout thousands of brilliant sparks by a well-directed blow at a\nsmouldering log. \"Shall I help you to dress, miss? I always helps her\nladyship.\"\n\nMolly, quite aware of the fact that she had but her white muslin gown\nfor the wedding besides that she had on, dismissed the good woman,\nand was thankful to be left to herself.\n\n\"Dinner\" was it called? Why, it was nearly eight o'clock; and\npreparations for bed seemed a more natural employment than dressing\nat this hour of night. All the dressing she could manage was the\nplacing of a red damask rose or two in the band of her grey stuff\ngown, there being a great nosegay of choice autumnal flowers on the\ntoilette-table. She did try the effect of another crimson rose in\nher black hair, just above her ear; it was very pretty, but too\ncoquettish, and so she put it back again. The dark-oak panels and\nwainscoting of the whole house seemed to glow in warm light; there\nwere so many fires in different rooms, in the hall, and even one on\nthe landing of the staircase. Mr. Preston must have heard her step,\nfor he met her in the hall, and led her into a small drawing-room,\nwith closed folding-doors on one side, opening into the larger\ndrawing-room, as he told her. This room into which she entered\nreminded her a little of Hamley--yellow-satin upholstery of seventy\nor a hundred years ago, all delicately kept and scrupulously clean;\ngreat Indian cabinets, and china jars, emitting spicy odours; a large\nblazing fire, before which her father stood in his morning dress,\ngrave and thoughtful, as he had been all day.\n\n\"This room is that which Lady Harriet uses when she comes here with\nher father for a day or two,\" said Mr. Preston. And Molly tried to\nsave her father by being ready to talk herself.\n\n\"Does she often come here?\"\n\n\"Not often. But I fancy she likes being here when she does. Perhaps\nshe finds it an agreeable change after the more formal life she leads\nat the Towers.\"\n\n\"I should think it was a very pleasant house to stay at,\" said Molly,\nremembering the look of warm comfort that pervaded it. But a little\nto her dismay Mr. Preston seemed to take it as a compliment to\nhimself.\n\n\"I was afraid a young lady like you might perceive all the\nincongruities of a bachelor's home. I'm very much obliged to you,\nMiss Gibson. In general I live pretty much in the room in which we\nshall dine; and I've a sort of agent's office in which I keep books\nand papers, and receive callers on business.\"\n\nThen they went in to dinner. Molly thought everything that was served\nwas delicious, and cooked to the point of perfection; but they\ndid not seem to satisfy Mr. Preston, who apologized to his guests\nseveral times for the bad cooking of this dish, or the omission\nof a particular sauce to that; always referring to bachelor's\nhousekeeping, bachelor's this and bachelor's that, till Molly grew\nquite impatient at the word. Her father's depression, which was still\ncontinuing and rendering him very silent, made her uneasy; yet she\nwished to conceal it from Mr. Preston; and so she talked away, trying\nto obviate the sort of personal bearing which their host would give\nto everything. She did not know when to leave the gentlemen, but her\nfather made a sign to her; and she was conducted back to the yellow\ndrawing-room by Mr. Preston, who made many apologies for leaving\nher there alone. She enjoyed herself extremely, however, feeling at\nliberty to prowl about, and examine all the curiosities the room\ncontained. Among other things was a Louis Quinze cabinet with lovely\nminiatures in enamel let into the fine woodwork. She carried a candle\nto it, and was looking intently at these faces when her father and\nMr. Preston came in. Her father still looked care-worn and anxious;\nhe came up and patted her on the back, looked at what she was looking\nat, and then went off to silence and the fire. Mr. Preston took the\ncandle out of her hand, and threw himself into her interests with an\nair of ready gallantry.\n\n\"That is said to be Mademoiselle de St. Quentin, a great beauty at\nthe French Court. This is Madame du Barri. Do you see any likeness in\nMademoiselle de St. Quentin to any one you know?\" He had lowered his\nvoice a little as he asked this question.\n\n\"No!\" said Molly, looking at it again. \"I never saw any one half so\nbeautiful.\"\n\n\"But don't you see a likeness--in the eyes particularly?\" he asked\nagain, with some impatience.\n\nMolly tried hard to find out a resemblance, and was again\nunsuccessful.\n\n\"It constantly reminds me of--of Miss Kirkpatrick.\"\n\n\"Does it?\" said Molly, eagerly. \"Oh! I am so glad--I've never seen\nher, so of course I couldn't find out the likeness. You know her,\nthen, do you? Please tell me all about her.\"\n\nHe hesitated a moment before speaking. He smiled a little before\nreplying.\n\n\"She's very beautiful; that of course is understood when I say that\nthis miniature does not come up to her for beauty.\"\n\n\"And besides?--Go on, please.\"\n\n\"What do you mean by 'besides'?\"\n\n\"Oh! I suppose she's very clever and accomplished?\"\n\nThat was not in the least what Molly wanted to ask; but it was\ndifficult to word the vague vastness of her unspoken inquiry.\n\n\"She is clever naturally; she has picked up accomplishments. But she\nhas such a charm about her, one forgets what she herself is in the\nhalo that surrounds her. You ask me all this, Miss Gibson, and I\nanswer truthfully; or else I should not entertain one young lady with\nmy enthusiastic praises of another.\"\n\n\"I don't see why not,\" said Molly. \"Besides, if you wouldn't do it\nin general, I think you ought to do it in my case; for you, perhaps,\ndon't know, but she is coming to live with us when she leaves school,\nand we are very nearly the same age; so it will be almost like having\na sister.\"\n\n\"She is to live with you, is she?\" said Mr. Preston, to whom this\nintelligence was news. \"And when is she to leave school? I thought\nshe would surely have been at this wedding; but I was told she was\nnot to come. When is she to leave school?\"\n\n\"I think it is to be at Easter. You know she's at Boulogne, and it's\na long journey for her to come alone; or else papa wished for her to\nbe at the marriage very much indeed.\"\n\n\"And her mother prevented it?--I understand.\"\n\n\"No, it wasn't her mother; it was the French schoolmistress, who\ndidn't think it desirable.\"\n\n\"It comes to pretty much the same thing. And she's to return and live\nwith you after Easter?\"\n\n\"I believe so. Is she a grave or a merry person?\"\n\n\"Never very grave, as far as I have seen of her. Sparkling would\nbe the word for her, I think. Do you ever write to her? If you do,\npray remember me to her, and tell her how we have been talking about\nher--you and I.\"\n\n\"I never write to her,\" said Molly, rather shortly.\n\nTea came in; and after that they all went to bed. Molly heard her\nfather exclaim at the fire in his bedroom, and Mr. Preston's reply--\n\n\"I pique myself on my keen relish for all creature comforts, and also\non my power of doing without them, if need be. My lord's woods are\nample, and I indulge myself with a fire in my bedroom for nine months\nin the year; yet I could travel in Iceland without wincing from the\ncold.\"\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XIV.\n\nMOLLY FINDS HERSELF PATRONIZED.\n\n\nThe wedding went off much as such affairs do. Lord Cumnor and Lady\nHarriet drove over from the Towers, so the hour for the ceremony\nwas as late as possible. Lord Cumnor came in order to officiate as\nthe bride's father, and was in more open glee than either bride or\nbridegroom, or any one else. Lady Harriet came as a sort of amateur\nbridesmaid, to \"share Molly's duties,\" as she called it. They went\nfrom the Manor-house in two carriages to the church in the park, Mr.\nPreston and Mr. Gibson in one, and Molly, to her dismay, shut up with\nLord Cumnor and Lady Harriet in the other. Lady Harriet's gown of\nwhite muslin had seen one or two garden-parties, and was not in the\nfreshest order; it had been rather a freak of the young lady's at the\nlast moment. She was very merry, and very much inclined to talk to\nMolly, by way of finding out what sort of a little personage Clare\nwas to have for her future daughter. She began:--\n\n\"We mustn't crush this pretty muslin dress of yours. Put it over\npapa's knee; he doesn't mind it in the least.\"\n\n\"What, my dear, a white dress!--no, to be sure not. I rather like\nit. Besides, going to a wedding, who minds anything? It would be\ndifferent if we were going to a funeral.\"\n\nMolly conscientiously strove to find out the meaning of this speech;\nbut before she had done so, Lady Harriet spoke again, going to the\npoint, as she always piqued herself on doing:\n\n\"I daresay it's something of a trial to you, this second marriage of\nyour father's; but you'll find Clare the most amiable of women. She\nalways let me have my own way, and I've no doubt she'll let you have\nyours.\"\n\n\"I mean to try and like her,\" said Molly, in a low voice, striving\nhard to keep down the tears that would keep rising to her eyes this\nmorning. \"I've seen very little of her yet.\"\n\n\"Why, it's the very best thing for you that could have happened, my\ndear,\" said Lord Cumnor. \"You're growing up into a young lady--and\na very pretty young lady, too, if you'll allow an old man to say\nso--and who so proper as your father's wife to bring you out, and\nshow you off, and take you to balls, and that kind of thing? I\nalways said this match that is going to come off to-day was the most\nsuitable thing I ever knew; and it's even a better thing for you than\nfor the people themselves.\"\n\n\"Poor child!\" said Lady Harriet, who had caught a sight of Molly's\ntroubled face, \"the thought of balls is too much for her just now;\nbut you'll like having Cynthia Kirkpatrick for a companion, shan't\nyou, dear?\"\n\n\"Very much,\" said Molly, cheering up a little. \"Do you know her?\"\n\n\"Oh, I've seen her over and over again when she was a little girl,\nand once or twice since. She's the prettiest creature that you ever\nsaw; and with eyes that mean mischief, if I'm not mistaken. But\nClare kept her spirit under pretty well when she was staying with\nus,--afraid of her being troublesome, I fancy.\"\n\nBefore Molly could shape her next question, they were at the church;\nand she and Lady Harriet went into a pew near the door to wait for\nthe bride, in whose train they were to proceed to the altar. The earl\ndrove on alone to fetch her from her own house, not a quarter of a\nmile distant. It was pleasant to her to be led to the hymeneal altar\nby a belted earl, and pleasant to have his daughter as a volunteer\nbridesmaid. Mrs. Kirkpatrick in this flush of small gratifications,\nand on the brink of matrimony with a man whom she liked, and who\nwould be bound to support her without any exertion of her own, looked\nbeamingly happy and handsome. A little cloud came over her face at\nthe sight of Mr. Preston,--the sweet perpetuity of her smile was\nrather disturbed as he followed in Mr. Gibson's wake. But his face\nnever changed; he bowed to her gravely, and then seemed absorbed in\nthe service. Ten minutes, and all was over. The bride and bridegroom\nwere driving together to the Manor-house, Mr. Preston was walking\nthither by a short cut, and Molly was again in the carriage with my\nlord, rubbing his hands and chuckling, and Lady Harriet, trying to\nbe kind and consolatory, when her silence would have been the best\ncomfort.\n\nMolly found out, to her dismay, that the plan was for her to return\nwith Lord Cumnor and Lady Harriet when they went back to the Towers\nin the evening. In the meantime Lord Cumnor had business to do with\nMr. Preston, and after the happy couple had driven off on their\nweek's holiday tour, she was to be left alone with the formidable\nLady Harriet. When they were by themselves after all the others had\nbeen thus disposed of, Lady Harriet sate still over the drawing-room\nfire, holding a screen between it and her face, but gazing intently\nat Molly for a minute or two. Molly was fully conscious of this\nprolonged look, and was trying to get up her courage to return the\nstare, when Lady Harriet suddenly said,--\n\n\"I like you;--you are a little wild creature, and I want to tame you.\nCome here, and sit on this stool by me. What is your name? or what do\nthey call you?--as North-country people would express it.\"\n\n\"Molly Gibson. My real name is Mary.\"\n\n\"Molly is a nice, soft-sounding name. People in the last century\nweren't afraid of homely names; now we are all so smart and fine: no\nmore 'Lady Bettys' now. I almost wonder they haven't re-christened\nall the worsted and knitting-cotton that bears her name. Fancy Lady\nConstantia's cotton, or Lady Anna-Maria's worsted.\"\n\n\"I didn't know there was a Lady Betty's cotton,\" said Molly.\n\n\"That proves you don't do fancy-work! You'll find Clare will set\nyou to it, though. She used to set me at piece after piece: knights\nkneeling to ladies; impossible flowers. But I must do her the justice\nto add that when I got tired of them she finished them herself. I\nwonder how you'll get on together?\"\n\n\"So do I!\" sighed out Molly, under her breath.\n\n\"I used to think I managed her, till one day an uncomfortable\nsuspicion arose that all the time she had been managing me. Still\nit's easy work to let oneself be managed; at any rate till one wakens\nup to the consciousness of the process, and then it may become\namusing, if one takes it in that light.\"\n\n\"I should hate to be managed,\" said Molly, indignantly. \"I'll try and\ndo what she wishes for papa's sake, if she'll only tell me outright;\nbut I should dislike to be trapped into anything.\"\n\n\"Now I,\" said Lady Harriet, \"am too lazy to avoid traps; and I rather\nlike to remark the cleverness with which they're set. But then,\nof course, I know that if I choose to exert myself, I can break\nthrough the withes of green flax with which they try to bind me. Now,\nperhaps, you won't be able.\"\n\n\"I don't quite understand what you mean,\" said Molly.\n\n\"Oh, well--never mind; I daresay it's as well for you that you\nshouldn't. The moral of all I have been saying is, 'Be a good girl,\nand suffer yourself to be led, and you'll find your new stepmother\nthe sweetest creature imaginable.' You'll get on capitally with her,\nI make no doubt. How you'll get on with her daughter is another\naffair; but I daresay very well. Now we'll ring for tea; for I\nsuppose that heavy breakfast is to stand for our lunch.\"\n\nMr. Preston came into the room just at this time, and Molly was a\nlittle surprised at Lady Harriet's cool manner of dismissing him,\nremembering as she did how Mr. Preston had implied his intimacy with\nher ladyship the evening before at dinner-time.\n\n\"I cannot bear that sort of person,\" said Lady Harriet, almost before\nhe was out of hearing; \"giving himself airs of gallantry towards\none to whom his simple respect is all his duty. I can talk to one\nof my father's labourers with pleasure, while with a man like that\nunderbred fop I am all over thorns and nettles. What is it the Irish\ncall that style of creature? They've some capital word for it, I\nknow. What is it?\"\n\n\"I don't know--I never heard it,\" said Molly, a little ashamed of her\nignorance.\n\n\"Oh! that shows you've never read Miss Edgeworth's tales;--now,\nhave you? If you had, you'd have recollected that there was such\na word, even if you didn't remember what it was. If you've never\nread those stories, they would be just the thing to beguile your\nsolitude--vastly improving and moral, and yet quite sufficiently\ninteresting. I'll lend them to you while you're all alone.\"\n\n\"I'm not alone. I'm not at home, but on a visit to Miss Brownings.\"\n\n\"Then I'll bring them to you. I know the Miss Brownings; they used\nto come regularly on the school-day to the Towers. Pecksy and Flapsy\nI used to call them. I like the Miss Brownings; one gets enough of\nrespect from them at any rate; and I've always wanted to see the\nkind of _ménage_ of such people. I'll bring you a whole pile of Miss\nEdgeworth's stories, my dear.\"\n\nMolly sate quite silent for a minute or two; then she mustered up\ncourage to speak out what was in her mind.\n\n\"Your ladyship\" (the title was the firstfruits of the lesson, as\nMolly took it, on paying due respect)--\"your ladyship keeps speaking\nof the sort of--the class of people to which I belong as if it was a\nkind of strange animal you were talking about; yet you talk so openly\nto me that--\"\n\n\"Well, go on--I like to hear you.\"\n\nStill silence.\n\n\"You think me in your heart a little impertinent--now, don't you?\"\nsaid Lady Harriet, almost kindly.\n\nMolly held her peace for two or three moments; then she lifted her\nbeautiful, honest eyes to Lady Harriet's face, and said,--\n\n\"Yes!--a little. But I think you a great many other things.\"\n\n\"We'll leave the 'other things' for the present. Don't you see,\nlittle one, I talk after my kind, just as you talk after your kind.\nIt's only on the surface with both of us. Why, I daresay some of your\ngood Hollingford ladies talk of the poor people in a manner which\nthey would consider as impertinent in their turn, if they could hear\nit. But I ought to be more considerate when I remember how often\nmy blood has boiled at the modes of speech and behaviour of one of\nmy aunts, mamma's sister, Lady-- No! I won't name names. Any one\nwho earns his livelihood by any exercise of head or hands, from\nprofessional people and rich merchants down to labourers, she calls\n'persons.' She would never in her most slip-slop talk accord them\neven the conventional title of 'gentlemen;' and the way in which\nshe takes possession of human beings, 'my woman,' 'my people,'--but,\nafter all, it is only a way of speaking. I ought not to have used\nit to you; but somehow I separate you from all these Hollingford\npeople.\"\n\n\"But why?\" persevered Molly. \"I'm one of them.\"\n\n\"Yes, you are. But--now don't reprove me again for impertinence--most\nof them are so unnatural in their exaggerated respect and admiration\nwhen they come up to the Towers, and put on so much pretence by way\nof fine manners, that they only make themselves objects of ridicule.\nYou at least are simple and truthful, and that's why I separate you\nin my own mind from them, and have talked unconsciously to you as I\nwould--well! now here's another piece of impertinence--as I would to\nmy equal--in rank, I mean; for I don't set myself up in solid things\nas any better than my neighbours. Here's tea, however, come in time\nto stop me from growing too humble.\"\n\nIt was a very pleasant little tea in the fading September twilight.\n\nJust as it was ended, in came Mr. Preston again:--\n\n\"Lady Harriet, will you allow me the pleasure of showing you some\nalterations I have made in the flower-garden--in which I have tried\nto consult your taste--before it grows dark?\"\n\n\n[Illustration: UNWELCOME ATTENTIONS.]\n\n\n\"Thank you, Mr. Preston. I will ride over with papa some day, and we\nwill see if we approve of them.\"\n\nMr. Preston's brow flushed. But he affected not to perceive Lady\nHarriet's haughtiness, and, turning to Molly, he said,--\n\n\"Will not you come out, Miss Gibson, and see something of the\ngardens? You haven't been out at all, I think, excepting to church.\"\n\nMolly did not like the idea of going out for a walk with only Mr.\nPreston; yet she pined for a little fresh air, would have been glad\nto see the gardens, and look at the Manor-house from different\naspects; and, besides this, much as she recoiled from Mr. Preston,\nshe felt sorry for him under the repulse he had just received.\n\nWhile she was hesitating, and slowly tending towards consent, Lady\nHarriet spoke,--\n\n\"I cannot spare Miss Gibson. If she would like to see the place, I\nwill bring her over some day myself.\"\n\nWhen he had left the room, Lady Harriet said,--\"I daresay it's my own\nlazy selfishness has kept you indoors all day against your will. But,\nat any rate, you are not to go out walking with that man. I've an\ninstinctive aversion to him; not entirely instinctive either; it has\nsome foundation in fact; and I desire you don't allow him ever to get\nintimate with you. He's a very clever land-agent, and does his duty\nby papa, and I don't choose to be taken up for libel; but remember\nwhat I say!\"\n\nThen the carriage came round, and after numberless last words from\nthe earl--who appeared to have put off every possible direction to\nthe moment when he stood, like an awkward Mercury, balancing himself\non the step of the carriage--they drove back to the Towers.\n\n\"Would you rather come in and dine with us--we should send you home,\nof course--or go home straight?\" asked Lady Harriet of Molly. She and\nher father had both been sleeping till they drew up at the bottom of\nthe flight of steps.\n\n\"Tell the truth, now and evermore. Truth is generally amusing, if\nit's nothing else!\"\n\n\"I would rather go back to Miss Brownings' at once, please,\" said\nMolly, with a nightmare-like recollection of the last, the only\nevening she had spent at the Towers.\n\nLord Cumnor was standing on the steps, waiting to hand his daughter\nout of the carriage. Lady Harriet stopped to kiss Molly on the\nforehead, and to say,--\n\n\"I shall come some day soon, and bring you a load of Miss Edgeworth's\ntales, and make further acquaintance with Pecksy and Flapsy.\"\n\n\"No, don't, please,\" said Molly, taking hold of her, to detain her.\n\"You must not come--indeed you must not.\"\n\n\"Why not?\"\n\n\"Because I would rather not--because I think that I ought not to have\nany one coming to see me who laughs at the friends I am staying with,\nand calls them names.\" Molly's heart beat very fast, but she meant\nevery word that she said.\n\n\"My dear little woman!\" said Lady Harriet, bending over her and\nspeaking quite gravely. \"I'm very sorry to have called them\nnames--very, very sorry to have hurt you. If I promise you to be\nrespectful to them in word and in deed--and in very thought, if I\ncan--you'll let me then, won't you?\"\n\nMolly hesitated. \"I'd better go home at once; I shall only say wrong\nthings--and there's Lord Cumnor waiting all this time.\"\n\n\"Let him alone; he's very well amused hearing all the news of the day\nfrom Brown. Then I shall come--under promise?\"\n\nSo Molly drove off in solitary grandeur; and Miss Brownings' knocker\nwas loosened on its venerable hinges by the never-ending peal of Lord\nCumnor's footman.\n\nThey were full of welcome, full of curiosity. All through the long\nday they had been missing their bright young visitor, and three or\nfour times in every hour they had been wondering and settling what\neverybody was doing at that exact minute. What had become of Molly\nduring all the afternoon, had been a great perplexity to them; and\nthey were very much oppressed with a sense of the great honour she\nhad received in being allowed to spend so many hours alone with\nLady Harriet. They were, indeed, more excited by this one fact than\nby all the details of the wedding, most of which they had known\nof beforehand, and talked over with much perseverance during the\nday. Molly began to feel as if there was some foundation for Lady\nHarriet's inclination to ridicule the worship paid by the good people\nof Hollingford to their liege lord, and to wonder with what tokens\nof reverence they would receive Lady Harriet if she came to pay her\npromised visit. She had never thought of concealing the probability\nof this call until this evening; but now she felt as if it would be\nbetter not to speak of the chance, as she was not at all sure that\nthe promise would be fulfilled.\n\nBefore Lady Harriet's call was paid, Molly received another visit.\n\nRoger Hamley came riding over one day with a note from his mother,\nand a wasps'-nest as a present from himself. Molly heard his powerful\nvoice come sounding up the little staircase, as he asked if Miss\nGibson was at home from the servant-maid at the door; and she was\nhalf amused and half annoyed as she thought how this call of his\nwould give colour to Miss Browning's fancies. \"I would rather never\nbe married at all,\" thought she, \"than marry an ugly man,--and dear\ngood Mr. Roger is really ugly; I don't think one could even call him\nplain.\" Yet Miss Brownings, who did not look upon young men as if\ntheir natural costume was a helmet and a suit of armour, thought\nMr. Roger Hamley a very personable young fellow, as he came into\nthe room, his face flushed with exercise, his white teeth showing\npleasantly in the courteous bow and smile he gave to all around. He\nknew the Miss Brownings slightly, and talked pleasantly to them while\nMolly read Mrs. Hamley's little missive of sympathy and good wishes\nrelating to the wedding; then he turned to her, and though Miss\nBrownings listened with all their ears, they could not find out\nanything remarkable either in the words he said or the tone in which\nthey were spoken.\n\n\"I've brought you the wasps'-nest I promised you, Miss Gibson. There\nhas been no lack of such things this year; we've taken seventy-four\non my father's land alone; and one of the labourers, a poor fellow\nwho ekes out his wages by bee-keeping, has had a sad misfortune--the\nwasps have turned the bees out of his seven hives, taken possession,\nand eaten up the honey.\"\n\n\"What greedy little vermin!\" said Miss Browning.\n\nMolly saw Roger's eyes twinkle at the misapplication of the word; but\nthough he had a strong sense of humour, it never appeared to diminish\nhis respect for the people who amused him.\n\n\"I'm sure they deserve fire and brimstone more than the poor dear\ninnocent bees,\" said Miss Phoebe. \"And then it seems so ungrateful\nof mankind, who are going to feast on the honey!\" She sighed over the\nthought, as if it was too much for her.\n\nWhile Molly finished reading her note, he explained its contents to\nMiss Browning.\n\n\"My brother and I are going with my father to an agricultural meeting\nat Canonbury on Thursday, and my mother desired me to say to you how\nvery much obliged she should be if you would spare her Miss Gibson\nfor the day. She was very anxious to ask for the pleasure of your\ncompany, too, but she really is so poorly that we persuaded her to\nbe content with Miss Gibson, as she wouldn't scruple leaving a young\nlady to amuse herself, which she would be unwilling to do if you and\nyour sister were there.\"\n\n\"I'm sure she's very kind; very. Nothing would have given us more\npleasure,\" said Miss Browning, drawing herself up in gratified\ndignity. \"Oh, yes, we quite understand, Mr. Roger; and we fully\nrecognize Mrs. Hamley's kind intention. We will take the will for the\ndeed, as the common people express it. I believe that there was an\nintermarriage between the Brownings and the Hamleys, a generation or\ntwo ago.\"\n\n\"I daresay there was,\" said Roger. \"My mother is very delicate, and\nobliged to humour her health, which has made her keep aloof from\nsociety.\"\n\n\"Then I may go?\" said Molly, sparkling with the idea of seeing her\ndear Mrs. Hamley again, yet afraid of appearing too desirous of\nleaving her kind old friends.\n\n\"To be sure, my dear. Write a pretty note, and tell Mrs. Hamley how\nmuch obliged to her we are for thinking of us.\"\n\n\"I'm afraid I can't wait for a note,\" said Roger. \"I must take a\nmessage instead, for I have to meet my father at one o'clock, and\nit's close upon it now.\"\n\nWhen he was gone, Molly felt so light-hearted at the thoughts of\nThursday that she could hardly attend to what the Miss Brownings were\nsaying. One was talking about the pretty muslin gown which Molly had\nsent to the wash only that morning, and contriving how it could be\nhad back again in time for her to wear; and the other, Miss Phoebe,\ntotally inattentive to her sister's speaking for a wonder, was piping\nout a separate strain of her own, and singing Roger Hamley's praises.\n\n\"Such a fine-looking young man, and so courteous and affable. Like\nthe young men of our youth now, is he not, sister? And yet they all\nsay Mr. Osborne is the handsomest. What do you think, child?\"\n\n\"I've never seen Mr. Osborne,\" said Molly, blushing, and hating\nherself for doing so. Why was it? She had never seen him as she said.\nIt was only that her fancy had dwelt on him so much.\n\nHe was gone--all the gentlemen were gone before the carriage, which\ncame to fetch Molly on Thursday, reached Hamley Hall. But Molly was\nalmost glad, she was so much afraid of being disappointed. Besides,\nshe had her dear Mrs. Hamley the more to herself; the quiet sit in\nthe morning-room, talking poetry and romance; the midday saunter into\nthe garden, brilliant with autumnal flowers and glittering dew-drops\non the gossamer webs that stretched from scarlet to blue, and thence\nto purple and yellow petals. As they were sitting at lunch, a strange\nman's voice and step were heard in the hall; the door was opened,\nand a young man came in, who could be no other than Osborne. He was\nbeautiful and languid-looking, almost as frail in appearance as\nhis mother, whom he strongly resembled. This seeming delicacy made\nhim appear older than he was. He was dressed to perfection, and\nyet with easy carelessness. He came up to his mother, and stood by\nher, holding her hand, while his eyes sought Molly, not boldly or\nimpertinently, but as if appraising her critically.\n\n\"Yes! I'm back again. Bullocks, I find, are not in my line. I\nonly disappointed my father in not being able to appreciate their\nmerits, and, I'm afraid, I didn't care to learn. And the smell was\ninsufferable on such a hot day.\"\n\n\"My dear boy, don't make apologies to me; keep them for your father.\nI'm only too glad to have you back. Miss Gibson, this tall fellow is\nmy son Osborne, as I daresay you have guessed. Osborne--Miss Gibson.\nNow, what will you have?\"\n\nHe looked round the table as he sate down. \"Nothing here,\" said he.\n\"Isn't there some cold game-pie? I'll ring for that.\"\n\nMolly was trying to reconcile the ideal with the real. The ideal was\nagile, yet powerful, with Greek features and an eagle-eye, capable\nof enduring long fasting, and indifferent as to what he ate. The\nreal was almost effeminate in movement, though not in figure; he had\nthe Greek features, but his blue eyes had a cold, weary expression\nin them. He was dainty in eating, and had anything but a Homeric\nappetite. However, Molly's hero was not to eat more than Ivanhoe,\nwhen he was Friar Tuck's guest; and, after all, with a little\nalteration, she began to think Mr. Osborne Hamley might turn out a\npoetical, if not a chivalrous hero. He was extremely attentive to\nhis mother, which pleased Molly, and, in return, Mrs. Hamley seemed\ncharmed with him to such a degree that Molly once or twice fancied\nthat mother and son would have been happier in her absence. Yet,\nagain, it struck on the shrewd, if simple girl, that Osborne was\nmentally squinting at her in the conversation which was directed to\nhis mother. There were little turns and 'fioriture' of speech which\nMolly could not help feeling were graceful antics of language not\ncommon in the simple daily intercourse between mother and son. But\nit was flattering rather than otherwise to perceive that a very fine\nyoung man, who was a poet to boot, should think it worth while to\ntalk on the tight rope for her benefit. And before the afternoon was\nended, without there having been any direct conversation between\nOsborne and Molly, she had reinstated him on his throne in her\nimagination; indeed, she had almost felt herself disloyal to her dear\nMrs. Hamley when, in the first hour after her introduction, she had\nquestioned his claims on his mother's idolatry. His beauty came out\nmore and more, as he became animated in some discussion with her; and\nall his attitudes, if a little studied, were graceful in the extreme.\nBefore Molly left, the squire and Roger returned from Canonbury.\n\n\"Osborne here!\" said the Squire, red and panting. \"Why the deuce\ncouldn't you tell us you were coming home? I looked about for you\neverywhere, just as we were going into the ordinary. I wanted to\nintroduce you to Grantley, and Fox, and Lord Forrest--men from the\nother side of the county, whom you ought to know; and Roger there\nmissed above half his dinner hunting about for you; and all the time\nyou'd stole away, and were quietly sitting here with the women. I\nwish you'd let me know the next time you make off. I've lost half my\npleasure in looking at as fine a lot of cattle as I ever saw, with\nthinking you might be having one of your old attacks of faintness.\"\n\n\"I should have had one, I think, if I'd stayed longer in that\natmosphere. But I'm sorry if I've caused you anxiety.\"\n\n\"Well! well!\" said the Squire, somewhat mollified. \"And Roger,\ntoo,--there I've been sending him here and sending him there all the\nafternoon.\"\n\n\"I didn't mind it, sir. I was only sorry you were so uneasy. I\nthought Osborne had gone home, for I knew it wasn't much in his way,\"\nsaid Roger.\n\nMolly intercepted a glance between the two brothers--a look of true\nconfidence and love, which suddenly made her like them both under the\naspect of relationship--new to her observation.\n\nRoger came up to her, and sat down by her.\n\n\"Well, and how are you getting on with Huber; don't you find him very\ninteresting?\"\n\n\"I'm afraid,\" said Molly, penitently, \"I haven't read much. Miss\nBrownings like me to talk; and, besides, there is so much to do at\nhome before papa comes back; and Miss Browning doesn't like me to go\nwithout her. I know it sounds nothing, but it does take up a great\ndeal of time.\"\n\n\"When is your father coming back?\"\n\n\"Next Tuesday, I believe. He cannot stay long away.\"\n\n\"I shall ride over and pay my respects to Mrs. Gibson,\" said he. \"I\nshall come as soon as I may. Your father has been a very kind friend\nto me ever since I was a boy. And when I come, I shall expect my\npupil to have been very diligent,\" he concluded, smiling his kind,\npleasant smile at idle Molly.\n\nThen the carriage came round, and she had the long solitary drive\nback to Miss Brownings'. It was dark out of doors when she got there;\nbut Miss Phoebe was standing on the stairs, with a lighted candle\nin her hand, peering into the darkness to see Molly come in.\n\n\"Oh, Molly! I thought you'd never come back. Such a piece of news!\nSister has gone to bed; she's had a headache--with the excitement,\nI think; but she says it's new bread. Come upstairs softly, my\ndear, and I'll tell you what it is! Who do you think has been\nhere,--drinking tea with us, too, in the most condescending manner?\"\n\n\"Lady Harriet?\" said Molly, suddenly enlightened by the word\n\"condescending.\"\n\n\"Yes. Why, how did you guess it? But, after all, her call, at any\nrate in the first instance, was upon you. Oh, dear Molly! if you're\nnot in a hurry to go to bed, let me sit down quietly and tell you all\nabout it; for my heart jumps into my mouth still when I think of how\nI was caught. She--that is, her ladyship--left the carriage at 'The\nGeorge,' and took to her feet to go shopping--just as you or I may\nhave done many a time in our lives. And sister was taking her forty\nwinks; and I was sitting with my gown up above my knees and my feet\non the fender, pulling out my grandmother's lace which I'd been\nwashing. The worst has yet to be told. I'd taken off my cap, for I\nthought it was getting dusk and no one would come, and there was I in\nmy black silk skull-cap, when Nancy put her head in, and whispered,\n'There's a lady downstairs--a real grand one, by her talk;' and in\nthere came my Lady Harriet, so sweet and pretty in her ways, it was\nsome time before I remembered I had never a cap on. Sister never\nwakened; or never roused up, so to say. She says she thought it was\nNancy bringing in the tea when she heard some one moving; for her\nladyship, as soon as she saw the state of the case, came and knelt\ndown on the rug by me, and begged my pardon so prettily for having\nfollowed Nancy upstairs without waiting for permission; and was so\ntaken by my old lace, and wanted to know how I washed it, and where\nyou were, and when you'd be back, and when the happy couple would be\nback: till sister wakened--she's always a little bit put out, you\nknow, when she first wakens from her afternoon nap,--and, without\nturning her head to see who it was, she said, quite sharp,--'Buzz,\nbuzz, buzz! When will you learn that whispering is more fidgeting\nthan talking out loud? I've not been able to sleep at all for the\nchatter you and Nancy have been keeping up all this time.' You know\nthat was a little fancy of sister's, for she'd been snoring away as\nnaturally as could be. So I went to her, and leant over her, and said\nin a low voice,--\n\n\"'Sister, it's her ladyship and me that has been conversing.'\n\n\"'Ladyship here, ladyship there! have you lost your wits, Phoebe,\nthat you talk such nonsense--and in your skull-cap, too!'\n\n\"By this time she was sitting up--and, looking round her, she saw\nLady Harriet, in her velvets and silks, sitting on our rug, smiling,\nher bonnet off, and her pretty hair all bright with the blaze of the\nfire. My word! sister was up on her feet directly; and she dropped\nher curtsey, and made her excuses for sleeping, as fast as might be,\nwhile I went off to put on my best cap, for sister might well say I\nwas out of my wits to go on chatting to an earl's daughter in an old\nblack silk skull-cap. Black silk, too! when, if I'd only known she\nwas coming, I might have put on my new brown silk one, lying idle in\nmy top drawer. And when I came back, sister was ordering tea for her\nladyship,--our tea, I mean. So I took my turn at talk, and sister\nslipped out to put on her Sunday silk. But I don't think we were\nquite so much at our ease with her ladyship as when I sat pulling\nout my lace in my skull-cap. And she was quite struck with our tea,\nand asked where we got it, for she had never tasted any like it\nbefore; and I told her we gave only 3_s._ 4_d._ a pound for it, at\nJohnson's--(sister says I ought to have told her the price of our\ncompany-tea, which is 5_s._ a pound, only that was not what we were\ndrinking; for, as ill-luck would have it, we'd none of it in the\nhouse)--and she said she would send us some of hers, all the way\nfrom Russia or Prussia, or some out-of-the-way place, and we were to\ncompare and see which we liked best; and if we liked hers best, she\ncould get it for us at 3_s._ a pound. And she left her love for you;\nand, though she was going away, you were not to forget her. Sister\nthought such a message would set you up too much, and told me she\nwould not be chargeable for the giving it you. 'But,' I said, 'a\nmessage is a message, and it's on Molly's own shoulders if she's set\nup by it. Let us show her an example of humility, sister, though we\nhave been sitting cheek-by-jowl in such company.' So sister humphed,\nand said she'd a headache, and went to bed. And now you may tell me\nyour news, my dear.\"\n\nSo Molly told her small events; which, interesting as they might\nhave been at other times to the gossip-loving and sympathetic Miss\nPhoebe, were rather pale in the stronger light reflected from the\nvisit of an earl's daughter.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XV.\n\nTHE NEW MAMMA.\n\n\n[Illustration (untitled)]\n\nOn Tuesday afternoon Molly returned home--to the home which was\nalready strange, and what Warwickshire people would call \"unked,\"\nto her. New paint, new paper, new colours; grim servants dressed\nin their best, and objecting to every change--from their master's\nmarriage to the new oilcloth in the hall, \"which tripped 'em up, and\nthrew 'em down, and was cold to the feet, and smelt just abominable.\"\nAll these complaints Molly had to listen to, and it was not a\ncheerful preparation for the reception which she already felt to be\nso formidable.\n\nThe sound of their carriage-wheels was heard at last, and Molly went\nto the front door to meet them. Her father got out first, and took\nher hand and held it while he helped his bride to alight. Then he\nkissed her fondly, and passed her on to his wife; but her veil was so\nsecurely (and becomingly) fastened down, that it was some time before\nMrs. Gibson could get her lips clear to greet her new daughter. Then\nthere was luggage to be seen about; and both the travellers were\noccupied in this, while Molly stood by trembling with excitement,\nunable to help, and only conscious of Betty's rather cross looks, as\nheavy box after heavy box jammed up the passage.\n\n\"Molly, my dear, show--your mamma to her room!\"\n\nMr. Gibson had hesitated, because the question of the name by\nwhich Molly was to call her new relation had never occurred to him\nbefore. The colour flashed into Molly's face. Was she to call her\n\"mamma?\"--the name long appropriated in her mind to some one else--to\nher own dead mother. The rebellious heart rose against it, but she\nsaid nothing. She led the way upstairs, Mrs. Gibson turning round,\nfrom time to time, with some fresh direction as to which bag or trunk\nshe needed most. She hardly spoke to Molly till they were both in\nthe newly-furnished bedroom, where a small fire had been lighted by\nMolly's orders.\n\n\"Now, my love, we can embrace each other in peace. O dear, how tired\nI am!\"--(after the embrace had been accomplished). \"My spirits are so\neasily affected with fatigue; but your dear papa has been kindness\nitself. Dear! what an old-fashioned bed! And what a-- But it doesn't\nsignify. By-and-by we'll renovate the house--won't we, my dear? And\nyou'll be my little maid to-night, and help me to arrange a few\nthings, for I'm just worn out with the day's journey.\"\n\n\"I've ordered a sort of tea-dinner to be ready for you,\" said Molly.\n\"Shall I go and tell them to send it in?\"\n\n\"I'm not sure if I can go down again to-night. It would be very\ncomfortable to have a little table brought in here, and sit in my\ndressing-gown by this cheerful fire. But, to be sure, there's your\ndear papa? I really don't think he would eat anything if I were not\nthere. One must not think about oneself, you know. Yes, I'll come\ndown in a quarter of an hour.\"\n\nBut Mr. Gibson had found a note awaiting him, with an immediate\nsummons to an old patient, dangerously ill; and, snatching a mouthful\nof food while his horse was being saddled, he had to resume at once\nhis old habits of attention to his profession above everything.\n\nAs soon as Mrs. Gibson found that he was not likely to miss her\npresence--he had eaten a very tolerable lunch of bread and cold meat\nin solitude, so her fears about his appetite in her absence were not\nwell founded--she desired to have her meal upstairs in her own room;\nand poor Molly, not daring to tell the servants of this whim, had to\ncarry up first a table, which, however small, was too heavy for her;\nand afterwards all the choice portions of the meal, which she had\ntaken great pains to arrange on the table, as she had seen such\nthings done at Hamley, intermixed with fruit and flowers that had\nthat morning been sent in from various great houses where Mr. Gibson\nwas respected and valued. How pretty Molly had thought her handiwork\nan hour or two before! How dreary it seemed as, at last released from\nMrs. Gibson's conversation, she sate down in solitude to cold tea and\nthe drumsticks of the chicken! No one to look at her preparations,\nand admire her deft-handedness and taste! She had thought that her\nfather would be gratified by it, and then he had never seen it. She\nhad meant her cares as an offering of good-will to her stepmother,\nwho even now was ringing her bell to have the tray taken away, and\nMiss Gibson summoned to her bedroom.\n\nMolly hastily finished her meal, and went upstairs again.\n\n\"I feel so lonely, darling, in this strange house; do come and be\nwith me, and help me to unpack. I think your dear papa might have put\noff his visit to Mr. Craven Smith for just this one evening.\"\n\n\"Mr. Craven Smith couldn't put off his dying,\" said Molly, bluntly.\n\n\"You droll girl!\" said Mrs. Gibson, with a faint laugh. \"But if this\nMr. Smith is dying, as you say, what's the use of your father's going\noff to him in such a hurry? Does he expect any legacy, or anything of\nthat kind?\"\n\nMolly bit her lips to prevent herself from saying something\ndisagreeable. She only answered,--\n\n\"I don't quite know that he is dying. The man said so; and papa can\nsometimes do something to make the last struggle easier. At any rate,\nit's always a comfort to the family to have him.\"\n\n\"What dreary knowledge of death you have learned for a girl of your\nage! Really, if I had heard all these details of your father's\nprofession, I doubt if I could have brought myself to have him!\"\n\n\"He doesn't make the illness or the death; he does his best against\nthem. I call it a very fine thing to think of what he does or tries\nto do. And you will think so, too, when you see how he is watched\nfor, and how people welcome him!\"\n\n\"Well, don't let us talk any more of such gloomy things, to-night! I\nthink I shall go to bed at once, I am so tired, if you will only sit\nby me till I get sleepy, darling. If you will talk to me, the sound\nof your voice will soon send me off.\"\n\nMolly got a book, and read her stepmother to sleep, preferring that\nto the harder task of keeping up a continual murmur of speech.\n\nThen she stole down and went into the dining-room, where the fire\nwas gone out; purposely neglected by the servants, to mark their\ndispleasure at their new mistress's having had her tea in her own\nroom. Molly managed to light it, however, before her father came\nhome, and collected and re-arranged some comfortable food for him.\nThen she knelt down again on the hearth-rug, gazing into the fire in\na dreamy reverie, which had enough of sadness about it to cause the\ntears to drop unnoticed from her eyes. But she jumped up, and shook\nherself into brightness at the sound of her father's step.\n\n\"How is Mr. Craven Smith?\" said she.\n\n\"Dead. He just recognized me. He was one of my first patients on\ncoming to Hollingford.\"\n\nMr. Gibson sate down in the arm-chair made ready for him, and warmed\nhis hands at the fire, seeming neither to need food nor talk, as he\nwent over a train of recollections. Then he roused himself from his\nsadness, and looking round the room, he said briskly enough,--\n\n\"And where's the new mamma?\"\n\n\"She was tired, and went to bed early. Oh, papa! must I call her\n'mamma?'\"\n\n\"I should like it,\" replied he, with a slight contraction of the\nbrows.\n\nMolly was silent. She put a cup of tea near him; he stirred it, and\nsipped it, and then he recurred to the subject.\n\n\"Why shouldn't you call her 'mamma?' I'm sure she means to do the\nduty of a mother to you. We all may make mistakes, and her ways may\nnot be quite all at once our ways; but at any rate let us start with\na family bond between us.\"\n\nWhat would Roger say was right?--that was the question that rose to\nMolly's mind. She had always spoken of her father's new wife as Mrs.\nGibson, and had once burst out at Miss Brownings with a protestation\nthat she never would call her \"mamma.\" She did not feel drawn to her\nnew relation by their intercourse that evening. She kept silence,\nthough she knew her father was expecting an answer. At last he\ngave up his expectation, and turned to another subject; told about\ntheir journey, questioned her as to the Hamleys, the Brownings,\nLady Harriet, and the afternoon they had passed together at the\nManor-house. But there was a certain hardness and constraint in his\nmanner, and in hers a heaviness and absence of mind. All at once she\nsaid,--\n\n\"Papa, I will call her 'mamma!'\"\n\nHe took her hand, and grasped it tight; but for an instant or two he\ndid not speak. Then he said,--\n\n\"You won't be sorry for it, Molly, when you come to lie as poor\nCraven Smith did to-night.\"\n\nFor some time the murmurs and grumblings of the two elder servants\nwere confined to Molly's ears, then they spread to her father's, who,\nto Molly's dismay, made summary work with them.\n\n\"You don't like Mrs. Gibson's ringing her bell so often, don't you?\nYou've been spoilt, I'm afraid; but if you don't conform to my wife's\ndesires, you have the remedy in your own hands, you know.\"\n\nWhat servant ever resisted the temptation to give warning after such\na speech as that? Betty told Molly she was going to leave, in as\nindifferent a manner as she could possibly assume towards the girl\nwhom she had tended and been about for the last sixteen years. Molly\nhad hitherto considered her former nurse as a fixture in the house;\nshe would almost as soon have thought of her father's proposing\nto sever the relationship between them; and here was Betty coolly\ntalking over whether her next place should be in town or country. But\na great deal of this was assumed hardness. In a week or two Betty was\nin floods of tears at the prospect of leaving her nursling, and would\nfain have stayed and answered all the bells in the house once every\nquarter of an hour. Even Mr. Gibson's masculine heart was touched by\nthe sorrow of the old servant, which made itself obvious to him every\ntime he came across her by her broken voice and her swollen eyes.\n\nOne day he said to Molly, \"I wish you'd ask your mamma if Betty might\nnot stay, if she made a proper apology, and all that sort of thing.\"\n\n\"I don't much think it will be of any use,\" said Molly, in a mournful\nvoice. \"I know she is writing, or has written, about some\nunder-housemaid at the Towers.\"\n\n\"Well!--all I want is peace and a decent quantity of cheerfulness\nwhen I come home. I see enough of tears at other people's houses.\nAfter all, Betty has been with us sixteen years--a sort of service\nof the antique world. But the woman may be happier elsewhere. Do as\nyou like about asking mamma; only if she agrees, I shall be quite\nwilling.\"\n\nSo Molly tried her hand at making a request to that effect to Mrs.\nGibson. Her instinct told her she would be unsuccessful; but surely\nfavour was never refused in so soft a tone.\n\n\"My dear girl, I should never have thought of sending an old servant\naway,--one who has had the charge of you from your birth, or nearly\nso. I could not have had the heart to do it. She might have stayed\nfor ever for me, if she had only attended to all my wishes; and I am\nnot unreasonable, am I? But, you see, she complained; and when your\ndear papa spoke to her, she gave warning; and it is quite against\nmy principles ever to take an apology from a servant who has given\nwarning.\"\n\n\"She is so sorry,\" pleaded Molly; \"she says she will do anything you\nwish, and attend to all your orders, if she may only stay.\"\n\n\"But, sweet one, you seem to forget that I cannot go against my\nprinciples, however much I may be sorry for Betty. She should not\nhave given way to ill-temper. As I said before, although I never\nliked her, and considered her a most inefficient servant, thoroughly\nspoilt by having had no mistress for so long, I should have borne\nwith her--at least, I think I should--as long as I could. Now I have\nall but engaged Maria, who was under-housemaid at the Towers, so\ndon't let me hear any more of Betty's sorrow, or anybody else's\nsorrow, for I'm sure, what with your dear papa's sad stories and\nother things, I'm getting quite low.\"\n\nMolly was silent for a moment or two.\n\n\"Have you quite engaged Maria?\" asked she.\n\n\"No--I said 'all but engaged.' Sometimes one would think you did not\nhear things, dear Molly!\" replied Mrs. Gibson, petulantly. \"Maria\nis living in a place where they don't give her as much wages as she\ndeserves. Perhaps they can't afford it, poor things! I'm always sorry\nfor poverty, and would never speak hardly of those who are not rich;\nbut I have offered her two pounds more than she gets at present, so I\nthink she'll leave. At any rate, if they increase her wages, I shall\nincrease my offer in proportion; so I think I'm sure to get her. Such\na genteel girl!--always brings in a letter on a salver!\"\n\n\"Poor Betty!\" said Molly, softly.\n\n\"Poor old soul! I hope she'll profit by the lesson, I'm sure,\" sighed\nout Mrs. Gibson; \"but it's a pity we hadn't Maria before the county\nfamilies began to call.\"\n\nMrs. Gibson had been highly gratified by the circumstance of so many\ncalls \"from county families.\" Her husband was much respected; and\nmany ladies from various halls, courts, and houses, who had profited\nby his services towards themselves and their families, thought it\nright to pay his new wife the attention of a call when they drove\ninto Hollingford to shop. The state of expectation into which these\ncalls threw Mrs. Gibson rather diminished Mr. Gibson's domestic\ncomfort. It was awkward to be carrying hot, savoury-smelling dishes\nfrom the kitchen to the dining-room at the very time when high-born\nladies, with noses of aristocratic refinement, might be calling.\nStill more awkward was the accident which happened in consequence\nof clumsy Betty's haste to open the front door to a lofty footman's\nran-tan, which caused her to set down the basket containing the dirty\nplates right in his mistress's way, as she stepped gingerly through\nthe comparative darkness of the hall; and then the young men, leaving\nthe dining-room quietly enough, but bursting with long-repressed\ngiggle, or no longer restraining their tendency to practical joking,\nno matter who might be in the passage when they made their exit. The\nremedy proposed by Mrs. Gibson for all these distressing grievances\nwas a late dinner. The luncheon for the young men, as she observed\nto her husband, might be sent into the surgery. A few elegant cold\ntrifles for herself and Molly would not scent the house, and she\nwould always take care to have some little dainty ready for him. He\nacceded, but unwillingly, for it was an innovation on the habits of\na lifetime, and he felt as if he should never be able to arrange his\nrounds aright with this new-fangled notion of a six o'clock dinner.\n\n\"Don't get any dainties for me, my dear; bread-and-cheese is the\nchief of my diet, like it was that of the old woman's.\"\n\n\"I know nothing of your old woman,\" replied his wife; \"but really I\ncannot allow cheese to come beyond the kitchen.\"\n\n\"Then I'll eat it there,\" said he. \"It's close to the stable-yard,\nand if I come in in a hurry I can get it in a moment.\"\n\n\"Really, Mr. Gibson, it is astonishing to compare your appearance and\nmanners with your tastes. You look such a gentleman, as dear Lady\nCumnor used to say.\"\n\nThen the cook left; also an old servant, though not so old a one as\nBetty. The cook did not like the trouble of late dinners; and, being\na Methodist, she objected on religious grounds to trying any of\nMrs. Gibson's new receipts for French dishes. It was not scriptural,\nshe said. There was a deal of mention of food in the Bible; but it\nwas of sheep ready dressed, which meant mutton, and of wine, and\nof bread-and-milk, and figs and raisins, of fatted calves, a good\nwell-browned fillet of veal, and such like; but it had always gone\nagainst her conscience to cook swine-flesh and make raised pork-pies,\nand now if she was to be set to cook heathen dishes after the fashion\nof the Papists, she'd sooner give it all up together. So the cook\nfollowed in Betty's track, and Mr. Gibson had to satisfy his healthy\nEnglish appetite on badly-made omelettes, rissoles, vol-au-vents,\ncroquets, and timbales; never being exactly sure what he was eating.\n\nHe had made up his mind before his marriage to yield in trifles,\nand be firm in greater things. But the differences of opinion about\ntrifles arose every day, and were perhaps more annoying than if they\nhad related to things of more consequence. Molly knew her father's\nlooks as well as she knew her alphabet; his wife did not; and being\nan unperceptive person, except when her own interests were dependent\nupon another person's humour, never found out how he was worried by\nall the small daily concessions which he made to her will or her\nwhims. He never allowed himself to put any regret into shape, even\nin his own mind; he repeatedly reminded himself of his wife's good\nqualities, and comforted himself by thinking they should work\ntogether better as time rolled on; but he was very angry at a\nbachelor great-uncle of Mr. Coxe's, who, after taking no notice of\nhis red-headed nephew for years, suddenly sent for him, after the old\nman had partially recovered from a serious attack of illness, and\nappointed him his heir, on condition that his great-nephew remained\nwith him during the rest of his life. This had happened almost\ndirectly after Mr. and Mrs. Gibson's return from their wedding\njourney, and once or twice since that time Mr. Gibson had found\nhimself wondering why the deuce old Benson could not have made\nup his mind sooner, and so have rid his house of the unwelcome\npresence of the young lover. To do Mr. Coxe justice, in the very\nlast conversation he had as a pupil with Mr. Gibson he said, with\nhesitating awkwardness, that perhaps the new circumstances in which\nhe should be placed might make some difference with regard to Mr.\nGibson's opinion on--\n\n\"Not at all,\" said Mr. Gibson, quickly. \"You are both of you too\nyoung to know your own minds; and if my daughter was silly enough to\nbe in love, she should never have to calculate her happiness on the\nchances of an old man's death. I dare say he'll disinherit you after\nall. He may do, and then you'd be worse off than ever. No! go away,\nand forget all this nonsense; and when you've done, come back and see\nus!\"\n\nSo Mr. Coxe went away, with an oath of unalterable faithfulness in\nhis heart; and Mr. Gibson had unwillingly to fulfil an old promise\nmade to a gentleman farmer in the neighbourhood a year or two before,\nand to take the second son of Mr. Browne in young Coxe's place. He\nwas to be the last of the race of pupils, and as he was rather more\nthan a year younger than Molly, Mr. Gibson trusted that there would\nbe no repetition of the Coxe romance.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XVI.\n\nTHE BRIDE AT HOME.\n\n\nAmong the \"county people\" (as Mrs. Gibson termed them) who called\nupon her as a bride, were the two young Mr. Hamleys. The Squire,\ntheir father, had done his congratulations, as far as he ever\nintended to do them, to Mr. Gibson himself when he came to the hall;\nbut Mrs. Hamley, unable to go and pay visits herself, anxious to show\nattention to her kind doctor's new wife, and with perhaps a little\nsympathetic curiosity as to how Molly and her stepmother got on\ntogether, made her sons ride over to Hollingford with her cards and\napologies. They came into the newly-furnished drawing-room, looking\nbright and fresh from their ride: Osborne first, as usual, perfectly\ndressed for the occasion, and with the sort of fine manner which\nsate so well upon him; Roger, looking like a strong-built, cheerful,\nintelligent country farmer, followed in his brother's train. Mrs.\nGibson was dressed for receiving callers, and made the effect she\nalways intended to produce, of a very pretty woman, no longer in\nfirst youth, but with such soft manners and such a caressing voice,\nthat people forgot to wonder what her real age might be. Molly was\nbetter dressed than formerly; her stepmother saw after that. She\ndisliked anything old or shabby, or out of taste about her; it hurt\nher eye; and she had already fidgeted Molly into a new amount of care\nabout the manner in which she put on her clothes, arranged her hair,\nand was gloved and shod. Mrs. Gibson had tried to put her through a\ncourse of rosemary washes and creams in order to improve her tanned\ncomplexion; but about that Molly was either forgetful or rebellious,\nand Mrs. Gibson could not well come up to the girl's bedroom every\nnight and see that she daubed her face and neck over with the\ncosmetics so carefully provided for her. Still her appearance was\nextremely improved, even to Osborne's critical eye. Roger sought\nrather to discover in her looks and expression whether she was happy\nor not; his mother had especially charged him to note all these\nsigns.\n\nOsborne and Mrs. Gibson made themselves agreeable to each other\naccording to the approved fashion when a young man calls on a\nmiddle-aged bride. They talked of the \"Shakspeare and musical\nglasses\" of the day, each vieing with the other in their knowledge\nof London topics. Molly heard fragments of their conversation in the\npauses of silence between Roger and herself. Her hero was coming\nout in quite a new character; no longer literary or poetical, or\nromantic, or critical, he was now full of the last new play, the\nsingers at the opera. He had the advantage over Mrs. Gibson, who, in\nfact, only spoke of these things from hearsay, from listening to the\ntalk at the Towers, while Osborne had run up from Cambridge two or\nthree times to hear this, or to see that wonder of the season. But\nshe had the advantage over him in greater boldness of invention to\neke out her facts; and besides she had more skill in the choice and\narrangement of her words, so as to make it appear as if the opinions\nthat were in reality quotations, were formed by herself from actual\nexperience or personal observation; such as, in speaking of the\nmannerisms of a famous Italian singer, she would ask,--\n\n\n[Illustration: SHAKSPEARE AND THE MUSICAL GLASSES.]\n\n\n\"Did you observe her constant trick of heaving her shoulders and\nclasping her hands together before she took a high note?\"--which was\nso said as to imply that Mrs. Gibson herself had noticed this trick.\nMolly, who had a pretty good idea by this time of how her stepmother\nhad passed the last year of her life, listened with no small\nbewilderment to this conversation; but at length decided that she\nmust misunderstand what they were saying, as she could not gather up\nthe missing links for the necessity of replying to Roger's questions\nand remarks. Osborne was not the same Osborne he was when with his\nmother at the Hall.\n\nRoger saw Molly glancing at his brother.\n\n\"You think my brother looking ill?\" said he, lowering his voice.\n\n\"No--not exactly.\"\n\n\"He is not well. Both my father and I are anxious about him.\nThat run on the Continent did him harm, instead of good; and his\ndisappointment at his examination has told upon him, I'm afraid.\"\n\n\"I was not thinking he looked ill; only changed somehow.\"\n\n\"He says he must go back to Cambridge soon. Possibly it may do him\ngood; and I shall be off next week. This is a farewell visit to you,\nas well as one of congratulation to Mrs. Gibson.\"\n\n\"Your mother will feel your both going away, won't she? But of course\nyoung men will always have to live away from home.\"\n\n\"Yes,\" he replied. \"Still she feels it a good deal; and I'm not\nsatisfied about her health either. You will go out and see her\nsometimes, will you? she is very fond of you.\"\n\n\"If I may,\" said Molly, unconsciously glancing at her stepmother. She\nhad an uncomfortable instinct that, in spite of Mrs. Gibson's own\nperpetual flow of words, she could, and did, hear everything that\nfell from Molly's lips.\n\n\"Do you want any more books?\" said he. \"If you do, make a list out,\nand send it to my mother before I leave, next Tuesday. After I am\ngone, there will be no one to go into the library and pick them out.\"\n\nAs soon as they had left, Mrs. Gibson began her usual comments on the\ndeparted visitors.\n\n\"I do like that Osborne Hamley! What a nice fellow he is! Somehow,\nI always do like eldest sons. He will have the estate, won't he? I\nshall ask your dear papa to encourage him to come about the house. He\nwill be a very good, very pleasant acquaintance for you and Cynthia.\nThe other is but a loutish young fellow, to my mind; there is no\naristocratic bearing about him. I suppose he takes after his mother,\nwho is but a parvenue, I've heard them say at the Towers.\"\n\nMolly was spiteful enough to have great pleasure in saying,--\n\n\"I think I've heard her father was a Russian merchant, and imported\ntallow and hemp. Mr. Osborne Hamley is extremely like her.\"\n\n\"Indeed! But there's no calculating these things. Anyhow, he is the\nperfect gentleman in appearance and manner. The estate is entailed,\nis it not?\"\n\n\"I know nothing about it,\" said Molly.\n\nA short silence ensued. Then Mrs. Gibson said,--\n\n\"Do you know, I almost think I must get dear papa to give a little\ndinner-party, and ask Mr. Osborne Hamley? I should like to have him\nfeel at home in this house. It would be something cheerful for him\nafter the dulness and solitude of Hamley Hall. For the old people\ndon't visit much, I believe?\"\n\n\"He's going back to Cambridge next week,\" said Molly.\n\n\"Is he? Well, then, we'll put off our little dinner till Cynthia\ncomes home. I should like to have some young society for her, poor\ndarling, when she returns.\"\n\n\"When is she coming?\" said Molly, who had always a longing curiosity\nfor this same Cynthia's return.\n\n\"Oh! I'm not sure; perhaps at the new year--perhaps not till Easter.\nI must get this drawing-room all new furnished first; and then I mean\nto fit up her room and yours just alike. They are just the same size,\nonly on opposite sides of the passage.\"\n\n\"Are you going to new-furnish that room?\" said Molly, in astonishment\nat the never-ending changes.\n\n\"Yes; and yours, too, darling; so don't be jealous.\"\n\n\"Oh, please, mamma, not mine,\" said Molly, taking in the idea for the\nfirst time.\n\n\"Yes, dear! You shall have yours done as well. A little French bed,\nand a new paper, and a pretty carpet, and a dressed-up toilet-table\nand glass, will make it look quite a different place.\"\n\n\"But I don't want it to look different. I like it as it is. Pray\ndon't do anything to it.\"\n\n\"What nonsense, child! I never heard anything more ridiculous!\nMost girls would be glad to get rid of furniture only fit for the\nlumber-room.\"\n\n\"It was my own mamma's before she was married,\" said Molly, in a\nvery low voice; bringing out this last plea unwillingly, but with a\ncertainty that it would not be resisted.\n\nMrs. Gibson paused for a moment before she replied:\n\n\"It's very much to your credit that you should have such feelings,\nI'm sure. But don't you think sentiment may be carried too far? Why,\nwe should have no new furniture at all, and should have to put up\nwith worm-eaten horrors. Besides, my dear, Hollingford will seem very\ndull to Cynthia, after pretty, gay France, and I want to make the\nfirst impressions attractive. I've a notion I can settle her down\nnear here; and I want her to come in a good temper; for, between\nourselves, my dear, she is a little, leetle wilful. You need not\nmention this to your papa.\"\n\n\"But can't you do Cynthia's room, and not mine? Please let mine\nalone.\"\n\n\"No, indeed! I couldn't agree to that. Only think what would be said\nof me by everybody; petting my own child and neglecting my husband's!\nI couldn't bear it.\"\n\n\"No one need know.\"\n\n\"In such a tittle-tattle place as Hollingford! Really, Molly, you are\neither very stupid or very obstinate, or else you don't care what\nhard things may be said about me: and all for a selfish fancy of\nyour own! No! I owe myself the justice of acting in this matter as I\nplease. Every one shall know I'm not a common stepmother. Every penny\nI spend on Cynthia I shall spend on you too; so it's no use talking\nany more about it.\"\n\nSo Molly's little white dimity bed, her old-fashioned chest of\ndrawers, and her other cherished relics of her mother's maiden-days,\nwere consigned to the lumber-room; and after a while, when Cynthia\nand her great French boxes had come home, the old furniture that had\nfilled up the space required for the fresh importation of trunks,\ndisappeared likewise into the same room.\n\nAll this time the family at the Towers had been absent; Lady Cumnor\nhad been ordered to Bath for the early part of the winter, and her\nfamily were with her there. On dull rainy days, Mrs. Gibson used to\nbethink her of missing \"the Cumnors,\" for so she had taken to calling\nthem since her position had become more independent of theirs. It\nmarked a distinction between her intimacy in the family, and the\nreverential manner in which the townspeople were accustomed to speak\nof \"the earl and the countess.\" Both Lady Cumnor and Lady Harriet\nwrote to their \"dear Clare\" from time to time. The former had\ngenerally some commissions that she wished to have executed at the\nTowers, or in the town; and no one could do them so well as Clare,\nwho was acquainted with all the tastes and ways of the countess.\nThese commissions were the cause of various bills for flys and cars\nfrom the George Inn. Mr. Gibson pointed out this consequence to\nhis wife; but she, in return, bade him remark that a present of\ngame was pretty sure to follow upon the satisfactory execution of\nLady Cumnor's wishes. Somehow, Mr. Gibson did not quite like this\nconsequence either; but he was silent about it, at any rate. Lady\nHarriet's letters were short and amusing. She had that sort of regard\nfor her old governess which prompted her to write from time to time,\nand to feel glad when the half-voluntary task was accomplished. So\nthere was no real outpouring of confidence, but enough news of the\nfamily and gossip of the place she was in, as she thought would\nmake Clare feel that she was not forgotten by her former pupils,\nintermixed with moderate but sincere expressions of regard. How\nthose letters were quoted and referred to by Mrs. Gibson in her\nconversations with the Hollingford ladies! She had found out their\neffect at Ashcombe; and it was not less at Hollingford. But she was\nrather perplexed at kindly messages to Molly, and at inquiries as\nto how the Miss Brownings liked the tea she had sent; and Molly\nhad first to explain, and then to narrate at full length, all the\noccurrences of the afternoon at Ashcombe Manor-house, and Lady\nHarriet's subsequent call upon her at Miss Brownings'.\n\n\"What nonsense!\" said Mrs. Gibson, with some annoyance. \"Lady Harriet\nonly went to see you out of a desire of amusement. She would only\nmake fun of Miss Brownings, and those two will be quoting her and\ntalking about her, just as if she was their intimate friend.\"\n\n\"I don't think she did make fun of them. She really seemed as if she\nhad been very kind.\"\n\n\"And you suppose you know her ways better than I do who have known\nher these fifteen years? I tell you she turns every one into ridicule\nwho does not belong to her set. Why, she used always to speak of Miss\nBrownings as 'Pecksy and Flapsy.'\"\n\n\"She promised me she would not,\" said Molly driven to bay.\n\n\"Promised you!--Lady Harriet? What do you mean?\"\n\n\"Only--she spoke of them as Pecksy and Flapsy--and when she talked of\ncoming to call on me at their house, I asked her not to come if she\nwas going to--to make fun of them.\"\n\n\"Upon my word! with all my long acquaintance with Lady Harriet, I\nshould never have ventured on such impertinence.\"\n\n\"I didn't mean it as impertinence,\" said Molly sturdily. \"And I don't\nthink Lady Harriet took it as such.\"\n\n\"You can't know anything about it. She can put on any kind of\nmanner.\"\n\nJust then Squire Hamley came in. It was his first call; and Mrs.\nGibson gave him a graceful welcome, and was quite ready to accept\nhis apology for its tardiness, and to assure him that she quite\nunderstood the pressure of business on every land-owner who farmed\nhis own estate. But no such apology was made. He shook her hand\nheartily, as a mark of congratulation on her good fortune in having\nsecured such a prize as his friend Gibson, but said nothing about his\nlong neglect of duty. Molly, who by this time knew the few strong\nexpressions of his countenance well, was sure that something was the\nmatter, and that he was very much disturbed. He hardly attended to\nMrs. Gibson's fluent opening of conversation, for she had already\ndetermined to make a favourable impression on the father of the\nhandsome young man who was heir to an estate, besides his own\npersonal agreeableness; but he turned to Molly and, addressing her,\nsaid--almost in a low voice, as if he was making a confidence to her\nthat he did not intend Mrs. Gibson to hear,--\n\n\"Molly, we are all wrong at home! Osborne has lost the fellowship\nat Trinity he went back to try for. Then he has gone and failed\nmiserably in his degree, after all that he said, and that his mother\nsaid; and I, like a fool, went and boasted about my clever son. I\ncan't understand it. I never expected anything extraordinary from\nRoger; but Osborne--! And then it has thrown madam into one of her\nbad fits of illness; and she seems to have a fancy for you, child!\nYour father came to see her this morning. Poor thing, she's very\npoorly, I'm afraid; and she told him how she should like to have you\nabout her, and he said I might fetch you. You'll come, won't you, my\ndear? She's not a poor woman, such as many people think it's the only\ncharity to be kind to, but she's just as forlorn of woman's care as\nif she was poor--worse, I daresay.\"\n\n\"I'll be ready in ten minutes,\" said Molly, much touched by the\nsquire's words and manner, never thinking of asking her stepmother's\nconsent, now that she had heard that her father had given his. As she\nrose to leave the room, Mrs. Gibson, who had only half heard what the\nSquire had said, and was a little affronted at the exclusiveness of\nhis confidence, said,--\"My dear, where are you going?\"\n\n\"Mrs. Hamley wants me, and papa says I may go,\" said Molly; and\nalmost at the same time the Squire replied,--\n\n\"My wife is ill, and as she's very fond of your daughter, she begged\nMr. Gibson to allow her to come to the Hall for a little while, and\nhe kindly said she might, and I'm come to fetch her.\"\n\n\"Stop a minute, darling,\" said Mrs. Gibson to Molly--a slight cloud\nover her countenance, in spite of her caressing word. \"I am sure dear\npapa quite forgot that you were to go out with me to-night, to visit\npeople,\" continued she, addressing herself to the Squire, \"with whom\nI am quite unacquainted--and it is very uncertain if Mr. Gibson can\nreturn in time to accompany me--so, you see, I cannot allow Molly to\ngo with you.\"\n\n\"I shouldn't have thought it would have signified. Brides are always\nbrides, I suppose; and it's their part to be timid; but I shouldn't\nhave thought it--in this case. And my wife sets her heart on things,\nas sick people do. Well, Molly\" (in a louder tone, for these\nforegoing sentences were spoken _sotto voce_), \"we must put it off\ntill to-morrow: and it's our loss, not yours,\" he continued, as\nhe saw the reluctance with which she slowly returned to her place.\n\"You'll be as gay as can be to-night, I daresay--\"\n\n\"No, I shall not,\" broke in Molly. \"I never wanted to go, and now I\nshall want it less than ever.\"\n\n\"Hush, my dear,\" said Mrs. Gibson; and, addressing the Squire, she\nadded, \"The visiting here is not all one could wish for so young a\ngirl--no young people, no dances, nothing of gaiety; but it is wrong\nin you, Molly, to speak against such kind friends of your father's as\nI understand these Cockerells are. Don't give so bad an impression of\nyourself to the kind Squire.\"\n\n\"Let her alone! let her alone!\" quoth he. \"I see what she means.\nShe'd rather come and be in my wife's sick-room than go out for this\nvisit to-night. Is there no way of getting her off?\"\n\n\"None whatever,\" said Mrs. Gibson. \"An engagement is an engagement\nwith me; and I consider that she is not only engaged to Mrs.\nCockerell, but to me--bound to accompany me, in my husband's\nabsence.\"\n\nThe Squire was put out; and when he was put out he had a trick of\nplacing his hands on his knees and whistling softly to himself. Molly\nknew this phase of his displeasure, and only hoped he would confine\nhimself to this wordless expression of annoyance. It was pretty hard\nwork for her to keep the tears out of her eyes; and she endeavoured\nto think of something else, rather than dwell on regrets and\nannoyances. She heard Mrs. Gibson talking on in a sweet monotone, and\nwished to attend to what she was saying, but the Squire's visible\nannoyance struck sharper on her mind. At length, after a pause of\nsilence, he started up, and said,--\n\n\"Well! it's no use. Poor madam; she won't like it. She'll be\ndisappointed! But it's but for one evening!--but for one evening! She\nmay come to-morrow, mayn't she? Or will the dissipation of such an\nevening as she describes, be too much for her?\"\n\nThere was a touch of savage irony in his manner which frightened Mrs.\nGibson into good behaviour.\n\n\"She shall be ready at any time you name. I am so sorry: my foolish\nshyness is in fault, I believe; but still you must acknowledge that\nan engagement is an engagement.\"\n\n\"Did I ever say an engagement was an elephant, madam? However,\nthere's no use saying any more about it, or I shall forget my\nmanners. I'm an old tyrant, and she--lying there in bed, poor\ngirl--has always given me my own way. So you'll excuse me, Mrs.\nGibson, won't you; and let Molly come along with me at ten to-morrow\nmorning?\"\n\n\"Certainly,\" said Mrs. Gibson, smiling. But when his back was turned,\nshe said to Molly,--\n\n\"Now, my dear, I must never have you exposing me to the ill-manners\nof such a man again! I don't call him a squire; I call him a boor,\nor a yeoman at best. You must not go on accepting or rejecting\ninvitations as if you were an independent young lady, Molly. Pay me\nthe respect of a reference to my wishes another time, if you please,\nmy dear!\"\n\n\"Papa had said I might go,\" said Molly, choking a little.\n\n\"As I am now your mamma, your references must be to me, for the\nfuture. But as you are to go you may as well look well dressed. I\nwill lend you my new shawl for this visit, if you like it, and my set\nof green ribbons. I am always indulgent when proper respect is paid\nto me. And in such a house as Hamley Hall, no one can tell who may be\ncoming and going, even if there is sickness in the family.\"\n\n\"Thank you. But I don't want the shawl and the ribbons, please: there\nwill be nobody there except the family. There never is, I think; and\nnow that she is so ill\"--Molly was on the point of crying at the\nthought of her friend lying ill and lonely, and looking for her\narrival. Moreover, she was sadly afraid lest the Squire had gone off\nwith the idea that she did not want to come--that she preferred that\nstupid, stupid party at the Cockerells'. Mrs. Gibson, too, was sorry;\nshe had an uncomfortable consciousness of having given way to temper\nbefore a stranger, and a stranger, too, whose good opinion she had\nmeant to cultivate; and she was also annoyed at Molly's tearful face.\n\n\"What can I do for you, to bring you back into good temper?\" she\nsaid. \"First, you insist upon your knowing Lady Harriet better than\nI do--I, who have known her for eighteen or nineteen years at least.\nThen you jump at invitations without ever consulting me, or thinking\nof how awkward it would be for me to go stumping into a drawing-room\nall by myself; following my new name, too, which always makes me feel\nuncomfortable, it is such a sad come-down after Kirkpatrick! And\nthen, when I offer you some of the prettiest things I have got, you\nsay it does not signify how you are dressed. What can I do to please\nyou, Molly? I, who delight in nothing more than peace in a family, to\nsee you sitting there with despair upon your face?\"\n\nMolly could stand it no longer; she went upstairs to her own\nroom--her own smart new room, which hardly yet seemed a familiar\nplace; and began to cry so heartily and for so long a time, that she\nstopped at length for very weariness. She thought of Mrs. Hamley\nwearying for her; of the old Hall whose very quietness might become\noppressive to an ailing person; of the trust the Squire had had in\nher that she would come off directly with him. And all this oppressed\nher much more than the querulousness of her stepmother's words.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XVII.\n\nTROUBLE AT HAMLEY HALL.\n\n\nIf Molly thought that peace dwelt perpetually at Hamley Hall\nshe was sorely mistaken. Something was out of tune in the whole\nestablishment; and, for a very unusual thing, the common irritation\nseemed to have produced a common bond. All the servants were old in\ntheir places, and were told by some one of the family, or gathered,\nfrom the unheeded conversation carried on before them, everything\nthat affected master or mistress or either of the young gentlemen.\nAny one of them could have told Molly that the grievance which lay at\nthe root of everything, was the amount of the bills run up by Osborne\nat Cambridge, and which, now that all chance of his obtaining a\nfellowship was over, came pouring down upon the Squire. But Molly,\nconfident of being told by Mrs. Hamley herself anything which she\nwished her to hear, encouraged no confidences from any one else.\n\nShe was struck with the change in \"madam's\" look as soon as she\ncaught sight of her in the darkened room, lying on the sofa in her\ndressing-room, all dressed in white, which almost rivalled the white\nwanness of her face. The Squire ushered Molly in with,--\n\n\"Here she is at last!\" and Molly had scarcely imagined that he had so\nmuch variety in the tones of his voice--the beginning of the sentence\nwas spoken in a loud congratulatory manner, while the last words\nwere scarcely audible. He had seen the death-like pallor on his\nwife's face; not a new sight, and one which had been presented to him\ngradually enough, but which was now always giving him a fresh shock.\nIt was a lovely tranquil winter's day; every branch and every twig\non the trees and shrubs was glittering with drops of the sun-melted\nhoar-frost; a robin was perched on a holly-bush, piping cheerily; but\nthe blinds were down, and out of Mrs. Hamley's windows nothing of all\nthis was to be seen. There was even a large screen placed between\nher and the wood-fire, to keep off that cheerful blaze. Mrs. Hamley\nstretched out one hand to Molly, and held hers firm; with the other\nshe shaded her eyes.\n\n\"She is not so well this morning,\" said the Squire, shaking his head.\n\"But never fear, my dear one; here's the doctor's daughter, nearly\nas good as the doctor himself. Have you had your medicine? Your\nbeef-tea?\" he continued, going about on heavy tiptoe and peeping into\nevery empty cup and glass. Then he returned to the sofa; looked at\nher for a minute or two, and then softly kissed her, and told Molly\nhe would leave her in charge.\n\nAs if Mrs. Hamley was afraid of Molly's remarks or questions, she\nbegan in her turn a hasty system of interrogatories.\n\n\"Now, dear child, tell me all; it's no breach of confidence, for I\nshan't mention it again, and I shan't be here long. How does it all\ngo on--the new mother, the good resolutions? let me help you if I\ncan. I think with a girl I could have been of use--a mother does not\nknow boys. But tell me anything you like and will; don't be afraid of\ndetails.\"\n\nEven with Molly's small experience of illness she saw how much of\nrestless fever there was in this speech; and instinct, or some\nsuch gift, prompted her to tell a long story of many things--the\nwedding-day, her visit to Miss Brownings', the new furniture, Lady\nHarriet, &c., all in an easy flow of talk which was very soothing\nto Mrs. Hamley, inasmuch as it gave her something to think about\nbeyond her own immediate sorrows. But Molly did not speak of her own\ngrievances, nor of the new domestic relationship. Mrs. Hamley noticed\nthis.\n\n\"And you and Mrs. Gibson get on happily together?\"\n\n\"Not always,\" said Molly. \"You know we didn't know much of each other\nbefore we were put to live together.\"\n\n\"I didn't like what the Squire told me last night. He was very\nangry.\"\n\nThat sore had not yet healed over; but Molly resolutely kept silence,\nbeating her brains to think of some other subject of conversation.\n\n\"Ah! I see, Molly,\" said Mrs. Hamley; \"you won't tell me your\nsorrows, and yet, perhaps, I could have done you some good.\"\n\n\"I don't like,\" said Molly, in a low voice. \"I think papa wouldn't\nlike it. And, besides, you have helped me so much--you and Mr.\nRoger Hamley. I often think of the things he said; they come in so\nusefully, and are such a strength to me.\"\n\n\"Ah, Roger! yes. He is to be trusted. Oh, Molly! I've a great deal\nto say to you myself, only not now. I must have my medicine and try\nto go to sleep. Good girl! You are stronger than I am, and can do\nwithout sympathy.\"\n\nMolly was taken to another room; the maid who conducted her to it\ntold her that Mrs. Hamley had not wished her to have her nights\ndisturbed, as they might very probably have been if she had been in\nher former sleeping-room. In the afternoon Mrs. Hamley sent for her,\nand with the want of reticence common to invalids, especially to\nthose suffering from long and depressing maladies, she told Molly of\nthe family distress and disappointment.