Mrs. Henry Wood UNIVERSITY OF NORTH CAROLINA BOOK CARD Please keep this card in book pocket V I Id O •ac ID I > 1 1 5 THE LIBRARY OF THE UNIVERSITY OF NORTH CAROLINA ENDOWED BY THE DIALECTIC AND PHILANTHROPIC SOCIETIES PR5842 .W8 L37 1890 This book is due at the WALTER R. DAVIS LIBRARY on the last date stamped under "Date Due." If not on hold it may be renewed by bringing it to the library. DATE RET DUE RET - DATE RET DUE KtK NOV 2 52 n IT ~ NOV 2 ij 20 2 Digitized by the Internet Archive i in 2013 http ://arch i ve . org/detai Is/ladyg raceOOwood LADY GRACE. » LADY GRACE. BY MRS. HENRY WOOD, AUTHOR OF " EAST LYNNE," " THE CHANNINGS," " JOHNNY LUDLOW," ETC. NEW EDITION. LONDON: RICHARD BENTLEY AND SON, Publishers in ©rtomarg to f§cr i^lajcstg tfje Auem. 1890. {All rights reserved.) CONTENTS. tC l CHAPTER I. Great and Little Whitton PAGE 1 II. A Curious Mistake .. . 21 III. The Earl of Avon ... 39 IV. The Last Journey ... 55 V. The Lads ... 78 VI. In the Cathedral ... 99 VII. With Sir William Chant ... 124 VIII. After the Dinner-party ... 144 IX. Miss Dynevor and the Girls ... 163 X. The Sub-dean 182 XI. Mystification ... ... 212 XII. What the Bishop saw on the Blotting-pad ... 226 XIII. At Great Whitton ... 243 XIV. Surprises ... 254 XV. In Eaton Place ... 272 XVI. The Sub-dean condescends ... 279 XVII. Cyrilla .. 285 XVIII. In the Moonlit Cloisters ... 299 XIX. The New Dean ... 320 LADY GRACE. i CHAPTER I. GREAT AND LITTLE WHITTON. A rustic congregation was pouring out of a rustic church one Sunday afternoon — St. Mary's, in the hamlet of Little Whitton, situated about thirty miles from the metropolis. Great Whitton, some three miles off, was altogether a different affair, for the parish there was more aristocratic than rustic, and the living was worth nine hundred a-year : Little Whitton brought its incumbent in only two hundred, all told. The living of Great Whitton was in the gift of the Earl of Avon, whose seat was on the other side of it. The incumbent of Great Whitton was an old man, almost past duty; the incumbent of Little Whitton was an able and attractive man scarcely thirty, the Reverend Ryle Baumgarten. Therefore, little wonder need be expressed if some of the Great Whitton families ignored their old Rector, who had lost his Lady Grace. 1 2 LADY GRACE. teeth, and could not by any effort be heard, and came to listen to the eloquent Mr. Baumgarten. A small open carriage, the horses driven by a boy, jockey fashiou, waited at the church-door. The boy was in a crimson jacket and a velvet cap, the postillion livery of the Avons. The carriage was without doors ; the sweeping seat behind was low and convenient; therefore, when two ladies emerged from the church they stepped into it unassisted. The one looked about fifty years of age, and walked slowly ; the other was a young lady of exceeding fairness, with somewhat haughty features and haughty eyes, blue as the summer sky. The boy touched his horses and drove on. " He surpassed himself to-day, Grace," began the elder lady. " I think he did, mamma." " But it is a long way to come — for me. I can't venture out in all weathers. If we had him at Great Whitton, now, I could hear him every Sunday." " Well, mamma, nothing is more easy than to have him there — as I have said more than once," observed the younger, bending down to adjust something in the carriage, that her sudden heightening of colour might pass unnoticed. "It is impossible that Mr. Chester should last long, and you could get Henry to give him the living." * Grace, you talk as a child. Good livings are not GREAT AND LITTLE WIIITTON. 3 given away so easily ; neither arc men without con- nections inducted to them. I never heard that young Baumgarten had any connections ; not as much as a father or mother, even ; he does not speak of his family. No ; the most sensible plan would be for Mr. Chester to turn off that muff of a curate, and take on Baumgarten in his stead." The young lady threw back her head. " Rectors don't give up their preferments to subside into curates, mamma." " Unless it is made well worth their while," returned the elder, in a matter-of-fact tone ; " and old Chester might make it worth Mr. Baumgarten's." " Mr. Chester ought to retire. For my part, I can- not imagine how these old clergymen can persist in remaining in their livings." " The clergy must grow old as well as other people, my dear." " I am not speaking of age so much as of failing faculties. Some men older than Mr. Chester are as capable of fulfilling their duties as ever they were. But Mr. Chester is not." The young lady received no answer to this, and they went along in silence. " Mamma ! " she exclaimed, when they were about a mile on the road, "we never called to inquire after Mrs. Dane." 4 LADY GRACE. " I did not think of doing so." " / did. I shall go back again. James ! " The boy, without slackening his speed, half turned on his horse. " My lady ? " " When you come to the corner, drive down the lane and go back to the cottage.'' He touched his cap and looked forward again, and Lady Grace sank back in the carriage. " You might have consulted me first, Grace," grumbled the Countess of Avon. " And why do you choose the longer way round by the lane ? " " The lane is shady, mamma, and the afternoon sunny ; to prolong our drive will do you good." Lady Grace laughed as she spoke, and it would have taken one more penetrating than the Lady Avon had ever been to divine that all had been done of set purpose : that when her daughter drove from the church-door, she had fully intended to pro- ceed part of the way home, and then go back again. Lady Grace Carmel had rather a strong will, which had been fostered by indulgence, for she was an only daughter. We must notice another of the congregation, one who had left the church by a different door. It was a young lady of two or three and twenty; she had less beauty than Lady Grace, but a far sweeter counte- nance. She crossed the churchyard, and opening one GREAT AND LITTLE WHITTON. 5 of its gates, found herself in a narrow sheltered walk, running through a corner of Whitton Wood. It was the nearest way to her home, Whitton Cottage. A few paces within it, she stood against a tree, turned and waited; her lips parted, her cheek flushed, and her hand was laid upon her beating heart. Was she expecting any one to join her ? Little doubt of it ; and that it was one all too dear to her these signs betrayed. The ear of love is strangely fine, and Edith Dane bent her ears to listen : with the first sound of approaching footsteps she walked hurriedly on. Would she be caught waiting for him ? No, no ; rather would she hide herself for ever than betray aught of the deep love that lay in her heart for the Reverend Ryle Baumgarten. It was Mr. Baumgarten who was following her. He sometimes chose the nearer way home, too: a tall, graceful man, with pale, classic features, and luminous brown eyes set deeply ; but in his face might be seen somewhat of irresolution. He strode on, and overtook Miss Dane. " How fast you are walking, Edith ! " She turned her head with the prettiest air of sur- prise possible, her cheeks bright with loves rosy flush. " Oh — is it you, Mr. Baumgarten ? I was walking fast to get home to poor mamma." Nevertheless, it did happen that their pace slackened G LADY GRACE. considerably; in fact, they scarcely advanced at all, but sauntered along side by side, as if to enjoy the beauty of the summer afternoon. " They have been taking me to task to-day/' suddenly began Mr. Baumgarten. 11 Who ? The Avons ; do you mean ? I saw they were at church." " Not the Avons. What have they to do with me, Edith ? " And Edith blushed at his question ; or rather at herself for having mentioned them. " Squire Wells and his wife, with half-a-dozen more, carpeted me in the vestry after service this morning." " What about ? " " About the duties of the parish ; secular, not clerical : I take care that the latter shall be efficiently per- formed. The old women are not coddled, the younger ones' households not sufficiently looked up, and the school, in the point of plain sewing, is running to rack and ruin." Mr. Baumgarten had been speaking in a half-joking way, his beautiful eyes alive with merriment. Miss Dane received the news more seriously "You did not say anything of this at dinner-time. You did not tell mamma." "No. Why should I tell her? It might only worry her, you know. The school sewing is the worst grievance," he lightly ran on. "Dame Giles's GREAT AND LITTLE WHITTON. 7 Betsy took some cloth with her which ought to have gone back a shirt, but which was returned a pair of pillow-cases: the dame boxed Betsy's ears, went to the school and nearly boxed Miss Turner's. It seems to me they could not have a better governess than she is. However, such mistakes, I am told, are often occurring, and the matrons of the parish are up in arms." " But do they expect you to look after the sewing of the school ? " breathlessly asked Edith. "Not exactly; but they think I might provide a remedy : some one who would do so." "How stupid they are. 1 I'm sure Miss Turner does what she can with such a tribe. Not that I think she is particularly clever; and were there any lady who would superintend occasionally it might be better ; mamma can't, but " "That is just it," interrupted Mr. Baumgarten, laughing. " They tell me I ought to help Miss Turner to a supervisor, by taking to myself a wife." He looked at Edith as he spoke, and her face happened to be turned full upon him. The words dyed it with a glowing crimson, even to the roots of her soft brown hair. In her confusion she knew not whether to keep it where it was, or to turn it away : her eyelids had dropped, glowing also , and Edith Dane could have boxed her own ears as 8 LADY GRACE. heartily as Dame Giles had boxed the unhappy Miss Betsy's. " It cannot be thought of, you know, Edith." " What cannot ? " " My marrying. Marry on two hundred a-year, and expose my wife, and perhaps others, to poverty and privation ? No, that I will never do." "The parsonage must be put in repair if you marry," stammered Edith, not in the least knowing what she said, but compelling herself to say something so that she might appear unconcerned. " And a great deal of money it would take to do it. I told Squire Wells if he could get my tithes increased to double their present value, then I might venture upon a wife. He laughed, and replied I might look out for a wife who had ten thousand pounds." "Such wives are not easily found," murmured Edith Dane. "Not by me," returned Mr. Baumgarten. "A college chum of mine, never dreaming to aspire to anything better than I possess now, married a rich young widow in the second year of his curacy, and lives on the fat of the land, in pomp and luxury. I would not have done it." "Why?" "Because no love went with it; even before his marriage he allowed himself to say as much to me — GREAT AND LITTLE WHITTON. 9 disparaged her in fact. No ; the school and the other difficulties, which are out of my line, must do as they can, yet awhile." " Of course, mamma would be the proper person to continue to look after these things for you as she used to do, if she were not incapacitated." "But she is, Edith. And your time is taken up with her, so that you cannot help me." Miss Dane was silent. Had her time not been taken up, she fancied it might not be deemed quite the thing, in her censorious neighbourhood, to be going about in conjunction with Mr. Baumgarten; although she was the late Rectors daughter. The Reverend Cyrus Dane had been many years Rector of Little Whitton; at his death Mr. Baum- garten was appointed. Mrs. Dane was left with a very slender provision, derived from an annuity. Her husband had been quite unable to save money : the needs of his parish, the education of his two daughters, and the expenses of living had utterly absorbed his stipend, and kept him sadly poor. So poor that the necessary repairs of the Rectory from year to year had never been attended to, and when he died it was in a woeful state of dilapidation. The eldest of his daughters, Charlotte, had married George Brice, a nephew of Brice the surgeon; he was junior partner in a shipping house, and lived in London. 10 LADY GRACE. When Mr. Baumgarten arrived to take possession of his new living, he found the Rectory perfectly uninhabitable. Mrs. Dane had moved out of it to Whitton Cottage, and it was arranged that he should take up his residence with her, paying a certain sum for his board. It was a comfortable arrangement for the young clergyman, and it was a help to Mrs. Dane. He had not the means to put the Rectory into repair, and was told that he must go to the late Rectors widow for them ; that she was responsible for them, as in fact she was. But Mr. Baumgarten could not and would not do that. She had not the means to restore it any more than he had. So things were left as they were, to drift, and he made himself happy and con- tented at Whitton Cottage. He had just entered now upon the second year of his residence with them ; during which Mrs. Dane had been seized with a slow and lingering illness, which must in time terminate fatally. " Why did she love him? Curious fool, be still ; Is human love the growth of human will?" A great deal happier for many of us if it were the growth of human will, or under its control. In too many instances it is born of association, of companion- ship; and thus had it been at Whitton Cottage. Thrown together in daily intercourse, an attachment had sprung up between the young Rector and Edith GREAT AND LITTLE WHITTON. 11 Dane — a concealed attachment, for he considered his circumstances barred his marriage, and she hid her feelings as a matter of course. He was an ambitious man, a proud man, though perhaps not quite conscious of it, and to encounter the expenses of a family house- hold upon small means appeared to him more to be shunned than any adverse fate on earth. Mr. Baum- garten was of gentle birth, but he had not any private fortune or near relatives ; he had in fact no connections whatever to push him forward in the Church. For all he could see now, he might live and die in this slender living, and he did not like the prospect. But we left him walking home from service with Edith, and they soon reached Whitton Cottage. Mr. Baumgarten went on at once to the little room he used as his study, but Edith, at the sound of wheels, lingered in the garden. The Countess of Avon's carriage drew up, and stopped at the gate. Miss Dane went out to it. Grace spoke first, her eyes running in all directions while she did so, as if they were in search of some object not in view. " Edith, we could not go home without driving round to ask after your mamma," " Thank you, Lady Grace. Mamma is in little pain to-day and her cough is not troublesome. I think her breathing is generally better in hot weather. Will you not come in ? " 12 LADY GBACE. " Couldn't think of it, my dear," spoke up the countess. " Our dinner will be ready ; you know I have to take it early. Grace forgot to order James round till we were half-way home." " Has Mr. Baumgarten got back from church yet ? " carelessly spoke Lady Grace, adjusting the lace of her summer mantle. "He is in his study, I fancy," replied Edith, and she turned round to hide the blush called up by the question, just as Mr. Baumgarten approached them. At his appearance the blush in Grace Carmel's face rivalled that in Edith's. " You surpassed yourself to-dajV cried Lady Avon, as she shook hands with him. " I must hear that sermon again. Would you mind lending it to me ? " " Not at all," he replied, " if you can only make out my hieroglyphics. My writing is plain to me, but I do not know that it would be so to you, Lady Avon." " When shall I have it ? Will you bring it up this evening, and take tea with us ? But you will find the walk long, perhaps, after your services to-day; and the weather is hot," she added. "Very long; too far. Could you not return with us now, Mr. Baumgarten ? " interposed her daughter. " Mamma will be glad of you to say grace at table. " Whether it pleased the countess or not, she had no GREAT AND LITTLE WHITTON. 13 resource, in good manners, but to second the invita- tion so unceremoniously given. Mr. Baumgarten may have thought he had no resource but to acquiesce — out of good manners also, perhaps. He stood leaning over the carriage, and spoke, half-laughing — . " Am I to bring my sermon with me ? If so, I must go in for it. I have just taken it from my pocket." He came back with his sermon in its black cover. The seat of the carriage was exceedingly large, sweep- ing round in a half-circle. Lady Grace drew nearer to her mother, sitting quite back in the middle of the seat, and Mr. Baumgarten took his seat beside her Edith Dane cast a look after them as the carriage rolled away ; a pained, envious look ; for her, the sunshine of the afternoon had gone out. Miss Dane did not like these visits of his to Avon House, and he seemed to be often going there on one plea or another. There, he was surrounded by all the glory and pomp of stately life, and that is apt to tell upon a man's heart; Grace Carmel, too, was more beautiful than she, and singularly attractive. Not that Edith did, or could, suppose there was any real danger : the difference in their social positions barred that. Some cloud, unexplained, and nearly forgotten now, had overshadowed Lady Avon's later life. It had 14 LADY GRACE. occurred, whatever it was, during the lifetime of her lord. She had chosen ever since to live at Avon House in retirement. An inward complaint, real or fancied, had set in, and the countess thought herself unable to move to London. Lady Grace had been presented by her aunt, and passed one season in town : then she had returned to her mother, to share perforce in her retirement, at which she inwardly rebelled. Over and over again did Grace wish her brother would marry and come home ; for the place was his, and it would compel her mother to quit it. But Lord Avon preferred his town house to his country one, and told his mother she was heartily welcome to stay in it. He liked a gay life better than a dull one : as all the world had known when he was young Viscount Standish. It is just possible that the ennui of Grace's monotonous life at Avon had led to her falling in love with Mr. Baumgarten. That she had done so, that she loved him, with a strong and irrepressible passion, was certain ; and she did not try to overcome it, but rather fostered it, seeking his society, dwelling upon his image. Had it occurred to her to fear that she might find a dangerous rival in Edith Dane ? No ; for she cherished the notion that Mr. Baumgarten was attached to herself, and Edith was supposed to GREAT AND LITTLE WHITTON. 15 be engaged to a distant cousin; a young man who had been reading with her father during the last year of his life. The young fellow had wanted Edith ; he asked her parents for her, he implored her to wait until he should be ordained. Edith had only laughed at him ; but the report that they were engaged had in some way got about, and Lady Grace never doubted it. No; strange though it may seem to those who understand the exacting and jealous nature of love, Lady Grace never had cast a fear to Edith's being her rival. This evening was but another of those Mr. Baum- garten sometimes spent at Avon House, feeding the flame of her ill-starred passion. His manner to women was naturally tender, and to Grace, with her fascinations brought unconsciously to bear upon him, dangerously warm. That he never for one moment had outstepped the bounds of friendly intercourse, Grace attributed entirely to the self-restraint imposed by his position ; but she did not doubt he loved her in secret. While at dinner he told them, jokingly, as he had told Edith, that the parish wanted him to marry. Lady Avon remarked, in answer, that he could not do better ; parsons and doctors should alwaj^s be married men. "Yes, that's very right, very true," he returned, 16 LADY GRACE. in the same jesting tone. "But suppose they have nothing to marry upon ? " " But you have something, Mr. Baumgarten." "Yes, I have two hundred a-year, and no residence/' " The Rectory is rather bad, I believe/' " Bad ! Well, Lady Avon, you should see it." " Mr. Dane ought not to have allowed it to get into that state," she remarked ; and the subject dropped. After dinner Mr. Baumgarten stood on the lawn with Grace, watching the glories of the setting sun. Lady Avon, indoors, was beginning to doze; they knew better than to disturb her ; this after-dinner sleep, which sometimes did not last more than ten minutes, was of great moment to her, the doctor said. And indeed it was so : when she did not get it she invariably had a restless night, the overtired brain not suffering her to sleep. She took it in the dining- room; only moving to the drawing-room when she awoke. Great ceremony was not observed at Avon House. Six or eight servants comprised the indoor household, for the countess's jointure was extremely limited. The Avon peerage was not a rich one. Mr. Baumgarten had held out his arm to Lady Grace in courtesy as they began to pace the paths, and she took it. They came to a halt near the entrance- gate, both gazing at the beautiful sky, their hands partially shading their eyes from the blaze of sunset, GREAT AND LITTLE WIIITTON. 17 when a little man dressed in black with a white neck- tie was seen approaching. " Why, here conies Moore ! " exclaimed Grace. He was the clerk at Great Whitton Church. Limp- ing up to the gate, for he was lame with rheumatism, he stood there and looked at Mr. Baumgarten, as if his business lay with him. But Grace, withdrawing her arm from her companion, was first at the gate. " I beg pardon, my lady, I thought it right to come up and inform the countess of the sad news — and I'm glad I did, seeing you here, sir. Mr. Chester is gone, my lady." * Gone ! " exclaimed Grace. " Gone where ? " " He is dead, my lady — he is dead, sir. Departed to that bourn whence no traveller returns," continued the clerk, wishing to be religiously impressive, and believing he was quoting from Scripture. " Surely it cannot be ! " said Mr. Baumgarten. "Ay, but it is, sir, mores the pity. And frightfully sudden. After getting home from afternoon service he said he felt uncommonly tired, he couldn't think why, and that he'd not have his tea till later in the evening. He went up to his room and sat down in the easy-chair there and dropped asleep. A sweet, tranquil sleep it was, to all appearance, and Mrs. Chester shut the door and left him. But after an hour or two, when she sent up to say he had better Lady Grace. 2 18 LADY GRACE. wake up for his tea, they found him dead. The poor old lady is quite beside herself with the suddenness, and the maids be running about, all sixes-and-sevens." " I will go down with you at once, Moore," said Mr. Baumgarten. " But you will come back and tell us — and tell us how Mrs. Chester is ? " said Lady Grace, as he was passing through the gate. " Yes, certainly, if you wish it/' he answered, walk- ing away with so fleet a step that the clerk with difficulty kept up with him. " I fancy it must have been on his mind, sir," saia he ; u not direct perhaps, but some inkling like of what was about to happen. This afternoon, when I'd took off his surplice in the vestry — it was him that had read prayers, as usual, Mr. Boyd preaching — I went and put things to rights a bit in the church, and when I got back to the vestry to lock up, I was surprised to see the Rector there still, sitting opposite the outer door, which stood open to the churchyard. Mr. Boyd was gone, but he was not. ' Don't you feel well, sir ? 9 said I. ' Oh yes, I'm well/ he answered, 'but I'm tired. We must all get to feel tired when the end of our life is at hand, Moore, and mine has been a long one/ ' Yes, it has, sir, and a happy one too/ I said, 'thank God/ With that he rose up from his chair and lifted his hands towards heaven, looking up at GREAT AND LITTLE WHITTON. 19 the blue sky. 'Thanks be to my merciful God/ he repeated solemnly, in a hushed sort of tone. 