The engine whistled its arriving shriek at Northwold. Happy Clara! What was the summer rain to her? Every house, every passenger, were tokens of home; and the damp rain-mottled face of the Terrace, looking like a child that had been crying, was more welcome to her longing eyes than ever had been lake or mountain.

Isabel and little Catharine stood on the step; but as Mr. Dynevor was lifted out, the little girl shrank out of sight with a childish awe of infirmity. The dining-room had been made a very comfortable sitting-room for him, and till he was settled there, nothing else could be attended to; but he was so much fatigued, that it was found best to leave him entirely to Jane; and Clara, after a few moments, followed her brother from the room.

As she shut the door, she stood for some seconds unobserved, and unwilling to interfere with the scene before her. Halfway upstairs, James had been pulled down to sit on the steps, surrounded by his delighted flock. The baby was in his arms, flourishing her hands as he danced her; Kitty, from above, had clasped tightly round his neck, chattering and kissing with breathless velocity; one twin in front was drumming on his knee, and shrieking in accordance with every shout of the baby; and below, leaning on the balusters, stood their mother's graceful figure, looking up at them with a lovely smiling face of perfect gladness. She was the first to perceive Clara; and, with a pretty gesture to be silent, she pointed to the stand of the Wedgewood jar, under which sat the other little maid, her two fat arms clasped tight round her papa's umbrella, and the ivory handle indenting her rosy cheek, as she fondled it in silent transport.

'My little Salome,' whispered Isabel, squeezing Clara's hand, 'our quiet one. She could not sleep for expecting papa, and now she is in a fit of shy delight; she can't shout with the others; she can only nurse his umbrella.'

Just then James made a desperate demonstration, amid peals of laughter from his daughters. 'We are stopping the way! Get out, you unruly monsters! Let go, Kitty—Mercy; I shall kick! Mamma, catch this ball;' making a feint of tossing the crowing Fanny at her.

Assuredly, thought Clara, pity was wasted; there was not one too many. And then began the happy exulting introductions, and a laugh at little Mercy, who stood blank and open-mouthed, gazing up and up her tall aunt, as if there were no coming to the top of her. Clara sat down on the stairs, to bring her face to a level, and struck up a friendship with her on the spot, while James lilted up his little Salome, her joy still too deep and reserved for manifestation; only without a word she nestled close to him, laid her head on his shoulder, and closed her eyes, as if languid with excess of rapture—a pretty contrast to her sister's frantic delight, which presently alarmed James lest it should disturb his uncle, and he called them up-stairs.

But Clara must first run to the House Beautiful, and little Mercy must needs come to show her the way, and trotted up before her, consequentially announcing, 'Aunt Cara.' Miss Faithfull alone was present; and, without speaking, Clara dropped on the ground, laid her head on her dear old friend's lap, and little Mercy exclaimed, in wondering alarm, 'Aunt Cara naughty—Aunt Cara crying!'

'My darling,' said Miss Faithfull, as she kissed Clara's brow and stroked her long flaxen hair, 'you have gone through a great deal. We must try to make you happy in your poor old home.'

'Oh, no! oh, no! It is happiness! Oh! such happiness! but I don't know what to do with it, and I want granny!'

She was almost like little Salome; the flood of bliss in returning home, joined with the missing of the one dearest welcome, had come on her so suddenly that she was almost stifled, till she had been calmed and soothed by the brief interval of quiet with her dear old friend. She returned to No. 5, there to find that her uncle was going to bed, and Charlotte, pink and beautiful with delight, was running about in attendance on Jane. She went up straight to her own little room, which had been set out exactly as in former times, so that she could feel as if she had been not a day absent; and she lost not a moment in adding to it all the other little treasures which made it fully like her own. She looked out at the Ormersfield trees, and smiled to think how well Louis's advice had turned out; and then she sighed, in the fear that it might yet be her duty to leave home. If her uncle could live without her, she must tear herself away, and work for his maintenance.

However, for the present, she might enjoy to the utmost, and she proceeded to the little parlour, which, to her extreme surprise, she found only occupied by the four children—Kitty holding the youngest upon her feet, till, at the new apparition, Fanny suddenly seated herself for the convenience of staring.