\n\nShe made Molly sit down near her on a little stool, and, holding her\nhand, and looking into her eyes to catch her spoken sympathy from\ntheir expression quicker than she could from her words, she said,--\n\n\"Osborne has so disappointed us! I cannot understand it yet. And the\nSquire was so terribly angry! I cannot think how all the money was\nspent--advances through money-lenders, besides bills. The Squire\ndoes not show me how angry he is now, because he's afraid of another\nattack; but I know how angry he is. You see he has been spending ever\nso much money in reclaiming that land at Upton Common, and is very\nhard pressed himself. But it would have doubled the value of the\nestate, and so we never thought anything of economies which would\nbenefit Osborne in the long run. And now the Squire says he must\nmortgage some of the land; and you can't think how it cuts him to\nthe heart. He sold a great deal of timber to send the two boys to\ncollege. Osborne--oh! what a dear, innocent boy he was: he was the\nheir, you know; and he was so clever, every one said he was sure of\nhonours and a fellowship, and I don't know what all; and he did get\na scholarship, and then all went wrong. I don't know how. That is\nthe worst. Perhaps the Squire wrote too angrily, and that stopped up\nconfidence. But he might have told me. He would have done, I think,\nMolly, if he had been here, face to face with me. But the Squire, in\nhis anger, told him not to show his face at home till he had paid off\nthe debts he had incurred out of his allowance. Out of two hundred\nand fifty a year to pay off more than nine hundred, one way or\nanother! And not to come home till then! Perhaps Roger will have\ndebts too! He had but two hundred; but, then, he was not the eldest\nson. The Squire has given orders that the men are to be turned off\nthe draining-works; and I lie awake thinking of their poor families\nthis wintry weather. But what shall we do? I've never been strong,\nand, perhaps, I've been extravagant in my habits; and there were\nfamily traditions as to expenditure, and the reclaiming of this land.\nOh! Molly, Osborne was such a sweet little baby, and such a loving\nboy: so clever, too! You know I read you some of his poetry: now,\ncould a person who wrote like that do anything very wrong? And yet\nI'm afraid he has.\"\n\n\"Don't you know, at all, how the money has gone?\" asked Molly.\n\n\"No! not at all. That's the sting. There are tailors' bills,\nand bills for book-binding and wine and pictures--those come\nto four or five hundred; and though this expenditure is\nextraordinary--inexplicable to such simple folk as we are--yet it\nmay be only the luxury of the present day. But the money for which\nhe will give no account,--of which, indeed, we only heard through\nthe Squire's London agents, who found out that certain disreputable\nattorneys were making inquiries as to the entail of the estate;--oh!\nMolly, worse than all--I don't know how to bring myself to tell\nyou--as to the age and health of the Squire, his dear father\"--(she\nbegan to sob almost hysterically; yet she would go on talking, in\nspite of Molly's efforts to stop her)--\"who held him in his arms, and\nblessed him, even before I had kissed him; and thought always so much\nof him as his heir and first-born darling. How he has loved him! How\nI have loved him! I sometimes have thought of late that we've almost\ndone that good Roger injustice.\"\n\n\"No! I'm sure you've not: only look at the way he loves you. Why, you\nare his first thought: he may not speak about it, but any one may see\nit. And dear, dear Mrs. Hamley,\" said Molly, determined to say out\nall that was in her mind now that she had once got the word, \"don't\nyou think that it would be better not to misjudge Mr. Osborne Hamley?\nWe don't know what he has done with the money: he is so good (is he\nnot?) that he may have wanted it to relieve some poor person--some\ntradesman, for instance, pressed by creditors--some--\"\n\n\"You forget, dear,\" said Mrs. Hamley, smiling a little at the girl's\nimpetuous romance, but sighing the next instant, \"that all the other\nbills come from tradesmen, who complain piteously of being kept out\nof their money.\"\n\nMolly was nonplussed for the moment; but then she said,--\n\n\"I daresay they imposed upon him. I'm sure I've heard stories of\nyoung men being made regular victims of by the shopkeepers in great\ntowns.\"\n\n\"You're a great darling, child,\" said Mrs. Hamley, comforted by\nMolly's strong partisanship, unreasonable and ignorant though it was.\n\n\"And, besides,\" continued Molly, \"some one must be acting wrongly in\nOsborne's--Mr. Osborne Hamley's, I mean--I can't help saying Osborne\nsometimes, but, indeed, I always think of him as Mr. Osborne--\"\n\n\"Never mind, Molly, what you call him; only go on talking. It\nseems to do me good to hear the hopeful side taken. The Squire has\nbeen so hurt and displeased: strange-looking men coming into the\nneighbourhood, too, questioning the tenants, and grumbling about the\nlast fall of timber, as if they were calculating on the Squire's\ndeath.\"\n\n\"That's just what I was going to speak about. Doesn't it show that\nthey are bad men? and would bad men scruple to impose upon him, and\nto tell lies in his name, and to ruin him?\"\n\n\"Don't you see, you only make him out weak, instead of wicked?\"\n\n\"Yes; perhaps I do. But I don't think he is weak. You know yourself,\ndear Mrs. Hamley, how very clever he really is. Besides, I would\nrather he was weak than wicked. Weak people may find themselves all\nat once strong in heaven, when they see things quite clearly; but I\ndon't think the wicked will turn themselves into virtuous people all\nat once.\"\n\n\"I think I've been very weak, Molly,\" said Mrs. Hamley, stroking\nMolly's curls affectionately. \"I've made such an idol of my beautiful\nOsborne; and he turns out to have feet of clay, not strong enough to\nstand firm on the ground. And that's the best view of his conduct,\ntoo!\"\n\nWhat with his anger against his son, and his anxiety about his wife;\nthe difficulty of raising the money immediately required, and his\nirritation at the scarce-concealed inquiries made by strangers as to\nthe value of his property, the poor Squire was in a sad state. He\nwas angry and impatient with every one who came near him; and then\nwas depressed at his own violent temper and unjust words. The old\nservants, who, perhaps, cheated him in many small things, were\nbeautifully patient under his upbraidings. They could understand\nbursts of passion, and knew the cause of his variable moods as well\nas he did himself. The butler, who was accustomed to argue with his\nmaster about every fresh direction as to his work, now nudged Molly\nat dinner-time to make her eat of some dish which she had just been\ndeclining, and explained his conduct afterwards as follows:--\n\n\"You see, miss, me and cook had planned a dinner as would tempt\nmaster to eat; but when you say, 'No, thank you,' when I hand you\nanything, master never so much as looks at it. But if you takes a\nthing, and eats with a relish, why first he waits, and then he looks,\nand by-and-by he smells; and then he finds out as he's hungry, and\nfalls to eating as natural as a kitten takes to mewing. That's the\nreason, miss, as I gave you a nudge and a wink, which no one knows\nbetter nor me was not manners.\"\n\nOsborne's name was never mentioned during these cheerless meals. The\nSquire asked Molly questions about Hollingford people, but did not\nseem much to attend to her answers. He used also to ask her every day\nhow she thought that his wife was; but if Molly told the truth--that\nevery day seemed to make her weaker and weaker--he was almost savage\nwith the girl. He could not bear it; and he would not. Nay, once he\nwas on the point of dismissing Mr. Gibson because he insisted on a\nconsultation with Dr. Nicholls, the great physician of the county.\n\n\"It's nonsense thinking her so ill as that--you know it's only the\ndelicacy she's had for years; and if you can't do her any good in\nsuch a simple case--no pain--only weakness and nervousness--it is a\nsimple case, eh?--don't look in that puzzled way, man!--you'd better\ngive her up altogether, and I'll take her to Bath or Brighton,\nor somewhere for change, for in my opinion it's only moping and\nnervousness.\"\n\nBut the Squire's bluff florid face was pinched with anxiety, and worn\nwith the effort of being deaf to the footsteps of fate as he said\nthese words which belied his fears.\n\nMr. Gibson replied very quietly,--\n\n\"I shall go on coming to see her, and I know you'll not forbid my\nvisits. But I shall bring Dr. Nicholls with me the next time I come.\nI may be mistaken in my treatment; and I wish to God he may say I am\nmistaken in my apprehensions.\"\n\n\"Don't tell me them! I cannot bear them!\" cried the Squire. \"Of\ncourse we must all die; and she must too. But the cleverest doctor\nin England shan't go about coolly meting out the life of such as her.\nI daresay I shall die first. I hope I shall. But I'll knock any one\ndown who speaks to me of death sitting within me. And, besides, I\nthink all doctors are ignorant quacks, pretending to knowledge they\nhaven't got. Ay, you may smile at me. I don't care. Unless you can\ntell me I shall die first, neither you nor your Dr. Nicholls shall\ncome prophesying and croaking about this house.\"\n\nMr. Gibson went away, heavy at heart from the thought of Mrs.\nHamley's approaching death, but thinking little enough of the\nSquire's speeches. He had almost forgotten them, in fact, when about\nnine o'clock that evening, a groom rode in from Hamley Hall in hot\nhaste, with a note from the Squire.\n\n\n   DEAR GIBSON,--\n\n   For God's sake forgive me if I was rude to-day. She is\n   much worse. Come and spend the night here. Write for\n   Nicholls, and all the physicians you want. Write before\n   you start off. They may give her ease. There were\n   Whitworth doctors much talked of in my youth for curing\n   people given up by the regular doctors; can't you get one\n   of them? I put myself in your hands. Sometimes I think it\n   is the turning point, and she'll rally after this bout. I\n   trust all to you.\n\n   Yours ever,\n\n   R. HAMLEY.\n\n   P.S.--Molly is a treasure.--God help me!\n\n\nOf course Mr. Gibson went; for the first time since his marriage\ncutting short Mrs. Gibson's querulous lamentations over her life,\nas involved in that of a doctor called out at all hours of day and\nnight.\n\nHe brought Mrs. Hamley through this attack; and for a day or two the\nSquire's alarm and gratitude made him docile in Mr. Gibson's hands.\nThen he returned to the idea of its being a crisis through which his\nwife had passed; and that she was now on the way to recovery. But\nthe day after the consultation with Dr. Nicholls, Mr. Gibson said to\nMolly,--\n\n\"Molly! I've written to Osborne and Roger. Do you know Osborne's\naddress?\"\n\n\"No, papa. He's in disgrace. I don't know if the Squire knows; and\nshe has been too ill to write.\"\n\n\"Never mind. I'll enclose it to Roger; whatever those lads may be to\nothers, there's as strong brotherly love as ever I saw, between the\ntwo. Roger will know. And, Molly, they are sure to come home as soon\nas they hear my report of their mother's state. I wish you'd tell the\nSquire what I've done. It's not a pleasant piece of work; and I'll\ntell madam myself in my own way. I'd have told him if he'd been at\nhome; but you say he was obliged to go to Ashcombe on business.\"\n\n\"Quite obliged. He was so sorry to miss you. But, papa, he will be so\nangry! You don't know how mad he is against Osborne.\"\n\nMolly dreaded the Squire's anger when she gave him her father's\nmessage. She had seen quite enough of the domestic relations of\nthe Hamley family to understand that, underneath his old-fashioned\ncourtesy, and the pleasant hospitality he showed to her as a guest,\nthere was a strong will, and a vehement passionate temper, along with\nthat degree of obstinacy in prejudices (or \"opinions,\" as he would\nhave called them) so common to those who have, neither in youth nor\nin manhood, mixed largely with their kind. She had listened, day\nafter day, to Mrs. Hamley's plaintive murmurs as to the deep disgrace\nin which Osborne was being held by his father--the prohibition of his\ncoming home; and she hardly knew how to begin to tell him that the\nletter summoning Osborne had already been sent off.\n\nTheir dinners were tête-à-tête. The Squire tried to make them\npleasant to Molly, feeling deeply grateful to her for the soothing\ncomfort she was to his wife. He made merry speeches, which sank\naway into silence, and at which they each forgot to smile. He\nordered up rare wines, which she did not care for, but tasted out of\ncomplaisance. He noticed that one day she had eaten some brown beurré\npears as if she liked them; and as his trees had not produced many\nthis year, he gave directions that this particular kind should be\nsought for through the neighbourhood. Molly felt that, in many ways,\nhe was full of good-will towards her; but it did not diminish her\ndread of touching on the one sore point in the family. However, it\nhad to be done, and that without delay.\n\nThe great log was placed on the after-dinner fire, the hearth swept\nup, the ponderous candles snuffed, and then the door was shut and\nMolly and the Squire were left to their dessert. She sat at the side\nof the table in her old place. That at the head was vacant; yet, as\nno orders had been given to the contrary, the plate and glasses and\nnapkin were always arranged as regularly and methodically as if Mrs.\nHamley would come in as usual. Indeed, sometimes, when the door\nby which she used to enter was opened by any chance, Molly caught\nherself looking round as if she expected to see the tall, languid\nfigure in the elegant draperies of rich silk and soft lace, which\nMrs. Hamley was wont to wear of an evening.\n\nThis evening, it struck her, as a new thought of pain, that into\nthat room she would come no more. She had fixed to give her father's\nmessage at this very point of time; but something in her throat\nchoked her, and she hardly knew how to govern her voice. The Squire\ngot up and went to the broad fireplace, to strike into the middle of\nthe great log, and split it up into blazing, sparkling pieces. His\nback was towards her. Molly began, \"When papa was here to-day, he\nbade me tell you he had written to Mr. Roger Hamley to say that--that\nhe thought he had better come home; and he enclosed a letter to Mr.\nOsborne Hamley to say the same thing.\"\n\nThe Squire put down the poker, but he still kept his back to Molly.\n\n\"He sent for Osborne and Roger?\" he asked, at length.\n\nMolly answered, \"Yes.\"\n\nThen there was a dead silence, which Molly thought would never end.\nThe Squire had placed his two hands on the high chimney-piece, and\nstood leaning over the fire.\n\n\"Roger would have been down from Cambridge on the 18th,\" said he.\n\"And he has sent for Osborne, too! Did he know,\"--he continued,\nturning round to Molly, with something of the fierceness she had\nanticipated in voice and look. In another moment he had dropped his\nvoice. \"It's right, quite right. I understand. It has come at length.\nCome! come! Osborne has brought it on, though,\" with a fresh access\nof anger in his tones. \"She might have\" (some word Molly could not\nhear--she thought it sounded like \"lingered\") \"but for that. I can't\nforgive him; I cannot.\"\n\nAnd then he suddenly left the room. While Molly sat there still, very\nsad in her sympathy with all, he put his head in again:--\n\n\"Go to her, my dear; I cannot--not just yet. But I will soon. Just\nthis bit; and after that I won't lose a moment. You're a good girl.\nGod bless you!\"\n\nIt is not to be supposed that Molly had remained all this time at the\nHall without interruption. Once or twice her father had brought her\na summons home. Molly thought she could perceive that he had brought\nit unwillingly; in fact, it was Mrs. Gibson that had sent for her,\nalmost, as it were, to preserve a \"right of way\" through her actions.\n\n\"You shall come back to-morrow, or the next day,\" her father had\nsaid. \"But mamma seems to think people will put a bad construction on\nyour being so much away from home so soon after our marriage.\"\n\n\"Oh, papa, I'm afraid Mrs. Hamley will miss me! I do so like being\nwith her.\"\n\n\"I don't think it is likely she will miss you as much as she would\nhave done a month or two ago. She sleeps so much now, that she is\nscarcely conscious of the lapse of time. I'll see that you come back\nhere again in a day or two.\"\n\nSo out of the silence and the soft melancholy of the Hall Molly\nreturned into the all-pervading element of chatter and gossip at\nHollingford. Mrs. Gibson received her kindly enough. Once she had a\nsmart new winter bonnet ready to give her as a present; but she did\nnot care to hear any particulars about the friends whom Molly had\njust left; and her few remarks on the state of affairs at the Hall\njarred terribly on the sensitive Molly.\n\n\"What a time she lingers! Your papa never expected she would last\nhalf so long after that attack. It must be very wearing work to them\nall; I declare you look quite another creature since you were there.\nOne can only wish it mayn't last, for their sakes.\"\n\n\"You don't know how the Squire values every minute,\" said Molly.\n\n\"Why, you say she sleeps a great deal, and doesn't talk much when\nshe's awake, and there's not the slightest hope for her. And yet, at\nsuch times, people are kept on the tenter-hooks with watching and\nwaiting. I know it by my dear Kirkpatrick. There really were days\nwhen I thought it never would end. But we won't talk any more of such\ndismal things; you've had quite enough of them, I'm sure, and it\nalways makes me melancholy to hear of illness and death; and yet your\npapa seems sometimes as if he could talk of nothing else. I'm going\nto take you out to-night, though, and that will give you something\nof a change; and I've been getting Miss Rose to trim up one of my\nold gowns for you; it's too tight for me. There's some talk of\ndancing,--it's at Mrs. Edwards'.\"\n\n\"Oh, mamma, I cannot go!\" cried Molly. \"I've been so much with her;\nand she may be suffering so, or even dying--and I to be dancing!\"\n\n\"Nonsense! You're no relation, so you need not feel it so much. I\nwouldn't urge you, if she was likely to know about it and be hurt;\nbut as it is, it's all fixed that you are to go; and don't let us\nhave any nonsense about it. We might sit twirling our thumbs, and\nrepeating hymns all our lives long, if we were to do nothing else\nwhen people were dying.\"\n\n\"I cannot go,\" repeated Molly. And, acting upon impulse, and almost\nto her own surprise, she appealed to her father, who came into the\nroom at this very time. He contracted his dark eyebrows, and looked\nannoyed as both wife and daughter poured their different sides of the\nargument into his ears. He sat down in desperation of patience. When\nhis turn came to pronounce a decision, he said,--\n\n\"I suppose I can have some lunch? I went away at six this morning,\nand there's nothing in the dining-room. I have to go off again\ndirectly.\"\n\nMolly started to the door; Mrs. Gibson made haste to ring the bell.\n\n\"Where are you going, Molly?\" said she, sharply.\n\n\"Only to see about papa's lunch.\"\n\n\"There are servants to do it; and I don't like your going into the\nkitchen.\"\n\n\"Come, Molly! sit down and be quiet,\" said her father. \"One comes\nhome wanting peace and quietness--and food too. If I am to be\nappealed to, which I beg I may not be another time, I settle that\nMolly stops at home this evening. I shall come back late and tired.\nSee that I have something ready to eat, goosey, and then I'll dress\nmyself up in my best, and go and fetch you home, my dear. I wish all\nthese wedding festivities were well over. Ready, is it? Then I'll go\ninto the dining-room and gorge myself. A doctor ought to be able to\neat like a camel, or like Major Dugald Dalgetty.\"\n\nIt was well for Molly that callers came in just at this time, for\nMrs. Gibson was extremely annoyed. They told her some little local\npiece of news, however, which filled up her mind; and Molly found\nthat, if she only expressed wonder enough at the engagement they had\nboth heard of from the departed callers, the previous discussion as\nto her accompanying her stepmother or not might be entirely passed\nover. Not entirely though; for the next morning she had to listen to\na very brilliantly touched-up account of the dance and the gaiety\nwhich she had missed; and also to be told that Mrs. Gibson had\nchanged her mind about giving her the gown, and thought now that\nshe should reserve it for Cynthia, if only it was long enough; but\nCynthia was so tall--quite overgrown, in fact. The chances seemed\nequally balanced as to whether Molly might not have the gown after\nall.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XVIII.\n\nMR. OSBORNE'S SECRET.\n\n\n[Illustration (untitled)]\n\nOsborne and Roger came to the Hall; Molly found Roger established\nthere when she returned after this absence at home. She gathered\nthat Osborne was coming; but very little was said about him in any\nway. The Squire scarcely ever left his wife's room; he sat by her,\nwatching her, and now and then moaning to himself. She was so much\nunder the influence of opiates that she did not often rouse up; but\nwhen she did, she almost invariably asked for Molly. On these rare\noccasions, she would ask after Osborne--where he was, if he had been\ntold, and if he was coming? In her weakened and confused state of\nintellect she seemed to have retained two strong impressions--one,\nof the sympathy with which Molly had received her confidence about\nOsborne; the other, of the anger which her husband entertained\nagainst him. Before the squire she never mentioned Osborne's name;\nnor did she seem at her ease in speaking about him to Roger; while,\nwhen she was alone with Molly, she hardly spoke of any one else.\nShe must have had some sort of wandering idea that Roger blamed his\nbrother, while she remembered Molly's eager defence, which she had\nthought hopelessly improbable at the time. At any rate, she made\nMolly her confidante about her first-born. She sent her to ask Roger\nhow soon he would come, for she seemed to know perfectly well that he\nwas coming.\n\n\"Tell me all Roger says. He will tell you.\"\n\nBut it was several days before Molly could ask Roger any questions;\nand meanwhile Mrs. Hamley's state had materially altered. At length\nMolly came upon Roger sitting in the library, his head buried in his\nhands. He did not hear her footstep till she was close beside him.\nThen he lifted up his face, red, and stained with tears, his hair all\nruffled up and in disorder.\n\n\"I've been wanting to see you alone,\" she began. \"Your mother does\nso want some news of your brother Osborne. She told me last week to\nask you about him, but I did not like to speak of him before your\nfather.\"\n\n\"She has hardly ever named him to me.\"\n\n\"I don't know why; for to me she used to talk of him perpetually. I\nhave seen so little of her this week, and I think she forgets a great\ndeal now. Still, if you don't mind, I should like to be able to tell\nher something if she asks me again.\"\n\nHe put his head again between his hands, and did not answer her for\nsome time.\n\n\"What does she want to know?\" said he, at last. \"Does she know that\nOsborne is coming soon--any day?\"\n\n\"Yes. But she wants to know where he is.\"\n\n\"I can't tell you. I don't exactly know. I believe he's abroad, but\nI'm not sure.\"\n\n\"But you've sent papa's letter to him?\"\n\n\"I've sent it to a friend of his who will know better than I do where\nhe's to be found. You must know that he isn't free from creditors,\nMolly. You can't have been one of the family, like a child of the\nhouse almost, without knowing that much. For that and for other\nreasons I don't exactly know where he is.\"\n\n\"I will tell her so. You are sure he will come?\"\n\n\"Quite sure. But, Molly, I think my mother may live some time yet;\ndon't you? Dr. Nicholls said so yesterday when he was here with\nyour father. He said she had rallied more than he had ever expected.\nYou're not afraid of any change that makes you so anxious for\nOsborne's coming?\"\n\n\"No. It's only for her that I asked. She did seem so to crave for\nnews of him. I think she dreamed of him; and then when she wakened\nit was a relief to her to talk about him to me. She always seemed to\nassociate me with him. We used to speak so much of him when we were\ntogether.\"\n\n\"I don't know what we should any of us have done without you. You've\nbeen like a daughter to my mother.\"\n\n\"I do so love her,\" said Molly, softly.\n\n\"Yes; I see. Have you ever noticed that she sometimes calls you\n'Fanny?' It was the name of a little sister of ours who died. I think\nshe often takes you for her. It was partly that, and partly that at\nsuch a time as this one can't stand on formalities, that made me call\nyou Molly. I hope you don't mind it?\"\n\n\"No; I like it. But will you tell me something more about your\nbrother? She really hungers for news of him.\"\n\n\"She'd better ask me herself. Yet, no! I am so involved by promises\nof secrecy, Molly, that I couldn't satisfy her if she once began to\nquestion me. I believe he's in Belgium, and that he went there about\na fortnight ago, partly to avoid his creditors. You know my father\nhas refused to pay his debts?\"\n\n\"Yes: at least, I knew something like it.\"\n\n\"I don't believe my father could raise the money all at once without\nhaving recourse to steps which he would exceedingly recoil from. Yet\nfor the time it places Osborne in a very awkward position.\"\n\n\"I think what vexes your father a good deal is some mystery as to how\nthe money was spent.\"\n\n\"If my mother ever says anything about that part of the affair,\" said\nRoger, hastily, \"assure her from me that there's nothing of vice or\nwrong-doing about it. I can't say more: I'm tied. But set her mind at\nease on that point.\"\n\n\"I'm not sure if she remembers all her painful anxiety about this,\"\nsaid Molly. \"She used to speak a great deal to me about him before\nyou came, when your father seemed so angry. And now, whenever she\nsees me she wants to talk on the old subject; but she doesn't\nremember so clearly. If she were to see him, I don't believe she\nwould recollect why she was uneasy about him while he was absent.\"\n\n\"He must be here soon. I expect him every day,\" said Roger, uneasily.\n\n\"Do you think your father will be very angry with him?\" asked Molly,\nwith as much timidity as if the squire's displeasure might be\ndirected against her.\n\n\"I don't know,\" said Roger. \"My mother's illness may alter him; but\nhe didn't easily forgive us formerly. I remember once--but that is\nnothing to the purpose. I can't help fancying that he has put himself\nunder some strong restraint for my mother's sake, and that he won't\nexpress much. But it doesn't follow that he will forget it. My father\nis a man of few affections, but what he has are very strong; he feels\nanything that touches him on these points deeply and permanently.\nThat unlucky valuing of the property! It has given my father the idea\nof post-obits--\"\n\n\"What are they?\" asked Molly.\n\n\"Raising money to be paid on my father's death, which, of course,\ninvolves calculations as to the duration of his life.\"\n\n\"How shocking!\" said she.\n\n\"I'm as sure as I am of my own life that Osborne never did anything\nof the kind. But my father expressed his suspicions in language\nthat irritated Osborne; and he doesn't speak out, and won't justify\nhimself even as much as he might; and, much as he loves me, I've but\nlittle influence over him, or else he would tell my father all. Well,\nwe must leave it to time,\" he added, sighing. \"My mother would have\nbrought us all right, if she'd been what she once was.\"\n\nHe turned away, leaving Molly very sad. She knew that every member of\nthe family she cared for so much was in trouble, out of which she saw\nno exit; and her small power of helping them was diminishing day by\nday as Mrs. Hamley sank more and more under the influence of opiates\nand stupefying illness. Her father had spoken to her only this very\nday of the desirableness of her returning home for good. Mrs. Gibson\nwanted her--for no particular reason, but for many small fragments of\nreasons. Mrs. Hamley had ceased to want her much, only occasionally\nappearing to remember her existence. Her position (her father\nthought--the idea had not entered her head) in a family of which\nthe only woman was an invalid confined to bed, was becoming awkward.\nBut Molly had begged hard to remain two or three days longer--only\nthat--only till Friday. If Mrs. Hamley should want her (she argued,\nwith tears in her eyes), and should hear that she had left the house,\nshe would think her so unkind, so ungrateful!\n\n\"My dear child, she's getting past wanting any one! The keenness of\nearthly feelings is deadened.\"\n\n\"Papa, that is worst of all. I cannot bear it. I won't believe it.\nShe may not ask for me again, and may quite forget me; but I'm sure,\nto the very last, if the medicines don't stupefy her, she will look\nround for the squire and her children. For poor Osborne most of all;\nbecause he's in sorrow.\"\n\nMr. Gibson shook his head, but said nothing in reply. In a minute or\ntwo he asked,--\n\n\"I don't like to take you away while you even fancy you can be of use\nor comfort to one who has been so kind to you; but, if she hasn't\nwanted you before Friday, will you be convinced, will you come home\nwillingly?\"\n\n\"If I go then, I may see her once again, even if she hasn't asked for\nme?\" inquired Molly.\n\n\"Yes, of course. You must make no noise, no step; but you may go in\nand see her. I must tell you, I'm almost certain she won't ask for\nyou.\"\n\n\"But she may, papa. I will go home on Friday, if she does not. I\nthink she will.\"\n\nSo Molly hung about the house, trying to do all she could out of the\nsick-room, for the comfort of those in it. They only came out for\nmeals, or for necessary business, and found little time for talking\nto her, so her life was solitary enough, waiting for the call that\nnever came. The evening of the day on which she had had the above\nconversation with Roger, Osborne arrived. He came straight into\nthe drawing-room, where Molly was seated on the rug, reading by\nfirelight, as she did not like to ring for candles merely for her\nown use. Osborne came in, with a kind of hurry, which almost made\nhim appear as if he would trip himself up, and fall down. Molly rose.\nHe had not noticed her before; now he came forwards, and took hold\nof both her hands, leading her into the full flickering light, and\nstraining his eyes to look into her face.\n\n\"How is she? You will tell me--you must know the truth! I've\ntravelled day and night since I got your father's letter.\"\n\nBefore she could frame her answer, he had sate down in the nearest\nchair, covering his eyes with his hand.\n\n\"She's very ill,\" said Molly. \"That you know; but I don't think she\nsuffers much pain. She has wanted you sadly.\"\n\nHe groaned aloud. \"My father forbade me to come.\"\n\n\"I know!\" said Molly, anxious to prevent his self-reproach. \"Your\nbrother was away, too. I think no one knew how ill she was--she had\nbeen an invalid for so long.\"\n\n\"You know-- Yes! she told you a great deal--she was very fond of you.\nAnd God knows how I loved her. If I had not been forbidden to come\nhome, I should have told her all. Does my father know of my coming\nnow?\"\n\n\"Yes,\" said Molly; \"I told him papa had sent for you.\"\n\nJust at that moment the Squire came in. He had not heard of Osborne's\narrival, and was seeking Molly to ask her to write a letter for him.\n\nOsborne did not stand up when his father entered. He was too much\nexhausted, too much oppressed by his feelings, and also too much\nestranged by his father's angry, suspicious letters. If he had come\nforward with any manifestation of feeling at this moment, everything\nmight have been different. But he waited for his father to see him\nbefore he uttered a word. All that the Squire said when his eye fell\nupon him at last was,--\n\n\"You here, sir!\"\n\nAnd, breaking off in the directions he was giving to Molly, he\nabruptly left the room. All the time his heart was yearning after his\nfirst-born; but mutual pride kept them asunder. Yet he went straight\nto the butler, and asked of him when Mr. Osborne had arrived, and how\nhe had come, and if he had had any refreshment--dinner or what--since\nhis arrival?\n\n\"For I think I forget everything now!\" said the poor Squire, putting\nhis hand up to his head. \"For the life of me, I can't remember\nwhether we've had dinner or not; these long nights, and all this\nsorrow and watching, quite bewilder me.\"\n\n\"Perhaps, sir, you will take some dinner with Mr. Osborne. Mrs.\nMorgan is sending up his directly. You hardly sate down at\ndinner-time, sir, you thought my mistress wanted something.\"\n\n\"Ay! I remember now. No! I won't have any more. Give Mr. Osborne what\nwine he chooses. Perhaps _he_ can eat and drink.\" So the Squire went\naway upstairs with bitterness as well as sorrow in his heart.\n\nWhen lights were brought, Molly was struck with the change in\nOsborne. He looked haggard and worn; perhaps with travelling and\nanxiety. Not quite such a dainty gentleman either, as Molly had\nthought him, when she had last seen him calling on her stepmother,\ntwo months before. But she liked him better now. The tone of his\nremarks pleased her more. He was simpler, and less ashamed of showing\nhis feelings. He asked after Roger in a warm, longing kind of way.\nRoger was out: he had ridden to Ashcombe to transact some business\nfor the Squire. Osborne evidently wished for his return; and hung\nabout restlessly in the drawing-room after he had dined.\n\n\"You're sure I mayn't see her to-night?\" he asked Molly, for the\nthird or fourth time.\n\n\"No, indeed. I will go up again if you like it. But Mrs. Jones, the\nnurse Dr. Nicholls sent, is a very decided person. I went up while\nyou were at dinner, and Mrs. Hamley had just taken her drops, and was\non no account to be disturbed by seeing any one, much less by any\nexcitement.\"\n\nOsborne kept walking up and down the long drawing-room, half talking\nto himself, half to Molly.\n\n\"I wish Roger would come. He seems to be the only one to give me a\nwelcome. Does my father always live upstairs in my mother's rooms,\nMiss Gibson?\"\n\n\"He has done since her last attack. I believe he reproaches himself\nfor not having been enough alarmed before.\"\n\n\"You heard all the words he said to me; they were not much of a\nwelcome, were they? And my dear mother, who always--whether I was to\nblame or not--I suppose Roger is sure to come home to-night?\"\n\n\"Quite sure.\"\n\n\"You are staying here, are you not? Do you often see my mother, or\ndoes this omnipotent nurse keep you out too?\"\n\n\"Mrs. Hamley hasn't asked for me for three days now, and I don't go\ninto her room unless she asks. I'm leaving on Friday, I believe.\"\n\n\"My mother was very fond of you, I know.\"\n\nAfter a while he said, in a voice that had a great deal of sensitive\npain in its tone,--\n\n\"I suppose--do you know whether she is quite conscious--quite\nherself?\"\n\n\"Not always conscious,\" said Molly, tenderly. \"She has to take so\nmany opiates. But she never wanders, only forgets, and sleeps.\"\n\n\"Oh, mother, mother!\" said he, stopping suddenly, and hanging over\nthe fire, his hands on the chimney-piece.\n\nWhen Roger came home, Molly thought it time to retire. Poor girl!\nit was getting to be time for her to leave this scene of distress\nin which she could be of no use. She sobbed herself to sleep this\nTuesday night. Two days more, and it would be Friday; and she would\nhave to wrench up the roots she had shot down into this ground. The\nweather was bright the next morning; and morning and sunny weather\ncheer up young hearts. Molly sate in the dining-room making tea for\nthe gentlemen as they came down. She could not help hoping that the\nSquire and Osborne might come to a better understanding before she\nleft; for after all, in the dissension between father and son, lay a\nbitterer sting than in the illness sent by God. But though they met\nat the breakfast-table, they purposely avoided addressing each other.\nPerhaps the natural subject of conversation between the two, at such\na time, would have been Osborne's long journey the night before; but\nhe had never spoken of the place he had come from, whether north,\nsouth, east, or west, and the Squire did not choose to allude to\nanything that might bring out what his son wished to conceal. Again,\nthere was an unexpressed idea in both their minds that Mrs. Hamley's\npresent illness was much aggravated, if not entirely brought on, by\nthe discovery of Osborne's debts; so, many inquiries and answers on\nthat head were tabooed. In fact, their attempts at easy conversation\nwere limited to local subjects, and principally addressed to Molly\nor Roger. Such intercourse was not productive of pleasure, or even\nof friendly feeling, though there was a thin outward surface of\npoliteness and peace. Long before the day was over, Molly wished that\nshe had acceded to her father's proposal, and gone home with him.\nNo one seemed to want her. Mrs. Jones, the nurse, assured her time\nafter time that Mrs. Hamley had never named her name; and her small\nservices in the sick-room were not required since there was a regular\nnurse. Osborne and Roger seemed all in all to each other; and Molly\nnow felt how much the short conversations she had had with Roger had\nserved to give her something to think about, all during the remainder\nof her solitary days. Osborne was extremely polite, and even\nexpressed his gratitude to her for her attentions to his mother in\na very pleasant manner; but he appeared to be unwilling to show\nher any of the deeper feelings of his heart, and almost ashamed of\nhis exhibition of emotion the night before. He spoke to her as any\nagreeable young man speaks to any pleasant young lady; but Molly\nalmost resented this. It was only the Squire who seemed to make her\nof any account. He gave her letters to write, small bills to reckon\nup; and she could have kissed his hands for thankfulness.\n\nThe last afternoon of her stay at the Hall came. Roger had gone out\non the Squire's business. Molly went into the garden, thinking over\nthe last summer, when Mrs. Hamley's sofa used to be placed under\nthe old cedar-tree on the lawn, and when the warm air seemed to be\nscented with roses and sweetbriar. Now, the trees leafless, there was\nno sweet odour in the keen frosty air; and looking up at the house,\nthere were the white sheets of blinds, shutting out the pale winter\nsky from the invalid's room. Then she thought of the day her father\nhad brought her the news of his second marriage: the thicket was\ntangled with dead weeds and rime and hoar-frost; and the beautiful\nfine articulations of branches and boughs and delicate twigs were\nall intertwined in leafless distinctness against the sky. Could she\never be so passionately unhappy again? Was it goodness, or was it\nnumbness, that made her feel as though life was too short to be\ntroubled much about anything? Death seemed the only reality. She had\nneither energy nor heart to walk far or briskly; and turned back\ntowards the house. The afternoon sun was shining brightly on the\nwindows; and, stirred up to unusual activity by some unknown cause,\nthe housemaids had opened the shutters and windows of the generally\nunused library. The middle window was also a door; the white-painted\nwood went halfway up. Molly turned along the little flag-paved path\nthat led past the library windows to the gate in the white railings\nat the front of the house, and went in at the opened door. She had\nhad leave given to choose out any books she wished to read, and to\ntake them home with her; and it was just the sort of half-dawdling\nemployment suited to her taste this afternoon. She mounted on the\nladder to get to a particular shelf high up in a dark corner of the\nroom; and finding there some volume that looked interesting, she sat\ndown on the step to read part of it. There she sat, in her bonnet and\ncloak, when Osborne suddenly came in. He did not see her at first;\nindeed, he seemed in such a hurry that he probably might not have\nnoticed her at all, if she had not spoken.\n\n\"Am I in your way? I only came here for a minute to look for some\nbooks.\" She came down the steps as she spoke, still holding the book\nin her hand.\n\n\"Not at all. It is I who am disturbing you. I must just write a\nletter for the post, and then I shall be gone. Is not this open door\ntoo cold for you?\"\n\n\"Oh, no. It is so fresh and pleasant.\"\n\nShe began to read again, sitting on the lowest step of the ladder;\nhe to write at the large old-fashioned writing-table close to the\nwindow. There was a minute or two of profound silence, in which the\nrapid scratching of Osborne's pen upon the paper was the only sound.\nThen came a click of the gate, and Roger stood at the open door. His\nface was towards Osborne, sitting in the light; his back to Molly,\ncrouched up in her corner. He held out a letter, and said in hoarse\nbreathlessness--\n\n\"Here's a letter from your wife, Osborne. I went past the post-office\nand thought--\"\n\nOsborne stood up, angry dismay upon his face:--\n\n\"Roger! what have you done! Don't you see her?\"\n\nRoger looked round, and Molly stood up in her corner, red, trembling,\nmiserable, as though she were a guilty person. Roger entered the\nroom. All three seemed to be equally dismayed. Molly was the first to\nspeak; she came forward and said--\n\n\"I am so sorry! I didn't wish to hear it, but I couldn't help it. You\nwill trust me, won't you?\" and turning to Roger she said to him with\ntears in her eyes--\"Please say you know I shall not tell.\"\n\n\"We can't help it,\" said Osborne, gloomily. \"Only Roger, who knew\nof what importance it was, ought to have looked round him before\nspeaking.\"\n\n\"So I should,\" said Roger. \"I'm more vexed with myself than you can\nconceive. Not but what I'm as sure of you as of myself,\" continued\nhe, turning to Molly.\n\n\"Yes; but,\" said Osborne, \"you see how many chances there are\nthat even the best-meaning persons may let out what it is of such\nconsequence to me to keep secret.\"\n\n\"I know you think it so,\" said Roger.\n\n\"Well, don't let us begin that old discussion again--at any rate,\nbefore a third person.\"\n\nMolly had had hard work all this time to keep from crying. Now that\nshe was alluded to as the third person before whom conversation was\nto be restrained, she said--\n\n\"I'm going away. Perhaps I ought not to have been here. I'm very\nsorry--very. But I'll try and forget what I've heard.\"\n\n\"You can't do that,\" said Osborne, still ungraciously. \"But will you\npromise me never to speak about it to any one--not even to me, or to\nRoger? Will you try to act and speak as if you had never heard it?\nI'm sure, from what Roger has told me about you, that if you give me\nthis promise I may rely upon it.\"\n\n\"Yes; I will promise,\" said Molly, putting out her hand as a kind of\npledge. Osborne took it, but rather as if the action was superfluous.\nShe added, \"I think I should have done so, even without a promise.\nBut it is, perhaps, better to bind oneself. I will go away now. I\nwish I'd never come into this room.\"\n\nShe put down her book on the table very softly, and turned to leave\nthe room, choking down her tears until she was in the solitude of her\nown chamber. But Roger was at the door before her, holding it open\nfor her, and reading--she felt that he was reading--her face. He held\nout his hand for hers, and his firm grasp expressed both sympathy and\nregret for what had occurred.\n\nShe could hardly keep back her sobs till she reached her bedroom. Her\nfeelings had been overwrought for some time past, without finding the\nnatural vent in action. The leaving Hamley Hall had seemed so sad\nbefore; and now she was troubled with having to bear away a secret\nwhich she ought never to have known, and the knowledge of which had\nbrought out a very uncomfortable responsibility. Then there would\narise a very natural wonder as to who Osborne's wife was. Molly had\nnot stayed so long and so intimately in the Hamley family without\nbeing well aware of the manner in which the future lady of Hamley was\nplanned for. The Squire, for instance, partly in order to show that\nOsborne, his heir, was above the reach of Molly Gibson, the doctor's\ndaughter, in the early days before he knew Molly well, had often\nalluded to the grand, the high, and the wealthy marriage which Hamley\nof Hamley, as represented by his clever, brilliant, handsome son\nOsborne, might be expected to make. Mrs. Hamley, too, unconsciously\non her part, showed the projects that she was constantly devising for\nthe reception of the unknown daughter-in-law that was to be.\n\n\"The drawing-room must be refurnished when Osborne marries\"--or\n\"Osborne's wife will like to have the west suite of rooms to herself;\nit will perhaps be a trial to her to live with the old couple; but we\nmust arrange it so that she will feel it as little as possible.\"--\"Of\ncourse, when Mrs. Osborne comes we must try and give her a new\ncarriage; the old one does well enough for us.\"--These, and similar\nspeeches had given Molly the impression of the future Mrs. Osborne as\nof some beautiful grand young lady, whose very presence would make\nthe old Hall into a stately, formal mansion, instead of the pleasant,\nunceremonious home that it was at present. Osborne, too, who had\nspoken with such languid criticism to Mrs. Gibson about various\ncountry belles, and even in his own home was apt to give himself\nairs--only at home his airs were poetically fastidious, while with\nMrs. Gibson they had been socially fastidious--what unspeakably\nelegant beauty had he chosen for his wife? Who had satisfied him; and\nyet satisfying him, had to have her marriage kept in concealment from\nhis parents? At length Molly tore herself up from her wonderings. It\nwas of no use: she could not find out; she might not even try. The\nblank wall of her promise blocked up the way. Perhaps it was not even\nright to wonder, and endeavour to remember slight speeches, casual\nmentions of a name, so as to piece them together into something\ncoherent. Molly dreaded seeing either of the brothers again; but they\nall met at dinner-time as if nothing had happened. The Squire was\ntaciturn, either from melancholy or displeasure. He had never spoken\nto Osborne since his return, excepting about the commonest trifles,\nwhen intercourse could not be avoided; and his wife's state oppressed\nhim like a heavy cloud coming over the light of his day. Osborne put\non an indifferent manner to his father, which Molly felt sure was\nassumed; but it was not conciliatory for all that. Roger, quiet,\nsteady, and natural, talked more than all the others; but he too\nwas uneasy, and in distress on many accounts. To-day he principally\naddressed himself to Molly; entering into rather long narrations of\nlate discoveries in natural history, which kept up the current of\ntalk without requiring much reply from any one. Molly had expected\nOsborne to look something different from usual--conscious, or\nashamed, or resentful, or even \"married\"--but he was exactly the\nOsborne of the morning--handsome, elegant, languid in manner and in\nlook; cordial with his brother, polite towards her, secretly uneasy\nat the state of things between his father and himself. She would\nnever have guessed the concealed romance which lay _perdu_ under\nthat every-day behaviour. She had always wished to come into direct\ncontact with a love-story: here she had, and she only found it very\nuncomfortable; there was a sense of concealment and uncertainty about\nit all; and her honest straightforward father, her quiet life at\nHollingford, which, even with all its drawbacks, was above-board,\nand where everybody knew what everybody was doing, seemed secure and\npleasant in comparison. Of course she felt great pain at quitting\nthe Hall, and at the mute farewell she had taken of her sleeping\nand unconscious friend. But leaving Mrs. Hamley now was a different\nthing to what it had been a fortnight ago. Then she was wanted at any\nmoment, and felt herself to be of comfort. Now her very existence\nseemed forgotten by the poor lady whose body appeared to be living so\nlong after her soul.\n\nShe was sent home in the carriage, loaded with true thanks from every\none of the family. Osborne ransacked the greenhouses for flowers for\nher; Roger had chosen her out books of every kind. The Squire himself\nkept shaking her hand, without being able to speak his gratitude,\ntill at last he took her in his arms, and kissed her as he would have\ndone a daughter.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XIX.\n\nCYNTHIA'S ARRIVAL.\n\n\nMolly's father was not at home when she returned; and there was no\none to give her a welcome. Mrs. Gibson was out paying calls, the\nservants told Molly. She went upstairs to her own room, meaning to\nunpack and arrange her borrowed books. Rather to her surprise she saw\nthe chamber, corresponding to her own, being dusted; water and towels\ntoo were being carried in.\n\n\"Is any one coming?\" she asked of the housemaid.\n\n\"Missus's daughter from France. Miss Kirkpatrick is coming\nto-morrow.\"\n\nWas Cynthia coming at last? Oh, what a pleasure it would be to have a\ncompanion, a girl, a sister of her own age! Molly's depressed spirits\nsprang up again with bright elasticity. She longed for Mrs. Gibson's\nreturn, to ask her all about it: it must be very sudden, for Mr.\nGibson had said nothing of it at the Hall the day before. No quiet\nreading now; the books were hardly put away with Molly's usual\nneatness. She went down into the drawing-room, and could not settle\nto anything. At last Mrs. Gibson came home, tired out with her walk\nand her heavy velvet cloak. Until that was taken off, and she had\nrested herself for a few minutes, she seemed quite unable to attend\nto Molly's questions.\n\n\"Oh, yes! Cynthia is coming home to-morrow, by the 'Umpire,' which\npasses through at ten o'clock. What an oppressive day it is for the\ntime of the year! I really am almost ready to faint. Cynthia heard of\nsome opportunity, I believe, and was only too glad to leave school a\nfortnight earlier than we planned. She never gave me the chance of\nwriting to say I did, or did not, like her coming so much before the\ntime; and I shall have to pay for her just the same as if she had\nstopped. And I meant to have asked her to bring me a French bonnet;\nand then you could have had one made after mine. But I'm very glad\nshe's coming, poor dear.\"\n\n\"Is anything the matter with her?\" asked Molly.\n\n\"Oh, no! Why should there be?\"\n\n\"You called her 'poor dear,' and it made me afraid lest she might be\nill.\"\n\n\"Oh, no! It's only a way I got into, when Mr. Kirkpatrick died. A\nfatherless girl--you know one always does call them 'poor dears.' Oh,\nno! Cynthia never is ill. She's as strong as a horse. She never would\nhave felt to-day as I have done. Could you get me a glass of wine and\na biscuit, my dear? I'm really quite faint.\"\n\nMr. Gibson was much more excited about Cynthia's arrival than her\nown mother was. He anticipated her coming as a great pleasure to\nMolly, on whom, in spite of his recent marriage and his new wife, his\ninterests principally centred. He even found time to run upstairs and\nsee the bedrooms of the two girls; for the furniture of which he had\npaid a pretty round sum.\n\n\"Well, I suppose young ladies like their bedrooms decked out in this\nway! It's very pretty certainly, but--\"\n\n\"I liked my own old room better, papa; but perhaps Cynthia is\naccustomed to such decking up.\"\n\n\"Perhaps; at any rate, she'll see we've tried to make it pretty.\nYours is like hers. That's right. It might have hurt her, if hers had\nbeen smarter than yours. Now, good-night in your fine flimsy bed.\"\n\nMolly was up betimes--almost before it was light--arranging her\npretty Hamley flowers in Cynthia's room. She could hardly eat her\nbreakfast that morning. She ran upstairs and put on her things,\nthinking that Mrs. Gibson was quite sure to go down to the \"George\nInn,\" where the \"Umpire\" stopped, to meet her daughter after a two\nyears' absence. But, to her surprise, Mrs. Gibson had arranged\nherself at her great worsted-work frame, just as usual; and she, in\nher turn, was astonished at Molly's bonnet and cloak.\n\n\"Where are you going so early, child? The fog hasn't cleared away\nyet.\"\n\n\"I thought you would go and meet Cynthia; and I wanted to go with\nyou.\"\n\n\"She will be here in half an hour; and dear papa has told the\ngardener to take the wheelbarrow down for her luggage. I'm not sure\nif he is not gone himself.\"\n\n\"Then are not you going?\" asked Molly, with a good deal of\ndisappointment.\n\n\"No, certainly not. She will be here almost directly. And, besides,\nI don't like to expose my feelings to every passer-by in High Street.\nYou forget I have not seen her for two years, and I hate scenes in\nthe market-place.\"\n\nShe settled herself to her work again; and Molly, after some\nconsideration, gave up her own going, and employed herself in looking\nout of the downstairs window which commanded the approach from the\ntown.\n\n\"Here she is--here she is!\" she cried out at last. Her father was\nwalking by the side of a tall young lady; William the gardener\nwas wheeling along a great cargo of baggage. Molly flew to the\nfront-door, and had it wide open to admit the new-comer some time\nbefore she arrived.\n\n\"Well! here she is. Molly, this is Cynthia. Cynthia, Molly. You're to\nbe sisters, you know.\"\n\nMolly saw the beautiful, tall, swaying figure, against the light of\nthe open door, but could not see any of the features that were, for\nthe moment, in shadow. A sudden gush of shyness had come over her\njust at the instant, and quenched the embrace she would have given a\nmoment before. But Cynthia took her in her arms, and kissed her on\nboth cheeks.\n\n\"Here's mamma,\" she said, looking beyond Molly on to the stairs where\nMrs. Gibson stood, wrapped up in a shawl, and shivering in the cold.\nShe ran past Molly and Mr. Gibson, who rather averted their eyes from\nthis first greeting between mother and child.\n\nMrs. Gibson said--\n\n\"Why, how you are grown, darling! You look quite a woman.\"\n\n\"And so I am,\" said Cynthia. \"I was before I went away; I've hardly\ngrown since,--except, it is always to be hoped, in wisdom.\"\n\n\"Yes! That we will hope,\" said Mrs. Gibson, in rather a meaning\nway. Indeed there were evidently hidden allusions in their seeming\ncommonplace speeches. When they all came into the full light and\nrepose of the drawing-room, Molly was absorbed in the contemplation\nof Cynthia's beauty. Perhaps her features were not regular; but the\nchanges in her expressive countenance gave one no time to think of\nthat. Her smile was perfect; her pouting charming; the play of the\nface was in the mouth. Her eyes were beautifully shaped, but their\nexpression hardly seemed to vary. In colouring she was not unlike\nher mother; only she had not so much of the red-haired tints in her\ncomplexion; and her long-shaped, serious grey eyes were fringed with\ndark lashes, instead of her mother's insipid flaxen ones. Molly fell\nin love with her, so to speak, on the instant. She sate there warming\nher feet and hands, as much at her ease as if she had been there all\nher life; not particularly attending to her mother--who, all the\ntime, was studying either her or her dress--measuring Molly and Mr.\nGibson with grave observant looks, as if guessing how she should like\nthem.\n\n\"There's hot breakfast ready for you in the dining-room, when you are\nready for it,\" said Mr. Gibson. \"I'm sure you must want it after your\nnight journey.\" He looked round at his wife, at Cynthia's mother, but\nshe did not seem inclined to leave the warm room again.\n\n\"Molly will take you to your room, darling,\" said she; \"it is near\nhers, and she has got her things to take off. I'll come down and sit\nin the dining-room while you are having your breakfast, but I really\nam afraid of the cold now.\"\n\nCynthia rose and followed Molly upstairs.\n\n\"I'm so sorry there isn't a fire for you,\" said Molly, \"but--I\nsuppose it wasn't ordered; and, of course, I don't give any orders.\nHere is some hot water, though.\"\n\n\"Stop a minute,\" said Cynthia, getting hold of both Molly's hands,\nand looking steadily into her face, but in such a manner that she did\nnot dislike the inspection.\n\n\"I think I shall like you. I am so glad! I was afraid I should not.\nWe're all in a very awkward position together, aren't we? I like your\nfather's looks, though.\"\n\n\n[Illustration: FIRST IMPRESSIONS.]\n\n\nMolly could not help smiling at the way this was said. Cynthia\nreplied to her smile.\n\n\"Ah, you may laugh. But I don't know that I am easy to get on with;\nmamma and I didn't suit when we were last together. But perhaps we\nare each of us wiser now. Now, please leave me for a quarter of an\nhour. I don't want anything more.\"\n\nMolly went into her own room, waiting to show Cynthia down to the\ndining-room. Not that, in the moderate-sized house, there was any\ndifficulty in finding the way. A very little trouble in conjecturing\nwould enable a stranger to discover any room. But Cynthia had\nso captivated Molly, that she wanted to devote herself to the\nnew-comer's service. Ever since she had heard of the probability\nof her having a sister--(she called her a sister, but whether it was\na Scotch sister, or a sister _à la mode de Brétagne_, would have\npuzzled most people)--Molly had allowed her fancy to dwell much on\nthe idea of Cynthia's coming; and in the short time since they had\nmet, Cynthia's unconscious power of fascination had been exercised\nupon her. Some people have this power. Of course, its effects are\nonly manifested in the susceptible. A school-girl may be found in\nevery school who attracts and influences all the others, not by her\nvirtues, nor her beauty, nor her sweetness, nor her cleverness, but\nby something that can neither be described nor reasoned upon. It is\nthe something alluded to in the old lines:--\n\n   Love me not for comely grace,\n   For my pleasing eye and face;\n   No, nor for my constant heart,--\n   For these may change, and turn to ill,\n   And thus true love may sever.\n   But love me on, and know not why,\n   So hast thou the same reason still\n   To dote upon me ever.\n\nA woman will have this charm, not only over men but over her own\nsex; it cannot be defined, or rather it is so delicate a mixture\nof many gifts and qualities that it is impossible to decide on the\nproportions of each. Perhaps it is incompatible with very high\nprinciple; as its essence seems to consist in the most exquisite\npower of adaptation to varying people and still more various moods;\n\"being all things to all men.\" At any rate, Molly might soon have\nbeen aware that Cynthia was not remarkable for unflinching morality;\nbut the glamour thrown over her would have prevented Molly from any\nattempt at penetrating into and judging her companion's character,\neven had such processes been the least in accordance with her own\ndisposition.\n\nCynthia was very beautiful, and was so well aware of this fact that\nshe had forgotten to care about it; no one with such loveliness ever\nappeared so little conscious of it. Molly would watch her perpetually\nas she moved about the room, with the free stately step of some wild\nanimal of the forest--moving almost, as it were, to the continual\nsound of music. Her dress, too, though now to our ideas it would\nbe considered ugly and disfiguring, was suited to her complexion\nand figure, and the fashion of it subdued within due bounds by her\nexquisite taste. It was inexpensive enough, and the changes in it\nwere but few. Mrs. Gibson professed herself shocked to find that\nCynthia had but four gowns, when she might have stocked herself so\nwell, and brought over so many useful French patterns, if she had but\npatiently waited for her mother's answer to the letter which she had\nsent, announcing her return by the opportunity madame had found for\nher. Molly was hurt for Cynthia at all these speeches; she thought\nthey implied that the pleasure which her mother felt in seeing her a\nfortnight sooner after her two years' absence was inferior to that\nwhich she would have received from a bundle of silver-paper patterns.\nBut Cynthia took no apparent notice of the frequent recurrence of\nthese small complaints. Indeed, she received much of what her mother\nsaid with a kind of complete indifference, that made Mrs. Gibson hold\nher rather in awe; and she was much more communicative to Molly than\nto her own child. With regard to dress, however, Cynthia soon showed\nthat she was her mother's own daughter in the manner in which she\ncould use her deft and nimble fingers. She was a capital workwoman;\nand, unlike Molly, who excelled in plain sewing, but had no notion of\ndressmaking or millinery, she could repeat the fashions she had only\nseen in passing along the streets of Boulogne, with one or two pretty\nrapid movements of her hands, as she turned and twisted the ribbons\nand gauze her mother furnished her with. So she refurbished Mrs.\nGibson's wardrobe; doing it all in a sort of contemptuous manner, the\nsource of which Molly could not quite make out.\n\nDay after day the course of these small frivolities was broken in\nupon by the news Mr. Gibson brought of Mrs. Hamley's nearer approach\nto death. Molly--very often sitting by Cynthia, and surrounded by\nribbon, and wire, and net--heard the bulletins like the toll of a\nfuneral bell at a marriage feast. Her father sympathized with her. It\nwas the loss of a dear friend to him too; but he was so accustomed to\ndeath, that it seemed to him but as it was, the natural end of all\nthings human. To Molly, the death of some one she had known so well\nand loved so much, was a sad and gloomy phenomenon. She loathed the\nsmall vanities with which she was surrounded, and would wander out\ninto the frosty garden, and pace the walk, which was both sheltered\nand concealed by evergreens.\n\nAt length--and yet it was not so long, not a fortnight since Molly\nhad left the Hall--the end came. Mrs. Hamley had sunk out of life as\ngradually as she had sunk out of consciousness and her place in this\nworld. The quiet waves closed over her, and her place knew her no\nmore.\n\n\"They all sent their love to you, Molly,\" said her father. \"Roger\nsaid he knew how you would feel it.\"\n\nMr. Gibson had come in very late, and was having a solitary dinner\nin the dining-room. Molly was sitting near him to keep him company.\nCynthia and her mother were upstairs. The latter was trying on a\nhead-dress which Cynthia had made for her.\n\nMolly remained downstairs after her father had gone out afresh on\nhis final round among his town patients. The fire was growing very\nlow, and the lights were waning. Cynthia came softly in, and taking\nMolly's listless hand, that hung down by her side, sat at her feet\non the rug, chafing her chilly fingers without speaking. The tender\naction thawed the tears that had been gathering heavily at Molly's\nheart, and they came dropping down her cheeks.\n\n\"You loved her dearly, did you not, Molly?\"\n\n\"Yes,\" sobbed Molly; and then there was a silence.\n\n\"Had you known her long?\"\n\n\"No, not a year. But I had seen a great deal of her. I was almost\nlike a daughter to her; she said so. Yet I never bid her good-by, or\nanything. Her mind became weak and confused.\"\n\n\"She had only sons, I think?\"\n\n\"No; only Mr. Osborne and Mr. Roger Hamley. She had a daughter\nonce--'Fanny.' Sometimes, in her illness, she used to call me\n'Fanny.'\"\n\nThe two girls were silent for some time, both gazing into the fire.\nCynthia spoke first:--\n\n\"I wish I could love people as you do, Molly!\"\n\n\"Don't you?\" said the other, in surprise.\n\n\"No. A good number of people love me, I believe, or at least they\nthink they do; but I never seem to care much for any one. I do\nbelieve I love you, little Molly, whom I have only known for ten\ndays, better than any one.\"\n\n\"Not than your mother?\" said Molly, in grave astonishment.\n\n\"Yes, than my mother!\" replied Cynthia, half-smiling. \"It's very\nshocking, I daresay; but it is so. Now, don't go and condemn me. I\ndon't think love for one's mother quite comes by nature; and remember\nhow much I have been separated from mine! I loved my father, if you\nwill,\" she continued, with the force of truth in her tone, and then\nshe stopped; \"but he died when I was quite a little thing, and no one\nbelieves that I remember him. I heard mamma say to a caller, not a\nfortnight after his funeral, 'Oh, no, Cynthia is too young; she has\nquite forgotten him'--and I bit my lips, to keep from crying out,\n'Papa! papa! have I?' But it's of no use. Well, then mamma had to go\nout as a governess; she couldn't help it, poor thing! but she didn't\nmuch care for parting with me. I was a trouble, I daresay. So I was\nsent to school at four years old; first one school, and then another;\nand in the holidays, mamma went to stay at grand houses, and I was\ngenerally left with the schoolmistresses. Once I went to the Towers;\nand mamma lectured me continually, and yet I was very naughty, I\nbelieve. And so I never went again; and I was very glad of it, for it\nwas a horrid place.\"\n\n\"That it was!\" said Molly, who remembered her own day of tribulation\nthere.\n\n\"And once I went to London, to stay with my uncle Kirkpatrick. He is\na lawyer, and getting on now; but then he was poor enough, and had\nsix or seven children. It was winter-time, and we were all shut up in\na small house in Doughty Street. But, after all, that wasn't so bad.\"\n\n\"But then you lived with your mother when she began school at\nAshcombe. Mr. Preston told me that, when I stayed that day at the\nManor-house.\"\n\n\"What did he tell you?\" asked Cynthia, almost fiercely.\n\n\"Nothing but that. Oh, yes! He praised your beauty, and wanted me to\ntell you what he had said.\"\n\n\"I should have hated you if you had,\" said Cynthia.\n\n\"Of course I never thought of doing such a thing,\" replied Molly. \"I\ndidn't like him; and Lady Harriet spoke of him the next day, as if he\nwasn't a person to be liked.\"\n\nCynthia was quite silent. At length she said,--\n\n\"I wish I was good!\"\n\n\"So do I,\" said Molly, simply. She was thinking again of Mrs.\nHamley,--\n\n   Only the actions of the just\n   Smell sweet and blossom in the dust,\n\nand \"goodness\" just then seemed to her to be the only enduring thing\nin the world.\n\n\"Nonsense, Molly! You are good. At least, if you're not good, what\nam I? There's a rule-of-three sum for you to do! But it's no use\ntalking; I am not good, and I never shall be now. Perhaps I might be\na heroine still, but I shall never be a good woman, I know.\"\n\n\"Do you think it easier to be a heroine?\"\n\n\"Yes, as far as one knows of heroines from history. I'm capable of a\ngreat jerk, an effort, and then a relaxation--but steady, every-day\ngoodness is beyond me. I must be a moral kangaroo!\"\n\nMolly could not follow Cynthia's ideas; she could not distract\nherself from the thoughts of the sorrowing group at the Hall.\n\n\"How I should like to see them all! and yet one can do nothing at\nsuch a time! Papa says the funeral is to be on Tuesday, and that,\nafter that, Roger Hamley is to go back to Cambridge. It will seem\nas if nothing had happened! I wonder how the squire and Mr. Osborne\nHamley will get on together.\"\n\n\"He's the eldest son, is he not? Why shouldn't he and his father get\non well together?\"\n\n\"Oh! I don't know. That is to say, I do know, but I think I ought not\nto tell.\"\n\n\"Don't be so pedantically truthful, Molly. Besides, your manner shows\nwhen you speak truth and when you speak falsehood, without troubling\nyourself to use words. I knew exactly what your 'I don't know' meant.\nI never consider myself bound to be truthful, so I beg we may be on\nequal terms.\"\n\nCynthia might well say she did not consider herself bound to be\ntruthful; she literally said what came uppermost, without caring very\nmuch whether it was accurate or not. But there was no ill-nature,\nand, in a general way, no attempt at procuring any advantage for\nherself in all her deviations; and there was often such a latent\nsense of fun in them that Molly could not help being amused with them\nin fact, though she condemned them in theory. Cynthia's playfulness\nof manner glossed such failings over with a kind of charm; and yet,\nat times, she was so soft and sympathetic that Molly could not resist\nher, even when she affirmed the most startling things. The little\naccount she made of her own beauty pleased Mr. Gibson extremely; and\nher pretty deference to him won his heart. She was restless too, till\nshe had attacked Molly's dress, after she had remodelled her\nmother's.\n\n\"Now for you, sweet one,\" said she as she began upon one of Molly's\ngowns. \"I've been working as connoisseur until now; now I begin as\namateur.\"\n\nShe brought down her pretty artificial flowers, plucked out of her\nown best bonnet to put into Molly's, saying they would suit her\ncomplexion, and that a knot of ribbons would do well enough for her.\nAll the time she worked, she sang; she had a sweet voice in singing,\nas well as in speaking, and used to run up and down her gay French\n_chansons_ without any difficulty; so flexible in the art was she.\nYet she did not seem to care for music. She rarely touched the piano,\non which Molly practised with daily conscientiousness. Cynthia was\nalways willing to answer questions about her previous life, though,\nafter the first, she rarely alluded to it of herself; but she was a\nmost sympathetic listener to all Molly's innocent confidences of joys\nand sorrows: sympathizing even to the extent of wondering how she\ncould endure Mr. Gibson's second marriage, and why she did not take\nsome active steps of rebellion.\n\nIn spite of all this agreeable and pungent variety of companionship\nat home, Molly yearned after the Hamleys. If there had been a woman\nin that family she would probably have received many little notes,\nand heard numerous details which were now lost to her, or summed\nup in condensed accounts of her father's visits at the Hall, which,\nsince his dear patient was dead, were only occasional.\n\n\"Yes! The Squire is a good deal changed; but he's better than he was.\nThere's an unspoken estrangement between him and Osborne; one can\nsee it in the silence and constraint of their manners; but outwardly\nthey are friendly--civil at any rate. The squire will always respect\nOsborne as his heir, and the future representative of the family.\nOsborne doesn't look well; he says he wants change. I think he's\nweary of the domestic dullness, or domestic dissension. But he feels\nhis mother's death acutely. It's a wonder that he and his father are\nnot drawn together by their common loss. Roger's away at Cambridge\ntoo--examination for the mathematical tripos. Altogether the aspect\nof both people and place is changed; it is but natural!\"\n\nSuch is perhaps the summing-up of the news of the Hamleys, as\ncontained in many bulletins. They always ended in some kind message\nto Molly.\n\nMrs. Gibson generally said, as a comment upon her husband's account\nof Osborne's melancholy,--\n\n\"My dear! why don't you ask him to dinner here? A little quiet\ndinner, you know. Cook is quite up to it; and we would all of us wear\nblacks and lilacs; he couldn't consider that as gaiety.\"\n\nMr. Gibson took no more notice of these suggestions than by shaking\nhis head. He had grown accustomed to his wife by this time, and\nregarded silence on his own part as a great preservative against long\ninconsequential arguments. But every time that Mrs. Gibson was struck\nby Cynthia's beauty, she thought it more and more advisable that Mr.\nOsborne Hamley should be cheered up by a quiet little dinner-party.\nAs yet no one but the ladies of Hollingford and Mr. Ashton, the\nvicar--that hopeless and impracticable old bachelor--had seen\nCynthia; and what was the good of having a lovely daughter, if there\nwere none but old women to admire her?\n\nCynthia herself appeared extremely indifferent upon the subject,\nand took very little notice of her mother's constant talk about the\ngaieties that were possible, and the gaieties that were impossible,\nin Hollingford. She exerted herself just as much to charm the two\nMiss Brownings as she would have done to delight Osborne Hamley,\nor any other young heir. That is to say, she used no exertion, but\nsimply followed her own nature, which was to attract every one of\nthose she was thrown amongst. The exertion seemed rather to be\nto refrain from doing so, and to protest, as she often did, by\nslight words and expressive looks against her mother's words and\nhumours--alike against her folly and her caresses. Molly was almost\nsorry for Mrs. Gibson, who seemed so unable to gain influence over\nher child. One day Cynthia read Molly's thought.\n\n\"I'm not good, and I told you so. Somehow, I cannot forgive her\nfor her neglect of me as a child, when I would have clung to her.\nBesides, I hardly ever heard from her when I was at school. And I\nknow she put a stop to my coming over to her wedding. I saw the\nletter she wrote to Madame Lefevre. A child should be brought up with\nits parents, if it is to think them infallible when it grows up.\"\n\n\"But though it may know that there must be faults,\" replied Molly,\n\"it ought to cover them over and try to forget their existence.\"\n\n\"It ought. But don't you see I have grown up outside the pale of\nduty and 'oughts.' Love me as I am, sweet one, for I shall never be\nbetter.\"\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XX.\n\nMRS. GIBSON'S VISITORS.\n\n\nOne day, to Molly's infinite surprise, Mr. Preston was announced\nas a caller. Mrs. Gibson and she were sitting together in the\ndrawing-room; Cynthia was out--gone into the town a-shopping--when\nthe door was opened, the name given, and in walked the young man. His\nentrance seemed to cause more confusion than Molly could well account\nfor. He came in with the same air of easy assurance with which he\nhad received her and her father at Ashcombe Manor-house. He looked\nremarkably handsome in his riding-dress, and with the open-air\nexercise he had just had. But Mrs. Gibson's smooth brows contracted a\nlittle at the sight of him, and her reception of him was much cooler\nthan that which she usually gave to visitors. Yet there was a degree\nof agitation in it, which surprised Molly a little. Mrs. Gibson was\nat her everlasting worsted-work frame when Mr. Preston entered the\nroom; but somehow in rising to receive him, she threw down her basket\nof crewels, and, declining Molly's offer to help her, she would pick\nup all the reels herself, before she asked her visitor to sit down.\nHe stood there, hat in hand, affecting an interest in the recovery of\nthe worsted which Molly was sure he did not feel; for all the time\nhis eyes were glancing round the room, and taking note of the details\nin the arrangement.\n\nAt length they were seated, and conversation began.\n\n\"It is the first time I have been in Hollingford since your marriage,\nMrs. Gibson, or I should certainly have called to pay my respects\nsooner.\"\n\n\"I know you are very busy at Ashcombe. I did not expect you to call.\nIs Lord Cumnor at the Towers? I have not heard from her ladyship for\nmore than a week!\"\n\n\"No! he seemed still detained at Bath. But I had a letter from him\ngiving me certain messages for Mr. Sheepshanks. Mr. Gibson is not at\nhome, I'm afraid?\"\n\n\"No. He is a great deal out--almost constantly, I may say. I had no\nidea that I should see so little of him. A doctor's wife leads a very\nsolitary life, Mr. Preston!\"\n\n\"You can hardly call it solitary, I should think, when you have such\na companion as Miss Gibson always at hand,\" said he, bowing to Molly.\n\n\"Oh, but I call it solitude for a wife when her husband is away. Poor\nMr. Kirkpatrick was never happy unless I always went with him;--all\nhis walks, all his visits, he liked me to be with him. But, somehow,\nMr. Gibson feels as if I should be rather in his way.\"\n\n\"I don't think you could ride pillion behind him on Black Bess,\nmamma,\" said Molly. \"And unless you could do that, you could hardly\ngo with him in his rounds up and down all the rough lanes.\"\n\n\"Oh! but he might keep a brougham! I've often said so. And then I\ncould use it for visiting in the evenings. Really it was one reason\nwhy I didn't go to the Hollingford Charity Ball. I couldn't bring\nmyself to use the dirty fly from the 'George.' We really must stir\npapa up against next winter, Molly; it will never do for you and--\"\n\nShe pulled herself up suddenly, and looked furtively at Mr. Preston\nto see if he had taken any notice of her abruptness. Of course he\nhad, but he was not going to show it. He turned to Molly, and said,--\n\n\"Have you ever been to a public ball yet, Miss Gibson?\"\n\n\"No!\" said Molly.\n\n\"It will be a great pleasure to you when the time comes.\"\n\n\"I'm not sure. I shall like it if I have plenty of partners; but I'm\nafraid I shan't know many people.\"\n\n\"And you suppose that young men haven't their own ways and means of\nbeing introduced to pretty girls?\"\n\nIt was exactly one of the speeches Molly had disliked him for before;\nand delivered, too, in that kind of underbred manner which showed\nthat it was meant to convey a personal compliment. Molly took great\ncredit to herself for the unconcerned manner with which she went on\nwith her tatting exactly as if she had never heard it.\n\n\"I only hope I may be one of your partners at the first ball you go\nto. Pray, remember my early application for that honour, when you are\noverwhelmed with requests for dances.\"\n\n\"I don't choose to engage myself beforehand,\" said Molly, perceiving,\nfrom under her dropped eyelids, that he was leaning forward and\nlooking at her as though he was determined to have an answer.\n\n\"Young ladies are always very cautious in fact, however modest they\nmay be in profession,\" he replied, addressing himself in a nonchalant\nmanner to Mrs. Gibson. \"In spite of Miss Gibson's apprehension of not\nhaving many partners, she declines the certainty of having one. I\nsuppose Miss Kirkpatrick will have returned from France before then?\"\n\nHe said these last words exactly in the same tone as he had used\nbefore; but Molly's instinct told her that he was making an effort to\ndo so. She looked up. He was playing with his hat, almost as if he\ndid not care to have any answer to his question. Yet he was listening\nacutely, and with a half smile on his face.\n\nMrs. Gibson reddened a little, and hesitated,--\n\n\"Yes; certainly. My daughter will be with us next winter, I believe;\nand I daresay she will go out with us.\"\n\n\"Why can't she say at once that Cynthia is here now?\" asked Molly of\nherself, yet glad that Mr. Preston's curiosity was baffled.\n\nHe still smiled; but this time he looked up at Mrs. Gibson, as he\nasked,--\"You have good news from her, I hope?\"\n\n\"Yes; very. By the way, how are our old friends the Robinsons? How\noften I think of their kindness to me at Ashcombe! Dear good people,\nI wish I could see them again.\"\n\n\"I will certainly tell them of your kind inquiries. They are very\nwell, I believe.\"\n\nJust at this moment, Molly heard the familiar sound of the click\nand opening of the front door. She knew it must be Cynthia; and,\nconscious of some mysterious reason which made Mrs. Gibson wish to\nconceal her daughter's whereabouts from Mr. Preston, and maliciously\ndesirous to baffle him, she rose to leave the room, and meet Cynthia\non the stairs; but one of the lost crewels of worsted had entangled\nitself in her gown and feet, and before she had freed herself of the\nencumbrance, Cynthia had opened the drawing-room door, and stood\nin it, looking at her mother, at Molly, at Mr. Preston, but not\nadvancing one step. Her colour, which had been brilliant the first\nmoment of her entrance, faded away as she gazed; but her eyes--her\nbeautiful eyes--usually so soft and grave, seemed to fill with fire,\nand her brows to contract, as she took the resolution to come forward\nand take her place among the three, who were all looking at her with\ndifferent emotions. She moved calmly and slowly forwards; Mr. Preston\nwent a step or two to meet her, his hand held out, and the whole\nexpression of his face that of eager delight.\n\nBut she took no notice of the outstretched hand, nor of the chair\nthat he offered her. She sate down on a little sofa in one of the\nwindows, and called Molly to her.\n\n\"Look at my purchases,\" said she. \"This green ribbon was\nfourteen-pence a yard, this silk three shillings,\" and so she went\non, forcing herself to speak about these trifles as if they were\nall the world to her, and she had no attention to throw away on her\nmother and her mother's visitor.\n\nMr. Preston took his cue from her. He, too, talked of the news of\nthe day, the local gossip--but Molly, who glanced up at him from\ntime to time, was almost alarmed by the bad expression of suppressed\nanger, almost amounting to vindictiveness, which entirely marred his\nhandsome looks. She did not wish to look again; and tried rather to\nback up Cynthia's efforts at maintaining a separate conversation. Yet\nshe could not help overhearing Mrs. Gibson's strain after increased\ncivility, as if to make up for Cynthia's rudeness, and, if possible,\nto deprecate his anger. She talked perpetually, as though her object\nwere to detain him; whereas, previous to Cynthia's return, she had\nallowed frequent pauses in the conversation, as though to give him\nthe opportunity to take his leave.\n\nIn the course of the conversation between them the Hamleys came up.\nMrs. Gibson was never unwilling to dwell upon Molly's intimacy with\nthis county family; and when the latter caught the sound of her own\nname, her stepmother was saying,--\n\n\"Poor Mrs. Hamley could hardly do without Molly; she quite looked\nupon her as a daughter, especially towards the last, when, I am\nafraid, she had a good deal of anxiety. Mr. Osborne Hamley--I daresay\nyou have heard--he did not do so well at college, and they had\nexpected so much--parents will, you know; but what did it signify?\nfor he had not to earn his living! I call it a very foolish kind of\nambition when a young man has not to go into a profession.\"\n\n\"Well, at any rate, the Squire must be satisfied now. I saw this\nmorning's _Times_, with the Cambridge examination lists in it. Isn't\nthe second son called after his father, Roger?\"\n\n\"Yes,\" said Molly, starting up, and coming nearer.\n\n\"He's senior wrangler, that's all,\" said Mr. Preston, almost as\nthough he were vexed with himself for having anything to say that\ncould give her pleasure. Molly went back to her seat by Cynthia.\n\n\"Poor Mrs. Hamley,\" said she, very softly, as if to herself. Cynthia\ntook her hand, in sympathy with Molly's sad and tender look, rather\nthan because she understood all that was passing in her mind, nor did\nshe quite understand it herself. A death that had come out of time;\na wonder whether the dead knew what passed upon the earth they had\nleft--the brilliant Osborne's failure, Roger's success; the vanity\nof human wishes,--all these thoughts, and what they suggested, were\ninextricably mingled up in her mind. She came to herself in a few\nminutes. Mr. Preston was saying all the unpleasant things he could\nthink of about the Hamleys in a tone of false sympathy.\n\n\"The poor old Squire--not the wisest of men--has woefully mismanaged\nhis estate. And Osborne Hamley is too fine a gentleman to understand\nthe means by which to improve the value of the land--even if he had\nthe capital. A man who had practical knowledge of agriculture, and\nsome thousands of ready money, might bring the rental up to eight\nthousand or so. Of course, Osborne will try and marry some one with\nmoney; the family is old and well-established, and he mustn't object\nto commercial descent, though I daresay the Squire will for him; but\nthen the young fellow himself is not the man for the work. No! the\nfamily's going down fast; and it's a pity when these old Saxon houses\nvanish off the land; but it is 'kismet' with the Hamleys. Even the\nsenior wrangler--if it is that Roger Hamley--he will have spent all\nhis brains in one effort. You never hear of a senior wrangler being\nworth anything afterwards. He'll be a Fellow of his college, of\ncourse--that will be a livelihood for him at any rate.\"\n\n\"I believe in senior wranglers,\" said Cynthia, her clear high voice\nringing through the room. \"And from all I've ever heard of Mr. Roger\nHamley, I believe he will keep up the distinction he has earned. And\nI don't believe that the house of Hamley is so near extinction in\nwealth and fame, and good name.\"\n\n\"They are fortunate in having Miss Kirkpatrick's good word,\" said Mr.\nPreston, rising to take his leave.\n\n\"Dear Molly,\" said Cynthia, in a whisper, \"I know nothing about your\nfriends the Hamleys, except that they are your friends, and what you\nhave told me about them. But I won't have that man speaking of them\nso--and your eyes filling with tears all the time. I'd sooner swear\nto their having all the talents and good fortune under the sun.\"\n\nThe only person of whom Cynthia appeared to be wholesomely afraid\nwas Mr. Gibson. When he was present she was more careful in speaking,\nand showed more deference to her mother. Her evident respect for him,\nand desire to win his good opinion, made her curb herself before him;\nand in this manner she earned his favour as a lively, sensible girl,\nwith just so much knowledge of the world as made her a very desirable\ncompanion to Molly. Indeed, she made something of the same kind of\nimpression on all men. They were first struck with her personal\nappearance; and then with her pretty deprecating manner, which\nappealed to them much as if she had said, \"You are wise, and I am\nfoolish--have mercy on my folly.\" It was a way she had; it meant\nnothing really; and she was hardly conscious of it herself; but it\nwas very captivating all the same. Even old Williams, the gardener,\nfelt it; he said to his confidante, Molly--\n\n\"Eh, miss, but that be a rare young lady! She do have such pretty\ncoaxing ways. I be to teach her to bud roses come the season--and\nI'll warrant ye she'll learn sharp enough, for all she says she bees\nso stupid.