'For that, and all the other blessings of my past life on earth, thanks be unto Him ! ' With that, he took his hat and stick and walked out to the churchyard," con- cluded the clerk, " leaving me a bit dazed as 'twere, for I had never heard him talk like that before ; he was not the sort o' man to do it." Within an hour Mr. Baumgarten was back at Avon House. Lady Grace was still lingering in the garden in the summer twilight. He told her in a hushed voice all he had to tell ; of the general state of things at the Rectory, of poor Mrs. Chester's sad distress. " Mamma is expecting you/' said Grace. u I broke the news to her, but she wants to hear more par- ticulars." They went into the drawing-room by the open doors of the window. Mr. Baumgarten gave the best account he could to Lady Avon, and then drank a cup of tea, standing ; he would not wait to sit down for it. Still asking questions, Grace passed out again with him to the open air, and strolled by his side along the smooth broad path which led to the entrance-gate. When they reached it, he held out his hand to bid her good- evening. The opal sky was clear and beautiful ; a large star shone in it. " Great Whitton is in my brother's gift/' she whis- 20 LADY GRACE. pered, as her hand rested in his. " I wish he would give it to you." A flush rose to the young clergyman's face. To exchange Little Whitton for Great Whitton had now and then made one of the flighty dreams of his ambition — but never really cherished. " Do not mock me with pleasant visions, Lady Grace. I can have no possible interest with Lord Avon." " You could marry then," she softly said, in reference to the conversation at dinner, "and set the parish grumblers at defiance." " Marry ? Yes, I should — I hope — do so," was his reply. His voice was as soft as her own, his speech hesitating ; he was thinking of Edith Dane. But how was Lady Grace to divine that ? She alas ! gave altogether a different interpretation to the words ; and her heart beat with a tender throbbing, and her lips parted with love and hope, and she gazed after him until he disappeared in the shadows of the sweet summer night. ( 21 ) CHAPTER II. A CURIOUS MISTAKE. The Countess of Avon, persuaded into it by her daughter, exacted a promise from her son that he would bestow the living of Great Whitton upon the Reverend Ryle Baumgarten. The earl did not give an immediate consent; in fact, he demurred to giving it at all, and sundry letters passed to and fro between Avon House and Paris — for his lordship happened just then to have taken a run over to the French capital. Great Whitton was too good a thing to be thrown away upon young Baum- garten, who was nobody, he told his mother, and he should like to give it to Elliot sen ; but Lady Avon, for peace' sake at home, urged her petition strongly, and the earl at length granted it and gave the promise. The morning the letter arrived containing the promise, and also the information that his lordship was back at his house in London, Lady Avon was 22 LADY GRACE. feeling unusually ill, and did not get up. Her head was aching violently, and she bade her maid put the letter aside; she would open it later. This she did in the afternoon, when she was sitting up in her dressing-room, and she then told Grace of the arrival of the unexpected promise. " Oh, let me see it ! " exclaimed Grace, in her in- cautious excitement, holding out her hand for the letter. She read it hungrily, with flushing cheeks and trembling fingers. Lady Avon could but note this. It somewhat puzzled her. " Grace," she said, " I cannot think why you should be so eager about this. What does it matter to you who gets the living — whether Mr. Baumgarten or another ? " Grace read to the end and folded up the letter before answering. She was a model of calmness now. " It would be very annoying to us, mamma, if some dolt of a man got it — and Henry, as you know, has no discrimination. Mr. Baumgarten is safe. He is suitable in all respects ; thoroughly capable, and a gentleman. Besides, yon like him." " Well, I do," assented Lady Avon. In the evening, when Grace was sauntering list- lessly in the rocky walk, wondering whether any one A CURIOUS MISTAKE. 23 would call that night or not, she saw him. Him. He was coming along the path from the Rectory. The old Rector had been buried some days now. "I have been sitting with Mrs. Chester, and thought I would just ask, in passing, how Lady Avon is," he remarked, swinging through the gate, as if he would offer an apology for calling. " The last time I was here she seemed so very poorly " She is not any better, I am sorry to say ; to-day she has not come downstairs at all," replied Grace, meeting his offered hand. " What will you give me for some news I can tell you ? " she resumed, standing before him in the full glow of her beauty, her hand not yet^ withdrawn from his. He bent his sweet smile down upon her, his deep, dark eyes speaking the admiration that he might not utter. Ryle Baumgarten was no more insensible to the charms of a fascinating and beautiful girl than are other men — despite his love for Edith Dane. She was awaiting an answer. " What may I give ? " he said. " Nothing that I could give would be of value to you." " How do you know that, Mr. Baumgarten ? " With a burning blush, for she had spoken un- guardedly, Grace laughed merrily, stepped a few steps backward, and drew a letter from her pocket. " It is one that came to mamma this morning, and it 24 LADY GRACE. has a secret in it. What will you give me to read you just one little sentence ? " Mr. Baumgarten, but that Edith and his calling were in the way, would have said a shower of kisses : it is possible that he might in spite of both, had he dared. Whether his looks betrayed him cannot be known; Lady Grace, blushing still, took Refuge in the letter. Folding it so that only the signature was visible, she held it out to him. He read the name, " Henry." " Is it — from — Lord Avon ? " he said, with hesita- tion. " It is from Lord Avon. He does not sign himself in any other way to us. ' Your ever affectionate son, Henry/ it always runs to mamma : and it is no un- meaning phrase; he is very fond of her. But now for the secret. Listen." Mr. Baumgarten, suspecting nothing, listened with a smile. " ' I have been dunned with applications since I got home/ " read Grace, aloud, from Lord Avon's letter, "'some of them from personal friends; but as you and Grace make so great a point of it, mother, I promise you that Mr. Baumgarten shall have Great Whitton.' " In reading, she had left out the words * and Grace." She closed the letter, and then stole a glance at his face. A CURIOUS MISTAKE. 25 It had turned pale to seriousness. "I do not quite understand," he said. "No? It means that you are appointed to Great Whitton." " How can I ever sufficiently thank Lord Avon ? " he breathed forth. " Now, is not the knowing that worth something ? 99 laughed she. " Oh, Lady Grace 1 It is worth far more than any- thing I have to give in return. But — it is not a jest, is it ? Can it be really true ? n "A jest! Is that likely? You will be publicly appointed in a day or two, and will, of course, hear from my brother. I am not acquainted, myself, with the formal routine of these things. Mamma is rejoicing . she would rather have you here than any one." " Lady Avon is too kind," he murmured abstractedly. "And what do you think mamma said? Shall I tell you ? ' Mr. Baumgarten can marry now.' Those were her words." Grace spoke with sweet sauciness, secure in the fact that he could not divine her feelings for him — although she believed in his love for her. His answer surprised her. "Yes, I can marry now," he assented, still half lost in his own thoughts. "I shall do so — soon. I 26 LADY GRACE. have only waited until some preferment should justify it." "You are a bold man, Mr. Baumgarten, to make so sure of the lady's consent. Have you asked it ? " " No : where was the use, until I could speak to some purpose ? But she has detected my wishes, I am sure of that : and there is no coquetry in Edith." " Edith ! " almost shrieked Lady Grace. " I beg your pardon ; I shall not fall." " What have you done ? You have hurt yourself ! " They had been walking close to the miniature rocks, and she had seemed to stumble over a pro- jecting corner. "I gave my ankle a twist. The pain was sharp," she moaned. " Pray lean on me, Lady Grace ; pray let me sup- port you : you are as white as death." He wound his arms gently round her, and laid her pallid face upon his shoulder; he thought she was going to faint. For one single moment she yielded to the fascination of the beloved resting-place. Oh ! that it could be hers for ever ! She shivered, raised her head, and drew away from him. "Thank you," she said faintly; "the anguish has passed. I must go indoors now." Mr. Baumgarten held out his arm, but she did not take it, walking alone with rapid steps towards the A CURIOUS MISTAKE. 27 house. At the entrance of the glass-cloors she turned to him : " I will wish you good-evening now." He held out his hand, but she did not appear to sec it. She ran in, and he turned away to depart, think- ing she must be in great pain. Lady Grace shut herself in the drawing-room. For a few moments she rushed about as one possessed; in her torrent of anger. As Congreve tells us, " Hell has no fury as a woman scorned." Then she sat clown to her writing-desk, and dashed off a blotted and hasty note to Lord Avon — which would just save the post : — " Give the living to any one you please, Harry, but not to Eyle Baumgarten ; bestow it where you will, but not on him. There are reasons why he would be utterly unfit for it. Explanations when we meet." During this, Mr. Baumgarten was hastening home, the great news surging in his brain. Edith was at the gate, not looking for him, of course ; merely enjoy- ing the air of the summer's night. That's what she said she was doing when he came up. He caught her by the waist, and drew her between the trees and the privet-hedge, and began to kiss her. She cried out, and gazed at him in wonder. 28 LADY GRACE. "Edith, do you think I am mad ? I believe I am — mad with joy; for the time has come that I may ask you to be my wife." " Your wife ? " she stammered, for in truth that prospect had seemed farther off than heaven. He drew her to him again in the plenitude of his emotion. Her heart beat wildly against his, and he laid her face upon his breast, more fondly than he had laid another's, not long before. " You know how I have loved you : you must have seen it, though I would not speak ; but I could not marry while my income was so small. It would not have been right, Edith." " If you think so — no." " But, oh, my dearest, I may speak now. Will you be my wife ? " " But — what has happened ? " she asked. " Ah, what! Promotion has come to me, my dear one. I am presented to the living of Great Whitton." "Of Great Whitton! Kyle!" " It is quite sure. Lord Avon's mother asked him to give it to me, it seems, and he generously com- plied. Edith, will you reject me, now I have Great Whitton ? " She hid her face ; she felt him lovingly stroking her hair. " I would not have rejected you when you had only Little Whitton, Byle." A CURIOUS MISTAKE. 29 " Yours is not the first fair face which has been there this night, Edith/' he said in a laughing whisper. " I had Lady Grace's there but an hour ago." A shiver seemed to dart through her heart. Her jealousy of Lady Grace had been almost as powerful as her love for Mr. Baumgarten. " Grace said, in a joking sort of way, that her mother had remarked I could marry now I had Great Whitton. So I told Grace that I should do so — one word leads to another, you know, Edith — and that I had only waited for preferment to marry you, my best love. As I was speaking, she managed somehow to twist her ankle. The pain must have- been intense, for she turned as white as death, and I had to hold her to me. But I did not pay myself for my trouble, as I am doing now — w r ith kisses." She lifted her face up and looked into his. " You would only have liked to do so, Byle." "I have liked to do so ! " he repeated, smothering back a glimmer of consciousness. " Edith, my whole love is yours." A little more love-making, a little more lingering in the soft shade of the evening twilight, and then they went in together and told the great news to Mrs. Dane. Some days passed on. Lady Avon rather wondered 30 LADY GRACE. that she did not hear more from her son, but supposed he had written direct to Mr. Baumgarten. Grace said nothing. The two lovers, over at Whitton Cottage, were busily planning out the future. One morning there was a startling announcement in the Times. As Lady Avon's eyes fell upon it she truly thought they must be playing her false, that her sight was failing her. The living of Great Whitton was bestowed upon the Honourable and Reverend Wilfred Elliotsen, a personal friend of the Earl of Avon. Her ladyship called out for her daughter in commo- tion ; she sent her maid, Charity, to hasten her. Grace feared her mother was worse, and flew to the room with rapid steps. " What can be the meaning of this, Grace ? " gasped the countess. " Henry has not given the living to Mr. Baumgarten, after all ; he has given it to young Elliotsen ! " " Oh, indeed," said Grace, carelessly. " Harry can do as he likes, I suppose." " No, he can't, in such a case as this. At least he ought not to. Once his promise was given to me it should have been kept. I cannot understand his going from it. It is not like him." " Well, mamma, I don't see that it matters to us, whichever way it may be." A CUEIOUS MISTAKE. 31 "But it does matter. I don't want a simpering young fellow like Wilfred Elliotsen down here, and whose wife goes in for rank Puseyism besides. She has only been waiting for his appointment to a church, report says, to make him play all kinds of antics in it ; she leads him by the nose." Grace laughed. "It is no laughing matter," reproved her mother, " for me or Mr. Baumgarten. I shall be ashamed to look him in the face. And he had begun to lay out plans for his marriage with Miss Dane and their life at Great Whitton ! " " How do you know that ? " asked Grace, quickly. " Mrs. Brice told me so when she was here yester- day," replied Lady Avon. " She knew from the Danes that Ryle Baumgarten was to have Great Whitton and to marry Edith. Why Henry should be so change- able I cannot imagine." Lady Avon was evidently very much annoyed, and justly so ; annoyed at the fact, and annoyed because she was unable to understand her son, who was neither capricious nor inconsiderate. She wrote a letter of complaint to him that day, and awaited his answer. The ill news broke abruptly upon Mr. Baumgarten. The little hard-worked, inoffensive doctor, Mr. Brice, who had a kind heart and never failed to have a kind word for his patients, chanced to see in the Times the 32 LADY GRACE. same paragraph that Lady Avon saw, and on the same morning. " Bless my heart/' he exclaimed, " what an unlucky thing ! How could Baumgarten have made such a mistake ? He said Lacly Grace told him. Perhaps it was she who mistook the matter ! " Away he hastened to Whitton Cottage, the news- paper in his pocket, and into the clergyman's presence, who sat in his little study writing a sermon. And when he got there, he felt at fault how to open the ball. It seemed so cruel a thing to do. Mr. Baum- garten, who looked gay and unconscious, led up to it. "Have you heard any particular news this morn- ing ? " began the surgeon, after a few words had passed. " No/' lightly replied Mr. Baumgarten ; " I've not seen any one to tell me any ; I have been busy since breakfast with my sermon for next Sunday. Nearly the last I shall preach at Little Whitton, I expect." Mr. Brice coughed. "Have you heard from Lord Avon ? " he asked. " Not yet ; I rather wonder at it. Every morning I look for a letter from him, but it does not come. He may be in France again for all I know myself ; I don't like to call at Avon House until my appoint- ment is confirmed. It would look pushing; as if I were impatient." A CURIOUS MISTAKE. 33 " Well, I — I saw a curious paragraph in the news- paper just now about Great Whitton being given away; but it was another name that was mentioned, not yours,'' said Mr Brice. " I thought I'd come here at once to see if you knew anything about it." " Not anything , newspapers are always making mistakes," smiled Mr, Baumgarten. Mr. Brice took the paper from his pocket. Finding the place, he laid it before the clergyman, who read it. Read it twice over, and began to feel somewhat less easy. He read it a third time, aloud. " ' We are authorized to state that the valuable living of Great Whitton, Homeshire, has been bestowed by its patron, the Earl of Avon, upon the Honourable and Reverend Wilfred Elliotsen.' " There ensued a pause. The two gentlemen were looking at one another, each questioningly. "It must be a mistake," said Mr. Baumgarten. "Lord Avon would not give the living to me, and then giv& it to some one else." " The question is — did he give it to you ? " returned Mr. Brice. " Perhaps the mistake lies in your having thought so." " I saw it in his own handwriting, in his letter to his mother. Lady Grace showed it to me; at least, a portion of it. He wrote in answer to an appeal Lady Avon had made to him to give me the living. Lady Grace. 3 34 LADY GRACE. His promise was a positive one. It is this newspaper that makes the mistake, Brice; it cannot be other- wise." " Any way, we will hope so," briskly added the surgeon. But he spoke more confidently than he felt, and perhaps Mr. Baumgarten had done the same. Lord Avon's reply to his mothers letter of complaint and inquiry came to her by return of post, and ran as follows :— "My dear Mother, "I cancelled my promise of giving the living to Baumgarten at Grace's request. She wrote to me post haste some days ago, telling me there were reasons why Baumgarten would be utterly unfit to hold Great Whitton, and begging me to bestow it upon any one rather than upon him. That is all I know; you must ask an explanation of Grace. Of course I assumed she was writing for you. It is settled now, and too late to change back again. Elliotsen will do very well in the living, I dare say. As to his wife wanting to turn and twist him to attempt foolish things in the church, as you seem to fear, I think it hardly likely. If she does, he must put her down. "Ever your loving son, " Henry." A CUK10US MISTAKE. 35 " Yes, I did write to Henry, mamma ; I did ask him not to give the living to Mr. Baumgarten" avowed Grace, with passionate emphasis when ques- tioned, her cheeks aflame, for the subject excited and tried her. u My reason was that I consider him an unfit man to hold it." " Why, it was at your request that I asked Henry to give it to Mr. Baumgarten j you gave me no peace until I consented," retorted Lady Avon. " But, after reflection, I came to the conclusion that I ought not to have pressed it, that he ought not to have it, and would not do in it; and the shortest way to mend the matter was by writing to Harry. That's all." Lady Avon glanced keenly at her daughter. She was mentally asking herself what it all meant — the burning face, the tone sharp as a knife and telling of pain, the capricious conduct in regard to the pre- ferment. But she could not tell : she might have her suspicions, and very ridiculous suspicions too, not at all to be entertained ; but she could not tell. " I am sorry that a daughter of mine should have condescended to behave so ; you best know what motive prompted it, Grace. To bestow a living and then snatch it away again in caprice is sheer child's play. It will be a cruel blow to Byle Baumgarten." A cruel blow it was. Lady Avon turned to her 36 LADY GRACE. desk after speaking these words to her daughter, and began a note to the young clergyman, feeling very much humbled in mind as she wrote it. In the most plausible way she could, a lame way at best, she apologized for the mistake which had been made, adding she hardly knew whether it might be attri- buted to her son, to herself, or to both, and pleaded for Mr. Baumgarten's forgiveness. This note she de- spatched by her footman to Whitton Cottage. Mr. Baumgarten chanced to be standing in the little hall as the man approached. He received the note from him. " Is there any answer to take back, sir ? My lady did not say." ' " I will see " replied Mr. Baumgarten. " Sit down, Kobert." Shutting himself into his study, he opened the note. For a few happy moments — if moments of suspense ever can be happy — he indulged in a vision that all might still be right ; that the note was to tell him so. It was short, filling only one side of the paper, and he stood while he read it. Before he had quite come to the end, before he had well gathered in its purport, a shock, singular in its effects, struck Mr. Baumgarten. Whether his breath stopped, or the circulation of his heart stopped, or the coursing of his pulses stopped, he could not have told; A CURIOUS MISTAKE. 37 but he sank down in a chair powerless, the letter falling on the table from his nerveless hand. A strange, beating movement stirred him inwardly, his throat was gasping, his eyelids were fluttering, a sick faintness had seized upon him. But that he struggled against it with desperate resolution, he believed he should have fainted. Once before he had felt something like this, when he was an undergraduate at Oxford, and had been rowing against time to win a match. They said then, those around him, that he had over-exercised his strength. But he had not been exercising his strength now, and he was far worse this time than he had been then. He sat perfectly still, his arms supported by the elbows of the chair, and recovered by degrees. After a bit, he took up Lady Avon's note to read it more fully, and then he knew and realized that all to which he had been so ardently looking forward was at an end. The servant was seated in the little hall, quietly waiting, when Mr. Baumgarten came out of his study. "Her ladyships note does not require an answer, Robert," he said, with apparent coolness. "How is she to-day ? " " Middling, sir. She seemed much upset this morn- ing, Charity told us, by a letter she got from his lordship in London," added Robert. " Good-day, sir." 38 LADY GRACE. Mr. Baumgarten nodded in answer. He stood at the door looking out, apparently watching the man away. The sun was shining in Byle Baumgarten's face, but the sun which had been latterly shining on his heart, illuminating it with colours of the brightest and sweetest phantasy — that sun seemed to have set for ever. ( 39 ) CHAPTER III. THE EARL OF AVON. The Honourable and Reverend Wilfred Elliotsen took possession of the living of Great Whitton, having been appointed to it by Lord Avon. And the Reverend Ryle Baumgarten remained, as before, at Little Whitton. Changes took place. They take place everywhere. The most notable one was the marriage of Mr. Baum- garten. That he had been grievously disappointed and annoyed at the appointment of another to the living, which he had been led to suppose would be his, was a bitter fact. He set it down to the caprice of great men, and strove to live down the sting. The chief difficulty lay in his contemplated marriage : and he deliberated with himself whether he ought for the present to abandon it or to carry it out. He decided upon the latter course. It is probable that he deemed he could not in honour withdraw now ; and it is more 40 LADY GRACE. than probable that, once having allowed himself to cherish his hopes and his love, he was not stoic enough to put them from him again. Finally, he resolved to le&ve the decision to Edith Dane. " What do you say, Edith ? " he asked her. " Shall we throw prudence to the winds, and come together for better, for worse ? " "Nay, Ryle, it is for you to decide that," she answered, a hundred blushes on her pretty cheeks. " I think not," he answered. " For I should decide it all one way; and it might not, for you, be the best way. Should you be afraid to risk housekeeping on my stipend, Edith ? Two hundred a-year, you know, my love, all told." " No, I should not," she whispered. "So be it, then," he answered. "And, with your mothers permission, we will have the wedding at once." Mrs. Dane gave the permission readily. As long as she lived, and was with them, her small income would augment theirs. And within a month of Mr. Baumgarten's disappointment he and Edith became man and wife. " You do quite right," warm-hearted little Mr. Brice had assured them. "The cuttings and contrivings necessary to make a small income go as far as a large one render a young couple all the happier. / ought THE EARL OF AVON. 41 to know : mine was small enough for many a year of my married life ; it's not much else now." The autumn was advancing when Lord Avon came down to pay a visit to his mother. His lordship brought with him full intentions to have it out with her, and with Grace, about that matter in the summer. He began with his mother. She knew no more of it than he did, she protested resentfully, for she was still sore upon the point. All she could say was that he had written to promise her the living for Mr. Baum- garten, and then gave it to Wilfred Elliotsen. Grace was more impervious still. She simply refused to discuss the subject at all, telling her brother to hold his tongue. "I don't see why you should blame me, mother," remonstrated the young man. " It was certainly no fault of mine." " It was your fault, Henry," retorted Lady Avon. " I told you of Grace's peremptory letter." " Who but you would heed the wild letter of a girl ? You should have waited for me to confirm it. As I did not do so, you ought to have written to me before acting. I did not myself care for Mr. Baumgarten to have Great Whitton — it was Grace who worried me into asking it of you ; but as you promised it to him, it should have been his. You cannot picture 42 LADY GRACE. to yourself, Henry, half the annoyance it has cost me." Lord Avon could picture it very well. All this arose from Grace's absurd caprice. She had been indulged all her life, and did just as she pleased. "And for you to put so silly a young fellow as Elliotsen into it ! " went on Lady Avon, enlarging on her grievances. " I told you his wife would make him play all kinds of pranks in the church/' " What does he do ? " asked Lord Avon. " Very ridiculous things indeed. He has put a lot of brass candlesticks on the communion-table, and he turns himself about and bows down at different parts of the service, and she sweeps her head forward in a fashion that sets the whole church staring. We are not used to these innovations, Henry." Lady Avon was correct in saying so. The innova- tions were innovations in those days; now they are looked upon almost as matters of history, as if they had come in with William the Conqueror. " And the parish is not pleased with them ? " returned Lord Avon. " Pleased with them ! " echoed his mother. " He began by wanting to make every soul in the parish, labourers and all, attend daily service in the church from eight o'clock to nine, allowing them ten minutes for breakfast and fifty for prayers; and she has THE EARL OF AVON. 43 dressed the Sunday school in scarlet cloaks, with a large white linen cross sewn down the back. One thing is not liked at all: the inexperienced rustics cannot be made to understand which way he wants them to turn at the Creeds ; so he has planted some men behind the free benches every Sunday with long white wands, and the moment the Belief begins, down come the wands, rapping the heads of the doubt- ful ones.* You have no idea of the commotion it causes." Lord Avon burst into a laugh. " Yd have run down for a Sunday before this had I known the fun that was going on," said he. "The girls must take care the bulls don't run at their scarlet cloaks.' ' "Ah, Henry, you young men regard these things only as matters for irreverent joking. Mr. Baum- garten would not have served us so." " I suppose not. Do you get up to attend the early week-day service, mother ? " "Not I. I can say my prayers more quietly at home. Elliotsen does not force the rich to the early service ; only the poor — when he can do so. He tells us he leaves it between ourselves and our consciences." " You'd be geese if you went," said my lord. " I'll talk to him." * An absolute fact; occurring in a rural church at the time such movements began, many years ago. 44 LADY GRACE. " It will not do any good, Henry. If you talked to her perhaps it might ; it is she who has done it all." And Lord Avon laughed again. He was a man of middle height, spare and angular, with a kindly, honest face, but not a handsome or a clever one. Presently he walked out. In one of the pleasant green lanes with which the place abounded he sud- denly encountered Brice, the surgeon, who was coming along at a steaming pace. " Walking for a wager ? " cried he. " That's it; your lordship has just hit it/* replied the surgeon, grasping warmly the ready hand held out to him. "I and Time often have a match to- gether, and sometimes he wins and sometimes I do." They iiad always been good friends, these two, from the time when the boy, Henry Carmel — for it was before his father came into the title — would fall into no end of outdoor random scrapes, and the little doctor, as far as he could, shielded him and brought him out of them. The earl then reigning was a valetudinarian, Henry's uncle, and the boy spent three parts of his time with him at Avon House. " When did you come down ? " asked Mr. Brice. "Only this morning. My mother seems pretty well, I think ? " "Y — es," assented the surgeon, with slight hesita- tion. " She could be much better, though, if she'd let THE EARL OF AVON. 45 the world wag its own way, and not trouble herself trying to set it to rights.'' " Meaning the new parson and his new ways ? " laughed Lord Avon, who talked more freely with the surgeon than he would have done with any one else. " She has been treating me to a history of the non- sense." "Well, and it is nonsense; just that," said Mr. Brice. "I ventured to say a few words of remon- strance to Mr. Elliotsen one day. ' Oh/ answered he, good-naturedly, ' but these new ways are all the rage in the fashionable world now.' ' May be so, sir/ said I ; ' but what suits a fashionable congregation does not suit a rustic parish.' ' Not all at once/ he readily answered, ( but they'll get used to it, Brice, they'll get used to it.' Perhaps they may." " I'm sure my mother never will," spoke Lord Avon. " To begin with, she dislikes Elliotsen. At least, she disliked his coming to Great Whitton." " She wanted Mr. Baumgarten to have it." Lord Avon looked surprised. "Did you know of that, Brice ? " "Most of us knew of it down here. For several days, more than a week, I think, it was understood that you had actually given him the living." " What— understood publicly ? " " Publicly and privately too. Baumgarten began 46 LADY GRACE. to make preparations for moving into the Rectory ; he arranged with old Mrs. Chester to take over some of her furniture. It was the certainty he had shown which made it so mortifying for him when the upshot came." To judge by Lord Avon's face just now some of the mortification had travelled to himself. He was looking through the branches of the trees overshadow- ing the lane, their foliage beautiful with the changing tints of autumn, his far-off gaze bent on the blue sky beyond the hills, as if seeking a solution there of something he could not understand. " I was sorry myself," said Mr. Brice. " Lady Avon talked to me, and Mrs. Dane talked to me, lamenting your caprice — if I may presume to say it, my lord/ he added, with a twinkle. " Certainly not," austerely spoke Lady Avon. " Ryle, you surely will not so far countenance the thing as to allow your children to go ! 99 " Well, I — hardly know," replied Mr. Baumgarten with hesitation. "All the children in the parish will be there to-morrow." " But not yours. It would be a direct encourage- ment of evil for the children of the Rector to be seen there. You and Grace know I never interfere with your management, but I really must do so in this one matter. The boys must not go to the fair." " Don't put yourself out, mother," said Lady Grace equably; "they shall not go, as you make a point of it." " I want to go, mamma," cried Cyras, sturdily. " Me and Charley are to go." " Be quiet, Cyras. You hear what grandmamma says. The fair is a naughty place, not good for little boys." " The fair is not a naughty place," disputed Cyras, 86 LADY GRACE. looking his stepmother undauntedly in the face while maintaining his opinion. " There's swings there, and drums and whistles." " I will have some drums and whistles bought for you, my dear, and bring them here, and some for Charley," said Lady Avon. "And here comes your hat, Cyras ; and we must be going, or we shall have time for only a short drive." Jaquet put on the child's hat and cape. Graces took the baby from her mother, and Mr. Baumgarten escorted Lady Avon to the carriage. " Be a good boy, Cyras ; don't be troublesome to v your grandmamma," enjoined the Bector, as he placed the lad beside Lady Avon. Cyras could be very good indeed when he pleased, quite an intelligent little companion, and he always was so when with Lady Avon. Without being in the least harsh in her manner to children, but ever kind and firm, Lady Avon was one of those women who seem to obtain obedience without palpably exacting it. The only child she had ever been too indulgent to, and not firm with, was her daughter Grace. Cyras talked to his grandmamma as they went along, some- times standing up — when Lady Avon held him fast by his blouse — to talk to the postillion about the pretty horses and the harness, and what not. Cyras was always sociable. THE LADS. 87 " Where are we going, grandmamma ? " asked he, as they turned into a green lane, which led to a cross- country road in the opposite direction to the fair, near which Lady Avon would not have gone had she been bribed to do so. " It is very pretty this way ; perhaps we shall see some haymakers." Cyras was quite satisfied; all roads were pretty much alike to him. They saw some haymakers, and they saw some gipsies. In returning home, when driving across a strip of waste land or common, an open carriage containing an old lady encountered that of Lady Avon. Both carriages stopped, and the ladies entered into conver- sation. It chanced that they had stopped exactly opposite a gipsy encampment, the sight of which gave Cyras unbounded delight. He had never seen one before ; or, if he had, had forgotten it. The fires on the short grass ; the kettles swung above them ; the tent behind ; the children running about, and the dark, sunburnt women looking up with smiling faces, had a wonderful attraction for Cyras. He wished he might get out and run to them ; but just as he was wishing it the carriages parted to move on. 1 " Grandmamma, look ! Do look. Isn't it nice ? " Lady Avon turned to Cyras's side of the carriage and saw the settlement; she had not before observed 88 LADY GRACE. it. " Dear me," said she, " a gipsy encampment ! I wonder they are not at the fair. The men are, I suppose ; I see none about." " What is it, grandmamma ? " "A gipsy camp, my dear. They are people who rove about the country, and sleep in the open air at night, or in caravans.' ' "I wish I could. Do you see the fires, grand- mamma ? Couldn't we go to them ? " " Oh dear, no," said Lady Avon, very decisively. " Little boys must never go near such people." The carriage deposited Cyras at the Kectory-gate as the clocks were striking one. Lady Avon watched him enter, and then drove on. Charley came running out of doors to meet his brother. " Oh, Charley, I wish you'd been with us ! " began Cyras. " We've seen something beautiful." " What is it ? " asked Charles. " Jam ? " " It was gipsies. They had fires all blazing on the ground — on the grass, you know ; and there was a big round thing you couldn't see inside of. I think there was a rocking-horse in it," added Cyras thoughtfully. " Take me to see it, Cy'as ! Please take me ! Jaquet " The child's words were cut short by Jaquet herself, who came to hasten them in to their dinner. The little boys dined at the luncheon-table That THE LADS. 89 day it happened that a clergyman from a distance was present at the meal. He and Mr. Baumgarten went into very deep converse about some public church matters which were not giving satisfaction. Lady Grace joined in it; thus Cyras found no op- portunity to tell of his experiences touching the gipsy camp, as he would otherwise have done. The children were trained on the good old-fashioned plan — not to interrupt the conversation of their seniors, or to speak at all if strangers were present, unless spoken to. It would be well if the same training held sway at the present day. Luncheon over, Mr. Baumgarten went out at once with his friend. Lady Grace proceeded to the nursery, and the boys ran to their swing at the back of the house. About three o'clock Lady Alwyn and her sister drove up. They came from a distance, and generally stayed an hour or two with Lady Grace, with whom they were intimate, the carriage being put up for the time. The days of afternoon-tea had not then come in; people would as soon have thought of offering broth as tea before dinner ; but wine and cake, the usual refreshment, were rung for by Lady Grace, which the man-servant, Moore, took in. About four o'clock Jaquet went to see after the boys. Her mistress had said they had gone to the 00 LADY GRACE. swing. Jaquet could not see them anywhere, and ran round to the front lawn. They were not there. " Do you know where the children are, Moore ? " she inquired, meeting the man in the hall. " No, unless they're with my lady in the drawing- room ; they were there when I took in the wine and cake," answered Moore. He was a son of the clerk at Great Whit'ton Church, and had lived with Mr. Baum- garten and Lady Grace since they first came to the Rectory, the only indoor man-servant. " Oh, then they are sure to be there ; trust them for stopping where there's any cake going on," said Jaquet. And she went back to her nursery and to the baby, then just waking up out of sleep. It was five o'clock when the carriage was brought round and the guests went away. Lady Grace ran up to the nursery. A maid was carrying in the tray containing the children's tea and Jaquet's. " Where are they ? " asked Lady Grace, looking round. " Where's who, my lady ? " returned the nurse. "The children." " They have not been up here,'' s &id Jaquet. " I thought they were with your ladyship." " They must be at the swing," said Lady Grace. But the children were not at the swing ; they were not in the front garden ; they did not seem to be THE LADS. anywhere. Lady Grace began to feel somewhat uneasy. She went outside the gate and looked down the avenue which led to the high-road ; still she did not think they would run off of their own accord ; even Cyras had never done that. Moore, Jaquet, and one of the housemaids went about, searching the house and grounds thoroughly ; all in vain. In the midst of the commotion Mr. Baumgarten came home. " Why, what's the matter ? * he exclaimed, seeing the assembled searchers at the gate with excited faces. " The children are lost," said Lady Grace. " Lost ! The children ! Oh, nonsense," said Mr. Baumgarten. It appeared that the last seen of them was when Moore took the wine and cake to the drawing-room. Lady Grace was not very clear as to how soon after- wards they left it ; she thought immediately; but she was quite sure they came into it only a minute or two before Moore. They did not have any cake ; did not wait until it was cut. " What time was it ? " asked Mr. Baumgarten. It wanted about a quarter to four, Moore thought, when he took the tray in. At this moment a youth, w T ho had been taken on that week to assist the gardener in bedding out some 92 LADY GRACE. plants, approached from the side of the lawn, touching his cap to the Rector, and looking as if he wanted to speak. " What is it, James ? " " I beg pardon, sir ; I saw the two little gentlemen go through the gate this afternoon. It was a little afore four o'clock. They ran as fast as they could down the avenue, their little legs did, as if afraid of being overtook. Master Cyras held the little one by the hand." « Why did you not stop them ? " demanded the Rector — which caused James to open wide his eyes. " Me, sir ! I shouldn't make bold to stop 'em, sir, without being telled to." " They have gone off to the fair," said Mr. Baum- garten to his wife. " I suppose this comes of our having promised your mother in their hearing that they should not go to it." " Then it's Cyras who is in fault," said she. " Charles . would not have the sense to do such a thing, or the courage either." " Of course not. He is too young for that yet awhile." " Will they come to harm, think you, Ryle ? n " Young monkeys ! " he cried, half laughing, as he walked away with a quick step in pursuit. " Harm, THE LADS. 93 no ; don't worry yourself, Grace ; I'll soon catch them up." The fair was held on Whitton Common, on the other side of the village, and near to Little Whitton. There was also a way to it through fields and shady lanes, and Lady Grace bethought herself to despatch Moore by that route, though it was hardly likely the children had taken it. In any kind of suspense time seems to move on leaden wings. When an hour had elapsed and did not briilg the truants, Lady Grace grew very uneasy. In her restlessness she put on her bonnet and went down the avenue to where the high-road crossed it, and stood there looking out. All the stragglers pass- ing by were going towards the fair ; none coming from it. Not one. " Of course not ! " she impatiently cried. " It is just the time when the workpeople are flocking to it," and she turned back home. This little excursion she repeated twice or thrice. About half-past six, standing again in the road, she saw Mr. Baumgarten hastening back. But he was not leading a child in each hand, as she had fondly pictured ; he was alone. u I cannot see or hear anything of them," he said, in answer to his wife's impulsive question. "I don't think they can have gone to the fair." 94 LADY GRACE, " But where else would they be likely to go, Ryle ? " " Boyd has been sitting in his garden all the after- noon, in full view of the road ; had his tea brought out to him there/' continued Mr. Baumgarten, alluding to his curate, who had been disabled the past week or two, through an accident to his foot. "He says he could not have failed to see the little ones had they appeared; and he has been watching the passers-by to the fair by way of amusement.'' "Did you go on to the fair, Ryle, and look about in it ? Did you inquire of the people ? " " Why, of course I did, Grace. I searched all over it, in the booths and out of them. Only a sprinkling of people had collected ; it was too early. I inquired of nearly every one, I think, describing the boys ; but they had not been seen." Just within the avenue leading to the house there stood a bench, placed there by Mr. Chester, the late Rector, for the accommodation of wayfarers. Mr. Baumgarten, who was hot and tired, sat down on it. "You had better come in and have some dinner, Ryle." " Not now ; I must be oft* again." " But where can you go now ? " she asked, taking a seat beside him. " I don't know where ; somewhere or other. I can't rest in this uncertainty." THE LADS. 95 " Did you see Moore ? I sent him after you, the field way." "I saw him on the common. He had not come across the young ones." Two or three minutes longer they sat. Mr. Baum- garten was utterly fatigued and quite at a loss to decide which way would be the best next to start upon. Grace shivered inwardly, picturing the harm that would come, or had come, to Charley. " Do you think they have been kidnapped, Ryle ? Both are beautiful boys." " No, no," said Mr. Baumgarten. By degrees they became aware that sundry people were speeding along the highway one after another, not towards the fair, but in the other direction. " Where can they be going ? " cried Grace. " Has anything happened ? " she inquired, running to arrest one of them — a working-man from a cottage hard by. " It's reported there has just been a great landslip in that cutting they were making for the railway, my lady, and some people are buried under it," answered the man. " One boy's killed." Lady Grace cried out in terror. " Oh, Ryle, Ryle, do you hear ? " she moaned. " That's where the children are gone. The other day, when I had them out with me, I could hardly get them past it. They wanted to go down into the cutting." 96 LADY GRACE. Mr. Baumgarten turned very pale. "Hush, my dear/' he said in low tender tones, " we must hope for the best. I will — here comes Brice ! " " Yes, I'm afraid it is a serious accident," began the doctor, in answer to their emotional faces. "A fellow has just run over to tell me. What do you say- ? What ? The children there ! Bless my heart ! " " Go indoors, my love ; keep yourself as tranquil as you can whilst I go on with Brice," whispered Mr. Baumgarten to his agitated wife. Indoors ! In that suspense ? No ! Lady Grace could not be tranquil enough for that. She paced about the avenue, and sat down on the bench, and stood in the highway watching the runners speeding to the scene ; all by fits and starts. Twilight was coming on when she saw her husband returning. Mr. Brice was with him. The landslip had not been so bad as reported. Landslips and other mishaps rarely are. Two men only were injured, and the boy spoken of ; none of them mortally, and Mr. Brice had attended to them. No trace had been found there of the children. " I'm sure I don't know where to look now," said Mr. Baumgarten, his voice betraying his weariness. " Grace, I believe I must snatch some refreshment before I go out again." She put her arm within his at once and led him THE LADS. 97 down the avenue. " Are you coming too, Mr. Brice ? " she said, holding out her hand. " That's right. I'm sure you must need something." Tea was brought in, and some hastily-cut sand- wiches. In ten minutes they were out of doors again. " They are at the fair, those young rebels, rely upon that," spoke Mr. Brice, purposely making light of the matter. " You must have missed them, Baumgarten." " I think so too," added Lady Grace. " I think you should go there again, Rye." Just as she was speaking, and they were walking slowly down the path, the gate opened and a group came in. A tall man, with flashing black eyes and a yellow skin, evidently a gipsy, and — the two boys. He was carrying Charley in his arms; Cyras trotted beside him. " Mamma, mamma ! " cried Charley And Grace Baumgarten wondered whether she had ever before given such heartfelt thanks to God, Instead of advancing to meet the children and the man, Mr. Baumgarten suddenly sat down on a garden seat. The same curious sickness, or pain, or oppres- sion — he hardly knew what it was — which had attacked him once or twice before, seized him now. Mr. Brice and Lady Grace were asking questions. " Yes, master," said the man, addressing Mr. Brice, " when we got back to the women and children this Lady Grace. 7 98 LADY GRACE. evening these two little gents was there with 'em round the fire ; so I set off again and brought 'em home." "How could you be so naughty, Cyras, as to run away ? " cried Lady Grace. " I wanted to show Charley the gipsy camp," replied Cyras. " Were you not afraid, Charley, to go all that way ? " she continued. " Me not afraid with Cy'as," said the little one. " I took care of Charley," put in Cyras, as if he had been a giant of strength. Looking white and ill, Mr. Baumgarten came for- ward. The paroxysm had passed. He spoke a few heartfelt thanks to the man and rewarded him, and took him indoors that something to eat and drink might be given to him. " I shall never speak against gipsies again," impul- sively declared Lady Grace Baumgarten. ( 09 ) CHAPTER VI. IN THE CATHEDRAL. The shades of twilight were fast gathering on the aisles of the old cathedral, and the congregation, assembled in the choir for afternoon service, began to wonder whether the chanter would be able to finish without a light. The beautiful colours of the painted east window were growing dim — exceedingly beautiful were they when the sun illumined them. It was a full congregation, unusually numerous for a winter s afternoon, and one that threatened rain. The Bishop of Denham occupied his throne ; the dean, a younger man and very handsome, sat in his stall. By his side was a boy of ten, or rather more; he possessed the deans own face in miniature, and there could be no mistaking that they were father and son. Underneath the dean was the pew of his wife, and with her was another boy, somewhat younger, but bearing a great resemblance to the one by the dean. She was a fair, beautiful woman, with stately manners 100 LADY GRACE. and a haughty face ; in age she may have been a year above thirty, though she did not look it. Lord Avon, through influential friends, had taken care of his brother-in-law's preferment, and Ryle Baumgarten had been made Dean of Denham, and had taken his doctor's degree. He still retained the living of Great Whitton, as he was able to do, and he and Lady Grace spent part of the year at it. This afternoon he is presiding in his cathedral, and his wife, as already observed, sits beneath him. Cyras sits with the dean, Charles with his mother. Now they are all rising for the anthem. The anthem was a short one this afternoon ; it was soon over, and the congregation knelt again. Mean- while the atmosphere had grown darker. The chanter, an elderly man with a round face and bald head, bent his spectacles nearer and nearer to his book, and the dean, quietly pushing back the curtain beside his own stall, leaned down, whispered a word to one of the bedesmen who were congregated on the steps inside the choir entrance. The old man shuffled out, and presently shuffled in again with a flaring tallow candle, which he carried to the chanter's desk. The chanter gave him a nod for the unexpected accom- modation, and went on more glibly. He had seen a light taken to the organ-loft before the commence- ment of the anthem. IN THE CATHEDRAL. 