\"\n\nIf Molly had not had the sweetest disposition in the world she might\nhave become jealous of all the allegiance laid at Cynthia's feet;\nbut she never thought of comparing the amount of admiration and\nlove which they each received. Yet once she did feel a little as\nif Cynthia were poaching on her manor. The invitation to the quiet\ndinner had been sent to Osborne Hamley, and declined by him. But he\nthought it right to call soon afterwards. It was the first time Molly\nhad seen any of the family since she left the Hall, just before Mrs.\nHamley's death; and there was so much that she wanted to ask. She\ntried to wait patiently till Mrs. Gibson had exhausted the first gush\nof her infinite nothings; and then Molly came in with her modest\nquestions. How was the Squire? Had he returned to his old habits? Had\nhis health suffered?--putting each inquiry with as light and delicate\na touch as if she had been dressing a wound. She hesitated a little,\na very little, before speaking of Roger; for just one moment the\nthought flitted across her mind, that Osborne might feel the contrast\nbetween his own and his brother's college career too painfully to\nlike to have it referred to; but then she remembered the generous\nbrotherly love that had always existed between the two, and had just\nentered upon the subject, when Cynthia in obedience to her mother's\nsummons, came into the room, and took up her work. No one could have\nbeen quieter--she hardly uttered a word; but Osborne seemed to fall\nunder her power at once. He no longer gave his undivided attention\nto Molly. He cut short his answers to her questions; and by-and-by,\nwithout Molly's rightly understanding how it was, he had turned\ntowards Cynthia, and was addressing himself to her. Molly saw the\nlook of content on Mrs. Gibson's face; perhaps it was her own\nmortification at not having heard all she wished to know about Roger,\nwhich gave her a keener insight than usual, but certain it is that\nall at once she perceived that Mrs. Gibson would not dislike a\nmarriage between Osborne and Cynthia, and considered the present\noccasion as an auspicious beginning. Remembering the secret which she\nhad been let into so unwillingly, Molly watched his behaviour, almost\nas if she had been retained in the interest of the absent wife; but,\nafter all, thinking as much of the possibility of his attracting\nCynthia as of the unknown and mysterious Mrs. Osborne Hamley. His\nmanner was expressive of great interest and of strong prepossession\nin favour of the beautiful girl to whom he was talking. He was in\ndeep mourning, which showed off his slight figure and delicate\nrefined face. But there was nothing of flirting, as far as Molly\nunderstood the meaning of the word, in either looks or words.\nCynthia, too, was extremely quiet; she was always much quieter with\nmen than with women; it was part of the charm of her soft allurement\nthat she was so passive. They were talking of France. Mrs. Gibson\nherself had passed two or three years of her girlhood there; and\nCynthia's late return from Boulogne made it a very natural subject\nof conversation. But Molly was thrown out of it; and with her heart\nstill unsatisfied as to the details of Roger's success, she had to\nstand up at last, and receive Osborne's good-by, scarcely longer or\nmore intimate than his farewell to Cynthia. As soon as he was gone,\nMrs. Gibson began in his praise.\n\n\"Well, really, I begin to have some faith in long descent. What a\ngentleman he is! How agreeable and polite! So different from that\nforward Mr. Preston,\" she continued, looking a little anxiously at\nCynthia. Cynthia, quite aware that her reply was being watched for,\nsaid, coolly,--\n\n\"Mr. Preston doesn't improve on acquaintance. There was a time,\nmamma, when I think both you and I thought him very agreeable.\"\n\n\"I don't remember. You've a clearer memory than I have. But we were\ntalking of this delightful Mr. Osborne Hamley. Why, Molly, you were\nalways talking of his brother--it was Roger this, and Roger that--I\ncan't think how it was you so seldom mentioned this young man.\"\n\n\"I didn't know I had mentioned Mr. Roger Hamley so often,\" said\nMolly, blushing a little. \"But I saw much more of him--he was more at\nhome.\"\n\n\"Well, well! It's all right, my dear. I daresay he suits you best.\nBut really, when I saw Osborne Hamley close to my Cynthia, I couldn't\nhelp thinking--but perhaps I'd better not tell you what I was\nthinking of. Only they are each of them so much above the average in\nappearance; and, of course, that suggests things.\"\n\n\"I perfectly understand what you were thinking of, mamma,\" said\nCynthia, with the greatest composure; \"and so does Molly, I have no\ndoubt.\"\n\n\"Well! there's no harm in it, I'm sure. Did you hear him say that,\nthough he did not like to leave his father alone just at present, yet\nthat when his brother Roger came back from Cambridge, he should feel\nmore at liberty! It was quite as much as to say, 'If you will ask me\nto dinner then, I shall be delighted to come.' And chickens will be\nso much cheaper, and cook has such a nice way of boning them, and\ndoing them up with forcemeat. Everything seems to be falling out\nso fortunately. And Molly, my dear, you know I won't forget you.\nBy-and-by, when Roger Hamley has taken his turn at stopping at home\nwith his father, we will ask him to one of our little quiet dinners.\"\n\nMolly was very slow at taking this in; but in about a minute the\nsense of it had reached her brain, and she went all over very red and\nhot; especially as she saw that Cynthia was watching the light come\ninto her mind with great amusement.\n\n\"I'm afraid Molly isn't properly grateful, mamma. If I were you, I\nwouldn't exert myself to give a dinner-party on her account. Bestow\nall your kindness upon me.\"\n\nMolly was often puzzled by Cynthia's speeches to her mother; and this\nwas one of these occasions. But she was more anxious to say something\nfor herself; she was so much annoyed at the implication in Mrs.\nGibson's last words.\n\n\"Mr. Roger Hamley has been very good to me; he was a great deal at\nhome when I was there, and Mr. Osborne Hamley was very little there:\nthat was the reason I spoke so much more of one than the other. If I\nhad--if he had,\"--losing her coherence in the difficulty of finding\nwords,--\"I don't think I should,--oh, Cynthia, instead of laughing at\nme, I think you might help me to explain myself!\"\n\nInstead, Cynthia gave a diversion to the conversation.\n\n\"Mamma's paragon gives me an idea of weakness. I can't quite make out\nwhether it's in body or mind. Which is it, Molly?\"\n\n\"He is not strong, I know; but he's very accomplished and clever.\nEvery one says that,--even papa, who doesn't generally praise young\nmen. That made the puzzle the greater when he did so badly at\ncollege.\"\n\n\"Then it's his character that is weak. I'm sure there's weakness\nsomewhere; but he's very agreeable. It must have been very pleasant,\nstaying at the Hall.\"\n\n\"Yes; but it's all over now.\"\n\n\"Oh, nonsense!\" said Mrs. Gibson, wakening up from counting the\nstitches in her pattern. \"We shall have the young men coming to\ndinner pretty often, you'll see. Your father likes them, and I shall\nalways make a point of welcoming his friends. They can't go on\nmourning for a mother for ever. I expect we shall see a great deal of\nthem; and that the two families will become very intimate. After all,\nthese good Hollingford people are terribly behindhand, and I should\nsay, rather commonplace.\"\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXI.\n\nTHE HALF-SISTERS.\n\n\n[Illustration (untitled)]\n\nIt appeared as if Mrs. Gibson's predictions were likely to be\nverified; for Osborne Hamley found his way to her drawing-room pretty\nfrequently. To be sure, sometimes prophets can help on the fulfilment\nof their own prophecies; and Mrs. Gibson was not passive.\n\nMolly was altogether puzzled by his manners and ways. He spoke of\noccasional absences from the Hall, without exactly saying where he\nhad been. But that was not her idea of the conduct of a married man;\nwho, she imagined, ought to have a house and servants, and pay rent\nand taxes, and live with his wife. Who this mysterious wife might be\nfaded into insignificance before the wonder of where she was. London,\nCambridge, Dover, nay, even France, were mentioned by him as places\nto which he had been on these different little journeys. These facts\ncame out quite casually, almost as if he was unaware of what he was\nbetraying. Sometimes he dropped out such sentences as these:--\"Ah,\nthat would be the day I was crossing! It was stormy indeed! Instead\nof our being only two hours, we were nearly five.\" Or, \"I met Lord\nHollingford at Dover last week, and he said,\" &c. \"The cold now is\nnothing to what it was in London on Thursday--the thermometer was\ndown at 15 .\" Perhaps, in the rapid flow of conversation, these\nsmall revelations were noticed by no one but Molly; whose interest\nand curiosity were always hovering over the secret she had become\npossessed of, in spite of all her self-reproach for allowing her\nthoughts to dwell on what was still to be kept as a mystery.\n\nIt was also evident to her that Osborne was not too happy at home.\nHe had lost the slight touch of cynicism which he had affected when\nhe was expected to do wonders at college; and that was one good\nresult of his failure. If he did not give himself the trouble of\nappreciating other people, and their performances, at any rate his\nconversation was not so amply sprinkled with critical pepper. He was\nmore absent, not so agreeable, Mrs. Gibson thought, but did not say.\nHe looked ill in health; but that might be the consequence of the\nreal depression of spirits which Molly occasionally saw peeping out\nthrough all his pleasant surface-talk. Now and then, when he was\ntalking directly to her, he referred to \"the happy days that are\ngone,\" or, \"to the time when my mother was alive;\" and then his voice\nsank, and a gloom came over his countenance, and Molly longed to\nexpress her own deep sympathy. He did not often mention his father;\nand Molly thought she could read in his manner, when he did, that\nsomething of the painful restraint she had noticed when she was last\nat the Hall still existed between them. Nearly every particular she\nknew of the family interior she had heard from Mrs. Hamley, and she\nwas uncertain how far her father was acquainted with them; so she\ndid not like to question him too closely; nor was he a man to be so\nquestioned as to the domestic affairs of his patients. Sometimes she\nwondered if it was a dream--that short half-hour in the library at\nHamley Hall--when she had learnt a fact which seemed so all-important\nto Osborne, yet which made so little difference in his way of\nlife--either in speech or action. During the twelve or fourteen hours\nthat she had remained at the Hall afterwards, no further allusion\nhad been made to his marriage, either by himself or by Roger. It was,\nindeed, very like a dream. Probably Molly would have been rendered\nmuch more uncomfortable in the possession of her secret if Osborne\nhad struck her as particularly attentive in his devotion to Cynthia.\nShe evidently amused and attracted him, but not in any lively or\npassionate kind of way. He admired her beauty, and seemed to feel\nher charm; but he would leave her side, and come to sit near Molly,\nif anything reminded him of his mother, about which he could talk\nto her, and to her alone. Yet he came so often to the Gibsons, that\nMrs. Gibson might be excused for the fancy she had taken into her\nhead, that it was for Cynthia's sake. He liked the lounge, the\nfriendliness, the company of two intelligent girls of beauty and\nmanners above the average; one of whom stood in a peculiar relation\nto him, as having been especially beloved by the mother whose memory\nhe cherished so fondly. Knowing himself to be out of the category\nof bachelors, he was, perhaps, too indifferent as to other people's\nignorance, and its possible consequences.\n\nSomehow, Molly did not like to be the first to introduce Roger's name\ninto the conversation, so she lost many an opportunity of hearing\nintelligence about him. Osborne was often so languid or so absent\nthat he only followed the lead of talk; and as an awkward fellow,\nwho had paid her no particular attention, and as a second son, Roger\nwas not pre-eminent in Mrs. Gibson's thoughts; Cynthia had never\nseen him, and the freak did not take her often to speak about him.\nHe had not come home since he had obtained his high place in the\nmathematical lists: that Molly knew; and she knew, too, that he was\nworking hard for something--she supposed a fellowship--and that was\nall. Osborne's tone in speaking of him was always the same: every\nword, every inflection of the voice breathed out affection and\nrespect--nay, even admiration! And this from the _nil admirari_\nbrother, who seldom carried his exertions so far.\n\n\"Ah, Roger!\" he said one day. Molly caught the name in an instant,\nthough she had not heard what had gone before. \"He is a fellow in a\nthousand--in a thousand, indeed! I don't believe there is his match\nanywhere for goodness and real solid power combined.\"\n\n\"Molly,\" said Cynthia, after Mr. Osborne Hamley had gone, \"what sort\nof a man is this Roger Hamley? One can't tell how much to believe of\nhis brother's praises; for it is the one subject on which Osborne\nHamley becomes enthusiastic. I've noticed it once or twice before.\"\n\nWhile Molly hesitated on which point of the large round to begin her\ndescription, Mrs. Gibson struck in,--\n\n\"It just shows what a sweet disposition Osborne Hamley is of--that\nhe should praise his brother as he does. I daresay he is a senior\nwrangler, and much good may it do him! I don't deny that; but as for\nconversation, he's as heavy as heavy can be. A great awkward fellow\nto boot, who looks as if he did not know two and two made four, for\nall he is such a mathematical genius. You would hardly believe he\nwas Osborne Hamley's brother to see him! I should not think he has a\nprofile at all.\"\n\n\"What do you think of him, Molly?\" said the persevering Cynthia.\n\n\"I like him,\" said Molly. \"He has been very kind to me. I know he\nisn't handsome like Osborne.\"\n\nIt was rather difficult to say all this quietly, but Molly managed to\ndo it, quite aware that Cynthia would not rest till she had extracted\nsome kind of an opinion out of her.\n\n\"I suppose he will come home at Easter,\" said Cynthia, \"and then I\nshall see him for myself.\"\n\n\"It's a great pity that their being in mourning will prevent their\ngoing to the Easter charity ball,\" said Mrs. Gibson, plaintively.\n\"I shan't like to take you two girls, if you are not to have any\npartners. It will put me in such an awkward position. I wish we could\njoin on to the Towers party. That would secure you partners, for they\nalways bring a number of dancing men, who might dance with you after\nthey had done their duty by the ladies of the house. But really\neverything is so changed since dear Lady Cumnor has been an invalid\nthat, perhaps, they won't go at all.\"\n\nThis Easter ball was a great subject of conversation with Mrs.\nGibson. She sometimes spoke of it as her first appearance in society\nas a bride, though she had been visiting once or twice a week all\nwinter long. Then she shifted her ground, and said she felt so much\ninterest in it, because she would then have the responsibility of\nintroducing both her own and Mr. Gibson's daughter to public notice,\nthough the fact was that pretty nearly every one who was going to\nthis ball had seen the two young ladies--though not their ball\ndresses--before. But, aping the manners of the aristocracy as far\nas she knew them, she intended to \"bring out\" Molly and Cynthia on\nthis occasion, which she regarded in something of the light of a\npresentation at Court. \"They are not out yet,\" was her favourite\nexcuse when either of them was invited to any house to which she did\nnot wish them to go, or they were invited without her. She even made\na difficulty about their \"not being out\" when Miss Browning--that\nold friend of the Gibson family--came in one morning to ask the two\ngirls to come to a friendly tea and a round game afterwards; this\nmild piece of gaiety being designed as an attention to three of Mrs.\nGoodenough's grandchildren--two young ladies and their schoolboy\nbrother--who were staying on a visit to their grand-mamma.\n\n\"You are very kind, Miss Browning, but, you see, I hardly like to let\nthem go--they are not out, you know, till after the Easter ball.\"\n\n\"Till when we are invisible,\" said Cynthia, always ready with her\nmockery to exaggerate any pretension of her mother's. \"We are so high\nin rank that our sovereign must give us her sanction before we can\nplay a round game at your house.\"\n\nCynthia enjoyed the idea of her own full-grown size and stately gait,\nas contrasted with that of a meek, half-fledged girl in the nursery;\nbut Miss Browning was half puzzled and half affronted.\n\n\"I don't understand it at all. In my days girls went wherever it\npleased people to ask them, without this farce of bursting out in all\ntheir new fine clothes at some public place. I don't mean but what\nthe gentry took their daughters to York, or Matlock, or Bath, to\ngive them a taste of gay society when they were growing up; and the\nquality went up to London, and their young ladies were presented to\nQueen Charlotte, and went to a birthday ball, perhaps. But for us\nlittle Hollingford people--why, we knew every child amongst us from\nthe day of its birth; and many a girl of twelve or fourteen have I\nseen go out to a card-party, and sit quiet at her work, and know how\nto behave as well as any lady there. There was no talk of 'coming\nout' in those days for any one under the daughter of a Squire.\"\n\n\"After Easter, Molly and I shall know how to behave at a card-party,\nbut not before,\" said Cynthia, demurely.\n\n\"You're always fond of your quips and your cranks, my dear,\" said\nMiss Browning, \"and I wouldn't quite answer for your behaviour: you\nsometimes let your spirits carry you away. But I'm quite sure Molly\nwill be a little lady as she always is, and always was, and I have\nknown her from a babe.\"\n\nMrs. Gibson took up arms on behalf of her own daughter, or, rather,\nshe took up arms against Molly's praises.\n\n\"I don't think you would have called Molly a lady the other day,\nMiss Browning, if you had found her where I did: sitting up in a\ncherry-tree, six feet from the ground at least, I do assure you.\"\n\n\"Oh! but that wasn't pretty,\" said Miss Browning, shaking her head at\nMolly. \"I thought you'd left off those tom-boy ways.\"\n\n\"She wants the refinement which good society gives in several ways,\"\nsaid Mrs. Gibson, returning to the attack on poor Molly. \"She's very\napt to come upstairs two steps at a time.\"\n\n\"Only two, Molly!\" said Cynthia. \"Why, to-day I found I could manage\nfour of these broad shallow steps.\"\n\n\"My dear child, what are you saying?\"\n\n\"Only confessing that I, like Molly, want the refinements which good\nsociety gives; therefore, please do let us go to Miss Brownings'\nthis evening. I will pledge myself for Molly that she shan't sit in\na cherry-tree; and Molly shall see that I don't go upstairs in an\nunladylike way. I will go upstairs as meekly as if I were a come-out\nyoung lady, and had been to the Easter ball.\"\n\nSo it was agreed that they should go. If Mr. Osborne Hamley had been\nnamed as one of the probable visitors, there would have been none of\nthis difficulty about the affair.\n\nBut though he was not there, his brother Roger was. Molly saw him in\na minute when she entered the little drawing-room; but Cynthia did\nnot.\n\n\"And see, my dears,\" said Miss Phoebe Browning, turning them round\nto the side where Roger stood waiting for his turn of speaking\nto Molly, \"we've got a gentleman for you after all! Wasn't it\nfortunate?--just as sister said that you might find it dull--you,\nCynthia, she meant, because you know you come from France--then, just\nas if he had been sent from heaven, Mr. Roger came in to call; and I\nwon't say we laid violent hands on him, because he was too good for\nthat; but really we should have been near it, if he had not stayed of\nhis own accord.\"\n\nThe moment Roger had done his cordial greeting to Molly, he asked her\nto introduce him to Cynthia.\n\n\n[Illustration: ROGER IS INTRODUCED AND ENSLAVED.]\n\n\n\"I want to know her--your new sister,\" he added, with the kind smile\nMolly remembered so well since the very first day she had seen it\ndirected towards her, as she sate crying under the weeping ash.\nCynthia was standing a little behind Molly when Roger asked for this\nintroduction. She was generally dressed with careless grace. Molly,\nwho was delicate neatness itself, used sometimes to wonder how\nCynthia's tumbled gowns, tossed away so untidily, had the art of\nlooking so well, and falling in such graceful folds. For instance,\nthe pale lilac muslin gown she wore this evening had been worn many\ntimes before, and had looked unfit to wear again till Cynthia put\nit on. Then the limpness became softness, and the very creases took\nthe lines of beauty. Molly, in a daintily clean pink muslin, did not\nlook half so elegantly dressed as Cynthia. The grave eyes that the\nlatter raised when she had to be presented to Roger had a sort of\nchild-like innocence and wonder about them, which did not quite\nbelong to Cynthia's character. She put on her armour of magic that\nevening--involuntarily as she always did; but, on the other side, she\ncould not help trying her power on strangers. Molly had always felt\nthat she should have a right to a good long talk with Roger when she\nnext saw him; and that he would tell her, or she should gather from\nhim all the details she so longed to hear about the Squire--about\nthe Hall--about Osborne--about himself. He was just as cordial and\nfriendly as ever with her. If Cynthia had not been there, all would\nhave gone on as she had anticipated; but of all the victims to\nCynthia's charms he fell most prone and abject. Molly saw it all,\nas she was sitting next to Miss Phoebe at the tea-table, acting\nright-hand, and passing cake, cream, sugar, with such busy assiduity\nthat every one besides herself thought that her mind, as well as her\nhands, was fully occupied. She tried to talk to the two shy girls,\nas in virtue of her two years' seniority she thought herself bound\nto do; and the consequence was, she went upstairs with the twain\nclinging to her arms, and willing to swear an eternal friendship.\nNothing would satisfy them but that she must sit between them at\nvingt-un; and they were so desirous of her advice in the important\npoint of fixing the price of the counters that she could not ever\nhave joined in the animated conversation going on between Roger and\nCynthia. Or, rather, it would be more correct to say that Roger was\ntalking in a most animated manner to Cynthia, whose sweet eyes were\nfixed upon his face with a look of great interest in all he was\nsaying, while it was only now and then she made her low replies.\nMolly caught a few words occasionally in intervals of business.\n\n\"At my uncle's, we always give a silver threepence for three dozen.\nYou know what a silver threepence is, don't you, dear Miss Gibson?\"\n\n\"The three classes are published in the Senate House at nine o'clock\non the Friday morning, and you can't imagine--\"\n\n\"I think it will be thought rather shabby to play at anything less\nthan sixpence. That gentleman\" (this in a whisper) \"is at Cambridge,\nand you know they always play very high there, and sometimes ruin\nthemselves, don't they, dear Miss Gibson?\"\n\n\"Oh, on this occasion the Master of Arts who precedes the candidates\nfor honours when they go into the Senate House is called the Father\nof the College to which he belongs. I think I mentioned that before,\ndidn't I?\"\n\nSo Cynthia was hearing all about Cambridge, and the very examination\nabout which Molly had felt such keen interest, without having ever\nbeen able to have her questions answered by a competent person;\nand Roger, to whom she had always looked as the final and most\nsatisfactory answerer, was telling the whole of what she wanted to\nknow, and she could not listen. It took all her patience to make up\nlittle packets of counters, and settle, as the arbiter of the game,\nwhether it would be better for the round or the oblong counters to be\nreckoned as six. And when all was done, and every one sate in their\nplaces round the table, Roger and Cynthia had to be called twice\nbefore they came. They stood up, it is true, at the first sound of\ntheir names; but they did not move--Roger went on talking, Cynthia\nlistening till the second call; when they hurried to the table and\ntried to appear, all on a sudden, quite interested in the great\nquestions of the game--namely, the price of three dozen counters, and\nwhether, all things considered, it would be better to call the round\ncounters or the oblong half-a-dozen each. Miss Browning, drumming the\npack of cards on the table, and quite ready to begin dealing, decided\nthe matter by saying, \"Rounds are sixes, and three dozen counters\ncost sixpence. Pay up, if you please, and let us begin at once.\"\nCynthia sate between Roger and William Orford, the young schoolboy,\nwho bitterly resented on this occasion his sisters' habit of calling\nhim \"Willie,\" as he thought it was this boyish sobriquet which\nprevented Cynthia from attending as much to him as to Mr. Roger\nHamley; he also was charmed by the charmer, who found leisure to\ngive him one or two of her sweet smiles. On his return home to his\ngrand-mamma's, he gave out one or two very decided and rather original\nopinions, quite opposed--as was natural--to his sisters'. One was--\n\n\"That, after all, a senior wrangler was no great shakes. Any man\nmight be one if he liked, but there were a lot of fellows that he\nknew who would be very sorry to go in for anything so slow.\"\n\nMolly thought the game never would end. She had no particular turn\nfor gambling in her; and whatever her card might be, she regularly\nput on two counters, indifferent as to whether she won or lost.\nCynthia, on the contrary, staked high, and was at one time very rich,\nbut ended by being in debt to Molly something like six shillings. She\nhad forgotten her purse, she said, and was obliged to borrow from the\nmore provident Molly, who was aware that the round game of which Miss\nBrowning had spoken to her was likely to require money. If it was\nnot a very merry affair for all the individuals concerned, it was\na very noisy one on the whole. Molly thought it was going to last\ntill midnight; but punctually, as the clock struck nine, the little\nmaid-servant staggered in under the weight of a tray loaded with\nsandwiches, cakes, and jelly. This brought on a general move; and\nRoger, who appeared to have been on the watch for something of the\nkind, came and took a chair by Molly.\n\n\"I am so glad to see you again--it seems such a long time since\nChristmas,\" said he, dropping his voice, and not alluding more\nexactly to the day when she had left the Hall.\n\n\"It is a long time,\" she replied; \"we are close to Easter now. I\nhave so wanted to tell you how glad I was to hear about your honours\nat Cambridge. I once thought of sending you a message through\nyour brother, but then I thought it might be making too much fuss,\nbecause I know nothing of mathematics, or of the value of a senior\nwranglership; and you were sure to have so many congratulations from\npeople who did know.\"\n\n\"I missed yours though, Molly,\" said he, kindly. \"But I felt sure you\nwere glad for me.\"\n\n\"Glad and proud too,\" said she. \"I should so like to hear something\nmore about it. I heard you telling Cynthia--\"\n\n\"Yes. What a charming person she is! I should think you must be\nhappier than we expected long ago.\"\n\n\"But tell me something about the senior wranglership, please,\" said\nMolly.\n\n\"It's a long story, and I ought to be helping the Miss Brownings to\nhand sandwiches--besides, you wouldn't find it very interesting, it's\nso full of technical details.\"\n\n\"Cynthia looked very much interested,\" said Molly.\n\n\"Well! then I refer you to her, for I must go now. I can't for shame\ngo on sitting here, and letting those good ladies have all the\ntrouble. But I shall come and call on Mrs. Gibson soon. Are you\nwalking home to-night?\"\n\n\"Yes, I think so,\" replied Molly, eagerly foreseeing what was to\ncome.\n\n\"Then I shall walk home with you. I left my horse at the 'George,'\nand that's half-way. I suppose old Betty will allow me to accompany\nyou and your sister? You used to describe her as something of a\ndragon.\"\n\n\"Betty has left us,\" said Molly, sadly. \"She's gone to live at a\nplace at Ashcombe.\"\n\nHe made a face of dismay, and then went off to his duties. The short\nconversation had been very pleasant, and his manner had had just the\nbrotherly kindness of old times; but it was not quite the manner he\nhad to Cynthia; and Molly half thought she would have preferred the\nlatter. He was now hovering about Cynthia, who had declined the offer\nof refreshments from Willie Orford. Roger was tempting her, and with\nplayful entreaties urging her to take some thing from him. Every word\nthey said could be heard by the whole room; yet every word was said,\non Roger's part at least, as if he could not have spoken it in that\npeculiar manner to any one else. At length, and rather more because\nshe was weary of being entreated, than because it was his wish,\nCynthia took a macaroon, and Roger seemed as happy as though she\nhad crowned him with flowers. The whole affair was as trifling and\ncommonplace as could be in itself; hardly worth noticing; and yet\nMolly did notice it, and felt uneasy; she could not tell why. As it\nturned out, it was a rainy night, and Mrs. Gibson sent a fly for the\ntwo girls instead of old Betty's substitute. Both Cynthia and Molly\nthought of the possibility of their taking the two Orford girls back\nto their grandmother's, and so saving them a wet walk; but Cynthia\ngot the start in speaking about it; and the thanks and the implied\npraise for thoughtfulness were hers.\n\nWhen they got home Mr. and Mrs. Gibson were sitting in the\ndrawing-room, quite ready to be amused by any details of the evening.\n\nCynthia began,--\n\n\"Oh! it wasn't very entertaining. One didn't expect that,\" and she\nyawned wearily.\n\n\"Who were there?\" asked Mr. Gibson. \"Quite a young party--wasn't it?\"\n\n\"They'd only asked Lizzie and Fanny Orford, and their brother; but\nMr. Roger Hamley had ridden over and called on Miss Brownings, and\nthey kept him to tea. No one else.\"\n\n\"Roger Hamley there!\" said Mr. Gibson. \"He's come home then. I must\nmake time to ride over and see him.\"\n\n\"You'd much better ask him here,\" said Mrs. Gibson. \"Suppose you\ninvite him and his brother to dine here on Friday, my dear. It would\nbe a very pretty attention, I think.\"\n\n\"My dear! these young Cambridge men have a very good taste in wine,\nand don't spare it. My cellar won't stand many of their attacks.\"\n\n\"I didn't think you were so inhospitable, Mr. Gibson.\"\n\n\"I'm not inhospitable, I'm sure. If you'll put 'bitter beer' in the\ncorner of your notes of invitation, just as the smart people put\n'quadrilles' as a sign of the entertainment offered, we'll have\nOsborne and Roger to dinner any day you like. And what did you think\nof my favourite, Cynthia? You hadn't seen him before, I think?\"\n\n\"Oh! he's nothing like so handsome as his brother; nor so polished;\nnor so easy to talk to. He entertained me for more than an hour with\na long account of some examination or other; but there's something\none likes about him.\"\n\n\"Well--and Molly,\" said Mrs. Gibson, who piqued herself on being an\nimpartial stepmother, and who always tried hard to make Molly talk as\nmuch as Cynthia,--\"what sort of an evening have you had?\"\n\n\"Very pleasant, thank you.\" Her heart a little belied her as she said\nthis. She had not cared for the round game; and she would have cared\nfor Roger's conversation. She had had what she was indifferent to,\nand not had what she would have liked.\n\n\"We've had our unexpected visitor, too,\" said Mr. Gibson. \"Just after\ndinner, who should come in but Mr. Preston. I fancy he's having\nmore of the management of the Hollingford property than formerly.\nSheepshanks is getting an old man. And if so, I suspect we shall\nsee a good deal of Preston. He's 'no blate,' as they used to say in\nScotland, and made himself quite at home to-night. If I'd asked him\nto stay, or, indeed, if I'd done anything but yawn, he'd have been\nhere now. But I defy any man to stay when I've a fit of yawning.\"\n\n\"Do you like Mr. Preston, papa?\" asked Molly.\n\n\"About as much as I do half the men I meet. He talks well, and has\nseen a good deal. I know very little of him, though, except that he's\nmy lord's steward, which is a guarantee for a good deal.\"\n\n\"Lady Harriet spoke pretty strongly against him that day I was with\nher at the Manor-house.\"\n\n\"Lady Harriet's always full of fancies: she likes persons to-day, and\ndislikes them to-morrow,\" said Mrs. Gibson, who was touched on her\nsore point whenever Molly quoted Lady Harriet, or said anything to\nimply ever so transitory an intimacy with her.\n\n\"You must know a good deal about Mr. Preston, my dear. I suppose you\nsaw a good deal of him at Ashcombe?\"\n\nMrs. Gibson coloured, and looked at Cynthia before she replied.\nCynthia's face was set into a determination not to speak, however\nmuch she might be referred to.\n\n\"Yes; we saw a good deal of him--at one time, I mean. He's\nchangeable, I think. But he always sent us game, and sometimes fruit.\nThere were some stories against him, but I never believed them.\"\n\n\"What kind of stories?\" said Mr. Gibson, quickly.\n\n\"Oh, vague stories, you know: scandal, I daresay. No one ever\nbelieved them. He could be so agreeable if he chose; and my lord, who\nis so very particular, would never have kept him as agent if they\nwere true; not that I ever knew what they were, for I consider all\nscandal as abominable gossip.\"\n\n\"I'm very glad I yawned in his face,\" said Mr. Gibson. \"I hope he'll\ntake the hint.\"\n\n\"If it was one of your giant-gapes, papa, I should call it more than\na hint,\" said Molly. \"And if you want a yawning chorus the next time\nhe comes, I'll join in; won't you, Cynthia?\"\n\n\"I don't know,\" replied the latter, shortly, as she lighted her\nbed-candle. The two girls had usually some nightly conversation in\none or other of their bed-rooms; but to-night Cynthia said something\nor other about being terribly tired, and hastily shut her door.\n\nThe very next day, Roger came to pay his promised call. Molly was out\nin the garden with Williams, planning the arrangement of some new\nflower-beds, and deep in her employment of placing pegs upon the lawn\nto mark out the different situations, when, standing up to mark the\neffect, her eye was caught by the figure of a gentleman, sitting with\nhis back to the light, leaning forwards and talking, or listening,\neagerly. Molly knew the shape of the head perfectly, and hastily\nbegan to put off her brown-holland gardening apron, emptying the\npockets as she spoke to Williams.\n\n\"You can finish it now, I think,\" said she. \"You know about the\nbright-coloured flowers being against the privet-hedge, and where the\nnew rose-bed is to be?\"\n\n\"I can't justly say as I do,\" said he. \"Mebbe, you'll just go o'er it\nall once again, Miss Molly. I'm not so young as I oncst was, and my\nhead is not so clear now-a-days, and I'd be loath to make mistakes\nwhen you're so set upon your plans.\"\n\nMolly gave up her impulse in a moment. She saw that the old gardener\nwas really perplexed, yet that he was as anxious as he could be to do\nhis best. So she went over the ground again, pegging and explaining\ntill the wrinkled brow was smooth again, and he kept saying, \"I see,\nmiss. All right, Miss Molly, I'se gotten it in my head as clear as\npatchwork now.\"\n\nSo she could leave him, and go in. But just as she was close to the\ngarden door, Roger came out. It really was for once a case of virtue\nits own reward, for it was far pleasanter to her to have him in a\ntête-à-tête, however short, than in the restraint of Mrs. Gibson's\nand Cynthia's presence.\n\n\"I only just found out where you were, Molly. Mrs. Gibson said you\nhad gone out, but she didn't know where; and it was the greatest\nchance that I turned round and saw you.\"\n\n\"I saw you some time ago, but I couldn't leave Williams. I think he\nwas unusually slow to-day; and he seemed as if he couldn't understand\nmy plans for the new flower-beds.\"\n\n\"Is that the paper you've got in your hand? Let me look at it, will\nyou? Ah, I see! you've borrowed some of your ideas from our garden at\nhome, haven't you? This bed of scarlet geraniums, with the border of\nyoung oaks, pegged down! That was a fancy of my dear mother's.\"\n\nThey were both silent for a minute or two. Then Molly said,--\n\n\"How is the Squire? I've never seen him since.\"\n\n\"No, he told me how much he wanted to see you, but he couldn't make\nup his mind to come and call. I suppose it would never do now for you\nto come and stay at the Hall, would it? It would give my father so\nmuch pleasure: he looks upon you as a daughter, and I'm sure both\nOsborne and I shall always consider you are like a sister to us,\nafter all my mother's love for you, and your tender care of her at\nlast. But I suppose it wouldn't do.\"\n\n\"No! certainly not,\" said Molly, hastily.\n\n\"I fancy if you could come it would put us a little to rights. You\nknow, as I think I once told you, Osborne has behaved differently to\nwhat I should have done, though not wrongly,--only what I call an\nerror of judgment. But my father, I'm sure, has taken up some notion\nof--never mind; only the end of it is that he holds Osborne still in\ntacit disgrace, and is miserable himself all the time. Osborne, too,\nis sore and unhappy, and estranged from my father. It is just what\nmy mother would have put right very soon, and perhaps you could\nhave done it--unconsciously, I mean--for this wretched mystery that\nOsborne preserves about his affairs is at the root of it all. But\nthere's no use talking about it; I don't know why I began.\" Then,\nwith a wrench, changing the subject, while Molly still thought of\nwhat he had been telling her, he broke out,--\"I can't tell you how\nmuch I like Miss Kirkpatrick, Molly. It must be a great pleasure to\nyou having such a companion!\"\n\n\"Yes,\" said Molly, half smiling. \"I'm very fond of her; and I think I\nlike her better every day I know her. But how quickly you have found\nout her virtues!\"\n\n\"I didn't say 'virtues,' did I?\" asked he, reddening, but putting\nthe question in all good faith. \"Yet I don't think one could be\ndeceived in that face. And Mrs. Gibson appears to be a very friendly\nperson,--she has asked Osborne and me to dine here on Friday.\"\n\n\"Bitter beer\" came into Molly's mind; but what she said was, \"And are\nyou coming?\"\n\n\"Certainly, I am, unless my father wants me; and I've given Mrs.\nGibson a conditional promise for Osborne, too. So I shall see you all\nvery soon again. But I must go now. I have to keep an appointment\nseven miles from here in half-an-hour's time. Good luck to your\nflower-garden, Molly.\"\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXII.\n\nTHE OLD SQUIRE'S TROUBLES.\n\n\nAffairs were going on worse at the Hall than Roger had liked to tell.\nMoreover, very much of the discomfort there arose from \"mere manner,\"\nas people express it, which is always indescribable and indefinable.\nQuiet and passive as Mrs. Hamley had always been in appearance,\nshe was the ruling spirit of the house as long as she lived. The\ndirections to the servants, down to the most minute particulars,\ncame from her sitting-room, or from the sofa on which she lay. Her\nchildren always knew where to find her; and to find her, was to find\nlove and sympathy. Her husband, who was often restless and angry from\none cause or another, always came to her to be smoothed down and\nput right. He was conscious of her pleasant influence over him, and\nbecame at peace with himself when in her presence; just as a child\nis at ease when with some one who is both firm and gentle. But the\nkeystone of the family arch was gone, and the stones of which it\nwas composed began to fall apart. It is always sad when a sorrow of\nthis kind seems to injure the character of the mourning survivors.\nYet, perhaps, this injury may be only temporary or superficial; the\njudgments so constantly passed upon the way in which people bear the\nloss of those whom they have deeply loved, appear to be even more\ncruel, and wrongly meted out, than human judgments generally are. To\ncareless observers, for instance, it would seem as though the Squire\nwas rendered more capricious and exacting, more passionate and\nauthoritative, by his wife's death. The truth was, that it occurred\nat a time when many things came to harass him, and some to bitterly\ndisappoint him; and _she_ was no longer there to whom he used to\ncarry his sore heart for the gentle balm of her sweet words. So the\nsore heart ached and smarted intensely; and often, when he saw how\nhis violent conduct affected others, he could have cried out for\ntheir pity, instead of their anger and resentment: \"Have mercy upon\nme, for I am very miserable.\" How often have such dumb thoughts gone\nup from the hearts of those who have taken hold of their sorrow\nby the wrong end, as prayers against sin! And when the Squire saw\nthat his servants were learning to dread him, and his first-born to\navoid him, he did not blame them. He knew he was becoming a domestic\ntyrant; it seemed as if all circumstances conspired against him, and\nas if he was too weak to struggle with them; else, why did everything\nin doors and out of doors go so wrong just now, when all he could\nhave done, had things been prosperous, was to have submitted, in very\nimperfect patience, to the loss of his wife? But just when he needed\nready money to pacify Osborne's creditors, the harvest had turned out\nremarkably plentiful, and the price of corn had sunk down to a level\nit had not touched for years. The Squire had insured his life at the\ntime of his marriage for a pretty large sum. It was to be a provision\nfor his wife, if she survived him, and for their younger children.\nRoger was the only representative of these interests now; but the\nSquire was unwilling to lose the insurance by ceasing to pay the\nannual sum. He would not, if he could, have sold any part of the\nestate which he inherited from his father; and, besides, it was\nstrictly entailed. He had sometimes thought how wise a step it\nwould have been could he have sold a portion of it, and with the\npurchase-money have drained and reclaimed the remainder; and at\nlength, learning from some neighbour that Government would make\ncertain advances for drainage, &c., at a very low rate of interest,\non condition that the work was done, and the money repaid, within a\ngiven time, his wife had urged him to take advantage of the proffered\nloan. But now that she was no longer there to encourage him, and take\nan interest in the progress of the work, he grew indifferent to it\nhimself, and cared no more to go out on his stout roan cob, and sit\nsquare on his seat, watching the labourers on the marshy land all\novergrown with rushes; speaking to them from time to time in their\nown strong nervous country dialect: but the interest to Government\nhad to be paid all the same, whether the men worked well or ill.\nThen the roof of the Hall let in the melted snow-water this winter;\nand, on examination, it turned out that a new roof was absolutely\nrequired. The men who had come about the advances made to Osborne by\nthe London money-lender, had spoken disparagingly of the timber on\nthe estate--\"Very fine trees--sound, perhaps, too, fifty years ago,\nbut gone to rot now; had wanted lopping and clearing. Was there no\nwood-ranger or forester? They were nothing like the value young Mr.\nHamley had represented them to be.\" The remarks had come round to\nthe squire's ears. He loved the trees he had played under as a boy\nas if they were living creatures; that was on the romantic side of\nhis nature. Merely looking at them as representing so many pounds\nsterling, he had esteemed them highly, and had had, until now,\nno opinion of another by which to correct his own judgment. So\nthese words of the valuers cut him sharp, although he affected to\ndisbelieve them, and tried to persuade himself that he did so. But,\nafter all, these cares and disappointments did not touch the root of\nhis deep resentment against Osborne. There is nothing like wounded\naffection for giving poignancy to anger. And the Squire believed that\nOsborne and his advisers had been making calculations, based upon his\nown death. He hated the idea so much--it made him so miserable--that\nhe would not face it, and define it, and meet it with full inquiry\nand investigation. He chose rather to cherish the morbid fancy that\nhe was useless in this world--born under an unlucky star--that all\nthings went badly under his management. But he did not become humble\nin consequence. He put his misfortunes down to the score of Fate--not\nto his own; and he imagined that Osborne saw his failures, and that\nhis first-born grudged him his natural term of life. All these\nfancies would have been set to rights could he have talked them over\nwith his wife; or even had he been accustomed to mingle much in\nthe society of those whom he esteemed his equals; but, as has been\nstated, he was inferior in education to those who should have been\nhis mates; and perhaps the jealousy and _mauvaise honte_ that this\ninferiority had called out long ago, extended itself in some measure\nto the feelings he entertained towards his sons--less to Roger\nthan to Osborne, though the former was turning out by far the most\ndistinguished man. But Roger was practical; interested in all\nout-of-doors things, and he enjoyed the details, homely enough, which\nhis father sometimes gave him of the every-day occurrences which\nthe latter had noticed in the woods and the fields. Osborne, on the\ncontrary, was what is commonly called \"fine;\" delicate almost to\neffeminacy in dress and in manner; careful in small observances. All\nthis his father had been rather proud of in the days when he looked\nforward to a brilliant career at Cambridge for his son; he had at\nthat time regarded Osborne's fastidiousness and elegance as another\nstepping-stone to the high and prosperous marriage which was to\nrestore the ancient fortunes of the Hamley family. But now that\nOsborne had barely obtained his degree; that all the boastings of his\nfather had proved vain; that the fastidiousness had led to unexpected\nexpenses (to attribute the most innocent cause to Osborne's debts),\nthe poor young man's ways and manners became a subject of irritation\nto his father. Osborne was still occupied with his books and his\nwritings when he was at home; and this mode of passing the greater\npart of the day gave him but few subjects in common with his father\nwhen they did meet at meal times, or in the evenings. Perhaps if\nOsborne had been able to have more out-of-door amusements it would\nhave been better; but he was short-sighted, and cared little for the\ncarefully observant pursuits of his brother; he knew but few young\nmen of his own standing in the county; his hunting even, of which he\nwas passionately fond, had been curtailed this season, as his father\nhad disposed of one of the two hunters he had been hitherto allowed.\nThe whole stable establishment had been reduced; perhaps because it\nwas the economy which told most on the enjoyment of both the Squire\nand Osborne, and which, therefore, the former took a savage pleasure\nin enforcing. The old carriage--a heavy family coach bought in the\ndays of comparative prosperity--was no longer needed after madam's\ndeath, and fell to pieces in the cobwebbed seclusion of the\ncoach-house. The best of the two carriage-horses was taken for a gig,\nwhich the Squire now set up; saying many a time to all who might\ncare to listen to him that it was the first time for generations\nthat the Hamleys of Hamley had not been able to keep their own coach.\nThe other carriage-horse was turned out to grass; being too old for\nregular work. Conqueror used to come whinnying up to the park palings\nwhenever he saw the Squire, who had always a piece of bread, or some\nsugar, or an apple for the old favourite; and would make many a\ncomplaining speech to the dumb animal, telling him of the change of\ntimes since both were in their prime. It had never been the Squire's\ncustom to encourage his boys to invite their friends to the Hall.\nPerhaps this, too, was owing to his _mauvaise honte_, and also to an\nexaggerated consciousness of the deficiencies of his establishment as\ncompared with what he imagined these lads were accustomed to at home.\nHe explained this once or twice to Osborne and Roger when they were\nat Rugby.\n\n\"You see, all you public schoolboys have a kind of freemasonry of\nyour own, and outsiders are looked on by you much as I look on\nrabbits and all that isn't game. Ay, you may laugh, but it is so; and\nyour friends will throw their eyes askance at me, and never think on\nmy pedigree, which would beat theirs all to shivers, I'll be bound.\nNo; I'll have no one here at the Hall who will look down on a Hamley\nof Hamley, even if he only knows how to make a cross instead of write\nhis name.\"\n\nThen, of course, they must not visit at houses to whose sons the\nSquire could not or would not return a like hospitality. On all these\npoints Mrs. Hamley had used her utmost influence without avail;\nhis prejudices were immoveable. As regarded his position as head\nof the oldest family in three counties, his pride was invincible;\nas regarded himself personally--ill at ease in the society of\nhis equals, deficient in manners, and in education--his morbid\nsensitiveness was too sore and too self-conscious to be called\nhumility.\n\nTake one instance from among many similar scenes of the state of\nfeeling between him and his eldest son, which, if it could not be\ncalled active discord, showed at least passive estrangement.\n\nIt took place on an evening in the March succeeding Mrs. Hamley's\ndeath. Roger was at Cambridge. Osborne had also been from home, and\nhe had not volunteered any information as to his absence. The Squire\nbelieved that Osborne had been either at Cambridge with his brother,\nor in London; he would have liked to hear where his son had been,\nwhat he had been doing, and whom he had seen, purely as pieces of\nnews, and as some diversion from the domestic worries and cares which\nwere pressing him hard; but he was too proud to ask any questions,\nand Osborne had not given him any details of his journey. This\nsilence had aggravated the Squire's internal dissatisfaction, and\nhe came home to dinner weary and sore-hearted a day or two after\nOsborne's return. It was just six o'clock, and he went hastily into\nhis own little business-room on the ground-floor, and, after washing\nhis hands, came into the drawing-room feeling as if he were very\nlate, but the room was empty. He glanced at the clock over the\nmantel-piece, as he tried to warm his hands at the fire. The fire had\nbeen neglected, and had gone out during the day; it was now piled up\nwith half-dried wood, which sputtered and smoked instead of doing its\nduty in blazing and warming the room, through which the keen wind was\ncutting its way in all directions. The clock had stopped, no one had\nremembered to wind it up, but by the squire's watch it was already\npast dinner-time. The old butler put his head into the room, but,\nseeing the squire alone, he was about to draw it back, and wait\nfor Mr. Osborne, before announcing dinner. He had hoped to do this\nunperceived, but the squire caught him in the act.\n\n\"Why isn't dinner ready?\" he called out sharply. \"It's ten minutes\npast six. And, pray, why are you using this wood? It's impossible to\nget oneself warm by such a fire as this.\"\n\n\"I believe, sir, that Thomas--\"\n\n\"Don't talk to me of Thomas. Send dinner in directly.\"\n\nAbout five minutes elapsed, spent by the hungry Squire in all sorts\nof impatient ways--attacking Thomas, who came in to look after\nthe fire; knocking the logs about, scattering out sparks, but\nconsiderably lessening the chances of warmth; touching up the\ncandles, which appeared to him to give a light unusually insufficient\nfor the large cold room. While he was doing this, Osborne came in\ndressed in full evening dress. He always moved slowly; and this, to\nbegin with, irritated the Squire. Then an uncomfortable consciousness\nof a black coat, drab trousers, checked cotton cravat, and splashed\nboots, forced itself upon him as he saw Osborne's point-device\ncostume. He chose to consider it affectation and finery in Osborne,\nand was on the point of bursting out with some remark, when the\nbutler, who had watched Osborne downstairs before making the\nannouncement, came in to say dinner was ready.\n\n\"It surely isn't six o'clock?\" said Osborne, pulling out his dainty\nlittle watch. He was scarcely more unaware than it of the storm that\nwas brewing.\n\n\"Six o'clock! It's more than a quarter past,\" growled out his father.\n\n\"I fancy your watch must be wrong, sir. I set mine by the Horse\nGuards only two days ago.\"\n\nNow, impugning that old steady, turnip-shaped watch of the Squire's\nwas one of the insults which, as it could not reasonably be resented,\nwas not to be forgiven. That watch had been given him by his\nfather when watches were watches long ago. It had given the law to\nhouse-clocks, stable-clocks, kitchen-clocks--nay, even to Hamley\nChurch clock in its day; and was it now, in its respectable old age,\nto be looked down upon by a little whipper-snapper of a French watch\nwhich could go into a man's waistcoat pocket, instead of having to\nbe extricated, with due effort, like a respectable watch of size and\nposition, from a fob in the waistband? No! not if the whipper-snapper\nwere backed by all the Horse Guards that ever were, with the Life\nGuards to boot. Poor Osborne might have known better than to cast\nthis slur on his father's flesh and blood; for so dear did he hold\nhis watch!\n\n\"My watch is like myself,\" said the squire, 'girning,' as the Scotch\nsay--\"plain, but steady-going. At any rate, it gives the law in my\nhouse. The King may go by the Horse Guards if he likes.\"\n\n\"I beg your pardon, sir,\" said Osborne, really anxious to keep the\npeace, \"I went by my watch, which is certainly right by London time;\nand I'd no idea you were waiting for me; otherwise I could have\ndressed much quicker.\"\n\n\"I should think so,\" said the Squire, looking sarcastically at his\nson's attire. \"When I was a young man I should have been ashamed to\nhave spent as much time at my looking-glass as if I'd been a girl.\nI could make myself as smart as any one when I was going to a dance,\nor to a party where I was likely to meet pretty girls; but I should\nhave laughed myself to scorn if I'd stood fiddle-faddling at a glass,\nsmirking at my own likeness, all for my own pleasure.\"\n\nOsborne reddened, and was on the point of letting fly some caustic\nremark on his father's dress at the present moment; but he contented\nhimself with saying, in a low voice,--\n\n\"My mother always expected us all to dress for dinner. I got into the\nhabit of doing it to please her, and I keep it up now.\" Indeed, he\nhad a certain kind of feeling of loyalty to her memory in keeping\nup all the little domestic habits and customs she had instituted or\npreferred. But the contrast which the Squire thought was implied by\nOsborne's remark, put him beside himself.\n\n\"And I, too, try to attend to her wishes. I do; and in more important\nthings. I did when she was alive; and I do so now.\"\n\n\"I never said you did not,\" said Osborne, astonished at his father's\npassionate words and manner.\n\n\"Yes, you did, sir. You meant it. I could see by your looks. I saw\nyou look at my morning coat. At any rate, I never neglected any wish\nof hers in her lifetime. If she'd wished me to go to school again\nand learn my A, B, C, I would. By ---- I would; and I wouldn't have\ngone playing me, and lounging away my time, for fear of vexing and\ndisappointing her. Yet some folks older than school-boys--\"\n\nThe squire choked here; but though the words would not come his\npassion did not diminish. \"I'll not have you casting up your mother's\nwishes to me, sir. You, who went near to break her heart at last!\"\n\nOsborne was strongly tempted to get up and leave the room. Perhaps it\nwould have been better if he had; it might then have brought about\nan explanation, and a reconciliation between father and son. But he\nthought he did well in sitting still and appearing to take no notice.\nThis indifference to what he was saying appeared to annoy the Squire\nstill more, and he kept on grumbling and talking to himself till\nOsborne, unable to bear it any longer, said, very quietly, but very\nbitterly--\n\n\"I am only a cause of irritation to you, and home is no longer home\nto me, but a place in which I am to be controlled in trifles, and\nscolded about trifles as if I were a child. Put me in a way of making\na living for myself--that much your oldest son has a right to ask of\nyou--I will then leave this house, and you shall be no longer vexed\nby my dress, or my want of punctuality.\"\n\n\"You make your request pretty much as another son did long ago: 'Give\nme the portion that falleth to me.' But I don't think what he did\nwith his money is much encouragement for me to--.\" Then the thought\nof how little he could give his son his \"portion,\" or any part of it,\nstopped the Squire.\n\nOsborne took up the speech.\n\n\"I'm as ready as any man to earn my living; only the preparation for\nany profession will cost money, and money I haven't got.\"\n\n\"No more have I,\" said the Squire, shortly.\n\n\"What is to be done then?\" said Osborne, only half believing his\nfather's words.\n\n\"Why, you must learn to stop at home, and not take expensive\njourneys; and you must reduce your tailor's bill. I don't ask you\nto help me in the management of the land--you're far too fine a\ngentleman for that; but if you can't earn money, at least you needn't\nspend it.\"\n\n\"I've told you I'm willing enough to earn money,\" cried Osborne,\npassionately at last. \"But how am I to do it? You really are very\nunreasonable, sir.\"\n\n\"Am I?\" said the Squire--cooling in manner, though not in temper, as\nOsborne grew warm. \"But I don't set up for being reasonable; men who\nhave to pay away money that they haven't got for their extravagant\nsons aren't likely to be reasonable. There's two things you've gone\nand done which put me beside myself, when I think of them; you've\nturned out next door to a dunce at college, when your poor mother\nthought so much of you--and when you might have pleased and gratified\nher so if you chose--and, well! I won't say what the other thing is.\"\n\n\"Tell me, sir,\" said Osborne, almost breathless with the idea that\nhis father had discovered his secret marriage; but the father was\nthinking of the money-lenders, who were calculating how soon Osborne\nwould come into the estate.\n\n\"No!\" said the Squire. \"I know what I know; and I'm not going to\ntell you how I know it. Only, I'll just say this--your friends no\nmore know a piece of good timber when they see it than you or I know\nhow you could earn five pounds if it was to keep you from starving.\nNow, there's Roger--we none of us made an ado about him; but he'll\nhave his Fellowship now, I'll warrant him, and be a bishop, or a\nchancellor, or something, before we've found out he's clever--we've\nbeen so much taken up thinking about you. I don't know what's come\nover me to speak of 'we'--'we' in this way,\" said he, suddenly\ndropping his voice,--a change of tone as sad as sad could be. \"I\nought to say 'I;' it will be 'I' for evermore in this world.\"\n\nHe got up and left the room in quick haste, knocking over his chair,\nand not stopping to pick it up. Osborne, who was sitting and shading\nhis eyes with his hand, as he had been doing for some time, looked up\nat the noise, and then rose as quickly and hurried after his father,\nonly in time to hear the study-door locked on the inside the moment\nhe reached it.\n\nOsborne returned into the dining-room chagrined and sorrowful. But he\nwas always sensitive to any omission of the usual observances, which\nmight excite remark; and even with his heavy heart he was careful to\npick up the fallen chair, and restore it to its place near the bottom\nof the table; and afterwards so to disturb the dishes as to make it\nappear that they had been touched, before ringing for Robinson. When\nthe latter came in, followed by Thomas, Osborne thought it necessary\nto say to him that his father was not well, and had gone into the\nstudy; and that he himself wanted no dessert, but would have a cup\nof coffee in the drawing-room. The old butler sent Thomas out of the\nroom, and came up confidentially to Osborne.\n\n\"I thought master wasn't justly himself, Mr. Osborne, before dinner.\nAnd, therefore, I made excuses for him--I did. He spoke to Thomas\nabout the fire, sir, which is a thing I could in nowise put up\nwith, unless by reason of sickness, which I am always ready to make\nallowances for.\"\n\n\"Why shouldn't my father speak to Thomas?\" said Osborne. \"But,\nperhaps, he spoke angrily, I daresay; for I'm sure he's not well.\"\n\n\"No, Mr. Osborne, it wasn't that. I myself am given to anger; and I'm\nblessed with as good health as any man in my years. Besides, anger's\na good thing for Thomas. He needs a deal of it. But it should come\nfrom the right quarter--and that is me, myself, Mr. Osborne. I know\nmy place, and I know my rights and duties as well as any butler that\nlives. And it's my duty to scold Thomas, and not master's. Master\nought to have said, 'Robinson! you must speak to Thomas about letting\nout the fire,' and I'd ha' given it him well,--as I shall do now,\nfor that matter. But as I said before, I make excuses for master,\nas being in mental distress and bodily ill-health; so I've brought\nmyself round not to give warning, as I should ha' done, for certain,\nunder happier circumstances.\"\n\n\"Really, Robinson, I think it's all great nonsense,\" said Osborne,\nweary of the long story the butler had told him, and to which he\nhad not half attended. \"What in the world does it signify whether\nmy father speaks to you or to Thomas? Bring me coffee in the\ndrawing-room, and don't trouble your head any more about scolding\nThomas.\"\n\nRobinson went away offended at his grievance being called nonsense.\nHe kept muttering to himself in the intervals of scolding Thomas, and\nsaying,--\"Things is a deal changed since poor missis went. I don't\nwonder master feels it, for I'm sure I do. She was a lady who had\nalways a becoming respect for a butler's position, and could have\nunderstood how he might be hurt in his mind. She'd never ha' called\nhis delicacies of feelings nonsense--not she; no more would Mr.\nRoger. He's a merry young gentleman, and over fond of bringing dirty,\nslimy creatures into the house; but he's always a kind word for a man\nwho is hurt in his mind. He'd cheer up the Squire, and keep him from\ngetting so cross and wilful. I wish Mr. Roger was here, I do.\"\n\nThe poor Squire, shut up with his grief, and his ill-temper as well,\nin the dingy, dreary study where he daily spent more and more of\nhis indoors life, turned over his cares and troubles till he was as\nbewildered with the process as a squirrel must be in going round in\na cage. He had out day-books and ledgers, and was calculating up\nback-rents; and every time the sum-totals came to different amounts.\nHe could have cried like a child over his sums; he was worn out and\nweary, angry and disappointed. He closed his books at last with a\nbang.\n\n\"I'm getting old,\" he said, \"and my head's less clear than it used to\nbe. I think sorrow for her has dazed me. I never was much to boast\non; but she thought a deal of me--bless her! She'd never let me call\nmyself stupid; but, for all that, I am stupid. Osborne ought to help\nme. He's had money enough spent on his learning; but, instead, he\ncomes down dressed like a popinjay, and never troubles his head to\nthink how I'm to pay his debts. I wish I'd told him to earn his\nliving as a dancing-master,\" said the squire, with a sad smile at his\nown wit. \"He's dressed for all the world like one. And how he's spent\nthe money no one knows! Perhaps Roger will turn up some day with a\nheap of creditors at his heels. No, he won't--not Roger; he may be\nslow, but he's steady, is old Roger. I wish he was here. He's not the\neldest son, but he'd take an interest in the estate; and he'd do up\nthese weary accounts for me. I wish Roger was here!\"\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXIII.\n\nOSBORNE HAMLEY REVIEWS HIS POSITION.\n\n\nOsborne had his solitary cup of coffee in the drawing-room. He was\nvery unhappy too, after his fashion. He stood on the hearth-rug\npondering over his situation. He was not exactly aware how hardly\nhis father was pressed for ready-money; the Squire had never spoken\nto him on the subject without being angry; and many of his loose\ncontradictory statements--all of which, however contradictory they\nmight appear, had their basis in truth--were set down by his son\nto the exaggeration of passion. But it was uncomfortable enough to\na young man of Osborne's age to feel himself continually hampered\nfor want of a five-pound note. The principal supplies for the\nliberal--almost luxurious table at the Hall, came off the estate; so\nthat there was no appearance of poverty as far as the household went;\nand as long as Osborne was content at home, he had everything he\ncould wish for; but he had a wife elsewhere--he wanted to see her\ncontinually--and that necessitated journeys. She, poor thing! had to\nbe supported--where was the money for the journeys and for Aimée's\nmodest wants to come from? That was the puzzle in Osborne's mind\njust now. While he had been at college his allowance--heir of the\nHamleys--had been three hundred, while Roger had to be content with a\nhundred less. The payment of these annual sums had given the Squire\na good deal of trouble; but he thought of it as a merely temporary\ninconvenience; perhaps unreasonably thought so. Osborne was to\ndo great things; take high honours, get a fellowship, marry a\nlong-descended heiress, live in some of the many uninhabited rooms at\nthe Hall, and help the squire in the management of the estate that\nwould some time be his. Roger was to be a clergyman; steady, slow\nRoger was just fitted for that, and when he declined entering the\nChurch, preferring a life of more activity and adventure, Roger was\nto be--anything; he was useful and practical, and fit for all the\nemployments from which Osborne was shut out by his fastidiousness,\nand his (pseudo) genius; so it was well he was an eldest son, for he\nwould never have done to struggle through the world; and as for his\nsettling down to a profession, it would be like cutting blocks with\na razor! And now here was Osborne, living at home, but longing to be\nelsewhere; his allowance stopped in reality; indeed, the punctual\npayment of it during the last year or two had been owing to his\nmother's exertions; but nothing had been said about its present\ncessation by either father or son; money matters were too sore a\nsubject between them. Every now and then the Squire threw him a\nten-pound note or so; but the sort of suppressed growl with which it\nwas given, and the entire uncertainty as to when he might receive\nsuch gifts, rendered any calculation based upon their receipt\nexceedingly vague and uncertain.\n\n\"What in the world can I do to secure an income?\" thought Osborne, as\nhe stood on the hearth-rug, his back to a blazing fire, his cup of\ncoffee sent up in the rare old china that had belonged to the Hall\nfor generations; his dress finished, as dress of Osborne's could\nhardly fail to be. One could hardly have thought that this elegant\nyoung man, standing there in the midst of comfort that verged on\nluxury, should have been turning over that one great problem in his\nmind; but so it was. \"What can I do to be sure of a present income?\nThings cannot go on as they are. I should need support for two or\nthree years, even if I entered myself at the Temple, or Lincoln's\nInn. It would be impossible to live on my pay in the army; besides,\nI should hate that profession. In fact, there are evils attending all\nprofessions--I couldn't bring myself to become a member of any I've\never heard of. Perhaps I'm more fitted to take 'orders' than anything\nelse; but to be compelled to write weekly sermons whether one had\nanything to say or not, and, probably, doomed only to associate with\npeople below one in refinement and education! Yet poor Aimée must\nhave money. I can't bear to compare our dinners here, overloaded with\njoints and game and sweets, as Morgan will persist in sending them\nup, with Aimée's two little mutton-chops. Yet what would my father\nsay if he knew I'd married a Frenchwoman? In his present mood he'd\ndisinherit me, if that is possible; and he'd speak about her in a way\nI couldn't stand. A Roman Catholic, too! Well, I don't repent it. I'd\ndo it again. Only if my mother had been in good health--if she could\nhave heard my story, and known Aimée! As it is I must keep it secret;\nbut where to get money? Where to get money?\"\n\nThen he bethought him of his poems--would they sell, and bring him\nin money? In spite of Milton, he thought they might; and he went to\nfetch his MSS. out of his room. He sate down near the fire, trying to\nstudy them with a critical eye, to represent public opinion as far as\nhe could. He had changed his style since the Mrs. Hemans' days. He\nwas essentially imitative in his poetic faculty; and of late he had\nfollowed the lead of a popular writer of sonnets. He turned his poems\nover: they were almost equivalent to an autobiographical passage in\nhis life. Arranging them in their order, they came as follows:--\n\n\"To Aimée, Walking with a Little Child.\"\n\n\"To Aimée, Singing at her Work.\"\n\n\"To Aimée, Turning away from me while I told my Love.\"\n\n\"Aimée's Confession.\"\n\n\"Aimée in Despair.\"\n\n\"The Foreign Land in which my Aimée dwells.\"\n\n\"The Wedding Ring.\"\n\n\"The Wife.\"\n\nWhen he came to this last sonnet he put down his bundle of papers\nand began to think. \"The wife.\" Yes, and a French wife; and a\nRoman Catholic wife--and a wife who might be said to have been in\nservice! And his father's hatred of the French, both collectively\nand individually--collectively, as tumultuous brutal ruffians,\nwho murdered their king, and committed all kinds of bloody\natrocities--individually, as represented by \"Boney,\" and the various\ncaricatures of \"Johnny Crapaud\" that had been in full circulation\nabout five-and-twenty years before this time, when the Squire had\nbeen young and capable of receiving impressions. As for the form of\nreligion in which Mrs. Osborne Hamley had been brought up, it is\nenough to say that Catholic emancipation had begun to be talked about\nby some politicians, and that the sullen roar of the majority of\nEnglishmen, at the bare idea of it, was surging in the distance with\nominous threatenings; the very mention of such a measure before the\nSquire was, as Osborne well knew, like shaking a red flag before a\nbull.\n\nAnd then he considered that if Aimée had had the unspeakable, the\nincomparable blessing of being born of English parents, in the very\nheart of England--Warwickshire, for instance--and had never heard\nof priests, or mass, or confession, or the Pope, or Guy Fawkes, but\nhad been born, baptized, and bred in the Church of England, without\nhaving ever seen the outside of a dissenting meeting-house, or a\npapist chapel--even with all these advantages, her having been a\n(what was the equivalent for \"bonne\" in English? 'nursery-governess'\nwas a term hardly invented) nursery-maid, with wages paid down once a\nquarter, liable to be dismissed at a month's warning, and having her\ntea and sugar doled out to her, would be a shock to his father's old\nancestral pride that he would hardly ever get over.\n\n\"If he saw her!\" thought Osborne. \"If he could but see her!\" But if\nthe Squire were to see Aimée, he would also hear her speak her pretty\nbroken English--precious to her husband, as it was in it that she\nhad confessed brokenly with her English tongue, that she loved him\nsoundly with her French heart--and Squire Hamley piqued himself on\nbeing a good hater of the French. \"She would make such a loving,\nsweet, docile little daughter to my father--she would go as near as\nany one could towards filling up the blank void in this house, if he\nwould but have her; but he won't; he never would; and he sha'n't have\nthe opportunity of scouting her. Yet if I called her 'Lucy' in these\nsonnets; and if they made a great effect--were praised in _Blackwood_\nand the _Quarterly_--and all the world was agog to find out the\nauthor; and I told him my secret--I could if I were successful--I\nthink then he would ask who Lucy was, and I could tell him all then.\nIf--how I hate 'ifs.' 'If me no ifs.' My life has been based on\n'whens;' and first they have turned to 'ifs,' and then they have\nvanished away. It was 'when Osborne gets honours,' and then 'if\nOsborne,' and then a failure altogether. I said to Aimée, 'when my\nmother sees you,' and now it is 'if my father saw her,' with a very\nfaint prospect of its ever coming to pass.\" So he let the evening\nhours flow on and disappear in reveries like these; winding up with\na sudden determination to try the fate of his poems with a publisher,\nwith the direct expectation of getting money for them, and an\nulterior fancy that, if successful, they might work wonders with his\nfather.\n\nWhen Roger came home Osborne did not let a day pass before telling\nhis brother of his plans. He never did conceal anything long from\nRoger; the feminine part of his character made him always desirous of\na confidant, and as sweet sympathy as he could extract. But Roger's\nopinion had no effect on Osborne's actions; and Roger knew this full\nwell. So when Osborne began with--\"I want your advice on a plan\nI have got in my head,\" Roger replied: \"Some one told me that the\nDuke of Wellington's maxim was never to give advice unless he could\nenforce its being carried into effect; now I can't do that; and you\nknow, old boy, you don't follow out my advice when you've got it.\"\n\n\"Not always, I know. Not when it doesn't agree with my own opinion.\nYou're thinking about this concealment of my marriage; but you're\nnot up in all the circumstances. You know how fully I meant to have\ndone it, if there hadn't been that row about my debts; and then my\nmother's illness and death. And now you've no conception how my\nfather is changed--how irritable he has become! Wait till you've been\nat home a week! Robinson, Morgan--it's the same with them all; but\nworst of all with me.\"\n\n\"Poor fellow!\" said Roger; \"I thought he looked terribly changed:\nshrunken, and his ruddiness of complexion altered.\"\n\n\"Why, he hardly takes half the exercise he used to do, so it's no\nwonder. He has turned away all the men off the new works, which used\nto be such an interest to him; and because the roan cob stumbled with\nhim one day, and nearly threw him, he won't ride it; and yet he won't\nsell it and buy another, which would be the sensible plan; so there\nare two old horses eating their heads off, while he is constantly\ntalking about money and expense. And that brings me to what I was\ngoing to say. I'm desperately hard up for money, and so I've been\ncollecting my poems--weeding them well, you know--going over them\nquite critically, in fact; and I want to know if you think Deighton\nwould publish them. You've a name in Cambridge, you know; and I\ndaresay he would look at them if you offered them to him.\"\n\n\"I can but try,\" said Roger; \"but I'm afraid you won't get much by\nthem.\"\n\n\"I don't expect much. I'm a new man, and must make my name. I should\nbe content with a hundred. If I'd a hundred pounds I'd set myself to\ndo something. I might keep myself and Aimée by my writings while I\nstudied for the bar; or, if the worst came to the worst, a hundred\npounds would take us to Australia.\"\n\n\"Australia! Why, Osborne, what could you do there? And leave my\nfather! I hope you'll never get your hundred pounds, if that's the\nuse you're to make of it! Why, you'd break the Squire's heart.\"\n\n\"It might have done once,\" said Osborne, gloomily, \"but it wouldn't\nnow. He looks at me askance, and shies away from conversation with\nme. Let me alone for noticing and feeling this kind of thing. It's\nthis very susceptibility to outward things that gives me what faculty\nI have; and it seems to me as if my bread, and my wife's too, were to\ndepend upon it. You'll soon see for yourself the terms which I am on\nwith my father!\"\n\nRoger did soon see. His father had slipped into a habit of silence\nat meal-times--a habit which Osborne, who was troubled and anxious\nenough for his own part, had not striven to break. Father and son\nsate together, and exchanged all the necessary speeches connected\nwith the occasion civilly enough; but it was a relief to them when\ntheir intercourse was over, and they separated--the father to brood\nover his sorrow and his disappointment, which were real and deep\nenough, and the injury he had received from his boy, which was\nexaggerated in his mind by his ignorance of the actual steps Osborne\nhad taken to raise money. If the money-lenders had calculated the\nchances of his father's life or death in making their bargain,\nOsborne himself had thought only of how soon and how easily he could\nget the money requisite for clearing him from all imperious claims\nat Cambridge, and for enabling him to follow Aimée to her home in\nAlsace, and for the subsequent marriage. As yet, Roger had never seen\nhis brother's wife; indeed, he had only been taken into Osborne's\nfull confidence after all was decided in which his advice could have\nbeen useful. And now, in the enforced separation, Osborne's whole\nthought, both the poetical and practical sides of his mind, ran\nupon the little wife who was passing her lonely days in farmhouse\nlodgings, wondering when her bridegroom husband would come to her\nnext. With such an engrossing subject, it was, perhaps, no wonder\nthat he unconsciously neglected his father; but it was none the less\nsad at the time, and to be regretted in its consequences.\n\n\"I may come in and have a pipe with you, sir, mayn't I?\" said Roger,\nthat first evening, pushing gently against the study-door, which his\nfather held only half open.\n\n\"You'll not like it,\" said the squire, still holding the door against\nhim, but speaking in a relenting tone. \"The tobacco I use isn't what\nyoung men like. Better go and have a cigar with Osborne.\"\n\n\"No. I want to sit with you, and I can stand pretty strong tobacco.\"\n\nRoger pushed in, the resistance slowly giving way before him.\n\n\"It will make your clothes smell. You'll have to borrow Osborne's\nscents to sweeten yourself,\" said the Squire, grimly, at the same\ntime pushing a short smart amber-mouthed pipe to his son.\n\n\"No; I'll have a churchwarden. Why, father, do you think I'm a baby\nto put up with a doll's head like this?\" looking at the carving upon\nit.\n\nThe Squire was pleased in his heart, though he did not choose to\nshow it. He only said, \"Osborne brought it me when he came back from\nGermany. That's three years ago.\" And then for some time they smoked\nin silence. But the voluntary companionship of his son was very\nsoothing to the Squire, though not a word might be said.\n\nThe next speech he made showed the direction of his thoughts; indeed,\nhis words were always a transparent medium through which the current\nmight be seen.\n\n\"A deal of a man's life comes and goes in three years--I've found\nthat out;\" and he puffed away at his pipe again. While Roger was\nturning over in his mind what answer to make to this truism, the\nsquire again stopped his smoking and spoke.\n\n\"I remember when there was all that fuss about the Prince of\nWales being made regent, I read somewhere--I daresay it was in a\nnewspaper--that kings and their heirs-apparent were always on bad\nterms. Osborne was quite a little chap then: he used to go out riding\nwith me on White Surrey;--you won't remember the pony we called White\nSurrey?\"\n\n\"I remember it; but I thought it a tall horse in those days.\"\n\n\"Ah! that was because you were such a small lad, you know. I'd seven\nhorses in the stable then--not counting the farm-horses. I don't\nrecollect having a care then, except--_she_ was always delicate, you\nknow. But what a beautiful boy Osborne was! He was always dressed in\nblack velvet--it was a foppery, but it wasn't my doing, and it was\nall right, I'm sure. He's a handsome fellow now, but the sunshine has\ngone out of his face.\"\n\n\"He's a good deal troubled about this money, and the anxiety he has\ngiven you,\" said Roger, rather taking his brother's feelings for\ngranted.\n\n\"Not he,\" said the Squire, taking the pipe out of his mouth, and\nhitting the bowl so sharply against the hob that it broke in pieces.\n\"There! But never mind! I say, not he, Roger! He's none troubled\nabout the money. It's easy getting money from Jews if you're the\neldest son, and the heir. They just ask, 'How old is your father, and\nhas he had a stroke, or a fit?' and it's settled out of hand, and\nthen they come prowling about a place, and running down the timber\nand land--Don't let us speak of him; it's no good, Roger. He and I\nare out of tune, and it seems to me as if only God Almighty could\nput us to rights. It's thinking of how he grieved _her_ at last that\nmakes me so bitter with him. And yet there's a deal of good in him!\nand he's so quick and clever, if only he'd give his mind to things.\nNow, you were always slow, Roger--all your masters used to say so.\"\n\nRoger laughed a little--\n\n\"Yes; I'd many a nickname at school for my slowness,\" said he.\n\n\"Never mind!\" said the Squire, consolingly. \"I'm sure I don't. If you\nwere a clever fellow like Osborne yonder, you'd be all for caring for\nbooks and writing, and you'd perhaps find it as dull as he does to\nkeep company with a bumpkin-squire Jones like me. Yet, I daresay,\nthey think a deal of you at Cambridge,\" said he, after a pause,\n\"since you've got this fine wranglership; I'd nearly forgotten\nthat--the news came at such a miserable time.\"\n\n\"Well, yes! They're always proud of the senior wrangler of the year\nup at Cambridge. Next year I must abdicate.\"\n\nThe Squire sat and gazed into the embers, still holding his useless\npipe-stem. At last he said, in a low voice, as if scarcely aware he\nhad got a listener,--\"I used to write to her when she was away in\nLondon, and tell her the home news. But no letter will reach her now!\nNothing reaches her!\"\n\nRoger started up.\n\n\"Where's the tobacco-box, father? Let me fill you another pipe!\"\nand when he had done so, he stooped over his father and stroked his\ncheek. The Squire shook his head.\n\n\"You've only just come home, lad. You don't know me, as I am\nnow-a-days! Ask Robinson--I won't have you asking Osborne, he ought\nto keep it to himself--but any of the servants will tell you I'm not\nlike the same man for getting into passions with them. I used to\nbe reckoned a good master, but that's past now! Osborne was once a\nlittle boy, and she was once alive--and I was once a good master--a\ngood master--yes! It's all past now.\"\n\nHe took up his pipe, and began to smoke afresh, and Roger, after a\nsilence of some minutes, began a long story about some Cambridge\nman's misadventure on the hunting-field, telling it with such humour\nthat the Squire was beguiled into hearty laughing. When they rose to\ngo to bed his father said to Roger,--\n\n\"Well, we've had a pleasant evening--at least, I have. But perhaps\nyou haven't; for I'm but poor company now, I know.\"\n\n\"I don't know when I've passed a happier evening, father,\" said\nRoger. And he spoke truly, though he did not trouble himself to find\nout the cause of his happiness.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXIV.\n\nMRS. GIBSON'S LITTLE DINNER.\n\n\n[Illustration (untitled)]\n\nAll this had taken place before Roger's first meeting with Molly and\nCynthia at Miss Brownings'; and the little dinner on the Friday at\nMr. Gibson's, which followed in due sequence.\n\nMrs. Gibson intended the Hamleys to find this dinner pleasant; and\nthey did. Mr. Gibson was fond of the two young men, both for their\nparents' sake and their own, for he had known them since boyhood; and\nto those whom he liked Mr. Gibson could be remarkably agreeable. Mrs.\nGibson really gave them a welcome--and cordiality in a hostess is a\nvery becoming mantle for any other deficiencies there may be. Cynthia\nand Molly looked their best, which was all the duty Mrs. Gibson\nabsolutely required of them, as she was willing enough to take her\nfull share in the conversation. Osborne fell to her lot, of course,\nand for some time he and she prattled on with all the ease of manner\nand commonplaceness of meaning which go far to make the \"art of\npolite conversation.\" Roger, who ought to have made himself agreeable\nto one or the other of the young ladies, was exceedingly interested\nin what Mr. Gibson was telling him of a paper on comparative\nosteology in some foreign journal of science, which Lord Hollingford\nwas in the habit of forwarding to his friend the country surgeon.\nYet, every now and then while he listened, he caught his attention\nwandering to the face of Cynthia, who was placed between his brother\nand Mr. Gibson. She was not particularly occupied with attending to\nanything that was going on; her eyelids were carelessly dropped, as\nshe crumbled her bread on the tablecloth, and her beautiful long\neyelashes were seen on the clear tint of her oval cheek. She was\nthinking of something else; Molly was trying to understand with all\nher might. Suddenly Cynthia looked up, and caught Roger's gaze of\nintent admiration too fully for her to be unaware that he was staring\nat her. She coloured a little; but, after the first moment of rosy\nconfusion at his evident admiration of her, she flew to the attack,\ndiverting his confusion at thus being caught, to the defence of\nhimself from her accusation.\n\n\"It is quite true!\" she said to him. \"I was not attending: you see\nI don't know even the A B C of science. But, please, don't look so\nseverely at me, even if I am a dunce!\"\n\n\"I didn't know--I didn't mean to look severely, I am sure,\" replied\nhe, not knowing well what to say.\n\n\"Cynthia is not a dunce either,\" said Mrs. Gibson, afraid lest her\ndaughter's opinion of herself might be taken seriously. \"But I have\nalways observed that some people have a talent for one thing and\nsome for another. Now Cynthia's talents are not for science and the\nseverer studies. Do you remember, love, what trouble I had to teach\nyou the use of the globes?\"\n\n\"Yes; and I don't know longitude from latitude now; and I'm always\npuzzled as to which is perpendicular and which is horizontal.\"\n\n\"Yet, I do assure you,\" her mother continued, rather addressing\nherself to Osborne, \"that her memory for poetry is prodigious. I have\nheard her repeat the 'Prisoner of Chillon' from beginning to end.\"\n\n\"It would be rather a bore to have to hear her, I think,\" said Mr.\nGibson, smiling at Cynthia, who gave him back one of her bright looks\nof mutual understanding.\n\n\"Ah, Mr. Gibson, I have found out before now that you have no soul\nfor poetry; and Molly there is your own child. She reads such deep\nbooks--all about facts and figures: she'll be quite a blue-stocking\nby-and-by.\"\n\n\"Mamma,\" said Molly, reddening, \"you think it was a deep book because\nthere were the shapes of the different cells of bees in it! but it\nwas not at all deep. It was very interesting.\"\n\n\"Never mind, Molly,\" said Osborne. \"I stand up for blue-stockings.\"\n\n\"And I object to the distinction implied in what you say,\" said\nRoger. \"It was not deep, _ergo_, it was very interesting. Now, a book\nmay be both deep and interesting.\"\n\n\"Oh, if you are going to chop logic and use Latin words, I think it\nis time for us to leave the room,\" said Mrs. Gibson.\n\n\"Don't let us run away as if we were beaten, mamma,\" said Cynthia.\n\"Though it may be logic, I, for one, can understand what Mr. Roger\nHamley said just now; and I read some of Molly's books; and whether\nit was deep or not I found it very interesting--more so than I should\nthink the 'Prisoner of Chillon' now-a-days. I've displaced the\nPrisoner to make room for Johnnie Gilpin as my favourite poem.\"\n\n\"How could you talk such nonsense, Cynthia!\" said Mrs. Gibson, as the\ngirls followed her upstairs. \"You know you are not a dunce. It is all\nvery well not to be a blue-stocking, because gentle-people don't like\nthat kind of woman; but running yourself down, and contradicting all\nI said about your liking for Byron, and poets and poetry--to Osborne\nHamley of all men, too!\"\n\nMrs. Gibson spoke quite crossly for her.\n\n\"But, mamma,\" Cynthia replied, \"I am either a dunce, or I am not. If\nI am, I did right to own it; if I am not, he's a dunce if he doesn't\nfind out I was joking.\"\n\n\"Well,\" said Mrs. Gibson, a little puzzled by this speech, and\nwanting some elucidatory addition.\n\n\"Only that if he's a dunce his opinion of me is worth nothing. So,\nany way, it doesn't signify.\"\n\n\"You really bewilder me with your nonsense, child. Molly is worth\ntwenty of you.\"\n\n\"I quite agree with you, mamma,\" said Cynthia, turning round to take\nMolly's hand.\n\n\"Yes; but she ought not to be,\" said Mrs. Gibson, still irritated.\n\"Think of the advantages you've had.\"\n\n\"I'm afraid I had rather be a dunce than a blue-stocking,\" said\nMolly; for the term had a little annoyed her, and the annoyance was\nrankling still.\n\n\"Hush; here they are coming: I hear the dining-room door! I never\nmeant you were a blue-stocking, dear, so don't look vexed.--Cynthia,\nmy love, where did you get those lovely flowers--anemones, are they?\nThey suit your complexion so exactly.\"\n\n\"Come, Molly, don't look so grave and thoughtful,\" exclaimed Cynthia.\n\"Don't you perceive mamma wants us to be smiling and amiable?\"\n\nMr. Gibson had had to go out to his evening round; and the young men\nwere all too glad to come up into the pretty drawing-room; the bright\nlittle wood-fire; the comfortable easy-chairs which, with so small\na party, might be drawn round the hearth; the good-natured hostess;\nthe pretty, agreeable girls. Roger sauntered up to the corner where\nCynthia was standing, playing with a hand-screen.\n\n\"There is a charity ball in Hollingford soon, isn't there?\" asked he.\n\n\"Yes; on Easter Tuesday,\" she replied.\n\n\"Are you going? I suppose you are?\"\n\n\"Yes; mamma is going to take Molly and me.\"\n\n\"You will enjoy it very much--going together?\"\n\nFor the first time during this little conversation she glanced up at\nhim--real honest pleasure shining out of her eyes.\n\n\"Yes; going together will make the enjoyment of the thing. It would\nbe dull without her.\"\n\n\"You are great friends, then?\" he asked.\n\n\"I never thought I should like any one so much,--any girl I mean.\"\n\nShe put in the final reservation in all simplicity of heart; and in\nall simplicity did he understand it. He came ever so little nearer,\nand dropped his voice a little.\n\n\"I was so anxious to know. I am so glad. I have often wondered how\nyou two were getting on.\"\n\n\"Have you?\" said she, looking up again. \"At Cambridge? You must be\nvery fond of Molly!\"\n\n\"Yes, I am. She was with us so long; and at such a time! I look upon\nher almost as a sister.\"\n\n\"And she is very fond of all of you. I seem to know you all from\nhearing her talk about you so much.--All of you!\" said she, laying an\nemphasis on \"all\" to show that it included the dead as well as the\nliving. Roger was silent for a minute or two.\n\n\"I didn't know you, even by hearsay. So you mustn't wonder that I was\na little afraid. But as soon as I saw you I knew how it must be; and\nit was such a relief!\"\n\n\"Cynthia,\" said Mrs. Gibson, who thought that the younger son had had\nquite his share of low, confidential conversation, \"come here, and\nsing that little French ballad to Mr. Osborne Hamley.\"\n\n\"Which do you mean, mamma? 'Tu t'en repentiras, Colin?'\"\n\n\"Yes; such a pretty, playful little warning to young men,\" said Mrs.\nGibson, smiling up at Osborne. \"The refrain is--\n\n   Tu t'en repentiras, Colin,\n     Tu t'en repentiras,\n   Car si tu prends une femme, Colin,\n     Tu t'en repentiras.\n\nThe advice may apply very well when there is a French wife in the\ncase; but not, I am sure, to an Englishman who is thinking of an\nEnglish wife.\"\n\n\n[Illustration: \"TU T'EN REPENTIRAS, COLIN.\"]\n\n\nThis choice of a song was exceedingly _mal-àpropos_, had Mrs. Gibson\nbut known it. Osborne and Roger knowing that the wife of the former\nwas a Frenchwoman, and, conscious of each other's knowledge, felt\ndoubly awkward; while Molly was as much confused as though she\nherself were secretly married. However, Cynthia carolled the saucy\nditty out, and her mother smiled at it, in total ignorance of any\napplication it might have. Osborne had instinctively gone to stand\nbehind Cynthia, as she sate at the piano, so as to be ready to turn\nover the leaves of her music if she required it. He kept his hands\nin his pockets and his eyes fixed on her fingers; his countenance\nclouded with gravity at all the merry quips which she so playfully\nsang. Roger looked grave as well, but was much more at his ease than\nhis brother; indeed, he was half-amused by the awkwardness of the\nsituation. He caught Molly's troubled eyes and heightened colour, and\nhe saw that she was feeling this _contretemps_ more seriously than\nshe needed to do. He moved to a seat by her, and half whispered, \"Too\nlate a warning, is it not?\"\n\nMolly looked up at him as he leant towards her, and replied in the\nsame tone--\"Oh, I am so sorry!\"\n\n\"You need not be. He won't mind it long; and a man must take the\nconsequences when he puts himself in a false position.\"\n\nMolly could not tell what to reply to this, so she hung her head\nand kept silence. Yet she could see that Roger did not change his\nattitude or remove his hand from the back of his chair, and, impelled\nby curiosity to find out the cause of his stillness, she looked up at\nhim at length, and saw his gaze fixed on the two who were near the\npiano. Osborne was saying something eagerly to Cynthia, whose grave\neyes were upturned to him with soft intentness of expression, and her\npretty mouth half-open, with a sort of impatience for him to cease\nspeaking, that she might reply.\n\n\"They are talking about France,\" said Roger, in answer to Molly's\nunspoken question. \"Osborne knows it well, and Miss Kirkpatrick has\nbeen at school there, you know. It sounds very interesting; shall we\ngo nearer and hear what they are saying?\"\n\nIt was all very well to ask this civilly, but Molly thought it would\nhave been better to wait for her answer. Instead of waiting, however,\nRoger went to the piano, and, leaning on it, appeared to join in the\nlight merry talk, while he feasted his eyes as much as he dared by\nlooking at Cynthia. Molly suddenly felt as if she could scarcely keep\nfrom crying--a minute ago he had been so near to her, and talking so\npleasantly and confidentially; and now he almost seemed as if he had\nforgotten her existence. She thought that all this was wrong; and\nshe exaggerated its wrongness to herself; \"mean,\" and \"envious of\nCynthia,\" and \"ill-natured,\" and \"selfish,\" were the terms she kept\napplying to herself; but it did no good, she was just as naughty at\nthe last as at the first.\n\nMrs. Gibson broke into the state of things which Molly thought was to\nendure for ever. Her work had been intricate up to this time, and had\nrequired a great deal of counting; so she had had no time to attend\nto her duties, one of which she always took to be to show herself to\nthe world as an impartial stepmother. Cynthia had played and sung,\nand now she must give Molly her turn of exhibition. Cynthia's singing\nand playing was light and graceful, but anything but correct; but\nshe herself was so charming, that it was only fanatics for music who\ncared for false chords and omitted notes. Molly, on the contrary, had\nan excellent ear, if she had ever been well taught; and both from\ninclination and conscientious perseverance of disposition, she would\ngo over an incorrect passage for twenty times. But she was very shy\nof playing in company; and when forced to do it, she went through her\nperformance heavily, and hated her handiwork more than any one.\n\n\"Now, you must play a little, Molly,\" said Mrs. Gibson; \"play us that\nbeautiful piece of Kalkbrenner's, my dear.\"\n\nMolly looked up at her stepmother with beseeching eyes; but it only\nbrought out another form of request, still more like a command.\n\n\"Go at once, my dear. You may not play it quite rightly; and I know\nyou are very nervous; but you're quite amongst friends.\"\n\nSo there was a disturbance made in the little group at the piano, and\nMolly sate down to her martyrdom.\n\n\"Please, go away!\" said she to Osborne, who was standing behind her\nready to turn over. \"I can quite well do it for myself. And oh! if\nyou would but talk!\"\n\nOsborne remained where he was in spite of her appeal, and gave\nher what little approval she got; for Mrs. Gibson, exhausted by\nher previous labour of counting her stitches, fell asleep in her\ncomfortable sofa-corner near the fire; and Roger, who began at first\nto talk a little in compliance with Molly's request, found his\nconversation with Cynthia so agreeable, that Molly lost her place\nseveral times in trying to catch a sudden glimpse of Cynthia sitting\nat her work, and Roger by her, intent on catching her low replies to\nwhat he was saying.\n\n\"There, now I've done!\" said Molly, standing up quickly as soon as\nshe had finished the eighteen dreary pages; \"and I think I will never\nsit down to play again!\"\n\nOsborne laughed at her vehemence. Cynthia began to take some part\nin what was being said, and thus made the conversation general. Mrs.\nGibson wakened up gracefully, as was her way of doing all things, and\nslid into the subjects they were talking about so easily, that she\nalmost succeeded in making them believe she had never been asleep at\nall.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXV.\n\nHOLLINGFORD IN A BUSTLE.\n\n\nAll Hollingford felt as if there was a great deal to be done before\nEaster this year. There was Easter proper, which always required new\nclothing of some kind, for fear of certain consequences from little\nbirds, who were supposed to resent the impiety of those that did\nnot wear some new article of dress on Easter-day. And most ladies\nconsidered it wiser that the little birds should see the new article\nfor themselves, and not have to take it upon trust, as they would\nhave to do if it were merely a pocket-handkerchief, or a petticoat,\nor any article of under-clothing. So piety demanded a new bonnet, or\na new gown; and was barely satisfied with an Easter pair of gloves.\nMiss Rose was generally very busy just before Easter in Hollingford.\nThen this year there was the charity ball. Ashcombe, Hollingford, and\nCoreham were three neighbouring towns, of about the same number of\npopulation, lying at the three equidistant corners of a triangle. In\nimitation of greater cities with their festivals, these three towns\nhad agreed to have an annual ball for the benefit of the county\nhospital to be held in turn at each place; and Hollingford was to be\nthe place this year.\n\nIt was a fine time for hospitality, and every house of any pretension\nwas as full as it could hold, and flys were engaged long months\nbefore.\n\nIf Mrs. Gibson could have asked Osborne, or in default, Roger Hamley\nto go to the ball with them and to sleep at their house,--or if,\nindeed, she could have picked up any stray scion of a \"county family\"\nto whom such an offer would have been a convenience, she would have\nrestored her own dressing-room to its former use as the spare-room,\nwith pleasure. But she did not think it was worth her while to put\nherself out for any of the humdrum and ill-dressed women who had been\nher former acquaintances at Ashcombe. For Mr. Preston it might have\nbeen worth while to give up her room, considering him in the light of\na handsome and prosperous young man, and a good dancer besides. But\nthere were more lights in which he was to be viewed. Mr. Gibson, who\nreally wanted to return the hospitality shown to him by Mr. Preston\nat the time of his marriage, had yet an instinctive distaste to the\nman, which no wish of freeing himself from obligation, nor even the\nmore worthy feeling of hospitality, could overcome. Mrs. Gibson\nhad some old grudges of her own against him, but she was not one\nto retain angry feelings, or be very active in her retaliation;\nshe was afraid of Mr. Preston, and admired him at the same time.\nIt was awkward too--so she said--to go into a ball-room without\nany gentleman at all, and Mr. Gibson was so uncertain! On the\nwhole--partly for this last-given reason, and partly because\nconciliation was the best policy, Mrs. Gibson was slightly in favour\nof inviting Mr. Preston to be their guest. But as soon as Cynthia\nheard the question discussed--or rather, as soon as she heard it\ndiscussed in Mr. Gibson's absence, she said that if Mr. Preston came\nto be their visitor on the occasion, she for one would not go to the\nball at all. She did not speak with vehemence or in anger; but with\nsuch quiet resolution that Molly looked up in surprise. She saw\nthat Cynthia was keeping her eyes fixed on her work, and that she\nhad no intention of meeting any one's gaze, or giving any further\nexplanation. Mrs. Gibson, too, looked perplexed, and once or twice\nseemed on the point of asking some question; but she was not angry\nas Molly had fully expected. She watched Cynthia furtively and in\nsilence for a minute or two, and then said that, after all, she could\nnot conveniently give up her dressing-room; and, altogether, they had\nbetter say no more about it. So no stranger was invited to stay at\nMr. Gibson's at the time of the ball; but Mrs. Gibson openly spoke\nof her regret at the unavoidable inhospitality, and hoped that they\nmight be able to build an addition to their house before the next\ntriennial Hollingford ball.\n\nAnother cause of unusual bustle at Hollingford this Easter was the\nexpected return of the family to the Towers, after their unusually\nlong absence. Mr. Sheepshanks might be seen trotting up and down on\nhis stout old cob, speaking to attentive masons, plasterers, and\nglaziers about putting everything--on the outside at least--about\nthe cottages belonging to \"my lord,\" in perfect repair. Lord Cumnor\nowned the greater part of the town; and those who lived under other\nlandlords, or in houses of their own, were stirred up by the dread\nof contrast to do up their dwellings. So the ladders of whitewashers\nand painters were sadly in the way of the ladies tripping daintily\nalong to make their purchases, and holding their gowns up in a bunch\nbehind, after a fashion quite gone out in these days. The housekeeper\nand steward from the Towers might also be seen coming in to give\norders at the various shops; and stopping here and there at those\nkept by favourites, to avail themselves of the eagerly-tendered\nrefreshments.\n\nLady Harriet came to call on her old governess the day after the\narrival of the family at the Towers. Molly and Cynthia were out\nwalking when she came--doing some errands for Mrs. Gibson, who had a\nsecret idea that Lady Harriet would call at the particular time she\ndid, and had a not uncommon wish to talk to her ladyship without the\ncorrective presence of any member of her own family.\n\nMrs. Gibson did not give Molly the message of remembrance that Lady\nHarriet had left for her; but she imparted various pieces of news\nrelating to the Towers with great animation and interest. The Duchess\nof Menteith and her daughter, Lady Alice, were coming to the Towers;\nwould be there the day of the ball; would come to the ball; and the\nMenteith diamonds were famous. That was piece of news the first.\nThe second was that ever so many gentlemen were coming to the\nTowers--some English, some French. This piece of news would have come\nfirst in order of importance had there been much probability of their\nbeing dancing men, and, as such, possible partners at the coming\nball. But Lady Harriet had spoken of them as Lord Hollingford's\nfriends, useless scientific men in all probability. Then, finally,\nMrs. Gibson was to go to the Towers next day to lunch; Lady Cumnor\nhad written a little note by Lady Harriet to beg her to come; if\nMrs. Gibson could manage to find her way to the Towers, one of the\ncarriages in use should bring her back to her own home in the course\nof the afternoon.\n\n\"The dear countess!\" said Mrs. Gibson, with soft affection. It was\na soliloquy, uttered after a minute's pause, at the end of all this\ninformation.\n\nAnd all the rest of that day her conversation had an aristocratic\nperfume hanging about it. One of the few books she had brought with\nher into Mr. Gibson's house was bound in pink, and in it she studied\n\"Menteith, Duke of, Adolphus George,\" &c., &c., till she was fully up\nin all the duchess's connections, and probable interests. Mr. Gibson\nmade his mouth up into a droll whistle when he came home at night,\nand found himself in a Towers' atmosphere. Molly saw the shade\nof annoyance through the drollery; she was beginning to see it\noftener than she liked, not that she reasoned upon it, or that she\nconsciously traced the annoyance to its source; but she could not\nhelp feeling uneasy in herself when she knew her father was in the\nleast put out.\n\nOf course a fly was ordered for Mrs. Gibson. In the early afternoon\nshe came home. If she had been disappointed in her interview with\nthe countess she never told her woe, nor revealed the fact that when\nshe first arrived at the Towers she had to wait for an hour in Lady\nCumnor's morning-room, uncheered by any companionship save that of\nher old friend, Mrs. Bradley, till suddenly, Lady Harriet coming in,\nshe exclaimed, \"Why, Clare! you dear woman! are you here all alone?\nDoes mamma know?\" And, after a little more affectionate conversation,\nshe rushed to find her ladyship, who was perfectly aware of the fact,\nbut too deep in giving the duchess the benefit of her wisdom and\nexperience in trousseaux to be at all aware of the length of time\nMrs. Gibson had been passing in patient solitude. At lunch Mrs.\nGibson was secretly hurt by my lord's supposing it to be her dinner,\nand calling out his urgent hospitality from the very bottom of the\ntable, giving as a reason for it, that she must remember it was her\ndinner. In vain she piped out in her soft, high voice, \"Oh, my lord!\nI never eat meat in the middle of the day; I can hardly eat anything\nat lunch.\" Her voice was lost, and the duchess might go away with the\nidea that the Hollingford doctor's wife dined early; that is to say,\nif her grace ever condescended to have any idea on the subject at\nall; which presupposes that she was cognizant of the fact of there\nbeing a doctor at Hollingford, and that he had a wife, and that his\nwife was the pretty, faded, elegant-looking woman sending away her\nplate of untasted food--food which she longed to eat, for she was\nreally desperately hungry after her drive and her solitude.\n\nAnd then after lunch there did come a _tête-à-tête_ with Lady Cumnor,\nwhich was conducted after this wise:--\n\n\"Well, Clare! I am really glad to see you. I once thought I should\nnever get back to the Towers, but here I am! There was such a clever\nman at Bath--a Doctor Snape--he cured me at last--quite set me up. I\nreally think if ever I am ill again I shall send for him: it is such\na thing to find a really clever medical man. Oh, by the way, I always\nforget you've married Mr. Gibson--of course he is very clever, and\nall that. (The carriage to the door in ten minutes, Brown, and desire\nBradley to bring my things down.) What was I asking you? Oh! how do\nyou get on with the stepdaughter? She seemed to me to be a young lady\nwith a pretty stubborn will of her own. I put a letter for the post\ndown somewhere, and I cannot think where; do help me look for it,\nthere's a good woman. Just run to my room, and see if Brown can find\nit, for it is of great consequence.\"\n\nOff went Mrs. Gibson, rather unwillingly; for there were several\nthings she wanted to speak about, and she had not heard half of what\nshe had expected to learn of the family gossip. But all chance was\ngone; for when she came back from her fruitless errand, Lady Cumnor\nand the duchess were in full talk, Lady Cumnor with the missing\nletter in her hand, which she was using something like a baton to\nenforce her words.\n\n\"Every iota from Paris! Every i-o-ta!\"\n\nLady Cumnor was too much of a lady not to apologize for useless\ntrouble, but they were nearly the last words she spoke to Mrs.\nGibson, for she had to go out and drive with the duchess; and the\nbrougham to take \"Clare\" (as she persisted in calling Mrs. Gibson)\nback to Hollingford followed the carriage to the door. Lady Harriet\ncame away from her _entourage_ of young men and young ladies, all\nprepared for some walking expedition, to wish Mrs. Gibson good-by.\n\n\"We shall see you at the ball,\" she said. \"You'll be there with your\ntwo girls, of course, and I must have a little talk with you there;\nwith all these visitors in the house, it has been impossible to see\nanything of you to-day, you know.\"\n\nSuch were the facts, but rose-colour was the medium through which\nthey were seen by Mrs. Gibson's household listeners on her return.\n\n\"There are many visitors staying at the Towers--oh, yes! a great\nmany: the duchess and Lady Alice, and Mr. and Mrs. Grey, and Lord\nAlbert Monson and his sister, and my old friend Captain James of the\nBlues--many more, in fact. But, of course, I preferred going to Lady\nCumnor's own room, where I could see her and Lady Harriet quietly,\nand where we were not disturbed by the bustle downstairs. Of course\nwe were obliged to go down to lunch, and then I saw my old friends,\nand renewed pleasant acquaintances. But I really could hardly get any\nconnected conversation with any one. Lord Cumnor seemed so delighted\nto see me there again: though there were six or seven between us, he\nwas always interrupting with some civil or kind speech especially\naddressed to me. And after lunch Lady Cumnor asked me all sorts of\nquestions about my new life with as much interest as if I had been\nher daughter. To be sure, when the duchess came in we had to leave\noff, and talk about the trousseau she is preparing for Lady Alice.\nLady Harriet made such a point of our meeting at the ball; she is\nsuch a good, affectionate creature, is Lady Harriet!\"\n\nThis last was said in a tone of meditative appreciation.\n\nThe afternoon of the day on which the ball was to take place, a\nservant rode over from Hamley with two lovely nosegays, \"with the\nMr. Hamleys' compliments to Miss Gibson and Miss Kirkpatrick.\"\nCynthia was the first to receive them. She came dancing into the\ndrawing-room, flourishing the flowers about in either hand, and\ndanced up to Molly, who was trying to settle to her reading, by way\nof passing the time away till the evening came.\n\n\"Look, Molly, look! Here are bouquets for us! Long life to the\ngivers!\"\n\n\"Who are they from?\" asked Molly, taking hold of one, and examining\nit with tender delight at its beauty.\n\n\"Who from? Why, the two paragons of Hamleys, to be sure. Is it not a\npretty attention?\"\n\n\"How kind of them!\" said Molly.\n\n\"I'm sure it is Osborne who thought of it. He has been so much\nabroad, where it is such a common compliment to send bouquets to\nyoung ladies.\"\n\n\"I don't see why you should think it is Osborne's thought!\" said\nMolly, reddening a little. \"Mr. Roger Hamley used to gather nosegays\nconstantly for his mother, and sometimes for me.\"\n\n\"Well, never mind whose thought it was, or who gathered them; we've\ngot the flowers, and that's enough. Molly, I'm sure these red flowers\nwill just match your coral necklace and bracelets,\" said Cynthia,\npulling out some camellias, then a rare kind of flower.\n\n\"Oh, please, don't!\" exclaimed Molly. \"Don't you see how carefully\nthe colours are arranged--they have taken such pains; please, don't.\"\n\n\"Nonsense!\" said Cynthia, continuing to pull them out; \"see, here are\nquite enough. I'll make you a little coronet of them--sewn on black\nvelvet, which will never be seen--just as they do in France!\"\n\n\"Oh, I am so sorry! It is quite spoilt,\" said Molly.\n\n\"Never mind! I'll take this spoilt bouquet; I can make it up again\njust as prettily as ever; and you shall have this, which has never\nbeen touched.\" Cynthia went on arranging the crimson buds and flowers\nto her taste. Molly said nothing, but kept watching Cynthia's nimble\nfingers tying up the wreath.\n\n\"There!\" said Cynthia, at last, \"when that is sewn on black velvet,\nto keep the flowers from dying, you'll see how pretty it will look.\nAnd there are enough red flowers in this untouched nosegay to carry\nout the idea!\"\n\n\"Thank you\" (very slowly). \"But sha'n't you mind having only the\nwrecks of the other?\"\n\n\"Not I; red flowers would not go with my pink dress.\"\n\n\"But--I daresay they arranged each nosegay so carefully!\"\n\n\"Perhaps they did. But I never would allow sentiment to interfere\nwith my choice of colours; and pink does tie one down. Now you,\nin white muslin, just tipped with crimson, like a daisy, may wear\nanything.\"\n\nCynthia took the utmost pains in dressing Molly, leaving the clever\nhousemaid to her mother's exclusive service. Mrs. Gibson was more\nanxious about her attire than was either of the girls; it had given\nher occasion for deep thought and not a few sighs. Her deliberation\nhad ended in her wearing her pearl-grey satin wedding-gown, with a\nprofusion of lace, and white and coloured lilacs. Cynthia was the one\nwho took the affair most lightly. Molly looked upon the ceremony of\ndressing for a first ball as rather a serious ceremony; certainly as\nan anxious proceeding. Cynthia was almost as anxious as herself; only\nMolly wanted her appearance to be correct and unnoticed; and Cynthia\nwas desirous of setting off Molly's rather peculiar charms--her\ncream-coloured skin, her profusion of curly black hair, her beautiful\nlong-shaped eyes, with their shy, loving expression. Cynthia took\nup so much time in dressing Molly to her mind, that she herself had\nto perform her toilette in a hurry. Molly, ready dressed, sate on a\nlow chair in Cynthia's room, watching the pretty creature's rapid\nmovements, as she stood in her petticoat before the glass, doing up\nher hair, with quick certainty of effect. At length, Molly heaved a\nlong sigh, and said,--\n\n\"I should like to be pretty!\"\n\n\"Why, Molly,\" said Cynthia, turning round with an exclamation on the\ntip of her tongue; but when she caught the innocent, wistful look on\nMolly's face, she instinctively checked what she was going to say,\nand, half-smiling to her own reflection in the glass, she said,--\"The\nFrench girls would tell you, to believe that you were pretty would\nmake you so.\"\n\nMolly paused before replying,--\n\n\"I suppose they would mean that if you knew you were pretty, you\nwould never think about your looks; you would be so certain of being\nliked, and that it is caring--\"\n\n\"Listen! that's eight o'clock striking. Don't trouble yourself with\ntrying to interpret a French girl's meaning, but help me on with my\nfrock, there's a dear one.\"\n\nThe two girls were dressed, and were standing over the fire waiting\nfor the carriage in Cynthia's room, when Maria (Betty's successor)\ncame hurrying into the room. Maria had been officiating as maid to\nMrs. Gibson, but she had had intervals of leisure, in which she had\nrushed upstairs, and, under the pretence of offering her services,\nhad seen the young ladies' dresses, and the sight of so many nice\nclothes had sent her into a state of excitement which made her think\nnothing of rushing upstairs for the twentieth time, with a nosegay\nstill more beautiful than the two previous ones.\n\n\"Here, Miss Kirkpatrick! No, it's not for you, miss!\" as Molly, being\nnearer to the door, offered to take it and pass it to Cynthia. \"It's\nfor Miss Kirkpatrick; and there's a note for her besides!\"\n\nCynthia said nothing, but took the note and the flowers. She held the\nnote so that Molly could read it at the same time she did.\n\n\n   I send you some flowers; and you must allow me to claim\n   the first dance after nine o'clock, before which time I\n   fear I cannot arrive.--R. P.\n\n\n\"Who is it?\" asked Molly.\n\nCynthia looked extremely irritated, indignant, perplexed--what was it\nturned her cheek so pale, and made her eyes so full of fire?\n\n\"It is Mr. Preston,\" said she, in answer to Molly. \"I shall not dance\nwith him; and here go his flowers--\"\n\nInto the very middle of the embers, which she immediately stirred\ndown upon the beautiful shrivelling petals as if she wished to\nannihilate them as soon as possible. Her voice had never been raised;\nit was as sweet as usual; nor, though her movements were prompt\nenough, were they hasty or violent.\n\n\"Oh!\" said Molly, \"those beautiful flowers! We might have put them in\nwater.\"\n\n\"No,\" said Cynthia; \"it's best to destroy them. We don't want them;\nand I can't bear to be reminded of that man.\"\n\n\"It was an impertinent familiar note,\" said Molly. \"What right had\nhe to express himself in that way--no beginning, no end, and only\ninitials! Did you know him well when you were at Ashcombe, Cynthia?\"\n\n\"Oh, don't let us think any more about him,\" replied Cynthia. \"It is\nquite enough to spoil any pleasure at the ball to think that he will\nbe there. But I hope I shall get engaged before he comes, so that I\ncan't dance with him--and don't you, either!\"\n\n\"There! they are calling for us,\" exclaimed Molly, and with quick\nstep, yet careful of their draperies, they made their way downstairs\nto the place where Mr. and Mrs. Gibson awaited them. Yes; Mr. Gibson\nwas going,--even if he had to leave them afterwards to attend to any\nprofessional call. And Molly suddenly began to admire her father\nas a handsome man, when she saw him now, in full evening attire.\nMrs. Gibson, too--how pretty she was! In short, it was true that no\nbetter-looking a party than these four people entered the Hollingford\nball-room that evening.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXVI.\n\nA CHARITY BALL.\n\n\nAt the present time there are few people at a public ball besides the\ndancers and their chaperones, or relations in some degree interested\nin them. But in the days when Molly and Cynthia were young--before\nrailroads were, and before their consequences, the excursion-trains,\nwhich take every one up to London now-a-days, there to see their fill\nof gay crowds and fine dresses--to go to an annual charity-ball, even\nthough all thought of dancing had passed by years ago, and without\nany of the responsibilities of a chaperone, was a very allowable\nand favourite piece of dissipation to all the kindly old maids who\nthronged the country towns of England. They aired their old lace and\ntheir best dresses; they saw the aristocratic magnates of the country\nside; they gossipped with their coevals, and speculated on the\nromances of the young around them in a curious yet friendly spirit.\nThe Miss Brownings would have thought themselves sadly defrauded\nof the gayest event of the year, if anything had prevented their\nattending the charity ball, and Miss Browning would have been\nindignant, Miss Phoebe aggrieved, had they not been asked to\nAshcombe and Coreham, by friends at each place, who had, like them,\ngone through the dancing-stage of life some five-and-twenty years\nbefore, but who liked still to haunt the scenes of their former\nenjoyment, and see a younger generation dance on \"regardless of their\ndoom.\" They had come in one of the two sedan-chairs that yet lingered\nin use at Hollingford; such a night as this brought a regular harvest\nof gains to the two old men who, in what was called the \"town's\nlivery,\" trotted backwards and forwards with their many loads of\nladies and finery. There were some postchaises, and some \"flys,\" but\nafter mature deliberation Miss Browning had decided to keep to the\nmore comfortable custom of the sedan-chair; \"which,\" as she said to\nMiss Piper, one of her visitors, \"came into the parlour, and got full\nof the warm air, and nipped you up, and carried you tight and cosy\ninto another warm room, where you could walk out without having to\nshow your legs by going up steps, or down steps.\" Of course only one\ncould go at a time; but here again a little of Miss Browning's good\nmanagement arranged everything so very nicely, as Miss Hornblower\n(their other visitor) remarked. She went first, and remained in the\nwarm cloak-room until her hostess followed; and then the two ladies\nwent arm-in-arm into the ball-room, finding out convenient seats\nwhence they could watch the arrivals and speak to their passing\nfriends, until Miss Phoebe and Miss Piper entered, and came to take\npossession of the seats reserved for them by Miss Browning's care.\nThese two younger ladies came in, also arm-in-arm, but with a certain\ntimid flurry in look and movement very different from the composed\ndignity of their seniors (by two or three years). When all four\nwere once more assembled together, they took breath, and began to\nconverse.\n\n\"Upon my word, I really do think this is a better room than our\nAshcombe Court-house!\"\n\n\"And how prettily it is decorated!\" piped out Miss Piper. \"How well\nthe roses are made! But you all have such taste at Hollingford.\"\n\n\"There's Mrs. Dempster,\" cried Miss Hornblower; \"she said she and her\ntwo daughters were asked to stay at Mr. Sheepshanks'. Mr. Preston\nwas to be there, too; but I suppose they could not all come at once.\nLook! and there is young Roscoe, our new doctor. I declare it seems\nas if all Ashcombe were here. Mr. Roscoe! Mr. Roscoe! come here and\nlet me introduce you to Miss Browning, the friend we are staying\nwith. We think very highly of our young doctor, I can assure you,\nMiss Browning.\"\n\nMr. Roscoe bowed, and simpered at hearing his own praises. But Miss\nBrowning had no notion of having any doctor praised, who had come to\nsettle on the very verge of Mr. Gibson's practice, so she said to\nMiss Hornblower,--\n\n\"You must be glad, I am sure, to have somebody you can call in, if\nyou are in any sudden hurry, or for things that are too trifling\nto trouble Mr. Gibson about; and I should think Mr. Roscoe would\nfeel it a great advantage to profit, as he will naturally have the\nopportunity of doing, by witnessing Mr. Gibson's skill!\"\n\nProbably Mr. Roscoe would have felt more aggrieved by this speech\nthan he really was, if his attention had not been called off just\nthen by the entrance of the very Mr. Gibson who was being spoken of.\nAlmost before Miss Browning had ended her severe and depreciatory\nremarks, he had asked his friend Miss Hornblower,--\n\n\"Who is that lovely girl in pink, just come in?\"\n\n\"Why, that's Cynthia Kirkpatrick!\" said Miss Hornblower, taking up a\nponderous gold eyeglass to make sure of her fact. \"How she has grown!\nTo be sure, it is two or three years since she left Ashcombe--she was\nvery pretty then--people did say Mr. Preston admired her very much;\nbut she was so young!\"\n\n\"Can you introduce me?\" asked the impatient young surgeon. \"I should\nlike to ask her to dance.\"\n\nWhen Miss Hornblower returned from her greeting to her former\nacquaintance, Mrs. Gibson, and had accomplished the introduction\nwhich Mr. Roscoe had requested, she began her little confidences to\nMiss Browning.\n\n\"Well, to be sure! How condescending we are! I remember the time when\nMrs. Kirkpatrick wore old black silks, and was thankful and civil\nas became her place as a schoolmistress, and as having to earn her\nbread. And now she is in a satin; and she speaks to me as if she\njust could recollect who I was, if she tried very hard! It isn't so\nlong ago since Mrs. Dempster came to consult me as to whether Mrs.\nKirkpatrick would be offended, if she sent her a new breadth for\nher lilac silk-gown, in place of one that had been spoilt by Mrs.\nDempster's servant spilling the coffee over it the night before; and\nshe took it and was thankful, for all she's dressed in pearl-grey\nsatin now! And she would have been glad enough to marry Mr. Preston\nin those days.\"\n\n\"I thought you said he admired her daughter,\" put in Miss Browning to\nher irritated friend.\n\n\"Well! perhaps I did, and perhaps it was so; I'm sure I can't tell;\nhe was a great deal at the house. Miss Dixon keeps a school in the\nsame house now, and I'm sure she does it a great deal better.\"\n\n\"The earl and the countess are very fond of Mrs. Gibson,\" said Miss\nBrowning. \"I know, for Lady Harriet told us when she came to drink\ntea with us last autumn; and they desired Mr. Preston to be very\nattentive to her when she lived at Ashcombe.\"\n\n\"For goodness' sake don't go and repeat what I've been saying\nabout Mr. Preston and Mrs. Kirkpatrick to her ladyship. One may be\nmistaken, and you know I only said 'people talked about it.'\"\n\nMiss Hornblower was evidently alarmed lest her gossip should be\nrepeated to the Lady Harriet, who appeared to be on such an intimate\nfooting with her Hollingford friends. Nor did Miss Browning dissipate\nthe illusion. Lady Harriet had drunk tea with them, and might do it\nagain; and, at any rate, the little fright she had put her friend\ninto was not a bad return for that praise of Mr. Roscoe, which had\noffended Miss Browning's loyalty to Mr. Gibson.\n\nMeanwhile Miss Piper and Miss Phoebe, who had not the character of\n_esprit-forts_ to maintain, talked of the dresses of the people\npresent, beginning by complimenting each other.\n\n\"What a lovely turban you have got on, Miss Piper, if I may be\nallowed to say so: so becoming to your complexion!\"\n\n\"Do you think so?\" said Miss Piper, with ill-concealed gratification;\nit was something to have a \"complexion\" at forty-five. \"I got it\nat Brown's, at Somerton, for this very ball. I thought I must have\nsomething to set off my gown, which isn't quite so new as it once\nwas; and I have no handsome jewellery like you\"--looking with\nadmiring eyes at a large miniature set round with pearls, which\nserved as a shield to Miss Phoebe's breast.\n\n\"It is handsome,\" that lady replied. \"It is a likeness of my dear\nmother; Dorothy has got my father on. The miniatures were both taken\nat the same time; and just about then my uncle died and left us each\na legacy of fifty pounds, which we agreed to spend on the setting of\nour miniatures. But because they are so valuable Dorothy always keeps\nthem locked up with the best silver, and hides the box somewhere; she\nnever will tell me where, because she says I've such weak nerves, and\nthat if a burglar, with a loaded pistol at my head, were to ask me\nwhere we kept our plate and jewels, I should be sure to tell him; and\nshe says, for her part, she would never think of revealing under any\ncircumstances. (I'm sure I hope she won't be tried.) But that's the\nreason I don't wear it often; it's only the second time I've had it\non; and I can't even get at it, and look at it, which I should like\nto do. I shouldn't have had it on to-night, but that Dorothy gave\nit out to me, saying it was but a proper compliment to pay to the\nDuchess of Menteith, who is to be here in all her diamonds.\"\n\n\"Dear-ah-me! Is she really! Do you know I never saw a duchess\nbefore.\" And Miss Piper drew herself up and craned her neck, as if\nresolved to \"behave herself properly,\" as she had been taught to\ndo at boarding-school thirty years before, in the presence of \"her\ngrace.\" By-and-by she said to Miss Phoebe, with a sudden jerk out\nof position,--\"Look, look! that's our Mr. Cholmley, the magistrate\"\n(he was the great man of Coreham), \"and that's Mrs. Cholmley in red\nsatin, and Mr. George and Mr. Harry from Oxford, I do declare; and\nMiss Cholmley, and pretty Miss Sophy. I should like to go and speak\nto them, but then it's so formidable crossing a room without a\ngentleman. And there is Coxe the butcher and his wife! Why all\nCoreham seems to be here! And how Mrs. Coxe can afford such a gown I\ncan't make out for one, for I know Coxe had some difficulty in paying\nfor the last sheep he bought of my brother.\"\n\nJust at this moment the band, consisting of two violins, a harp, and\nan occasional clarionet, having finished their tuning, and brought\nthemselves as nearly into accord as was possible, struck up a brisk\ncountry-dance, and partners quickly took their places. Mrs. Gibson\nwas secretly a little annoyed at Cynthia's being one of those\nto stand up in this early dance, the performers in which were\nprincipally the punctual plebeians of Hollingford, who, when a ball\nwas fixed to begin at eight, had no notion of being later, and so\nlosing part of the amusement for which they had paid their money. She\nimparted some of her feelings to Molly, sitting by her, longing to\ndance, and beating time to the spirited music with one of her pretty\nlittle feet.\n\n\"Your dear papa is always so very punctual! To-night it seems almost\na pity, for we really are here before there is any one come that we\nknow.\"\n\n\"Oh! I see so many people here that I know. There are Mr. and Mrs.\nSmeaton, and that nice good-tempered daughter.\"\n\n\"Oh! booksellers and butchers if you will.\"\n\n\"Papa has found a great many friends to talk to.\"\n\n\"Patients, my dear--hardly friends. There are some nice-looking\npeople here,\" catching her eye on the Cholmleys; \"but I daresay they\nhave driven over from the neighbourhood of Ashcombe or Coreham, and\nhave hardly calculated how soon they would get here. I wonder when\nthe Towers' party will come. Ah! there's Mr. Ashton, and Mr. Preston.\nCome, the room is beginning to fill.\"\n\nSo it was, for this was to be a very good ball, people said; and a\nlarge party from the Towers was coming, and a duchess in diamonds\namong the number. Every great house in the district was expected to\nbe full of guests on these occasions; but at this early hour, the\ntownspeople had the floor almost entirely to themselves; the county\nmagnates came dropping in later; and chiefest among them all was the\nlord-lieutenant from the Towers. But to-night they were unusually\nlate, and the aristocratic ozone being absent from the atmosphere,\nthere was a flatness about the dancing of all those who considered\nthemselves above the plebeian ranks of the tradespeople. They,\nhowever, enjoyed themselves thoroughly, and sprang and bounded\ntill their eyes sparkled and their cheeks glowed with exercise and\nexcitement. Some of the more prudent parents, mindful of the next\nday's duties, began to consider at what hour they ought to go home;\nbut with all there was an expressed or unexpressed curiosity to\nsee the duchess and her diamonds; for the Menteith diamonds were\nfamous in higher circles than that now assembled; and their fame\nhad trickled down to it through the medium of ladies'-maids and\nhousekeepers. Mr. Gibson had had to leave the ball-room for a time,\nas he had anticipated, but he was to return to his wife as soon as\nhis duties were accomplished; and, in his absence, Mrs. Gibson kept\nherself a little aloof from the Miss Brownings and those of her\nacquaintance who would willingly have entered into conversation with\nher, with the view of attaching herself to the skirts of the Towers'\nparty, when they should make their appearance. If Cynthia would not\nbe so very ready in engaging herself to every possible partner who\nasked her to dance, there were sure to be young men staying at the\nTowers who would be on the look-out for pretty girls: and who could\ntell to what a dance might lead? Molly, too, though not so good a\ndancer as Cynthia, and, from her timidity, less graceful and easy,\nwas becoming engaged pretty deeply; and, it must be confessed,\nshe was longing to dance every dance, no matter with whom. Even\nshe might not be available for the more aristocratic partners Mrs.\nGibson anticipated. She was feeling very much annoyed with the whole\nproceedings of the evening when she was aware of some one standing by\nher; and, turning a little to one side, she saw Mr. Preston keeping\nguard, as it were, over the seats which Molly and Cynthia had just\nquitted. He was looking so black that, if their eyes had not met,\nMrs. Gibson would have preferred not speaking to him; as it was, she\nthought it unavoidable.\n\n\"The rooms are not well-lighted to-night, are they, Mr. Preston?\"\n\n\"No,\" said he; \"but who could light such dingy old paint as this,\nloaded with evergreens, too, which always darken a room?\"\n\n\"And the company, too! I always think that freshness and brilliancy\nof dress go as far as anything to brighten up a room. Look what a set\nof people are here: the greater part of the women are dressed in\ndark silks, really only fit for a morning. The place will be quite\ndifferent, by-and-by, when the county families are in a little more\nforce.\"\n\nMr. Preston made no reply. He had put his glass in his eye,\napparently for the purpose of watching the dancers. If its exact\ndirection could have been ascertained, it would have been found\nthat he was looking intently and angrily at a flying figure in pink\nmuslin: many a one was gazing at Cynthia with intentness besides\nhimself, but no one in anger. Mrs. Gibson was not so fine an observer\nas to read all this; but here was a gentlemanly and handsome young\nman, to whom she could prattle, instead of either joining herself on\nto objectionable people, or sitting all forlorn until the Towers'\nparty came. So she went on with her small remarks.\n\n\"You are not dancing, Mr. Preston!\"\n\n\"No! The partner I had engaged has made some mistake. I am waiting to\nhave an explanation with her.\"\n\nMrs. Gibson was silent. An uncomfortable tide of recollections\nappeared to come over her; she, like Mr. Preston, watched Cynthia;\nthe dance was ended, and she was walking round the room in easy\nunconcern as to what might await her. Presently her partner, Mr.\nHarry Cholmley, brought her back to her seat. She took that vacant\nnext to Mr. Preston, leaving the one by her mother for Molly's\noccupation. The latter returned a moment afterwards to her place.\nCynthia seemed entirely unconscious of Mr. Preston's neighbourhood.\nMrs. Gibson leaned forwards, and said to her daughter,--\n\n\"Your last partner was a gentleman, my dear. You are improving in\nyour selection. I really was ashamed of you before, figuring away\nwith that attorney's clerk. Molly, do you know whom you have been\ndancing with? I have found out he is the Coreham bookseller.\"\n\n\"That accounts for his being so well up in all the books I've been\nwanting to hear about,\" said Molly, eagerly, but with a spice of\nmalice in her mind. \"He really was very pleasant, mamma,\" she added;\n\"and he looks quite a gentleman, and dances beautifully!\"\n\n\"Very well. But remember if you go on this way you will have to shake\nhands over the counter to-morrow morning with some of your partners\nof to-night,\" said Mrs. Gibson, coldly.\n\n\"But I really don't know how to refuse when people are introduced\nto me and ask me, and I am longing to dance. You know to-night it\nis a charity ball, and papa said everybody danced with everybody,\"\nsaid Molly, in a pleading tone of voice; for she could not quite\nthoroughly enjoy herself if she was out of harmony with any one.\nWhat reply Mrs. Gibson would have made to this speech cannot now\nbe ascertained; for, before she could answer, Mr. Preston stepped\na little forwards, and said, in a tone which he meant to be icily\nindifferent, but which trembled with anger,--\n\n\"If Miss Gibson finds any difficulty in refusing a partner, she has\nonly to apply to Miss Kirkpatrick for instructions.\"\n\nCynthia lifted up her beautiful eyes, and, fixing them on Mr.\nPreston's face, said, very quietly, as if only stating a matter of\nfact,--\n\n\"You forget, I think, Mr. Preston: Miss Gibson implied that she\nwished to dance with the person who asked her--that makes all the\ndifference. I can't instruct her how to act in that difficulty.\"\n\nAnd to the rest of this little conversation, Cynthia appeared to lend\nno ear; and she was almost directly claimed by her next partner. Mr.\nPreston took the seat now left empty much to Molly's annoyance. At\nfirst she feared lest he might be going to ask her to dance; but,\ninstead, he put out his hand for Cynthia's nosegay, which she had\nleft on rising, entrusted to Molly. It had suffered considerably from\nthe heat of the room, and was no longer full and fresh; not so much\nso as Molly's, which had not, in the first instance, been pulled to\npieces in picking out the scarlet flowers which now adorned Molly's\nhair, and which had since been cherished with more care. Enough,\nhowever, remained of Cynthia's to show very distinctly that it was\nnot the one Mr. Preston had sent; and it was perhaps to convince\nhimself of this, that he rudely asked to examine it. But Molly,\nfaithful to what she imagined would be Cynthia's wish, refused to\nallow him to touch it; she only held it a little nearer.\n\n\"Miss Kirkpatrick has not done me the honour of wearing the bouquet\nI sent her, I see. She received it, I suppose, and my note?\"\n\n\"Yes,\" said Molly, rather intimidated by the tone in which this was\nsaid. \"But we had already accepted these two nosegays.\"\n\nMrs. Gibson was just the person to come to the rescue with her\nhoneyed words on such an occasion as the present. She evidently was\nrather afraid of Mr. Preston, and wished to keep at peace with him.\n\n\"Oh, yes, we were so sorry! Of course, I don't mean to say we could\nbe sorry for any one's kindness; but two such lovely nosegays had\nbeen sent from Hamley Hall--you may see how beautiful from what Molly\nholds in her hand--and they had come before yours, Mr. Preston.\"\n\n\"I should have felt honoured if you had accepted of mine, since\nthe young ladies were so well provided for. I was at some pains in\nselecting the flowers at Green's; I think I may say it was rather\nmore recherché than that of Miss Kirkpatrick's, which Miss Gibson\nholds so tenderly and securely in her hand.\"\n\n\"Oh, because Cynthia would take out the most effective flowers to put\nin my hair!\" exclaimed Molly, eagerly.\n\n\"Did she?\" said Mr. Preston, with a certain accent of pleasure in his\nvoice, as though he were glad she set so little store by the nosegay;\nand he walked off to stand behind Cynthia in the quadrille that was\nbeing danced; and Molly saw him making her reply to him--against her\nwill, Molly was sure. But, somehow, his face and manner implied power\nover her. She looked grave, deaf, indifferent, indignant, defiant;\nbut, after a half-whispered speech to Cynthia, at the conclusion\nof the dance, she evidently threw him an impatient consent to what\nhe was asking, for he walked off with a disagreeable smile of\nsatisfaction on his handsome face.\n\nAll this time the murmurs were spreading at the lateness of the party\nfrom the Towers, and person after person came up to Mrs. Gibson as\nif she were the accredited authority as to the earl and countess's\nplans. In one sense this was flattering; but then the acknowledgment\nof common ignorance and wonder reduced her to the level of the\ninquirers. Mrs. Goodenough felt herself particularly aggrieved; she\nhad had her spectacles on for the last hour and a half, in order to\nbe ready for the sight the very first minute any one from the Towers\nappeared at the door.\n\n\"I had a headache,\" she complained, \"and I should have sent my money,\nand never stirred out o' doors to-night; for I've seen a many of\nthese here balls, and my lord and my lady too, when they were better\nworth looking at nor they are now; but every one was talking of the\nduchess, and the duchess and her diamonds, and I thought I shouldn't\nlike to be behindhand, and never ha' seen neither the duchess nor\nher diamonds; so I'm here, and coal and candle-light wasting away\nat home, for I told Sally to sit up for me; and, above everything,\nI cannot abide waste. I took it from my mother, who was such a one\nagainst waste as you never see now-a-days. She was a manager, if\never there was a one; and brought up nine children on less than\nany one else could do, I'll be bound. Why! she wouldn't let us be\nextravagant--not even in the matter of colds. Whenever any on us had\ngot a pretty bad cold, she took the opportunity and cut our hair; for\nshe said, said she, it was of no use having two colds when one would\ndo--and cutting of our hair was sure to give us a cold. But, for all\nthat, I wish the duchess would come.\"\n\n\"Ah! but fancy what it is to me,\" sighed out Mrs. Gibson; \"so long as\nI have been without seeing the dear family--and seeing so little of\nthem the other day when I was at the Towers (for the duchess would\nhave my opinion on Lady Alice's trousseau, and kept asking me so many\nquestions it took up all the time)--and Lady Harriet's last words\nwere a happy anticipation of our meeting to-night. It's nearly twelve\no'clock.\"\n\nEvery one of any pretensions to gentility was painfully affected by\nthe absence of the family from the Towers; the very fiddlers seemed\nunwilling to begin playing a dance that might be interrupted by the\nentrance of the great folks. Miss Phoebe Browning had apologized\nfor them--Miss Browning had blamed them with calm dignity; it was\nonly the butchers and bakers and candlestick-makers who rather\nenjoyed the absence of restraint, and were happy and hilarious.\n\nAt last, there was a rumbling, and a rushing, and a whispering, and\nthe music stopped; so the dancers were obliged to do so too; and in\ncame Lord Cumnor in his state dress, with a fat, middle-aged woman\non his arm; she was dressed almost like a girl--in a sprigged muslin,\nwith natural flowers in her hair, but not a vestige of a jewel or a\ndiamond. Yet it must be the duchess; but what was a duchess without\ndiamonds?--and in a dress which farmer Hudson's daughter might have\nworn! Was it the duchess? Could it be the duchess? The little crowd\nof inquirers around Mrs. Gibson thickened, to hear her confirm their\ndisappointing surmise. After the duchess came Lady Cumnor, looking\nlike Lady Macbeth in black velvet--a cloud upon her brow, made more\nconspicuous by the lines of age rapidly gathering on her handsome\nface; and Lady Harriet, and other ladies, amongst whom there was one\ndressed so like the duchess as to suggest the idea of a sister rather\nthan a daughter, as far as dress went. There was Lord Hollingford,\nplain in face, awkward in person, gentlemanly in manner; and\nhalf-a-dozen younger men, Lord Albert Monson, Captain James, and\nothers of their age and standing, who came in looking anything if not\ncritical. This long-expected party swept up to the seats reserved\nfor them at the head of the room, apparently regardless of the\ninterruption they caused; for the dancers stood aside, and almost\ndispersed back to their seats, and when \"Money-musk\" struck up again,\nnot half the former set of people stood up to finish the dance.\n\nLady Harriet, who was rather different to Miss Piper, and no more\nminded crossing the room alone than if the lookers-on were so many\ncabbages, spied the Gibson party pretty quickly out, and came across\nto them.\n\n\"Here we are at last. How d'ye do, dear? Why, little one\" (to Molly),\n\"how nice you're looking! Aren't we shamefully late?\"\n\n\"Oh! it's only just past twelve,\" said Mrs. Gibson; \"and I daresay\nyou dined very late.\"\n\n\"It wasn't that; it was that ill-mannered woman, who went to her own\nroom after we came out from dinner, and she and Lady Alice stayed\nthere invisible, till we thought they were putting on some splendid\nattire--as they ought to have done--and at half-past ten, when mamma\nsent up to them to say the carriages were at the door, the duchess\nsent down for some beef-tea, and at last appeared _à l'enfant_ as\nyou see her. Mamma is so angry with her, and some of the others are\nannoyed at not coming earlier, and one or two are giving themselves\nairs about coming at all. Papa is the only one who is not affected by\nit.\" Then turning to Molly Lady Harriet asked,--\n\n\"Have you been dancing much, Miss Gibson?\"\n\n\"Yes; not every dance, but nearly all.\"\n\nIt was a simple question enough; but Lady Harriet's speaking at all\nto Molly had become to Mrs. Gibson almost like shaking a red rag at\na bull; it was the one thing sure to put her out of temper. But she\nwould not have shown this to Lady Harriet for the world; only she\ncontrived to baffle any endeavours at further conversation between\nthe two, by placing herself betwixt Lady Harriet and Molly, whom the\nformer asked to sit down in the absent Cynthia's room.\n\n\"I won't go back to those people, I am so mad with them; and,\nbesides, I hardly saw you the other day, and I must have some gossip\nwith you.\" So she sat down by Mrs. Gibson, and as Mrs. Goodenough\nafterwards expressed it, \"looked like anybody else.\" Mrs. Goodenough\nsaid this to excuse herself for a little misadventure she fell into.\nShe had taken a deliberate survey of the grandees at the upper end of\nthe room, spectacles on nose, and had inquired, in no very measured\nvoice, who everybody was, from Mr. Sheepshanks, my lord's agent, and\nher very good neighbour, who in vain tried to check her loud ardour\nfor information by replying to her in whispers. But she was rather\ndeaf as well as blind, so his low tones only brought upon him fresh\ninquiries. Now, satisfied as far as she could be, and on her way\nto departure, and the extinguishing of fire and candle-light, she\nstopped opposite to Mrs. Gibson, and thus addressed her by way of\nrenewal of their former subject of conversation:--\n\n\"Such a shabby thing for a duchess I never saw; not a bit of a\ndiamond near her! They're none of 'em worth looking at except the\ncountess, and she's always a personable woman, and not so lusty\nas she was. But they're not worth waiting up for till this time o'\nnight.\"\n\nThere was a moment's pause. Then Lady Harriet put her hand out, and\nsaid,--\n\n\"You don't remember me, but I know you from having seen you at the\nTowers. Lady Cumnor is a good deal thinner than she was, but we hope\nher health is better for it.\"\n\n\"It's Lady Harriet,\" said Mrs. Gibson to Mrs. Goodenough, in\nreproachful dismay.\n\n\"Deary me, your ladyship! I hope I've given no offence! But, you\nsee--that is to say, your ladyship sees, that it's late hours for\nsuch folks as me, and I only stayed out of my bed to see the duchess,\nand I thought she'd come in diamonds and a coronet; and it puts one\nout at my age, to be disappointed in the only chance I'm like to have\nof so fine a sight.\"\n\n\"I'm put out too,\" said Lady Harriet. \"I wanted to have come early,\nand here we are as late as this. I'm so cross and ill-tempered, I\nshould be glad to hide myself in bed as soon as you will do.\"\n\nShe said this so sweetly that Mrs. Goodenough relaxed into a smile,\nand her crabbedness into a compliment.\n\n\"I don't believe as ever your ladyship can be cross and ill-tempered\nwith that pretty face. I'm an old woman, so you must let me say so.\"\nLady Harriet stood up, and made a low curtsey. Then holding out her\nhand, she said,--\n\n\"I won't keep you up any longer; but I'll promise one thing in return\nfor your pretty speech: if ever I am a duchess, I'll come and show\nmyself to you in all my robes and gewgaws. Good night, madam!\"\n\n\"There! I knew how it would be!\" said she, not resuming her seat.\n\"And on the eve of a county election too.\"\n\n\"Oh! you must not take old Mrs. Goodenough as a specimen, dear Lady\nHarriet. She is always a grumbler! I am sure no one else would\ncomplain of your all being as late as you liked,\" said Mrs. Gibson.\n\n\"What do you say, Molly?\" said Lady Harriet, suddenly turning her\neyes on Molly's face. \"Don't you think we've lost some of our\npopularity,--which at this time means votes--by coming so late. Come,\nanswer me! you used to be a famous little truth-teller.\"\n\n\"I don't know about popularity or votes,\" said Molly, rather\nunwillingly. \"But I think many people were sorry you did not come\nsooner; and isn't that rather a proof of popularity?\" she added.\n\n\"That's a very neat and diplomatic answer,\" said Lady Harriet,\nsmiling, and tapping Molly's cheek with her fan.\n\n\"Molly knows nothing about it,\" said Mrs. Gibson, a little off\nher guard. \"It would be very impertinent if she or any one else\nquestioned Lady Cumnor's perfect right to come when she chose.\"\n\n\"Well, all I know is, I must go back to mamma now; but I shall make\nanother raid into these regions by-and-by, and you must keep a place\nfor me. Ah! there are--Miss Brownings; you see I don't forget my\nlesson, Miss Gibson.\"\n\n\"Molly, I cannot have you speaking so to Lady Harriet,\" said Mrs.\nGibson, as soon as she was left alone with her stepdaughter. \"You\nwould never have known her at all if it had not been for me, and\ndon't be always putting yourself into our conversation.\"\n\n\"But I must speak if she asks me questions,\" pleaded Molly.\n\n\"Well! if you must, you must, I acknowledge. I'm candid about that at\nany rate. But there's no need for you to set up to have an opinion at\nyour age.\"\n\n\"I don't know how to help it,\" said Molly.\n\n\"She's such a whimsical person; look there, if she's not talking to\nMiss Phoebe; and Miss Phoebe is so weak she'll be easily led away\ninto fancying she is hand and glove with Lady Harriet. If there is\none thing I hate more than another, it is the trying to make out an\nintimacy with great people.\"\n\nMolly felt innocent enough, so she offered no justification of\nherself, and made no reply. Indeed she was more occupied in watching\nCynthia. She could not understand the change that seemed to have come\nover her. She was dancing, it was true, with the same lightness and\ngrace as before, but the smooth bounding motion, as of a feather\nblown onwards by the wind, was gone. She was conversing with her\npartner, but without the soft animation that usually shone out upon\nher countenance. And when she was brought back to her seat Molly\nnoticed her changed colour, and her dreamily abstracted eyes.\n\n\"What is the matter, Cynthia?\" asked she, in a very low voice.\n\n\"Nothing,\" said Cynthia, suddenly looking up, and in an accent of\nwhat, in her, was sharpness. \"Why should there be?\"\n\n\"I don't know; but you look different to what you did--tired or\nsomething.\"\n\n\"There's nothing the matter, or, if there is, don't talk about it.\nIt's all your fancy.\"\n\nThis was a rather contradictory speech, to be interpreted by\nintuition rather than by logic. Molly understood that Cynthia wished\nfor quietness and silence. But what was her surprise, after the\nspeeches that had passed before, and the implication of Cynthia's\nwhole manner to Mr. Preston, to see him come up to her, and, without\na word, offer his arm and lead her away to dance. It appeared to\nstrike Mrs. Gibson as something remarkable; for, forgetting her late\npassage at arms with Molly, she asked, wonderingly, as if almost\ndistrusting the evidence of her senses,--\n\n\"Is Cynthia going to dance with Mr. Preston?\"\n\nMolly had scarcely time to answer before she herself was led off by\nher partner. She could hardly attend to him or to the figures of the\nquadrille for watching for Cynthia among the moving forms.\n\nOnce she caught a glimpse of her standing still--downcast--listening\nto Mr. Preston's eager speech. Again she was walking languidly among\nthe dancers, almost as if she took no notice of those around her.\nWhen she and Molly joined each other again, the shade on Cynthia's\nface had deepened to gloom. But, at the same time, if a physiognomist\nhad studied her expression, he would have read in it defiance and\nanger, and perhaps also a little perplexity. While this quadrille had\nbeen going on, Lady Harriet had been speaking to her brother.\n\n\"Hollingford!\" she said, laying her hand on his arm, and drawing him\na little apart from the well-born crowd amid which he stood, silent\nand abstracted, \"you don't know how these good people here have been\nhurt and disappointed with our being so late, and with the duchess's\nridiculous simplicity of dress.\"\n\n\"Why should they mind it?\" asked he, taking advantage of her being\nout of breath with eagerness.\n\n\"Oh, don't be so wise and stupid; don't you see, we're a show and a\nspectacle--it's like having a pantomime with harlequin and columbine\nin plain clothes.\"\n\n\"I don't understand how--\" he began.\n\n\"Then take it upon trust. They really are a little disappointed,\nwhether they are logical or not in being so, and we must try and make\nit up to them; for one thing, because I can't bear our vassals to\nlook dissatisfied and disloyal, and then there's the election in\nJune.\"\n\n\"I really would as soon be out of the House as in it.\"\n\n\"Nonsense; it would grieve papa beyond measure--but there's no\ntime to talk about that now. You must go and dance with some of\nthe townspeople, and I'll ask Sheepshanks to introduce me to a\nrespectable young farmer. Can't you get Captain James to make himself\nuseful? There he goes with Lady Alice! If I don't get him introduced\nto the ugliest tailor's daughter I can find for the next dance!\" She\nput her arm in her brother's as she spoke, as if to lead him to some\npartner. He resisted, however--resisted piteously.\n\n\"Pray don't, Harriet. You know I can't dance. I hate it; I always\ndid. I don't know how to get through a quadrille.\"\n\n\"It's a country dance!\" said she, resolutely.\n\n\"It's all the same. And what shall I say to my partner? I haven't\na notion: I shall have no subject in common. Speak of being\ndisappointed, they'll be ten times more disappointed when they find I\ncan neither dance nor talk!\"\n\n\"I'll be merciful; don't be so cowardly. In their eyes a lord may\ndance like a bear--as some lords not very far from me are--if he\nlikes, and they'll take it for grace. And you shall begin with Molly\nGibson, your friend the doctor's daughter. She's a good, simple,\nintelligent little girl, which you'll think a great deal more of, I\nsuppose, than of the frivolous fact of her being very pretty. Clare!\nwill you allow me to introduce my brother to Miss Gibson? he hopes to\nengage her for this dance. Lord Hollingford, Miss Gibson!\"\n\nPoor Lord Hollingford! there was nothing for it but for him to follow\nhis sister's very explicit lead, and Molly and he walked off to their\nplaces, each heartily wishing their dance together well over. Lady\nHarriet flew off to Mr. Sheepshanks to secure her respectable young\nfarmer, and Mrs. Gibson remained alone, wishing that Lady Cumnor\nwould send one of her attendant gentlemen for her. It would be so\nmuch more agreeable to be sitting even at the fag-end of nobility\nthan here on a bench with everybody; hoping that everybody would see\nMolly dancing away with a lord, yet vexed that the chance had so\nbefallen that Molly instead of Cynthia was the young lady singled\nout; wondering if simplicity of dress was now become the highest\nfashion, and pondering on the possibility of cleverly inducing\nLady Harriet to introduce Lord Albert Monson to her own beautiful\ndaughter, Cynthia.\n\nMolly found Lord Hollingford, the wise and learned Lord Hollingford,\nstrangely stupid in understanding the mystery of \"Cross hands and\nback again, down the middle and up again.\" He was constantly getting\nhold of the wrong hands, and as constantly stopping when he had\nreturned to his place, quite unaware that the duties of society and\nthe laws of the dance required that he should go on capering till\nhe had arrived at the bottom of the room. He perceived that he had\nperformed his part very badly, and apologized to Molly when once they\nhad arrived at that haven of comparative peace; and he expressed his\nregret so simply and heartily that she felt at her ease with him at\nonce, especially when he confided to her his reluctance at having to\ndance at all, and his only doing it under his sister's compulsion.\nTo Molly he was an elderly widower, almost as old as her father,\nand by-and-by they got into very pleasant conversation. She learnt\nfrom him that Roger Hamley had just been publishing a paper in some\nscientific periodical, which had excited considerable attention,\nas it was intended to confute some theory of a great French\nphysiologist, and Roger's article proved the writer to be possessed\nof a most unusual amount of knowledge on the subject. This piece\nof news was of great interest to Molly; and, in her questions, she\nherself evinced so much intelligence, and a mind so well prepared for\nthe reception of information, that Lord Hollingford at any rate would\nhave felt his quest of popularity a very easy affair indeed, if he\nmight have gone on talking quietly to Molly during the rest of the\nevening. When he took her back to her place, he found Mr. Gibson\nthere, and fell into talk with him, until Lady Harriet once more came\nto stir him up to his duties. Before very long, however, he returned\nto Mr. Gibson's side, and began telling him of this paper of Roger\nHamley's, of which Mr. Gibson had not yet heard. In the midst\nof their conversation, as they stood close by Mrs. Gibson, Lord\nHollingford saw Molly in the distance, and interrupted himself to\nsay, \"What a charming little lady that daughter of yours is! Most\ngirls of her age are so difficult to talk to; but she is intelligent\nand full of interest in all sorts of sensible things; well read,\ntoo--she was up in _Le Règne Animal_--and very pretty!\"\n\nMr. Gibson bowed, much pleased at such a compliment from such a man,\nwere he lord or not. It is very likely that if Molly had been a\nstupid listener, Lord Hollingford would not have discovered her\nbeauty; or the converse might be asserted--if she had not been young\nand pretty, he would not have exerted himself to talk on scientific\nsubjects in a manner which she could understand. But in whatever way\nMolly had won his approbation and admiration, there was no doubt that\nshe had earned it somehow. And, when she next returned to her place,\nMrs. Gibson greeted her with soft words and a gracious smile; for\nit does not require much reasoning power to discover, that if it\nis a very fine thing to be mother-in-law to a very magnificent\nthree-tailed bashaw, it presupposes that the wife who makes the\nconnection between the two parties is in harmony with her mother. And\nso far had Mrs. Gibson's thoughts wandered into futurity. She only\nwished that the happy chance had fallen to Cynthia's instead of to\nMolly's lot. But Molly was a docile, sweet creature, very pretty,\nand remarkably intelligent, as my lord had said. It was a pity that\nCynthia preferred making millinery to reading; but perhaps that could\nbe rectified. And there was Lord Cumnor coming to speak to her, and\nLady Cumnor nodding to her, and indicating a place by her side.\n\nIt was not an unsatisfactory ball upon the whole to Mrs. Gibson,\nalthough she paid the usual penalty for sitting up beyond her\nordinary hour in perpetual glare and movement. The next morning\nshe awoke irritable and fatigued; and a little of the same feeling\noppressed both Cynthia and Molly. The former was lounging in the\nwindow-seat, holding a three-days'-old newspaper in her hand, which\nshe was making a pretence of reading, when she was startled by her\nmother's saying,--\n\n\"Cynthia! can't you take up a book and improve yourself? I am sure\nyour conversation will never be worth listening to, unless you read\nsomething better than newspapers. Why don't you keep up your French?\nThere was some French book that Molly was reading--_Le Règne Animal_,\nI think.\"\n\n\"No! I never read it!\" said Molly, blushing. \"Mr. Roger Hamley\nsometimes read pieces out of it when I was first at the Hall, and\ntold me what it was about.\"\n\n\"Oh! well. Then I suppose I was mistaken. But it comes to all the\nsame thing. Cynthia, you really must learn to settle yourself to some\nimproving reading every morning.\"\n\nRather to Molly's surprise, Cynthia did not reply a word; but\ndutifully went and brought down from among her Boulogne school-books,\n_Le Siècle de Louis XIV_. But after a while, Molly saw that this\n\"improving reading\" was just as much a mere excuse for Cynthia's\nthinking her own thoughts as the newspaper had been.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXVII.\n\nFATHER AND SONS.\n\n\n[Illustration (untitled)]\n\nThings were not going on any better at Hamley Hall. Nothing had\noccurred to change the state of dissatisfied feeling into which the\nSquire and his eldest son had respectively fallen; and the long\ncontinuance merely of dissatisfaction is sure of itself to deepen\nthe feeling. Roger did all in his power to bring the father and son\ntogether; but sometimes wondered if it would not have been better to\nleave them alone; for they were falling into the habit of each making\nhim their confidant, and so defining emotions and opinions which\nwould have had less distinctness if they had been unexpressed. There\nwas little enough relief in the daily life at the Hall to help them\nall to shake off the gloom; and it even told on the health of both\nthe Squire and Osborne. The Squire became thinner, his skin as well\nas his clothes began to hang loose about him, and the freshness\nof his colour turned to red streaks, till his cheeks looked like\nEardiston pippins, instead of resembling \"a Katherine pear on the\nside that's next the sun.\" Roger thought that his father sate indoors\nand smoked in his study more than was good for him, but it had\nbecome difficult to get him far afield; he was too much afraid of\ncoming across some sign of the discontinued drainage works, or being\nirritated afresh by the sight of his depreciated timber. Osborne was\nwrapt up in the idea of arranging his poems for the press, and so\nworking out his wish for independence. What with daily writing to\nhis wife--taking his letters himself to a distant post-office, and\nreceiving hers there--touching up his sonnets, &c., with fastidious\ncare--and occasionally giving himself the pleasure of a visit to the\nGibsons, and enjoying the society of the two pleasant girls there,\nhe found little time for being with his father. Indeed, Osborne was\ntoo self-indulgent or \"sensitive,\" as he termed it, to bear well\nwith the Squire's gloomy fits, or too frequent querulousness. The\nconsciousness of his secret, too, made Osborne uncomfortable in his\nfather's presence. It was very well for all parties that Roger was\nnot \"sensitive,\" for, if he had been, there were times when it would\nhave been hard to bear little spurts of domestic tyranny, by which\nhis father strove to assert his power over both his sons. One of\nthese occurred very soon after the night of the Hollingford\ncharity-ball.\n\nRoger had induced his father to come out with him; and the Squire\nhad, on his son's suggestion, taken with him his long unused spud.\nThe two had wandered far afield; perhaps the elder man had found the\nunwonted length of exercise too much for him; for, as he approached\nthe house, on his return, he became what nurses call in children\n\"fractious,\" and ready to turn on his companion for every remark he\nmade. Roger understood the case by instinct, as it were, and bore it\nall with his usual sweetness of temper. They entered the house by\nthe front door; it lay straight on their line of march. On the old\ncracked yellow-marble slab, there lay a card with Lord Hollingford's\nname on it, which Robinson, evidently on the watch for their return,\nhastened out of his pantry to deliver to Roger.\n\n\"His lordship was very sorry not to see you, Mr. Roger, and his\nlordship left a note for you. Mr. Osborne took it, I think, when\nhe passed through. I asked his lordship if he would like to see Mr.\nOsborne, who was indoors, as I thought. But his lordship said he was\npressed for time, and told me to make his excuses.\"\n\n\"Didn't he ask for me?\" growled the Squire.\n\n\"No, sir; I can't say as his lordship did. He would never have\nthought of Mr. Osborne, sir, if I hadn't named him. It was Mr. Roger\nhe seemed so keen after.\"\n\n\"Very odd,\" said the Squire. Roger said nothing, although he\nnaturally felt some curiosity. He went into the drawing-room, not\nquite aware that his father was following him. Osborne sate at a\ntable near the fire, pen in hand, looking over one of his poems, and\ndotting the _i_'s, crossing the _t_'s, and now and then pausing over\nthe alteration of a word.\n\n\"Oh, Roger!\" he said, as his brother came in, \"here's been Lord\nHollingford wanting to see you.\"\n\n\"I know,\" replied Roger.\n\n\"And he's left a note for you. Robinson tried to persuade him it was\nfor my father, so he's added a 'junior' (Roger Hamley, Esq., junior)\nin pencil.\" The Squire was in the room by this time, and what he had\noverheard rubbed him up still more the wrong way. Roger took his\nunopened note and read it.\n\n\"What does he say?\" asked the Squire.\n\nRoger handed him the note. It contained an invitation to dinner to\nmeet M. Geoffroi St. H----, whose views on certain subjects Roger had\nbeen advocating in the article Lord Hollingford had spoken about to\nMolly, when he danced with her at the Hollingford ball. M. Geoffroi\nSt. H---- was in England now, and was expected to pay a visit at\nthe Towers in the course of the following week. He had expressed a\nwish to meet the author of the paper which had already attracted the\nattention of the French comparative anatomists; and Lord Hollingford\nadded a few words as to his own desire to make the acquaintance of a\nneighbour whose tastes were so similar to his own; and then followed\na civil message from Lord and Lady Cumnor.\n\nLord Hollingford's hand was cramped and rather illegible. The squire\ncould not read it all at once, and was enough put out to decline any\nassistance in deciphering it. At last he made it out.\n\n\"So my lord lieutenant is taking some notice of the Hamleys at last.\nThe election is coming on, is it? But I can tell him we're not to be\ngot so easily. I suppose this trap is set for you, Osborne? What's\nthis you've been writing that the French mounseer is so taken with?\"\n\n\"It is not me, sir!\" said Osborne. \"Both note and call are for\nRoger.\"\n\n\"I don't understand it,\" said the Squire. \"These Whig fellows have\nnever done their duty by me; not that I want it of them. The Duke\nof Debenham used to pay the Hamleys a respect due to 'em--the\noldest landowners in the county--but since he died, and this\nshabby Whig lord has succeeded him, I've never dined at the lord\nlieutenant's--no, not once.\"\n\n\"But I think, sir, I've heard you say Lord Cumnor used to invite\nyou,--only you did not choose to go,\" said Roger.\n\n\"Yes. What d'ye mean by that? Do you suppose I was going to desert\nthe principles of my family, and curry favour with the Whigs? No!\nleave that to them. They can ask the heir of the Hamleys fast enough\nwhen a county election is coming on.\"\n\n\"I tell you, sir,\" said Osborne, in the irritable tone he sometimes\nused when his father was particularly unreasonable, \"it is not me\nLord Hollingford is inviting; it is Roger. Roger is making himself\nknown for what he is, a first-rate fellow,\" continued Osborne--a\nsting of self-reproach mingling with his generous pride in his\nbrother--\"and he's getting himself a name; he's been writing\nabout these new French theories and discoveries, and this foreign\n_savant_ very naturally wants to make his acquaintance, and so Lord\nHollingford asks him to dine. It's as clear as can be,\" lowering his\ntone, and addressing himself to Roger; \"it has nothing to do with\npolitics, if my father would but see it.\"\n\nOf course the Squire heard this little aside with the unlucky\nuncertainty of hearing which is a characteristic of the beginning\nof deafness; and its effect on him was perceptible in the increased\nacrimony of his next speech.\n\n\"You young men think you know everything. I tell you it's a palpable\nWhig trick. And what business has Roger--if it is Roger the man\nwants--to go currying favour with the French? In my day we were\ncontent to hate 'em and to lick 'em. But it's just like your conceit,\nOsborne, setting yourself up to say it's your younger brother they're\nasking, and not you; I tell you it's you. They think the eldest son\nwas sure to be called after his father, Roger--Roger Hamley, junior.\nIt's as plain as a pike-staff. They know they can't catch me with\nchaff, but they've got up this French dodge. What business had you to\ngo writing about the French, Roger? I should have thought you were\ntoo sensible to take any notice of their fancies and theories; but if\nit is you they've asked, I'll not have you going and meeting these\nforeigners at a Whig house. They ought to have asked Osborne. He's\nthe representative of the Hamleys, if I'm not; and they can't get me,\nlet 'em try ever so. Besides, Osborne has got a bit of the mounseer\nabout him, which he caught with being so fond of going off to the\nContinent, instead of coming back to his good old English home.\"\n\nHe went on repeating much of what he had said before, till he\nleft the room. Osborne had kept on replying to his unreasonable\ngrumblings, which had only added to his anger; and as soon as the\nSquire was fairly gone, Osborne turned to Roger, and said,--\n\n\"Of course you'll go, Roger? ten to one he'll be in another mind\nto-morrow.\"\n\n\"No,\" said Roger, bluntly enough--for he was extremely disappointed;\n\"I won't run the chance of vexing him. I shall refuse.\"\n\n\"Don't be such a fool!\" exclaimed Osborne. \"Really, my father is too\nunreasonable. You heard how he kept contradicting himself; and such a\nman as you to be kept under like a child by--\"\n\n\"Don't let us talk any more about it, Osborne,\" said Roger, writing\naway fast. When the note was written, and sent off, he came and put\nhis hand caressingly on Osborne's shoulder, as he sate pretending\nto read, but in reality vexed with both his father and his brother,\nthough on very different grounds.\n\n\"How go the poems, old fellow? I hope they're nearly ready to bring\nout.\"\n\n\"No, they're not; and if it weren't for the money, I shouldn't care\nif they were never published. What's the use of fame, if one mayn't\nreap the fruits of it?\"\n\n\"Come, now, we'll have no more of that; let's talk about the money.\nI shall be going up for my Fellowship examination next week, and then\nwe'll have a purse in common, for they'll never think of not giving\nme a Fellowship now I'm senior wrangler. I'm short enough myself at\npresent, and I don't like to bother my father; but when I'm Fellow,\nyou shall take me down to Winchester, and introduce me to the little\nwife.\"\n\n\"It will be a month next Monday since I left her,\" said Osborne,\nlaying down his papers and gazing into the fire, as if by so doing he\ncould call up her image. \"In her letter this morning she bids me give\nyou such a pretty message. It won't bear translating into English;\nyou must read it for yourself,\" continued he, pointing out a line or\ntwo in a letter he drew from his pocket.