101 The service concluded, the bishop gave the blessing, and the congregation left the choir, but they did not leave the edifice; they waited in the body of the cathedral to listen to the music, for the organist was treating them to some of the choicest morceaux amongst his voluntaries. He was an eminent player, and now and then chose to snow them that he was so, and would keep them, delighted listeners, full half-an-hour after the conclusion of afternoon service ; and some- times he had to do so by order of the dean. The bishop had little ear for music, but liked stopping in the cathedral, and the social chat it afforded, very well. He slowly paced the flagstones by the side of the deans wife, the respectful crowd allowing them a wide berth ; Dr. Baumgarten stood close to the railings of a fine monument, partly listen- ing, partly talking, to the sub-dean. It was the month of November, the audit season, therefore all the great dignitaries of the cathedral were gathered in Denham. " What's that now, Lady Grace ? " asked the bishop. " Its something like Luther's Hymn ; variations on it, possibly." Lady Grace Baumgarten coughed down a laugh; but she knew the bishop's musical deficiencies. " It is from a symphony of Mozart's : your lordship does not listen." 102 LADY GRACE. " Mozart, eh ? I can distinguish a tune well enough when they sing the words to it, and I know our familiar airs, ' God save the Queen/ and ' The Bluebells of Scotland/ and such like, but when it comes to these grand intricate pieces I am all at sea/' spoke the bishop, in his honest simple-mindedness. "How are the children, Lady Grace ? " " Quite well, thank you. The two boys are here. I don't see them just now, but they are somewhere about." Lady Grace could not see them, and for a very good reason — that they were not there. The eldest, an indulged boy and wilful, had scampered out to the cloisters the moment he could steal away from the paternal surplice, drawing his brother with him. " Charley," quoth he, " its come on to pour cats and dogs, and I promised Dynevor to go out with him after college. You go in and bring me my top- coat." " Oh, Cyras, don't send me ! Let me stop and listen to the organ." " You stupid little monkey ! Come, be off ; or else you know what you'll get." "But the music will be over, Cy," pleaded Charles, who was little and yielding and timid still, and com- pletely under the dominion of masterful Cyras. " The music be bothered ! Here, take my Prayer- IN THE CATHEDRAL. 103 book in with you. Such nonsense as it is of mamma, to make us bring our Prayer-books to college when there are the large books in the stalls, ready for use ! Look you, Mr. Charles, I'll allow you three minutes to get back here with the coat, and if you exceed it by half a second you'll catch a tanning." Master Baumgarten took out his watch — an ap- pendage of which he was excessively proud — as he spoke ; and Charley, knowing there was no appeal against his imperious brother, took the Prayer-book, and flew off through the covered passages which led into the Deanery from the cloisters. Cyras amused himself with hissing and spitting at an unhappy cat, which had by some mischance got into the inclosed cloister graveyard; and, just before the time was up, back came the child, all breathless, the coat over his arm. Cyras snatched it from him, thrust an arm into one of its sleeves, and was attempting to thrust the other, when he discovered that it did not belong to him. Charley had by mistake brought his own, and Cyras could not, by any dint of pushing, get into it. His temper rose ; he struck the child a smart tap on the cheek, and then began to buffet him with the unlucky coat. But he took care not to hurt him. It was all show. * You careless little beggar ! What the bother did 104 LADY GRACE. you bring yours for ? Haven't you got eyes ? Haven't you got sense ? Now, if " "Halloa! what's up? What's he been at now, Cy?" The speaker was Frank Dynevor, Cyras Baum- garten's especial chum when he was at Denham. He was considerably older than Cyras, but the latter was a forward boy of his years, and would not acknow- ledge a companion in one of his own age. " I sent him in for my coat, and he must bring his," explained Cyras. " A tanning would do him good." " Of course it would," said Frank Dynevor. "What's he crying for ? " " For his sins," said Cyras. The tears stood in Charley's eyes : nothing grieved him so much as for Cyras to be angry with him. " He cries for nothing," went on Cyras, " and then they get him into the nursery and give him sugar- candy. Mamma and old Jaquet make a regular molly of him. Now, Master Charles, perhaps you'll go and get the right coat. It's his fault that I keep you waiting, Dynevor." " I am not going," said Dynevor. " They began a row at home about my running out in the rain, so it's stopped, and I came to tell you. Here, Cy, come down this way." The two boys, Dynevor's arm carelessly cast on IN THE CATHEDRAL. 105 the shoulder of Cyras, strolled off together along the cloisters towards the obscure exit which led to the Dark Alley, Cyras having tossed the coa^ on Charleys head, nearly throwing him off his legs. Charley disencumbered himself, and espying some of the college boys, with whom he kept up a passing acquaintance when at Denham, he joined them. They were emerging noisily from the schoolroom, after taking off their surplices : music had no charms for them, so they had not remained amidst the listeners in the cathedral. Now there was a charity school in Denham for the sons of poor parents, where plain learning was taught : the three R's, with a smattering of history and other matters. It was a large school, its numbers averaging four or five times those of the foundation school in the cathedral ; and from time immemorial the gentlemen on the college foundation, called the king's scholars, and the boys of the charity school had been at daggers drawn. The slight pastimes of hard abuse and stone- throwing were indulged in whenever the opposition parties came into contact and circumstances permitted, but there occurred sometimes a more serious interlude — that of a general battle. Animosity at the present time ran unusually high, and, in consequence of some offence offered by the haughty college boys in the past week, the opposition boys (favoured possibly by the 106 LADY GRACE. unusual darkness of the afternoon) had ventured on the unheard-of exploit of collecting in a body round the cloister gate to waylay the king's scholars on their leaving the cathedral at the close of afternoon service. The latter walked into the trap and were caught; but they did not want for " pluck/' and began laying about them right and left. The noise penetrated to the other end of the cloisters, to the ears of the two lads parading there, and away they tore, eager to take part in any mischief that might have turned up. The first thing Cyras saw was his brother Charles struggling in the hands of some half-dozen of the enemy, and being roughly handled. Of course, having been with the college boys, he was taken for one of them ; and being a meek little fellow, who stood aghast in the melee, instead of helping on the assault — besides looking remarkably aristocratic, a great crime in their eyes — he was singled out as being a particularly eligible target. All the hot blood of Cyras Baumgarten's body rushed to his face and his temper : if he chose to put upon Charley and "tan" him, he was not going to see others do it. He flung off his jacket and his cap, threw them to Dynevor, and with his sturdy young fists doubled sprang upon the assailants. What a con- trast, when you come to think of it ! The stately, impassive dean, master of his cathedral, and standing IN THE CATHEDRAL. 107 in it at the present moment, the cynosure of neighbour- ing eyes ; the elegant Lady Grace with her rank and beauty, both of them particularly alive to the con- venances of civilized life ; and the two young Baum- gartens, just beyond earshot, taking part in a juvenile fight, as fierce as any Irish row. Ah, good doctors of divinity, fair Lady Graces, your sons may be just as disreputably engaged behind your backs, little as you may suspect it, unworthy of belief as you would deem it. What would have been the upshot it is impossible to say — broken noses certainly, if not broken legs — had not the master of the opposition boys come up ; a worthy gentleman and martinet, whom the whole lot dreaded more than anything alive. He had scented, or been told of, the expedition, and had hastened to follow it, and bring down upon those fractious heads the weight of his wrathful authority. The very moment they caught sight of his portly figure off flew the crew in ignominious alarm, the college boys raising a derisive shout after them, and then decamp- ing to their own homes. A good thing for them, and that the whole affair was over and done with before their masters came out of the cathedral. Dynevor, who was hand-in-glove with some of the senior boys, returned Cyras's jacket and cap to him, and went away with his friends; and the two 108 LADY GRACE. Baumgartens were left alone. Charles was crying and shaking, Charles's nose was bleeding, and down sat Cyras in a corner of the now deserted cloisters, and held the child to him, as tenderly as any mother could have done. "Don't cr}^, Charley dear," quoth he, kissing him fondly. "I know that biggest fellow that set upon you, and I'll pay him off as sure as he's a snob. I'd have paid them off now if they had waited, the cowards, and I don't care if they had killed me for it. Where did they hit you, Charley ? " " They hit me everywhere, Cyras," sobbed the child, who, though barely two years younger than his brother, was as a baby compared with him in hardi- hood and in knowledge of the world — if the remark may be applied to a young gentleman rising eleven. " Oh, how my nose bleeds ! " Cyras with his own white handkerchief kept wiping the suffering nose, kissing Charley between whiles. " Charley dear," he began, between the latter's sobs, u if I hit you sometimes, it isn't that I want to hurt you, for I love you very much, better than anything in the world. You mustn't mind my hitting you ; I'm used to hitting, and it'll teach you to be a man." "Yes," breathed Charley, clinging closer to Cyras, whom, in spite of the latter's imperiousness, he dearly loved. " I know you don't do it to hurt me." IN THE CATHEDRAL. 109 u No, that I don't. I don't hurt you ever — do I, Charley?" " No, never/' sobbed Charley. " It's only that I'm afraid you are angry with me." " But I'm not," disclaimed Cyras. " There's not a soul in the house cares for you as I do, and I'll stand by you always, through thick and thin." " Mamma cares for me, Cyras." "After her fashion," returned Mr. Cyras. "She makes a girl of you, and pets you up to the skies. But I'll fight for you, Charley ; I'll never let a hair of your head be touched when we go together to Eton or Rugby, whichever it's to be." " I hope I shall get brave, like you, Cy. I think I shall, when I am as big as you: nurse says you were not much better than me when you were as little." " Oh, I'm blest, though ! " returned Cyras, not pleased with the remark. " Who says it ? " " Jaquet." " Jaquet had better say that to me. She's a nice one ! I never was a molly, Charley ; I never had the chance to be ; she knows that, and she must have said it just to humour you. Why now, only see what a girl they make of you: they keep you in these dandy velvet dresses with a white frill. And they don't let you stir out beyond the door, unless there's a 110 LADY GRACE. woman at your tail to see you don't fall, or don't get lost, or some such nonsense ! " Poor, unhappy, timid Charley caught up his sobbing breath. " And then, look at mamma — taking you into her pew on Sunday ! Never was such a spectacle seen before in Denham Cathedral, as for a chap of your a^e to sit in the ladies' seats. I'd rather be one of those snobs than I'd be made a molly of." " Don't call me a molly, Cy," urged the child. "It's not your fault," returned Cyras, kissing him still, " it's theirs. You have a brave heart, Charley, for you won't tell a lie, and you'll be brave yourself when they'll let you. I'll make you so. I'll teach you, and I'll love you better than all of them put together. Does your nose pain you now, Charley dear ? " " Not much. I was frightened." A little while longer they sat there, Cyras soothing the still sobbing child, stroking his hair, wiping his eyes, whispering endearing names; and then they got up, and Cyras led Charley affectionately into the Deanery, through the covered passage. A couple of pretty objects they looked when they entered the well-lighted residence ! Both their faces smeared with blood, as well as Charley's velvet dress and his " white frill," and Cyras's shirt-front; for the latter, in his caresses, had not escaped catching the IN THE CATHEDRAL. Ill stains. The dean and Lady Grace had not entered, for all this had taken place in a very short space of time, and the organist was still playing. Cyras smuggled Charles into the nursery. " Oh, my patience ! " uttered the nurse, who was sitting there with her charge, a lovely little lady, between five and six years old, Gertrude Baumgarten, who had been kept at home from college that after- noon with an incipient cold. "You wicked boys, what have you been up to ? This is your work, I know, Master Cyras ! " " Is it ! — who gave you leave to know ? " retorted Cyras. He was no more friendly to Jaquet than he used to be, or she to him. Gertrude backed in fear against the wall, her eyes, haughty and blue as were her mothers, wide open with astonishment. She did not like the appearance of things, and began to cry. "Now don't be such a little stupid, Gerty," ex- claimed Cyras ; " there's nothing to cry for. Charley's nose bled, and it got on to our clothes." "Yes, its me that's hurt, Jaquet," put in Charley, remembering his grievances and giving way again. « It isn't Cyras." "Of course it's not," indignantly returned Jaquet; " what harm does he ever come to ? You have been striking him, that's what you have been doing, Master 112 LADY GRACE. Cyras. You've been thumping him on the nose to make it bleed." " Its nothing to you if I have," retorted Cyras, in choler. " You just say it again, though, and I'll strike you." He disdained to say it was not so, or to defend himself; he was of by far too indifferent a tempera- ment. " Oh, nurse — look ! look ! " screamed out the little girl. It was supplemented by a sharp scream from Charley ; his nose had begun to bleed again ; and at that moment there was another interruption. The room-door opened, and the dean and his wife entered ; the former still wearing his surplice and hood, and carrying his trencher, for they had been hurriedly disturbed by the noise as they came in from the cathedral. The nurse, whose temper was not a remarkably calm one, and who disliked the daring Cyras, was busy getting hot water and a basin. " Look at him, my lady, look at him/' cried she ; " and its Master Cyras's doings." " What does all this mean ? " demanded the dean, his eyes wandering from one boy to the other, from their faces to their clothes, his ears taking in the sobbing and the crying. " What is it, I ask ? " he sternly continued, for no one had replied. IN THE CATHEDRAL. 113 The dean might ask again and again, but he was none the nearer to getting an answer. Charley, his head over the basin, was crying, and in too much fear and excitement to hear the question. The sight of only a cut finger had always terrified him. Cyras had one of his independent, obstinate fits coming on, and would not open his lips in explanation or self-defence. "Cyras thumped Charleys nose to make it bleed, papa," said the little girl, unconsciously improving upon Jaquet's assertion. " How dared you hit him ? " exclaimed Lady Grace, turning to Cyras. The boy looked at her but did not answer. She took it for bravado. Her passion rose. "You are growing a perfect little savage ! " And raising her delicately-gloved hand in the heat of the moment, she struck Master Cyras some tingling blows upon his cheeks. Dr. Baumgarten, deeming possibly that to stand witness of the scene did not contribute to the dignity of the Dean of Denham, just escaped from service in his cathedral, turned away, calling upon Cyras to follow him. It was not Cyras, however, who followed the dean ; it was Lady Grace. He had gone to his own study, had laid down his cap, and was taking off his sacred vestments himself, dispensing with the customary aid of his servant. His wife closed the door. Lady Grace. 8 114 LADY GRACE. u Ryle, how is this to end ? " she asked. " What do you mean, Grace ? " "I mean about Cyras; but you know very well without my telling you. The boy has been indulged until he is getting the mastery of us all. He positively struck Gertrude the other day." "As Jaquet chose to interpret it/' said the dean. " I inquired into that. Cyras gave the child a tap on the arm. Of course he ought not to have done even that, and I punished him for it." " You cannot see his failings, Ryle ; you supply him with an unlimited command of money " iC Unlimited ! " again interrupted the dean. " You speak without thought, Grace." " I think too much," she replied. " I have abstained hitherto from serious remonstrance, for if ever I have interfered by a word, you have attributed it, I feel sure, to a jealous feeling, because he is not my own child. But I now tell you that something must be done : if that boy is to stop in the house and rule it, I won't. I will not allow him to ill-treat Charles : I will not, I say." " Hush, Grace; you are excited. Remember the day. " I do not forget it. Your son did, probably, when he struck Charles." "I cannot think he struck him — in that fierce manner.'' IN THE CATHEDRAL. 115 " Why, you saw the proofs," she retorted. " Don't you mean to inquire into it — and punish him ? " "I certainly do — if you will only allow me time, Grace. Much has not been lost yet." "If you have any feeling for your other children, you will take measures by which this annoyance may be put a stop to ; it is to me most irritating." Lady Grace left the room, and the dean rang the bell, despatching the servant who answered it for Master Baumgarten. Cyras had not yet gone the length of disobeying his fathers mandates, and attended as soon as he had been, what the nurse called, "put to rights," meaning his unsightly shirt changed for a clean one. Charley, his nose swollen, but himself otherwise in order, stole in after him. u Now, Cyras," began the clean, " we must have an explanation, and if you deserve punishment you shall not escape it. I did not think my boy was a coward, still less that he would ill-treat his younger brother." The colour flashed into the cheeks of Cyras, and a light into his eyes. But he would not speak. "Come hither, Charles. Do you see his face, sir?" added the dean, taking the child's hand. u Are you not ashamed to look at it, and to reflect that you have caused him all this grief and pain " "Papa," interrupted Charles, "it was not Cyras who hurt me. It was the snobs." 116 LADY GRACE. "It — was— the — what?" slowly uttered the dean, his dignity taken a little aback. " Those charity boys. Frank Dynevor calls them snobs, so does Cyras. I was with the college boys in the cloisters, and they set upon us ; there were five or six upon me all at once, papa; they hit me on the nose, and I dare say they would have killed me, only Cyras came running up and fought with them, because I was not strong enough, and got me away. And then he sat down in the cloisters and nursed me as long as I was frightened, and that's how the blood got upon his clothes." The dean looked from one to the other. " Was it not Cyras who hurt you, then ? I scarcely understand." "Cyras loves me too much to hurt me/' cried Charley, lifting his beautiful, deeply-set brown eyes, just like Cyras's, just like the dean's, to his father's face. " He was kissing me all the time jn the cloisters ; he was so sorry I was hurt; and he says he loves me better than anybody else in the world, and he'll pay off that biggest snob the first time he sees him. Don't you, Cyras ? " The boy turned caressingly to Cyras. Cyras looked red and foolish, not caring to have his private affections betrayed for the public benefit, and he shook off Charley. Dr. Baumgarten drew Cyras to him, and fondly pushed his hair from his forehead. IN THE CATHEDRAL. 117 " Tell me about it, my boy." "Charley was just talking to some of the college boys, papa, and those horrid charity snobs " " Stop a bit. What do you mean by ' snobs ' ? Very vulgar word, Cyras, and a wrong one for you to use. Of whom do you speak ? " "Oh, you know that big parish school, papa: well, they are always setting on the college boys, and they came up to the cloisters this evening, and Charley, being with the boys, got in for his share of pummelling, and I beat the fellows off him. That's all." " Why did you not say this to your mamma in the nursery ? You made her angry with you for nothing." Cyras shook back his head with a somewhat defiant movement. " Mammas often angry with me for nothing, as far as that goes. I don't care. As to Jaquet," he added, drowning a warning gesture of the dean's, "she's always telling stories of me." " Now what do you mean by saying, ' I don t care,' Cyras ? It is very wrong to be indifferent, even in speech." " I mean nothing, papa," laughed the boy. " Only I can fight my own battles against Jaquet, and I will. She has no business to interfere with me when she hates me so much ; let her concern herself with Charles and Gertrude." 118 LADY GRACE. The dean left the boys together, and went in search of his wife. He found her in her chamber. She had taken off her outdoor things, and was now in her dinner dress. The attendant quitted the room as he entered it. " Grace/' said he, going up to her, " there has been a misapprehension, and I have come to set you right. Charley got into an affray with some strange boys in the cloisters (the details of which I shall make it my business to inquire into), and Cyras defended him against them — going into them no doubt like a young lion, for he possesses uncommon spirit — too much of it. We have been casting blame on Cyras un- necessarily." Lady Grace lifted her eyes to her husband. She knew him to be an honourable man (putting out of the question his divinity and his deanship), and that he would not assert a thing except in perfect good faith. " Do you mean that Cyras did not beat Charles ? " " He did not. He protected him." " Why did not Cyras say so, then ? " " His spirit in fault again, I suppose ; too proud to defend himself against an unjust imputation," replied the dean. But the dean was wrong, unhappily; Cyras was too carelessly indifferent to defend him- self. The dean continued: "I ordered Cyras before IN THE CATHEDRAL. 