\n\nRoger suspected that one or two of the words were wrongly spelt;\nbut their purport was so gentle and loving, and had such a touch of\nsimple, respectful gratitude in them, that he could not help being\ndrawn afresh to the little unseen sister-in-law, whose acquaintance\nOsborne had made by helping her to look for some missing article of\nthe children's, whom she was taking for their daily walk in Hyde\nPark. For Mrs. Osborne Hamley had been nothing more than a French\n_bonne_, very pretty, very graceful, and very much tyrannized over\nby the rough little boys and girls she had in charge. She was a\nlittle orphan girl, who had charmed the heads of a travelling English\nfamily, as she had brought madame some articles of lingerie at an\nhotel; and she had been hastily engaged by them as _bonne_ to their\nchildren, partly as a pet and plaything herself, partly because it\nwould be so good for the children to learn French from a native\n(of Alsace!). By-and-by her mistress ceased to take any particular\nnotice of Aimée in the bustle of London and London gaiety; but though\nfeeling more and more forlorn in a strange land every day, the French\ngirl strove hard to do her duty. One touch of kindness, however, was\nenough to set the fountain gushing; and she and Osborne naturally\nfell into an ideal state of love, to be rudely disturbed by the\nindignation of the mother, when accident discovered to her the\nattachment existing between her children's _bonne_ and a young man\nof an entirely different class. Aimée answered truly to all her\nmistress's questions; but no worldly wisdom, nor any lesson to be\nlearnt from another's experience, could in the least disturb her\nentire faith in her lover. Perhaps Mrs. Townshend did no more than\nher duty in immediately sending Aimée back to Metz, where she had\nfirst met with her, and where such relations as remained to the girl\nmight be supposed to be residing. But, altogether, she knew so little\nof the kind of people or life to which she was consigning her deposed\nprotégée that Osborne, after listening with impatient indignation to\nthe lecture which Mrs. Townshend gave him when he insisted on seeing\nher in order to learn what had become of his love, that the young man\nset off straight for Metz in hot haste, and did not let the grass\ngrow under his feet until he had made Aimée his wife. All this had\noccurred the previous autumn, and Roger did not know of the step his\nbrother had taken until it was irrevocable. Then came the mother's\ndeath, which, besides the simplicity of its own overwhelming sorrow,\nbrought with it the loss of the kind, tender mediatrix, who could\nalways soften and turn his father's heart. It is doubtful, however,\nif even she could have succeeded in this, for the Squire looked high,\nand over high, for the wife of his heir; he detested all foreigners,\nand overmore held all Roman Catholics in dread and abomination\nsomething akin to our ancestors' hatred of witchcraft. All these\nprejudices were strengthened by his grief. Argument would always have\nglanced harmless away off his shield of utter unreason; but a loving\nimpulse, in a happy moment, might have softened his heart to what he\nmost detested in the former days. But the happy moments came not now,\nand the loving impulses were trodden down by the bitterness of his\nfrequent remorse, not less than by his growing irritability; so Aimée\nlived solitary in the little cottage near Winchester in which Osborne\nhad installed her when she first came to England as his wife, and\nin the dainty furnishing of which he had run himself so deeply into\ndebt. For Osborne consulted his own fastidious taste in his purchases\nrather than her simple childlike wishes and wants, and looked upon\nthe little Frenchwoman rather as the future mistress of Hamley Hall\nthan as the wife of a man who was wholly dependent on others at\npresent. He had chosen a southern county as being far removed from\nthose midland shires where the name of Hamley of Hamley was well and\nwidely known; for he did not wish his wife to assume, if only for a\ntime, a name which was not justly and legally her own. In all these\narrangements he had willingly striven to do his full duty by her; and\nshe repaid him with passionate devotion and admiring reverence. If\nhis vanity had met with a check, or his worthy desires for college\nhonours had been disappointed, he knew where to go for a comforter;\none who poured out praise till her words were choked in her throat by\nthe rapidity of her thoughts, and who poured out the small vials of\nher indignation on every one who did not acknowledge and bow down to\nher husband's merits. If she ever wished to go to the château--that\nwas his home--and to be introduced to his family, Aimée never hinted\na word of it to him. Only she did yearn, and she did plead, for a\nlittle more of her husband's company; and the good reasons which had\nconvinced her of the necessity of his being so much away when he was\npresent to urge them, failed in their efficacy when she tried to\nreproduce them to herself in his absence.\n\nThe afternoon of the day on which Lord Hollingford called Roger\nwas going upstairs, three steps at a time, when, at a turn on the\nlanding, he encountered his father. It was the first time he had seen\nhim since their conversation about the Towers' invitation to dinner.\nThe Squire stopped his son by standing right in the middle of the\npassage.\n\n\"Thou'rt going to meet the mounseer, my lad?\" said he, half as\naffirmation, half as question.\n\n\"No, sir; I sent off James almost immediately with a note declining\nit. I don't care about it--that's to say, not to signify.\"\n\n\"Why did you take me up so sharp, Roger?\" said his father pettishly.\n\"You all take me up so hastily now-a-days. I think it's hard when a\nman mustn't be allowed a bit of crossness when he's tired and heavy\nat heart--that I do.\"\n\n\"But, father, I should never like to go to a house where they had\nslighted you.\"\n\n\"Nay, nay, lad,\" said the Squire, brightening up a little; \"I think\nI slighted them. They asked me to dinner, after my lord was made\nlieutenant, time after time, but I never would go near 'em. I call\nthat my slighting them.\"\n\nAnd no more was said at the time; but the next day the Squire again\nstopped Roger.\n\n\"I've been making Jem try on his livery-coat that he hasn't worn this\nthree or four years,--he's got too stout for it now.\"\n\n\"Well, he needn't wear it, need he? and Morgan's lad will be glad\nenough of it,--he's sadly in want of clothes.\"\n\n\"Ay, ay; but who's to go with you when you call at the Towers? It's\nbut polite to call after Lord What's-his-name has taken the trouble\nto come here; and I shouldn't like you to go without a groom.\"\n\n\"My dear father! I shouldn't know what to do with a man riding at my\nback. I can find my way to the stable-yard for myself, or there'll be\nsome man about to take my horse. Don't trouble yourself about that.\"\n\n\"Well, you're not Osborne, to be sure. Perhaps it won't strike 'em\nas strange for you. But you must look up, and hold your own, and\nremember you're one of the Hamleys, who've been on the same land for\nhundreds of years, while they're but trumpery Whig folk who only came\ninto the county in Queen Anne's time.\"\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXVIII.\n\nRIVALRY.\n\n\nFor some days after the ball Cynthia seemed languid, and was very\nsilent. Molly, who had promised herself fully as much enjoyment in\ntalking over the past gaiety with Cynthia as in the evening itself,\nwas disappointed when she found that all conversation on the subject\nwas rather evaded than encouraged. Mrs. Gibson, it is true, was ready\nto go over the ground as many times as any one liked; but her words\nwere always like ready-made clothes, and never fitted individual\nthoughts. Anybody might have used them, and, with a change of proper\nnames, they might have served to describe any ball. She repeatedly\nused the same language in speaking about it, till Molly knew the\nsentences and their sequence even to irritation.\n\n\"Ah! Mr. Osborne, you should have been there! I said to myself many a\ntime how you really should have been there--you and your brother, of\ncourse.\"\n\n\"I thought of you very often during the evening!\"\n\n\"Did you? Now that I call very kind of you. Cynthia, darling! Do you\nhear what Mr. Osborne Hamley was saying?\" as Cynthia came into the\nroom just then. \"He thought of us all on the evening of the ball.\"\n\n\"He did better than merely remember us then,\" said Cynthia, with her\nsoft slow smile. \"We owe him thanks for those beautiful flowers,\nmamma.\"\n\n\"Oh!\" said Osborne, \"you must not thank me exclusively. I believe it\nwas my thought, but Roger took all the trouble of it.\"\n\n\"I consider the thought as everything,\" said Mrs. Gibson. \"Thought is\nspiritual, while action is merely material.\"\n\nThis fine sentence took the speaker herself by surprise; and in such\nconversation as was then going on, it is not necessary to accurately\ndefine the meaning of everything that is said.\n\n\"I'm afraid the flowers were too late to be of much use, though,\"\ncontinued Osborne. \"I met Preston the next morning, and of course we\ntalked about the ball. I was sorry to find he had been beforehand\nwith us.\"\n\n\"He only sent one nosegay, and that was for Cynthia,\" said Molly,\nlooking up from her work. \"And it did not come till after we had\nreceived the flowers from Hamley.\" Molly caught a sight of Cynthia's\nface before she bent down again to her sewing. It was scarlet in\ncolour, and there was a flash of anger in her eyes. Both she and her\nmother hastened to speak as soon as Molly had finished, but Cynthia's\nvoice was choked with passion, and Mrs. Gibson had the word.\n\n\"Mr. Preston's bouquet was just one of those formal affairs any one\ncan buy at a nursery-garden, which always strike me as having no\nsentiment in them. I would far rather have two or three lilies of the\nvalley gathered for me by a person I like, than the most expensive\nbouquet that could be bought!\"\n\n\"Mr. Preston had no business to speak as if he had forestalled you,\"\nsaid Cynthia. \"It came just as we were ready to go, and I put it into\nthe fire directly.\"\n\n\"Cynthia, my dear love!\" said Mrs. Gibson (who had never heard of the\nfate of the flowers until now), \"what an idea of yourself you will\ngive to Mr. Osborne Hamley; but, to be sure, I can quite understand\nit. You inherit my feeling--my prejudice--sentimental I grant,\nagainst bought flowers.\"\n\nCynthia was silent for a moment; then she said, \"I used some of\nyour flowers, Mr. Hamley, to dress Molly's hair. It was a great\ntemptation, for the colour so exactly matched her coral ornaments;\nbut I believe she thought it treacherous to disturb the arrangement,\nso I ought to take all the blame on myself.\"\n\n\"The arrangement was my brother's, as I told you; but I am sure he\nwould have preferred seeing them in Miss Gibson's hair rather than\nin the blazing fire. Mr. Preston comes far the worst off.\" Osborne\nwas rather amused at the whole affair, and would have liked to probe\nCynthia's motives a little farther. He did not hear Molly saying in\nas soft a voice as if she were talking to herself, \"I wore mine just\nas they were sent,\" for Mrs. Gibson came in with a total change of\nsubject.\n\n\"Speaking of lilies of the valley, is it true that they grow wild\nin Hurst Wood? It is not the season for them to be in flower yet;\nbut when it is, I think we must take a walk there--with our luncheon\nin a basket--a little picnic in fact. You'll join us, won't you?\"\nturning to Osborne. \"I think it's a charming plan! You could ride to\nHollingford and put up your horse here, and we could have a long day\nin the woods and all come home to dinner--dinner with a basket of\nlilies in the middle of the table!\"\n\n\"I should like it very much,\" said Osborne; \"but I may not be at\nhome. Roger is more likely to be here, I believe, at that time--a\nmonth hence.\" He was thinking of the visit to London to sell\nhis poems, and the run down to Winchester which he anticipated\nafterwards--the end of May had been the period fixed for this\npleasure for some time, not merely in his own mind, but in writing to\nhis wife.\n\n\"Oh, but you must be with us! We must wait for Mr. Osborne Hamley,\nmust not we, Cynthia?\"\n\n\"I'm afraid the lilies won't wait,\" replied Cynthia.\n\n\"Well, then, we must put it off till dog-rose and honey-suckle time.\nYou will be at home then, won't you? or does the London season\npresent too many attractions?\"\n\n\"I don't exactly know when dog-roses are in flower!\"\n\n\"Not know, and you a poet? Don't you remember the lines--\n\n   It was the time of roses,\n   We plucked them as we passed?\"\n\n\"Yes; but that doesn't specify the time of year that is the time\nof roses; and I believe my movements are guided more by the lunar\ncalendar than the floral. You had better take my brother for your\ncompanion; he is practical in his love of flowers, I am only\ntheoretical.\"\n\n\"Does that fine word 'theoretical' imply that you are ignorant?\"\nasked Cynthia.\n\n\"Of course we shall be happy to see your brother; but why can't we\nhave you too? I confess to a little timidity in the presence of one\nso deep and learned as your brother is from all accounts. Give me a\nlittle charming ignorance, if we must call it by that hard word.\"\n\nOsborne bowed. It was very pleasant to him to be petted and\nflattered, even though he knew all the time that it was only\nflattery. It was an agreeable contrast to the home that was so dismal\nto him, to come to this house, where the society of two agreeable\ngirls, and the soothing syrup of their mother's speeches, awaited\nhim whenever he liked to come. To say nothing of the difference that\nstruck upon his senses, poetical though he might esteem himself, of a\nsitting-room full of flowers, and tokens of women's presence, where\nall the chairs were easy, and all the tables well covered with pretty\nthings, to the great drawing-room at home, where the draperies were\nthreadbare, and the seats uncomfortable, and no sign of feminine\npresence ever now lent a grace to the stiff arrangement of the\nfurniture. Then the meals, light and well-cooked, suited his taste\nand delicate appetite so much better than the rich and heavy viands\nprepared by the servants at the Hall. Osborne was becoming a little\nafraid of falling into the habit of paying too frequent visits to\nthe Gibsons (and that, not because he feared the consequences of\nhis intercourse with the two young ladies; for he never thought of\nthem excepting as friends;--the fact of his marriage was constantly\npresent to his mind, and Aimée too securely enthroned in his heart,\nfor him to remember that he might be looked upon by others in the\nlight of a possible husband); but the reflection forced itself\nupon him occasionally, whether he was not trespassing too often on\nhospitality which he had at present no means of returning.\n\nBut Mrs. Gibson, in her ignorance of the true state of affairs, was\nsecretly exultant in the attraction which made him come so often\nand lounge away the hours in her house and garden. She had no doubt\nthat it was Cynthia who drew him thither; and if the latter had been\na little more amenable to reason, her mother would have made more\nfrequent allusions than she did to the crisis which she thought was\napproaching. But she was restrained by the intuitive conviction that\nif her daughter became conscious of what was impending, and was made\naware of Mrs. Gibson's cautious and quiet efforts to forward the\ncatastrophe, the wilful girl would oppose herself to it with all\nher skill and power. As it was, Mrs. Gibson trusted that Cynthia's\naffections would become engaged before she knew where she was, and\nthat in that case she would not attempt to frustrate her mother's\ndelicate scheming, even though she did perceive it. But Cynthia had\ncome across too many varieties of flirtation, admiration, and even\npassionate love, to be for a moment at fault as to the quiet friendly\nnature of Osborne's attentions. She received him always as a sister\nmight a brother. It was different when Roger returned from his\nelection as Fellow of Trinity. The trembling diffidence, the hardly\nsuppressed ardour of his manner, made Cynthia understand before long\nwith what kind of love she had now to deal. She did not put it into\nso many words--no, not even in her secret heart--but she recognized\nthe difference between Roger's relation to her and Osborne's long\nbefore Mrs. Gibson found it out. Molly was, however, the first to\ndiscover the nature of Roger's attention. The first time they saw\nhim after the ball, it came out to her observant eyes. Cynthia had\nnot been looking well since that evening; she went slowly about the\nhouse, pale and heavy-eyed; and, fond as she usually was of exercise\nand the free fresh air, there was hardly any persuading her now to go\nout for a walk. Molly watched this fading with tender anxiety, but\nto all her questions as to whether she had felt over-fatigued with\nher dancing, whether anything had occurred to annoy her, and all\nsuch inquiries, she replied in languid negatives. Once Molly touched\non Mr. Preston's name, and found that this was a subject on which\nCynthia was raw; now, Cynthia's face lighted up with spirit, and her\nwhole body showed her ill-repressed agitation, but she only said a\nfew sharp words, expressive of anything but kindly feeling towards\nthe gentleman, and then bade Molly never name his name to her again.\nStill, the latter could not imagine that he was more than intensely\ndistasteful to her friend, as well as to herself; he could not be\nthe cause of Cynthia's present indisposition. But this indisposition\nlasted so many days without change or modification, that even Mrs.\nGibson noticed it, and Molly became positively uneasy. Mrs. Gibson\nconsidered Cynthia's quietness and languor as the natural consequence\nof \"dancing with everybody who asked her\" at the ball. Partners whose\nnames were in the \"Red Book\" would not have produced half the amount\nof fatigue, according to Mrs. Gibson's judgment apparently, and if\nCynthia had been quite well, very probably she would have hit the\nblot in her mother's speech with one of her touches of sarcasm.\nThen, again, when Cynthia did not rally, Mrs. Gibson grew impatient,\nand accused her of being fanciful and lazy; at length, and partly\nat Molly's instance, there came an appeal to Mr. Gibson, and a\nprofessional examination of the supposed invalid, which Cynthia hated\nmore than anything, especially when the verdict was, that there was\nnothing very much the matter, only a general lowness of tone, and\ndepression of health and spirits, which would soon be remedied by\ntonics, and meanwhile, she was not to be roused to exertion.\n\n\"If there is one thing I dislike,\" said Cynthia to Mr. Gibson, after\nhe had pronounced tonics to be the cure for her present state, \"it is\nthe way doctors have of giving tablespoonfuls of nauseous mixtures as\na certain remedy for sorrows and cares.\" She laughed up in his face\nas she spoke; she had always a pretty word and smile for him, even in\nthe midst of her loss of spirits.\n\n\"Come! you acknowledge you have 'sorrows' by that speech: we'll make\na bargain: if you'll tell me your sorrows and cares, I'll try and\nfind some other remedy for them than giving you what you are pleased\nto term my nauseous mixtures.\"\n\n\"No,\" said Cynthia, colouring; \"I never said I had sorrows and cares;\nI spoke generally. What should I have a sorrow about?--you and Molly\nare only too kind to me,\" her eyes filling with tears.\n\n\"Well, well, we'll not talk of such gloomy things, and you shall have\nsome sweet emulsion to disguise the taste of the bitters I shall be\nobliged to fall back upon.\"\n\n\"Please, don't. If you but knew how I dislike emulsions and\ndisguises! I do want bitters--and if I sometimes--if I'm obliged\nto--if I'm not truthful myself, I do like truth in others--at least,\nsometimes.\" She ended her sentence with another smile, but it was\nrather faint and watery.\n\nNow the first person out of the house to notice Cynthia's change of\nlook and manner was Roger Hamley--and yet he did not see her until,\nunder the influence of the nauseous mixture, she was beginning to\nrecover. But his eyes were scarcely off her during the first five\nminutes he was in the room. All the time he was trying to talk\nto Mrs. Gibson in reply to her civil platitudes, he was studying\nCynthia; and at the first convenient pause he came and stood before\nMolly, so as to interpose his person between her and the rest of the\nroom; for some visitors had come in subsequent to his entrance.\n\n\"Molly, how ill your sister is looking! What is it? Has she had\nadvice? You must forgive me, but so often those who live together in\nthe same house don't observe the first approaches of illness.\"\n\nNow Molly's love for Cynthia was fast and unwavering, but if anything\ntried it, it was the habit Roger had fallen into of always calling\nCynthia Molly's sister in speaking to the latter. From any one else\nit would have been a matter of indifference to her, and hardly to be\nnoticed; it vexed both ear and heart when Roger used the expression;\nand there was a curtness of manner as well as of words in her reply.\n\n\"Oh! she was over-tired by the ball. Papa has seen her, and says she\nwill be all right very soon.\"\n\n\"I wonder if she wants change of air?\" said Roger, meditatively. \"I\nwish--I do wish we could have her at the Hall; you and your mother\ntoo, of course. But I don't see how it would be possible--or else how\ncharming it would be!\"\n\nMolly felt as if a visit to the Hall under such circumstances would\nbe altogether so different an affair to all her former ones, that she\ncould hardly tell if she should like it or not.\n\nRoger went on,--\n\n\"You got our flowers in time, did you not? Ah! you don't know how\noften I thought of you that evening! And you enjoyed it too, didn't\nyou?--you had plenty of agreeable partners, and all that makes a\nfirst ball delightful? I heard that your sister danced every dance.\"\n\n\"It was very pleasant,\" said Molly, quietly. \"But, after all, I'm not\nsure if I want to go to another just yet; there seems to be so much\ntrouble connected with a ball.\"\n\n\"Ah! you are thinking of your sister, and her not being well?\"\n\n\"No, I was not,\" said Molly, rather bluntly. \"I was thinking of the\ndress, and the dressing, and the weariness the next day.\"\n\nHe might think her unfeeling if he liked; she felt as if she had only\ntoo much feeling just then, for it was bringing on her a strange\ncontraction of heart. But he was too inherently good himself to put\nany harsh construction on her speech. Just before he went away, while\nhe was ostensibly holding her hand and wishing her good-by, he said\nto her in a voice too low to be generally heard,--\n\n\"Is there anything I could do for your sister? We have plenty of\nbooks, as you know, if she cares for reading.\" Then, receiving no\naffirmative look or word from Molly in reply to this suggestion,\nhe went on,--\"Or flowers? she likes flowers. Oh! and our forced\nstrawberries are just ready--I will bring some over to-morrow.\"\n\n\"I am sure she will like them,\" said Molly.\n\nFor some reason or other, unknown to the Gibsons, a longer interval\nthan usual occurred between Osborne's visits, while Roger came almost\nevery day, always with some fresh offering by which he openly sought\nto relieve Cynthia's indisposition as far as it lay in his power.\nHer manner to him was so gentle and gracious that Mrs. Gibson became\nalarmed, lest, in spite of his \"uncouthness\" (as she was pleased\nto term it), he might come to be preferred to Osborne, who was so\nstrangely neglecting his own interests, in Mrs. Gibson's opinion. In\nher quiet way, she contrived to pass many slights upon Roger; but the\ndarts rebounded from his generous nature that could not have imagined\nher motives, and fastened themselves on Molly. She had often been\ncalled naughty and passionate when she was a child; and she thought\nnow that she began to understand that she really had a violent\ntemper. What seemed neither to hurt Roger nor annoy Cynthia made\nMolly's blood boil; and now she had once discovered Mrs. Gibson's\nwish to make Roger's visits shorter and less frequent, she was\nalways on the watch for indications of this desire. She read her\nstepmother's heart when the latter made allusions to the Squire's\nloneliness, now that Osborne was absent from the Hall, and that Roger\nwas so often away amongst his friends during the day,--\n\n\"Mr. Gibson and I should be so delighted if you could have stopped to\ndinner; but, of course, we cannot be so selfish as to ask you to stay\nwhen we remember how your father would be left alone. We were saying\nyesterday we wondered how he bore his solitude, poor old gentleman!\"\n\nOr, as soon as Roger came with his bunch of early roses, it was\ndesirable for Cynthia to go and rest in her own room, while Molly\nhad to accompany Mrs. Gibson on some improvised errand or call.\nStill Roger, whose object was to give pleasure to Cynthia, and who\nhad, from his boyhood, been always certain of Mr. Gibson's friendly\nregard, was slow to perceive that he was not wanted. If he did not\nsee Cynthia, that was his loss; at any rate, he heard how she was,\nand left her some little thing which he believed she would like, and\nwas willing to risk the chance of his own gratification by calling\nfour or five times in the hope of seeing her once. At last there came\na day when Mrs. Gibson went beyond her usual negative snubbiness,\nand when, in some unwonted fit of crossness, for she was a very\nplacid-tempered person in general, she was guilty of positive\nrudeness.\n\nCynthia was very much better. Tonics had ministered to a mind\ndiseased, though she hated to acknowledge it; her pretty bloom and\nmuch of her light-heartedness had come back, and there was no cause\nremaining for anxiety. Mrs. Gibson was sitting at her embroidery\nin the drawing-room, and the two girls were at the window, Cynthia\nlaughing at Molly's earnest endeavours to imitate the French accent\nin which the former had been reading a page of Voltaire. For\nthe duty, or the farce, of settling to \"improving reading\" in\nthe mornings was still kept up, although Lord Hollingford, the\nunconscious suggestor of the idea, had gone back to town without\nmaking any of the efforts to see Molly again that Mrs. Gibson had\nanticipated on the night of the ball. That Alnaschar vision had\nfallen to the ground. It was as yet early morning; a delicious,\nfresh, lovely June day, the air redolent with the scents of\nflower-growth and bloom; and half the time the girls had been\nostensibly employed in the French reading they had been leaning out\nof the open window trying to reach a cluster of climbing roses. They\nhad secured them at last, and the buds lay on Cynthia's lap, but many\nof the petals had fallen off; so, though the perfume lingered about\nthe window-seat, the full beauty of the flowers had passed away. Mrs.\nGibson had once or twice reproved them for the merry noise they were\nmaking, which hindered her in the business of counting the stitches\nin her pattern; and she had set herself a certain quantity to do\nthat morning before going out, and was of that nature which attaches\ninfinite importance to fulfilling small resolutions, made about\nindifferent trifles without any reason whatever.\n\n\"Mr. Roger Hamley,\" was announced. \"So tiresome!\" said Mrs. Gibson,\nalmost in his hearing, as she pushed away her embroidery frame. She\nput out her cold, motionless hand to him, with a half-murmured word\nof welcome, still eyeing her lost embroidery. He took no apparent\nnotice, and passed on to the window.\n\n\"How delicious!\" said he. \"No need for any more Hamley roses now\nyours are out.\"\n\n\"I agree with you,\" said Mrs. Gibson, replying to him before either\nCynthia or Molly could speak, though he addressed his words to them.\n\"You have been very kind in bringing us flowers so long; but now our\nown are out we need not trouble you any more.\"\n\nHe looked at her with a little surprise clouding his honest face; it\nwas perhaps more at the tone than the words. Mrs. Gibson, however,\nhad been bold enough to strike the first blow, and she determined\nto go on as opportunity offered. Molly would perhaps have been more\npained if she had not seen Cynthia's colour rise. She waited for her\nto speak, if need were; for she knew that Roger's defence, if defence\nwere required, might be safely entrusted to Cynthia's ready wit.\n\nHe put out his hand for the shattered cluster of roses that lay in\nCynthia's lap.\n\n\"At any rate,\" said he, \"my trouble--if Mrs. Gibson considers it has\nbeen a trouble to me--will be over-paid, if I may have this.\"\n\n\"Old lamps for new,\" said Cynthia, smiling as she gave it to him. \"I\nwish one could always buy nosegays such as you have brought us, as\ncheaply.\"\n\n\"You forget the waste of time that, I think, we must reckon as part\nof the payment,\" said her mother. \"Really, Mr. Hamley, we must learn\nto shut our doors on you if you come so often, and at such early\nhours! I settle myself to my own employment regularly after breakfast\ntill lunch-time; and it is my wish to keep Cynthia and Molly to a\ncourse of improving reading and study--so desirable for young people\nof their age, if they are ever to become intelligent, companionable\nwomen; but with early visitors it is quite impossible to observe any\nregularity of habits.\"\n\nAll this was said in that sweet, false tone which of late had gone\nthrough Molly like the scraping of a slate-pencil on a slate. Roger's\nface changed. His ruddy colour grew paler for a moment, and he looked\ngrave and not pleased. In another moment the wonted frankness of\nexpression returned. Why should not he, he asked himself, believe\nher? It was early to call; it did interrupt regular occupation. So he\nspoke, and said,--\n\n\"I believe I have been very thoughtless--I'll not come so early\nagain; but I had some excuse to-day: my brother told me you had made\na plan for going to see Hurst Wood when the roses were out, and they\nare earlier than usual this year--I've been round to see. He spoke of\na long day there, going before lunch--\"\n\n\"The plan was made with Mr. Osborne Hamley. I could not think of\ngoing without him!\" said Mrs. Gibson, coldly.\n\n\"I had a letter from him this morning, in which he named your wish,\nand he says he fears he cannot be at home till they are out of\nflower. I daresay they are not much to see in reality, but the day is\nso lovely I thought that the plan of going to Hurst Wood would be a\ncharming excuse for being out of doors.\"\n\n\"Thank you. How kind you are! and so good, too, in sacrificing your\nnatural desire to be with your father as much as possible.\"\n\n\"I'm glad to say my father is so much better than he was in the\nwinter that he spends much of his time out of doors in his fields. He\nhas been accustomed to go about alone, and I--we think that as great\na return to his former habits as he can be induced to make is the\nbest for him.\"\n\n\"And when do you return to Cambridge?\"\n\nThere was some hesitation in Roger's manner as he replied,--\n\n\"It is uncertain. You probably know that I am a Fellow of Trinity\nnow. I hardly yet know what my future plans may be; I am thinking of\ngoing up to London soon.\"\n\n\"Ah! London is the true place for a young man,\" said Mrs. Gibson,\nwith decision, as if she had reflected a good deal on the question.\n\"If it were not that we really are so busy this morning, I should\nhave been tempted to make an exception to our general rule; one more\nexception, for your early visits have made us make too many already.\nPerhaps, however, we may see you again before you go?\"\n\n\"Certainly I shall come,\" replied he, rising to take his leave, and\nstill holding the demolished roses in his hand. Then, addressing\nhimself more especially to Cynthia, he added, \"My stay in London will\nnot exceed a fortnight or so--is there anything I can do for you--or\nyou?\" turning a little to Molly.\n\n\"No, thank you very much,\" said Cynthia, very sweetly, and then,\nacting on a sudden impulse, she leant out of the window, and gathered\nhim some half-opened roses. \"You deserve these; do throw that poor\nshabby bunch away.\"\n\nHis eyes brightened, his cheeks glowed. He took the offered buds, but\ndid not throw away the other bunch.\n\n\"At any rate, I may come after lunch is over, and the afternoons and\nevenings will be the most delicious time of day a month hence.\" He\nsaid this to both Molly and Cynthia, but in his heart he addressed it\nto the latter.\n\nMrs. Gibson affected not to hear what he was saying, but held out her\nlimp hand once more to him.\n\n\"I suppose we shall see you when you return; and pray tell your\nbrother how we are longing to have a visit from him again.\"\n\nWhen he had left the room, Molly's heart was quite full. She\nhad watched his face, and read something of his feelings: his\ndisappointment at their non-acquiescence in his plan of a day's\npleasure in Hurst Wood, the delayed conviction that his presence\nwas not welcome to the wife of his old friend, which had come so\nslowly upon him--perhaps, after all, these things touched Molly more\nkeenly than they did him. His bright look when Cynthia gave him the\nrose-buds indicated a gush of sudden delight more vivid than the pain\nhe had shown by his previous increase of gravity.\n\n\"I can't think why he will come at such untimely hours,\" said Mrs.\nGibson, as soon as she heard him fairly out of the house. \"It's\ndifferent from Osborne; we are so much more intimate with him: he\ncame and made friends with us all the time this stupid brother of\nhis was muddling his brains with mathematics at Cambridge. Fellow of\nTrinity, indeed! I wish he would learn to stay there, and not come\nintruding here, and assuming that because I asked Osborne to join in\na picnic it was all the same to me which brother came.\"\n\n\"In short, mamma, one man may steal a horse, but another must not\nlook over the hedge,\" said Cynthia, pouting a little.\n\n\"And the two brothers have always been treated so exactly alike by\ntheir friends, and there has been such a strong friendship between\nthem, that it is no wonder Roger thinks he may be welcome where\nOsborne is allowed to come at all hours,\" continued Molly, in high\ndudgeon. \"Roger's 'muddled brains,' indeed! Roger, 'stupid!'\"\n\n\"Oh, very well, my dears! When I was young it wouldn't have been\nthought becoming for girls of your age to fly out because a little\nrestraint was exercised as to the hours at which they should receive\nthe young men's calls. And they would have supposed that there might\nbe good reasons why their parents disapproved of the visits of\ncertain gentlemen, even while they were proud and pleased to see some\nmembers of the same family.\"\n\n\"But that was what I said, mamma,\" said Cynthia, looking at her\nmother with an expression of innocent bewilderment on her face. \"One\nman may--\"\n\n\"Be quiet, child! All proverbs are vulgar, and I do believe that\nis the vulgarest of all. You are really catching Roger Hamley's\ncoarseness, Cynthia!\"\n\n\"Mamma,\" said Cynthia, roused to anger, \"I don't mind your abusing\nme, but Mr. Roger Hamley has been very kind to me while I've not\nbeen well: I can't bear to hear him disparaged. If he's coarse, I've\nno objection to be coarse as well, for it seems to me it must mean\nkindliness and pleasantness, and the bringing of pretty flowers and\npresents.\"\n\nMolly's tears were brimming over at these words; she could have\nkissed Cynthia for her warm partisanship, but, afraid of betraying\nemotion, and \"making a scene,\" as Mrs. Gibson called any signs of\nwarm feeling, she laid down her book hastily, and ran upstairs to\nher room, and locked the door in order to breathe freely. There were\ntraces of tears upon her face when she returned into the drawing-room\nhalf-an-hour afterwards, walking straight and demurely up to her\nformer place, where Cynthia still sate and gazed idly out of the\nwindow, pouting and displeased; Mrs. Gibson, meanwhile, counting her\nstitches aloud with great distinctness and vigour.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXIX.\n\nBUSH-FIGHTING.\n\n\nDuring all the months that had elapsed since Mrs. Hamley's death,\nMolly had wondered many a time about the secret she had so\nunwittingly become possessed of that last day in the Hall library. It\nseemed so utterly strange and unheard-of a thing to her inexperienced\nmind, that a man should be married, and yet not live with his\nwife--that a son should have entered into the holy state of matrimony\nwithout his father's knowledge, and without being recognized as the\nhusband of some one known or unknown by all those with whom he came\nin daily contact, that she felt occasionally as if that little ten\nminutes of revelation must have been a vision in a dream. Roger\nhad only slightly referred to it once, and Osborne had kept entire\nsilence on the subject ever since. Not even a look, or a pause,\nbetrayed any allusion to it; it even seemed to have passed out of\ntheir thoughts. There had been the great sad event of their mother's\ndeath to fill their minds on the next occasion of their meeting\nMolly; and since then long pauses of intercourse had taken place; so\nthat she sometimes felt as if both the brothers must have forgotten\nhow she had come to know their important secret. She even found\nherself often entirely forgetting it, but perhaps the consciousness\nof it was present to her unawares, and enabled her to comprehend the\nreal nature of Osborne's feelings towards Cynthia. At any rate, she\nnever for a moment had supposed that his gentle kind manner towards\nCynthia was anything but the courtesy of a friend. Strange to say, in\nthese latter days Molly had looked upon Osborne's relation to herself\nas pretty much the same as that in which at one time she had regarded\nRoger's; and she thought of the former as of some one as nearly a\nbrother both to Cynthia and herself, as any young man could well be,\nwhom they had not known in childhood, and who was in nowise related\nto them. She thought that he was very much improved in manner, and\nprobably in character, by his mother's death. He was no longer\nsarcastic, or fastidious, or vain, or self-confident. She did not\nknow how often all these styles of talk or of behaviour were put on\nto conceal shyness or consciousness, and to veil the real self from\nstrangers.\n\nOsborne's conversation and ways might very possibly have been just\nthe same as before, had he been thrown amongst new people; but Molly\nonly saw him in their own circle in which he was on terms of decided\nintimacy. Still there was no doubt that he was really improved,\nthough perhaps not to the extent for which Molly gave him credit; and\nthis exaggeration on her part arose very naturally from the fact,\nthat he, perceiving Roger's warm admiration for Cynthia, withdrew a\nlittle out of his brother's way; and used to go and talk to Molly in\norder not to intrude himself between Roger and Cynthia. Of the two,\nperhaps, Osborne preferred Molly; to her he needed not to talk if the\nmood was not on him--they were on those happy terms where silence is\npermissible, and where efforts to act against the prevailing mood of\nthe mind are not required. Sometimes, indeed, when Osborne was in the\nhumour to be critical and fastidious as of yore, he used to vex Roger\nby insisting upon it that Molly was prettier than Cynthia.\n\n\"You mark my words, Roger. Five years hence the beautiful Cynthia's\nred and white will have become just a little coarse, and her figure\nwill have thickened, while Molly's will only have developed into more\nperfect grace. I don't believe the girl has done growing yet; I'm\nsure she's taller than when I first saw her last summer.\"\n\n\"Miss Kirkpatrick's eyes must always be perfection. I cannot fancy\nany could come up to them: soft, grave, appealing, tender; and such a\nheavenly colour--I often try to find something in nature to compare\nthem to; they are not like violets--that blue in the eyes is too like\nphysical weakness of sight; they are not like the sky--that colour\nhas something of cruelty in it.\"\n\n\"Come, don't go on trying to match her eyes as if you were a draper,\nand they a bit of ribbon; say at once 'her eyes are loadstars,' and\nhave done with it! I set up Molly's grey eyes and curling black\nlashes, long odds above the other young woman's; but, of course, it's\nall a matter of taste.\"\n\nAnd now both Osborne and Roger had left the neighbourhood. In spite\nof all that Mrs. Gibson had said about Roger's visits being ill-timed\nand intrusive, she began to feel as if they had been a very pleasant\nvariety, now that they had ceased altogether. He brought in a whiff\nof a new atmosphere from that of Hollingford. He and his brother had\nbeen always ready to do numberless little things which only a man can\ndo for women; small services which Mr. Gibson was always too busy to\nrender. For the good doctor's business grew upon him. He thought that\nthis increase was owing to his greater skill and experience, and he\nwould probably have been mortified if he could have known how many\nof his patients were solely biassed in sending for him, by the fact\nthat he was employed at the Towers. Something of this sort must have\nbeen contemplated in the low scale of payment adopted long ago by\nthe Cumnor family. Of itself the money he received for going to the\nTowers would hardly have paid him for horse-flesh, but then, as Lady\nCumnor in her younger days had worded it,--\n\n\"It is such a thing for a man just setting up in practice for himself\nto be able to say he attends at this house!\"\n\nSo the prestige was tacitly sold and paid for; but neither buyer nor\nseller defined the nature of the bargain.\n\nOn the whole, it was as well that Mr. Gibson spent so much of his\ntime from home. He sometimes thought so himself when he heard his\nwife's plaintive fret or pretty babble over totally indifferent\nthings, and perceived of how flimsy a nature were all her fine\nsentiments. Still, he did not allow himself to repine over the step\nhe had taken; he wilfully shut his eyes and waxed up his ears to many\nsmall things that he knew would have irritated him if he had attended\nto them; and, in his solitary rides, he forced himself to dwell on\nthe positive advantages that had accrued to him and his through his\nmarriage. He had obtained an unexceptionable chaperone, if not a\ntender mother, for his little girl; a skilful manager of his previous\ndisorderly household; a woman who was graceful and pleasant to\nlook at for the head of his table. Moreover, Cynthia reckoned for\nsomething on the favourable side of the balance. She was a capital\ncompanion for Molly; and the two were evidently very fond of each\nother. The feminine companionship of the mother and daughter was\nagreeable to him as well as to his child,--when Mrs. Gibson was\nmoderately sensible and not over-sentimental, he mentally added; and\nthen he checked himself, for he would not allow himself to become\nmore aware of her faults and foibles by defining them. At any rate,\nshe was harmless, and wonderfully just to Molly for a stepmother.\nShe piqued herself upon this indeed, and would often call attention\nto the fact of her being unlike other women in this respect. Just\nthen sudden tears came into Mr. Gibson's eyes, as he remembered how\nquiet and undemonstrative his little Molly had become in her general\nbehaviour to him; but how once or twice, when they had met upon the\nstairs, or were otherwise unwitnessed, she had caught him and kissed\nhim--hand or cheek--in a sad passionateness of affection. But in a\nmoment he began to whistle an old Scotch air he had heard in his\nchildhood, and which had never recurred to his memory since; and\nfive minutes afterwards he was too busily treating a case of white\nswelling in the knee of a little boy, and thinking how to relieve the\npoor mother, who went out charring all day, and had to listen to the\nmoans of her child all night, to have any thought for his own cares,\nwhich, if they really existed, were of so trifling a nature compared\nto the hard reality of this hopeless woe.\n\nOsborne came home first. He returned, in fact, not long after Roger\nhad gone away; but he was languid and unwell, and, though he did\nnot complain, he felt unequal to any exertion. Thus a week or more\nelapsed before any of the Gibsons knew that he was at the Hall; and\nthen it was only by chance that they became aware of it. Mr. Gibson\nmet him in one of the lanes near Hamley; the acute surgeon noticed\nthe gait of the man as he came near, before he recognized who it was.\nWhen he overtook him he said,--\n\n\"Why, Osborne, is it you? I thought it was an old man of fifty\nloitering before me! I didn't know you had come back.\"\n\n\n[Illustration: \"WHY, OSBORNE, IS IT YOU?\"]\n\n\n\"Yes,\" said Osborne, \"I've been at home nearly ten days. I daresay\nI ought to have called on your people, for I made a half promise to\nMrs. Gibson to let her know as soon as I returned; but the fact is,\nI'm feeling very good-for-nothing,--this air oppresses me; I could\nhardly breathe in the house, and yet I'm already tired with this\nshort walk.\"\n\n\"You'd better get home at once; and I'll call and see you as I come\nback from Rowe's.\"\n\n\"No, you mustn't on any account!\" said Osborne, hastily; \"my father\nis annoyed enough about my going from home, so often, he says, though\nI hadn't been from it for six weeks. He puts down all my languor\nto my having been away,--he keeps the purse-strings, you know,\" he\nadded, with a faint smile, \"and I'm in the unlucky position of a\npenniless heir, and I've been brought up so--In fact, I must leave\nhome from time to time, and, if my father gets confirmed in this\nnotion of his that my health is worse for my absences, he'll stop the\nsupplies altogether.\"\n\n\"May I ask where you do spend your time when you are not at Hamley\nHall?\" asked Mr. Gibson, with some hesitation in his manner.\n\n\"No!\" replied Osborne, reluctantly. \"I will tell you this:--I\nstay with friends in the country. I lead a life which ought to be\nconducive to health, because it is thoroughly simple, rational, and\nhappy. And now I've told you more about it than my father himself\nknows. He never asks me where I've been; and I shouldn't tell him if\nhe did--at least, I think not.\"\n\nMr. Gibson rode on by Osborne's side, not speaking for a moment or\ntwo.\n\n\"Osborne, whatever scrapes you may have got into, I should advise\nyour telling your father boldly out. I know him; and I know he'll be\nangry enough at first, but he'll come round, take my word for it;\nand, somehow or another, he'll find money to pay your debts and set\nyou free, if it's that kind of difficulty; and if it's any other\nkind of entanglement, why still he's your best friend. It's this\nestrangement from your father that's telling on your health, I'll be\nbound.\"\n\n\"No,\" said Osborne, \"I beg your pardon; but it's not that; I am\nreally out of order. I daresay my unwillingness to encounter any\ndispleasure from my father is the consequence of my indisposition;\nbut I'll answer for it, it is not the cause of it. My instinct tells\nme there is something really the matter with me.\"\n\n\"Come, don't be setting up your instinct against the profession,\"\nsaid Mr. Gibson, cheerily.\n\nHe dismounted, and throwing the reins of his horse round his arm, he\nlooked at Osborne's tongue and felt his pulse, asking him various\nquestions. At the end he said,--\n\n\"We'll soon bring you about, though I should like a little more quiet\ntalk with you, without this tugging brute for a third. If you'll\nmanage to ride over and lunch with us to-morrow, Dr. Nicholls will\nbe with us; he's coming over to see old Rowe; and you shall have the\nbenefit of the advice of two doctors instead of one. Go home now,\nyou've had enough exercise for the middle of a day as hot as this is.\nAnd don't mope in the house, listening to the maunderings of your\nstupid instinct.\"\n\n\"What else have I to do?\" said Osborne. \"My father and I are not\ncompanions; one can't read and write for ever, especially when\nthere's no end to be gained by it. I don't mind telling you--but in\nconfidence, recollect--that I've been trying to get some of my poems\npublished; but there's no one like a publisher for taking the conceit\nout of one. Not a man among them would have them as a gift.\"\n\n\"Oho! so that's it, is it, Master Osborne? I thought there was some\nmental cause for this depression of health. I wouldn't trouble my\nhead about it, if I were you, though that's always very easily said,\nI know. Try your hand at prose, if you can't manage to please the\npublishers with poetry; but, at any rate, don't go on fretting\nover spilt milk. But I mustn't lose my time here. Come over to us\nto-morrow, as I said; and what with the wisdom of two doctors, and\nthe wit and folly of three women, I think we shall cheer you up a\nbit.\"\n\nSo saying, Mr. Gibson remounted, and rode away at the long, slinging\ntrot so well known to the country people as the doctor's pace.\n\n\"I don't like his looks,\" thought Mr. Gibson to himself at night,\nas over his daybooks he reviewed the events of the day. \"And then\nhis pulse. But how often we're all mistaken; and, ten to one, my own\nhidden enemy lies closer to me than his does to him--even taking the\nworse view of the case.\"\n\nOsborne made his appearance a considerable time before luncheon\nthe next morning; and no one objected to the earliness of his call.\nHe was feeling better. There were few signs of the invalid about\nhim; and what few there were disappeared under the bright pleasant\ninfluence of such a welcome as he received from all. Molly and\nCynthia had much to tell him of the small proceedings since he went\naway, or to relate the conclusions of half-accomplished projects.\nCynthia was often on the point of some gay, careless inquiry as\nto where he had been, and what he had been doing; but Molly, who\nconjectured the truth, as often interfered to spare him the pain of\nequivocation--a pain that her tender conscience would have felt for\nhim, much more than he would have felt it for himself.\n\nMrs. Gibson's talk was desultory, complimentary, and sentimental,\nafter her usual fashion; but still, on the whole, though Osborne\nsmiled to himself at much that she said, it was soothing and\nagreeable. Presently, Dr. Nicholls and Mr. Gibson came in; the former\nhad had some conference with the latter on the subject of Osborne's\nhealth; and, from time to time, the skilful old physician's sharp and\nobservant eyes gave a comprehensive look at Osborne.\n\nThen there was lunch, when every one was merry and hungry, excepting\nthe hostess, who was trying to train her midday appetite into\nthe genteelest of all ways, and thought (falsely enough) that Dr.\nNicholls was a good person to practise the semblance of ill-health\nupon, and that he would give her the proper civil amount of\ncommiseration for her ailments, which every guest ought to bestow\nupon a hostess who complains of her delicacy of health. The old\ndoctor was too cunning a man to fall into this trap. He would keep\nrecommending her to try the coarsest viands on the table; and, at\nlast, he told her if she could not fancy the cold beef to try a\nlittle with pickled onions. There was a twinkle in his eye as he said\nthis, that would have betrayed his humour to any observer; but Mr.\nGibson, Cynthia, and Molly were all attacking Osborne on the subject\nof some literary preference he had expressed, and Dr. Nicholls had\nMrs. Gibson quite at his mercy. She was not sorry when luncheon was\nover to leave the room to the three gentlemen; and ever afterwards\nshe spoke of Dr. Nicholls as \"that bear.\"\n\nPresently, Osborne came upstairs, and, after his old fashion, began\nto take up new books, and to question the girls as to their music.\nMrs. Gibson had to go out and pay some calls, so she left the three\ntogether; and after a while they adjourned into the garden, Osborne\nlounging on a chair, while Molly employed herself busily in tying up\ncarnations, and Cynthia gathered flowers in her careless, graceful\nway.\n\n\"I hope you notice the difference in our occupations, Mr. Hamley.\nMolly, you see, devotes herself to the useful, and I to the\nornamental. Please, under what head do you class what you are doing?\nI think you might help one of us, instead of looking on like the\nGrand Seigneur.\"\n\n\"I don't know what I can do,\" said he, rather plaintively. \"I should\nlike to be useful, but I don't know how; and my day is past for\npurely ornamental work. You must let me be, I'm afraid. Besides, I'm\nreally rather exhausted by being questioned and pulled about by those\ngood doctors.\"\n\n\"Why, you don't mean to say they have been attacking you since\nlunch!\" exclaimed Molly.\n\n\"Yes; indeed, they have; and they might have gone on till now if Mrs.\nGibson had not come in opportunely.\"\n\n\"I thought mamma had gone out some time ago!\" said Cynthia, catching\nwafts of the conversation as she flitted hither and thither among the\nflowers.\n\n\"She came into the dining-room not five minutes ago. Do you want her,\nfor I see her crossing the hall at this very moment?\" and Osborne\nhalf rose.\n\n\"Oh, not at all!\" said Cynthia. \"Only she seemed to be in such a\nhurry to go out, I fancied she had set off long ago. She had some\nerrand to do for Lady Cumnor, and she thought she could manage to\ncatch the housekeeper, who is always in the town on Thursday.\"\n\n\"Are the family coming to the Towers this autumn?\"\n\n\"I believe so. But I don't know, and I don't much care. They don't\ntake kindly to me,\" continued Cynthia, \"and so I suppose I'm not\ngenerous enough to take kindly to them.\"\n\n\"I should have thought that such a very unusual blot in their\ndiscrimination would have interested you in them as extraordinary\npeople,\" said Osborne, with a little air of conscious gallantry.\n\n\"Isn't that a compliment?\" said Cynthia, after a pause of mock\nmeditation. \"If any one pays me a compliment, please let it be short\nand clear. I'm very stupid at finding out hidden meanings.\"\n\n\"Then such speeches as 'you are very pretty,' or 'you have charming\nmanners,' are what you prefer. Now, I pique myself on wrapping up my\nsugar-plums delicately.\"\n\n\"Then would you please to write them down, and at my leisure I'll\nparse them.\"\n\n\"No! It would be too much trouble. I'll meet you half-way, and study\nclearness next time.\"\n\n\"What are you two talking about?\" said Molly, resting on her light\nspade.\n\n\"It's only a discussion on the best way of administering\ncompliments,\" said Cynthia, taking up her flower-basket again, but\nnot going out of the reach of the conversation.\n\n\"I don't like them at all in any way,\" said Molly. \"But, perhaps,\nit's rather sour grapes with me,\" she added.\n\n\"Nonsense!\" said Osborne. \"Shall I tell you what I heard of you at\nthe ball?\"\n\n\"Or shall I provoke Mr. Preston,\" said Cynthia, \"to begin upon you?\nIt's like turning a tap, such a stream of pretty speeches flows out\nat the moment.\" Her lip curled with scorn.\n\n\"For you, perhaps,\" said Molly; \"but not for me.\"\n\n\"For any woman. It's his notion of making himself agreeable. If you\ndare me, Molly, I'll try the experiment, and you'll see with what\nsuccess.\"\n\n\"No, don't, pray!\" said Molly, in a hurry. \"I do so dislike him!\"\n\n\"Why?\" said Osborne, roused to a little curiosity by her vehemence.\n\n\"Oh! I don't know. He never seems to know what one is feeling.\"\n\n\"He wouldn't care if he did know,\" said Cynthia. \"And he might know\nhe is not wanted.\"\n\n\"If he chooses to stay, he cares little whether he is wanted or not.\"\n\n\"Come, this is very interesting,\" said Osborne. \"It is like the\nstrophe and anti-strophe in a Greek chorus. Pray, go on.\"\n\n\"Don't you know him?\" asked Molly.\n\n\"Yes, by sight, and I think we were once introduced. But, you know,\nwe are much farther from Ashcombe, at Hamley, than you are here, at\nHollingford.\"\n\n\"Oh! but he's coming to take Mr. Sheepshanks' place, and then he'll\nlive here altogether,\" said Molly.\n\n\"Molly! who told you that?\" said Cynthia, in quite a different tone\nof voice from that in which she had been speaking hitherto.\n\n\"Papa,--didn't you hear him? Oh, no! it was before you were down this\nmorning. Papa met Mr. Sheepshanks yesterday, and he told him it was\nall settled: you know we heard a rumour about it in the spring!\"\n\nCynthia was very silent after this. Presently, she said that she had\ngathered all the flowers she wanted, and that the heat was so great\nshe would go indoors. And then Osborne went away. But Molly had set\nherself a task to dig up such roots as had already flowered, and to\nput down some bedding-out plants in their stead. Tired and heated as\nshe was she finished it, and then went upstairs to rest, and change\nher dress. According to her wont, she sought for Cynthia; there was\nno reply to her soft knock at the bedroom-door opposite to her own,\nand, thinking that Cynthia might have fallen asleep, and be lying\nuncovered in the draught of the open window, she went in softly.\nCynthia was lying upon the bed as if she had thrown herself down on\nit without caring for the ease or comfort of her position. She was\nvery still; and Molly took a shawl, and was going to place it over\nher, when she opened her eyes, and spoke,--\n\n\"Is that you, dear? Don't go. I like to know that you are there.\"\n\nShe shut her eyes again, and remained quite quiet for a few minutes\nlonger. Then she started up into a sitting posture, pushed her hair\naway from her forehead and burning eyes, and gazed intently at Molly.\n\n\"Do you know what I've been thinking, dear?\" said she. \"I think I've\nbeen long enough here, and that I had better go out as a governess.\"\n\n\"Cynthia! what do you mean?\" asked Molly, aghast. \"You've been\nasleep--you've been dreaming. You're over-tired,\" continued she,\nsitting down on the bed, and taking Cynthia's passive hand, and\nstroking it softly--a mode of caressing that had come down to her\nfrom her mother--whether as an hereditary instinct, or as a lingering\nremembrance of the tender ways of the dead woman, Mr. Gibson often\nwondered within himself when he observed it.\n\n\"Oh, how good you are, Molly! I wonder, if I had been brought up like\nyou, whether I should have been as good. But I've been tossed about\nso.\"\n\n\"Then, don't go and be tossed about any more,\" said Molly, softly.\n\n\"Oh, dear! I had better go. But, you see, no one ever loved me like\nyou, and, I think, your father--doesn't he, Molly? And it's hard to\nbe driven out.\"\n\n\"Cynthia, I am sure you're not well, or else you're not half awake.\"\n\nCynthia sate with her arms encircling her knees, and looking at\nvacancy.\n\n\"Well!\" said she, at last, heaving a great sigh; but, then, smiling\nas she caught Molly's anxious face, \"I suppose there's no escaping\none's doom; and anywhere else I should be much more forlorn and\nunprotected.\"\n\n\"What do you mean by your doom?\"\n\n\"Ah, that's telling, little one,\" said Cynthia, who seemed now to\nhave recovered her usual manner. \"I don't mean to have one, though. I\nthink that, though I am an arrant coward at heart, I can show fight.\"\n\n\"With whom?\" asked Molly, really anxious to probe the mystery--if,\nindeed, there was one--to the bottom, in the hope of some remedy\nbeing found for the distress Cynthia was in when first Molly entered.\n\nAgain Cynthia was lost in thought; then, catching the echo of Molly's\nlast words in her mind, she said,--\n\n\"'With whom?'--oh! show fight with whom?--why, my doom, to be sure.\nAm not I a grand young lady to have a doom? Why, Molly, child, how\npale and grave you look!\" said she, kissing her all of a sudden. \"You\nought not to care so much for me; I'm not good enough for you to\nworry yourself about me. I've given myself up a long time ago as a\nheartless baggage!\"\n\n\"Nonsense! I wish you wouldn't talk so, Cynthia!\"\n\n\"And I wish you wouldn't always take me 'at the foot of the letter,'\nas an English girl at school used to translate it. Oh, how hot it\nis! Is it never going to get cool again? My child! what dirty hands\nyou've got, and face too; and I've been kissing you--I daresay I'm\ndirty with it, too. Now, isn't that like one of mamma's speeches?\nBut, for all that, you look more like a delving Adam than a spinning\nEve.\" This had the effect that Cynthia intended; the daintily clean\nMolly became conscious of her soiled condition, which she had\nforgotten while she had been attending to Cynthia, and she hastily\nwithdrew to her own room. When she had gone, Cynthia noiselessly\nlocked the door; and, taking her purse out of her desk, she began to\ncount over her money. She counted it once--she counted it twice, as\nif desirous of finding out some mistake which should prove it to be\nmore than it was; but the end of it all was a sigh.\n\n\"What a fool!--what a fool I was!\" said she, at length. \"But even if\nI don't go out as a governess, I shall make it up in time.\"\n\nSome weeks after the time he had anticipated when he had spoken of\nhis departure to the Gibsons, Roger returned back to the Hall. One\nmorning when he called, Osborne told them that his brother had been\nat home for two or three days.\n\n\"And why has he not come here, then?\" said Mrs. Gibson. \"It is not\nkind of him not to come and see us as soon as he can. Tell him I say\nso--pray do.\"\n\nOsborne had gained one or two ideas as to her treatment of Roger the\nlast time he had called. Roger had not complained of it, or even\nmentioned it, till that very morning; when Osborne was on the point\nof starting, and had urged Roger to accompany him, the latter had\ntold him something of what Mrs. Gibson had said. He spoke rather as\nif he was more amused than annoyed; but Osborne could read that he\nwas chagrined at those restrictions placed upon calls which were the\ngreatest pleasure of his life. Neither of them let out the suspicion\nwhich had entered both their minds--the well-grounded suspicion\narising from the fact that Osborne's visits, be they paid early or\nlate, had never yet been met with a repulse.\n\nOsborne now reproached himself with having done Mrs. Gibson\ninjustice. She was evidently a weak, but probably a disinterested,\nwoman; and it was only a little bit of ill-temper on her part which\nhad caused her to speak to Roger as she had done.\n\n\"I daresay it was rather impertinent of me to call at such an\nuntimely hour,\" said Roger.\n\n\"Not at all; I call at all hours, and nothing is ever said about it.\nIt was just because she was put out that morning. I'll answer for it\nshe's sorry now, and I'm sure you may go there at any time you like\nin the future.\"\n\nStill, Roger did not choose to go again for two or three weeks, and\nthe consequence was that the next time he called the ladies were out.\nOnce again he had the same ill-luck, and then he received a little\npretty three-cornered note from Mrs. Gibson:--\n\n\n   MY DEAR SIR,\n\n   How is it that you are become so formal all on a sudden,\n   leaving cards, instead of awaiting our return? Fie for\n   shame! If you had seen the faces of disappointment that\n   I did when the horrid little bits of pasteboard were\n   displayed to our view, you would not have borne malice\n   against me so long; for it is really punishing others as\n   well as my naughty self. If you will come to-morrow--as\n   early as you like--and lunch with us, I'll own I was\n   cross, and acknowledge myself a penitent.--Yours ever,\n\n   HYACINTH C. K. GIBSON.\n\n\nThere was no resisting this, even if there had not been strong\ninclination to back up the pretty words. Roger went, and Mrs. Gibson\ncaressed and petted him in her sweetest, silkiest manner. Cynthia\nlooked lovelier than ever to him for the slight restriction that\nhad been laid for a time on their intercourse. She might be gay\nand sparkling with Osborne; with Roger she was soft and grave.\nInstinctively she knew her men. She saw that Osborne was only\ninterested in her because of her position in a family with whom he\nwas intimate; that his friendship was without the least touch of\nsentiment; and that his admiration was only the warm criticism of\nan artist for unusual beauty. But she felt how different Roger's\nrelation to her was. To him she was _the_ one, alone, peerless. If\nhis love was prohibited, it would be long years before he could\nsink down into tepid friendship; and to him her personal loveliness\nwas only one of the many charms that made him tremble into passion.\nCynthia was not capable of returning such feelings; she had had too\nlittle true love in her life, and perhaps too much admiration to do\nso; but she appreciated this honest ardour, this loyal worship that\nwas new to her experience. Such appreciation, and such respect for\nhis true and affectionate nature, gave a serious tenderness to her\nmanner to Roger, which allured him with a fresh and separate grace.\nMolly sate by, and wondered how it would all end, or, rather, how\nsoon it would all end, for she thought that no girl could resist such\nreverent passion; and on Roger's side there could be no doubt--alas!\nthere could be no doubt. An older spectator might have looked far\nahead, and thought of the question of pounds, shillings, and pence.\nWhere was the necessary income for a marriage to come from? Roger\nhad his Fellowship now, it is true; but the income of that would be\nlost if he married; he had no profession, and the life interest of\nthe two or three thousand pounds that he inherited from his mother,\nbelonged to his father. This older spectator might have been a little\nsurprised at the _empressement_ of Mrs. Gibson's manner to a younger\nson, always supposing this said spectator to have read to the depths\nof her worldly heart. Never had she tried to be more agreeable to\nOsborne; and though her attempt was a great failure when practised\nupon Roger, and he did not know what to say in reply to the delicate\nflatteries which he felt to be insincere, he saw that she intended\nhim to consider himself henceforward free of the house; and he was\ntoo glad to avail himself of this privilege to examine over-closely\ninto what might be her motives for her change of manner. He shut his\neyes, and chose to believe that she was now desirous of making up for\nher little burst of temper on his previous visit.\n\nThe result of Osborne's conference with the two doctors had been\ncertain prescriptions which appeared to have done him much good,\nand which would in all probability have done him yet more, could he\nhave been free of the recollection of the little patient wife in\nher solitude near Winchester. He went to her whenever he could; and,\nthanks to Roger, money was far more plentiful with him now than it\nhad been. But he still shrank, and perhaps even more and more, from\ntelling his father of his marriage. Some bodily instinct made him\ndread all agitation inexpressibly. If he had not had this money from\nRoger, he might have been compelled to tell his father all, and to\nask for the necessary funds to provide for the wife and the coming\nchild. But with enough in hand, and a secret, though remorseful,\nconviction that as long as Roger had a penny his brother was sure to\nhave half of it, made him more reluctant than ever to irritate his\nfather by a revelation of his secret. \"Not just yet, not just at\npresent,\" he kept saying both to Roger and to himself. \"By-and-by, if\nwe have a boy, I will call it Roger\"--and then visions of poetical\nand romantic reconciliations brought about between father and son,\nthrough the medium of a child, the offspring of a forbidden marriage,\nbecame still more vividly possible to him, and at any rate it was a\nstaving-off of an unpleasant thing. He atoned to himself for taking\nso much of Roger's Fellowship money by reflecting that, if Roger\nmarried, he would lose this source of revenue; yet Osborne was\nthrowing no impediment in the way of this event, rather forwarding it\nby promoting every possible means of his brother's seeing the lady of\nhis love. Osborne ended his reflections by convincing himself of his\nown generosity.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXX.\n\nOLD WAYS AND NEW WAYS.\n\n\n[Illustration (untitled)]\n\nMr. Preston was now installed in his new house at Hollingford; Mr.\nSheepshanks having entered into dignified idleness at the house of\nhis married daughter, who lived in the county town. His successor\nhad plunged with energy into all manner of improvements; and\namong others, he fell to draining a piece of outlying waste and\nunreclaimed land of Lord Cumnor's, which was close to Squire Hamley's\nproperty--that very piece for which he had had the Government grant,\nbut which now lay neglected, and only half drained, with stacks of\nmossy tiles, and lines of upturned furrows telling of abortive plans.\nIt was not often that the Squire rode in this direction now-a-days;\nbut the cottage of a man who had been the squire's gamekeeper\nin those more prosperous days when the Hamleys could afford to\n\"preserve,\" was close to the rush-grown ground. This old servant and\ntenant was ill, and had sent a message up to the Hall, asking to see\nthe Squire: not to reveal any secret, or to say anything particular,\nbut only from the feudal loyalty, which made it seem to the dying man\nas if it would be a comfort to shake the hand, and look once more\ninto the eyes of the lord and master whom he had served, and whose\nancestors his own forbears had served for so many generations. And\nthe Squire was as fully alive as old Silas to the claims of the tie\nthat existed between them. Though he hated the thought, and still\nmore, should hate the sight of the piece of land, on the side of\nwhich Silas's cottage stood, the Squire ordered his horse, and rode\noff within half-an-hour of receiving the message. As he drew near\nthe spot he thought he heard the sound of tools, and the hum of\nmany voices, just as he used to hear them a year or two before. He\nlistened with surprise. Yes! Instead of the still solitude he had\nexpected, there was the clink of iron, the heavy gradual thud of the\nfall of barrows-ful of soil--the cry and shout of labourers. But not\non his land--better worth expense and trouble by far than the reedy\nclay common on which the men were, in fact, employed. He knew it was\nLord Cumnor's property; and he knew Lord Cumnor and his family had\ngone up in the world (\"the Whig rascals!\"), both in wealth and in\nstation, as the Hamleys had gone down. But all the same--in spite\nof long known facts, and in spite of reason--the Squire's ready\nanger rose high at the sight of his neighbour doing what he had been\nunable to do, and he a Whig, and his family only in the county since\nQueen Anne's time. He went so far as to wonder whether they might\nnot--the labourers he meant--avail themselves of his tiles, lying so\nconveniently close to hand. All these thoughts, regrets, and wonders\nwere in his mind as he rode up to the cottage he was bound to, and\ngave his horse in charge to a little lad, who had hitherto found his\nmorning's business and amusement in playing at \"houses\" with a still\nyounger sister, with some of the Squire's neglected tiles. But he\nwas old Silas's grandson, and he might have battered the rude red\nearthenware to pieces--a whole stack--one by one, and the Squire\nwould have said little or nothing. It was only that he would not\nspare one to a labourer of Lord Cumnor's. No! not one.\n\nOld Silas lay in a sort of closet, opening out of the family\nliving-room. The small window that gave it light looked right on to\nthe \"moor,\" as it was called; and by day the check curtain was drawn\naside so that he might watch the progress of the labour. Everything\nabout the old man was clean, if coarse; and, with Death, the\nleveller, so close at hand, it was the labourer who made the first\nadvances, and put out his horny hand to the Squire.\n\n\"I thought you'd come, Squire. Your father came for to see my father\nas he lay a-dying.\"\n\n\"Come, come, my man!\" said the Squire, easily affected, as he always\nwas. \"Don't talk of dying, we shall soon have you out, never fear.\nThey've sent you up some soup from the Hall, as I bade 'em, haven't\nthey?\"\n\n\"Ay, ay, I've had all as I could want for to eat and to drink. The\nyoung squire and Master Roger was here yesterday.\"\n\n\"Yes, I know.\"\n\n\"But I'm a deal nearer Heaven to-day, I am. I should like you to look\nafter th' covers in th' West Spinney, Squire; them gorse, you know,\nwhere th' old fox had her hole--her as give 'em so many a run. You'll\nmind it, Squire, though you was but a lad. I could laugh to think on\nher tricks yet.\" And, with a weak attempt at a laugh, he got himself\ninto a violent fit of coughing, which alarmed the squire, who thought\nhe would never get his breath again. His daughter-in-law came in\nat the sound, and told the Squire that he had these coughing-bouts\nvery frequently, and that she thought he would go off in one of them\nbefore long. This opinion of hers was spoken simply out before the\nold man, who now lay gasping and exhausted upon his pillow. Poor\npeople acknowledge the inevitableness and the approach of death in\na much more straightforward manner than is customary among more\neducated folk. The Squire was shocked at her hard-heartedness, as\nhe considered it; but the old man himself had received much tender\nkindness from his daughter-in-law; and what she had just said was no\nmore news to him than the fact that the sun would rise to-morrow. He\nwas more anxious to go on with his story.\n\n\"Them navvies--I call 'em navvies because some on 'em is strangers,\nthough some on 'em is th' men as was turned off your own works,\nsquire, when there came orders to stop 'em last fall--they're\na-pulling up gorse and brush to light their fire for warming up their\nmesses. It's a long way off to their homes, and they mostly dine\nhere; and there'll be nothing of a cover left, if you don't see after\n'em. I thought I should like to tell ye afore I died. Parson's been\nhere; but I did na tell him. He's all for the earl's folk, and he'd\nnot ha' heeded. It's the earl as put him into his church, I reckon,\nfor he said what a fine thing it were for to see so much employment\na-given to the poor, and he never said nought o' th' sort when your\nworks were agait, Squire.\"\n\nThis long speech had been interrupted by many a cough and gasp for\nbreath; and having delivered himself of what was on his mind, he\nturned his face to the wall, and appeared to be going to sleep.\nPresently he roused himself with a start:--\n\n\"I know I flogged him well, I did. But he were after pheasants' eggs,\nand I didn't know he were an orphan. Lord, forgive me!\"\n\n\"He's thinking on David Morton, the cripple, as used to go about\ntrapping vermin,\" whispered the woman.\n\n\"Why, he died long ago--twenty year, I should think,\" replied the\nSquire.\n\n\"Ay, but when grandfather goes off i' this way to sleep after a bout\nof talking he seems to be dreaming on old times. He'll not waken up\nyet, sir; you'd best sit down if you'd like to stay,\" she continued,\nas she went into the house-place and dusted a chair with her apron.\n\"He was very particular in bidding me wake him if he were asleep, and\nyou or Mr. Roger was to call. Mr. Roger said he'd be coming again\nthis morning--but he'll likely sleep an hour or more, if he's let\nalone.\"\n\n\"I wish I'd said good-by, I should like to have done that.\"\n\n\"He drops off so sudden,\" said the woman. \"But if you'd be better\npleased to have said it, Squire, I'll waken him up a bit.\"\n\n\"No, no!\" the Squire called out as the woman was going to be as good\nas her word. \"I'll come again, perhaps to-morrow. And tell him I was\nsorry; for I am indeed. And be sure and send to the Hall for anything\nyou want! Mr. Roger is coming, is he? He'll bring me word how he is,\nlater on. I should like to have bidden him good-by.\"\n\nSo, giving sixpence to the child who had held his horse, the Squire\nmounted. He sate still a moment, looking at the busy work going on\nbefore him, and then at his own half-completed drainage. It was a\nbitter pill. He had objected to borrowing from Government, in the\nfirst instance; and then his wife had persuaded him to the step; and\nafter it was once taken, he was as proud as could be of the only\nconcession to the spirit of progress he ever made in his life. He had\nread and studied the subject pretty thoroughly, if also very slowly,\nduring the time his wife had been influencing him. He was tolerably\nwell up in agriculture, if in nothing else; and at one time he had\ntaken the lead among the neighbouring landowners, when he first began\ntile-drainage. In those days people used to speak of Squire Hamley's\nhobby; and at market ordinaries, or county dinners, they rather\ndreaded setting him off on long repetitions of arguments from the\ndifferent pamphlets on the subject which he had read. And now the\nproprietors all around him were draining--draining; his interest\nto Government was running on all the same, though his works were\nstopped, and his tiles deteriorating in value. It was not a soothing\nconsideration, and the Squire was almost ready to quarrel with his\nshadow. He wanted a vent for his ill-humour; and suddenly remembering\nthe devastations on his covers, which he had heard about not a\nquarter of an hour before, he rode towards the men busy at work on\nLord Cumnor's land. Just before he got up to them he encountered\nMr. Preston, also on horseback, come to overlook his labourers. The\nSquire did not know him personally, but from the agent's manner\nof speaking, and the deference that was evidently paid to him, Mr.\nHamley saw that he was a responsible person. So he addressed the\nagent:--\"I beg your pardon, I suppose you are the manager of these\nworks?\"\n\nMr. Preston replied,--\"Certainly. I am that and many other things\nbesides, at your service. I have succeeded Mr. Sheepshanks in the\nmanagement of my lord's property. Mr. Hamley of Hamley, I believe?\"\n\nThe Squire bowed stiffly. He did not like his name to be asked or\npresumed upon in that manner. An equal might conjecture who he was,\nor recognize him, but, till he announced himself, an inferior had no\nright to do more than address him respectfully as \"sir.\" That was the\nSquire's code of etiquette.\n\n\"I am Mr. Hamley of Hamley. I suppose you are as yet ignorant of the\nboundary of Lord Cumnor's land, and so I will inform you that my\nproperty begins at the pond yonder--just where you see the rise in\nthe ground.\"\n\n\"I am perfectly acquainted with that fact, Mr. Hamley,\" said Mr.\nPreston, a little annoyed at the ignorance attributed to him. \"But\nmay I inquire why my attention is called to it just now?\"\n\nThe Squire was beginning to boil over; but he tried to keep his\ntemper in. The effort was very much to be respected, for it was a\ngreat one. There was something in the handsome and well-dressed\nagent's tone and manner inexpressibly irritating to the squire, and\nit was not lessened by an involuntary comparison of the capital\nroadster on which Mr. Preston was mounted with his own ill-groomed\nand aged cob.\n\n\"I have been told that your men out yonder do not respect these\nboundaries, but are in the habit of plucking up gorse from my covers\nto light their fires.\"\n\n\"It is possible they may!\" said Mr. Preston, lifting his eyebrows,\nhis manner being more nonchalant than his words. \"I daresay they\nthink no great harm of it. However, I'll inquire.\"\n\n\"Do you doubt my word, sir?\" said the Squire, fretting his mare till\nshe began to dance about. \"I tell you I've heard it only within this\nlast half-hour.\"\n\n\"I don't mean to doubt your word, Mr. Hamley; it's the last thing\nI should think of doing. But you must excuse my saying that the\nargument which you have twice brought up for the authenticity of your\nstatement, 'that you have heard it within the last half-hour,' is not\nquite so forcible as to preclude the possibility of a mistake.\"\n\n\"I wish you'd only say in plain language that you doubt my word,\"\nsaid the Squire, clenching and slightly raising his horsewhip. \"I\ncan't make out what you mean--you use so many words.\"\n\n\"Pray don't lose your temper, sir. I said I should inquire. You have\nnot seen the men pulling up gorse yourself, or you would have named\nit. I, surely, may doubt the correctness of your information until\nI have made some inquiry; at any rate, that is the course I shall\npursue, and if it gives you offence, I shall be sorry, but I shall\ndo it just the same. When I am convinced that harm has been done to\nyour property, I shall take steps to prevent it for the future, and\nof course, in my lord's name, I shall pay you compensation--it may\nprobably amount to half-a-crown.\" He added these last words in a\nlower tone, as if to himself, with a slight contemptuous smile on his\nface.\n\n\"Quiet, mare, quiet,\" said the Squire, totally unaware that he was\nthe cause of her impatient movements by the way he was perpetually\ntightening her reins; and also, perhaps, he unconsciously addressed\nthe injunction to himself.\n\nNeither of them saw Roger Hamley, who was just then approaching them\nwith long, steady steps. He had seen his father from the door of old\nSilas's cottage, and, as the poor fellow was still asleep, he was\ncoming to speak to his father, and was near enough now to hear the\nnext words.\n\n\"I don't know who you are, but I've known land-agents who were\ngentlemen, and I've known some who were not. You belong to this last\nset, young man,\" said the squire, \"that you do. I should like to try\nmy horsewhip on you for your insolence.\"\n\n\"Pray, Mr. Hamley,\" replied Mr. Preston, coolly, \"curb your temper a\nlittle, and reflect. I really feel sorry to see a man of your age in\nsuch a passion:\"--moving a little farther off, however, but really\nmore with a desire to save the irritated man from carrying his threat\ninto execution, out of a dislike to the slander and excitement it\nwould cause, than from any personal dread. Just at this moment Roger\nHamley came close up. He was panting a little, and his eyes were very\nstern and dark; but he spoke quietly enough.\n\n\"Mr. Preston, I can hardly understand what you mean by your last\nwords. But, remember, my father is a gentleman of age and position,\nand not accustomed to receive advice as to the management of his\ntemper from young men like you.\"\n\n\n[Illustration: THE BURNING OF THE GORSE.]\n\n\n\"I desired him to keep his men off my land,\" said the Squire to\nhis son--his wish to stand well in Roger's opinion restraining his\ntemper a little; but though his words might be a little calmer, there\nwere all other signs of passion present--the discoloured complexion,\nthe trembling hands, the fiery cloud in his eyes. \"He refused, and\ndoubted my word.\"\n\nMr. Preston turned to Roger, as if appealing from Philip drunk to\nPhilip sober, and spoke in a tone of cool explanation, which, though\nnot insolent in words, was excessively irritating in manner.\n\n\"Your father has misunderstood me--perhaps it is no wonder,\" trying\nto convey, by a look of intelligence at the son, his opinion that the\nfather was in no state to hear reason. \"I never refused to do what\nwas just and right. I only required further evidence as to the past\nwrong-doing; your father took offence at this,\" and then he shrugged\nhis shoulders, and lifted his eyebrows in a manner he had formerly\nlearnt in France.\n\n\"At any rate, sir! I can scarcely reconcile the manner and words\nto my father, which I heard you use when I first came up, with the\ndeference you ought to have shown to a man of his age and position.\nAs to the fact of the trespass--\"\n\n\"They are pulling up all the gorse, Roger--there'll be no cover\nwhatever for game soon,\" put in the Squire.\n\nRoger bowed to his father, but took up his speech at the point it was\nat before the interruption.\n\n\"I will inquire into it myself at a cooler moment; and if I find that\nsuch trespass or damage has been committed, of course I shall expect\nthat you will see it put a stop to. Come, father! I am going to\nsee old Silas--perhaps you don't know that he is very ill.\" So he\nendeavoured to wile the Squire away to prevent further words. He was\nnot entirely successful.\n\nMr. Preston was enraged by Roger's calm and dignified manner,\nand threw after them this parting shaft, in the shape of a loud\nsoliloquy,--\n\n\"Position, indeed! What are we to think of the position of a man who\nbegins works like these without counting the cost, and comes to a\nstand-still, and has to turn off his labourers just at the beginning\nof winter, leaving--\"\n\nThey were too far off to hear the rest. The Squire was on the point\nof turning back before this, but Roger took hold of the reins of the\nold mare, and led her over some of the boggy ground, as if to guide\nher into sure footing, but, in reality, because he was determined to\nprevent the renewal of the quarrel. It was well that the cob knew\nhim, and was, indeed, old enough to prefer quietness to dancing; for\nMr. Hamley plucked hard at the reins, and at last broke out with an\noath,--\"Damn it, Roger! I'm not a child; I won't be treated as such.\nLeave go, I say!\"\n\nRoger let go; they were now on firm ground, and he did not wish any\nwatchers to think that he was exercising any constraint over his\nfather; and this quiet obedience to his impatient commands did more\nto soothe the Squire than anything else could have effected just\nthen.