119 me, and began taking him to task. Charles, who had come in with him, spoke up eagerly, saying Cyras had fought for him, to defend him from his assailants, not against him. You should have heard the child, Grace, telling how Cyras sat down and nursed him afterwards in the cloisters, kissing him and wiping the blood from his face, and whispering him how he loved him better than anything else in the world. Grace, those two will be affectionate, loving brothers if we do not mar it." Lady Grace felt that she had been unjust in striking Cyras, as well as guilty of an unladylike action, and perhaps she felt more contrition at the moment than the case really warranted. " How mar it ? " she faltered. The dean put his arm round his wife's waist before replying. " Grace, you best know what is in your heart — whether or not there is a dislike towards Cyras rankling there. I think there is, and that it makes you unjust to him. If you are not very cautious it may sow dissension between the children." Grace Baumgarten burst into tears, and laid her face caressingly upon her husband's breast : she loved him almost as passionately as she had ever done. " Ryle," she whispered, u if there be any such feeling, it is born of my love for you." He smiled to himself. " I know it, my dearest ; I 120 LADY GRACE. know that you remember he is not your child ; yet that does not make the feeling less inexcusable." " Oh, but you are mistaken in using such a word," she spoke up, rallying herself. " Dislike ! Kyle, I do not dislike Cyras. I cannot love him as I do Charles — how can I ? — and he is very troublesome and vexes me. Some boys are ten times more wearying than others ; they must try the patience of even their own mothers." Cyras ivas troublesome ; one of those boys who are never still — always in some mischief or other. The dean allowed that. <( Grace, listen. I think the boy is made worse than he would be ; he has hardly fair play between you and Jaquet." "I never allow Jaquet to be unjust to him." "Is she ever anything but unjust to him?" re- turned the dean. " Does she not bring to you tales of him continually ? making molehills into mountains, purposely to set you against him ? My dear, I fancy it is so." " If I thought she did I would discharge her to-day," spoke Lady Grace, in haughty impulse. " Not to-day ; it is Sunday," laughed the dean. " I will watch," said Lady Grace. " But, Ryle, you know you do indulge Cyras too much ; you have ever done so. You may not be conscious of it. When a IN THE CATHEDRAL. 121 parent inordinately indulges a child, I do not believe he ever is conscious of it. And there are boys and boys, you know. We may indulge Charles as much as we please, it would never hurt him ; but it is bad for a self-willed boy like Cyras." Lady Grace was right. But no more was said, for the steps of the boys were heard on the stairs, and she opened the door. " Come in, Cyras ; I want you," she said, drawing him gently to her. " Your papa has been telling me that it was not you who hit Charles and made his nose bleed." " Of course it was not me — as if I would ! " said Cyras. " I wonder what it is ? " thought Sir William. " Something, I am sure. Do you suspect any particular mischief yourself ? " he inquired. " Well, I suppose I ought to do so." " The heart ? " queried Sir William. "That, if anything. Possibly it may arise only from my being somewhat overdone with work and other matters. I have been attacked at times rather curiously." " Will you describe the attacks/ " There is not much to describe," said the dean, " A sudden stoppage of the heart, accompanied by a strange inward fluttering, which I feel to my fingers, ends; and then a faintness, almost, but not quite, amounting to a fainting-fit." Sir William Chant put another question or two as to symptoms, and then passed on to another phase. " How frequently do you have these attacks ? " " Very seldom indeed. I have only had about half- a-dozen in all. The first time was after boating, when I was an undergraduate at Oxford ; the last WITH SIR WILLIAM CHANT. 141 time was yesterday evening ; and that covers a good many years, you perceive." "Yesterday evening !" repeated the doctor, struck with the remark. " Not when you were here ? " "No; afterwards. In going home, we got into a crowd collected at a fire. I ran, and otherwise exerted myself, and the attack came on." "And sometimes, I expect, it has come on from mental emotion ? " " Yes ; more frequently so. What do you make of it, Sir William ? " Sir William Chant smiled, rose, and took some instrument from a drawer in his table. " You must let me test your organs a little before I can give you an answer." " Beginning with the heart, I suppose ? " observed the dean, as he unbuttoned his clerical coat and waistcoat. "Beginning with it and ending with it, I fancy," thought the physician ; but he did not say so. The examination, a slight one, was over. The instrument was in its place again, the clerical coat and waistcoat had been refastened, and the gentle- men sat, each in his chair, facing one another as before. "Well ? " said the dean, for Sir William did not speak. 142 LADY GRACE. " Yes, undoubtedly the seat of mischief lies in the heart. It is not quite as sound as it ought to be." " Am I in danger ? I must beg of you to tell me the truth," added the dean, finding he was not immediately answered. " My dear Mr. Dean, in one sense of the word you are in danger; all people must be in danger whose heart is in the condition of yours ; but the extent of the peril depends very much upon yourself." "You mean that with tranquillity it may be reduced to a minimum ? " "I do. With perfect tranquillity maintained of mind and body, your heart may serve you for years and years to come." " I may not be able to command that." " But you must do so. My dear sir, you must I do not know which would be the worse for you, worry of mind or undue exertion of body." " He would be a clever man who is able to ensure himself a life exempt from worry," remarked the dean. "I mean emotional worry — worry that runs to agitation," said Sir William. "Of small worries we all have enough and to spare; life is full of them. Even these I would have you meet calmly." « If I can." " Some matters will not admit of an ' if,' Dr. Baum- garten — must not be allowed to do so. Every WITH SIR WILLIAM CHANT. 143 individual has so much under his control. And — I think I may understand that with each attack you have had you were able to trace it to some emotion or other. Is that not so ? " « It is so." " Well, then, what more need of argument ? Keep emotion from you, and you will not have the attacks. ,, " On the other hand — I think I am to understand that should any undue agitation arise, despite every precaution, to induce an attack, it might be fatal ? My life may pass away in it ? " " Yes. But you must not allow it to arise." With a few quiet words of thanks Dr. Baumgarten arose ; he put his fingers into his waistcoat pocket. " No, no, no ; no fee from you, Dr. Baumgarten," spoke the physician, warmly. " You were my honoured guest last night ; let me have the pleasure of regarding our interview to-day as one of friendship. And be sure to come to me whenever you want advice of any kind." " So be it, Sir William ; and I thank you greatly," answered the dean, as their hands met. He walked slowly along the street on his return to Berkeley Square, deep in thought, unable to put away an impression which had taken hold of him — that for him the dread fiat had gone forth. It seemed as sure as though he heard the death-bell tolling for him in his coffin. 144 LADY GRACE. CHAPTER VIII. AFTER THE DINNER-PARTY. Once more in the drawing-room at Berkeley Square sat the dean and Lady Grace. They had entered the room at almost the same moment, dressed to receive guests. The dean gave a dinner-party that evening, and Lady Grace, as she sat at the window, observed the first carriage, as she thought, driving up to the door. Four or five weeks have elapsed since the deans interview with Sir William Chant, and the sweet month of June is close at hand. The dean has been feeling well of late — that is, he has not had any return of his malady; but he is overwhelmed with worry. Lady Grace has been extravagant this season, and her husband knows not how to defer any longer the embarrassments which creditors are pressing upon him. He has been staying at Great Whitton, and has only now been in town a day or two. An idea has lately been forcing itself upon him AFTER THE DINNER-PARTY. 145 * which he does not like to entertain ; yet, unwelcome as it is, he begins to fear he shall have to act upon it. It is that he shall disclose his position to his brother- in-law and obtain from him seasonable help. It might take from four to five thousand pounds to extricate him from his dilemma and put him straight again; probably quite five. Then he would have to make all known to Grace, and persuade her to live in quiet retirement for a time at Great Whitton, and pay back Lord Avon by degrees. But Dr. Baumgarten does not like to ask this loan of Lord Avon ; one or two loans he has had already from him, The good- natured earl has always been generous to them ; apart from the Berkeley Square house lie often slips a ten- pound note into his sister's hand, of which she makes no secret to her husband, and for which she hardly thanks Lord Avon. " He has no wife," remarks Lady Grace; "why should he not occasionally make me presents ? " It was to be a formal dinner-party this evening; one given yearly by Dr. Baumgarten to a few nearly superannuated lights of the Church, who came in their mitred chariots, with their old wives beside them. It was not at all one delighted in by Lady Grace, who called the worthy people " ancient fogies." Neither Charles nor Gertrude, if at home, would have been admitted to it. Cyras would have been still more out Lady Grace. 10 146 LADY GKACE. of his element than they. Cyras, who would soon be on the wing again for a distant land, was paying a farewell visit to Charles at Oxford ; Gertrude was spending the day with their friends in Eaton Place — the Maude-Dynevors. " That carriage has passed out of the square ; I fancied it was coming here," remarked Lady Grace as she turned from the window. The dean stood with his elbow leaning on the mantelpiece, the hand supporting his head. A strange weight of care sat upon his brow ; so great, so strange, that it did not escape the notice of his wife. " Is anything the matter, Byle ? You do not look well." " Well ? Oh yes ; I am quite well." " You are troubled, then. What is it ? " " Nothing ; it is nothing, Grace. The day has been very hot, and heat always makes me feel languid, you know." And the dean removed his elbow, smoothed his brow, and called up a smile, just as the first black silk apron, worn by the Bishop of Denham, came sailing in. In point of fact, the dean had cause to show an uneasy front : a terrible blow had fallen upon him — painfully perplexing tidings that he knew not how to cope with. But never had the Dean of Denham been more AFTER THE DINNER-PARTY. 147 courteous, more brilliant, more alive to the duties of a host than he was that evening. He sat at the head of his board, after Lady Grace had withdrawn, and the sociable old bishops admired his learning, retorted to his wit, yielded to his fascinations, and enjoyed his good wine. It was a remark amongst their lordships the next day that Baumgarten had surpassed himself. The ladies thought the same when he appeared with their lords in the drawing-room. Gertrude Baum- garten was in it then, and was singing to them some of her sweetest songs, but they forgot the songs when they listened to the dean. A servant was crossing the saloon with a coffee-cup ; he halted for a moment near his master, and spoke in a tone imperceptible to other ears. It was Moore, who had lived so long in the family ; a middle-aged man now, and quite a confidential servant. "Mr. Fuller is come again, sir; and another gentle- man with him. I have shown them into the library." Drawing towards the door, unconsciously as it were, with a word to one, a smile for another, the dean pre- sently passed out of it, unnoticed, for they were engaged with their coffee, and Gertrude was singing again. In the library were two gentlemen, and farther off, sitting on the edge of a handsome chair, as if handsome chairs and himself did not often come into contact with each other, was a shabby-looking man. 148 LADY GRACE. The man had been there for several hours, and had had substantial refreshments served to him more than once. Mr. Fuller was the dean's lawyer. The gentleman he had now brought with him was the deans banker, and the man was a sheriff's officer. The Dean of Denham had been arrested. The Dean of Denham had been personally arrested ! Such calamities have occurred to divines even higher in the Church than he. As he came up to his door that afternoon, and put his foot upon his door-sill to enter it, he was touched upon the shoulder by the man sitting now in that uneasy chair. The exclusive dean shrank from the contaminating contact, his haughty pride rose, and he spoke severely : " Fellow, what are you doing ? " " The Reverend Ryle Baumgarten, Dean of Denham, I believe. Sir, you are my prisoner." Staggered, shocked, almost bewildered, he, by some process of persuasion or reasoning, induced the man to enter his house, and wait while he sent for his lawyer. The lawyer came. Arrangement appeared to be hopeless, for the dean was worse than out of funds, and of revenues to fall back upon he had none. There was a consultation. The dean said that he must receive the bishops that night, as had been decided ; and an awful sickness fell upon him at the prospect of AFTER THE DINNER-PARTY. 149 going to prison. Mr. Fuller threw out a word of suggestion touching Lord Avon. But Lord Avon, as the dean knew, had gone to Epsom races ; he might not be home till midnight, if then. Mr. Fuller knew the dean to be a man of honour, whose word was not to be questioned, and he passed it, to go quietly to his destination the following morning, provided he could remain at liberty in his house for that night. Mr. Fuller gave an undertaking to the capturer, answering for the dean's good faith, and the man was made at home in the library, Moore alone being cognizant of his business. Meanwhile the dean wrote a note to his banker, of which Mr. Fuller took charge. The banker, wishing to be courteous, answered it in person, and sat now at the library table, the dean on one side of him, the lawyer on the other. But of what use was his coming ? He had been privately saying to the lawyer that he and his house were in for it too deeply as it was, and not a shilling more would they advance ; no, not to keep the dean out of purgatory, let alone out of prison. He intimated somewhat of the same now to the dean, though in more courtly terms. They consulted together in subdued tones, not to be audible to the man at the other end of the room, but to no earthly effect; it all came round to the same point : the dean had neither money nor money's 150 LADY GRACE. worth ; even the very furniture of the house he was in was not his ; it had been settled by Lord Avon on his sister, and the dean's debts could not touch it. The furniture at the Deanery, the furniture at Great Whitton Rectory was already mortgaged, as it may be said, for money which had been lent upon it ; heavy liabilities were upon him, and he had no means of meeting them — he had put off and put off the evil day, only to make it all the worse, now that it had come to this. " I'll try to see Lord Avon in the morning ; he'll be back by that time,'' remarked Mr. Fuller. " And only to find that he has gone off to Paris by to-night's train," said the dean. " He talked of going over this week." Nothing could be done then ; nothing whatever. The lawyer was unable to help, the banker would not do so, and the conference closed. Mr. Fuller promised to be there again in the morning. Dr. Baumgarten, upon thorns in more ways than one, went back to his wondering bishops, the comforting assurance that he must surrender the next morning playing havoc with his brain. " Oh, here's the dean at last ! Lady Grace feared you must be taken ill." " Never in better health in my life," laughed the dean, gaily. " I was summoned to the library on AFTER THE DINNER-PARTY. 151 business; people will come at troublesome times. Your lordship is winning, I see — a knight and a castle already ; fair trophies, but Lady Grace generally con- trives to lose all before her when she attempts chess." The guests departed at the sober hour of eleven, and Lady Grace immediately prepared to go to her dressing-room. The dean had been making up his mind to tell her while he talked to the bishops. "A smooth tongue covers an aching heart " — how runs the proverb ? In all the world perhaps there could not have been found that night a more aching heart than Ryle Baumgarten's. The time had come when his wife must know, and the telling would be to him as a very bitter pill. "Grace, don't go up just yet. Good-night, Ger- trude ; run on, my dear." " Good-night, dear papa." " Ryle ! " uttered Lady Grace, as the door closed, " you are not well. I am sure of it. Something must be wrong. What were you doing when you were out of the room so long to-night ? " The dean leaned against the wall by the side of the fireplace, all his assumed bravery gone out of him. When the spirits have been forced for hours, the revulsion is sometimes terrible. She went up to him in alarm and placed her hands upon him. He took them in his own. 152 LADY UK ACE. " Yes, Grace, something is wrong. It seems/' he added, with a ghastly face, a as if I should almost die in telling you of it." Her lips turned whiter than his, and her voice sank to a dread whisper. "Something has happened to Charles?" " No, no ; the children are all safe ; it has nothing to do with them. It has to do with myself alone, and — with you — in a degree — as part of myself." " Kyle, you are ill," she faintly said. " You have some disorder that you are concealing from me. Why do you keep me in suspense ? " " 111 in mind, Grace. Oh, my wife, how shall I tell you that I have been an embarrassed man for years, and that now the blow has fallen." She shivered inwardly, but would not let it be seen. " What is the blow ? " "I am arrested. I must go to prison to-morrow morning," So little was Lady Grace familiar with " arrests " and " prisons " that she could not at once comprehend him ; and when she did so, the popular belief seemed to be in her mind that a dean, so enshrined in divinity and dignity, could never be made an inmate of a prison. The first emotion passed, they sat down close together on the sofa, and Grace poured forth question upon question. What had brought it on ? How AFTEIl THE DINNER-PARTY. 153 much did they owe ? Why didn't he tell the lawyers to settle it ? Puzzling questions, all, for the dean to answer. It had been coming on too long for him to be able to trace " what " had brought it on, except that they had lived at too great an expense. Little by little, step by step, the grain of sand had grown to a desert. How much they owed he could not precisely say; and, oh ! the mockery of the innocent remark : "Why didn't he tell the lawyers to settle it ? " " Byle ! " she suddenly exclaimed, " you had an advance from the bankers a day or two ago. I saw you draw a cheque for two hundred and twenty pounds — don't you remember ? I came in as you were writing it. Is that all gone ? " " It was the last cheque they cashed — the last they would cash. The money was not for myself." " For whom, then ? " " That is of no importance. It is gone." " But you must tell me. You know, Byle, now that it has come to this pass, you must not keep me in the dark. I must know how much you owe, and how the money has gone, and the right and the wrong of everything. Of course, there's nothing to be done now but to get Henry to help us ; and if he won't, or can't do so, we must raise money upon my property. What did that two hundred and twenty pounds go in ? " 154 LADY GRACE. "Arrests seem to be running in the family just now," observed the dean, with a bitter smile. " Cyras — Cyras — well, I had to give that cheque to Cyras to get rid of a little trouble. It was not much, Grace ; as a drop of water to the ocean." Whether as a drop, or a bucket, it seemed to freeze Lady Grace. " Cyras ! " she ejaculated scornfully. " What right have you to help him when you cannot afford to do it ? I shall tell Cyras what I think of his despicable conduct." " Don't do that, Grace. The trouble was not Cyras's. He has not had a shilling from me." "You have just said he had that cheque." " Yes — to extricate another." " Another ? " echoed Lady Grace, looking at him. " It was not — oh, Eyle ! it surely was not Charles ? " " Yes it was," said the dean, in a low, sad tone. "He got into debt, and Cyras took my cheque to Oxford to release him. No one can be more repentant than Charles is ; I do not think it will ever happen again. It was not his fault ; he was drawn into it by others. I had the nicest possible letter from him this morning ; he says it will be a life's lesson to him. I believe it will. There— let us leave Charles's affairs for mine. Grace, this blow will kill me." " If you went to prison it would be quite enough to kill you ; but that cannot be thought of. As a last AFTER THE DINNER-PARTY. 155 resource, money, I say, must be raised on my pro- perty.'' " My dear, I thought you knew better than that. It is yours for your life only, and then it descends to your children. The Lord Chancellor himself could not raise a shilling upon it." Lady Grace started up. " Is it so ? Then what in the world is to be done ? " He did not say what — he foresaw too well, and his countenance betrayed it. She put her arm round his neck. " No, Byle, dearest, you never shall ; there shall be no prison for you whilst I live. I will be back in an hour." . a Why, where are you going ? " he exclaimed. " To my brother. A cab will take me there in safety. He must manage this. Now, don't attempt to stop me, Eyle ; what harm could I come to ? If you are afraid it might do so, come with me." " I wish I could. I am a prisoner." " A prisoner ! " she ejaculated. " Here, in your own house ? " "I may not quit it, except to exchange it for a prison. But, my dear, listen to reason. You are not likely to find your brother at this hour of the night ; perhaps he is not even back from the races. Fuller will see after him in the morning." 156 LADY GRACE. " I shall go and find him now," she persisted. She had a bonnet and shawl brought down, and a man-servant was ordered to attend her : not Moore, who could not be spared from home. For once in her life Lady Grace condescended a word of explanation. " She had business with Lord Avon, and the dean felt too unwell to accompany her." She remembered one important item of information she was ignorant of, and went back to ask it. " Ryle, how much are you arrested for ? " "The sum that I am arrested for is about four hundred pounds. But now that this crisis has come, I shall not escape without making arrangements to pay all I owe," added the dean. " And how much is it in the whole ? " " Close upon five thousand pounds." Grace looked at him; he was sitting back in the large chair, almost, as it seemed to her, gasping for breath. She saw how much the confession had shaken him. Running across the room, she kissed him fondly. I " Don't distress yourself, my husband. Henry will see that all comes right. I'll make him do so." The man who had been bidden to attend her stood at the cab-door, holding it open. As Lady Grace took her seat the thought crossed her that she would not take the man — servants find out things so quickly. AFTER THE DINNER-PARTY. 157 "Kichard, I think I shall not want you/' she said. " I will go alone. Tell the man where to drive to — Lord Avon's." So Lady Grace went alone to the earl's residence in Piccadilly. He was not at home. His valet thought he might be at the club ; he had heard his lordship talking with a friend about dining there when they got back from Epsom. Away to the club went Lady Grace. The hall- porter, who was airing himself on the steps, watched the cab stop, saw a lady looking out of it, and con- descended to go down to it and see what she wanted. Yes, the earl was there, he and some other noble- men had been dining together. Lady Grace sent a message, which the porter took in and delivered. A lady in a cab was waiting to see his lordship. She wished him to come to her immediately. A titter went round the table, and the earl exploded a little at the porter. " What the deuce ? A lady to see him ? What next ? Who was she ? " The porter could not say anything about her except that she was in a cab. " What's her name ? " returned the earl. " Im- pudence ! Go and ask." The man went and came back again, interrupting the" chaff that was then in full swing round the table. It dropped to silence, awaiting the announcement. 158 LADY GRACE. " It is Lady Grace Baumgarten, my lord." Lord Avon gave a prolonged stare, and then hurried out. A youngster at the table began to take liberties with Lady Grace's name. "Hold your silly tongue, you young fool," repri- manded an older man. "Don't you know that the Lady Grace is his sister and the wife of the Dean of Denham ? " " Oh ! " said the young fellow, feeling that he should like to sink into his shoes. « Why, Grace, what's up now ? " cried Lord Avon, as he approached the cab. " Is Berkeley Square on fire ? Or is Baumgarten made Primate of All England ? " " Come inside, Henry, for a minute ; I want to speak to you. The deans arrested for five thousand pounds." " Oh, is he ? " equably returned Lord Avon. " He has been a clever fellow to keep out of it so long. No one but a dean could have done it." " And you must find the money to release him." " Anything else ? " inquired Lord Avon. " You will find it, Henry ; you must." "Look here, Grace," said the earl, "thousands are not so plentiful with me; but if they were, and I went, to the sponging-house to-night, and paid the money down, there'd be the same to do over and over again to-morrow." AFTER THE DINNER-PARTY. 159 "No, there would not — but there's no time to explain. Went to where, did you say ? " « Where's he taken to ? " "He is at home. They have gone out of their usual way, he said, and allowed him to be at home to-night : a man is there, and will take him away in the morning. Henry, it must not be ; you must come to his aid." " What I can do will not be of much use, I fear. I know more of Baumgarten's affairs than you do ; in fact, I have already helped him out of one or two pits; though of course things have been kept from you." "Whilst I have been the culprit, I expect. It is my extravagance that has brought this about, not his. Only fancy, Henry ! We had a lot of the old bishops to dinner to-night, and Eyle sat at the table just as usual, knowing he was virtually a prisoner, whilst the wicked man, his capturer, was waiting for him in the library ! " " A fine state of things ! 99 " You must help him out of it. The Dean of Den- ham can't go to prison ; such a scandal never was heard of. Henry, I won't stir from your side, this night, till you give nie the money." " Where am I to get it from ! " quietly asked the earl. " The birds of the air ? " " Nonsense, You possess a cheque-book, I suppose." 160 LADY GRACE. " I don't carry it about with me. All this comes of marrying a parson. In position, Baumgarten was beneath you " " Hold your tongue," interrupted Lady Grace. " He is an honour to the family ; and I know, if he has lived beyond his means, it has been for my sake. Will you go home with me now and talk things over with him ? " " No," said the earl ; " I can t to-night. What with the day's racing, and the dinner after it, I'm tired to death : fit for nothing. I'll be in Berkeley Square the first thing in the morning, and see what can be done." " What time ? By nine o'clock ? Even that may be too late." "111 be there by eight." " You won't fail me, Henry ? " she said in an imploring tone. "I will not fail you, Grace. And I'll get Baum- garten out of the mess if I can, for I like him. Good- night!" Lady Grace returned home. She was entering the drawing-room, when the butler, Moore, came suddenly out of it to meet her, and in a very unbutlerlike way closed the door in her face to prevent her entrance. His usually florid complexion had turned yellow, and he spoke in a flurry, as if not weighing his words. " Oh, my lady — not in there, please." AFTER THE DINNER-PARTY. 1C1 Lady Grace wondered if Moore had been visiting the decanters. "Open the door," she calmly said " Is the dean there still ? " But Moore held the handle firmly. "I beg your pardon, my lady, you must not go in." She was alarmed now : she saw the man's agitation. "My lady, the dean is taken ill," continued Moore, " that's the truth. I thought your ladyship had best not see him." She waved him aside in her wilful manner : ne would have had to give way. But at that moment the door was opened from within and Cyras came out. He had just got back from Oxford, and it was his arrival which had brought about the discovery that something was amiss with the dean. " I am going for -a doctor, mamma," said Cyras, and leaped away. Lady Grace went in, and Moore followed her. Leaning back in a low easy-chair, almost at full length, his head resting on the back of it, lay the dean. His face was white, his mouth was open, but his eyes were closed, as if in a calm sleep. Neverthe- less, there was that in his face which struck terror to the heart of his wife. She touched the faithful old servant on the arm and cried aloud. "Yes, my lady," he whispered, believing that she saw as well as he : "I fear it is death." Lady Grace. 11 162 LADY GRACE. Lady Grace knelt down and clasped her hands round her husband. In that moment of distress, what cared she who was present ? She called him by en- dearing names, she kissed his face, she besought him to speak to her. But there was no answering response, and conviction told her that there never would be again. Never in this world. Cyras came back with a doctor ; curiously enough, it was Sir "William Chant. Sir William had been quietly walking home from a whist-party at a friend's house when Cyras met him. A small mercy this, for Sir William was able to testify to the cause of death, thereby avoiding an inquest. The dean had died from disease of the heart, brought on by the evening's excitement. And the world, next day, was busy with the news that the Very Reverend Ryle Baumgarten had been gathered to his fathers, and that the rich Deanery of Denham, richer in those days than in these, was in the clerical market. ( 163 ) CHAPTER IX. MISS DYNEVOR AND THE GIRLS. It was not an ordinary match ; it was something quite out .of the common way; but Mary Dynevor was a girl out of the common way also. Not, however, as regarded beauty : in that respect she could not compete with her sister, Grace, or with her brilliant friend, Gertrude Baumgarten. She was a ladylike girl, with a pale serene face, very much like that of her sister, Cyrilla, whose love had been blighted ; her hair was of a rich brown, her eyes were violet blue ; she was quiet in manner and calm in speech. That was the best that could be said of her, and yet it was certain that some unusual charm did attach itself to Mary Dynevor. In the past year, when abroad with Lady Grace Baumgarten, Mary had made the acquaintance of Everard Wilmot, an attache to one of the Continental embassies, and the son of Sir John Wilmot. Exceed- ingly to her own surprise he had asked her to become his wife. In the impulse of the moment she went, 164 LADY GRACE. letter in hand — for he had made the offer in writing — to Lady Grace. " What am I to do ? " she asked. " What a fortunate girl you are ! " exclaimed Lady Grace, when she had digested its contents. " He is the eldest son, you know, and old Sir Johns worth twenty thousand a-year, if he's worth a shilling. What news for your father ! " "Then you think that — I — should — accept him?" repeated Mary Dynevor. "Accept him!" retorted Lady Grace; "why, what else would you do ? " " I don't know. I don't particularly care for him." " What a strange girl you are ! You do not like any one else, I conclude ? " " Oh dear, no," returned Mary ; " what an idea ! " But the idea had served to bring up the deepest and most confusing blushes to her face. They looked a little suggestive to Lady Grace Baumgarten. "But — before accepting an offer of this kind, I thought it was necessary — or usual — to — to " Mary broke down. Lady Grace burst into a merry laugh. " You thought it was necessary first of all to fall in love. I see. Well, it is sometimes done, Mary ; but it is not abso- lutely essential. My opinion was that something was impending, for Everard has been here much." MISS DYNEVOR AND THE GIRLS. 165 "But I never imagined he came for me." " Oh, indeed ! " said Lady Grace, not choosing to say that she herself had never imagined it either. " For whom, then, did you think he came ? " Another accession of colour, and a slightly evasive tone. " Not for any one — of course , I had no definite thoughts upon the subject " " One word, Mary. Do you dislike Mr. Wilmot ? " " I like him very much ; and I esteem him greatly." " And yet you come to me, and demurely say, ' What am I to do ? ' Go away with you, you shy, foolish girl." So Mary accepted Mr. Wilmot. Nevertheless, she felt half-conscious that if she had had the courage to search out the hidden secrets of her heart, it might have told her that her love was given to Charles Baumgarten. Some few years had elapsed since the sudden death of the Dean of Denham. It was a terrible shock, that, to his wife and children. His affairs were arranged by the help of Lord Avon ; Cyras and Charles both doing also something towards it. A small sum of money, left to the boys by a relative, but of which the dean had enjoyed the interest for his life, they had at once sacrificed. Cyras had returned to New Zealand. He was still in the same shipping-house there, Brice and Jansens, and held a good position in it now. He 166 LADY GRACE. had not visited England a second time, but wrote occasionally. Sometimes his letters would contain a pretty -looking little cheque for Charles or for Gertrude. Charles had done well at Oxford; had taken honours and gained his fellowship. He was called to the Bar, and lived at his chambers in Pump Court for economy's sake ; now and then staying for a few days with his mother in Berkeley Square, Lady Grace's residence. Her income was small. She had only two thousand a-year of her own, which would go to Charles and Gertrude in equal shares at her death ; but Lord Avon considerably augmented it. He had been a good brother to her. Charles hoped to get on well in his profession in time, and had taken to go circuit ; this would be his second year of it. It was February by the calendar. Judging by the wind, one might have called it March, for dust whirled in the streets and windows rattled. But Miss Dynevor' s drawing-room in Eaton Place was cheerful with its fire and wax-lights. Dr. Dynevor was rather in the habit of calling it "My town house" when speaking of it, but it was his sister's and not his. His name was really Maude-Dynevor, though he was rarely called by it. Some people dropped the one name and some dropped the other. His wife's family name was Maude, and when he married her he had had to take it in addition to his own. MISS DYNEVOB AND THE GIRLS. 107 When Dr. Baumgarten was made Dean of Denham, Dr. Maude-Dynevor was one of the prebendaries of the same cathedral. The word "prebend," or "pre- bendary," was then almost universally used for the higher cathedral dignitaries; " canon " rarely. Two or three years later Dr. Dynevor was made pre- bendary of Oldchurch, and quitted Denham. He was at Oldchurch still, its sub-clean. He had a large family of boys and girls, and ruled them with an iron hand. He was a dark, stern, ugly man, who walked with his head thrown back in haughty pomposity and his perky nose turned up to the air. Caroline, his second daughter, had married a man very much older than herself, Colonel Sir Thomas Hume, and was in India ; but the doctor had four daughters on his hands still. The eldest of them, Cyrilla, rarely came to town. Perhaps, though, it may be said that they were on Miss Dynevor's hands rather than on his. She had all the trouble of them. Since Mrs. Maude-Dynevor's death some years back, his sister had taken much charge of them. Occasionally she was with them at Oldchurch, more frequently they were with her in London. The girls were not at all grateful. Ann Esther Dynevor was _ rather eccentric and wore a flaxen wig, and her nieces took advantage of her peculiarities to tease her. She was a rich woman and very generous to them. 168 LADY GRACE. When Lady Grace Baumgarten returned from her visit to the Continent in the past October, and resigned his daughter Mary into Dr. Dynevor's charge — he had travelled from Oldchurch to Eaton Pla^e to receive her — and laid before him Mr. Wilmot's very handsome proposals, the sub-dean was intensely gratified, and expressed obligation and satisfaction to Lady Grace. Mary and her sisters, Regina and Grace, had remained that winter with their aunt. With February changes had come. Sir John Wilmot was dead, Sir Everard was on his road home, and Dr. Dynevor came up from Oldchurch and was in Eaton Place. According to the sub-deans computation, Wilmot might be in London now. He was anxious to see his future son- in-law. In his private opinion he set him down as a milksop. Who else, with a title and good rent- roll, would have been attracted by Mary, a quiet, pale girl with nothing in her ? The canon was not com- plimentary to his daughters, either in public or private, and was given to underrating their merits. Dinner was over, and all were in the drawing-room except the sub-dean. He was fond of his port-wine, and did not quit the table with the young and frivolous. On one of the large old-fashioned sofas sat Miss Dynevor in her flaxen wig ; her head had drooped on to the sofa pillow, and she was fast asleep. On another sofa sat the three girls in a half-circle; and perched MISS DYNEVOR AND THE GIRLS. 1G9 on one of its arms was their brother Richard ; on the other arm sat the young man who had dined with them. This was Charles Baumgarten. Nearly six-and- twenty years of age, not very tall, but stately and handsome, he was the very image of what his father had been as a young man ; not resembling his sister Gertrude, not resembling his mother, Lady Grace ; only his dead father. Richard Dynevor was little and insignificant. The sub-dean's sons were the plague of his life. Not that they were worse than other sons, but there were several of them to get on in life, and the dean was poor; and to supply their wants was often an inconvenience to him. Richard was studying for the Bar, but was not yet called to it. He had wanted to go into the Church ; but the sub-dean had two sons in it, or going into it, and would not put in a third. " Isn't it a shame ! " suddenly exclaimed Regina Dynevor in the subdued tone they had adopted for their conversation. " She says her limbs are getting bad again, and that she can't chaperon us to-morrow night ! " " Regina ! " interposed Grace, in a tone of sharp reproof, although Regina was the eldest and she was the youngest. "I declare that she said it," returned Regina, the 170 LADY GRACE. whole party having imperceptibly glanced at the opposite sofa, so that there could be no mistaking who was alluded to. " We were in her dressing-room, just before dinner. 'My limbs are getting bad again:' those were the very words she used." " Very possibly ; but there was no necessity for you to repeat them. We are not alone." "We are," said Regina. "Who's Charley Baum- garten ? Nobody." " Nobody, as you say," interposed Charles. " Regina's tongue will be the bane of her life," cried Grace. "Of course we are used to Charley, but it would have been all the same had there been a room- ful of strangers present. She says anything that comes uppermost in her mind." " Like papa," carelessly spoke Regina. " Yes ; but what is proper for papa is unladylike for you," returned Grace, who liked to set the world to rights. " Go on, Gracie," laughed Richard ; " keep them in order. What else did Aunt Ann say ? " "Nothing. I hope it's not true, though, that she is going to be ill. We shall all be kept prisoners, as we were last season." "I'd rather run away than put up with it," pro- tested Regina fiercely. "It's not rheumatism, but temper, from which she is suffering." MISS DYNEVOR AND THE GIRLS. 171 Charles Baumgarten laughed. " It is quite .true, Charley ; even you don't know her yet. I protest that it was half-and-half last year — a little rheumatism and a great deal of cross-grained temper. If she does have this attack, mind, I shall have brought it on." » You ! What next, Regina ? " " Little Archdeacon Duck called this morning " "Archdeacon Duck — who is he?" interrupted Charles Baumgarten. " It's the girls' name for him ; she means Arch- deacon Drake," explained Richard. " Let her go on, Charley." " Well," said Regina, "you all know how Aunt Ann has been setting her cap at him, thinking, perhaps, he might convert her into Mrs. Duck the second. The little archdeacon was beginning with his foolishly complimentary speeches — its my belief he learns them by heart, and says them to every woman he meets — and brought in something about aunt's ' locks, of which the weather, windy or wet, never disturbed the beauty.' 'Or if it does/ I put in, 'Aunt Ann Esther can send them to the hairdresser to be renewed ; she is more fortunate than we poor young damsels.' " " Regina ! you never said it ! " " Indeed I did. She looked daggers, and the arch- 172 LADY GRACE. deacon looked foolish. There's nothing she hates so much either as being called Ann Esther. I was determined to pay her off," avowed Regina ; " she had driven me wild all the morning with her aggravations. And now I expect she intends to pay us off by having an attack of rheumatism." " A blessed thing for you girls, if you were married and away," said Richard, cynically ; " but you'll never find another Aunt Ann. I don't know where I should be for pocket-money without her. I say, girls, I think Wilmot has landed." "Then, if so, he'll be here to-night," said Regina. " And Mary is as cool over it as a cucumber ! One would think " The sub-dean entered. Regina cut short her speech, and Charles Baumgarten slipped from his perch on the sofa and took his seat decently in a chair. In the presence of Dr. Dynevor his family put on their best behaviour. He walked up to the fire, and stood with his back to it, his shoe buckles glittering in the wax- lights. A dead silence had fallen in the room ; Miss Dynevor dozed on, and in the midst of it the arrival of a visitor was heard. Whether they felt who it might be cannot be told ; the silence of expectation was on all, and their eyes turned to the door as it was thrown open. " Sir Everard Wilmot." MISS DYNEVOR AND THE GIRLS. 173 Dr. Dynevor and his buckles bustled forward with his right hand stretched out. He had pictured to himself a foolish young man, with an incipient moustache and an eyeglass; he saw before him a right noble-looking form, with a noble face, a man who had left thirty years behind him. Miss Dynevor tumbled upright in consternation, and pushed up her flaxen curls too high in her flurry. A warm greeting to the sub-dean, a quiet greeting to Mary, holding her hand for a moment only, an introduction to the rest of the party, including Charles Baumgarten, and then Sir Everard sat down. "Look at Mary," whispered Richard to his sister Regina. " Is she fainting ? " Regina started up and turned to her. Mary's whole frame was shivering, and her face had turned of a deathlike whiteness. But she was not fainting. "It will be over in a moment," she murmured to Regina. "Don't notice me, for the love of Heaven! Talk to them — do anything — stand before me — draw attention from me." And soon the colour came into her face again. " Catch me turning sick and faint for the dearest lover that ever stepped ! " thought Regina, as she began rattling the teacups on the table, sharply in- quiring how her aunts legs felt now, and pushed Charles Baumgarten towards the bell-rope, telling 174 LADY GRACE. him to ring for the urn ; all with the good intention of keeping observation from Mary. " Perhaps you would prefer coffee, Sir Everard ? " He smiled. te I should prefer tea. I long to fall into the good old English customs again. A traveller on the sandy desert never longed for the sight of water more than I have these many months longed for home." "Then why didn't you come to it?" sensibly questioned Regina. " First of all, I could not be spared, and was forced to remain at my post," replied Sir Everard. " Secondly, my father was with me, and he believed England would not be the proper climate for his declining health. We all have to bow to circumstances, you know, Miss Dynevor." "Very disagreeable circumstances too, sometimes," returned the young lady. "But, Sir Everard, I am not Miss Dynevor, and you will incur my aunt's everlasting displeasure if you accord me the honour of the title. She is Miss Dynevor— at present — and I am Miss Regina." There was a shade of malice and so much point in Regina's last sentence that some of them smothered a titter. Sir Everard turned to Miss Dynevor, and entered into conversation with her with marked courtesy. MISS DYNEVOR AND THE GIRLS. 175 "Dear Aunt Ann is a great sufferer," cried Regina. " She has rheumatism in her legs." "A pity but that you had it in your tongue," returned Miss Dynevor, provoked into a' retort ; and Dr. Dynevor wheeled round and stared in anger at his daughter Regina. " So you are growing tired of a Continental life," he observed to Sir Everard. " I never was abroad ; don't know what it is like over there." " We grow tired in time of all things but home, sir. I hope never to go abroad again — except for a tem- porary sojourn." "Mary came home enraptured with Germany," exclaimed Grace Dynevor. " To hear her account of it, we thought she could only have alighted in some terrestrial paradise." Sir Everard glanced at Mary and half smiled. A sudden flush suffused her white face, and she looked terribly embarrassed. After tea they dispersed about the two rooms, which opened to "each other. One of the girls sat down to the piano, the others gathered round it, leaving the sub-dean and Sir Everard alone, standing on the hearthrug. "My daughters delight in having a little fling at their aunt, especially Regina," he began confidentially, as if he deemed their behaviour needed an apology. 176 LADY GRACE. "Ann keeps them rather strictly, and they rebel against it. Richard, too, and Charley Baumgarten help to keep up the ball against her, I fancy." " He is the son of Lady Grace, I presume ? " " Her son, and her idol." " He is a fine young man — has a particularly nice countenance." "I don't know that countenances go for much," remarked the reverend doctor. "Charles has some- thing in him, and is steady as old Time. He did well at college, and gained his fellowship." " Does he follow a profession ? " inquired Sir Everard. " Lady Grace used to talk to me about him, but I really have forgotten details." " I don't know how he would expect to get on in the world without a profession. Dean Baumgarten died worse than poor, as you may have heard. Charles is called to the Bar, and is already getting into some practice." " There's an elder son, is there not ? " " Of the dean's, yes ; not of Lady Grace's. The dean was married twice. Cyras lives at Wellington, in New Zealand ; he has not been in England for years." "Cyras!" exclaimed Sir Everard, with emphasis. " Is that his name ? And he lives, you say, at Wellington ? Is he in a shipping-house there — Brice and Jansen's ? " MISS DYNEVOR AND THE GIRLS. 177 "I believe that is the firm," replied the sub-dean, haughtily, who would have thought it beneath him to know well the name of any one in trade. "Then I must have made a passing acquaintance with him when I was at Wellington two or three years ago," remarked Sir Everard. "But I thought his name was Brice. I am sure he called Mr. Brice < uncle. 5 " " Not unlikely ; they are connected in some way. But his name is Cyras Baumgarten." Sir Everard strolled towards the other room. Mary sat on a sofa, apparently lost in thought, and Charles Baumgarten stood underneath the chandelier, with an open book, Sir Everard sat down by Mary. " It has been a long separation, Mary," he whispered. " Did you think I was never coming ? " "Yes; it has been long," she faintly said. Her hands were trembling, her heart was beating; she spoke — and looked — as if she were frightened. " But from no fault of mine," he returned. " Had you permitted a regular correspondence you would have known this." u My aunt said it was more proper not to correspond — except by an occasional letter at stated seasons. I explained this to you after I returned." A smile passed across Sir Everard's face. " I am aware — I remember ; and I dare say it has all been Lady Grace. 