\n\n\"I know I turned them off--what could I do? I'd no more money for\ntheir weekly wages; it's a loss to me, as you know. He doesn't know,\nno one knows, but I think your mother would, how it cut me to turn\n'em off just before winter set in. I lay awake many a night thinking\nof it, and I gave them what I had--I did, indeed. I hadn't got money\nto pay 'em, but I had three barren cows fattened, and gave every\nscrap of meat to the men, and I let 'em go into the woods and gather\nwhat was fallen, and I winked at their breaking off old branches, and\nnow to have it cast up against me by that cur--that servant. But I'll\ngo on with the works, by ----, I will, if only to spite him. I'll\nshow him who I am. My position, indeed! A Hamley of Hamley takes a\nhigher position than his master. I'll go on with the works, see if\nI don't! I'm paying between one and two hundred a year interest on\nGovernment money. I'll raise some more if I go to the Jews; Osborne\nhas shown me the way, and Osborne shall pay for it--he shall. I'll\nnot put up with insults. You shouldn't have stopped me, Roger! I wish\nto heaven I'd horsewhipped the fellow!\"\n\nHe was lashing himself again into an impotent rage, painful to a son\nto witness; but just then the little grandchild of old Silas, who\nhad held the Squire's horse during his visit to the sick man, came\nrunning up, breathless:\n\n\"Please, sir, please, squire, mammy has sent me; grandfather has\nwakened up sudden, and mammy says he's dying, and would you please\ncome; she says he'd take it as a kind compliment, she's sure.\"\n\nSo they went to the cottage, the Squire speaking never a word, but\nsuddenly feeling as if lifted out of a whirlwind and set down in a\nstill and awful place.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXXI.\n\nA PASSIVE COQUETTE.\n\n\nIt is not to be supposed that such an encounter as Mr. Preston had\njust had with Roger Hamley sweetened the regards in which the two\nyoung men henceforward held each other. They had barely spoken to one\nanother before, and but seldom met; for the land-agent's employment\nhad hitherto lain at Ashcombe, some sixteen or seventeen miles from\nHamley. He was older than Roger by several years; but during the\ntime he had been in the county Osborne and Roger had been at school\nand at college. Mr. Preston was prepared to dislike the Hamleys for\nmany unreasonable reasons. Cynthia and Molly had both spoken of\nthe brothers with familiar regard, implying considerable intimacy;\ntheir flowers had been preferred to his on the occasion of the ball;\nmost people spoke well of them; and Mr. Preston had an animal's\ninstinctive jealousy and combativeness against all popular young men.\nTheir \"position\"--poor as the Hamleys might be--was far higher than\nhis own in the county; and, moreover, he was agent to the great Whig\nlord, whose political interests were diametrically opposed to those\nof the old Tory squire. Not that Lord Cumnor troubled himself much\nabout his political interests. His family had obtained property and\ntitle from the Whigs at the time of the Hanoverian succession; and\nso, traditionally, he was a Whig, and had belonged in his youth to\nWhig clubs, where he had lost considerable sums of money to Whig\ngamblers. All this was satisfactory and consistent enough. And if\nLord Hollingford had not been returned for the county on the Whig\ninterest--as his father had been before him, until he had succeeded\nto the title--it is quite probable Lord Cumnor would have considered\nthe British constitution in danger, and the patriotism of his\nancestors ungratefully ignored. But, excepting at elections, he had\nno notion of making Whig and Tory a party cry. He had lived too much\nin London, and was of too sociable a nature, to exclude any man who\njumped with his humour from the hospitality he was always ready to\noffer, be the agreeable acquaintance Whig, Tory, or Radical. But in\nthe county of which he was lord-lieutenant, the old party distinction\nwas still a shibboleth by which men were tested as to their fitness\nfor social intercourse, as well as on the hustings. If by any chance\na Whig found himself at a Tory dinner-table--or vice versâ--the food\nwas hard of digestion, and wine and viands were criticized rather\nthan enjoyed. A marriage between the young people of the separate\nparties was almost as unheard-of and prohibited an alliance as that\nof Romeo and Juliet's. And of course Mr. Preston was not a man in\nwhose breast such prejudices would die away. They were an excitement\nto him for one thing, and called out all his talent for intrigue on\nbehalf of the party to which he was allied. Moreover, he considered\nit as loyalty to his employer to \"scatter his enemies\" by any means\nin his power. He had always hated and despised the Tories in general;\nand after that interview on the marshy common in front of Silas's\ncottage, he hated the Hamleys and Roger especially, with a very\nchoice and particular hatred. \"That prig,\" as hereafter he always\ndesignated Roger--\"he shall pay for it yet,\" he said to himself by\nway of consolation, after the father and son had left him. \"What a\nlout it is!\"--watching the receding figures, \"The old chap has twice\nas much spunk,\" as the Squire tugged at his bridle reins. \"The old\nmare could make her way better without being led, my fine fellow. But\nI see through your dodge. You're afraid of your old father turning\nback and getting into another rage. Position indeed! a beggarly\nsquire--a man who did turn off his men just before winter, to rot\nor starve, for all he cared--it's just like a brutal old Tory.\" And,\nunder the cover of sympathy with the dismissed labourers, Mr. Preston\nindulged his own private pique very pleasantly.\n\nMr. Preston had many causes for rejoicing: he might have forgotten\nthis discomfiture, as he chose to feel it, in the remembrance of\nan increase of income, and in the popularity he enjoyed in his new\nabode. All Hollingford came forward to do the earl's new agent\nhonour. Mr. Sheepshanks had been a crabbed, crusty old bachelor,\nfrequenting inn-parlours on market days, not unwilling to give\ndinners to three or four chosen friends and familiars, with whom,\nin return, he dined from time to time, and with whom, also, he kept\nup an amicable rivalry in the matter of wines. But he \"did not\nappreciate female society,\" as Miss Browning elegantly worded his\nunwillingness to accept the invitations of the Hollingford ladies.\nHe was even unrefined enough to speak of these invitations to his\nintimate friends aforesaid as \"those old women's worrying,\" but, of\ncourse, they never heard of this. Little quarter-of-sheet notes,\nwithout any envelopes--that invention was unknown in those days--but\nsealed in the corners when folded up instead of gummed as they are\nfastened at present--occasionally passed between Mr. Sheepshanks\nand the Miss Brownings, Mrs. Goodenough or others. From the\nfirst-mentioned ladies the form ran as follows:--\"Miss Browning\nand her sister, Miss Phoebe Browning, present their respectful\ncompliments to Mr. Sheepshanks, and beg to inform him that a few\nfriends have kindly consented to favour them with their company at\ntea on Thursday next. Miss Browning and Miss Phoebe will take it\nvery kindly if Mr. Sheepshanks will join their little circle.\"\n\nNow for Mrs. Goodenough.\n\n\"Mrs. Goodenough's respects to Mr. Sheepshanks, and hopes he is in\ngood health. She would be very glad if he would favour her with his\ncompany to tea on Monday. My daughter, in Combermere, has sent me a\ncouple of guinea-fowls, and Mrs. Goodenough hopes Mr. Sheepshanks\nwill stay and take a bit of supper.\"\n\nNo need for the dates of the days of the month. The good ladies would\nhave thought that the world was coming to an end if the invitation\nhad been sent out a week before the party therein named. But not even\nguinea-fowls for supper could tempt Mr. Sheepshanks. He remembered\nthe made-wines he had tasted in former days at Hollingford parties,\nand shuddered. Bread-and-cheese, with a glass of bitter-beer, or a\nlittle brandy-and-water, partaken of in his old clothes (which had\nworn into shapes of loose comfort, and smelt strongly of tobacco),\nhe liked better than roast guinea-fowl and birch-wine, even without\nthrowing into the balance the stiff uneasy coat, and the tight\nneckcloth and tighter shoes. So the ex-agent had been seldom, if\never, seen at the Hollingford tea-parties. He might have had his form\nof refusal stereotyped, it was so invariably the same.\n\n\"Mr. Sheepshanks' duty to Miss Browning and her sister\" (to Mrs.\nGoodenough, or to others, as the case might be). \"Business of\nimportance prevents him from availing himself of their polite\ninvitation; for which he begs to return his best thanks.\"\n\nBut now that Mr. Preston had succeeded, and come to live in\nHollingford, things were changed.\n\nHe accepted every civility right and left, and won golden opinions\naccordingly. Parties were made in his honour, \"just as if he had been\na bride,\" Miss Phoebe Browning said; and to all of them he went.\n\n\"What's the man after?\" said Mr. Sheepshanks to himself, when he\nheard of his successor's affability, and sociability, and amiability,\nand a variety of other agreeable \"ilities,\" from the friends whom the\nold steward still retained at Hollingford. \"Preston's not a man to\nput himself out for nothing. He's deep. He'll be after something\nsolider than popularity.\"\n\nThe sagacious old bachelor was right. Mr. Preston was \"after\"\nsomething more than mere popularity. He went wherever he had a chance\nof meeting Cynthia Kirkpatrick.\n\nIt might be that Molly's spirits were more depressed at this time\nthan they were in general; or that Cynthia was exultant, unawares to\nherself, in the amount of attention and admiration she was receiving\nfrom Roger by day, from Mr. Preston in the evening, but the two girls\nseemed to have parted company in cheerfulness. Molly was always\ngentle, but very grave and silent. Cynthia, on the contrary, was\nmerry, full of pretty mockeries, and hardly ever silent. When first\nshe came to Hollingford one of her great charms had been that she\nwas such a gracious listener; now her excitement, by whatever caused,\nmade her too restless to hold her tongue; yet what she said was too\npretty, too witty, not to be a winning and sparkling interruption,\neagerly welcomed by those who were under her sway. Mr. Gibson was\nthe only one who observed this change, and reasoned upon it. \"She's\nin a mental fever of some kind,\" thought he to himself. \"She's very\nfascinating, but I don't quite understand her.\"\n\nIf Molly had not been so entirely loyal to her friend, she might have\nthought this constant brilliancy a little tiresome when brought into\nevery-day life; it was not the sunshiny rest of a placid lake, it was\nrather the glitter of the pieces of a broken mirror, which confuses\nand bewilders. Cynthia would not talk quietly about anything now;\nsubjects of thought or conversation seemed to have lost their\nrelative value. There were exceptions to this mood of hers, when she\nsank into deep fits of silence, that would have been gloomy had it\nnot been for the never varying sweetness of her temper. If there was\na little kindness to be done to either Mr. Gibson or Molly, Cynthia\nwas just as ready as ever to do it; nor did she refuse to do anything\nher mother wished, however fidgety might be the humour that prompted\nthe wish. But in this latter case Cynthia's eyes were not quickened\nby her heart.\n\nMolly was dejected, she knew not why. Cynthia had drifted a little\napart; that was not it. Her stepmother had whimsical moods; and if\nCynthia displeased her, she would oppress Molly with small kindnesses\nand pseudo-affection. Or else everything was wrong, the world was\nout of joint, and Molly had failed in her mission to set it right,\nand was to be blamed accordingly. But Molly was of too steady a\ndisposition to be much moved by the changeableness of an unreasonable\nperson. She might be annoyed, or irritated, but she was not\ndepressed. That was not it. The real cause was certainly this. As\nlong as Roger was drawn to Cynthia, and sought her of his own accord,\nit had been a sore pain and bewilderment to Molly's heart; but it was\na straightforward attraction, and one which Molly acknowledged, in\nher humility and great power of loving, to be the most natural thing\nin the world. She would look at Cynthia's beauty and grace, and feel\nas if no one could resist it. And when she witnessed all the small\nsigns of honest devotion which Roger was at no pains to conceal, she\nthought, with a sigh, that surely no girl could help relinquishing\nher heart to such tender, strong keeping as Roger's character\nensured. She would have been willing to cut off her right hand,\nif need were, to forward his attachment to Cynthia; and the\nself-sacrifice would have added a strange zest to a happy crisis. She\nwas indignant at what she considered to be Mrs. Gibson's obtuseness\nto so much goodness and worth; and when she called Roger \"a country\nlout,\" or any other depreciative epithet, Molly would pinch herself\nin order to keep silent. But after all, those were peaceful days\ncompared to the present, when she, seeing the wrong side of the\ntapestry, after the wont of those who dwell in the same house with\na plotter, became aware that Mrs. Gibson had totally changed her\nbehaviour to Roger, from some cause unknown to Molly.\n\nBut he was always exactly the same; \"steady as old Time,\" as Mrs.\nGibson called him, with her usual originality; \"a rock of strength,\nunder whose very shadow there is rest,\" as Mrs. Hamley had once\nspoken of him. So the cause of Mrs. Gibson's altered manner lay not\nin him. Yet now he was sure of a welcome, let him come at any hour he\nwould. He was playfully reproved for having taken Mrs. Gibson's words\ntoo literally, and for never coming before lunch. But he said he\nconsidered her reasons for such words to be valid, and should respect\nthem. And this was done out of his simplicity, and from no tinge of\nmalice. Then in their family conversations at home, Mrs. Gibson was\nconstantly making projects for throwing Roger and Cynthia together,\nwith so evident a betrayal of her wish to bring about an engagement,\nthat Molly chafed at the net spread so evidently, and at Roger's\nblindness in coming so willingly to be entrapped. She forgot his\nprevious willingness, his former evidences of manly fondness for the\nbeautiful Cynthia; she only saw plots of which he was the victim, and\nCynthia the conscious if passive bait. She felt as if she could not\nhave acted as Cynthia did; no, not even to gain Roger's love. Cynthia\nheard and saw as much of the domestic background as she did, and yet\nshe submitted to the rôle assigned to her! To be sure, this rôle\nwould have been played by her unconsciously; the things prescribed\nwere what she would naturally have done; but because they were\nprescribed--by implication only, it is true--Molly would have\nresisted; have gone out, for instance, when she was expected to stay\nat home; or have lingered in the garden when a long country walk was\nplanned. At last--for she could not help loving Cynthia, come what\nwould--she determined to believe that Cynthia was entirely unaware of\nall; but it was with an effort that she brought herself to believe\nit.\n\nIt may be all very pleasant \"to sport with Amaryllis in the shade,\nor with the tangles of Neæra's hair,\" but young men at the outset of\ntheir independent life have many other cares in this prosaic England\nto occupy their time and their thoughts. Roger was Fellow of Trinity,\nto be sure; and from the outside it certainly appeared as if his\nposition, as long as he chose to keep unmarried, was a very easy\none. His was not a nature, however, to sink down into inglorious\nease, even had his fellowship income been at his disposal. He\nlooked forward to an active life; in what direction he had not yet\ndetermined. He knew what were his talents and his tastes; and did\nnot wish the former to lie buried, nor the latter, which he regarded\nas gifts, fitting him for some peculiar work, to be disregarded or\nthwarted. He rather liked awaiting an object, secure in his own\nenergy to force his way to it, when once he saw it clearly. He\nreserved enough of money for his own personal needs, which were\nsmall, and for the ready furtherance of any project he might see\nfit to undertake; the rest of his income was Osborne's; given and\naccepted in the spirit which made the bond between these two brothers\nso rarely perfect. It was only the thought of Cynthia that threw\nRoger off his balance. A strong man in everything else, about her\nhe was as a child. He knew that he could not marry and retain\nhis fellowship; his intention was to hold himself loose from any\nemployment or profession until he had found one to his mind, so\nthere was no immediate prospect--no prospect for many years, indeed,\nthat he would be able to marry. Yet he went on seeking Cynthia's\nsweet company, listening to the music of her voice, basking in her\nsunshine, and feeding his passion in every possible way, just like an\nunreasoning child. He knew that it was folly--and yet he did it; and\nit was perhaps this that made him so sympathetic with Osborne. Roger\nracked his brains about Osborne's affairs much more frequently than\nOsborne troubled himself. Indeed, he had become so ailing and languid\nof late, that even the Squire made only very faint objections to\nhis desire for frequent change of scene, though formerly he used to\ngrumble so much at the necessary expenditure it involved.\n\n\"After all, it doesn't cost much,\" the Squire said to Roger one day.\n\"Choose how he does it, he does it cheaply; he used to come and ask\nme for twenty, where now he does it for five. But he and I have\nlost each other's language, that's what we have! and my dictionary\"\n(only he called it \"dixonary\") \"has all got wrong because of those\nconfounded debts--which he will never explain to me, or talk\nabout--he always holds me off at arm's length when I begin upon\nit--he does, Roger--me, his old dad, as was his primest favourite of\nall, when he was a little bit of a chap!\"\n\nThe Squire dwelt so much upon Osborne's reserved behaviour to\nhimself, that brooding over this one subject perpetually he became\nmore morose and gloomy than ever in his manner to Osborne, resenting\nthe want of the confidence and affection that he thus repelled. So\nmuch so that Roger, who desired to avoid being made the receptacle\nof his father's complaints against Osborne--and Roger's passive\nlistening was the sedative his father always sought--had often\nto have recourse to the discussion of the drainage works as a\ncounter-irritant. The Squire had felt Mr. Preston's speech about\nthe dismissal of his work-people very keenly; it fell in with the\nreproaches of his own conscience, though, as he would repeat to\nRoger over and over again,--\"I couldn't help it--how could I?--I was\ndrained dry of ready money--I wish the land was drained as dry as\nI am,\" said he, with a touch of humour that came out before he was\naware, and at which he smiled sadly enough. \"What was I to do, I ask\nyou, Roger? I know I was in a rage--I've had a deal to make me so--and\nmaybe I didn't think as much about consequences as I should ha'\ndone, when I gave orders for 'em to be sent off; but I couldn't have\ndone otherwise if I'd ha' thought for a twelvemonth in cool blood.\nConsequences! I hate consequences; they've always been against me;\nthey have. I'm so tied up I can't cut down a stick more, and that's a\n'consequence' of having the property so deucedly well settled; I wish\nI'd never had any ancestors. Ay, laugh, lad! it does me good to see\nthee laugh a bit, after Osborne's long face, which always grows longer\nat sight o' me!\"\n\n\"Look here, father!\" said Roger, suddenly, \"I'll manage somehow about\nthe money for the works. You trust to me; give me two months to turn\nmyself in, and you shall have some money, at any rate, to begin\nwith.\"\n\nThe Squire looked at him, and his face brightened as a child's does\nat the promise of a pleasure made to him by some one on whom he can\nrely. He became a little graver, however, as he said,--\"But how will\nyou get it? It's hard enough work.\"\n\n\"Never mind; I'll get it--a hundred or so at first--I don't yet\nknow how--but remember, father, I'm a senior wrangler, and a 'very\npromising young writer,' as that review called me. Oh, you don't know\nwhat a fine fellow you've got for a son! You should have read that\nreview to know all my wonderful merits.\"\n\n\"I did, Roger. I heard Gibson speaking of it, and I made him get it\nfor me. I should have understood it better if they could have called\nthe animals by their English names, and not put so much of their\nFrench jingo into it.\"\n\n\"But it was an answer to an article by a French writer,\" pleaded\nRoger.\n\n\"I'd ha' let him alone!\" said the Squire, earnestly. \"We had to\nbeat 'em, and we did it at Waterloo; but I'd not demean myself by\nanswering any of their lies, if I was you. But I got through the\nreview, for all their Latin and French--I did; and if you doubt me,\nyou just look at the end of the great ledger, turn it upside down,\nand you'll find I've copied out all the fine words they said of you:\n'careful observer,' 'strong nervous English,' 'rising philosopher.'\nOh! I can nearly say it all off by heart, for many a time when I'm\nfrabbed by bad debts, or Osborne's bills, or moidered with accounts,\nI turn the ledger wrong way up, and smoke a pipe over it, while I\nread those pieces out of the review which speak about you, lad!\"\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXXII.\n\nCOMING EVENTS.\n\n\nRoger had turned over many plans in his mind, by which he thought\nthat he could obtain sufficient money for the purpose he desired to\naccomplish. His careful grandfather, who had been a merchant in the\ncity, had so tied up the few thousands he had left to his daughter,\nthat although, in case of her death before her husband's, the latter\nmight enjoy the life-interest thereof, yet, in case of both their\ndeaths, their second son did not succeed to the property until he was\nfive-and-twenty; and if he died before that age, the money that would\nthen have been his went to one of his cousins on the maternal side.\nIn short, the old merchant had taken as many precautions about his\nlegacy as if it had been for tens, instead of units of thousands. Of\ncourse Roger might have slipped through all these meshes by insuring\nhis life until the specified age; and, probably, if he had consulted\nany lawyer, this course would have been suggested to him. But he\ndisliked taking any one into his confidence on the subject of\nhis father's want of ready money. He had obtained a copy of his\ngrandfather's will at Doctors' Commons, and he imagined that all the\ncontingencies involved in it would be patent to the light of nature\nand common sense. He was a little mistaken in this, but not the less\nresolved that money in some way he would have in order to fulfil his\npromise to his father, and for the ulterior purpose of giving the\nsquire some daily interest to distract his thoughts from the regrets\nand cares that were almost weakening his mind. It was \"Roger Hamley,\nsenior wrangler and Fellow of Trinity, to the highest bidder, no\nmatter what honest employment,\" and presently it came down to \"any\nbidder at all.\"\n\nAnother perplexity and distress at this time weighed upon Roger.\nOsborne, heir to the estate, was going to have a child. The Hamley\nproperty was entailed on \"heirs male born in lawful wedlock.\" Was the\n\"wedlock\" lawful? Osborne never seemed to doubt that it was--never\nseemed, in fact, to think twice about it. And if he, the husband, did\nnot, how much less did Aimée, the trustful wife? Yet who could tell\nhow much misery any shadows of illegality might cast into the future?\nOne evening Roger, sitting by the languid, careless, dilettante\nOsborne, began to question him as to the details of the marriage.\nOsborne knew instinctively at what Roger was aiming. It was not that\nhe did not desire perfect legality in justice to his wife; it was\nthat he was so indisposed at the time that he hated to be bothered.\nIt was something like the refrain of Gray's Scandinavian Prophetess:\n\"Leave me, leave me to repose.\"\n\n\"But do try and tell me how you managed it.\"\n\n\"How tiresome you are, Roger!\" put in Osborne.\n\n\"Well, I daresay I am. Go on!\"\n\n\"I've told you Morrison married us. You remember old Morrison at\nTrinity?\"\n\n\"Yes; as good and blunder-headed a fellow as ever lived.\"\n\n\"Well, he's taken orders; and the examination for priest's orders\nfatigued him so much that he got his father to give him a hundred or\ntwo for a tour on the Continent. He meant to get to Rome, because he\nheard that there were such pleasant winters there. So he turned up at\nMetz in August.\"\n\n\"I don't see why.\"\n\n\"No more did he. He never was great in geography, you know; and\nsomehow he thought that Metz, pronounced French fashion, must be on\nthe road to Rome. Some one had told him so in fun. However, it was\nvery well for me that I met with him there, for I was determined to\nbe married, and that without loss of time.\"\n\n\"But Aimée is a Catholic?\"\n\n\"That's true! but you see I am not. You don't suppose I would do her\nany wrong, Roger?\" asked Osborne, sitting up in his lounging-chair,\nand speaking rather indignantly to Roger, his face suddenly flushing\nred.\n\n\"No! I'm sure you would not mean it; but, you see, there's a child\ncoming, and this estate is entailed on 'heirs-male.' Now, I want\nto know if the marriage is legal or not? and it seems to me it's a\nticklish question.\"\n\n\"Oh!\" said Osborne, falling back into repose, \"if that's all, I\nsuppose you're next heir-male, and I can trust you as I can myself.\nYou know my marriage is _bonâ fide_ in intention, and I believe\nit to be legal in fact. We went over to Strasbourg; Aimée picked\nup a friend--a good middle-aged Frenchwoman--who served half\nas bridesmaid, half as chaperone, and then we went before the\nmayor--préfet--what do you call them? I think Morrison rather enjoyed\nthe spree. I signed all manner of papers in the prefecture; I did not\nread them over, for fear lest I could not sign them conscientiously.\nIt was the safest plan. Aimée kept trembling so I thought she would\nfaint; and then we went off to the nearest English chaplaincy,\nCarlsruhe, and the chaplain was away, so Morrison easily got the loan\nof the chapel, and we were married the next day.\"\n\n\"But surely some registration or certificate was necessary?\"\n\n\"Morrison said he would undertake all those forms; and he ought to\nknow his own business. I know I tipped him pretty well for the job.\"\n\n\"You must be married again,\" said Roger, after a pause, \"and\nthat before the child is born. Have you got a certificate of the\nmarriage?\"\n\n\"I daresay Morrison has got it somewhere. But I believe I'm legally\nmarried according to the laws both of England and France; I really\ndo, old fellow. I've got the préfet's papers somewhere.\"\n\n\"Never mind! you shall be married again in England. Aimée goes to the\nRoman Catholic chapel at Prestham, doesn't she?\"\n\n\"Yes. She is so good I wouldn't disturb her in her religion for the\nworld.\"\n\n\"Then you shall be married both there and at the church of the parish\nin which she lives as well,\" said Roger, decidedly.\n\n\"It's a great deal of trouble, unnecessary trouble, and unnecessary\nexpense, I should say,\" said Osborne. \"Why can't you leave well\nalone? Neither Aimée nor I are of the sort of stuff to turn\nscoundrels and deny the legality of our marriage; and if the child\nis a boy and my father dies, and I die, why I'm sure you'll do him\njustice, as sure as I am of myself, old fellow!\"\n\n\"But if I die into the bargain? Make a hecatomb of the present\nHamleys all at once, while you are about it. Who succeeds as\nheir-male?\"\n\nOsborne thought for a moment. \"One of the Irish Hamleys, I suppose.\nI fancy they are needy chaps. Perhaps you're right. But what need to\nhave such gloomy forebodings?\"\n\n\"The law makes one have foresight in such affairs,\" said Roger. \"So\nI'll go down to Aimée next week when I'm in town, and I'll make all\nnecessary arrangements before you come. I think you'll be happier if\nit is all done.\"\n\n\"I shall be happier if I've a chance of seeing the little woman, that\nI grant you. But what is taking you up to town? I wish I'd money to\nrun about like you, instead of being shut up for ever in this dull\nold house.\"\n\nOsborne was apt occasionally to contrast his position with Roger's\nin a tone of complaint, forgetting that both were the results of\ncharacter, and also that out of his income Roger gave up so large\na portion for the maintenance of his brother's wife. But if this\nungenerous thought of Osborne's had been set clearly before his\nconscience, he would have smote his breast and cried \"Mea culpa\" with\nthe best of them; it was only that he was too indolent to keep an\nunassisted conscience.\n\n\"I shouldn't have thought of going up,\" said Roger, reddening as if\nhe had been accused of spending another's money instead of his own,\n\"if I hadn't had to go up on business. Lord Hollingford has written\nfor me; he knows my great wish for employment, and has heard of\nsomething which he considers suitable; there's his letter if you care\nto read it. But it does not tell anything definitely.\"\n\nOsborne read the letter and returned it to Roger. After a moment or\ntwo of silence he said,--\"Why do you want money? Are we taking too\nmuch from you? It's a great shame of me; but what can I do? Only\nsuggest a career for me, and I'll follow it to-morrow.\" He spoke as\nif Roger had been reproaching him.\n\n\"My dear fellow, don't get those notions into your head! I must\ndo something for myself sometimes, and I've been on the look-out.\nBesides, I want my father to go on with his drainage; it would do\ngood both to his health and his spirits. If I can advance any part of\nthe money requisite, he and you shall pay me interest until you can\nreturn the capital.\"\n\n\"Roger, you're the providence of the family,\" exclaimed Osborne,\nsuddenly struck by admiration at his brother's conduct, and\nforgetting to contrast it with his own.\n\nSo Roger went up to London and Osborne followed him, and for two or\nthree weeks the Gibsons saw nothing of the brothers. But as wave\nsucceeds to wave, so interest succeeds to interest. \"The family,\"\nas they were called, came down for their autumn sojourn at the\nTowers, and again the house was full of visitors, and the Towers'\nservants, and carriages, and liveries were seen in the two streets of\nHollingford, just as they might have been seen for scores of autumns\npast.\n\nSo runs the round of life from day to day. Mrs. Gibson found the\nchances of intercourse with the Towers rather more personally\nexciting than Roger's visits, or the rarer calls of Osborne Hamley.\nCynthia had an old antipathy to the great family who had made so much\nof her mother and so little of her; and whom she considered as in\nsome measure the cause why she had seen so little of her mother in\nthe days when the little girl had craved for love and found none.\nMoreover, Cynthia missed her slave, although she did not care for\nRoger one thousandth part of what he did for her; yet she had found\nit not unpleasant to have a man whom she thoroughly respected, and\nwhom men in general respected, the subject of her eye, the glad\nministrant to each scarce-spoken wish, a person in whose sight\nall her words were pearls or diamonds, all her actions heavenly\ngraciousness, and in whose thoughts she reigned supreme. She had\nno modest unconsciousness about her; and yet she was not vain.\nShe knew of all this worship; and when from circumstances she no\nlonger received it, she missed it. The Earl and the Countess, Lord\nHollingford and Lady Harriet, lords and ladies in general, liveries,\ndresses, bags of game, and rumours of riding parties, were as nothing\nto her compared to Roger's absence. And yet she did not love him.\nNo, she did not love him. Molly knew that Cynthia did not love him.\nMolly grew angry with her many and many a time as the conviction of\nthis fact was forced upon her. Molly did not know her own feelings;\nRoger had no overwhelming interest in what they might be; while his\nvery life-breath seemed to depend on what Cynthia felt and thought.\nTherefore Molly had keen insight into her \"sister's\" heart; and she\nknew that Cynthia did not love Roger. Molly could have cried with\npassionate regret at the thought of the unvalued treasure lying at\nCynthia's feet; and it would have been a merely unselfish regret.\nIt was the old fervid tenderness: \"Do not wish for the moon, O my\ndarling, for I cannot give it thee.\" Cynthia's love was the moon\nRoger yearned for; and Molly saw that it was far away and out of\nreach, else would she have strained her heart-cords to give it to\nRoger.\n\n\"I am his sister,\" she would say to herself. \"That old bond is not\ndone away with, though he is too much absorbed by Cynthia to speak\nabout it just now. His mother called me 'Fanny;' it was almost like\nan adoption. I must wait and watch, and see if I can do anything for\nmy brother.\"\n\nOne day Lady Harriet came to call on the Gibsons, or rather on Mrs.\nGibson, for the latter retained her old jealousy if any one else\nin Hollingford was supposed to be on intimate terms at the great\nhouse, or in the least acquainted with their plans. Mr. Gibson might\npossibly know as much, but then he was professionally bound to\nsecrecy. Out of the house she considered Mr. Preston as her rival,\nand he was aware that she did so, and delighted in teasing her by\naffecting a knowledge of family plans and details of affairs of which\nshe was ignorant. Indoors she was jealous of the fancy Lady Harriet\nhad evidently taken for her step-daughter, and she contrived to place\nquiet obstacles in the way of a too frequent intercourse between the\ntwo. These obstacles were not unlike the shield of the knight in\nthe old story; only instead of the two sides presented to the two\ntravellers approaching it from opposite quarters, one of which was\nsilver, and one of which was gold, Lady Harriet saw the smooth and\nshining yellow radiance, while poor Molly only perceived a dull and\nheavy lead. To Lady Harriet it was \"Molly is gone out; she will be so\nsorry to miss you, but she was obliged to go to see some old friends\nof her mother's whom she ought not to neglect; as I said to her,\nconstancy is everything. It is Sterne, I think, who says, 'Thine own\nand thy mother's friends forsake not.' But, dear Lady Harriet, you'll\nstop till she comes home, won't you? I know how fond you are of her;\nin fact\" (with a little surface playfulness) \"I sometimes say you\ncome more to see her than your poor old Clare.\"\n\nTo Molly it had previously been,--\n\n\"Lady Harriet is coming here this morning. I can't have any one else\ncoming in. Tell Maria to say I'm not at home. Lady Harriet has always\nso much to tell me. Dear Lady Harriet! I've known all her secrets\nsince she was twelve years old. You two girls must keep out of the\nway. Of course she'll ask for you, out of common civility; but\nyou would only interrupt us if you came in, as you did the other\nday;\"--now addressing Molly--\"I hardly like to say so, but I thought\nit was very forward.\"\n\n\"Maria told me she had asked for me,\" put in Molly, simply.\n\n\"Very forward indeed!\" continued Mrs. Gibson, taking no further\nnotice of the interruption, except to strengthen the words to which\nMolly's little speech had been intended as a correction.\n\n\"I think this time I must secure her ladyship from the chances of\nsuch an intrusion, by taking care that you are out of the house,\nMolly. You had better go to the Holly Farm, and speak about those\ndamsons I ordered, and which have never been sent.\"\n\n\"I'll go,\" said Cynthia. \"It's far too long a walk for Molly; she's\nhad a bad cold, and isn't as strong as she was a fortnight ago. I\ndelight in long walks. If you want Molly out of the way, mamma, send\nher to the Miss Brownings'--they are always glad to see her.\"\n\n\"I never said I wanted Molly out of the way, Cynthia,\" replied Mrs.\nGibson. \"You always put things in such an exaggerated--I should\nalmost say, so coarse a manner. I am sure, Molly, my love, you\ncould never have so misunderstood me; it is only on Lady Harriet's\naccount.\"\n\n\"I don't think I can walk as far as the Holly Farm; papa would take\nthe message; Cynthia need not go.\"\n\n\"Well! I'm the last person in the world to tax any one's strength;\nI'd sooner never see damson preserve again. Suppose you do go and see\nMiss Browning; you can pay her a nice long call, you know she likes\nthat; and ask after Miss Phoebe's cold from me, you know. They were\nfriends of your mother's, my dear, and I would not have you break off\nold friendships for the world. 'Constancy above everything' is my\nmotto, as you know, and the memory of the dead ought always to be\ncherished.\"\n\n\"Now, mamma, where am I to go?\" asked Cynthia. \"Though Lady Harriet\ndoesn't care for me as much as she does for Molly--indeed, quite the\ncontrary I should say--yet she might ask after me, and I had better\nbe safely out of the way.\"\n\n\"True!\" said Mrs. Gibson, meditatively, yet unconscious of any satire\nin Cynthia's speech.\n\n\"She is much less likely to ask for you, my dear: I almost think\nyou might remain in the house, or you might go to the Holly Farm;\nI really do want the damsons; or you might stay here in the\ndining-room, you know, so as to be ready to arrange lunch prettily,\nif she does take a fancy to stay for it. She is very fanciful,\nis dear Lady Harriet! I would not like her to think we made any\ndifference in our meals because she stayed. 'Simple elegance,' as I\ntell her, 'always is what we aim at.' But still you could put out the\nbest service, and arrange some flowers, and ask cook what there is\nfor dinner that she could send us for lunch, and make it all look\npretty, and impromptu, and natural. I think you had better stay at\nhome, Cynthia, and then you could fetch Molly from Miss Brownings' in\nthe afternoon, you know, and you two could take a walk together.\"\n\n\"After Lady Harriet was fairly gone! I understand, mamma. Off with\nyou, Molly. Make haste, or Lady Harriet may come and ask for you as\nwell as mamma. I'll take care and forget where you are going to, so\nthat no one shall learn from me where you are, and I'll answer for\nmamma's loss of memory.\"\n\n\"Child! what nonsense you talk; you quite confuse me with being so\nsilly,\" said Mrs. Gibson, fluttered and annoyed as she usually was\nwith the Lilliputian darts Cynthia flung at her. She had recourse to\nher accustomed feckless piece of retaliation--bestowing some favour\non Molly; and this did not hurt Cynthia one whit.\n\n\"Molly, darling, there's a very cold wind, though it looks so fine.\nYou had better put on my Indian shawl; and it will look so pretty,\ntoo, on your grey gown--scarlet and grey; it's not everybody I would\nlend it to, but you're so careful.\"\n\n\"Thank you,\" said Molly: and she left Mrs. Gibson in careless\nuncertainty as to whether her offer would be accepted or not.\n\nLady Harriet was sorry to miss Molly, as she was fond of the\ngirl; but as she perfectly agreed with Mrs. Gibson's truism about\n\"constancy\" and \"old friends,\" she saw no occasion for saying any\nmore about the affair, but sat down in a little low chair with her\nfeet on the fender. This said fender was made of bright, bright\nsteel, and was strictly tabooed to all household and plebeian feet;\nindeed the position, if they assumed it, was considered low-bred and\nvulgar.\n\n\"That's right, dear Lady Harriet! you can't think what a pleasure it\nis to me to welcome you at my own fireside, into my humble home.\"\n\n\"Humble! now, Clare, that's a little bit of nonsense, begging your\npardon. I don't call this pretty little drawing-room a bit of a\n'humble home.' It's as full of comforts, and of pretty things too, as\nany room of its size can be.\"\n\n\"Ah! how small you must feel it! even I had to reconcile myself to it\nat first.\"\n\n\"Well! perhaps your schoolroom was larger, but remember how bare it\nwas, how empty of anything but deal tables, and forms, and mats. Oh,\nindeed, Clare, I quite agree with mamma, who always says you have\ndone very well for yourself; and Mr. Gibson too! What an agreeable,\nwell-informed man!\"\n\n\"Yes, he is,\" said his wife, slowly, as if she did not like to\nrelinquish her rôle of a victim to circumstances quite immediately.\n\"He is very agreeable, very; only we see so little of him; and of\ncourse he comes home tired and hungry, and not inclined to talk to\nhis own family, and apt to go to sleep.\"\n\n\"Come, come!\" said Lady Harriet, \"I'm going to have my turn now.\nWe've had the complaint of a doctor's wife, now hear the moans of a\npeer's daughter. Our house is so overrun with visitors! and literally\nto-day I have come to you for a little solitude.\"\n\n\"Solitude!\" exclaimed Mrs. Gibson. \"Would you rather be alone?\"\nslightly aggrieved.\n\n\"No, you dear silly woman; my solitude requires a listener, to\nwhom I may say, 'How sweet is solitude!' But I am tired of the\nresponsibility of entertaining. Papa is so open-hearted, he asks\nevery friend he meets with to come and pay us a visit. Mamma is\nreally a great invalid, but she does not choose to give up her\nreputation for good health, having always considered illness a want\nof self-control. So she gets wearied and worried by a crowd of people\nwho are all of them open-mouthed for amusement of some kind; just\nlike a brood of fledglings in a nest; so I have to be parent-bird,\nand pop morsels into their yellow leathery bills, to find them\nswallowed down before I can think of where to find the next. Oh, it's\n'entertaining' in the largest, literalist, dreariest sense of the\nword. So I have told a few lies this morning, and come off here for\nquietness and the comfort of complaining!\"\n\nLady Harriet threw herself back in her chair, and yawned; Mrs. Gibson\ntook one of her ladyship's hands in a soft sympathizing manner, and\nmurmured,--\n\n\"Poor Lady Harriet!\" and then she purred affectionately.\n\nAfter a pause Lady Harriet started up and said--\"I used to take you\nas my arbiter of morals when I was a little girl. Tell me, do you\nthink it wrong to tell lies?\"\n\n\"Oh, my dear! how can you ask such questions?--of course it is very\nwrong,--very wicked indeed, I think I may say. But I know you were\nonly joking when you said you had told lies.\"\n\n\"No, indeed, I wasn't. I told as plump fat lies as you would wish\nto hear. I said I 'was obliged to go into Hollingford on business,'\nwhen the truth was there was no obligation in the matter, only an\ninsupportable desire of being free from my visitors for an hour or\ntwo, and my only business was to come here, and yawn, and complain,\nand lounge at my leisure. I really think I'm unhappy at having told a\nstory, as children express it.\"\n\n\"But, my dear Lady Harriet,\" said Mrs. Gibson, a little puzzled as to\nthe exact meaning of the words that were trembling on her tongue, \"I\nam sure you thought that you meant what you said, when you said it.\"\n\n\"No, I didn't,\" put in Lady Harriet.\n\n\"And besides, if you didn't, it was the fault of the tiresome people\nwho drove you into such straits--yes, it was certainly their fault,\nnot yours--and then you know the conventions of society--ah, what\ntrammels they are!\"\n\nLady Harriet was silent for a minute or two; then she said,--\"Tell\nme, Clare; you've told lies sometimes, haven't you?\"\n\n\"Lady Harriet! I think you might have known me better; but I know you\ndon't mean it, dear.\"\n\n\"Yes, I do. You must have told white lies, at any rate. How did you\nfeel after them?\"\n\n\"I should have been miserable if I ever had. I should have died of\nself-reproach. 'The truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the\ntruth,' has always seemed to me such a fine passage. But then I have\nso much that is unbending in my nature, and in our sphere of life\nthere are so few temptations. If we are humble, we are also simple,\nand unshackled by etiquette.\"\n\n\"Then you blame me very much? If somebody else will blame me, I\nsha'n't be so unhappy at what I said this morning.\"\n\n\"I am sure I never blamed you, not in my innermost heart, dear Lady\nHarriet. Blame you, indeed! That would be presumption in me.\"\n\n\"I think I shall set up a confessor! and it sha'n't be you, Clare,\nfor you have always been only too indulgent to me.\"\n\nAfter a pause she said,--\"Can you give me some lunch, Clare? I don't\nmean to go home till three. My 'business' will take me till then, as\nthe people at the Towers are duly informed.\"\n\n\"Certainly. I shall be delighted! but you know we are very simple in\nour habits.\"\n\n\"Oh, I only want a little bread-and-butter, and perhaps a slice of\ncold meat--you must not give yourself any trouble, Clare--perhaps you\ndine now? let me sit down just like one of your family.\"\n\n\"Yes, you shall; I won't make any alteration;--it will be so pleasant\nto have you sharing our family meal, dear Lady Harriet. But we dine\nlate, we only lunch now. How low the fire is getting; I really am\nforgetting everything in the pleasure of this tête-à-tête!\"\n\nSo she rang twice; with great distinctness, and with a long pause\nbetween the rings. Maria brought in coals.\n\nBut the signal was as well understood by Cynthia as the \"Hall of\nApollo\" was by the servants of Lucullus. The brace of partridges that\nwere to have been for the late dinner were instantly put down to the\nfire; and the prettiest china brought out, and the table decked with\nflowers and fruit, arranged with all Cynthia's usual dexterity and\ntaste. So that when the meal was announced, and Lady Harriet entered\nthe room, she could not but think her hostess's apologies had been\nquite unnecessary; and be more and more convinced that Clare had\ndone very well for herself. Cynthia now joined the party, pretty\nand elegant as she always was; but somehow she did not take Lady\nHarriet's fancy; she only noticed her on account of her being her\nmother's daughter. Her presence made the conversation more general,\nand Lady Harriet gave out several pieces of news, none of them of any\ngreat importance to her, but as what had been talked about by the\ncircle of visitors assembled at the Towers.\n\n\"Lord Hollingford ought to have been with us,\" she said, amongst\nother things; \"but he is obliged, or fancies himself obliged, which\nis all the same thing, to stay in town about this Crichton legacy!\"\n\n\"A legacy? To Lord Hollingford? I am so glad!\"\n\n\"Don't be in a hurry to be glad! It's nothing for him but trouble.\nDidn't you hear of that rich eccentric Mr. Crichton, who died\nsome time ago, and--fired by the example of Lord Bridgewater,\nI suppose--left a sum of money in the hands of trustees, of\nwhom my brother is one, to send out a man with a thousand fine\nqualifications, to make a scientific voyage, with a view to bringing\nback specimens of the fauna of distant lands, and so forming the\nnucleus of a museum which is to be called the Crichton Museum, and so\nperpetuate the founder's name. Such various forms does man's vanity\ntake! Sometimes it stimulates philanthropy; sometimes a love of\nscience!\"\n\n\"It seems to me a very laudable and useful object, I am sure,\" said\nMrs. Gibson, safely.\n\n\"I daresay it is, taking it from the public-good view. But it's\nrather tiresome to us privately, for it keeps Hollingford in town--or\nbetween it and Cambridge--and each place as dull and empty as can be,\njust when we want him down at the Towers. The thing ought to have\nbeen decided long ago, and there's some danger of the legacy lapsing.\nThe two other trustees have run away to the Continent, feeling, as\nthey say, the utmost confidence in him, but in reality shirking their\nresponsibilities. However, I believe he likes it, so I ought not to\ngrumble. He thinks he is going to be very successful in the choice of\nhis man--and he belongs to this county, too,--young Hamley of Hamley,\nif he can only get his college to let him go, for he is a Fellow of\nTrinity, senior wrangler or something; and they're not so foolish as\nto send their crack man to be eaten up by lions and tigers!\"\n\n\"It must be Roger Hamley!\" exclaimed Cynthia, her eyes brightening,\nand her cheeks flushing.\n\n\"He's not the eldest son; he can scarcely be called Hamley of\nHamley!\" said Mrs. Gibson.\n\n\"Hollingford's man is a Fellow of Trinity, as I said before.\"\n\n\"Then it is Mr. Roger Hamley,\" said Cynthia; \"and he's up in London\nabout some business! What news for Molly when she comes home!\"\n\n\"Why, what has Molly to do with it?\" asked Lady Harriet. \"Is--?\" and\nshe looked into Mrs. Gibson's face for an answer. Mrs. Gibson in\nreply gave an intelligent and very expressive glance at Cynthia, who\nhowever did not perceive it.\n\n\"Oh, no! not at all,\"--and Mrs. Gibson nodded a little at her\ndaughter, as much as to say, \"If any one, that.\"\n\nLady Harriet began to look at the pretty Miss Kirkpatrick with fresh\ninterest; her brother had spoken in such a manner of this young\nMr. Hamley that every one connected with the phoenix was worthy of\nobservation. Then, as if the mention of Molly's name had brought her\nafresh into her mind, Lady Harriet said,--\"And where is Molly all\nthis time? I should like to see my little mentor. I hear she is very\nmuch grown since those days.\"\n\n\"Oh! when she once gets gossiping with the Miss Brownings, she never\nknows when to come home,\" said Mrs. Gibson.\n\n\"The Miss Brownings? Oh! I'm so glad you named them! I'm very fond of\nthem. Pecksy and Flapsy; I may call them so in Molly's absence. I'll\ngo and see them before I go home, and then perhaps I shall see my\ndear little Molly too. Do you know, Clare, I've quite taken a fancy\nto that girl!\"\n\nSo Mrs. Gibson, after all her precautions, had to submit to Lady\nHarriet's leaving her half-an-hour earlier than she otherwise would\nhave done in order to \"make herself common\" (as Mrs. Gibson expressed\nit) by calling on the Miss Brownings.\n\nBut Molly had left before Lady Harriet arrived.\n\nMolly went the long walk to the Holly Farm, to order the damsons,\nout of a kind of penitence. She had felt conscious of anger at being\nsent out of the house by such a palpable manoeuvre as that which\nher stepmother had employed. Of course she did not meet Cynthia, so\nshe went alone along the pretty lanes, with grassy sides and high\nhedge-banks not at all in the style of modern agriculture. At first\nshe made herself uncomfortable with questioning herself as to how\nfar it was right to leave unnoticed the small domestic failings--the\nwebs, the distortions of truth which had prevailed in their household\never since her father's second marriage. She knew that very often\nshe longed to protest, but did not do it, from the desire of sparing\nher father any discord; and she saw by his face that he, too, was\noccasionally aware of certain things that gave him pain, as showing\nthat his wife's standard of conduct was not as high as he would have\nliked. It was a wonder to Molly whether this silence was right or\nwrong. With a girl's want of toleration, and want of experience to\nteach her the force of circumstances, and of temptation, she had\noften been on the point of telling her stepmother some forcible home\ntruths. But, possibly, her father's example of silence, and often\nsome piece of kindness on Mrs. Gibson's part (for after her way, and\nwhen in a good temper, she was very kind to Molly), made her hold her\ntongue.\n\nThat night at dinner, Mrs. Gibson recounted the conversation between\nherself and Lady Harriet, giving it a very strong individual\ncolouring, as was her wont, and telling nearly the whole of what had\npassed, although implying that there was a great deal said which was\nso purely confidential, that she was bound in honour not to repeat\nit. Her three auditors listened to her without interrupting her\nmuch--indeed, without bestowing extreme attention on what she was\nsaying, until she came to the fact of Lord Hollingford's absence in\nLondon, and the reason for it.\n\n\"Roger Hamley going off on a scientific expedition!\" exclaimed Mr.\nGibson, suddenly awakened into vivacity.\n\n\"Yes. At least it is not settled finally; but as Lord Hollingford\nis the only trustee who takes any interest--and being Lord Cumnor's\nson--it is next to certain.\"\n\n\"I think I must have a voice in the matter,\" said Mr. Gibson; and he\nrelapsed into silence, keeping his ears open, however, henceforward.\n\n\"How long will he be away?\" asked Cynthia. \"We shall miss him sadly.\"\n\nMolly's lips formed an acquiescing \"yes\" to this remark, but no sound\nwas heard. There was a buzzing in her ears as if the others were\ngoing on with the conversation, but the words they uttered seemed\nindistinct and blurred; they were merely conjectures, and did not\ninterfere with the one great piece of news. To the rest of the party\nshe appeared to be eating her dinner as usual, and, if she were\nsilent, there was one listener the more to Mrs. Gibson's stream of\nprattle, and Mr. Gibson's and Cynthia's remarks.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXXIII.\n\nBRIGHTENING PROSPECTS.\n\n\n[Illustration (untitled)]\n\nIt was a day or two afterwards, that Mr. Gibson made time to ride\nround by Hamley, desirous to learn more exact particulars of this\nscheme for Roger than he could obtain from any extraneous source, and\nrather puzzled to know whether he should interfere in the project or\nnot. The state of the case was this:--Osborne's symptoms were, in Mr.\nGibson's opinion, signs of his having a fatal disease. Dr. Nicholls\nhad differed from him on this head, and Mr. Gibson knew that the old\nphysician had had long experience, and was considered very skilful\nin the profession. Still he believed that he himself was right, and,\nif so, the complaint was one which might continue for years in the\nsame state as at present, or might end the young man's life in an\nhour--a minute. Supposing that Mr. Gibson was right, would it be well\nfor Roger to be away where no sudden calls for his presence could\nreach him--away for two years? Yet if the affair was concluded, the\ninterference of a medical man might accelerate the very evil to be\nfeared; and after all, Dr. Nicholls might be right, and the symptoms\nmight proceed from some other cause. Might? Yes. Probably did? No.\nMr. Gibson could not bring himself to say \"yes\" to this latter form\nof sentence. So he rode on, meditating; his reins slack, his head\na little bent. It was one of those still and lovely autumn days\nwhen the red and yellow leaves are hanging-pegs to dewy, brilliant\ngossamer-webs; when the hedges are full of trailing brambles, loaded\nwith ripe blackberries; when the air is full of the farewell whistles\nand pipes of birds, clear and short--not the long full-throated\nwarbles of spring; when the whirr of the partridge's wings is heard\nin the stubble-fields, as the sharp hoof-blows fall on the paved\nlanes; when here and there a leaf floats and flutters down to the\nground, although there is not a single breath of wind. The country\nsurgeon felt the beauty of the seasons perhaps more than most men.\nHe saw more of it by day, by night, in storm and sunshine, or in the\nstill, soft, cloudy weather. He never spoke about what he felt on\nthe subject; indeed, he did not put his feelings into words, even to\nhimself. But if his mood ever approached to the sentimental, it was\non such days as this. He rode into the stable-yard, gave his horse to\na man, and went into the house by a side entrance. In the passage he\nmet the Squire.\n\n\"That's capital, Gibson! what good wind blew you here? You'll have\nsome lunch? it's on the table, I only just this minute left the\nroom.\" And he kept shaking Mr. Gibson's hand all the time till he had\nplaced him, nothing loth, at the well-covered dining-table.\n\n\"What's this I hear about Roger?\" said Mr. Gibson, plunging at once\ninto the subject.\n\n\"Aha! so you've heard, have you? It's famous, isn't it? He's a boy to\nbe proud of, is old Roger. Steady Roger; we used to think him slow,\nbut it seems to me that slow and sure wins the race. But tell me;\nwhat have you heard? how much is known? Nay, you must have a glass\nfull. It's old ale, such as we don't brew now-a-days; it's as old\nas Osborne. We brewed it that autumn, and we called it the young\nsquire's ale. I thought to have tapped it on his marriage, but I\ndon't know when that will come to pass, so we've tapped it now in\nRoger's honour.\"\n\nThe old squire had evidently been enjoying the young squire's ale\nto the verge of prudence. It was indeed as he said, \"as strong as\nbrandy,\" and Mr. Gibson had to sip it very carefully as he ate his\ncold roast beef.\n\n\"Well! and what have you heard? There's a deal to hear, and all good\nnews, though I shall miss the lad, I know that.\"\n\n\"I did not know it was settled; I only heard that it was in\nprogress.\"\n\n\"Well, it was only in progress, as you call it, till last Tuesday.\nHe never let me know anything about it, though; he says he thought I\nmight be fidgety with thinking of the pros and cons. So I never knew\na word on't till I had a letter from my Lord Hollingford--where is\nit?\" pulling out a great black leathern receptacle for all manner of\npapers. And putting on his spectacles, he read aloud their headings.\n\n\"'Measurement of timber, new railings,' 'drench for cows, from Farmer\nHayes,' 'Dobson's accounts,'--'um 'um--here it is. Now read that\nletter,\" handing it to Mr. Gibson.\n\nIt was a manly, feeling, sensible letter, explaining to the old\nfather in very simple language the services which were demanded\nby the terms of the will to which he and two or three others were\ntrustees; the liberal allowance for expenses, the still more liberal\nreward for performance, which had tempted several men of considerable\nrenown to offer themselves as candidates for the appointment. Lord\nHollingford then went on to say that, having seen a good deal of\nRoger lately, since the publication of his article in reply to the\nFrench osteologist, he had had reason to think that in him the\ntrustees would find united the various qualities required in a\ngreater measure than in any of the applicants who had at that time\npresented themselves. Roger had deep interest in the subject; much\nacquired knowledge, and at the same time, great natural powers of\ncomparison, and classification of facts; he had shown himself to be\nan observer of a fine and accurate kind; he was of the right age, in\nthe very prime of health and strength, and unshackled by any family\nties. Here Mr. Gibson paused for consideration. He hardly cared to\nascertain by what steps the result had been arrived at--he already\nknew what that result was; but his mind was again arrested as his eye\ncaught on the remuneration offered, which was indeed most liberal;\nand then he read with attention the high praise bestowed on the\nson in this letter to the father. The Squire had been watching Mr.\nGibson--waiting till he came to this part--and he rubbed his hands\ntogether as he said,--\n\n\"Ay! you've come to it at last. It's the best part of the whole,\nisn't it? God bless the boy! and from a Whig, mind you, which makes\nit the more handsome. And there's more to come still. I say, Gibson,\nI think my luck is turning at last,\" passing him on yet another\nletter to read. \"That only came this morning; but I've acted on it\nalready, I sent for the foreman of the drainage works at once, I did;\nand to-morrow, please God, they'll be at work again.\"\n\nMr. Gibson read the second letter, from Roger. To a certain degree\nit was a modest repetition of what Lord Hollingford had said, with\nan explanation of how he had come to take so decided a step in life\nwithout consulting his father. He did not wish him to be in suspense\nfor one reason. Another was that he felt, as no one else could feel\nfor him, that by accepting this offer, he entered upon the kind of\nlife for which he knew himself to be most fitted. And then he merged\nthe whole into business. He said that he knew well the suffering his\nfather had gone through when he had had to give up his drainage works\nfor want of money; that he, Roger, had been enabled at once to raise\nmoney upon the remuneration he was to receive on the accomplishment\nof his two years' work; and that he had also insured his life, in\norder to provide for the repayment of the money he had raised, in\ncase he did not live to return to England. He said that the sum he\nhad borrowed on this security would at once be forwarded to his\nfather.\n\nMr. Gibson laid down the letter without speaking a word for some\ntime; then he said,--\"He'll have to pay a pretty sum for insuring his\nlife beyond seas.\"\n\n\"He's got his Fellowship money,\" said the Squire, a little depressed\nat Mr. Gibson's remark.\n\n\"Yes; that's true. And he's a strong young fellow, as I know.\"\n\n\"I wish I could tell his mother,\" said the Squire in an under-tone.\n\n\"It seems all settled now,\" said Mr. Gibson, more in reply to his own\nthoughts than to the Squire's remark.\n\n\"Yes!\" said the Squire; \"and they're not going to let the grass grow\nunder his feet. He's to be off as soon as he can get his scientific\ntraps ready. I almost wish he wasn't to go. You don't seem quite to\nlike it, doctor?\"\n\n\"Yes, I do,\" said Mr. Gibson in a more cheerful tone than before. \"It\ncan't be helped now without doing a mischief,\" thought he to himself.\n\"Why, Squire, I think it a great honour to have such a son. I envy\nyou, that's what I do. Here's a lad of three or four and twenty\ndistinguishing himself in more ways than one, and as simple and\naffectionate at home as any fellow need to be--not a bit set up.\"\n\n\"Ay, ay; he's twice as much a son to me as Osborne, who has been all\nhis life set up on nothing at all, as one may say.\"\n\n\"Come, Squire, I mustn't hear anything against Osborne; we may praise\none, without hitting at the other. Osborne hasn't had the strong\nhealth which has enabled Roger to work as he has done. I met a man\nwho knew his tutor at Trinity the other day, and of course we began\ncracking about Roger--it's not every day that one can reckon a senior\nwrangler amongst one's friends, and I'm nearly as proud of the lad\nas you are. This Mr. Mason told me the tutor said that only half of\nRoger's success was owing to his mental powers; the other half was\nowing to his perfect health, which enabled him to work harder and\nmore continuously than most men without suffering. He said that in\nall his experience he had never known any one with an equal capacity\nfor mental labour; and that he could come again with a fresh appetite\nto his studies after shorter intervals of rest than most. Now I,\nbeing a doctor, trace a good deal of his superiority to the material\ncause of a thoroughly good constitution, which Osborne hasn't got.\"\n\n\"Osborne might have, if he got out o' doors more,\" said the Squire,\nmoodily; \"but except when he can loaf into Hollingford he doesn't\ncare to go out at all. I hope,\" he continued, with a glance of sudden\nsuspicion at Mr. Gibson, \"he's not after one of your girls? I don't\nmean any offence, you know; but he'll have the estate, and it won't\nbe free, and he must marry money. I don't think I could allow it in\nRoger; but Osborne's the eldest son, you know.\"\n\nMr. Gibson reddened; he was offended for a moment. Then the partial\ntruth of what the Squire said was presented to his mind, and he\nremembered their old friendship, so he spoke quietly, if shortly.\n\n\"I don't believe there's anything of the kind going on. I'm not much\nat home, you know; but I've never heard or seen anything that should\nmake me suppose that there is. When I do, I'll let you know.\"\n\n\"Now, Gibson, don't go and be offended. I'm glad for the boys to have\na pleasant house to go to, and I thank you and Mrs. Gibson for making\nit pleasant. Only keep off love; it can come to no good. That's\nall. I don't believe Osborne will ever earn a farthing to keep a\nwife during my life, and if I were to die to-morrow, she would have\nto bring some money to clear the estate. And if I do speak as I\nshouldn't have done formerly--a little sharp or so--why, it's because\nI've been worried by many a care no one knows anything of.\"\n\n\"I'm not going to take offence,\" said Mr. Gibson, \"but let us\nunderstand each other clearly. If you don't want your sons to come\nas much to my house as they do, tell them so yourself. I like the\nlads, and am glad to see them; but if they do come, you must take the\nconsequences, whatever they are, and not blame me, or them either,\nfor what may happen from the frequent intercourse between two young\nmen and two young women; and what is more, though, as I said, I see\nnothing whatever of the kind you fear at present, and have promised\nto tell you of the first symptoms I do see, yet farther than that\nI won't go. If there's an attachment at any future time, I won't\ninterfere.\"\n\n\"I shouldn't so much mind if Roger fell in love with your Molly. He\ncan fight for himself, you see, and she's an uncommon nice girl. My\npoor wife was so fond of her,\" answered the Squire. \"It's Osborne and\nthe estate I'm thinking of!\"\n\n\"Well, then, tell him not to come near us. I shall be sorry, but you\nwill be safe.\"\n\n\"I'll think about it; but he's difficult to manage. I've always to\nget my blood well up before I can speak my mind to him.\"\n\nMr. Gibson was leaving the room, but at these words he turned and\nlaid his hand on the Squire's arm.\n\n\"Take my advice, Squire. As I said, there's no harm done as yet, as\nfar as I know. Prevention is better than cure. Speak out, but speak\ngently to Osborne, and do it at once. I shall understand how it is if\nhe doesn't show his face for some months in my house. If you speak\ngently to him, he'll take the advice as from a friend. If he can\nassure you there's no danger, of course he'll come just as usual,\nwhen he likes.\"\n\nIt was all very fine giving the Squire this good advice; but as\nOsborne had already formed the very kind of marriage his father most\ndeprecated, it did not act quite as well as Mr. Gibson had hoped. The\nSquire began the conversation with unusual self-control; but he grew\nirritated when Osborne denied his father's right to interfere in any\nmarriage he might contemplate; denied it with a certain degree of\ndoggedness and weariness of the subject that drove the Squire into\none of his passions; and although, on after reflection, he remembered\nthat he had his son's promise and solemn word not to think of either\nCynthia or Molly for his wife, yet the father and son had passed\nthrough one of those altercations which help to estrange men for\nlife. Each had said bitter things to the other; and, if the brotherly\naffection had not been so true between Osborne and Roger, they\ntoo might have become alienated, in consequence of the Squire's\nexaggerated and injudicious comparison of their characters and deeds.\nBut as Roger in his boyhood had loved Osborne too well to be jealous\nof the praise and love which the eldest son, the beautiful brilliant\nlad, had received, to the disparagement of his own plain awkwardness\nand slowness, so now Osborne strove against any feeling of envy or\njealousy with all his might; but his efforts were conscious, Roger's\nhad been the simple consequence of affection, and the end to poor\nOsborne was that he became moody and depressed in mind and body; but\nboth father and son concealed their feelings in Roger's presence.\nWhen he came home just before sailing, busy and happy, the Squire\ncaught his infectious energy, and Osborne looked up and was cheerful.\n\nThere was no time to be lost. He was bound to a hot climate, and must\ntake all advantage possible of the winter months. He was to go first\nto Paris, to have interviews with some of the scientific men there.\nSome of his outfit, instruments, &c., were to follow him to Havre,\nfrom which port he was to embark, after transacting his business in\nParis. The Squire learnt all his arrangements and plans, and even\ntried in after-dinner conversations to penetrate into the questions\ninvolved in the researches his son was about to make. But Roger's\nvisit home could not be prolonged beyond two days.\n\nThe last day he rode into Hollingford earlier than he needed to have\ndone to catch the London coach, in order to bid the Gibsons good-by.\nHe had been too actively busy for some time to have leisure to bestow\nmuch thought on Cynthia; but there was no need for fresh meditation\non that subject. Her image as a prize to be worked for, to be served\nfor seven years, and seven years more, was safe and sacred in his\nheart. It was very bad, this going away, and wishing her good-by\nfor two long years; and he wondered much during his ride how far he\nshould be justified in telling her mother, perhaps in telling her own\nsweet self, what his feelings were without expecting, nay, indeed\nreprobating, any answer on her part. Then she would know at any\nrate how dearly she was beloved by one who was absent; how in all\ndifficulties or dangers the thought of her would be a polar star,\nhigh up in the heavens, and so on, and so on; for with all a lover's\nquickness of imagination and triteness of fancy, he called her\na star, a flower, a nymph, a witch, an angel, or a mermaid, a\nnightingale, a siren, as one or another of her attributes rose up\nbefore him.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXXIV.\n\nA LOVER'S MISTAKE.\n\n\nIt was afternoon. Molly had gone out for a walk. Mrs. Gibson had been\npaying some calls. Lazy Cynthia had declined accompanying either. A\ndaily walk was not a necessity to her as it was to Molly. On a lovely\nday, or with an agreeable object, or when the fancy took her, she\ncould go as far as any one; but these were exceptional cases; in\ngeneral, she was not disposed to disturb herself from her in-door\noccupations. Indeed, not one of the ladies would have left the house,\nhad they been aware that Roger was in the neighbourhood; for they\nwere aware that he was to come down but once before his departure,\nand that his stay at home then would be but for a short time, and\nthey were all anxious to wish him good-by before his long absence.\nBut they had understood that he was not coming to the Hall until\nthe following week, and therefore they had felt themselves at full\nliberty this afternoon to follow their own devices.\n\nMolly chose a walk that had been a favourite with her ever since she\nwas a child. Something or other had happened just before she left\nhome that made her begin wondering how far it was right for the sake\nof domestic peace to pass over without comment the little deviations\nfrom right that people perceive in those whom they live with. Or\nwhether, as they are placed in families for distinct purposes, not by\nchance merely, there are not duties involved in this aspect of their\nlot in life,--whether by continually passing over failings, their own\nstandard is not lowered,--the practical application of these thoughts\nbeing a dismal sort of perplexity on Molly's part as to whether her\nfather was quite aware of her stepmother's perpetual lapses from\ntruth; and whether his blindness was wilful or not. Then she felt\nbitterly enough that although she was sure as could be that there\nwas no real estrangement between her and her father, yet there were\nperpetual obstacles thrown in the way of their intercourse; and she\nthought with a sigh that if he would but come in with authority, he\nmight cut his way clear to the old intimacy with his daughter, and\nthat they might have all the former walks and talks, and quips and\ncranks, and glimpses of real confidence once again; things that her\nstepmother did not value, yet which she, like the dog in the manger,\nprevented Molly's enjoying. But after all Molly was a girl, not so\nfar removed from childhood; and in the middle of her grave regrets\nand perplexities, her eye was caught by the sight of some fine\nripe blackberries flourishing away high up on the hedge-bank among\nscarlet hips and green and russet leaves. She did not care much for\nblackberries herself; but she had heard Cynthia say that she liked\nthem; and besides there was the charm of scrambling and gathering\nthem; so she forgot all about her troubles, and went climbing up the\nbanks, and clutching at her almost inaccessible prizes, and slipping\ndown again triumphant, to carry them back to the large leaf which was\nto serve her as a basket. One or two of them she tasted, but they\nwere as vapid to her palate as ever. The skirt of her pretty print\ngown was torn out of the gathers, and even with the fruit she had\neaten \"her pretty lips with blackberries were all besmeared and\ndyed,\" when having gathered as many and more than she could possibly\ncarry, she set off home, hoping to escape into her room and mend her\ngown before it had offended Mrs. Gibson's neat eye. The front door\nwas easily opened from the outside, and Molly was out of the clear\nlight of the open air and in the shadow of the hall, when she saw a\nface peep out of the dining-room before she quite recognized whose it\nwas; and then Mrs. Gibson came softly out, sufficiently at least to\nbeckon her into the room. When Molly had entered Mrs. Gibson closed\nthe door. Poor Molly expected a reprimand for her torn gown and\nuntidy appearance, but was soon relieved by the expression of Mrs.\nGibson's face--mysterious and radiant.\n\n\"I've been watching for you, dear. Don't go upstairs into the\ndrawing-room, love. It might be a little interruption just now. Roger\nHamley is there with Cynthia; and I've reason to think--in fact I did\nopen the door unawares, but I shut it again softly, and I don't think\nthey heard me. Isn't it charming? Young love, you know, ah, how sweet\nit is!\"\n\n\"Do you mean that Roger has proposed to Cynthia?\" asked Molly.\n\n\"Not exactly that. But I don't know; of course I know nothing. Only I\ndid hear him say that he had meant to leave England without speaking\nof his love, but that the temptation of seeing her alone had been too\ngreat for him. It was symptomatic, was it not, my dear? And all I\nwanted was to let it come to a crisis without interruption. So I've\nbeen watching for you to prevent your going in and disturbing them.\"\n\n\"But I may go to my own room, mayn't I,\" pleaded Molly.\n\n\"Of course,\" said Mrs. Gibson, a little testily. \"Only I had expected\nsympathy from you at such an interesting moment.\"\n\nBut Molly did not hear these last words. She had escaped upstairs,\nand shut her door. Instinctively she had carried her leaf full of\nblackberries--what would blackberries be to Cynthia now? She felt\nas if she could not understand it all; but as for that matter, what\ncould she understand? Nothing. For a few minutes her brain seemed\nin too great a whirl to comprehend anything but that she was being\ncarried on in earth's diurnal course, with rocks, and stones, and\ntrees, with as little volition on her part as if she were dead.\nThen the room grew stifling, and instinctively she went to the open\ncasement window, and leant out, gasping for breath. Gradually the\nconsciousness of the soft peaceful landscape stole into her mind, and\nstilled the buzzing confusion. There, bathed in the almost level rays\nof the autumn sunlight, lay the landscape she had known and loved\nfrom childhood; as quiet, as full of low humming life as it had been\nat this hour for many generations. The autumn flowers blazed out in\nthe garden below, the lazy cows were in the meadow beyond, chewing\ntheir cud in the green aftermath; the evening fires had just been\nmade up in the cottages beyond, in preparation for the husband's\nhome-coming, and were sending up soft curls of blue smoke into the\nstill air; the children, let loose from school, were shouting merrily\nin the distance, and she-- Just then she heard nearer sounds; an\nopened door, steps on the lower flight of stairs. He could not\nhave gone without even seeing her. He never, never would have done\nso cruel a thing--never would have forgotten poor little Molly,\nhowever happy he might be! No! there were steps and voices, and the\ndrawing-room door was opened and shut once more. She laid down her\nhead on her arms that rested upon the window-sill, and cried,--she\nhad been so distrustful as to have let the idea enter her mind that\nhe could go without wishing her good-by--her, whom his mother had so\nloved, and called by the name of his little dead sister. And as she\nthought of the tender love Mrs. Hamley had borne her she cried the\nmore, for the vanishing of such love for her off the face of the\nearth. Suddenly the drawing-room door opened, and some one was heard\ncoming upstairs; it was Cynthia's step. Molly hastily wiped her eyes,\nand stood up and tried to look unconcerned; it was all she had time\nto do before Cynthia, after a little pause at the closed door, had\nknocked; and on an answer being given, had said, without opening\nthe door,--\"Molly! Mr. Roger Hamley is here, and wants to wish you\ngood-by before he goes.\" Then she went downstairs again, as if\nanxious just at that moment to avoid even so short a tête-à-tête with\nMolly. With a gulp and a fit of resolution, as a child makes up its\nmind to swallow a nauseous dose of medicine, Molly went instantly\ndownstairs.\n\nRoger was talking earnestly to Mrs. Gibson in the bow of the window\nwhen Molly entered; Cynthia was standing near, listening, but taking\nno part in the conversation. Her eyes were downcast, and she did not\nlook up as Molly drew shyly near.\n\nRoger was saying,--\"I could never forgive myself if I had accepted a\npledge from her. She shall be free until my return; but the hope, the\nwords, her sweet goodness, have made me happy beyond description. Oh,\nMolly!\" suddenly becoming aware of her presence, and turning to her,\nand taking her hand in both of his,--\"I think you have long guessed\nmy secret, have you not? I once thought of speaking to you before I\nleft, and confiding it all to you. But the temptation has been too\ngreat,--I have told Cynthia how fondly I love her, as far as words\ncan tell; and she says--\" then he looked at Cynthia with passionate\ndelight, and seemed to forget in that gaze that he had left his\nsentence to Molly half finished.\n\nCynthia did not seem inclined to repeat her saying, whatever it was,\nbut her mother spoke for her.\n\n\"My dear sweet girl values your love as it ought to be valued, I am\nsure. And I believe,\" looking at Cynthia and Roger with intelligent\narchness, \"I could tell tales as to the cause of her indisposition in\nthe spring.\"\n\n\"Mother,\" said Cynthia suddenly, \"you know it was no such thing. Pray\ndon't invent stories about me. I have engaged myself to Mr. Roger\nHamley, and that is enough.\"\n\n\"Enough! more than enough!\" said Roger. \"I will not accept your\npledge. I am bound, but you are free. I like to feel bound, it makes\nme happy and at peace, but with all the chances involved in the next\ntwo years, you must not shackle yourself by promises.\"\n\nCynthia did not speak at once; she was evidently revolving something\nin her own mind. Mrs. Gibson took up the word.\n\n\"You are very generous, I am sure. Perhaps it will be better not to\nmention it.\"\n\n\"I would much rather have it kept a secret,\" said Cynthia,\ninterrupting.\n\n\"Certainly, my dear love. That was just what I was going to say.\nI once knew a young lady who heard of the death of a young man in\nAmerica, whom she had known pretty well; and she immediately said she\nhad been engaged to him, and even went so far as to put on weeds; and\nit was a false report, for he came back well and merry, and declared\nto everybody he had never so much as thought about her. So it was\nvery awkward for her. These things had much better be kept secret\nuntil the proper time has come for divulging them.\"\n\nEven then and there Cynthia could not resist the temptation of\nsaying,--\"Mamma, I will promise you I won't put on weeds, whatever\nreports come of Mr. Roger Hamley.\"\n\n\"Roger, please!\" he put in, in a tender whisper.\n\n\"And you will all be witnesses that he has professed to think of me,\nif he is tempted afterwards to deny the fact. But at the same time I\nwish it to be kept a secret until his return--and I am sure you will\nall be so kind as to attend to my wish. Please, _Roger!_ Please,\nMolly! Mamma, I must especially beg it of you!\"\n\nRoger would have granted anything when she asked him by that name,\nand in that tone. He took her hand in silent pledge of his reply.\nMolly felt as if she could never bring herself to name the affair\nas a common piece of news. So it was only Mrs. Gibson that answered\naloud,--\n\n\"My dear child! why 'especially' to poor me? You know I'm the most\ntrustworthy person alive!\"\n\nThe little pendule on the chimney-piece struck the half-hour.\n\n\"I must go!\" said Roger, in dismay. \"I had no idea it was so late. I\nshall write from Paris. The coach will be at the George by this time,\nand will only stay five minutes. Dearest Cynthia--\" he took her hand,\nand then, as if the temptation was irresistible, he drew her to him\nand kissed her. \"Only remember you are free!\" said he, as he released\nher and passed on to Mrs. Gibson.\n\n\"If I had considered myself free,\" said Cynthia, blushing a little,\nbut ready with her repartee to the last,--\"if I had thought myself\nfree, do you think I would have allowed that?\"\n\nThen Molly's turn came, and the old brotherly tenderness came back\ninto his look, his voice, his bearing.\n\n\"Molly! you won't forget me, I know; I shall never forget you, nor\nyour goodness to--her.\" His voice began to quiver, and it was best\nto be gone. Mrs. Gibson was pouring out, unheard and unheeded, words\nof farewell; Cynthia was re-arranging some flowers in a vase on the\ntable, the defects in which had caught her artistic eye, without\nthe consciousness penetrating to her mind. Molly stood, numb to the\nheart; neither glad nor sorry, nor anything but stunned. She felt the\nslackened touch of the warm grasping hand; she looked up--for till\nnow her eyes had been downcast, as if there were heavy weights to\ntheir lids--and the place was empty where he had been; his quick\nstep was heard on the stair, the front door was opened and shut;\nand then as quick as lightning Molly ran up to the front attic--the\nlumber-room, whose window commanded the street down which he\nmust pass. The window-clasp was unused and stiff, Molly tugged at\nit--unless it was open, and her head put out, that last chance would\nbe gone.\n\n\"I must see him again; I must! I must!\" she wailed out, as she was\npulling. There he was, running hard to catch the London coach; his\nluggage had been left at the George before he came up to wish the\nGibsons good-by. In all his hurry, Molly saw him turn round and shade\nhis eyes from the level rays of the westering sun, and rake the house\nwith his glances--in hopes, she knew, of catching one more glimpse of\nCynthia. But apparently he saw no one, not even Molly at the attic\ncasement; for she had drawn back when he had turned, and kept herself\nin shadow; for she had no right to put herself forward as the one to\nwatch and yearn for farewell signs. None came--another moment--he was\nout of sight for years!\n\n\n[Illustration: THE LAST TURNING.]\n\n\nShe shut the window softly, and shivered all over. She left the attic\nand went to her own room; but she did not begin to take off her\nout-of-door things till she heard Cynthia's foot on the stairs.\nThen she hastily went to the toilet-table, and began to untie her\nbonnet-strings; but they were in a knot, and took time to undo.\nCynthia's step stopped at Molly's door; she opened it a little and\nsaid,--\"May I come in, Molly?\"\n\n\"Certainly,\" said Molly, longing to be able to say \"No\" all the time.\nMolly did not turn to meet her, so Cynthia came up behind her, and\nputting her two hands round Molly's waist, peeped over her shoulder,\nputting out her lips to be kissed. Molly could not resist the\naction--the mute entreaty for a caress. But, in the moment before,\nshe had caught the reflection of the two faces in the glass; her\nown, red-eyed, pale, with lips dyed with blackberry juice, her curls\ntangled, her bonnet pulled awry, her gown torn--and contrasted it\nwith Cynthia's brightness and bloom, and the trim elegance of her\ndress. \"Oh! it is no wonder!\" thought poor Molly, as she turned\nround, and put her arms round Cynthia, and laid her head for an\ninstant on her shoulder--the weary, aching head that sought a loving\npillow in that supreme moment! The next she had raised herself, and\ntaken Cynthia's two hands, and was holding her off a little, the\nbetter to read her face.\n\n\n[Illustration: \"OH! IT IS NO WONDER!\"]\n\n\n\"Cynthia! you do love him dearly, don't you?\"\n\nCynthia winced a little aside from the penetrating steadiness of\nthose eyes.\n\n\"You speak with all the solemnity of an adjuration, Molly!\" said she,\nlaughing a little at first to cover her nervousness, and then looking\nup at Molly. \"Don't you think I've given a proof of it? But you know\nI've often told you I've not the gift of loving; I said pretty much\nthe same thing to him. I can respect, and I fancy I can admire, and\nI can like, but I never feel carried off my feet by love for any one,\nnot even for you, little Molly, and I'm sure I love you more than--\"\n\n\"No, don't!\" said Molly, putting her hand before Cynthia's mouth, in\nalmost a passion of impatience. \"Don't, don't--I won't hear you--I\nought not to have asked you--it makes you tell lies!\"\n\n\"Why, Molly!\" said Cynthia, in her turn seeking to read Molly's\nface, \"what's the matter with you? One might think you cared for him\nyourself.\"\n\n\"I?\" said Molly, all the blood rushing to her heart suddenly; then it\nreturned, and she had courage to speak, and she spoke the truth as\nshe believed it, though not the real actual truth.\n\n\"I do care for him; I think you have won the love of a prince amongst\nmen. Why, I am proud to remember that he has been to me as a brother,\nand I love him as a sister, and I love you doubly because he has\nhonoured you with his love.\"\n\n\"Come, that's not complimentary!\" said Cynthia, laughing, but\nnot ill-pleased to hear her lover's praises, and even willing to\ndepreciate him a little in order to hear more.\n\n\"He's well enough, I daresay, and a great deal too learned and clever\nfor a stupid girl like me; but even you must acknowledge he's very\nplain and awkward; and I like pretty things and pretty people.\"\n\n\"Cynthia, I won't talk to you about him. You know you don't mean what\nyou are saying, and you only say it out of contradiction, because I\npraise him. He shan't be run down by you, even in joke.\"\n\n\"Well, then, we won't talk of him at all. I was so surprised when\nhe began to speak--so--\" and Cynthia looked very lovely, blushing\nand dimpling up as she remembered his words and looks. Suddenly she\nrecalled herself to the present time, and her eye caught on the leaf\nfull of blackberries--the broad, green leaf, so fresh and crisp when\nMolly had gathered it an hour or so ago, but now soft and flabby, and\ndying. Molly saw it, too, and felt a strange kind of sympathetic pity\nfor the poor inanimate leaf.\n\n\"Oh! what blackberries! you've gathered them for me, I know!\" said\nCynthia, sitting down and beginning to feed herself daintily,\ntouching them lightly with the ends of her taper fingers, and\ndropping each ripe berry into her open mouth. When she had eaten\nabout half she stopped suddenly short.\n\n\"How I should like to have gone as far as Paris with him!\" she\nexclaimed. \"I suppose it wouldn't have been proper; but how pleasant\nit would have been! I remember at Boulogne\" (another blackberry),\n\"how I used to envy the English who were going to Paris; it seemed\nto me then as if nobody stopped at Boulogne, but dull, stupid\nschool-girls.\"\n\n\"When will he be there?\" asked Molly.\n\n\"On Wednesday, he said. I'm to write to him there; at any rate he's\ngoing to write to me.\"\n\nMolly went about the adjustment of her dress in a quiet,\nbusiness-like manner, not speaking much; Cynthia, although sitting\nstill, seemed very restless. Oh! how much Molly wished that she would\ngo.\n\n\"Perhaps, after all,\" said Cynthia, after a pause of apparent\nmeditation, \"we shall never be married.\"\n\n\"Why do you say that?\" said Molly, almost bitterly. \"You have nothing\nto make you think so. I wonder how you can bear to think you won't,\neven for a moment.\"\n\n\"Oh!\" said Cynthia; \"you mustn't go and take me _au grand sérieux_. I\ndaresay I don't mean what I say, but you see everything seems a dream\nat present. Still, I think the chances are equal--the chances for and\nagainst our marriage, I mean. Two years! it's a long time! he may\nchange his mind, or I may; or some one else may turn up, and I may\nget engaged to him: what should you think of that, Molly? I'm putting\nsuch a gloomy thing as death quite on one side, you see; yet in two\nyears how much may happen!\"\n\n\"Don't talk so, Cynthia, please don't,\" said Molly, piteously. \"One\nwould think you didn't care for him, and he cares so much for you!\"\n\n\"Why, did I say I didn't care for him? I was only calculating\nchances. I'm sure I hope nothing will happen to prevent the marriage.\nOnly, you know it may, and I thought I was taking a step in wisdom,\nin looking forward to all the evils that might befall. I'm sure all\nthe wise people I've ever known thought it a virtue to have gloomy\nprognostics of the future. But you're not in a mood for wisdom or\nvirtue, I see; so I'll go and get ready for dinner, and leave you to\nyour vanities of dress.\"\n\nShe took Molly's face in both her hands, before Molly was aware\nof her intention, and kissed it playfully. Then she left Molly to\nherself.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXXV.\n\nTHE MOTHER'S MANOEUVRE.\n\n\nMr. Gibson was not at home at dinner--detained by some patient, most\nprobably. This was not an unusual occurrence; but it _was_ rather an\nunusual occurrence for Mrs. Gibson to go down into the dining-room,\nand sit with him as he ate his deferred meal when he came in an hour\nor two later. In general, she preferred her easy-chair, or her corner\nof the sofa, upstairs in the drawing-room, though it was very rarely\nthat she would allow Molly to avail herself of her stepmother's\nneglected privilege. Molly would fain have gone down and kept her\nfather company every night that he had these solitary meals; but for\npeace and quietness she gave up her own wishes on the matter.\n\nMrs. Gibson took a seat by the fire in the dining-room, and patiently\nwaited for the auspicious moment when Mr. Gibson, having satisfied\nhis healthy appetite, turned from the table, and took his place by\nher side. She got up, and with unaccustomed attention moved the wine\nand glasses so that he could help himself without moving from his\nchair.\n\n\"There, now! are you comfortable? for I have a great piece of news to\ntell you!\" said she, when all was arranged.\n\n\"I thought there was something on hand,\" said he, smiling. \"Now for\nit!\"\n\n\"Roger Hamley has been here this afternoon to bid us good-by.\"\n\n\"Good-by! Is he gone? I didn't know he was going so soon!\" exclaimed\nMr. Gibson.\n\n\"Yes: never mind, that's not it.\"\n\n\"But tell me; has he left this neighbourhood? I wanted to have seen\nhim.\"\n\n\"Yes, yes. He left love and regret, and all that sort of thing\nfor you. Now let me get on with my story: he found Cynthia alone,\nproposed to her, and was accepted.\"\n\n\"Cynthia? Roger proposed to her, and she accepted him?\" repeated Mr.\nGibson, slowly.\n\n\"Yes, to be sure. Why not? you speak as if it was something so very\nsurprising.\"\n\n\"Did I? But I am surprised. He's a very fine young fellow, and I\nwish Cynthia joy; but do you like it? It will have to be a very long\nengagement.\"\n\n\"Perhaps,\" said she, in a knowing manner.\n\n\"At any rate he will be away for two years,\" said Mr. Gibson.\n\n\"A great deal may happen in two years,\" she replied.\n\n\"Yes! he will have to run many risks, and go into many dangers, and\nwill come back no nearer to the power of maintaining a wife than when\nhe went out.\"\n\n\"I don't know that,\" she replied, still in the arch manner of one\npossessing superior knowledge. \"A little bird did tell me that\nOsborne's life is not so very secure; and then--what will Roger be?\nHeir to the estate.\"\n\n\"Who told you that about Osborne?\" said he, facing round upon her,\nand frightening her with his sudden sternness of voice and manner.\nIt seemed as if absolute fire came out of his long dark sombre eyes.\n\"_Who_ told you, I say?\"\n\nShe made a faint rally back into her former playfulness.\n\n\"Why? can you deny it? Is it not the truth?\"\n\n\"I ask you again, Hyacinth, who told you that Osborne Hamley's life\nis in more danger than mine--or yours?\"\n\n\"Oh, don't speak in that frightening way. My life is not in danger,\nI'm sure; nor yours either, love, I hope.\"\n\nHe gave an impatient movement, and knocked a wine-glass off the\ntable. For the moment she felt grateful for the diversion, and\nbusied herself in picking up the fragments: \"bits of glass were so\ndangerous,\" she said. But she was startled by a voice of command,\nsuch as she had never yet heard from her husband.\n\n\"Never mind the glass. I ask you again, Hyacinth, who told you\nanything about Osborne Hamley's state of health?\"\n\n\"I am sure I wish no harm to him, and I daresay he is in very good\nhealth, as you say,\" whispered she, at last.\n\n\"Who told--?\" began he again, sterner than ever.\n\n\"Well, if you will know, and will make such a fuss about it,\" said\nshe, driven to extremity, \"it was you yourself--you or Dr. Nicholls,\nI am sure I forget which.\"\n\n\"I never spoke to you on the subject, and I don't believe Nicholls\ndid. You'd better tell me at once what you're alluding to, for I'm\nresolved I'll have it out before we leave this room.\"\n\n\"I wish I'd never married again,\" she said, now fairly crying, and\nlooking round the room, as if in vain search for a mouse-hole in\nwhich to hide herself. Then, as if the sight of the door into the\nstore-room gave her courage, she turned and faced him.\n\n\"You should not talk your medical secrets so loud then, if you don't\nwant people to hear them. I had to go into the store-room that day\nDr. Nicholls was here; cook wanted a jar of preserve, and stopped me\njust as I was going out--I am sure it was for no pleasure of mine,\nfor I was sadly afraid of stickying my gloves--it was all that you\nmight have a comfortable dinner.\"\n\nShe looked as if she was going to cry again, but he gravely motioned\nher to go on, merely saying,--\n\n\"Well! you overheard our conversation, I suppose?\"\n\n\"Not much,\" she answered eagerly, almost relieved by being thus\nhelped out in her forced confession. \"Only a sentence or two.\"\n\n\"What were they?\" he asked.\n\n\"Why, you had just been saying something, and Dr. Nicholls said, 'If\nhe has got aneurism of the aorta his days are numbered.'\"\n\n\"Well. Anything more?\"\n\n\"Yes; you said, 'I hope to God I may be mistaken; but there is a\npretty clear indication of symptoms, in my opinion.'\"\n\n\"How do you know we were speaking of Osborne Hamley?\" he asked;\nperhaps in hopes of throwing her off the scent. But as soon as she\nperceived that he was descending to her level of subterfuge, she took\ncourage, and said in quite a different tone to the cowed one which\nshe had been using:\n\n\"Oh! I know. I heard his name mentioned by you both before I began to\nlisten.\"\n\n\"Then you own you did listen?\"\n\n\"Yes,\" said she, hesitating a little now.\n\n\"And pray how do you come to remember so exactly the name of the\ndisease spoken of?\"\n\n\"Because I went--now don't be angry, I really can't see any harm in\nwhat I did--\"\n\n\"Then, don't deprecate anger. You went--\"\n\n\"Into the surgery, and looked it out. Why might not I?\"\n\nMr. Gibson did not answer--did not look at her. His face was very\npale, and both forehead and lips were contracted. At length he roused\nhimself, sighed, and said,--\n\n\"Well! I suppose as one brews one must bake.\"\n\n\"I don't understand what you mean,\" pouted she.\n\n\"Perhaps not,\" he replied. \"I suppose that it was what you heard on\nthat occasion that made you change your behaviour to Roger Hamley?\nI've noticed how much more civil you were to him of late.\"\n\n\"If you mean that I have ever got to like him as much as Osborne,\nyou are very much mistaken; no, not even though he has offered to\nCynthia, and is to be my son-in-law.\"\n\n\"Let me know the whole affair. You overheard,--I will own that it was\nOsborne about whom we were speaking, though I shall have something to\nsay about that presently--and then, if I understand you rightly, you\nchanged your behaviour to Roger, and made him more welcome to this\nhouse than you had ever done before, regarding him as proximate heir\nto the Hamley estates?\"\n\n\"I don't know what you mean by 'proximate.'\"\n\n\"Go into the surgery, and look into the dictionary, then,\" said he,\nlosing his temper for the first time during the conversation.\n\n\"I knew,\" said she through sobs and tears, \"that Roger had taken\na fancy to Cynthia; any one might see that; and as long as Roger\nwas only a younger son, with no profession, and nothing but his\nfellowship, I thought it right to discourage him, as any one would\nwho had a grain of common sense in them; for a clumsier, more common,\nawkward, stupid fellow I never saw--to be called 'county,' I mean.\"\n\n\"Take care; you'll have to eat your words presently when you come to\nfancy he'll have Hamley some day.\"\n\n\"No, I shan't,\" said she, not perceiving his exact drift. \"You are\nvexed now because it is not Molly he's in love with; and I call it\nvery unjust and unfair to my poor fatherless girl. I am sure I have\nalways tried to further Molly's interests as if she was my own\ndaughter.\"\n\nMr. Gibson was too indifferent to this accusation to take any notice\nof it. He returned to what was of far more importance to him.\n\n\"The point I want to be clear about is this. Did you or did you not\nalter your behaviour to Roger in consequence of what you overheard of\nmy professional conversation with Dr. Nicholls? Have you not favoured\nhis suit to Cynthia since then, on the understanding gathered from\nthat conversation that he stood a good chance of inheriting Hamley?\"\n\n\"I suppose I did,\" said she, sulkily. \"And if I did, I can't\nsee any harm in it, that I should be questioned as if I were\nin a witness-box. He was in love with Cynthia long before that\nconversation, and she liked him so much. It was not for me to cross\nthe path of true love. I don't see how you would have a mother show\nher love for her child if she may not turn accidental circumstances\nto her advantage. Perhaps Cynthia might have died if she had been\ncrossed in love; her poor father was consumptive.\"\n\n\"Don't you know that all professional conversations are confidential?\nThat it would be the most dishonourable thing possible for me to\nbetray secrets which I learn in the exercise of my profession?\"\n\n\"Yes, of course, you.\"\n\n\"Well! and are not you and I one in all these respects? You cannot do\na dishonourable act without my being inculpated in the disgrace. If\nit would be a deep disgrace for me to betray a professional secret,\nwhat would it be for me to trade on that knowledge?\"\n\nHe was trying hard to be patient; but the offence was of that class\nwhich galled him insupportably.\n\n\"I don't know what you mean by trading. Trading in a daughter's\naffections is the last thing I should do; and I should have thought\nyou would be rather glad than otherwise to get Cynthia well married,\nand off your hands.\"\n\nMr. Gibson got up, and walked about the room, his hands in his\npockets. Once or twice he began to speak, but he stopped impatiently\nshort without going on.\n\n\"I don't know what to say to you,\" he said at length. \"You either\ncan't or won't see what I mean. I'm glad enough to have Cynthia here.\nI have given her a true welcome, and I sincerely hope she will find\nthis house as much a home as my own daughter does. But for the future\nI must look out of my doors, and double-lock the approaches if I am\nso foolish as to-- However, that's past and gone; and it remains with\nme to prevent its recurrence as far as I can for the future. Now let\nus hear the present state of affairs.\"\n\n\"I don't think I ought to tell you anything about it. It is a secret,\njust as much as your mysteries are.\"\n\n\"Very well; you have told me enough for me to act upon, which I\nmost certainly shall do. It was only the other day I promised the\nSquire to let him know if I suspected anything--any love affair, or\nentanglement, much less an engagement, between either of his sons and\nour girls.\"\n\n\"But this is not an engagement; he would not let it be so; if you\nwould only listen to me, I could tell you all. Only I do hope you\nwon't go and tell the Squire and everybody. Cynthia did so beg that\nit might not be known. It is only my unfortunate frankness that has\nled me into this scrape. I never could keep a secret from those whom\nI love.\"\n\n\"I must tell the Squire. I shall not mention it to any one else. And\ndo you quite think it was consistent with your general frankness to\nhave overheard what you did, and never to have mentioned it to me?\nI could have told you then that Dr. Nicholls' opinion was decidedly\nopposed to mine, and that he believed that the disturbance about\nwhich I consulted him on Osborne's behalf was merely temporary. Dr.\nNicholls would tell you that Osborne is as likely as any man to live\nand marry and beget children.\"\n\nIf there was any skill used by Mr. Gibson so to word this speech\nas to conceal his own opinion, Mrs. Gibson was not sharp enough to\nfind it out. She was dismayed, and Mr. Gibson enjoyed her dismay; it\nrestored him to something like his usual frame of mind.\n\n\"Let us review this misfortune, for I see you consider it as such,\"\nsaid he.\n\n\"No, not quite a misfortune,\" said she. \"But, certainly, if I had\nknown Dr. Nicholls' opinion--\" she hesitated.\n\n\"You see the advantage of always consulting me,\" he continued\ngravely. \"Here is Cynthia engaged--\"\n\n\"Not engaged, I told you before. He would not allow it to be\nconsidered an engagement on her part.\"\n\n\"Well, entangled in a love-affair with a lad of three-and-twenty,\nwith nothing beyond his fellowship and a chance of inheriting an\nencumbered estate; no profession even, abroad for two years, and\nI must go and tell his father all about it to-morrow.\"\n\n\"Oh dear! Pray say that, if he dislikes it, he has only to express\nhis opinion.\"\n\n\"I don't think you can act without Cynthia in the affair. And if I am\nnot mistaken, Cynthia will have a pretty stout will of her own on the\nsubject.\"\n\n\"Oh, I don't think she cares for him very much; she is not one to be\nalways falling in love, and she does not take things very deeply to\nheart. But, of course, one would not do anything abruptly; two years'\nabsence gives one plenty of time to turn oneself in.\"\n\n\"But a little while ago we were threatened with consumption and an\nearly death if Cynthia's affections were thwarted.\"\n\n\"Oh, you dear creature, how you remember all my silly words! It might\nbe, you know. Poor dear Mr. Kirkpatrick was consumptive, and Cynthia\nmay have inherited it, and a great sorrow might bring out the latent\nseeds. At times I am so fearful. But I daresay it is not probable,\nfor I don't think she takes things very deeply to heart.\"\n\n\"Then I'm quite at liberty to give up the affair, acting as Cynthia's\nproxy, if the Squire disapproves of it?\"\n\nPoor Mrs. Gibson was in a strait at this question.\n\n\"No!\" she said at last. \"We cannot give it up. I am sure Cynthia\nwould not; especially if she thought others were acting for her. And\nhe really is very much in love. I wish he were in Osborne's place.\"\n\n\"Shall I tell you what I should do?\" said Mr. Gibson, in real\nearnest. \"However it may have been brought about, here are two young\npeople in love with each other. One is as fine a young fellow as ever\nbreathed; the other a very pretty, lively, agreeable girl. The father\nof the young man must be told, and it is most likely he will bluster\nand oppose; for there is no doubt it is an imprudent affair as far as\nmoney goes. But let them be steady and patient, and a better lot need\nawait no young woman. I only wish it were Molly's good fortune to\nmeet with such another.\"\n\n\"I will try for her; I will indeed,\" said Mrs. Gibson, relieved by\nhis change of tone.\n\n\"No, don't. That's one thing I forbid. I'll have no 'trying' for\nMolly.\"\n\n\"Well, don't be angry, dear! Do you know I was quite afraid you were\ngoing to lose your temper at one time.\"\n\n\"It would have been of no use!\" said he, gloomily, getting up as if\nto close the sitting. His wife was only too glad to make her escape.\nThe conjugal interview had not been satisfactory to either. Mr.\nGibson had been compelled to face and acknowledge the fact, that the\nwife he had chosen had a very different standard of conduct from\nthat which he had upheld all his life, and had hoped to have seen\ninculcated in his daughter. He was more irritated than he chose to\nshow; for there was so much of self-reproach in his irritation that\nhe kept it to himself, brooded over it, and allowed a feeling of\nsuspicious dissatisfaction with his wife to grow up in his mind,\nwhich extended itself by-and-by to the innocent Cynthia, and\ncaused his manner to both mother and daughter to assume a certain\ncurt severity, which took the latter at any rate with extreme\nsurprise. But on the present occasion he followed his wife up to the\ndrawing-room, and gravely congratulated the astonished Cynthia.\n\n\"Has mamma told you?\" said she, shooting an indignant glance at her\nmother. \"It is hardly an engagement; and we all pledged ourselves to\nkeep it a secret, mamma among the rest!\"\n\n\"But, my dearest Cynthia, you could not expect--you could not have\nwished me to keep a secret from my husband?\" pleaded Mrs. Gibson.\n\n\"No, perhaps not. At any rate, sir,\" said Cynthia, turning towards\nhim with graceful frankness, \"I am glad you should know it. You have\nalways been a most kind friend to me, and I daresay I should have\ntold you myself, but I did not want it named; if you please, it must\nstill be a secret. In fact, it is hardly an engagement--he\" (she\nblushed and sparkled a little at the euphuism, which implied that\nthere was but one \"he\" present in her thoughts at the moment) \"would\nnot allow me to bind myself by any promise until his return!\"\n\nMr. Gibson looked gravely at her, irresponsive to her winning looks,\nwhich at the moment reminded him too forcibly of her mother's ways.\nThen he took her hand, and said, seriously enough,--\"I hope you are\nworthy of him, Cynthia, for you have indeed drawn a prize. I have\nnever known a truer or warmer heart than Roger's; and I have known\nhim boy and man.\"\n\nMolly felt as if she could have thanked her father aloud for this\ntestimony to the value of him who was gone away. But Cynthia pouted a\nlittle before she smiled up in his face.\n\n\"You are not complimentary, are you, Mr. Gibson?\" said she. \"He\nthinks me worthy, I suppose; and if you have so high an opinion\nof him, you ought to respect his judgment of me.\" If she hoped to\nprovoke a compliment she was disappointed, for Mr. Gibson let go her\nhand in an absent manner, and sate down in an easy chair by the fire,\ngazing at the wood embers as if hoping to read the future in them.\nMolly saw Cynthia's eyes fill with tears, and followed her to the\nother end of the room, where she had gone to seek some working\nmaterials.\n\n\"Dear Cynthia,\" was all she said; but she pressed her hand while\ntrying to assist in the search.\n\n\"Oh, Molly, I am so fond of your father; what makes him speak so to\nme to-night?\"\n\n\"I don't know,\" said Molly; \"perhaps he's tired.\"\n\nThey were recalled from further conversation by Mr. Gibson. He had\nroused himself from his reverie, and was now addressing Cynthia.\n\n\"I hope you will not consider it a breach of confidence, Cynthia, but\nI must tell the Squire of--of what has taken place to-day between\nyou and his son. I have bound myself by a promise to him. He was\nafraid--it's as well to tell you the truth--he was afraid\" (an\nemphasis on this last word) \"of something of this kind between his\nsons and one of you two girls. It was only the other day I assured\nhim there was nothing of the kind on foot; and I told him then I\nwould inform him at once if I saw any symptoms.\"\n\nCynthia looked extremely annoyed.\n\n\"It was the one thing I stipulated for--secrecy.\"\n\n\"But why?\" said Mr. Gibson. \"I can understand your not wishing to\nhave it made public under the present circumstances. But the nearest\nfriends on both sides! Surely you can have no objection to that?\"\n\n\"Yes, I have,\" said Cynthia; \"I would not have had any one know if I\ncould have helped it.\"\n\n\"I'm almost certain Roger will tell his father.\"\n\n\"No, he won't,\" said Cynthia; \"I made him promise, and I think he is\none to respect a promise\"--with a glance at her mother, who, feeling\nherself in disgrace with both husband and child, was keeping a\njudicious silence.\n\n\"Well, at any rate, the story would come with so much better a grace\nfrom him that I shall give him the chance; I won't go over to the\nHall till the end of the week; he may have written and told his\nfather before then.\"\n\nCynthia held her tongue for a little while. Then she said, with\ntearful pettishness,--\n\n\"A man's promise is to override a woman's wish, then, is it?\"\n\n\"I don't see any reason why it should not.\"\n\n\"Will you trust in my reasons when I tell you it will cause me\na great deal of distress if it gets known?\" She said this in so\npleading a voice, that if Mr. Gibson had not been thoroughly\ndispleased and annoyed by his previous conversation with her mother,\nhe must have yielded to her. As it was, he said, coldly,--\"Telling\nRoger's father is not making it public. I don't like this exaggerated\ndesire for such secrecy, Cynthia. It seems to me as if something more\nthan is apparent was concealed behind it.\"\n\n\"Come, Molly,\" said Cynthia, suddenly; \"let us sing that duet I've\nbeen teaching you; it's better than talking as we are doing.\"\n\nIt was a little lively French duet. Molly sang it carelessly, with\nheaviness at her heart; but Cynthia sang it with spirit and apparent\nmerriment; only she broke down in hysterics at last, and flew\nupstairs to her own room. Molly, heeding nothing else--neither her\nfather nor Mrs. Gibson's words--followed her, and found the door of\nher bedroom locked, and for all reply to her entreaties to be allowed\nto come in, she heard Cynthia sobbing and crying.\n\nIt was more than a week after the incidents just recorded before\nMr. Gibson found himself at liberty to call on the Squire; and he\nheartily hoped that long before then, Roger's letter might have\narrived from Paris, telling his father the whole story. But he saw at\nthe first glance that the Squire had heard nothing unusual to disturb\nhis equanimity. He was looking better than he had done for months\npast; the light of hope was in his eyes, his face seemed of a healthy\nruddy colour, gained partly by his resumption of outdoor employment\nin the superintendence of the works, and partly because the happiness\nhe had lately had through Roger's means, caused his blood to flow\nwith regular vigour. He had felt Roger's going away, it is true; but\nwhenever the sorrow of parting with him pressed too heavily upon him,\nhe filled his pipe, and smoked it out over a long, slow, deliberate,\nre-perusal of Lord Hollingford's letter, every word of which he knew\nby heart; but expressions in which he made a pretence to himself\nof doubting, that he might have an excuse for looking at his son's\npraises once again. The first greetings over, Mr. Gibson plunged into\nhis subject.\n\n\"Any news from Roger yet?\"\n\n\"Oh, yes; here's his letter,\" said the Squire, producing his black\nleather case, in which Roger's missive had been placed along with the\nother very heterogeneous contents.\n\nMr. Gibson read it, hardly seeing the words after he had by one rapid\nglance assured himself that there was no mention of Cynthia in it.\n\n\"Hum! I see he doesn't name one very important event that has\nbefallen him since he left you,\" said Mr. Gibson, seizing on the\nfirst words that came. \"I believe I'm committing a breach of\nconfidence on one side; but I'm going to keep the promise I made\nthe last time I was here. I find there is something--something\nof the kind you apprehended--you understand--between him and my\nstep-daughter, Cynthia Kirkpatrick. He called at our house to wish\nus good-by, while waiting for the London coach, found her alone, and\nspoke to her. They don't call it an engagement, but of course it is\none.\"\n\n\"Give me back the letter,\" said the Squire, in a constrained kind of\nvoice. Then he read it again, as if he had not previously mastered\nits contents, and as if there might be some sentence or sentences he\nhad overlooked.\n\n\"No!\" he said at last, with a sigh. \"He tells me nothing about it.\nLads may play at confidences with their fathers, but they keep a deal\nback.\" The Squire appeared more disappointed at not having heard of\nthis straight from Roger than displeased at the fact itself, Mr.\nGibson thought. But he let him take his time.\n\n\"He's not the eldest son,\" continued the Squire, talking as it\nwere to himself. \"But it's not the match I should have planned\nfor him. How came you, sir,\" said he, firing round on Mr. Gibson,\nsuddenly--\"to say when you were last here, that there was nothing\nbetween my sons and either of your girls? Why, this must have been\ngoing on all the time!\"\n\n\"I'm afraid it was. But I was as ignorant about it as the babe\nunborn. I only heard of it on the evening of the day of Roger's\ndeparture.\"\n\n\"And that's a week ago, sir. What's kept you quiet ever since?\"\n\n\"I thought that Roger would tell you himself.\"\n\n\"That shows you've no sons. More than half their life is unknown to\ntheir fathers. Why, Osborne there, we live together--that's to say,\nwe have our meals together, and we sleep under the same roof--and\nyet--Well! well! life is as God has made it. You say it's not an\nengagement yet? But I wonder what I'm doing? Hoping for my lad's\ndisappointment in the folly he's set his heart on--and just when he's\nbeen helping me. Is it a folly, or is it not? I ask you, Gibson, for\nyou must know this girl. She hasn't much money, I suppose?\"\n\n\"About thirty pounds a year, at my pleasure during her mother's\nlife.\"\n\n\"Whew! It's well he's not Osborne. They'll have to wait. What family\nis she of? None of 'em in trade, I reckon, from her being so poor?\"\n\n\"I believe her father was grandson of a certain Sir Gerald\nKirkpatrick. Her mother tells me it is an old baronetcy. I know\nnothing of such things.\"\n\n\"That's something. I do know something of such things, as you are\npleased to call them. I like honourable blood.\"\n\nMr. Gibson could not help saying, \"But I'm afraid that only\none-eighth of Cynthia's blood is honourable; I know nothing further\nof her relations excepting the fact that her father was a curate.\"\n\n\"Professional. That's a step above trade at any rate. How old is\nshe?\"\n\n\"Eighteen or nineteen.\"\n\n\"Pretty?\"\n\n\"Yes, I think so; most people do; but it's all a matter of taste.\nCome, Squire, judge for yourself. Ride over and take lunch with us\nany day you like. I may not be in; but her mother will be there, and\nyou can make acquaintance with your son's future wife.\"\n\nThis was going too fast, however; presuming too much on the quietness\nwith which the Squire had been questioning him. Mr. Hamley drew back\nwithin his shell, and spoke in a surly manner as he replied,--\n\n\"Roger's 'future wife!' He'll be wiser by the time he comes home. Two\nyears among the black folk will have put more sense in him.\"\n\n\"Possible, but not probable, I should say,\" replied Mr. Gibson.\n\"Black folk are not remarkable for their powers of reasoning, I\nbelieve, so that they haven't much chance of altering his opinion\nby argument, even if they understood each other's language; and\ncertainly if he shares my taste, their peculiarity of complexion will\nonly make him appreciate white skins the more.\"\n\n\"But you said it was no engagement,\" growled the Squire. \"If he\nthinks better of it, you won't keep him to it, will you?\"\n\n\"If he wishes to break it off, I shall certainly advise Cynthia to\nbe equally willing, that's all I can say. And I see no reason for\ndiscussing the affair further at present. I've told you how matters\nstand because I promised you I would, if I saw anything of this kind\ngoing on. But in the present condition of things, we can neither make\nnor mar; we can only wait.\" And he took up his hat to go. But the\nSquire was discontented.\n\n\"Don't go, Gibson. Don't take offence at what I've said, though I'm\nsure I don't know why you should. What's the girl like in herself?\"\n\n\"I don't know what you mean,\" said Mr. Gibson. But he did; only he\nwas vexed, and did not choose to understand.\n\n\"Is she--well, is she like your Molly?--sweet-tempered and\nsensible--with her gloves always mended, and neat about the feet, and\nready to do anything one asks her just as if doing it was the very\nthing she liked best in the world?\"\n\nMr. Gibson's face relaxed now, and he could understand all the\nSquire's broken sentences and unexplained meanings.\n\n\"She is much prettier than Molly to begin with, and has very winning\nways. She's always well-dressed and smart-looking, and I know she\nhasn't much to spend on her clothes, and always does what she's asked\nto do, and is ready enough with her pretty, lively answers. I don't\nthink I ever saw her out of temper; but then I'm not sure if she\ntakes things keenly to heart, and a certain obtuseness of feeling\ngoes a great way towards a character for good temper, I've observed.\nAltogether I think Cynthia is one in a hundred.\"\n\nThe Squire meditated a little. \"Your Molly is one in a thousand, to\nmy mind. But then, you see, she comes of no family at all,--and I\ndon't suppose she'll have a chance of much money.\" This he said as if\nhe were thinking aloud, and without reference to Mr. Gibson, but it\nnettled the latter, and he replied somewhat impatiently,--\n\n\"Well, but as there's no question of Molly in this business, I don't\nsee the use of bringing her name in, and considering either her\nfamily or her fortune.\"\n\n\"No, to be sure not,\" said the Squire, rousing up. \"My wits had gone\nfar afield, and I'll own I was only thinking what a pity it was she\nwouldn't do for Osborne. But, of course, it's out of the\nquestion--out of the question.\"\n\n\"Yes,\" said Mr. Gibson, \"and if you will excuse me, Squire, I really\nmust go now, and then you'll be at liberty to send your wits afield\nuninterrupted.\" This time he was at the door before the Squire\ncalled him back. He stood impatiently hitting his top-boots with his\nriding-whip, waiting for the interminable last words.\n\n\"I say, Gibson, we're old friends, and you're a fool if you take\nanything I say as an offence. Madam your wife and I didn't hit it off\nthe only time I ever saw her. I won't say she was silly, but I think\none of us was silly, and it wasn't me. However, we'll pass that over.\nSuppose you bring her, and this girl Cynthia (which is as outlandish\na Christian name as I'd wish to hear), and little Molly out here to\nlunch some day,--I'm more at my ease in my own house,--and I'm more\nsure to be civil, too. We need say nothing about Roger,--neither the\nlass nor me,--and you keep your wife's tongue quiet, if you can. It\nwill only be like a compliment to you on your marriage, you know--and\nno one must take it for anything more. Mind, no allusion or mention\nof Roger, and this piece of folly. I shall see the girl then, and\nI can judge her for myself; for, as you say, that will be the best\nplan. Osborne will be here too; and he's always in his element\ntalking to women. I sometimes think he's half a woman himself, he\nspends so much money and is so unreasonable.\"\n\nThe Squire was pleased with his own speech and his own thought, and\nsmiled a little as he finished speaking. Mr. Gibson was both pleased\nand amused; and he smiled too, anxious as he was to be gone. The next\nThursday was soon fixed upon as the day on which Mr. Gibson was to\nbring his womenkind out to the Hall. He thought that, on the whole,\nthe interview had gone off a good deal better than he had expected,\nand felt rather proud of the invitation of which he was the bearer.\nTherefore Mrs. Gibson's manner of receiving it was an annoyance to\nhim. She, meanwhile, had been considering herself as an injured woman\never since the evening of the day of Roger's departure; what business\nhad any one had to speak as if the chances of Osborne's life being\nprolonged were infinitely small, if in fact the matter was uncertain?\nShe liked Osborne extremely, much better than Roger; and would gladly\nhave schemed to secure him for Cynthia, if she had not shrunk from\nthe notion of her daughter's becoming a widow. For if Mrs. Gibson had\never felt anything acutely it was the death of Mr. Kirkpatrick; and,\namiably callous as she was in most things, she recoiled from exposing\nher daughter wilfully to the same kind of suffering which she herself\nhad experienced. But if she had only known Dr. Nicholls' opinion she\nwould never have favoured Roger's suit; never. And then Mr. Gibson\nhimself; why was he so cold and reserved in his treatment of her\nsince that night of explanation? She had done nothing wrong; yet she\nwas treated as though she were in disgrace. And everything about\nthe house was flat just now. She even missed the little excitement\nof Roger's visits, and the watching of his attentions to Cynthia.\nCynthia too was silent enough; and as for Molly, she was absolutely\ndull and out of spirits, a state of mind so annoying to Mrs. Gibson\njust now, that she vented some of her discontent upon the poor girl,\nfrom whom she feared neither complaint nor repartee.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXXVI.\n\nDOMESTIC DIPLOMACY.\n\n\nThe evening of the day on which Mr. Gibson had been to see the\nSquire, the three women were alone in the drawing-room, for Mr.\nGibson had had a long round and was not as yet come in. They had had\nto wait dinner for him; and for some time after his return there was\nnothing done or said but what related to the necessary business of\neating. Mr. Gibson was, perhaps, as well satisfied with his day's\nwork as any of the four; for this visit to the Squire had been\nweighing on his mind ever since he had heard of the state of things\nbetween Roger and Cynthia. He did not like the having to go and\ntell of a love-affair so soon after he had declared his belief\nthat no such thing existed; it was a confession of fallibility\nwhich is distasteful to most men. If the Squire had not been of\nso unsuspicious and simple a nature, he might have drawn his own\nconclusions from the apparent concealment of facts, and felt doubtful\nof Mr. Gibson's perfect honesty in the business; but being what\nhe was, there was no danger of such unjust misapprehension. Still\nMr. Gibson knew the hot hasty temper he had to deal with, and had\nexpected more violence of language than he really encountered; and\nthe last arrangement by which Cynthia, her mother, and Molly--who, as\nMr. Gibson thought to himself, and smiled at the thought, was sure to\nbe a peacemaker, and a sweetener of intercourse--were to go to the\nHall and make acquaintance with the Squire, appeared like a great\nsuccess to Mr. Gibson, for achieving which he took not a little\ncredit to himself. Altogether, he was more cheerful and bland than he\nhad been for many days; and when he came up into the drawing-room for\na few minutes after dinner, before going out again to see his town\npatients, he whistled a little under his breath, as he stood with his\nback to the fire, looking at Cynthia, and thinking that he had not\ndone her justice when describing her to the Squire. Now this soft,\nalmost tuneless whistling, was to Mr. Gibson what purring is to a\ncat. He could no more have done it with an anxious case on his mind,\nor when he was annoyed by human folly, or when he was hungry, than\nhe could have flown through the air. Molly knew all this by instinct,\nand was happy without being aware of it, as soon as she heard the low\nwhistle which was no music after all. But Mrs. Gibson did not like\nthis trick of her husband's; it was not refined she thought, not even\n\"artistic;\" if she could have called it by this fine word it would\nhave compensated her for the want of refinement. To-night it was\nparticularly irritating to her nerves; but since her conversation\nwith Mr. Gibson about Cynthia's engagement, she had not felt herself\nin a sufficiently good position to complain.\n\nMr. Gibson began,--\"Well, Cynthia; I've seen the Squire to-day, and\nmade a clean breast of it.\"\n\nCynthia looked up quickly, questioning with her eyes; Molly stopped\nher netting to listen; no one spoke.\n\n\"You're all to go there on Thursday to lunch; he asked you all, and I\npromised for you.\"\n\nStill no reply; natural, perhaps, but very flat.\n\n\"You'll be glad of that, Cynthia, shan't you?\" asked Mr. Gibson. \"It\nmay be a little formidable, but I hope it will be the beginning of a\ngood understanding between you.\"\n\n\"Thank you!\" said she, with an effort. \"But--but won't it make it\npublic? I do so wish not to have it known, or talked about, not till\nhe comes back or close upon the marriage.\"\n\n\"I don't see how it should make it public,\" said Mr. Gibson. \"My\nwife goes to lunch with my friend, and takes her daughters with\nher--there's nothing in that, is there?\"\n\n\"I am not sure that I shall go,\" put in Mrs. Gibson. She did not\nknow why she said it, for she fully intended to go all the time; but\nhaving said it, she was bound to stick to it for a little while; and,\nwith such a husband as hers, the hard necessity was sure to fall upon\nher of having to find a reason for her saying. Then it came, quick\nand sharp.\n\n\"Why not?\" said he, turning round upon her.\n\n\"Oh, because--because I think he ought to have called on Cynthia\nfirst; I've that sort of sensitiveness I can't bear to think of her\nbeing slighted because she is poor.\"\n\n\"Nonsense!\" said Mr. Gibson. \"I do assure you, no slight whatever\nwas intended. He does not wish to speak about the engagement to any\none--not even to Osborne--that's your wish, too, isn't it, Cynthia?\nNor does he intend to mention it to any of you when you go there;\nbut, naturally enough, he wants to make acquaintance with his future\ndaughter-in-law. If he deviated so much from his usual course as to\ncome calling here--\"\n\n\"I am sure I don't want him to come calling here,\" said Mrs. Gibson,\ninterrupting. \"He was not so very agreeable the only time he did\ncome. But I am that sort of a character that I cannot put up with\nany neglect of persons I love, just because they are not smiled upon\nby fortune.\" She sighed a little ostentatiously as she ended her\nsentence.\n\n\"Well, then, you won't go!\" said Mr. Gibson, provoked, but not\nwishing to have a long discussion, especially as he felt his temper\ngoing.\n\n\"Do you wish it, Cynthia?\" said Mrs. Gibson, anxious for an excuse to\nyield.\n\nBut her daughter was quite aware of this motive for the question, and\nreplied quietly,--\"Not particularly, mamma. I am quite willing to\nrefuse the invitation.\"\n\n\"It is already accepted,\" said Mr. Gibson, almost ready to vow\nthat he would never again meddle in any affair in which women were\nconcerned, which would effectually shut him out from all love-affairs\nfor the future. He had been touched by the Squire's relenting,\npleased with what he had thought would give others pleasure, and this\nwas the end of it!\n\n\"Oh, do go, Cynthia!\" said Molly, pleading with her eyes as well as\nher words. \"Do; I am sure you will like the Squire; and it is such a\npretty place, and he'll be so much disappointed.\"\n\n\"I should not like to give up my dignity,\" said Cynthia, demurely.\n\"And you heard what mamma said!\"\n\nIt was very malicious of her. She fully intended to go, and was\nequally sure that her mother was already planning her dress for the\noccasion in her own mind. Mr. Gibson, however, who, surgeon though\nhe was, had never learnt to anatomize a woman's heart, took it all\nliterally, and was excessively angry both with Cynthia and her\nmother; so angry that he did not dare to trust himself to speak. He\nwent quickly to the door, intending to leave the room; but his wife's\nvoice arrested him; she said,--\n\n\"My dear, do you wish me to go? if you do, I will put my own feelings\non one side.\"\n\n\"Of course I do!\" he said, short and stern, and left the room.\n\n\"Then I'll go!\" said she, in the voice of a victim--those words were\nmeant for him, but he hardly heard them. \"And we'll have a fly from\nthe 'George,' and get a livery-coat for Thomas, which I've long been\nwanting, only dear Mr. Gibson did not like it, but on an occasion\nlike this I'm sure he won't mind; and Thomas shall go on the box,\nand--\"\n\n\"But, mamma, I've my feelings too,\" said Cynthia.\n\n\"Nonsense, child! when all is so nicely arranged too.\"\n\nSo they went on the day appointed. Mr. Gibson was aware of the change\nof plans, and that they were going after all; but he was so much\nannoyed by the manner in which his wife had received an invitation\nthat appeared to him so much kinder than he had expected from his\nprevious knowledge of the Squire, and his wishes on the subject of\nhis sons' marriage, that Mrs. Gibson heard neither interest nor\ncuriosity expressed by her husband as to the visit itself, or the\nreception they met with. Cynthia's indifference as to whether the\ninvitation was accepted or not had displeased Mr. Gibson. He was not\nup to her ways with her mother, and did not understand how much of\nthis said indifference had been assumed in order to countervent Mrs.\nGibson's affectation and false sentiment. But for all his annoyance\non the subject, he was, in fact, very curious to know how the visit\nhad gone off, and took the first opportunity of being alone with\nMolly to question her about the lunch of the day before at Hamley\nHall.\n\n\"And so you went to Hamley yesterday after all?\"\n\n\"Yes; I thought you would have come. The Squire seemed quite to\nexpect you.\"\n\n\"I thought of going there at first; but I changed my mind like\nother people. I don't see why women are to have a monopoly of\nchangeableness. Well! how did it go off? Pleasantly, I suppose, for\nboth your mother and Cynthia were in high spirits last night.\"\n\n\"Yes. The dear old Squire was in his best dress and on his best\nbehaviour, and was so prettily attentive to Cynthia, and she looked\nso lovely, walking about with him, and listening to all his talk\nabout the garden and farm. Mamma was tired, and stopped in-doors, so\nthey got on very well, and saw a great deal of each other.\"\n\n\"And my little girl trotted behind?\"\n\n\"Oh, yes. You know I was almost at home, and besides--of course--\"\nMolly went very red, and left the sentence unfinished.\n\n\"Do you think she's worthy of him?\" asked her father, just as if she\nhad completed her speech.\n\n\"Of Roger, papa? oh, who is? But she is very sweet, and very, very\ncharming.\"\n\n\"Very charming if you will, but somehow I don't quite understand her.\nWhy does she want all this secrecy? Why was she not more eager to go\nand pay her duty to Roger's father? She took it as coolly as if I'd\nasked her to go to church!\"\n\n\"I don't think she did take it coolly; I believe I don't quite\nunderstand her either, but I love her dearly all the same.\"\n\n\"Umph; I like to understand people thoroughly, but I know it's not\nnecessary to women. D'ye really think she's worthy of him?\"\n\n\"Oh, papa--\" said Molly, and then she stopped; she wanted to speak in\nfavour of Cynthia, but somehow she could form no reply that pleased\nher to this repeated inquiry. He did not seem much to care whether he\ngot an answer or not, for he went on with his own thoughts, and the\nresult was that he asked Molly if Cynthia had heard from Roger.\n\n\"Yes; on Wednesday morning.\"\n\n\"Did she show it to you? But of course not. Besides, I read the\nSquire's letter, which told all about him.\"\n\nNow Cynthia, rather to Molly's surprise, had told her that she might\nread the letter if she liked, and Molly had shrunk from availing\nherself of the permission, for Roger's sake. She thought that he\nwould probably have poured out his heart to the one sole person, and\nthat it was not fair to listen, as it were, to his confidences.\n\n\"Was Osborne at home?\" asked Mr. Gibson. \"The Squire said he did\nnot think he would have come back; but the young fellow is so\nuncertain--\"\n\n\"No, he was still from home.\" Then Molly blushed all over crimson,\nfor it suddenly struck her that Osborne was probably with his\nwife--that mysterious wife, of whose existence she was cognizant,\nbut of whom she knew so little, and of whom her father knew nothing.\nMr. Gibson noticed the blush with anxiety. What did it mean? It was\ntroublesome enough to find that one of the Squire's precious sons\nhad fallen in love within the prohibited ranks; and what would not\nhave to be said and done if anything fresh were to come out between\nOsborne and Molly? He spoke out at once to relieve himself of this\nnew apprehension.\n\n\"Molly, I was taken by surprise by this affair between Cynthia and\nRoger Hamley--if there's anything more on the tapis let me know at\nonce, honestly and openly. I know it's an awkward question for you to\nreply to; but I wouldn't ask it unless I had good reasons.\" He took\nher hand as he spoke. She looked up at him with clear, truthful eyes,\nwhich filled with tears as she spoke. She did not know why the tears\ncame; perhaps it was because she was not so strong as formerly.\n\n\"If you mean that you're afraid that Osborne thinks of me as Roger\nthinks of Cynthia, papa, you are quite mistaken. Osborne and I are\nfriends and nothing more, and never can be anything more. That's all\nI can tell you.\"\n\n\"It's quite enough, little one. It's a great relief. I don't want to\nhave my Molly carried off by any young man just yet; I should miss\nher sadly.\" He could not help saying this in the fulness of his heart\njust then, but he was surprised at the effect these few tender words\nproduced. Molly threw her arms round his neck, and began to sob\nbitterly, her head lying on his shoulder. \"There, there!\" said he,\npatting her on the back, and leading her to the sofa, \"that will do.\nI get quite enough of tears in the day, shed for real causes, not to\nwant them at home, where, I hope, they are shed for no cause at all.\nThere's nothing really the matter, is there, my dear?\" he continued,\nholding her a little away from him that he might look in her face.\nShe smiled at him through her tears; and he did not see the look of\nsadness which returned to her face after he had left her.\n\n\"Nothing, dear, dear papa--nothing now. It is such a comfort to have\nyou all to myself--it makes me happy.\"\n\nMr. Gibson knew all implied in these words, and felt that there was\nno effectual help for the state of things which had arisen from his\nown act. It was better for them both that they should not speak out\nmore fully. So he kissed her, and said,--\n\n\"That's right, dear! I can leave you in comfort now, and indeed I've\nstayed too long already gossiping. Go out and have a walk--take\nCynthia with you, if you like. I must be off. Good-by, little one.\"\n\nHis commonplace words acted like an astringent on Molly's relaxed\nfeelings. He intended that they should do so; it was the truest\nkindness to her; but he walked away from her with a sharp pang at his\nheart, which he stunned into numbness as soon as he could by throwing\nhimself violently into the affairs and cares of others.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXXVII.\n\nA FLUKE, AND WHAT CAME OF IT.\n\n\n[Illustration (untitled)]\n\nThe honour and glory of having a lover of her own was soon to fall\nto Molly's share; though, to be sure, it was a little deduction from\nthe honour that the man who came with the full intention of proposing\nto her, ended by making Cynthia an offer. It was Mr. Coxe, who came\nback to Hollingford to follow out the purpose he had announced to Mr.\nGibson nearly two years before, of inducing Molly to become his wife\nas soon as he should have succeeded to his uncle's estate. He was now\na rich, though still a red-haired, young man. He came to the George\nInn, bringing his horses and his groom; not that he was going to ride\nmuch, but that he thought such outward signs of his riches might help\non his suit; and he was so justly modest in his estimation of himself\nthat he believed that he needed all extraneous aid. He piqued himself\non his constancy; and indeed, considering that he had been so much\nrestrained by his duty, his affection, and his expectations to his\ncrabbed old uncle, that he had not been able to go much into society,\nand very rarely indeed into the company of young ladies, such\nfidelity to Molly was very meritorious, at least in his own eyes. Mr.\nGibson too was touched by it, and made it a point of honour to give\nhim a fair field, all the time sincerely hoping that Molly would not\nbe such a goose as to lend a willing ear to a youth who could never\nremember the difference between apophysis and epiphysis. He thought\nit as well not to tell his wife more of Mr. Coxe's antecedents than\nthat he had been a former pupil; who had relinquished (\"all that he\nknew of,\" understood) the medical profession because an old uncle\nhad left him enough of money to be idle. Mrs. Gibson, who felt that\nshe had somehow lost her place in her husband's favour, took it into\nher head that she could reinstate herself if she was successful\nin finding a good match for his daughter Molly. She knew that her\nhusband had forbidden her to try for this end, as distinctly as\nwords could express a meaning; but her own words so seldom expressed\nher meaning, or if they did, she held to her opinions so loosely,\nthat she had no idea but that it was the same with other people.\nAccordingly she gave Mr. Coxe a very sweet and gracious welcome.\n\n\"It is such a pleasure to me to make acquaintance with the former\npupils of my husband. He has spoken to me so often of you that I\nquite feel as if you were one of the family, as indeed I am sure that\nMr. Gibson considers you.\"\n\nMr. Coxe felt much flattered, and took the words as a happy omen for\nhis love-affair. \"Is Miss Gibson in?\" asked he, blushing violently.\n\"I knew her formerly--that is to say, I lived in the same house\nwith her, for more than two years, and it would be a great pleasure\nto--to--\"\n\n\"Certainly, I am sure she will be so glad to see you. I sent her\nand Cynthia--you don't know my daughter Cynthia, I think, Mr. Coxe?\nshe and Molly are such great friends--out for a brisk walk this\nfrosty day, but I think they will soon come back.\" She went on saying\nagreeable nothings to the young man, who received her attentions\nwith a certain complacency, but was all the time much more engaged\nin listening to the well-remembered click at the front door,--the\nshutting it to again with household care, and the sound of the\nfamiliar bounding footstep on the stair. At last they came. Cynthia\nentered first, bright and blooming, fresh colour in her cheeks and\nlips, fresh brilliance in her eyes. She looked startled at the sight\nof a stranger, and for an instant she stopped short at the door, as\nif taken by surprise. Then in came Molly softly behind her, smiling,\nhappy, dimpled; but not such a glowing beauty as Cynthia.\n\n\"Oh, Mr. Coxe, is it you?\" said she, going up to him with an\noutstretched hand, and greeting him with simple friendliness.\n\n\"Yes; it seems such a long time since I saw you. You are so much\ngrown--so much--well, I suppose I mustn't say what,\" he replied,\nspeaking hurriedly, and holding her hand all the time, rather to\nher discomfiture. Then Mrs. Gibson introduced her daughter, and the\ntwo girls spoke of the enjoyment of their walk. Mr. Coxe marred his\ncause in that very first interview, if indeed he ever could have\nhad any chance, by his precipitancy in showing his feelings, and\nMrs. Gibson helped him to mar it by trying to assist him. Molly lost\nher open friendliness of manner, and began to shrink away from him\nin a way which he thought was a very ungrateful return for all his\nfaithfulness to her these two years past; and after all she was not\nthe wonderful beauty his fancy or his love had painted her. That Miss\nKirkpatrick was far more beautiful and much easier of access. For\nCynthia put on all her pretty airs--her look of intent interest in\nwhat any one was saying to her, let the subject be what it would,\nas if it was the thing she cared most about in the whole world; her\nunspoken deference; in short, all the unconscious ways she possessed\nby instinct of tickling the vanity of men. So while Molly quietly\nrepelled him, Cynthia drew him to her by her soft attractive ways;\nand his constancy fell before her charms. He was thankful that he had\nnot gone too far with Molly, and grateful to Mr. Gibson for having\nprohibited all declarations two years ago; for Cynthia, and Cynthia\nalone, could make him happy. After a fortnight's time, during which\nhe had entirely veered round in his allegiance, he thought it\ndesirable to speak to Mr. Gibson. He did so with a certain sense\nof exultation in his own correct behaviour in the affair, but at\nthe same time feeling rather ashamed of the confession of his own\nchangeableness which was naturally involved. Now it had so happened\nthat Mr. Gibson had been unusually little at home during the\nfortnight that Mr. Coxe had ostensibly lodged at the \"George,\" but\nin reality had spent the greater part of his time at Mr. Gibson's\nhouse--so that he had seen very little of his former pupil, and on\nthe whole he had thought him improved, especially after Molly's\nmanner had made her father pretty sure that Mr. Coxe stood no chance\nin that quarter. But Mr. Gibson was quite ignorant of the attraction\nwhich Cynthia had had for the young man. If he had perceived it, he\nwould have nipped it in the bud pretty quickly, for he had no notion\nof any girl, even though only partially engaged to one man, receiving\noffers from others, if a little plain speaking could prevent it. Mr.\nCoxe had asked for a private interview; they were sitting in the old\nsurgery, now called the consulting-room, but still retaining so much\nof its former self as to be the last place in which Mr. Coxe could\nfeel himself at ease. He was red up to the very roots of his red\nhair, and kept turning his glossy new hat round and round in his\nfingers, unable to find out the proper way of beginning his sentence,\nso at length he plunged in, grammar or no grammar.\n\n\"Mr. Gibson, I daresay you'll be surprised, I'm sure I am at--at what\nI want to say; but I think it's the part of an honourable man, as you\nsaid yourself, sir, a year or two ago, to--to speak to the father\nfirst, and as you, sir, stand in the place of a father to Miss\nKirkpatrick, I should like to express my feelings, my hopes, or\nperhaps I should say wishes, in short--\"\n\n\"Miss Kirkpatrick?\" said Mr. Gibson, a good deal surprised.\n\n\"Yes, sir!\" continued Mr. Coxe, rushing on now he had got so far. \"I\nknow it may appear inconstant and changeable, but I do assure you, I\ncame here with a heart as faithful to your daughter as ever beat in a\nman's bosom. I most fully intended to offer myself and all that I had\nto her acceptance before I left; but really, sir, if you had seen her\nmanner to me every time I endeavoured to press my suit a little--it\nwas more than coy, it was absolutely repellent, there could be no\nmistaking it,--while Miss Kirkpatrick--\" he looked modestly down, and\nsmoothed the nap of his hat, smiling a little while he did so.\n\n\"While Miss Kirkpatrick--?\" repeated Mr. Gibson, in such a stern\nvoice, that Mr. Coxe, landed esquire as he was now, felt as much\ndiscomfited as he used to do when he was an apprentice, and Mr.\nGibson had spoken to him in a similar manner.\n\n\"I was only going to say, sir, that so far as one can judge from\nmanner, and willingness to listen, and apparent pleasure in my\nvisits--altogether, I think I may venture to hope that Miss\nKirkpatrick is not quite indifferent to me,--and I would wait,--you\nhave no objection, have you, sir, to my speaking to her, I mean?\"\nsaid Mr. Coxe, a little anxious at the expression on Mr. Gibson's\nface. \"I do assure you I haven't a chance with Miss Gibson,\" he\ncontinued, not knowing what to say, and fancying that his inconstancy\nwas rankling in Mr. Gibson's mind.\n\n\"No! I don't suppose you have. Don't go and fancy it is that which is\nannoying me. You're mistaken about Miss Kirkpatrick, however. I don't\nbelieve she could ever have meant to give you encouragement!\"\n\nMr. Coxe's face grew perceptibly paler. His feelings, if evanescent,\nwere evidently strong.\n\n\"I think, sir, if you could have seen her--I don't consider myself\nvain, and manner is so difficult to describe. At any rate, you can\nhave no objection to my taking my chance, and speaking to her.\"\n\n\"Of course, if you won't be convinced otherwise, I can have no\nobjection. But if you'll take my advice, you will spare yourself the\npain of a refusal. I may, perhaps, be trenching on confidence, but I\nthink I ought to tell you that her affections are otherwise engaged.\"\n\n\"It cannot be!\" said Mr. Coxe. \"Mr. Gibson, there must be some\nmistake. I have gone as far as I dared in expressing my feelings,\nand her manner has been most gracious. I don't think she could have\nmisunderstood my meaning. Perhaps she has changed her mind? It is\npossible that, after consideration, she has learnt to prefer another,\nis it not?\"\n\n\"By 'another,' you mean yourself, I suppose. I can believe in such\ninconstancy\" (he could not help, in his own mind, giving a slight\nsneer at the instance before him), \"but I should be very sorry to\nthink that Miss Kirkpatrick could be guilty of it.\"\n\n\"But she may--it is a chance. Will you allow me to see her?\"\n\n\"Certainly, my poor fellow\"--for, intermingled with a little\ncontempt, was a good deal of respect for the simplicity, the\nunworldliness, the strength of feeling, even though the feeling was\nevanescent--\"I will send her to you directly.\"\n\n\"Thank you, sir. God bless you for a kind friend!\"\n\nMr. Gibson went upstairs to the drawing-room, where he was pretty\nsure he should find Cynthia. There she was, as bright and careless as\nusual, making up a bonnet for her mother, and chattering to Molly as\nshe worked.\n\n\"Cynthia, you will oblige me by going down into my consulting-room at\nonce. Mr. Coxe wants to speak to you!\"\n\n\"Mr. Coxe?\" said Cynthia. \"What can he want with me?\"\n\nEvidently, she answered her own question as soon as it was asked, for\nshe coloured, and avoided meeting Mr. Gibson's severe, uncompromising\nlook. As soon as she had left the room, Mr. Gibson sat down,\nand took up a new _Edinburgh_ lying on the table, as an excuse\nfor conversation. Was there anything in the article that made\nhim say, after a minute or two, to Molly, who sat silent and\nwondering--\"Molly, you must never trifle with the love of an honest\nman. You don't know what pain you may give.\"\n\nPresently Cynthia came back into the drawing-room, looking very\nmuch confused. Most likely she would not have returned if she had\nknown that Mr. Gibson was still there; but it was such an unheard-of\nthing for him to be sitting in that room in the middle of the day,\nreading or making pretence to read, that she had never thought of his\nremaining. He looked up at her the moment she came in, so there was\nnothing for it but putting a bold face on it, and going back to her\nwork.\n\n\"Is Mr. Coxe still downstairs?\" asked Mr. Gibson.\n\n\"No. He is gone. He asked me to give you both his kind regards. I\nbelieve he is leaving this afternoon.\" Cynthia tried to make her\nmanner as commonplace as possible; but she did not look up, and her\nvoice trembled a little.\n\nMr. Gibson went on looking at his book for a few minutes; but Cynthia\nfelt that more was coming, and only wished it would come quickly, for\nthe severe silence was very hard to bear. It came at last.\n\n\"I trust this will never occur again, Cynthia!\" said he, in grave\ndispleasure. \"I should not feel satisfied with the conduct of any\ngirl, however free, who could receive marked attentions from a young\nman with complacency, and so lead him on to make an offer which she\nnever meant to accept. But what must I think of a young woman in\nyour position, engaged--yet 'accepting most graciously,' for that\nwas the way Coxe expressed it--the overtures of another man? Do you\nconsider what unnecessary pain you have given him by your thoughtless\nbehaviour? I call it thoughtless, but it's the mildest epithet I can\napply to it. I beg that such a thing may not occur again, or I shall\nbe obliged to characterize it more severely.\"\n\n\n[Illustration: \"I TRUST THIS WILL NEVER OCCUR AGAIN, CYNTHIA!\"]\n\n\nMolly could not imagine what \"more severely\" could be, for her\nfather's manner appeared to her almost cruel in its sternness.\nCynthia coloured up extremely, then went pale, and at length raised\nher beautiful appealing eyes full of tears to Mr. Gibson. He was\ntouched by that look, but he resolved immediately not to be mollified\nby any of her physical charms of expression, but to keep to his sober\njudgment of her conduct.\n\n\"Please, Mr. Gibson, hear my side of the story before you speak so\nhardly to me. I did not mean to--to flirt. I merely meant to make\nmyself agreeable,--I can't help doing that,--and that goose of a Mr.\nCoxe seems to have fancied I meant to give him encouragement.\"\n\n\"Do you mean that you were not aware that he was falling in love with\nyou?\" Mr. Gibson was melting into a readiness to be convinced by that\nsweet voice and pleading face.\n\n\"Well, I suppose I must speak truly.\" Cynthia blushed and\nsmiled--ever so little--but it was a smile, and it hardened Mr.\nGibson's heart again. \"I did think once or twice that he was becoming\na little more complimentary than the occasion required; but I hate\nthrowing cold water on people, and I never thought he could take it\ninto his silly head to fancy himself seriously in love, and to make\nsuch a fuss at the last, after only a fortnight's acquaintance.\"\n\n\"You seem to have been pretty well aware of his silliness (I\nshould rather call it simplicity). Don't you think you should have\nremembered that it might lead him to exaggerate what you were doing\nand saying into encouragement?\"\n\n\"Perhaps. I daresay I'm all wrong, and that he is all right,\" said\nCynthia, piqued and pouting. \"We used to say in France, that '_les\nabsens ont toujours tort_,' but really it seems as if here--\" she\nstopped. She was unwilling to be impertinent to a man whom she\nrespected and liked. She took up another point of her defence, and\nrather made matters worse. \"Besides, Roger would not allow me to\nconsider myself as finally engaged to him; I would willingly have\ndone it, but he would not let me.\"\n\n\"Nonsense. Don't let us go on talking about it, Cynthia! I've said\nall that I mean to say. I believe that you were only thoughtless, as\nI told you before. But don't let it happen again.\" He left the room\nat once, to put a stop to the conversation, the continuance of which\nwould serve no useful purpose, and perhaps end by irritating him.\n\n\"Not guilty, but we recommend the prisoner not to do it again. It's\npretty much that, isn't it, Molly?\" said Cynthia, letting her tears\ndownfall, even while she smiled. \"I do believe your father might make\na good woman of me yet, if he would only take the pains, and wasn't\nquite so severe. And to think of that stupid little fellow making all\nthis mischief! He pretended to take it to heart, as if he had loved\nme for years instead of only for days. I daresay only for hours if\nthe truth were told.\"\n\n\"I was afraid he was becoming very fond of you,\" said Molly; \"at\nleast it struck me once or twice; but I knew he could not stay long,\nand I thought it would only make you uncomfortable if I said anything\nabout it. But now I wish I had!\"\n\n\"It wouldn't have made a bit of difference,\" replied Cynthia. \"I knew\nhe liked me, and I like to be liked; it's born in me to try to make\nevery one I come near fond of me; but then they shouldn't carry it\ntoo far, for it becomes very troublesome if they do. I shall hate\nred-haired people for the rest of my life. To think of such a man as\nthat being the cause of your father's displeasure with me!\"\n\nMolly had a question at her tongue's end that she longed to put; she\nknew it was indiscreet, but at last out it came almost against her\nwill:\n\n\"Shall you tell Roger about it?\"\n\nCynthia replied, \"I've not thought about it--no! I don't think I\nshall--there's no need. Perhaps, if we are ever married--\"\n\n\"Ever married!\" said Molly, under her breath. But Cynthia took no\nnotice of the exclamation until she had finished the sentence which\nit interrupted.\n\n\"--and I can see his face and know his mood, I may tell it him then;\nbut not in writing, and when he is absent; it might annoy him.\"\n\n\"I am afraid it would make him uncomfortable,\" said Molly,\nsimply. \"And yet it must be so pleasant to be able to tell him\neverything--all your difficulties and troubles.\"\n\n\"Yes; only I don't worry him with these things; it's better to\nwrite him merry letters, and cheer him up among the black folk. You\nrepeated 'Ever married,' a little while ago; do you know, Molly, I\ndon't think I ever shall be married to him? I don't know why, but I\nhave a strong presentiment, so it's just as well not to tell him all\nmy secrets, for it would be awkward for him to know them if it never\ncame off!\"\n\nMolly dropped her work, and sat silent, looking into the future; at\nlength she said, \"I think it would break his heart, Cynthia!\"\n\n\"Nonsense. Why, I'm sure that Mr. Coxe came here with the intention\nof falling in love with you--you needn't blush so violently. I'm sure\nyou saw it as plainly as I did, only you made yourself disagreeable,\nand I took pity on him, and consoled his wounded vanity.\"\n\n\"Can you--do you dare to compare Roger Hamley to Mr. Coxe?\" asked\nMolly, indignantly.\n\n\"No, no, I don't!\" said Cynthia in a moment. \"They are as different\nas men can be. Don't be so dreadfully serious over everything, Molly.\nYou look as oppressed with sad reproach, as if I had been passing on\nto you the scolding your father gave me.\"\n\n\"Because I don't think you value Roger as you ought, Cynthia!\" said\nMolly stoutly, for it required a good deal of courage to force\nherself to say this, although she could not tell why she shrank so\nfrom speaking.\n\n\"Yes, I do! It's not in my nature to go into ecstasies, and I don't\nsuppose I shall ever be what people call 'in love.' But I am glad he\nloves me, and I like to make him happy, and I think him the best and\nmost agreeable man I know, always excepting your father when he isn't\nangry with me. What can I say more, Molly? would you like me to say I\nthink him handsome?\"\n\n\"I know most people think him plain, but--\"\n\n\"Well, I'm of the opinion of most people then, and small blame to\nthem. But I like his face--oh, ten thousand times better than Mr.\nPreston's handsomeness!\" For the first time during the conversation\nCynthia seemed thoroughly in earnest. Why Mr. Preston was introduced\nneither she nor Molly knew; it came up and out by a sudden impulse;\nbut a fierce look came into the eyes, and the soft lips contracted\nthemselves as Cynthia named his name. Molly had noticed this look\nbefore, always at the mention of this one person.\n\n\"Cynthia, what makes you dislike Mr. Preston so much?\"\n\n\"Don't you? Why do you ask me? and yet, Molly,\" said she, suddenly\nrelaxing into depression, not merely in tone and look, but in the\ndroop of her limbs--\"Molly, what should you think of me if I married\nhim after all?\"\n\n\"Married him! Has he ever asked you?\"\n\nBut Cynthia, instead of replying to this question, went on, uttering\nher own thoughts,--\"More unlikely things have happened. Have you\nnever heard of strong wills mesmerizing weaker ones into submission?\nOne of the girls at Madame Lefevre's went out as a governess to a\nRussian family, who lived near Moscow. I sometimes think I'll write\nto her to find me a situation in Russia, just to get out of the daily\nchance of seeing that man!\"\n\n\"But sometimes you seem quite intimate with him, and talk to him--\"\n\n\"How can I help it?\" said Cynthia impatiently. Then recovering\nherself she added: \"We knew him so well at Ashcombe, and he's not a\nman to be easily thrown off, I can tell you. I must be civil to him;\nit's not from liking, and he knows it's not, for I've told him so.\nHowever, we won't talk about him. I don't know how we came to do it,\nI'm sure: the mere fact of his existence, and of his being within\nhalf a mile of us, is bad enough. Oh! I wish Roger was at home,\nand rich, and could marry me at once, and carry me away from that\nman! If I'd thought of it, I really believe I would have taken poor\nred-haired Mr. Coxe.\"\n\n\"I don't understand it at all,\" said Molly. \"I dislike Mr. Preston,\nbut I should never think of taking such violent steps as you speak\nof, to get away from the neighbourhood in which he lives.\"\n\n\"No, because you are a reasonable little darling,\" said Cynthia,\nresuming her usual manner, and coming up to Molly, and kissing her.\n\"At least you'll acknowledge I'm a good hater!\"\n\n\"Yes. But still I don't understand it.\"\n\n\"Oh, never mind! There are old complications with our affairs at\nAshcombe. Money matters are at the root of it all. Horrid poverty--do\nlet us talk of something else! Or, better still, let me go and finish\nmy letter to Roger, or I shall be too late for the African mail!\"\n\n\"Isn't it gone? Oh, I ought to have reminded you! It will be too\nlate. Did you not see the notice at the post-office that letters\nought to be in London on the morning of the 10th instead of the\nevening. Oh, I am so sorry!\"\n\n\"So am I, but it can't be helped. It is to be hoped it will be the\ngreater treat when he does get it. I've a far greater weight on my\nheart, because your father seems so displeased with me. I was fond\nof him, and now he is making me quite a coward. You see, Molly,\"\ncontinued she, a little piteously, \"I've never lived with people with\nsuch a high standard of conduct before; and I don't quite know how to\nbehave.\"\n\n\"You must learn,\" said Molly tenderly. \"You'll find Roger quite as\nstrict in his notions of right and wrong.\"\n\n\"Ah, but he's in love with me!\" said Cynthia, with a pretty\nconsciousness of her power. Molly turned away her head, and was\nsilent; it was of no use combating the truth, and she tried rather\nnot to feel it--not to feel, poor girl, that she too had a great\nweight on her heart, into the cause of which she shrank from\nexamining. That whole winter long she had felt as if her sun was all\nshrouded over with grey mist, and could no longer shine brightly for\nher. She wakened up in the morning with a dull sense of something\nbeing wrong; the world was out of joint, and, if she were born to set\nit right, she did not know how to do it. Blind herself as she would,\nshe could not help perceiving that her father was not satisfied with\nthe wife he had chosen. For a long time Molly had been surprised at\nhis apparent contentment; sometimes she had been unselfish enough to\nbe glad that he was satisfied; but still more frequently nature would\nhave its way, and she was almost irritated at what she considered\nhis blindness. Something, however, had changed him now: something\nthat had arisen at the time of Cynthia's engagement. He had become\nnervously sensitive to his wife's failings, and his whole manner\nhad grown dry and sarcastic, not merely to her, but sometimes to\nCynthia,--and even--but this very rarely, to Molly herself. He was\nnot a man to go into passions, or ebullitions of feeling: they would\nhave relieved him, even while degrading him in his own eyes; but\nhe became hard, and occasionally bitter in his speeches and ways.\nMolly now learnt to long after the vanished blindness in which her\nfather had passed the first year of his marriage; yet there were no\noutrageous infractions of domestic peace. Some people might say that\nMr. Gibson \"accepted the inevitable;\" he told himself in more homely\nphrase \"that it was no use crying over spilt milk:\" and he, from\nprinciple, avoided all actual dissensions with his wife, preferring\nto cut short a discussion by a sarcasm, or by leaving the room.\nMoreover, Mrs. Gibson had a very tolerable temper of her own, and her\ncat-like nature purred and delighted in smooth ways, and pleasant\nquietness. She had no great facility for understanding sarcasm; it\nis true it disturbed her, but as she was not quick at deciphering\nany depth of meaning, and felt it unpleasant to think about it, she\nforgot it as soon as possible. Yet she saw she was often in some kind\nof disfavour with her husband, and it made her uneasy. She resembled\nCynthia in this: she liked to be liked; and she wanted to regain\nthe esteem which she did not perceive she had lost for ever. Molly\nsometimes took her stepmother's part in secret; she felt as if\nshe herself could never have borne her father's hard speeches so\npatiently; they would have cut her to the heart, and she must either\nhave demanded an explanation, and probed the sore to the bottom, or\nsat down despairing and miserable. Instead of which Mrs. Gibson,\nafter her husband had left the room, on these occasions would say in\na manner more bewildered than hurt--\n\n\"I think dear papa seems a little put out to-day; we must see that he\nhas a dinner that he likes when he comes home. I have often perceived\nthat everything depends on making a man comfortable in his own\nhouse.\"\n\nAnd thus she went on, groping about to find the means of reinstating\nherself in his good graces--really trying, according to her lights,\ntill Molly was often compelled to pity her in spite of herself, and\nalthough she saw that her stepmother was the cause of her father's\nincreased astringency of disposition. For, indeed, he had got into\nthat kind of exaggerated susceptibility with regard to his wife's\nfaults, which may be best typified by the state of bodily irritation\nthat is produced by the constant recurrence of any particular noise:\nthose who are brought within hearing of it, are apt to be always on\nthe watch for the repetition, if they are once made to notice it, and\nare in an irritable state of nerves.\n\nSo that poor Molly had not passed a cheerful winter, independently of\nany private sorrows that she might have in her own heart. She did not\nlook well, either: she was gradually falling into low health, rather\nthan bad health. Her heart beat more feebly and slower; the vivifying\nstimulant of hope--even unacknowledged hope--was gone out of her\nlife. It seemed as if there was not, and never could be in this\nworld, any help for the dumb discordancy between her father and his\nwife. Day after day, month after month, year after year, would Molly\nhave to sympathize with her father, and pity her stepmother, feeling\nacutely for both, and certainly more than Mrs. Gibson felt for\nherself. Molly could not imagine how she had at one time wished for\nher father's eyes to be opened, and how she could ever have fancied\nthat if they were, he would be able to change things in Mrs. Gibson's\ncharacter. It was all hopeless, and the only attempt at a remedy was\nto think about it as little as possible. Then Cynthia's ways and\nmanners about Roger gave Molly a great deal of uneasiness. She did\nnot believe that Cynthia cared enough for him; at any rate, not with\nthe sort of love that she herself would have bestowed, if she had\nbeen so happy--no, that was not it--if she had been in Cynthia's\nplace. She felt as if she should have gone to him both hands held\nout, full and brimming over with tenderness, and been grateful for\nevery word of precious confidence bestowed on her. Yet Cynthia\nreceived his letters with a kind of carelessness, and read them with\na strange indifference, while Molly sat at her feet, so to speak,\nlooking up with eyes as wistful as a dog's waiting for crumbs, and\nsuch chance beneficences.\n\nShe tried to be patient on these occasions, but at last she must\nask--\"Where is he, Cynthia? What does he say?\" By this time Cynthia\nhad put down the letter on the table by her, smiling a little from\ntime to time, as she remembered the loving compliments it contained.\n\n\"Where? Oh, I didn't look exactly--somewhere in Abyssinia--Huon. I\ncan't read the word, and it doesn't much signify, for it would give\nme no idea.\"\n\n\"Is he well?\" asked greedy Molly.\n\n\"Yes, now. He has had a slight touch of fever, he says; but it's all\nover now, and he hopes he is getting acclimatized.\"\n\n\"Of fever!--and who took care of him? he would want nursing,--and so\nfar from home. Oh, Cynthia!\"\n\n\"Oh, I don't fancy he had any nursing, poor fellow! One doesn't\nexpect nursing, and hospitals, and doctors in Abyssinia; but he had\nplenty of quinine with him, and I suppose that is the best specific.\nAt any rate he says he is quite well now!\"\n\nMolly sat silent for a minute or two.\n\n\"What is the date of the letter, Cynthia?\"\n\n\"I didn't look. December the--December the 10th.\"\n\n\"That's nearly two months ago,\" said Molly.\n\n\"Yes; but I determined I wouldn't worry myself with useless anxiety,\nwhen he went away. If anything did--go wrong, you know,\" said\nCynthia, using a euphuism for death, as most people do (it is an\nugly word to speak plain out in the midst of life), \"it would be all\nover before I even heard of his illness, and I could be of no use to\nhim--could I, Molly?\"\n\n\"No. I daresay it is all very true; only I should think the Squire\ncould not take it so easily.\"\n\n\"I always write him a little note when I hear from Roger, but I don't\nthink I'll name this touch of fever--shall I, Molly?\"\n\n\"I don't know,\" said Molly. \"People say one ought, but I almost wish\nI hadn't heard it. Please, does he say anything else that I may\nhear?\"\n\n\"Oh, lovers' letters are so silly, and I think this is sillier than\nusual,\" said Cynthia, looking over her letter again. \"Here's a piece\nyou may read, from that line to that,\" indicating two places. \"I\nhaven't read it myself for it looked dullish--all about Aristotle and\nPliny--and I want to get this bonnet-cap made up before we go out to\npay our calls.\"\n\nMolly took the letter, the thought crossing her mind that he had\ntouched it, had had his hands upon it, in those far distant desert\nlands, where he might be lost to sight and to any human knowledge\nof his fate; even now her pretty brown fingers almost caressed the\nflimsy paper with their delicacy of touch as she read. She saw\nreferences made to books, which, with a little trouble, would be\naccessible to her here in Hollingford. Perhaps the details and the\nreferences would make the letter dull and dry to some people, but not\nto her, thanks to his former teaching and the interest he had excited\nin her for his pursuits. But, as he said in apology, what had he to\nwrite about in that savage land, but his love, and his researches,\nand travels? There was no society, no gaiety, no new books to write\nabout, no gossip in Abyssinian wilds.\n\nMolly was not in strong health, and perhaps this made her a little\nfanciful; but certain it is that her thoughts by day and her dreams\nby night were haunted by the idea of Roger lying ill and untended in\nthose savage lands. Her constant prayer, \"O my Lord! give her the\nliving child, and in no wise slay it,\" came from a heart as true as\nthat of the real mother in King Solomon's judgment. \"Let him live,\nlet him live, even though I may never set eyes upon him again. Have\npity upon his father! Grant that he may come home safe, and live\nhappily with her whom he loves so tenderly--so tenderly, O God.\" And\nthen she would burst into tears, and drop asleep at last, sobbing.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXXVIII.\n\nMR. KIRKPATRICK, Q.C.\n\n\nCynthia was always the same with Molly: kind, sweet-tempered, ready\nto help, professing a great deal of love for her, and probably\nfeeling as much as she did for any one in the world. But Molly had\nreached to this superficial depth of affection and intimacy in the\nfirst few weeks of Cynthia's residence in her father's house; and if\nshe had been of a nature prone to analyse the character of one whom\nshe loved dearly, she might have perceived that, with all Cynthia's\napparent frankness, there were certain limits beyond which her\nconfidence did not go; where her reserve began, and her real self was\nshrouded in mystery. For instance, her relations with Mr. Preston\nwere often very puzzling to Molly. She was sure that there had been a\nmuch greater intimacy between them formerly at Ashcombe, and that the\nremembrance of this was often very galling and irritating to Cynthia,\nwho was as evidently desirous of forgetting it as he was anxious\nto make her remember it. But why this intimacy had ceased, why\nCynthia disliked him so extremely now, and many other unexplained\ncircumstances connected with these two facts, were Cynthia's secrets;\nand she effectually baffled all Molly's innocent attempts during\nthe first glow of her friendship for Cynthia, to learn the girlish\nantecedents of her companion's life. Every now and then Molly came\nto a dead wall, beyond which she could not pass--at least with the\ndelicate instruments which were all she chose to use. Perhaps Cynthia\nmight have told all there was to tell to a more forcible curiosity,\nwhich knew how to improve every slip of the tongue and every fit of\ntemper to its own gratification. But Molly's was the interest of\naffection, not the coarser desire of knowing everything for a little\nexcitement; and as soon as she saw that Cynthia did not wish to tell\nher anything about that period of her life, Molly left off referring\nto it. But if Cynthia had preserved a sweet tranquillity of manner\nand an unvarying kindness for Molly during the winter of which there\nis question, at present she was the only person to whom the beauty's\nways were unchanged. Mr. Gibson's influence had been good for her as\nlong as she saw that he liked her; she had tried to keep as high a\nplace in his good opinion as she could, and had curbed many a little\nsarcasm against her mother, and many a twisting of the absolute\ntruth when he was by. Now there was a constant uneasiness about her\nwhich made her more cowardly than before; and even her partisan,\nMolly, could not help being aware of the distinct equivocations she\noccasionally used when anything in Mr. Gibson's words or behaviour\npressed her too hard. Her repartees to her mother were less frequent\nthan they had been, but there was often the unusual phenomenon\nof pettishness in her behaviour to her. These changes in humour\nand disposition, here described all at once, were in themselves a\nseries of delicate alterations of relative conduct spread over many\nmonths--many winter months of long evenings and bad weather, which\nbring out discords of character, as a dash of cold water brings out\nthe fading colours of an old fresco.\n\nDuring much of this time Mr. Preston had been at Ashcombe; for Lord\nCumnor had not been able to find an agent whom he liked to replace\nMr. Preston; and while the inferior situation remained vacant Mr.