12 178 LADY GRACE. very 'proper' if not affectionate. But the past is over and gone, Mary, and now we need fear no further " He did not say what. A hasty glance had shown him that no one was looking. Charles Baumgarten, buried in his book, stood with his back towards them ; the rest were round the piano, singing. He bent his face down to Mary's, and his lips touched her cheek. " Oh, don't 5 don't ! " she shrinkingly uttered. " Nay, my dearest, would you deny it to me ? It is a reward long waited for." She gasped for breath as she stood up and caught the corner of the mantelpiece. Her face had turned painfully white again. The song over, the conversation became general, and presently Sir Everard rose to leave. . " Will you tell Lady Grace, with my kind regards, that I anticipate the pleasure of seeing her to- morrow ? " said Sir Everard to Charles, as he held out his hand. Charles did not choose to see the hand, and he replied, coldly and stiffly, " I do not reside with Lady Grace, and shall not be likely to meet her to-night or to-morrow." " He has his mother's pride," thought Sir Everard. But Sir Everard was mistaken. MISS DYNEVOR AND THE GIRLS. 179 Mary slipped out of the room afterwards, and she had not returned to it when Charles said good-night. As he passed a small parlour on his way out, usually devoted to the studies and pursuits of the young ladies, Charles's ear caught the sound of something very like a sob. He halted and looked in. There were no candles in the room, but the fire was blazing away, and in its light stood Mary, He went in and shut the door behind him. She smoothed the traces of tears from her face, but could not hide its ghastly look. Charles turned white also, and confronted her upon the old, worn hearthrug. " The time for concealment has passed, Mary, as it seems to me," he began. " We have gone on, like two children, making believe to hide things from one another. This is the awaking i What is to be done ? You cannot enact a lie, and marry that man ! " " Oh, Charles ! what are you saying ? " she uttered, in a wailing tone. He stood quite still for a moment, looking at her. " Do you wish to marry him ? " " I would rather die." "Yes, for you love me — nay, don't I tell you the time for concealment is over, and this night is the awaking. You love me — and oh, my darling ! how I love you 1 cannot stay now to tell. Nor need I ; for you have known it without my telling you." 180 LADY GRACE. " I am terrified," she whispered. " I am nearly terrified to death at the thought of what is before me. Think of the wrong I have done to him ! " "And I think of my position — my poverty," re- turned Charles Baumgarten. "If I spoke to your father he would turn me out of the house and keep me out of it. We have just gone on living in a fool's paradise, Mary, shutting our eyes to the future, I shutting mine to honour." "Not a word must be breathed to my father," she whispered eagerly. " Would you marry Everard Wilmot ? " sharply cried Charles Baumgarten. "But that I forced con- trol upon myself with an iron will, I should have struck him when he kissed you to-night." She cried out with pain. " You saw it, then ? " " Saw it ! I felt it. Felt it as if it had been a sharp steel piercing my heart Oh, the curse of poverty ! I seem to be helpless in the matter. Mary, I can only trust in you." " A dim idea came over me, while I sat with him on the sofa, of speaking to him," she said in a tone of abstraction. " But I don't know how I could do it. He is so good a man, so honourable, so kindly ; one of those men you may trust. I wish he had never taken it in his head to ask me to marry him ! I wish I had followed my own impulse at the time and declined him." MISS DYNEVOR AND THE GIRLS. 181 " Why did you not do so ? " he returned. " I had not the courage, and I — did not care for you so much then as I do now," she whispered. " We have nearly our whole lives before us, Mary, and they must not be sacrificed to misery," he urged. "Mary, you must wait for me; I know I shall get on." " Leave me to think it over for to-night," she answered. "I must try and see what ought to be done — and do it." " That will not do," he impetuously said. " If you put it upon ' duty ' and that sort of thing, y ou will marry him." " Charles ! " It was her turn to reprove now. " I said I would try and see what I ought to do, meaning my duty, neither more nor less. It is not my duty to marry where I do not love." " Mary, I beg your pardon. All this has driven me half out of my mind." " Leave me now," she repeated. " Indeed, I tremble lest any of them should come and find you here. Good-night." He put his arm round her to kiss her, but she started away. " Charles ! at present, remember, I am engaged to him" It was of no use. " I must take away the one that he left," whispered Charles Baumgarten. 182 LADY GRACE. CHAPTER X. THE SUB-DEAN. Mary Dynevor lay awake the whole night, thinking over what she ought to do, as she had expressed it. To her father she could not speak : she dared not do so ; his temper was fiery, his authority absolute ; she was utterly in awe of him. And to speak to him would be utterly useless — nay, worse than useless ; for at the slightest hint of reluctance on her part he would have forced the marriage on. No ; if broken off at all it must be done without the knowledge of Dr. Dynevor. She could only see one way out of the dilemma — to throw herself on the generosity of Sir Everard ; but she shrank from the prospect of doing this, and when she rose in the morning she was as much perplexed as when she had gone to rest. But every hour of indecision only added to the difficulty. Sir Everard would be coming again in the course of the day to see her, his promised bride. What THE SUB-DEAN. 183 was to be done must be done without delay. Miss Dynevor announced herself better, and said that she should chaperon her nieces to the evening's engage- ment, which they had been afraid of missing. They were speaking of it when Sir Everard called in the afternoon. " We can get you a card also, Sir Everard," spoke up Miss Dynevor. a The Laysons will be delighted to see you." " You are very kind. I fear I must decline. Just yet I do not wish to join in any gaiety," was his answer. A thought occurred to Mary, and she nerved herself to its execution — if she could only find the chance of doing so. It came to her when they were standing together at the window, their backs to the room. " I have a favour to ask of you," she whispered tremulously. " It is not my intention to go out to-night : will you come -here and spend a quiet half- hour with me ? " " Thank you, Mary. I will come." "Do not mistake me," she hurriedly added. "I must speak with you alone ; and it is the best oppor- tunity I shall have, as far as I can see." The sub-dean was engaged that evening to a clerical dinner, and Miss Dynevor departed with her nieces at the appointed hour, all three much surprised at Marys 184 LADY GRACE. suddenly proclaimed resolution of remaining at home. They had scarcely gone when Sir Everard Wilmot entered. And now came Mary's task. She did not know how to begin it. She was absent and agitated. Sir Everard could not fail to observe her strangeness of manner. " What is the matter ? " he inquired. A strange wild rush of red illumined her cheek, and she clasped her hands tightly one over the other ; so tightly as to cause pain had her mind been at ease ; then she got up and stood by the fire : all in the effort to nerve herself to her task — it must be done. Now or never. "I have a communication to make to you, Sir Everard " " Sir Everard ' " he interrupted, standing near her. " And I don't know how to do it," she continued, unmindful of the reproof. " Had you been any other than — than — what you are, I could not have made it." He did not speak now. He glanced at her shrink- ing air, her downcast face, her nervous hands, and waited to hear more. " I have been very wicked, very wrong. I have let things go on, suffering you to believe that I would — that I was going to marry you ; and I find I cannot do so. 5 ' THE SUB-DEAN. 185 A dead pause. Sir Everard thought that he had never seen any one so confused, so painfully agitated. "I do not understand you," he said. "But I think you had better sit down/' he added gently, leading her to the sofa, on which he took a place beside her. " It is your coming home which has awakened me," she continued, scarcely knowing what she spoke. " Indeed, I did not mean to do wrong, or to act dis- honourably ; but when you came yesterday evening — then — I found — that I could not marry you." Sir Everard thought it a singular avowal — especially singular as made to him. " Let me tell you all," she resumed, gathering some courge now the ice was broken, as nervously sensitive people will do. " I found I did not love you ; that it would be wrong to myself, and doubly, doubly wrong to you, if I fulfilled my engagement and married you ; and I lay awake all night, thinking what ought to be my course. I did not dare tell papa ; he is very severe, he would not have listened to me; and I — decided to — tell you ; to ask you to give me up. It is what I am now trying to ask you to do." She sat now with her hands clasped before her, looking down at them, a sort of helpless look upon her face. Sir Everard was silent. " I knew how good you were, how considerate, how honourable, and it gave me courage to speak to your- 186 LADY GRACE. self, to show you my unfortunate position, and to ask you to be generous, and let the refusal to carry out the marriage come from you. Oh, Sir Edward/' she added, bursting into tears, " I do like and esteem you very much ; and it nearly breaks my heart to have to say this." " You must forgive me if I repeat that I do not understand you," he said in low, kind tones, " and your last words less than all. You c like and esteem me,' but you do not love me ? I am quite content to take the esteem and the liking, Mary; to trust that the love will follow." " It never will," she almost vehemently answered, lifting her eyes to his for a moment in her eagerness. " It cannot do so." Another pause : her face was bent again, and she had turned crimson to the roots of her hair. A light dawned upon the baronet. " You love another ! " "Oh, forgive me," she whispered. "It was not willingly done ; it seems to have come on without my having been aware of it. He did not know it either — until last night when you came. At least — at least — he had never spoken of it." "You have betrayed yourself — I suspect unwittingly. You speak of Mr. Baumgarten ? " She had indeed betrayed herself, and certainly THE SUB-DEAN. 187 not intentionally. It did not tend to reassure her. " Why did you accept me ? " asked Sir Everard. " Why, indeed ! " she murmured. " But I did not know that I was doing wrong. I liked you very much ; I admired and respected you ; you were so different, so superior to the frivolous men we mostly meet. It is true I did not love you, and even then I knew that I liked — only liked, mind — Charles Baum- garten; but I thought it would all come right in the future. I was acting in a species of dream or be- wilderment, which was the effect your offer had upon me. I had taken a wrong view of your frequent visits to us — you see I am telling you all — and that alone would have kept me from caring for you in a different way had there been no other impediment." " What wrong view had you taken up ? " inquired Sir Everard. She hesitated for a moment, and then spoke in a low tone. " I fancied you came for the sake of Gertrude Baumgarten." " Gertrude Baumgarten ! " he repeated in a curious intonation. " Gertrude would not have cared for me." " Gertrude ivould — as I truly believe now." " Nonsense, Mary ! Gertrude Baumgarten was wrapt in that Italian prince, who had more money than brains." 188 LADY GRACE. Mary shook her head. " She did not care for him ; and when he asked her to be his wife she refused, and felt surprise, I think, at his proposal. After it was all over — I mean when I had accepted you and we were away, and on our return home again — an idea came over me that it was you Gertrude had really cared for. I was not sure, and I judged it better not to continue the train of thought ; but this I know, Gertrude has never been quite the same girl since. I suppose I ought not to tell you this ; I fear I am forgetting myself in more ways than one. " Everard Wilmot paused. " Do you know, Mary," he said, " that this communication in regard to your- self places me in a very painful position ? " "I can only throw myself upon your generosity; only plead for your forgiveness.' , " Putting aside the question of my private feelings, you place me in a most embarrassing and painful position towards Dr. Dynevor. He expects that I have come home to marry his daughter; I expected it ; the world expects it ; and what can be my excuse for refusing ? Can I go to him, hat in hand, and say, ' Sir, I am tired of your daughter • I do not intend to marry her ? ' " She caught up the silk flounce of her evening dress, and rolled it about in thought as she spoke. " How can it be managed ? what can be done ? Oh, Sir THE SUB-DEAN. 189 Everard, can you think of no plan ? You are so much wiser than I." " You seem to assume confidently that I must con- sent to the breaking up of my cherished plans — to summarily resigning my promised wife." She looked very much distressed. " What can I do ? Can I marry you, liking some one else ? " " Having promised to be my wife, was it right that you should cultivate so much the society of Mr. Baum- garten ? " " You do not understand,'' she hastily said. " It was not right ; but you do not quite understand. We have always been very intimate with the Baum- gartens; my youngest sister was named after Lady Grace, and Charles has come here as freely as our own brothers have come. I did not think of any danger, I don't think Charles did ; it is your coming home which has shown us the truth." "You wish me to understand that you and Mr. Baumgarten are irrevocably attached to one another ? " There was a risk of the flounce being pulled into shreds, and Sir Everard scarcely caught the confirma- tive answer. " Then will it not be better to tell the simple truth to Dr. Dynevor ? I do not suggest this to avert un- pleasantness to myself, but " " It is the very thing that must not be done," she 100 LADY GRACE. interrupted, in agitation. " Charles Baumgarten is as yet too poor to ask for me, and papa would go wild at the bare idea of it. He of course considers it a most desirable thing — oh pardon me for having to say all this — that I should — should — become Lady Wilmot, and I dare not tell him I object. I thought if you could do it — as if the objection came from you — you would not be afraid of him, for he could not be harsh and peremptory with you, as he would be with me. I know it is a great boon to ask of you/' she added, her eyes filling again, " but — if you knew how unhappy, how perplexed I am — perhaps you would not refuse to help me." " You forget one thing," he returned in a low tone : " that the odium of being refused had far better fall upon me than upon you. The world is not generous in these matters, but I can fight it better than you can." " I forget all things," she answered, " but the bare fact before me — that I must not marry you, and dare not confess to papa the true cause. The world can only say that you repented of your engagement to me. Let it do so." Sir Everard was silent. He knew that the world's ability to say it would not prove so pleasant as she thought. "I must have time to consider this," he said, rising. "I will see you again to-morrow morning." THE SUB-DEAN. 191 She rose also, and stood before him as a culprit. He took her hand. " I hope you will forgive me ; I hope you did not like me very much," she whispered, raising her repentant eyes to his. Her words and manner almost amused him, they were so truthful and childlike. " I do like you very much," he answered, with a smile ; " too much to part from you without a pang of regret and mortifi- cation." "But you will get over it," she eagerly said. "Very soon, I hope." "It will be the second case of a similar nature I have had to get over," he returned, possibly surprised out of the confession, possibly making it with de- liberate intention. " I was going to be married in my early youth, or what seems early youth to me now. I was four-and-twenty." " And she refused you ? " whispered Mary. " No ; she died. All the love I had to give died with her, and I had only liking left for any one else. I had none even of that for a long while, for years after she died. 'Wilmot never means to marry/ people used to say; 'he must have taken a vow of hatred against women.' They little thought he had once loved one too much. Do not be ungenerous, and fancy I retort this confession upon you in requital for the one you have given me ; it was always my inten- LADY GRACE, tion to make it before we were married, more fully than I have now done." Mary Dynevor's face was raised ; her lips were parted with eagerness. " Then — if I understand you rightly — you have not really loved me ? " " In the imaginative sense of the term — no. Only — I quote your favourite words — liked you very much. But my wife should never have felt the want of that ideal love." She looked almost beside herself with joy. A rosy flush suffused her cheeks, a light came to her eyes, and she positively clasped Sir Everard's hands in her own. " I am so thankful ! " she burst forth, " I am so happy ! If you do not love me, why, no great harm has been done, and we can still be friends. Oh, Everard, let us be friends. There is no one in the world I would rather have for a friend than you ; and you will be Charles's friend also, and let him be yours." " Perhaps- — after a little while." " Yes ; after a little while. As soon as you can ; as soon as you can forget my ingratitude and ill-doing. I know I have behaved badly, and I do beg your pardon. I am very happy, and shall now say to myself over and over again, 'It is not all over and done with ; we shall still be friends/ " He fully understood what she meant to imply, THE SUB-DEAN. 193 though it was not expressed in the most lucid manner. As a candid child, she had spoken out her mind unreservedly, and Sir Everard went away, regretting that this candour was not inherent in all girls. The revelation she had made to him inflicted no deep wound. When a man or a woman has gone through the phases of the passion called " love," and survived it, deep wounds are over. A strangely bright dream while it lasts ; sweet, pure, heavenly ; far too much so for this earth, to all else of which it stands in contrast. Few men — or women either — are organized to experience it ; their love is not this love, and let them be glad that it is not. It had done its work on Everard Wilmot, and had gone ; quite, com- pletely gone, scarcely leaving its remembrance ; but it had taken with it the inward springs of imaginative existence; poetry, ideality, pure passion; all that stands in contradistinction to hard reality. Hence- forth he could make the best of this matter-of-fact, work-a-day world, and strive on for the next ; but he knew that there was no more life for his heart, no more thrill, no more hope, no more satisfying happiness. No, no ; deep wounds were over for Sir Everard. The song had left the bird. What does Byron, that great master of the heart's life, tell us in one of his poems ? Have you for- gotten it ? Lady Grace. 13 104 LADY GRACE. " But sweeter still than this, than these, than all, Is first and passionate love— it stands alone, Like Adam's recollection of his fall ; The tree of knowledge has been plucked— all's known — And life needs nothing further to recall Worthy of this ambrosial sin, so shown, No doubt in fable, as the unforgiven Fire which Prometheus filch'd for us from Heaven." Surely yes ! Nothing in this world, but that alone, can impart any idea of what Heaven's bliss will be. Beyond that confession of his own past life, Sir Everard could have made another had he chosen to do so — that his second essay in love, the "liking," had not been given to Mary Dynevor but to Gertrude Baumgarten. He met Gertrude for the first time when she was on the Continent with her mother. He was strangely attracted to her; and he took to frequenting the house of Lady Grace. One evening he spoke to Gertrude. Or, it may rather be said, that he hinted he should like to speak. She stopped him at the outset, scorn on her beautiful face, resentment in her voice, as she bade him be silent and not so speak to her again. Sir Everard bowed and obeyed. But the wish to settle down, to have a home and a wife in it, was strong upon him. As a Frenchman says, " Je vais me ranger, 5 ' so said Everard Wilmot ; and, while smarting under Gertrudes rather premature refusal, he wrote to ask for the hand of Mary Dynevor. THE SUB-DEAN. 195 Therefore, as the reader will readily perceive, this confession of Mary's did not carry a great sting with it; and Sir Everard was enabled to consider with calmness what kind of communication might be made to the formidable canon. On the following day, after breakfast, Sir Everard called at Eaton Place. He saw Mary, and went straight from her presence to that of Dr. Dynevor. There, after shaking hands, he quietly said that differences had arisen between himself and Miss Mary, and they had mutually agreed to part. Never, perhaps, was a canon so astounded, never did one feel more outraged, and — if we may venture to say it of a divine coveting in all his heart a deanery — never was one in a greater passion, though he con- trolled it. "What was the cause ? " he demanded. The precise cause he and Miss Mary Dynevor had agreed to keep to themselves, was the answer of the baronet. It was sufficient to say that they were both fully convinced a union between them would not conduce to their happiness, and they had come to tliG conclusion not to carry it out. Sir Everard said as little as he could and left, and then up rose the fiery Dynevor wrath. It was let loose on the family in conclave : Miss Dynevor, Regina, Mary, and Grace. What the sub-dean said in his 196 LADY GRACE. passion is of no consequence, an I if he might have been fined (had he been before a magistrate) a few- small sums of five shillings each, we won't transcribe the fact, out of respect to the feelings of any other sub-dean who may chance to read this. Miss Dyne- vor and two of her nieces were simply confounded, not so much at the ebullition of anger as at its cause ; Mary could only shiver in silence, and inwardly pray that it might pass away. " I will know the truth," foamed the canon, " Why do you part ? " " Differences," gasped Mary, who had taken her cue from Sir Everard. " Differences be — be— forgotten ! " stammered his reverence. " What differences ? " " Nothing that I can particularly explain," faintly returned Mary. " We found that a marriage between us would not lead to happiness, and we parted." " Won't you speak out ? " cried he, bringing down his clerical shoe upon the carpet. "That is all I have to say," she answered, drooping her head. " I am to understand, then, that Sir Everard Wilmot declines to carry out the engagement ? " " Yes." She had slightly hesitated at the answer, but it appeared to her that she must give it, for want of a better. THE SUB-DEAN. 197 " Very well/' cried Dr. Dynevor, as he quitted the room and shut himself into his study. This gave Miss Dynevor and the girls an oppor- tunity of inquiring on their own account. Question after question they poured out on the unhappy Mary, but they did not succeed in getting from her any solution to the mystery, which, of course, bore an ill appearance. " I very much fear it is a case of jilting," groaned Aunt Ann. " If the days of duelling were not past, one of your brothers ought to go out and shoot Everard Wilmot. Dishonourable craven ! " Mary's cheeks burnt. The " jilting" had been on her side, not his ; and it was great pain to hear this epithet applied to one so generous and upright. Miss Dynevor's anger, however, could do neither harm nor good ; but, unfortunately, Dr. Dynevor's could, and he had adopted precisely similar sentiments in regard to Sir Everard. It did not occur to him to surmise that a young lady who had waited hopefully (as he concluded) for the return of her bridegroom to claim her would be likely to refuse him as soon as he appeared, therefore he laid all the blame at his door and not hers. A very few days, and then — something- like a thunder-clap burst forth on Mary. Her father was entering an action against Sir Everard Wilmot for breach of promise. 