\nPreston had undertaken to do the duties of both. Mrs. Goodenough had\nhad a serious illness; and the little society at Hollingford did not\ncare to meet while one of their habitual set was scarcely out of\ndanger. So there had been very little visiting; and though Miss\nBrowning said that the absence of the temptations of society was very\nagreeable to cultivated minds, after the dissipations of the previous\nautumn, when there were parties every week to welcome Mr. Preston,\nyet Miss Phoebe let out in confidence that she and her sister had\nfallen into the habit of going to bed at nine o'clock, for they found\ncribbage night after night, from five o'clock till ten, rather too\nmuch of a good thing. To tell the truth, that winter, if peaceful,\nwas monotonous in Hollingford; and the whole circle of gentility\nthere was delighted to be stirred up in March by the intelligence\nthat Mr. Kirkpatrick, the newly-made Q.C., was coming on a visit for\na couple of days to his sister-in-law, Mrs. Gibson. Mrs. Goodenough's\nroom was the very centre of gossip; gossip had been her daily bread\nthrough her life, gossip was meat and wine to her now.\n\n\"Dear-ah-me!\" said the old lady, rousing herself so as to sit upright\nin her easy-chair, and propping herself with her hands on the arms;\n\"who would ha' thought she'd such grand relations! Why, Mr. Ashton\ntold me once that a Queen's counsel was as like to be a judge as a\nkitten is like to be a cat. And to think of her being as good as\na sister to a judge! I saw one oncst; and I know I thought as I\nshouldn't wish for a better winter-cloak than his old robes would\nmake me, if I could only find out where I could get 'em second-hand.\nAnd I know she'd her silk gowns turned and dyed and cleaned, and, for\naught I know, turned again, while she lived at Ashcombe. Keeping a\nschool, too, and so near akin to this Queen's counsel all the time!\nWell, to be sure, it wasn't much of a school--only ten young ladies\nat the best o' times; so perhaps he never heard of it.\"\n\n\"I've been wondering what they'll give him to dinner,\" said Miss\nBrowning. \"It is an unlucky time for visitors; no game to be had,\nand lamb so late this year, and chicken hardly to be had for love or\nmoney.\"\n\n\"He'll have to put up with calf's head, that he will,\" said Mrs.\nGoodenough, solemnly. \"If I'd ha' got my usual health I'd copy out\na receipt of my grandmother's for a rolled calf's head, and send it\nto Mrs. Gibson--the doctor has been very kind to me all through this\nillness--I wish my daughter in Combermere would send me some autumn\nchickens--I'd pass 'em on to the doctor, that I would; but she's been\na-killing of 'em all, and a-sending of them to me, and the last she\nsent she wrote me word was the last.\"\n\n\"I wonder if they'll give a party for him!\" suggested Miss Phoebe.\n\"I should like to see a Queen's counsel for once in my life. I have\nseen javelin-men, but that's the greatest thing in the legal line I\never came across.\"\n\n\"They'll ask Mr. Ashton, of course,\" said Miss Browning. \"The three\nblack graces, Law, Physic, and Divinity, as the song calls them.\nWhenever there's a second course, there's always the clergyman of the\nparish invited in any family of gentility.\"\n\n\"I wonder if he's married!\" said Mrs. Goodenough. Miss Phoebe had\nbeen feeling the same wonder, but had not thought it maidenly to\nexpress it, even to her sister, who was the source of knowledge,\nhaving met Mrs. Gibson in the street on her way to Mrs. Goodenough's.\n\n\"Yes, he's married, and must have several children, for Mrs. Gibson\nsaid that Cynthia Kirkpatrick had paid them a visit in London, to\nhave lessons with her cousins. And she said that his wife was a most\naccomplished woman, and of good family, though she brought him no\nfortune.\"\n\n\"It's a very creditable connection, I'm sure; it's only a wonder\nto me as how we've heard so little talk of it before,\" said Mrs.\nGoodenough. \"At the first look of the thing, I shouldn't ha' thought\nMrs. Gibson was one to hide away her fine relations under a bushel;\nindeed, for that matter, we're all of us fond o' turning the best\nbreadth o' the gown to the front. I remember, speaking o' breadths,\nhow I've undone my skirts many a time and oft to put a stain or a\ngrease-spot next to poor Mr. Goodenough. He'd a soft kind of heart\nwhen first we was married, and he said, says he, 'Patty, link thy\nright arm into my left one, then thou'lt be nearer to my heart;' and\nso we kept up the habit, when, poor man, he'd a deal more to think on\nthan romancing on which side his heart lay; so, as I said, I always\nput my damaged breadths on the right hand, and when we walked arm in\narm, as we always did, no one was never the wiser.\"\n\n\"I should not be surprised if he invited Cynthia to pay him another\nvisit in London,\" said Miss Browning. \"If he did it when he was poor,\nhe's twenty times more likely to do it now he's a Queen's counsel.\"\n\n\"Ay, work it by the rule o' three, and she stands a good chance. I\nonly hope it won't turn her head; going up visiting in London at her\nage. Why, I was fifty before ever I went!\"\n\n\"But she has been in France; she's quite a travelled young lady,\"\nsaid Miss Phoebe.\n\nMrs. Goodenough shook her head for a whole minute before she gave\nvent to her opinion.\n\n\"It's a risk,\" said she, \"a great risk. I don't like saying so to\nthe doctor, but I shouldn't like having my daughter, if I was him,\nso cheek-by-jowl with a girl as was brought up in the country where\nRobespierre and Bonyparte was born.\"\n\n\"But Buonaparte was a Corsican,\" said Miss Browning, who was much\nfarther advanced both in knowledge and in liberality of opinions than\nMrs. Goodenough. \"And there's a great opportunity for cultivation of\nthe mind afforded by intercourse with foreign countries. I always\nadmire Cynthia's grace of manner, never too shy to speak, yet never\nputting herself forwards; she's quite a help to a party; and if she\nhas a few airs and graces, why they're natural at her age! Now as for\ndear Molly, there's a kind of awkwardness about her--she broke one of\nour best china cups last time she was at a party at our house, and\nspilt the coffee on the new carpet; and then she got so confused that\nshe hardly did anything but sit in a corner and hold her tongue all\nthe rest of the evening.\"\n\n\"She was so sorry for what she'd done, sister,\" said Miss Phoebe,\nin a gentle tone of reproach; she was always faithful to Molly.\n\n\"Well, and did I say she wasn't? but was there any need for her to be\nstupid all the evening after?\"\n\n\"But you were rather sharp,--rather displeased--\"\n\n\"And I think it my duty to be sharp, ay, and cross too, when I see\nyoung folks careless. And when I see my duty clear, I do it; I'm not\none to shrink from it, and they ought to be grateful to me. It's\nnot every one that will take the trouble of reproving them, as Mrs.\nGoodenough knows. I'm very fond of Molly Gibson, very, for her own\nsake and for her mother's too; I'm not sure if I don't think she's\nworth half-a-dozen Cynthias, but for all that she shouldn't break my\nbest china teacup, and then sit doing nothing for her livelihood all\nthe rest of the evening.\"\n\nBy this time Mrs. Goodenough gave evident signs of being tired;\nMolly's misdemeanors and Miss Browning's broken teacup were not as\nexciting subjects of conversation as Mrs. Gibson's newly-discovered\ngood luck in having a successful London lawyer for a relation.\n\nMr. Kirkpatrick had been, like many other men, struggling on in his\nprofession, and encumbered with a large family of his own; he was\nready to do a good turn for his connections, if it occasioned him no\nloss of time, and if (which was, perhaps, a primary condition) he\nremembered their existence. Cynthia's visit to Doughty Street nine\nor ten years ago had not made much impression upon him after he had\nonce suggested its feasibility to his good-natured wife. He was even\nrather startled every now and then by the appearance of a pretty\nlittle girl amongst his own children, as they trooped in to dessert,\nand had to remind himself who she was. But as it was his custom\nto leave the table almost immediately and to retreat into a small\nback-room called his study, to immerse himself in papers for the rest\nof the evening, the child had not made much impression upon him; and\nprobably the next time he remembered her existence was when Mrs.\nKirkpatrick wrote to him to beg him to receive Cynthia for a night on\nher way to school at Boulogne. The same request was repeated on her\nreturn; but it so happened that he had not seen her either time; and\nonly dimly remembered some remarks which his wife had made on one of\nthese occasions, that it seemed to her rather hazardous to send so\nyoung a girl so long a journey without making more provision for her\nsafety than Mrs. Kirkpatrick had done. He knew that his wife would\nfill up all deficiencies in this respect as if Cynthia had been her\nown daughter; and thought no more about her until he received an\ninvitation to attend Mrs. Kirkpatrick's wedding with Mr. Gibson, the\nhighly-esteemed surgeon of Hollingford, &c. &c.--an attention which\nirritated instead of pleasing him. \"Does the woman think I have\nnothing to do but run about the country in search of brides and\nbridegrooms, when this great case of Houghton _v._ Houghton is coming\non, and I haven't a moment to spare?\" he asked of his wife.\n\n\"Perhaps she never heard of it,\" suggested Mrs. Kirkpatrick.\n\n\"Nonsense! the case has been in the papers for days.\"\n\n\"But she mayn't know you are engaged in it.\"\n\n\"She mayn't,\" said he, meditatively--such ignorance was possible.\n\nBut now the great case of Houghton _v._ Houghton was a thing of the\npast; the hard struggle was over, the comparative table-land of Q.\nC.-dom gained, and Mr. Kirkpatrick had leisure for family feeling and\nrecollection. One day in the Easter vacation he found himself near\nHollingford; he had a Sunday to spare, and he wrote to offer himself\nas a visitor to the Gibsons from Friday till Monday, expressing\nstrongly (what he really felt, in a less degree,) his wish to make\nMr. Gibson's acquaintance. Mr. Gibson, though often overwhelmed with\nprofessional business, was always hospitable; and moreover, it was\nalways a pleasure to him to get out of the somewhat confined mental\natmosphere which he had breathed over and over again, and have a\nwhiff of fresh air: a glimpse of what was passing in the great world\nbeyond his daily limits of thought and action. So he was ready to\ngive a cordial welcome to his unknown relation. Mrs. Gibson was\nin a flutter of sentimental delight, which she fancied was family\naffection, but which might not have been quite so effervescent if Mr.\nKirkpatrick had remained in his former position of struggling lawyer,\nwith seven children, living in Doughty Street.\n\nWhen the two gentlemen met they were attracted towards each other\nby a similarity of character, with just enough difference in their\nopinions to make the experience of each, on which such opinions\nwere based, valuable to the other. To Mrs. Gibson, although the\nbond between them counted for very little in their intercourse, Mr.\nKirkpatrick paid very polite attention; and was, in fact, very glad\nthat she had done so well for herself as to marry a sensible and\nagreeable man, who was able to keep her in comfort, and to behave\nto her daughter in so liberal a manner. Molly struck him as a\ndelicate-looking girl, who might be very pretty if she had a greater\nlook of health and animation: indeed, looking at her critically,\nthere were beautiful points about her face--long soft grey eyes,\nblack curling eyelashes, rarely-showing dimples, perfect teeth;\nbut there was a languor over all, a slow depression of manner,\nwhich contrasted unfavourably with the brightly-coloured Cynthia,\nsparkling, quick, graceful, and witty. As Mr. Kirkpatrick expressed\nit afterwards to his wife, he was quite in love with that girl;\nand Cynthia, as ready to captivate strangers as any little girl\nof three or four, rose to the occasion, forgot all her cares and\ndespondencies, remembered no longer her regret at having lost\nsomething of Mr. Gibson's good opinion, and listened eagerly and made\nsoft replies, intermixed with naïve sallies of droll humour, till\nMr. Kirkpatrick was quite captivated. He left Hollingford, almost\nsurprised to have performed a duty, and found it a pleasure. For Mrs.\nGibson and Molly he had a general friendly feeling; but he did not\ncare if he never saw them again. But for Mr. Gibson he had a warm\nrespect, a strong personal liking, which he should be glad to have\nripen into a friendship, if there was time for it in this bustling\nworld. And he fully resolved to see more of Cynthia; his wife must\nknow her; they must have her up to stay with them in London, and show\nher something of the world. But, on returning home, Mr. Kirkpatrick\nfound so much work awaiting him that he had to lock up embryo\nfriendships and kindly plans in some safe closet of his mind,\nand give himself up, body and soul, to the immediate work of his\nprofession. But, in May, he found time to take his wife to the\nAcademy Exhibition, and some portrait there striking him as being\nlike Cynthia, he told his wife more about her and his visit to\nHollingford than he had ever had leisure to do before; and the\nresult was that on the next day a letter was sent off to Mrs. Gibson,\ninviting Cynthia to pay a visit to her cousins in London, and\nreminding her of many little circumstances that had occurred when she\nwas with them as a child, so as to carry on the clue of friendship\nfrom that time to the present.\n\nOn its receipt, this letter was greeted in various ways by the four\npeople who sate round the breakfast-table. Mrs. Gibson read it to\nherself first. Then, without telling what its contents were, so that\nher auditors were quite in the dark as to what her remarks applied,\nshe said,--\n\n\"I think they might have remembered that I am a generation nearer to\nthem than she is, but nobody thinks of family affection now-a days;\nand I liked him so much, and bought a new cookery-book, all to make\nit pleasant and agreeable and what he was used to.\" She said all this\nin a plaintive, aggrieved tone of voice; but as no one knew to what\nshe was referring, it was difficult to offer her consolation. Her\nhusband was the first to speak.\n\n\"If you want us to sympathize with you, tell us what is the nature of\nyour woe.\"\n\n\"Why, I daresay it's what he means as a very kind attention, only I\nthink I ought to have been asked before Cynthia,\" said she, reading\nthe letter over again.\n\n\"Who's _he_? and what's meant for a 'kind attention'?\"\n\n\"Mr. Kirkpatrick, to be sure. This letter is from him; and he wants\nCynthia to go and pay them a visit, and never says anything about you\nor me, my dear. And I'm sure we did our best to make it pleasant; and\nhe should have asked us first, I think.\"\n\n\"As I couldn't possibly have gone, it makes very little difference to\nme.\"\n\n\"But I could have gone; and, at any rate, he should have paid us\nthe compliment: it's only a proper mark of respect, you know. So\nungrateful, too, when I gave up my dressing-room on purpose for him!\"\n\n\"And I dressed for dinner every day he was here, if we are each to\nrecapitulate all our sacrifices on his behalf. But, for all that, I\ndidn't expect to be invited to his house. I shall be only too glad if\nhe will come again to mine.\"\n\n\"I've a great mind not to let Cynthia go,\" said Mrs. Gibson\nreflectively.\n\n\"I can't go, mamma,\" said Cynthia, colouring. \"My gowns are all so\nshabby, and my old bonnet must do for the summer.\"\n\n\"Well, but you can buy a new one; and I'm sure it is high time you\nshould get yourself another silk gown. You must have been saving up a\ngreat deal, for I don't know when you've had any new clothes.\"\n\nCynthia began to say something, but stopped short. She went on\nbuttering her toast, but she held it in her hand without eating it;\nwithout looking up either, as, after a minute or two of silence, she\nspoke again:--\n\n\"I cannot go. I should like it very much; but I really cannot go.\nPlease, mamma, write at once, and refuse it.\"\n\n\"Nonsense, child! When a man in Mr. Kirkpatrick's position comes\nforward to offer a favour, it does not do to decline it without\ngiving a sufficient reason. So kind of him as it is, too!\"\n\n\"Suppose you offer to go instead of me?\" proposed Cynthia.\n\n\"No, no! that won't do,\" said Mr. Gibson, decidedly. \"You can't\ntransfer invitations in that way. But, really, this excuse about your\nclothes does appear to be very trivial, Cynthia, if you have no other\nreason to give.\"\n\n\"It is a real, true reason to me,\" said Cynthia, looking up at him\nas she spoke. \"You must let me judge for myself. It would not do\nto go there in a state of shabbiness, for even in Doughty Street,\nI remember, my aunt was very particular about dress; and now that\nMargaret and Helen are grown up, and they visit so much,--pray don't\nsay anything more about it, for I know it would not do.\"\n\n\"What have you done with all your money, I wonder?\" said Mrs. Gibson.\n\"You've twenty pounds a year, thanks to Mr. Gibson and me; and I'm\nsure you haven't spent more than ten.\"\n\n\"I hadn't many things when I came back from France,\" said Cynthia, in\na low voice, and evidently troubled by all this questioning. \"Pray\nlet it be decided at once; I can't go, and there's an end of it.\" She\ngot up, and left the room rather suddenly.\n\n\"I don't understand it at all,\" said Mrs. Gibson. \"Do you, Molly?\"\n\n\"No. I know she doesn't like spending money on her dress, and is very\ncareful.\" Molly said this much, and then was afraid she had made\nmischief.\n\n\"But then she must have got the money somewhere. It always has struck\nme that if you have not extravagant habits, and do not live up to\nyour income, you must have a certain sum to lay by at the end of the\nyear. Have I not often said so, Mr. Gibson?\"\n\n\"Probably.\"\n\n\"Well, then, apply the same reasoning to Cynthia's case; and then, I\nask, what has become of the money?\"\n\n\"I cannot tell,\" said Molly, seeing that she was appealed to. \"She\nmay have given it away to some one who wants it.\"\n\nMr. Gibson put down his newspaper.\n\n\"It's very clear that she has neither got the dress nor the money\nnecessary for this London visit, and that she doesn't want any more\ninquiries to be made on the subject. She likes mysteries, in fact,\nand I detest them. Still, I think it's a desirable thing for her to\nkeep up the acquaintance, or friendship, or whatever it is to be\ncalled, with her father's family; and I shall gladly give her ten\npounds; and if that's not enough, why, either you must help her out,\nor she must do without some superfluous article of dress or another.\"\n\n\"I'm sure there never was such a kind, dear, generous man as you are,\nMr. Gibson,\" said his wife. \"To think of your being a stepfather!\nand so good to my poor fatherless girl! But, Molly my dear, I\nthink you'll acknowledge that you too are very fortunate in your\nstepmother. Are not you, love? And what happy _tête-à-têtes_ we shall\nhave together when Cynthia goes to London! I'm not sure if I don't\nget on better with you even than with her, though she is my own\nchild; for, as dear papa says so truly, there is a love of mystery\nabout her; and if I hate anything, it is the slightest concealment\nor reserve. Ten pounds! Why, it will quite set her up, buy her a\ncouple of gowns and a new bonnet, and I don't know what all! Dear Mr.\nGibson, how generous you are!\"\n\nSomething very like \"Pshaw!\" was growled out from behind the\nnewspaper.\n\n\"May I go and tell her?\" said Molly, rising up.\n\n\"Yes, do, love. Tell her it would be so ungrateful to refuse; and\ntell her that your father wishes her to go; and tell her, too, that\nit would be quite wrong not to avail herself of an opening which may\nby-and-by be extended to the rest of the family. I am sure if they\nask me--which certainly they ought to do--I won't say before they\nasked Cynthia, because I never think of myself, and am really the\nmost forgiving person in the world, in forgiving slights;--but when\nthey do ask me, which they are sure to do, I shall never be content\ntill, by putting in a little hint here and a little hint there, I've\ninduced them to send you an invitation. A month or two in London\nwould do you so much good, Molly.\"\n\nMolly had left the room before this speech was ended, and Mr. Gibson\nwas occupied with his newspaper; but Mrs. Gibson finished it to\nherself very much to her own satisfaction; for, after all, it was\nbetter to have some one of the family going on the visit, though she\nmight not be the right person, than to refuse it altogether, and\nnever to have the opportunity of saying anything about it. As Mr.\nGibson was so kind to Cynthia, she too would be kind to Molly, and\ndress her becomingly, and invite young men to the house; do all\nthe things, in fact, which Molly and her father did not want to\nhave done, and throw the old stumbling-blocks in the way of their\nunrestrained intercourse, which was the one thing they desired to\nhave, free and open, and without the constant dread of her jealousy.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXXIX.\n\nSECRET THOUGHTS OOZE OUT.\n\n\nMolly found Cynthia in the drawing-room, standing in the bow-window,\nlooking out on the garden. She started as Molly came up to her.\n\n\"Oh, Molly,\" said she, putting her arms out towards her, \"I am always\nso glad to have you with me!\"\n\nIt was outbursts of affection such as these that always called\nMolly back, if she had been ever so unconsciously wavering in her\nallegiance to Cynthia. She had been wishing downstairs that Cynthia\nwould be less reserved, and not have so many secrets; but now it\nseemed almost like treason to have wanted her to be anything but what\nshe was. Never had any one more than Cynthia the power spoken of by\nGoldsmith when he wrote--\n\n\tHe threw off his friends like a huntsman his pack,\n\tFor he knew when he liked he could whistle them back.\n\n\"Do you know, I think you'll be glad to hear what I've got to tell\nyou,\" said Molly. \"I think you would really like to go to London;\nshouldn't you?\"\n\n\"Yes, but it's of no use liking,\" said Cynthia. \"Don't you begin\nabout it, Molly, for the thing is settled; and I can't tell you why,\nbut I can't go.\"\n\n\"It is only the money, dear. And papa has been so kind about it. He\nwants you to go; he thinks you ought to keep up relationships; and he\nis going to give you ten pounds.\"\n\n\"How kind he is!\" said Cynthia. \"But I ought not to take it. I wish I\nhad known you years ago; I should have been different to what I am.\"\n\n\"Never mind that! We like you as you are; we don't want you\ndifferent. You'll really hurt papa if you don't take it. Why do you\nhesitate? Do you think Roger won't like it?\"\n\n\"Roger! no, I wasn't thinking about him! Why should he care? I shall\nbe there and back again before he even hears about it.\"\n\n\"Then you will go?\" said Molly.\n\nCynthia thought for a minute or two. \"Yes, I will,\" said she, at\nlength. \"I daresay it's not wise; but it will be pleasant, and I'll\ngo. Where is Mr. Gibson? I want to thank him. Oh, how kind he is!\nMolly, you're a lucky girl!\"\n\n\"I?\" said Molly, quite startled at being told this; for she had been\nfeeling as if so many things were going wrong, almost as if they\nwould never go right again.\n\n\"There he is!\" said Cynthia. \"I hear him in the hall!\" And down\nshe flew, and laying her hands on Mr. Gibson's arm, she thanked\nhim with such warm impulsiveness, and in so pretty and caressing a\nmanner, that something of his old feeling of personal liking for her\nreturned, and he forgot for a time the causes of disapproval he had\nagainst her.\n\n\"There, there!\" said he, \"that's enough, my dear! It's quite right\nyou should keep up with your relations; there's nothing more to be\nsaid about it.\"\n\n\"I do think your father is the most charming man I know,\" said\nCynthia, on her return to Molly; \"and it's that which always makes\nme so afraid of losing his good opinion, and fret so when I think he\nis displeased with me. And now let us think all about this London\nvisit. It will be delightful, won't it? I can make ten pounds go ever\nso far; and in some ways it will be such a comfort to get out of\nHollingford.\"\n\n\"Will it?\" said Molly, rather wistfully.\n\n\"Oh, yes! You know I don't mean that it will be a comfort to leave\nyou; that will be anything but a comfort. But, after all, a country\ntown is a country town, and London is London. You need not smile at\nmy truisms; I've always had a sympathy with M. de la Palisse,--\n\n   M. de la Palisse est mort\n      En perdant sa vie;\n   Un quart d'heure avant sa mort\n      Il était en vie,\"\n\nsang she, in so gay a manner that she puzzled Molly, as she often\ndid, by her change of mood from the gloomy decision with which she\nhad refused to accept the invitation only half an hour ago. She\nsuddenly took Molly round the waist, and began waltzing round the\nroom with her, to the imminent danger of the various little tables,\nloaded with \"_objets d'art_\" (as Mrs. Gibson delighted to call them)\nwith which the drawing-room was crowded. She avoided them, however,\nwith her usual skill; but they both stood still at last, surprised\nat Mrs. Gibson's surprise, as she stood at the door, looking at the\nwhirl going on before her.\n\n\"Upon my word, I only hope you are not going crazy, both of you!\nWhat's all this about, pray?\"\n\n\"Only because I'm so glad I'm going to London, mamma,\" said Cynthia,\ndemurely.\n\n\"I'm not sure if it's quite the thing for an engaged young lady to\nbe so much beside herself at the prospect of gaiety. In my time, our\ngreat pleasure in our lovers' absence was in thinking about them.\"\n\n\"I should have thought that would have given you pain, because you\nwould have had to remember that they were away, which ought to have\nmade you unhappy. Now, to tell you the truth, just at the moment I\nhad forgotten all about Roger. I hope it wasn't very wrong. Osborne\nlooks as if he did all my share as well as his own of the fretting\nafter Roger. How ill he looked yesterday!\"\n\n\"Yes,\" said Molly; \"I didn't know if any one besides me had noticed\nit. I was quite shocked.\"\n\n\"Ah,\" said Mrs. Gibson, \"I'm afraid that young man won't live\nlong--very much afraid,\" and she shook her head ominously.\n\n\"Oh, what will happen if he dies!\" exclaimed Molly, suddenly sitting\ndown, and thinking of that strange, mysterious wife who never made\nher appearance, whose very existence was never spoken about--and\nRoger away too!\n\n\"Well, it would be very sad, of course, and we should all feel it\nvery much, I've no doubt; for I've always been very fond of Osborne;\nin fact, before Roger became, as it were, my own flesh and blood, I\nliked Osborne better: but we must not forget the living, dear Molly,\"\n(for Molly's eyes were filling with tears at the dismal thoughts\npresented to her). \"Our dear good Roger would, I am sure, do all in\nhis power to fill Osborne's place in every way; and his marriage need\nnot be so long delayed.\"\n\n\"Don't speak of that in the same breath as Osborne's life, mamma,\"\nsaid Cynthia, hastily.\n\n\"Why, my dear, it is a very natural thought. For poor Roger's sake,\nyou know, one wishes it not to be so very, very long an engagement;\nand I was only answering Molly's question, after all. One can't help\nfollowing out one's thoughts. People must die, you know--young, as\nwell as old.\"\n\n\"If I ever suspected Roger of following out his thoughts in a similar\nway,\" said Cynthia, \"I'd never speak to him again.\"\n\n\"As if he would!\" said Molly, warm in her turn. \"You know he never\nwould; and you shouldn't suppose it of him, Cynthia--no, not even for\na moment!\"\n\n\"I can't see the great harm of it all, for my part,\" said Mrs.\nGibson, plaintively. \"A young man strikes us all as looking very\nill--and I'm sure I'm sorry for it; but illness very often leads to\ndeath. Surely you agree with me there, and what's the harm of saying\nso? Then Molly asks what will happen if he dies; and I try to answer\nher question. I don't like talking or thinking of death any more than\nany one else; but I should think myself wanting in strength of mind\nif I could not look forward to the consequences of death. I really\nthink we're commanded to do so, somewhere in the Bible or the\nPrayer-book.\"\n\n\"Do you look forward to the consequences of my death, mamma?\" asked\nCynthia.\n\n\"You really are the most unfeeling girl I ever met with,\" said Mrs.\nGibson, really hurt. \"I wish I could give you a little of my own\nsensitiveness, for I have too much for my happiness. Don't let us\nspeak of Osborne's looks again; ten to one it was only some temporary\nover-fatigue, or some anxiety about Roger, or perhaps a little fit\nof indigestion. I was very foolish to attribute it to anything more\nserious, and dear papa might be displeased if he knew I had done\nso. Medical men don't like other people to be making conjectures\nabout health; they consider it as trenching on their own particular\nprovince, and very proper, I'm sure. Now let us consider about your\ndress, Cynthia; I could not understand how you had spent your money,\nand made so little show with it.\"\n\n\"Mamma! it may sound very cross, but I must tell Molly, and you, and\neverybody, once for all, that as I don't want and didn't ask for more\nthan my allowance, I'm not going to answer any questions about what\nI do with it.\" She did not say this with any want of respect; but she\nsaid it with quiet determination, which subdued her mother for the\ntime; though often afterwards, when Mrs. Gibson and Molly were alone,\nthe former would start the wonder as to what Cynthia could possibly\nhave done with her money, and hunt each poor conjecture through woods\nand valleys of doubt, till she was wearied out; and the exciting\nsport was given up for the day. At present, however, she confined\nherself to the practical matter in hand; and the genius for millinery\nand dress, inherent in both mother and daughter, soon settled a great\nmany knotty points of contrivance and taste, and then they all three\nset to work to \"gar auld claes look amaist as weel's the new.\"\n\nCynthia's relations with the Squire had been very stationary ever\nsince the visit she had paid to the Hall the previous autumn. He had\nreceived them all at that time with hospitable politeness, and he\nhad been more charmed with Cynthia than he liked to acknowledge to\nhimself when he thought the visit all over afterwards.\n\n\"She's a pretty lass, sure enough,\" thought he, \"and has pretty ways\nabout her too, and likes to learn from older people, which is a good\nsign; but somehow I don't like madam her mother; but still she is her\nmother, and the girl's her daughter; yet she spoke to her once or\ntwice as I shouldn't ha' liked our little Fanny to have spoken, if\nit had pleased God for her to ha' lived. No, it's not the right way,\nand it may be a bit old-fashioned, but I like the right way. And then\nagain she took possession o' me, as I may say, and little Molly had\nto run after us in the garden walks that are too narrow for three,\njust like a little four-legged doggie; and the other was so full of\nlistening to me, she never turned round for to speak a word to Molly.\nI don't mean to say they're not fond of each other, and that's in\nRoger's sweetheart's favour; and it's very ungrateful in me to go and\nfind fault with a lass who was so civil to me, and had such a pretty\nway with her of hanging on every word that fell from my lips. Well!\na deal may come and go in two years! and the lad says nothing to me\nabout it. I'll be as deep as him, and take no more notice of the\naffair till he comes home and tells me himself.\"\n\nSo although the Squire was always delighted to receive the little\nnotes which Cynthia sent him every time she heard from Roger, and\nalthough this attention on her part was melting the heart he tried\nto harden, he controlled himself into writing her the briefest\nacknowledgments. His words were strong in meaning, but formal\nin expression; she herself did not think much about them, being\nsatisfied to do the kind actions that called them forth. But her\nmother criticised them and pondered them. She thought she had hit\non the truth when she decided in her own mind that it was a very\nold-fashioned style, and that he and his house and his furniture\nall wanted some of the brightening up and polishing which they were\nsure to receive, when--she never quite liked to finish the sentence\ndefinitely, although she kept repeating to herself that \"there was no\nharm in it.\"\n\nTo return to the Squire. Occupied as he now was, he recovered his\nformer health, and something of his former cheerfulness. If Osborne\nhad met him half-way, it is probable that the old bond between father\nand son might have been renewed; but Osborne either was really an\ninvalid, or had sunk into invalid habits, and made no effort to\nrally. If his father urged him to go out--nay, once or twice he\ngulped down his pride, and asked Osborne to accompany him--Osborne\nwould go to the window and find out some flaw or speck in the wind\nor weather, and make that an excuse for stopping in-doors over his\nbooks. He would saunter out on the sunny side of the house in a\nmanner that the Squire considered as both indolent and unmanly. Yet\nif there was a prospect of his leaving home, which he did pretty\noften about this time, he was seized with a hectic energy: the clouds\nin the sky, the easterly wind, the dampness of the air, were nothing\nto him then; and as the Squire did not know the real secret cause\nof this anxiety to be gone, he took it into his head that it arose\nfrom Osborne's dislike to Hamley and to the monotony of his father's\nsociety.\n\n\"It was a mistake,\" thought the Squire. \"I see it now. I was never\ngreat at making friends myself: I always thought those Oxford and\nCambridge men turned up their noses at me for a country booby, and\nI'd get the start and have none o' them. But when the boys went to\nRugby and Cambridge, I should ha' let them have had their own friends\nabout 'em, even though they might ha' looked down on me; it was the\nworst they could ha' done to me; and now what few friends I had have\nfallen off from me, by death or somehow, and it is but dreary work\nfor a young man, I grant it. But he might try not to show it so plain\nto me as he does. I'm getting case-hardened, but it does cut me to\nthe quick sometimes--it does. And he so fond of his dad as he was\nonce! If I can but get the land drained I'll make him an allowance,\nand let him go to London, or where he likes. Maybe he'll do better\nthis time, or maybe he'll go to the dogs altogether; but perhaps it\nwill make him think a bit kindly of the old father at home--I should\nlike him to do that, I should!\"\n\nIt is possible that Osborne might have been induced to tell his\nfather of his marriage during their long solitary intercourse, if the\nSquire, in an unlucky moment, had not given him his confidence about\nRoger's engagement with Cynthia. It was on one wet Sunday afternoon,\nwhen the father and son were sitting together in the large empty\ndrawing-room. Osborne had not been to church in the morning; the\nSquire had, and he was now trying hard to read one of Blair's\nsermons. They had dined early; they always did on Sundays; and either\nthat, or the sermon, or the hopeless wetness of the day, made the\nafternoon seem interminably long to the Squire. He had certain\nunwritten rules for the regulation of his conduct on Sundays. Cold\nmeat, sermon-reading, no smoking till after evening prayers, as\nlittle thought as possible as to the state of the land and the\ncondition of the crops, and as much respectable sitting in-doors in\nhis best clothes as was consistent with going to church twice a day,\nand saying the responses louder than the clerk. To-day it had rained\nso unceasingly that he had remitted the afternoon church; but oh,\neven with the luxury of a nap, how long it seemed before he saw the\nHall servants trudging homewards, along the field-path, a covey of\numbrellas! He had been standing at the window for the last half-hour,\nhis hands in his pockets, and his mouth often contracting itself into\nthe traditional sin of a whistle, but as often checked into sudden\ngravity--ending, nine times out of ten, in a yawn. He looked askance\nat Osborne, who was sitting near the fire absorbed in a book. The\npoor Squire was something like the little boy in the child's story,\nwho asks all sorts of birds and beasts to come and play with him;\nand, in every case, receives the sober answer, that they are too busy\nto have leisure for trivial amusements. The father wanted the son to\nput down his book, and talk to him: it was so wet, so dull, and a\nlittle conversation would so wile away the time! But Osborne, with\nhis back to the window where his father was standing, saw nothing\nof all this, and went on reading. He had assented to his father's\nremark that it was a very wet afternoon, but had not carried on the\nsubject into all the varieties of truisms of which it was susceptible.\nSomething more rousing must be started, and this the Squire felt. The\nrecollection of the affair between Roger and Cynthia came into his\nhead, and, without giving it a moment's consideration, he began,--\n\n\"Osborne! Do you know anything about this--this attachment of\nRoger's?\"\n\nQuite successful. Osborne laid down his book in a moment, and turned\nround to his father.\n\n\"Roger! an attachment! No! I never heard of it--I can hardly believe\nit--that is to say, I suppose it is to--\"\n\nAnd then he stopped; for he thought he had no right to betray his own\nconjecture that the object was Cynthia Kirkpatrick.\n\n\"Yes. He is though. Can you guess who to? Nobody that I particularly\nlike--not a connection to my mind--yet she's a very pretty girl; and\nI suppose I was to blame in the first instance.\"\n\n\"Is it--?\"\n\n\"It's no use beating about the bush. I've gone so far, I may as well\ntell you all. It's Miss Kirkpatrick, Gibson's stepdaughter. But it's\nnot an engagement, mind you--\"\n\n\"I'm very glad--I hope she likes Roger back again--\"\n\n\"Like--it's only too good a connection for her not to like it: if\nRoger is of the same mind when he comes home, I'll be bound she'll be\nonly too happy!\"\n\n\"I wonder Roger never told me,\" said Osborne, a little hurt, now he\nbegan to consider himself.\n\n\"He never told me either,\" said the Squire. \"It was Gibson, who came\nhere, and made a clean breast of it, like a man of honour. I'd been\nsaying to him, I couldn't have either of you two lads taking up with\nhis lasses. I'll own it was you I was afraid of--it's bad enough with\nRoger, and maybe will come to nothing after all; but if it had been\nyou, I'd ha' broken with Gibson and every mother's son of 'em, sooner\nthan have let it go on; and so I told Gibson.\"\n\n\"I beg your pardon for interrupting you, but, once for all, I claim\nthe right of choosing my wife for myself, subject to no man's\ninterference,\" said Osborne, hotly.\n\n\"Then you'll keep your wife with no man's interference, that's all;\nfor ne'er a penny will you get from me, my lad, unless you marry to\nplease me a little, as well as yourself a great deal. That's all I\nask of you. I'm not particular as to beauty, or as to cleverness, and\npiano-playing, and that sort of thing; if Roger marries this girl, we\nshall have enough of that in the family. I shouldn't much mind her\nbeing a bit older than you, but she must be well-born, and the more\nmoney she brings the better for the old place.\"\n\n\"I say again, father, I choose my wife for myself, and I don't admit\nany man's right of dictation.\"\n\n\"Well, well!\" said the Squire, getting a little angry in his turn.\n\"If I'm not to be father in this matter, thou sha'n't be son. Go\nagainst me in what I've set my heart on, and you'll find there's the\ndevil to pay, that's all. But don't let us get angry, it's Sunday\nafternoon for one thing, and it's a sin; and besides that, I've not\nfinished my story.\"\n\nFor Osborne had taken up his book again, and under pretence of\nreading, was fuming to himself. He hardly put it away even at his\nfather's request.\n\n\"As I was saying, Gibson said, when first we spoke about it, that\nthere was nothing on foot between any of you four, and that if there\nwas, he would let me know; so by-and-by he comes and tells me of\nthis.\"\n\n\"Of what--I don't understand how far it has gone?\"\n\nThere was a tone in Osborne's voice the Squire did not quite like;\nand he began answering rather angrily.\n\n\"Of this, to be sure--of what I'm telling you--of Roger going and\nmaking love to this girl, that day he left, after he had gone away\nfrom here, and was waiting for the 'Umpire' in Hollingford. One would\nthink you quite stupid at times, Osborne.\"\n\n\"I can only say that these details are quite new to me; you never\nmentioned them before, I assure you.\"\n\n\"Well; never mind whether I did or not. I'm sure I said Roger was\nattached to Miss Kirkpatrick, and be hanged to her; and you might\nhave understood all the rest as a matter of course.\"\n\n\"Possibly,\" said Osborne, politely. \"May I ask if Miss Kirkpatrick,\nwho appeared to me to be a very nice girl, responds to Roger's\naffection?\"\n\n\"Fast enough, I'll be bound,\" said the Squire, sulkily. \"A Hamley of\nHamley isn't to be had every day. Now, I'll tell you what, Osborne,\nyou're the only marriageable one left in the market, and I want to\nhoist the old family up again. Don't go against me in this; it really\nwill break my heart if you do.\"\n\n\"Father, don't talk so,\" said Osborne. \"I'll do anything I can to\noblige you, except--\"\n\n\"Except the only thing I've set my heart on your doing.\"\n\n\"Well, well, let it alone for the present. There's no question of my\nmarrying just at this moment. I'm out of health, and I'm not up to\ngoing into society, and meeting young ladies and all that sort of\nthing, even if I had an opening into fitting society.\"\n\n\"You should have an opening fast enough. There'll be more money\ncoming in, in a year or two, please God. And as for your health, why,\nwhat's to make you well, if you cower over the fire all day, and\nshudder away from a good honest tankard as if it were poison?\"\n\n\"So it is to me,\" said Osborne, languidly, playing with his book as\nif he wanted to end the conversation and take it up again. The Squire\nsaw the movements, and understood them.\n\n\"Well,\" said he, \"I'll go and have a talk with Will about poor old\nBlack Bess. It's Sunday work enough, asking after a dumb animal's\naches and pains.\"\n\nBut after his father had left the room Osborne did not take up his\nbook again. He laid it down on the table by him, leant back in his\nchair, and covered his eyes with his hand. He was in a state of\nhealth which made him despondent about many things, though, least\nof all, about what was most in danger. The long concealment of his\nmarriage from his father made the disclosure of it far, far more\ndifficult than it would have been at first. Unsupported by Roger, how\ncould he explain it all to one so passionate as the Squire? how tell\nof the temptation, the stolen marriage, the consequent happiness, and\nalas! the consequent suffering?--for Osborne had suffered, and did\nsuffer, greatly in the untoward circumstances in which he had placed\nhimself. He saw no way out of it all, excepting by the one strong\nstroke of which he felt himself incapable. So with a heavy heart he\naddressed himself to his book again. Everything seemed to come in his\nway, and he was not strong enough in character to overcome obstacles.\nThe only overt step he took in consequence of what he had heard from\nhis father, was to ride over to Hollingford the first fine day after\nhe had received the news, and go to see Cynthia and the Gibsons. He\nhad not been there for a long time; bad weather and languor combined\nhad prevented him. He found them full of preparations and discussions\nabout Cynthia's visit to London; and she herself not at all in\nthe sentimental mood proper to respond to his delicate intimations\nof how glad he was in his brother's joy. Indeed, it was so long\nafter the time, that Cynthia scarcely perceived that to him the\nintelligence was recent, and that the first bloom of his emotions\nhad not yet passed away. With her head a little on one side,\nshe was contemplating the effect of a knot of ribbons, when he\nbegan, in a low whisper, and leaning forward towards her as he\nspoke,--\"Cynthia--I may call you Cynthia now, mayn't I?--I'm so glad\nof this news; I've only just heard of it, but I'm so glad!\"\n\n\"What news do you mean?\" She had her suspicions; but she was annoyed\nto think that from one person her secret was passing to another and\nanother, till, in fact, it was becoming no secret at all. Still,\nCynthia could always conceal her annoyance when she chose. \"Why are\nyou to begin calling me Cynthia now?\" she went on, smiling. \"The\nterrible word has slipped out from between your lips before, do you\nknow?\"\n\nThis light way of taking his tender congratulation did not quite\nplease Osborne, who was in a sentimental mood, and for a minute or so\nhe remained silent. Then, having finished making her bow of ribbon,\nshe turned to him, and continued in a quick low voice, anxious to\ntake advantage of a conversation between her mother and Molly,--\n\n\"I think I can guess why you made that pretty little speech just\nnow. But do you know you ought not to have been told? And, moreover,\nthings are not quite arrived at the solemnity of--of--well--an\nengagement. He would not have it so. Now, I sha'n't say any more; and\nyou must not. Pray remember you ought not to have known; it is my\nown secret, and I particularly wished it not to be spoken about; and\nI don't like its being so talked about. Oh, the leaking of water\nthrough one small hole!\"\n\nAnd then she plunged into the talk of the other two, making the\nconversation general. Osborne was rather discomfited at the\nnon-success of his congratulations; he had pictured to himself the\nunbosoming of a love-sick girl, full of rapture, and glad of a\nsympathizing confidant. He little knew Cynthia's nature. The more she\nsuspected that she was called upon for a display of emotion, the less\nwould she show; and her emotions were generally under the control of\nher will. He had made an effort to come and see her; and now he leant\nback in his chair, weary and a little dispirited.\n\n\"You poor dear young man,\" said Mrs. Gibson, coming up to him with\nher soft, soothing manner; \"how tired you look! Do take some of that\neau-de-Cologne and bathe your forehead. This spring weather overcomes\nme too. 'Primavera' I think the Italians call it. But it is very\ntrying for delicate constitutions, as much from its associations as\nfrom its variableness of temperature. It makes me sigh perpetually;\nbut then I am so sensitive. Dear Lady Cumnor always used to say I was\nlike a thermometer. You've heard how ill she has been?\"\n\n\"No,\" said Osborne, not very much caring either.\n\n\"Oh, yes, she is better now; but the anxiety about her has tried me\nso: detained here by what are, of course, my duties, but far away\nfrom all intelligence, and not knowing what the next post might\nbring.\"\n\n\"Where was she then?\" asked Osborne, becoming a little more\nsympathetic.\n\n\"At Spa. Such a distance off! Three days' post! Can't you conceive\nthe trial? Living with her as I did for years; bound up in the family\nas I was.\"\n\n\"But Lady Harriet said, in her last letter, that they hoped she would\nbe stronger than she had been for years,\" said Molly, innocently.\n\n\"Yes--Lady Harriet--of course--every one who knows Lady Harriet knows\nthat she is of too sanguine a temperament for her statements to be\nperfectly relied on. Altogether--strangers are often deluded by Lady\nHarriet--she has an off-hand manner which takes them in; but she does\nnot mean half she says.\"\n\n\"We will hope she does in this instance,\" said Cynthia, shortly.\n\"They're in London now, and Lady Cumnor hasn't suffered from the\njourney.\"\n\n\"They say so,\" said Mrs. Gibson, shaking her head, and laying an\nemphasis on the word \"say.\" \"I am perhaps over-anxious, but I wish--I\nwish I could see and judge for myself. It would be the only way of\ncalming my anxiety. I almost think I shall go up with you, Cynthia,\nfor a day or two, just to see her with my own eyes. I don't quite\nlike your travelling alone either. We will think about it, and you\nshall write to Mr. Kirkpatrick, and propose it, if we determine upon\nit. You can tell him of my anxiety; and it will be only sharing your\nbed for a couple of nights.\"\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XL.\n\nMOLLY GIBSON BREATHES FREELY.\n\n\nThat was the way in which Mrs. Gibson first broached her intention\nof accompanying Cynthia up to London for a few days' visit. She had\na trick of producing the first sketch of any new plan before an\noutsider to the family circle; so that the first emotions of others,\nif they disapproved of her projects, had to be repressed, until the\nidea had become familiar to them. To Molly it seemed too charming\na proposal ever to come to pass. She had never allowed herself to\nrecognize the restraint she was under in her stepmother's presence;\nbut all at once she found it out when her heart danced at the idea\nof three whole days--for that it would be at the least--of perfect\nfreedom of intercourse with her father; of old times come back again;\nof meals without perpetual fidgetiness after details of ceremony and\ncorrectness of attendance.\n\n\"We'll have bread-and-cheese for dinner, and eat it on our knees;\nwe'll make up for having had to eat sloppy puddings with a fork\ninstead of a spoon all this time, by putting our knives in our mouths\ntill we cut ourselves. Papa shall pour his tea into his saucer if\nhe's in a hurry; and if I'm thirsty, I'll take the slop-basin. And\noh, if I could but get, buy, borrow, or steal any kind of an old\nhorse; my grey skirt isn't new, but it will do;--that would be too\ndelightful! After all, I think I can be happy again; for months and\nmonths it has seemed as if I had got too old ever to feel pleasure,\nmuch less happiness again.\"\n\nSo thought Molly. Yet she blushed, as if with guilt, when Cynthia,\nreading her thoughts, said to her one day,--\n\n\"Molly, you're very glad to get rid of us, are not you?\"\n\n\"Not of you, Cynthia; at least, I don't think I am. Only, if you but\nknew how I love papa, and how I used to see a great deal more of him\nthan I ever do now--\"\n\n\"Ah! I often think what interlopers we must seem, and are in fact--\"\n\n\"I don't feel you as such. You, at any rate, have been a new delight\nto me--a sister; and I never knew how charming such a relationship\ncould be.\"\n\n\"But mamma?\" said Cynthia, half-suspiciously, half-sorrowfully.\n\n\"She is papa's wife,\" said Molly, quietly. \"I don't mean to say I'm\nnot often very sorry to feel I'm no longer first with him; but it\nwas\"--the violent colour flushed into her face till even her eyes\nburnt, and she suddenly found herself on the point of crying; the\nweeping ash-tree, the misery, the slow dropping comfort, and the\ncomforter came all so vividly before her--\"it was Roger!\"--she went\non looking up at Cynthia, as she overcame her slight hesitation at\nmentioning his name--\"Roger, who told me how I ought to take papa's\nmarriage, when I was first startled and grieved at the news. Oh,\nCynthia, what a great thing it is to be loved by him!\"\n\nCynthia blushed, and looked fluttered and pleased.\n\n\"Yes, I suppose it is. At the same time, Molly, I'm afraid he'll\nexpect me to be always as good as he fancies me now, and I shall have\nto walk on tiptoe all the rest of my life.\"\n\n\"But you are good, Cynthia,\" put in Molly.\n\n\"No, I'm not. You're just as much mistaken as he is; and some day I\nshall go down in your opinions with a run, just like the hall clock\nthe other day when the spring broke.\"\n\n\"I think he'll love you just as much,\" said Molly.\n\n\"Could you? Would you be my friend if--if it turned out ever that I\nhad done very wrong things? Would you remember how very difficult it\nhas sometimes been to me to act rightly?\" (she took hold of Molly's\nhand as she spoke). \"We won't speak of mamma, for your sake as much\nas mine or hers; but you must see she isn't one to help a girl with\nmuch good advice, or good-- Oh, Molly, you don't know how I was\nneglected just at a time when I wanted friends most. Mamma does not\nknow it; it is not in her to know what I might have been if I had\nonly fallen into wise, good hands. But I know it; and what's more,\"\ncontinued she, suddenly ashamed of her unusual exhibition of feeling,\n\"I try not to care, which I daresay is really the worst of all; but I\ncould worry myself to death if I once took to serious thinking.\"\n\n\"I wish I could help you, or even understand you,\" said Molly, after\na moment or two of sad perplexity.\n\n\"You can help me,\" said Cynthia, changing her manner abruptly. \"I can\ntrim bonnets, and make head-dresses; but somehow my hands can't fold\nup gowns and collars, like your deft little fingers. Please will\nyou help me to pack? That's a real, tangible piece of kindness, and\nnot sentimental consolation for sentimental distresses, which are,\nperhaps, imaginary after all.\"\n\nIn general, it is the people that are left behind stationary, who\ngive way to low spirits at any parting; the travellers, however\nbitterly they may feel the separation, find something in the change\nof scene to soften regret in the very first hour of separation. But\nas Molly walked home with her father from seeing Mrs. Gibson and\nCynthia off to London by the \"Umpire\" coach, she almost danced along\nthe street.\n\n\"Now, papa!\" said she, \"I'm going to have you all to myself for a\nwhole week. You must be very obedient.\"\n\n\"Don't be tyrannical, then. You're walking me out of breath, and\nwe're cutting Mrs. Goodenough, in our hurry.\"\n\nSo they crossed over the street to speak to Mrs. Goodenough.\n\n\"We've just been seeing my wife and her daughter off to London. Mrs.\nGibson has gone up for a week!\"\n\n\"Deary, deary, to London, and only for a week! Why, I can remember\nits being a three days' journey! It'll be very lonesome for you, Miss\nMolly, without your young companion!\"\n\n\"Yes!\" said Molly, suddenly feeling as if she ought to have taken\nthis view of the case. \"I shall miss Cynthia very much.\"\n\n\"And you, Mr. Gibson; why, it'll be like being a widower over again!\nYou must come and drink tea with me some evening. We must try and\ncheer you up a bit amongst us. Shall it be Tuesday?\"\n\nIn spite of the sharp pinch which Molly gave to his arm, Mr. Gibson\naccepted the invitation, much to the gratification of the old lady.\n\n\"Papa, how could you go and waste one of our evenings! We have but\nsix in all, and now but five; and I had so reckoned on our doing all\nsorts of things together.\"\n\n\"What sort of things?\"\n\n\"Oh, I don't know: everything that is unrefined and ungenteel,\" added\nshe, slily looking up into her father's face.\n\nHis eyes twinkled, but the rest of his face was perfectly grave. \"I'm\nnot going to be corrupted. With toil and labour I've reached a very\nfair height of refinement. I won't be pulled down again.\"\n\n\"Yes, you will, papa. We'll have bread-and-cheese for lunch this\nvery day. And you shall wear your slippers in the drawing-room every\nevening you'll stay quietly at home; and oh, papa, don't you think I\ncould ride Nora Creina? I've been looking out the old grey skirt, and\nI think I could make myself tidy.\"\n\n\"Where is the side-saddle to come from?\"\n\n\"To be sure, the old one won't fit that great Irish mare. But I'm not\nparticular, papa. I think I could manage somehow.\"\n\n\"Thank you. But I'm not quite going to return into barbarism. It may\nbe a depraved taste, but I should like to see my daughter properly\nmounted.\"\n\n\"Think of riding together down the lanes--why, the dog-roses must be\nall out in flower, and the honeysuckles, and the hay--how I should\nlike to see Merriman's farm again! Papa, do let me have one ride with\nyou! Please do. I'm sure we can manage it somehow.\"\n\nAnd \"somehow\" it was managed. \"Somehow\" all Molly's wishes came to\npass; there was only one little drawback to this week of holiday and\nhappy intercourse with her father. Everybody would ask them out to\ntea. They were quite like bride and bridegroom; for the fact was,\nthat the late dinners which Mrs. Gibson had introduced into her own\nhouse, were a great inconvenience in the calculations of the small\ntea-drinkings at Hollingford. How ask people to tea at six, who dined\nat that hour? How, when they refused cake and sandwiches at half-past\neight, how induce other people who were really hungry to commit a\nvulgarity before those calm and scornful eyes? So there had been a\ngreat lull of invitations for the Gibsons to Hollingford tea-parties.\nMrs. Gibson, whose object was to squeeze herself into \"county\nsociety,\" had taken this being left out of the smaller festivities\nwith great equanimity; but Molly missed the kind homeliness of the\nparties to which she had gone from time to time as long as she could\nremember; and though, as each three-cornered note was brought in,\nshe grumbled a little over the loss of another charming evening\nwith her father, she really was glad to go again in the old way\namong old friends. Miss Browning and Miss Phoebe were especially\ncompassionate towards her in her loneliness. If they had had their\nwill she would have dined there every day; and she had to call upon\nthem very frequently in order to prevent their being hurt at her\ndeclining the dinners. Mrs. Gibson wrote twice during her week's\nabsence to her husband. That piece of news was quite satisfactory\nto the Miss Brownings, who had of late held themselves a great deal\naloof from a house where they chose to suppose that their presence\nwas not wanted. In their winter evenings they had often talked over\nMr. Gibson's household, and having little besides conjecture to go\nupon, they found the subject interminable, as they could vary the\npossibilities every day. One of their wonders was how Mr. and Mrs.\nGibson really got on together; another was whether Mrs. Gibson was\nextravagant or not. Now two letters during the week of her absence\nshowed what was in those days considered a very proper amount of\nconjugal affection. Yet not too much--at elevenpence-halfpenny\npostage. A third letter would have been extravagant. Sister looked to\nsister with an approving nod as Molly named the second letter, which\narrived in Hollingford the very day before Mrs. Gibson was to return.\nThey had settled between themselves that two letters would show the\nright amount of good feeling and proper understanding in the Gibson\nfamily: more would have been extravagant; only one would have been\na mere matter of duty. There had been rather a question between\nMiss Browning and Miss Phoebe as to which person the second letter\n(supposing it came) was to be addressed to. It would be very conjugal\nto write twice to Mr. Gibson; and yet it would be very pretty if\nMolly came in for her share.\n\n\"You've had another letter, you say, my dear?\" asked Miss Browning.\n\"I daresay Mrs. Gibson has written to you this time?\"\n\n\"It is a large sheet, and Cynthia has written on one half to me, and\nall the rest is to papa.\"\n\n\"A very nice arrangement, I'm sure. And what does Cynthia say? Is she\nenjoying herself?\"\n\n\"Oh, yes, I think so. They've had a dinner-party; and one night,\nwhen mamma was at Lady Cumnor's, Cynthia went to the play with her\ncousins.\"\n\n\"Upon my word! and all in one week? I do call that dissipation. Why,\nThursday would be taken up with the journey, and Friday with resting,\nand Sunday is Sunday all the world over; and they must have written\non Tuesday. Well! I hope Cynthia won't find Hollingford dull, that's\nall, when she comes back.\"\n\n\"I don't think it's likely,\" said Miss Phoebe, with a little simper\nand a knowing look, which sate oddly on her kindly innocent face.\n\"You see a great deal of Mr. Preston, don't you, Molly?\"\n\n\"Mr. Preston!\" said Molly, flushing up with surprise. \"No! not much.\nHe's been at Ashcombe all winter, you know! He has but just come back\nto settle here. What should make you think so?\"\n\n\"Oh! a little bird told us,\" said Miss Browning. Molly knew that\nlittle bird from her childhood, and had always hated it, and longed\nto wring its neck. Why could not people speak out and say that they\ndid not mean to give up the name of their informant? But it was a\nvery favourite form of fiction with the Miss Brownings, and to Miss\nPhoebe it was the very acme of wit.\n\n\"The little bird was flying about one day in Heath Lane, and it saw\nMr. Preston and a young lady--we won't say who--walking together in\na very friendly manner, that is to say, he was on horseback; but the\npath is raised above the road, just where there is the little wooden\nbridge over the brook--\"\n\n\"Perhaps Molly is in the secret, and we ought not to ask her about\nit,\" said Miss Phoebe, seeing Molly's extreme discomfiture and\nannoyance.\n\n\"It can be no great secret,\" said Miss Browning, dropping the\nlittle-bird formula, and assuming an air of dignified reproval at\nMiss Phoebe's interruption, \"for Miss Hornblower says Mr. Preston\nowns to being engaged--\"\n\n\"At any rate it isn't to Cynthia, that I know positively,\" said Molly\nwith some vehemence. \"And pray put a stop to any such reports; you\ndon't know what mischief they may do. I do so hate that kind of\nchatter!\" It was not very respectful of Molly to speak in this way\nto be sure, but she thought only of Roger; and the distress any such\nreports might cause, should he ever hear of them (in the centre of\nAfrica!) made her colour up scarlet with vexation.\n\n\"Heighty-teighty! Miss Molly! don't you remember that I am old enough\nto be your mother, and that it is not pretty behaviour to speak so to\nus--to me! 'Chatter' to be sure. Really, Molly--\"\n\n\"I beg your pardon,\" said Molly, only half-penitent.\n\n\"I daresay you did not mean to speak so to sister,\" said Miss\nPhoebe, trying to make peace.\n\nMolly did not answer all at once. She wanted to explain how much\nmischief might be done by such reports.\n\n\"But don't you see,\" she went on, still flushed by vexation, \"how\nbad it is to talk of such things in such a way? Supposing one of\nthem cared for some one else, and that might happen, you know; Mr.\nPreston, for instance, may be engaged to some one else?\"\n\n\"Molly! I pity the woman! Indeed I do. I have a very poor opinion of\nMr. Preston,\" said Miss Browning, in a warning tone of voice; for a\nnew idea had come into her head.\n\n\"Well, but the woman, or young lady, would not like to hear such\nreports about Mr. Preston.\"\n\n\"Perhaps not. But for all that, take my word for it, he's a great\nflirt, and young ladies had better not have much to do with him.\"\n\n\"I daresay it was all accident their meeting in Heath Lane,\" said\nMiss Phoebe.\n\n\"I know nothing about it,\" said Molly, \"and I daresay I have been\nimpertinent, only please don't talk about it any more. I have my\nreasons for asking you.\" She got up, for by the striking of the\nchurch clock she had just found out that it was later than she had\nthought, and she knew that her father would be at home by this time.\nShe bent down and kissed Miss Browning's grave and passive face.\n\n\"How you are growing, Molly!\" said Miss Phoebe, anxious to cover\nover her sister's displeasure. \"'As tall and as straight as a\npoplar-tree!' as the old song says.\"\n\n\"Grow in grace, Molly, as well as in good looks!\" said Miss Browning,\nwatching her out of the room. As soon as she was fairly gone, Miss\nBrowning got up and shut the door quite securely, and then sitting\ndown near her sister, she said, in a low voice, \"Phoebe, it was\nMolly herself that was with Mr. Preston in Heath Lane that day when\nMrs. Goodenough saw them together!\"\n\n\"Gracious goodness me!\" exclaimed Miss Phoebe, receiving it at once\nas gospel. \"How do you know?\"\n\n\"By putting two and two together. Didn't you notice how red Molly\nwent, and then pale, and how she said she knew for a fact that Mr.\nPreston and Cynthia Kirkpatrick were not engaged?\"\n\n\"Perhaps not engaged; but Mrs. Goodenough saw them loitering\ntogether, all by their own two selves--\"\n\n\"Mrs. Goodenough only crossed Heath Lane at the Shire Oak, as she was\nriding in her phaeton,\" said Miss Browning sententiously. \"We all\nknow what a coward she is in a carriage, so that most likely she had\nonly half her wits about her, and her eyes are none of the best when\nshe is standing steady on the ground. Molly and Cynthia have got\ntheir new plaid shawls just alike, and they trim their bonnets alike,\nand Molly is grown as tall as Cynthia since Christmas. I was always\nafraid she'd be short and stumpy, but she's now as tall and slender\nas anyone need be. I'll answer for it, Mrs. Goodenough saw Molly, and\ntook her for Cynthia.\"\n\nWhen Miss Browning \"answered for it\" Miss Phoebe gave up doubting.\nShe sate some time in silence revolving her thoughts. Then she said:\n\n\"It wouldn't be such a very bad match after all, sister.\" She spoke\nvery meekly, awaiting her sister's sanction to her opinion.\n\n\"Phoebe, it would be a bad match for Mary Pearson's daughter. If\nI had known what I know now we'd never have had him to tea last\nSeptember.\"\n\n\"Why, what do you know?\" asked Miss Phoebe.\n\n\"Miss Hornblower told me many things; some that I don't think\nyou ought to hear, Phoebe. He was engaged to a very pretty Miss\nGregson, at Henwick, where he comes from; and her father made\ninquiries, and heard so much that was bad about him that he made his\ndaughter break off the match, and she's dead since!\"\n\n\"How shocking!\" said Miss Phoebe, duly impressed.\n\n\"Besides, he plays at billiards, and he bets at races, and some\npeople do say he keeps race-horses.\"\n\n\"But isn't it strange that the earl keeps him on as his agent?\"\n\n\"No! perhaps not. He's very clever about land, and very sharp in all\nlaw affairs; and my lord isn't bound to take notice--if indeed he\nknows--of the manner in which Mr. Preston talks when he has taken too\nmuch wine.\"\n\n\"Taken too much wine! Oh, sister, is he a drunkard? and we have had\nhim to tea!\"\n\n\"I didn't say he was a drunkard, Phoebe,\" said Miss Browning,\npettishly. \"A man may take too much wine occasionally, without being\na drunkard. Don't let me hear you using such coarse words, Phoebe!\"\n\nMiss Phoebe was silent for a time after this rebuke.\n\nPresently she said, \"I do hope it wasn't Molly Gibson.\"\n\n\"You may hope as much as you like, but I'm pretty sure it was.\nHowever, we'd better say nothing about it to Mrs. Goodenough; she has\ngot Cynthia into her head, and there let her rest. Time enough to set\nreports afloat about Molly when we know there's some truth in them.\nMr. Preston might do for Cynthia, who's been brought up in France,\nthough she has such pretty manners; but it may have made her not\nparticular. He must not, and he shall not, have Molly, if I go into\nchurch and forbid the banns myself; but I'm afraid--I'm afraid\nthere's something between her and him. We must keep on the look-out,\nPhoebe. I'll be her guardian angel, in spite of herself.\"\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XLI.\n\nGATHERING CLOUDS.\n\n\n[Illustration (untitled)]\n\nMrs. Gibson came back full of rose-coloured accounts of London. Lady\nCumnor had been gracious and affectionate, \"so touched by my going\nup to see her so soon after her return to England,\" Lady Harriet\ncharming and devoted to her old governess, Lord Cumnor \"just like\nhis dear usual hearty self;\" and as for the Kirkpatricks, no Lord\nChancellor's house was ever grander than theirs, and the silk gown of\nthe Q.C. had floated over housemaids and footmen. Cynthia, too, was\nso much admired; and as for her dress, Mrs. Kirkpatrick had showered\ndown ball-dresses and wreaths, and pretty bonnets and mantles, like a\nfairy godmother. Mr. Gibson's poor present of ten pounds shrank into\nvery small dimensions compared with all this munificence.\n\n\"And they're so fond of her, I don't know when we shall have her\nback,\" was Mrs. Gibson's winding-up sentence. \"And now, Molly, what\nhave you and papa been doing? Very gay, you sounded in your letter.\nI had not time to read it in London; so I put it in my pocket, and\nread it in the coach coming home. But, my dear child, you do look\nso old-fashioned with your gown made all tight, and your hair all\ntumbling about in curls. Curls are quite gone out. We must do your\nhair differently,\" she continued, trying to smooth Molly's black\nwaves into straightness.\n\n\"I sent Cynthia an African letter,\" said Molly, timidly. \"Did you\nhear anything of what was in it?\"\n\n\"Oh, yes, poor child! It made her very uneasy, I think; she said she\ndid not feel inclined to go to Mr. Rawson's ball, which was on that\nnight, and for which Mrs. Kirkpatrick had given her the ball-dress.\nBut there was really nothing for her to fidget herself about. Roger\nonly said he had had another touch of fever, but was better when he\nwrote. He says every European has to be acclimatized by fever in that\npart of Abyssinia where he is.\"\n\n\"And did she go?\" asked Molly.\n\n\"Yes, to be sure. It is not an engagement; and if it were, it is not\nacknowledged. Fancy her going and saying, 'A young man that I know\nhas been ill for a few days in Africa, two months ago, therefore I\ndon't want to go to the ball to-night.' It would have seemed like\naffectation of sentiment; and if there's one thing I hate it is\nthat.\"\n\n\"She would hardly enjoy herself,\" said Molly.\n\n\"Oh, yes, but she did. Her dress was white gauze, trimmed with\nlilacs, and she really did look--a mother may be allowed a little\nnatural partiality--most lovely. And she danced every dance, although\nshe was quite a stranger. I am sure she enjoyed herself, from her\nmanner of talking about it next morning.\"\n\n\"I wonder if the Squire knows.\"\n\n\"Knows what? Oh, yes, to be sure--you mean about Roger. I daresay he\ndoesn't, and there's no need to tell him, for I've no doubt it is all\nright now.\" And she went out of the room to finish her unpacking.\n\nMolly let her work fall, and sighed. \"It will be a year the day after\nto-morrow since he came here to propose our going to Hurst Wood, and\nmamma was so vexed at his calling before lunch. I wonder if Cynthia\nremembers it as well as I do. And now, perhaps-- Oh! Roger, Roger! I\nwish--I pray that you were safe home again! How could we all bear it,\nif--\"\n\nShe covered her face with her hands, and tried to stop thinking.\nSuddenly she got up, as if stung by a venomous fancy.\n\n\"I don't believe she loves him as she ought, or she could not--could\nnot have gone and danced. What shall I do if she does not? What shall\nI do? I can bear anything but that.\"\n\nBut she found the long suspense as to his health hard enough to\nendure. They were not likely to hear from him for a month at least,\nand before that time had elapsed Cynthia would be at home again.\nMolly learnt to long for her return before a fortnight of her absence\nwas over. She had had no idea that perpetual tête-à-têtes with Mrs.\nGibson could, by any possibility, be so tiresome as she found them.\nPerhaps Molly's state of delicate health, consequent upon her rapid\ngrowth during the last few months, made her irritable; but really\noften she had to get up and leave the room to calm herself down after\nlistening to a long series of words, more frequently plaintive or\ndiscontented in tone than cheerful, and which at the end conveyed\nno distinct impression of either the speaker's thought or feeling.\nWhenever anything had gone wrong, whenever Mr. Gibson had coolly\npersevered in anything to which she had objected; whenever the cook\nhad made a mistake about the dinner, or the housemaid broken any\nlittle frangible article; whenever Molly's hair was not done to her\nliking, or her dress did not become her, or the smell of dinner\npervaded the house, or the wrong callers came, or the right callers\ndid not come--in fact, whenever anything went wrong, poor Mr.\nKirkpatrick was regretted and mourned over, nay, almost blamed, as\nif, had he only given himself the trouble of living, he could have\nhelped it.\n\n\"When I look back to those happy days, it seems to me as if I had\nnever valued them as I ought. To be sure--youth, love,--what did we\ncare for poverty! I remember dear Mr. Kirkpatrick walking five miles\ninto Stratford to buy me a muffin because I had such a fancy for one\nafter Cynthia was born. I don't mean to complain of dear papa--but\nI don't think--but, perhaps I ought not to say it to you. If Mr.\nKirkpatrick had but taken care of that cough of his; but he was so\nobstinate! Men always are, I think. And it really was selfish of\nhim. Only I daresay he did not consider the forlorn state in which I\nshould be left. It came harder upon me than upon most people, because\nI always was of such an affectionate sensitive nature. I remember a\nlittle poem of Mr. Kirkpatrick's, in which he compared my heart to a\nharpstring, vibrating to the slightest breeze.\"\n\n\"I thought harpstrings required a pretty strong finger to make them\nsound,\" said Molly.\n\n\"My dear child, you've no more poetry in you than your father. And as\nfor your hair! it's worse than ever. Can't you drench it in water to\ntake those untidy twists and twirls out of it?\"\n\n\"It only makes it curl more and more when it gets dry,\" said Molly,\nsudden tears coming into her eyes as a recollection came before her\nlike a picture seen long ago and forgotten for years--a young mother\nwashing and dressing her little girl; placing the half-naked darling\non her knee, and twining the wet rings of dark hair fondly round her\nfingers, and then, in an ecstasy of fondness, kissing the little\ncurly head.\n\nThe receipt of Cynthia's letters made very agreeable events. She\ndid not write often, but her letters were tolerably long when they\ndid come, and very sprightly in tone. There was constant mention\nmade of many new names, which conveyed no idea to Molly, though Mrs.\nGibson would try and enlighten her by running commentaries like the\nfollowing:--\n\n\"Mrs. Green! ah, that's Mr. Jones's pretty cousin, who lives in\nRussell Square with the fat husband. They keep their carriage; but\nI'm not sure if it is not Mr. Green who is Mrs. Jones's cousin. We\ncan ask Cynthia when she comes home. Mr. Henderson! to be sure--a\nyoung man with black whiskers, a pupil of Mr. Kirkpatrick's\nformerly,--or was he a pupil of Mr. Murray's? I know they said he had\nread law with somebody. Ah, yes! they are the people who called the\nday after Mr. Rawson's ball, and who admired Cynthia so much, without\nknowing I was her mother. She was very handsomely dressed indeed, in\nblack satin; and the son had a glass eye, but he was a young man of\ngood property. Coleman! yes, that was the name.\"\n\nNo more news of Roger until some time after Cynthia had returned from\nher London visit. She came back looking fresher and prettier than\never, beautifully dressed, thanks to her own good taste, and her\ncousin's generosity, full of amusing details of the gay life she had\nbeen enjoying, yet not at all out of spirits at having left it behind\nher. She brought home all sorts of pretty and dainty devices for\nMolly; a neck-ribbon made up in the newest fashion, a pattern for a\ntippet, a delicate pair of light gloves, embroidered as Molly had\nnever seen gloves embroidered before, and many another little sign of\nremembrance during her absence. Yet somehow or other, Molly felt that\nCynthia was changed in her relation to her. Molly was aware that she\nhad never had Cynthia's full confidence, for with all her apparent\nfrankness and _naïveté_ of manner, Cynthia was extremely reserved and\nreticent. She knew this much of herself, and had often laughed about\nit to Molly, and the latter had by this time found out the truth of\nher friend's assertion. But Molly did not trouble herself much about\nit. She too knew that there were many thoughts and feelings that\nflitted through her mind which she should never think of telling\nto any one, except perhaps--if they were ever very much thrown\ntogether--to her father. She knew that Cynthia withheld from her more\nthan thoughts and feelings--that she withheld facts. But then, as\nMolly reflected, these facts might involve details of struggle and\nsuffering--might relate to her mother's neglect--and altogether be of\nso painful a character, that it would be well if Cynthia could forget\nher childhood altogether, instead of fixing it in her mind by the\nrelation of her grievances and troubles. So it was not now by any\nwant of confidence that Molly felt distanced as it were. It was\nbecause Cynthia rather avoided than sought her companionship; because\nher eyes shunned the straight, serious, loving look of Molly's;\nbecause there were certain subjects on which she evidently disliked\nspeaking, not particularly interesting things as far as Molly could\nperceive, but it almost seemed as if they lay on the road to points\nto be avoided. Molly felt a sort of sighing pleasure in noticing\nCynthia's changed manner of talking about Roger. She spoke of him\ntenderly now; \"poor Roger,\" as she called him; and Molly thought\nthat she must be referring to the illness which he had mentioned\nin his last letter. One morning in the first week after Cynthia's\nreturn home, just as he was going out, Mr. Gibson ran up into the\ndrawing-room, hat on, booted and spurred, and hastily laid an open\npamphlet down before her; pointing out a particular passage with\nhis finger, but not speaking a word before he rapidly quitted the\nroom. His eyes were sparkling, and had an amused as well as pleased\nexpression. All this Molly noticed, as well as Cynthia's flush of\ncolour as she read what was thus pointed out to her. Then she pushed\nit a little on one side, not closing the book, however, and went on\nwith her work.\n\n\"What is it? may I see it?\" asked Molly, stretching out her hand for\nthe pamphlet, which lay within her reach. But she did not take it\nuntil Cynthia had said--\n\n\"Certainly; I don't suppose there are any great secrets in a\nscientific journal, full of reports of meetings.\" And she gave the\nbook a little push towards Molly.\n\n\"Oh, Cynthia!\" said Molly, catching her breath as she read, \"are\nyou not proud?\" For it was an account of an annual gathering of the\nGeographical Society, and Lord Hollingford had read a letter he had\nreceived from Roger Hamley, dated from Arracuoba, a district in\nAfrica, hitherto unvisited by any intelligent European traveller; and\nabout which Mr. Hamley sent many curious particulars. The reading of\nthis letter had been received with the greatest interest, and several\nsubsequent speakers had paid the writer very high compliments.\n\nBut Molly might have known Cynthia better than to expect an answer\nresponsive to the feelings that prompted her question. Let Cynthia\nbe ever so proud, ever so glad, or so grateful, or even indignant,\nremorseful, grieved or sorry, the very fact that she was expected by\nanother to entertain any of these emotions, would have been enough to\nprevent her expressing them.\n\n\"I'm afraid I'm not as much struck by the wonder of the thing as you\nare, Molly. Besides, it is not news to me; at least, not entirely.\nI heard about the meeting before I left London; it was a good deal\ntalked about in my uncle's set; to be sure, I didn't hear all the\nfine things they say of him there--but then, you know, that's a mere\nfashion of speaking, which means nothing; somebody is bound to pay\ncompliments when a lord takes the trouble to read one of his letters\naloud.\"\n\n\"Nonsense,\" said Molly. \"You know you don't believe what you are\nsaying, Cynthia.\"\n\nCynthia gave that pretty little jerk of her shoulders, which was her\nequivalent for a French shrug, but did not lift up her head from her\nsewing. Molly began to read the report over again.\n\n\"Why, Cynthia!\" she said, \"you might have been there; ladies were\nthere. It says 'many ladies were present.' Oh, couldn't you have\nmanaged to go? If your uncle's set cared about these things, wouldn't\nsome of them have taken you?\"\n\n\"Perhaps, if I had asked them. But I think they would have been\nrather astonished at my sudden turn for science.\"\n\n\"You might have told your uncle how matters really stood, he wouldn't\nhave talked about it if you had wished him not, I am sure, and he\ncould have helped you.\"\n\n\"Once for all, Molly,\" said Cynthia, now laying down her work, and\nspeaking with quick authority, \"do learn to understand that it is,\nand always has been my wish, not to have the relation which Roger and\nI bear to each other, mentioned or talked about. When the right time\ncomes, I will make it known to my uncle, and to everybody whom it may\nconcern; but I am not going to make mischief, and get myself into\ntrouble--even for the sake of hearing compliments paid to him--by\nletting it out before the time. If I'm pushed to it, I'd sooner\nbreak it off altogether at once, and have done with it. I can't be\nworse off than I am now.\" Her angry tone had changed into a kind of\ndesponding complaint before she had ended her sentence. Molly looked\nat her with dismay.\n\n\"I can't understand you, Cynthia,\" she said at length.\n\n\"No; I daresay you can't,\" said Cynthia, looking at her with tears\nin her eyes, and very tenderly, as if in atonement for her late\nvehemence. \"I am afraid--I hope you never will.\"\n\nIn a moment, Molly's arms were round her. \"Oh, Cynthia,\" she\nmurmured, \"have I been plaguing you? Have I vexed you? Don't say\nyou're afraid of my knowing you. Of course you've your faults,\neverybody has, but I think I love you the better for them.\"\n\n\"I don't know that I am so very bad,\" said Cynthia, smiling a little\nthrough the tears that Molly's words and caresses had forced to\noverflow from her eyes. \"But I have got into scrapes. I'm in a scrape\nnow. I do sometimes believe I shall always be in scrapes, and if they\never come to light, I shall seem to be worse than I really am; and I\nknow your father will throw me off, and I--no, I won't be afraid that\nyou will, Molly.\"\n\n\"I'm sure I won't. Are they--do you think--how would Roger take it?\"\nasked Molly, very timidly.\n\n\"I don't know. I hope he will never hear of it. I don't see why he\nshould, for in a little while I shall be quite clear again. It all\ncame about without my ever thinking I was doing wrong. I've a great\nmind to tell you all about it, Molly.\"\n\nMolly did not like to urge it, though she longed to know, and to see\nif she could not offer help; but while Cynthia was hesitating, and\nperhaps, to say the truth, rather regretting that she had even made\nthis slight advance towards bestowing her confidence, Mrs. Gibson\ncame in, full of some manner of altering a gown of hers, so as to\nmake it into the fashion of the day, as she had seen it during her\nvisit to London. Cynthia seemed to forget her tears and her troubles,\nand to throw her whole soul into millinery.\n\nCynthia's correspondence went on pretty briskly with her London\ncousins, according to the usual rate of correspondence in those\ndays. Indeed, Mrs. Gibson was occasionally inclined to complain of\nthe frequency of Helen Kirkpatrick's letters; for before the penny\npost came in, the recipient had to pay the postage of letters; and\neleven-pence-halfpenny three times a week came, according to Mrs.\nGibson's mode of reckoning when annoyed, to a sum \"between three\nand four shillings.\" But these complaints were only for the family;\nthey saw the wrong side of the tapestry. Hollingford in general,\nMiss Brownings in particular, heard of \"dear Helen's enthusiastic\nfriendship for Cynthia,\" and of \"the real pleasure it was to receive\nsuch constant news--relays of news indeed--from London. It was almost\nas good as living there!\"\n\n\"A great deal better I should think,\" said Miss Browning with some\nseverity. For she had got many of her notions of the metropolis\nfrom the British Essayists, where town is so often represented as\nthe centre of dissipation, corrupting country wives and squires'\ndaughters, and unfitting them for all their duties by the constant\nwhirl of its not always innocent pleasures. London was a sort of\nmoral pitch, which few could touch and not be defiled. Miss Browning\nhad been on the watch for the signs of deterioration in Cynthia's\ncharacter ever since her return home. But, except in a greater number\nof pretty and becoming articles of dress, there was no great change\nfor the worse to be perceived. Cynthia had been \"in the world,\" had\n\"beheld the glare and glitter and dazzling display of London,\" yet\nhad come back to Hollingford as ready as ever to place a chair for\nMiss Browning, or to gather flowers for a nosegay for Miss Phoebe,\nor to mend her own clothes. But all this was set down to the merits\nof Cynthia, not to the credit of London-town.\n\n\"As far as I can judge of London,\" said Miss Browning, sententiously\ncontinuing her tirade against the place, \"it's no better than a\npickpocket and a robber dressed up in the spoils of honest folk. I\nshould like to know where my Lord Hollingford was bred, and Mr. Roger\nHamley. Your good husband lent me that report of the meeting, Mrs.\nGibson, where so much was said about them both, and he was as proud\nof their praises as if he had been akin to them, and Phoebe read\nit aloud to me, for the print was too small for my eyes; she was a\ngood deal perplexed with all the new names of places, but I said\nshe had better skip them all, for we had never heard of them before\nand probably should never hear of them again, but she read out the\nfine things they said of my lord, and Mr. Roger, and I put it to\nyou, where were they born and bred? Why, within eight miles of\nHollingford; it might have been Molly there or me; it's all a chance;\nand then they go