198 LADY GRACE. "Oh, Aunt Ann/' gasped Mary, appearing before Miss Dynevor whiter than a sheet, " what can be done ? " Intensely provoked at the state of affairs altogether, Miss Dynevor declined to say. In point of fact she did not know. " Has papa really entered an action against him ? " "How can I tell what your papa has or has not done ? " retorted Aunt Ann. " If he has not done it, he will do it ; be sure of that. My brother Richard is the most obstinate man living. Once his mind was set upon a thing when a boy, you couldn't turn him, and I'm sure you can't now." " But think of the dreadful scandal, Aunt Ann ! ' ; " You should tell him to think of that." The possibility of concealment was all over now, as Mary saw ; and she dragged herself, in fear and sick- ness, to his presence. " Is it true that you have done it ? " she gasped; and the sub-clean was at no loss to understand her meaning, " It soon will be true. The man shall be held up, a spectacle to the world." " Oh, papa, you must undo it, 3^011 must undo it ! Do not lose a moment. It was not Sir Everard who broke off the engagement ; it was I." The canon felt rather savage. He had only just come from a pitched battle with Miss Dynevor upon THE SUB-DEAN. 199 this very point, his will conflicting with hers. Miss Dynevor was decidedly against the action, and told him it would be derogatory to his daughter and dis- graceful to himself. Of course he did not listen to her; he never listened to any one who opposed him ; and he believed that his sister had now been sending Mary to him with an assertion that was not true. " You may go back to your aunt/ said he, " and tell her to mind her own business, and 111 mind mine." " I did not come at my aunt's instigation, papa. It was from Regina I heard the news ; and I have come to you to tell you the truth. It might have been better to tell it you from the first, as Sir Everard wished to do." The sub-clean stared at her through his great ugly spectacles, for he had been reading a letter when she interrupted him. " What do you mean about ■ the truth ' ? " he sternly asked " What is the truth ? " She laid her arms upon the back of a chair and seemed to lean her weight upon it ; he saw that she was trembling. "The truth, papa, is that I refused Sir Everard ; so that if an action might be brought on either side it would, be on his. He came home to marry me ; but I — I — could not marry him, and he was so kind as to let it appear to you that it was as much his fault as mine." " You broke it off? Of your own accord ? M 200 LADY GRACE. " Yes," she answered. Dr. Dynevor paused to collect his senses, perhaps his temper. He took his daughter's hand, placed her in a chair, and took up his standing before her, staring right into her face. " Your reason for doing that, young lady ? " "Oh, papa, I cannot tell you," she said, bursting into tears. " Your reason ? " he repeated. " You do not stir from my presence till you have given it to me." She was terrified at his stern tone, terrified at what the future might have in store for her, terrified altogether. Better let him know the truth and get it over, a voice seemed to whisper to her. "Papa," she breathed, bending her face down upon the arm of the chair, " I— I liked some one else better than Sir Everard." " You liked " The canon stopped ; indignation and astonishment overmastered him. " Who is it ? " he demanded, in an awful voice. She did not answer. What he could see of her face looked as crimson as his own sometimes was. " Who is it, I ask ? " he repeated ; and shrink and shiver as she would, there was no evading that resolute question. " Charles Baumgarten." To attempt to describe the state of feeling of THE SUB-DEAN. 201 Richard Dynevor, canon and sub-dean of Oldchurch Cathedral, would be a task beyond any modern pen, for we take stings and checks more soberly now than we used to do. What with his condemning anger, with her aunt's covert reproaches, with the vexation, the suspense, and the distress the affair had brought her, and the knowledge that she and Charles Baum- garten were parted for good, Mail's mind could not bear up against it, and she became seriously ill. Dr. Dynevor condescended to call upon Everard Wilmot, who had taken up his abode at the residence in Grosvenor Place, formerly his father's house, now his own. The canon was in a frightful state of wrath at the turn affairs had taken, but he was a just man on the whole, and went to retract, in a manner, the reproaches he had bestowed upon Sir Everard. "I was wholly misled, you see, Wilmot, and I'm sorry I said as much," he began, which was a wonder- ful concession for him. " Girls capable of acting in the capricious manner my daughter has done ought to be made to smart for it. She took you in, of course, as she did me." " Why, yes, she did," replied Sir Everard. " I'm very sorry for her, sir. I hear she is ill." " Sorry ! Ill ! " retorted the indignant canon. " Let me tell you, Sir Everard, if she were ten times as ill as she is she deserves no pity. My opinion is, you 202 LADY GRACE. should have kept her to her bargain. However, the time for that is past now." "Quite so," spoke Sir Everarcl. A curt letter, couched in the haughtiest of terms, reached Charles Baumgarten's chambers in Pump Court from Dr. Dynevor, forbidding him all further intercourse with the Dynevor family. <( I know the old boy can do the thing in style when he brings his mind to it, but this is super-extra, Charley," remarked Richard Dynevor, who chanced to call in Pump Court soon after the missive was delivered. " Cheer up, lad ; things may take a turn." It was not from her son Charles that Lady Grace heard the news of the rupture of the engagement, but from Everard Wilmot himself. He called in Berkeley Square, and told her what had occurred. " The marriage broken off ! — not going to take place at all i What can be the reason for this ? " cried Lady Grace, fair and handsome as she ever had been in the days gone by. " We have mutually agreed upon it," he replied. " But why have you done that ? There must be some cause for it, Sir Everard." " I think," he said, lowering his voice, " you had better ask Mary for a reason." " Then, was it her fault ? " " It was not mine. At least, not — not altogether. THE SUB-DEAN. 203 Dear Lady Grace, although I have come expressly to tell you this, I do not feel at liberty to speak more fully/' he added, in a quicker tone. " I think you will be quite sure to hear the truth from the Dynevors, and then I can be more explicit as regards myself." "Well, I am very greatly surprised," she said. "But I don't think it appears to have broken your heart." "Hearts- are elastic, and don't break so easily," replied Sir Everard, with a half-smile. After he left, Lady Grace sat buried in a reverie. Her daughter, who had been out, found her so. "Mamma," exclaimed the latter, "how serious you look!" "I was thinking, Gertrude. Everard Wilmot has been here to tell me some news : his en^a^ement to Mary Dynevor is at an end." "Oh, indeed," said Gertrude, carelessly, but she turned crimson. f< And his manner, as he told me, has set me won- dering," continued Lady Grace. "My dear, I don't believe he cares one bit about it; I am inclined to suspect there was not the smallest particle of love in the matter — -on either side. Take care ! What are you about, Gertrude ?— leaning out of the window like that ! " " I was looking at the accident at the corner of the 204 LADY GRACE. square ; a horse has fallen down," was the composed reply of Gertrude. And a few weeks passed on. Mary Dynevor was not dying; no one said that; but every one did say that she was wasting away. The sub-dean, haughty, cold, and implacable, would not see it; Miss Dynevor had begun to speak of it complainingly ; Regina and Grace grieved. She had a touch of low fever, and seemed unable to struggle out of it. Mary chiefly lay upon the sofa ; she was too weak to sit up throughout the day. Smarting under the displeasure of her father, obliged to submit to the querulous remarks of her aunt, who rarely ceased to grumble at the rupture of so desirable a marriage, suffering, in a less degree, from the covert reproaches of her sisters, who felt it as a slur upon them, Mary had a sad time of it As to Charles Baumgarten, he had gone on circuit and seemed to be done with for ever. Even Richard never heard from him or of him. But all this only shows how we estimate things by comparison. Had it not been for the visions opened up by Mary's becoming the wife of Sir Everard, it might not have occurred to Dr. Dynevor to turn up his nose at Charles, nephew of the Earl of Avon, heir THE SUB-DEAN. 205 to the half of Lady Grace's fortune, sure to meet with support and to get on at the Bar. Sensible and steady, Charles Baumgarten would have been welcomed for any one of the portionless daughters of the canon. He and Mary might have had to struggle a little at first, but it would all come right in the end, and the sub-dean would have married them himself with pleasure. But under the actual circumstances — Maryk having refused a splendid match that she might throw herself away upon him — of course Charles Baumgarten was nothing less than a bete noire in the eyes of the Dynevors — very black indeed to the sub-dean. " It is of no use, madam, my coming here day after day to see the patient," somewhat testily explained Dr. Lamb, the family physician, one day to Miss Dynevor. " The disorder is on the mind : some trouble, I believe, is weighing upon her. If it cannot be set at rest I can do no good." "And what then?" asked Miss Dynevor, "If nothing can be done for her mind, what then ? " "Why, you take away the chance of her getting better, and if she does not get better she must get worse ; and the result may be — if I may speak plainly — death. It is not in my province to inquire into family secrets," continued the physician ; " but it does seem strange that a girl of her age should have any wasting care which cannot be removed.'' 20(3 LADY GRACE. Miss Dynevor, now very uneasy, sat down to write an epistle — as she invariably called her letters — to the sub-dean, at Oldchurch. She then had a serious talk with Mary; laid aside her crossness for the occasion, and pointed out to her, kindly and rationally, that it was her duty to rouse herself and forget Charles Baumgarten. With the effort to do this forgetfulness might come, and with forgetfulness health would return. Mary burst into tears, and sobbed so long and vehemently that Miss Dynevor was startled, but her reply was that she vjould try to forget him, provided she might be allowed one inter- view with him, to explain to him that they must finally part. The epistle had the effect of bringing Dr. Dynevor to town. Though harsh and stern with his children, he was fond of them at heart — just as his sister was — and he did not like to hear that Mary might be in danger of dying. He travelled up by night, reaching Eaton Place in the morning. Breakfast over, he shut himself in with his sister. " And now, Ann, what do you mean by writing to me as you did ? 99 began he, in his sternest manner. " Calling Mary names — and all the rest of it ! " " Names ! 99 cried Miss Dynevor. " You said she was dying ! " " I said to you, Richard, what Dr. Lamb said to me. THE SUB-DEAN, 207 And I gave you my own opinion — that she had better be allowed to marry Charles Baumgarten." u I dare say," exclaimed the haughty canon. " There's not a shade of chance now for Sir Everard Wili^t/' went on Miss Dynevor. "It's of no use thinking of him. Of course, girls are only born to give a heap of trouble to their family, and for nothing else — as I have remarked to yours, every one of them, over and over again — and they ought not to be given way to under ordinary circumstances. But when it comes to this point, that the girl may be dying, to give way may be nothing less than a duty." " What next ? " asked the sub-dean. Miss Dynevor took up a screen to shield her face, which always grew unpleasantly pink in argument, and repeated the substance of her conversation with Mary. That she had promised to try to get well, provided she might once more see Charles Baumgarten. " And did you sanction it ? " demanded the sub- dean, turning round fiercely, both hands thrust into his clerical pockets. " Why, no. I expect you'd have come down upon me pretty sharply, if I had, Richard. I couldn't either, for Charles is on circuit." "Much good he'll do on that!" growled the sub- dean. " Time he was back though now, I suppose," added 208 LADY GRACE, Miss Dynevor thoughtfully. " It is some weeks since he started on it. Mary wants to be allowed to see him, that they may bid one another adieu for ever." " Let her see him then, and have done with it," spoke the canon, sharply. Miss Dynevor was surprised at the concession, but hastened to repeat it to Mary. It made her pale and agitated. " I shall write a short epistle to his chambers in Pump Court, and let it await him there," said Miss Dynevor. " No doubt he will call here as soon as he reads it." " Mind, aunt, I must see him alone," said Mary, a strangely heightened colour lighting her w r an cheeks. " You need not fear that any of us will covet to be present; we are not so fond of him," retorted Miss Dynevor. She sent the " epistle " to Pump Court. It lay there for some little time. Charles's was the Home Circuit ; and when its business was over, he turned to Great Whitton to spend a day or two with his mother and sister, who were staying at Avon House. But he lost no time in obeying the summons when he was back in London. Mary received him alone, as she had wished. She sat back upon the large old-fashioned sofa in the drawing-room, her head supported by a pillow. Charles THE RUB-DEAN. 209 was shocked to observe the change in her, and thought she must be dying. " No/' she said to him, after they had spoken for some time, "I am not dying. They think — at least they say — that when once my mind is at rest, when we shall have parted for good, suspense exchanged for certain misery, that I shall begin to get well again. It may be so." " Mary, they have no right to part us." " It must be so ; it is to be. I cannot act in defiance of my father." " And you can part from me without an effort ! " " Without an effort ? " she repeated. " Look at me, Charles, and then see what it has cost me." He repented of his hasty words, sat down by her side, and drew her to him. Her head lay passively upon his shoulder; and they had just settled them- selves into this most interesting position, when the door opened with a crash, and in marched the sub- dean. Mary's head started back to its pillow ; Charles stood up, folded his arms, and looked fearlessly at the intruder. " So you are here again, sir ? " " % appointment, Dr. Dynevor. And I am grieved to see what I do see. She is surely dying." " You think so, do you ? " cried the canon. " Per- haps you imagine you could aave her life ? " Lady Grace. 14 210 LADY GRACE. "At any rate, I would try to save it, if I were allowed. What is your objection to me, sir?" he hastily added, his tone one of sharp demand. " My connections are unexceptionable ; and many a briefless barrister has risen in time to the woolsack/' " I am glad you have the modesty to acknowledge that you are briefless." " I did not acknowledge it, and I am not briefless," returned Charles. " I have begun to get on." Dr. Dynevor looked at his daughter. " Would you patronize this sort of ' getting on ' ? " asked he. There was a strange meaning in his tone, which struck on Mary's ear. She rose in agitation, her hands clasped. " Papa, I would risk it. Oh, papa, if you would only let me, I would risk it and trust it." " If you choose to risk it and trust it, you may do so," responded the sub-dean, coolly ; "and that is what I have come in to say. But, recollect, I wash my hands of the consequences. When you shall have gathered all kinds of embarrassments about you," he added, turning to Charles, "don't expect that you are to come to me to help you out of them. If you two wish to make simpletons of yourselves and marry, go and do it. But understand that you will do it with your eyes open, Mr. Charles Baumgarten." The sub-dean strutted out of the room, and THE SUB-DEAN. 211 Charles caught the girl to him, for he thought she was fainting. t( How good he is to us ! " gasped the young man, in the revulsion of feeling which the decision brought him. 212 LADY GRACE. CHAPTER XL MYSTIFICATION. Charles Baumgarten" sat in his chambers, Pump Court, Temple, enjoying an animated discussion with his friend Jephson, the great Chancery lawyer. About a week had gone by since Charles had come home from circuit, and held that momentous interview with Mary Dynevor which had been broken in upon by the sub-dean. Mary had now gone, with some friends, to Brighton for change of air, and Charles was, so to say, a bachelor at large again. The change from despair to hope had so elated him that he had somewhat rashly likened it to Elysium. For on this morning a matter had occurred not at all in harmony with the ease said to be the portion of the denizens of the Elysian Fields. A certain ugly-looking bill for eighty- one pounds, bearing Charles's acceptance, had been presented to him for pajanent. Charles declined to pay it, on the ground that he had not accepted it. He repudiated the bill altogether. MYSTIFICATION. 213 It was held by that eminent legal firm, Godfrey and Herbert Jephson; the latter of whom had now come to Pump Court in person, bringing the bill with him. " I never saw it in my life until to-day/' protested Charles Baumgarten. " You have been imposed upon." Mr. Jephson laughed. In days gone by, they had been very intimate at the University together, and had there formed a close friendship, though Herbert Jephson was the elder by some years. " Stuff and nonsense ! " quoth he ; u would you deny your own signature ? Look at it. 5 ' Charles had looked enough at it, but looked again. "I don't deny that it's a clever imitation, except, in one particular. This is signed 'C. Baumgarten.' I always sign ' Charles ' in full. Look over my notes to you, Jephson, should you have kept any, and see if I ever signed myself in any other way." " If you never did it before, that's no reason why you might not have done it on this occasion," was the unanswerable response. " I have never done it," returned Charles. " Now consider, J ephson. You have known me well for two years ; Godfrey knows me. Do you think it likely that I would repudiate a bill of my own acceptance ? Am I capable of it ? " " It is scarcely possible to believe so. But there is the bill." 214 LADY GEACE. "And if ifc were mine, I would take it up, did it involve a sum that would ruin me. Do you remember that bill in my college days, which was such a night- mare to me ; and some of you wanted me to plead minority and get rid of it ? " "And you stuck out for honour, and declined the advice, and went into unheard-of straits to take it up. I remember." " Well, Jephson, that bill was a life's lesson to me. I declare to you that I have never given another or accepted one. I don't believe I ever shall." The bill, dated ' London,' was drawn a month ago. Charles could not plead that he was then on circuit, as he ought to have been. It was a curious coin- cidence that at the date of the bill he was in London, having run up for a couple of days upon some intricate law business, which without him was at a standstill. "How do you say it came into your hands, Jeph- son ? " he asked. "We received it from White, the engraver and jeweller," was the reply. "Some property White is entitled to got thrown into Chancery, and we have been acting for him. The expenses are draining him, and he had some difficulty to pay our last bill of costs. My brother pressed for it — one can't work for nothing ; and White brought this bill of yours, and asked if we MYSTIFICATION. 215 would take it in payment. Godfrey did so, and handed White the balance." "You ought to have doubted how a bill of mine should get into a jeweller s hands/ 5 rt Not at all," drawled Jephson, who was exceedingly indolent in manner and speech. "Rather likely hands for a gentleman's bill to get into, I should say. White told us the bill was given for jewellery you had bought." "Jewellery !" retorted Charles. f< All the jewellery I have bought in the last six months is a silver pencil- case — if you can call that jewellery ; and for that I gave seven shillings and paid at the time. I am not likely to lay out eighty-one pounds in jewellery ; I am laying by for something far more important than that." "Well, what's to be done ? " "Nothing — as far as I am concerned. You'll not get me to pay a bill I've never seen or heard of." " We must protest it, Baumgarten," " I can't help that." They came to no satisfactory conclusion. And Mr. Jephson departed, taking the bill with him, declaring to the last, in his idle, joking manner, that the bill was undoubtedly Charles Baumgarten's, and might have been accepted in his sleep. Charles was busy all day. After a hurried dinner 216 LADY GRACE. in the evening, he went out to call upon the elder of the two Jephsons ; for, in spite of his assertion that he should do nothing, the affair was giving him con- cern, and he determined to look into it. Godfrey Jephson lived in the neighbourhood of Lincoln's Inn; a keen, grasping man was he, quite a contrast to his brother Herbert. He was in his dining-room, but came out of it at once to Mr. Baumgarten. "It is incomprehensible to me how you can deny the signature," he said, entering upon the matter at once. " If you saw my signature and Herbert's you would know them, would you not ? " " Yes. But " " And we in the same way know yours," he inter- rupted. " I recognized it the moment I saw it. White is a respectable man ; there's not a more upright tradesman in the City of London; he is not one to say you accepted the bill if you did not. It is most strange that you should disown it, Mr. Baumgarten." " Did White tell you I accepted it ? " " He told Herbert. I have not had time to see him." " Go with me to him now," suggested Charles. " He will not say to my face that I have bought jewellery of him and paid him with a bill. I never saw the man in my life to my knowledge, and never was inside his shop." Godfrey Jephson, his interest and curiosity aroused, MYSTIFICATION: 217 agreed to the proposal ; and they proceeded in the dusk of the spring evening to the jeweller's, in one of the leading thoroughfares. A shopman was standing at the door. « Mr. White in ? " asked the lawyer. " Yes, sir." "You go forward first/' whispered Charles, "and enter upon it. I should like to watch his countenance. I'll come and confront him at the right time." A smile, that caused Charles to knit his brow, crossed Mr. Jephson's face as he advanced to the jeweller. The shop was brilliant with gas. Charles sat down near the entrance, as if to wait for his friend, "This bill," began Godfrey Jephson, taking it from his pocket-book, " was due to-day and presented for payment. Mr. Baumgarten refuses to take it up. He says it is a forgery." " But how can Mr. Baumgarten say that ? " returned the jeweller, after a few moments given to what looked like astonishment. " He accepted the bill in my presence." " Mr. Baumgarten says that he does not know you, and that he never was in your shop to his recollec- tion," continued the lawyer. "Why, how is it possible that he can assert so palpable a falsehood ? " retorted Mr. White. " He was here when he bought the jewellery, and has been in 218 LADY GRACE. once or twice besides. Let me come face to face with him, Mr. Jephson, and you'll see whether he will dare deny it. He must and shall pay the bill." Charles Baumgarten walked slowly forward, and the jeweller's eyes fell upon him. " Why, that — that — is Mr. Baumgarten ! " he uttered, though in a tone of hesitation. l< Yes ; I am Charles Baumgarten. There's some mistake here, Mr. White, that I cannot understand. How is it that you told Mr. Jephson we have had dealings together ? " " Because we have had them/' returned the jeweller. " The question is, how is it that you deny it ? I recognize you fully now, sir. You purchased several articles of jewellery of me and paid me with this bill." "I never bought a shilling's worth of jewellery of you in my life," replied Charles Baumgarten.