'Are you all alone here!' exclaimed Clara.

'I am taking care of the little ones,' replied Kitty, with dignity.

'Where's mamma!'

'She is gone down to get tea. Papa is gone to the Union; but we do not mean to wait for him,' answered the little personage, with an air capable, the more droll because she was on the smallest scale, of much less substance than the round fat twins, and indeed chiefly distinguishable from them by her slender neat shape; for the faces were at first sight all alike, brown, small-featured, with large dark eyes, and dark curly hair—Mercy, with the largest and most impetuous eyes, and Salome with a dreamy look, more like her mother. Fanny was in a different style, and much prettier; but her contemplation ended in alarm and inclination to cry, whereupon Kitty embraced her, and consoled her like a most efficient guardian; then seeing Mercy becoming rather rude in her familiarities with her aunt, held up her small forefinger, and called out gravely, 'Mercy, recollect yourself!'

Wonders would never cease! Here was Isabel coming up with the tea-tray in her own hands!

'My dear, do you always do that?'

'No, only when Charlotte is busy; and,' as she picked up the baby, 'now Kitty may bring the rest.'

So, in various little journeys, the miniature woman's curly head arose above the loaf, and the butter-dish, and even the milk-jug, held without spilling; while Isabel would have set out the tea-things with one hand, if Clara had not done it for her; and the workhouse girl finally appeared with the kettle.

Was this the same Isabel whom Clara last remembered with her baby in her lap, beautiful and almost as inanimate as a statue? There was scarcely more change from the long-frocked infant to the bustling important sprite, than from that fair piece of still life to the active house-mother. Unruffled grace was innate; every movement had a lofty, placid deliberation and simplicity, that made her like a disguised princess; and though her beauty was a little worn, what it had lost in youth was far more than compensated by sweetness and animation. The pensive cast remained, but the dreaminess had sobered into thought and true hope. Her dress was an old handsome silk, frayed and worn, but so becoming to her, that the fading was unnoticed in the delicate neatness of the accompaniments. And the dear old room! It looked like a cheerful habitation; but Clara's almost instant inquiry was for the porcelain Arcadians, and could not think it quite as tidy and orderly as it used to be in old times, when she was the only fairy Disorder. 'However, I'll see to that,' quoth she to herself. And she gave herself up to the happy tea-drinking, when James was welcomed by another tumult, and was pinned down by Kitty and Salome on either side—mamma making tea in spite of Fanny on her lap—Mercy adhering to the new-comer—the eager conversation—Kitty thrusting in her little oar, and being hushed by mamma—the grand final game at romps, ending with Isabel carrying off her little victims, one by one, to bed; and James taking the tea-tray down stairs. Clara followed with other parts of the equipage, and then both stood together warming themselves, and gossiped over the dear old kitchen fire, till Isabel came down and found them there. And then, before any of the grand news was discussed, all the infant marvels of the last fortnight had to be detailed; and the young parents required Clara's opinion whether they were spoiling Kitty.

Next, Clara found her way to the cupboard, brought the shepherd and shepherdess to light, looked them well over, and satisfied herself that there was not one scar or wound on either—nay, it is not absolutely certain that she did not kiss the damsel's delicate pink cheek—set them up on the mantelpiece, promised to keep them in order, and stood gazing at them till James accused her of regarding them as her penates!

'Why, Jem!' she said, turning on him, 'you are a mere recreant if you can feel it like home without them!'

'I have other porcelain figures to depend on for a home!' said James.

'Take care, James!' said his wife, with the fond sadness of one whose cup overflowed with happiness; 'Clara's shepherdess may look fragile, but she has kept her youth and seen many a generation pass by of such as you depend on!'

'She once was turned out of Cheveleigh, too, and has borne it as easily as Clara,' said James, smiling. 'I suspect her worst danger is from Fanny. There's a lady who, I warn you, can never withstand Fanny!'

Isabel took up her own defence, and they laughed on. Poor Uncle Oliver! could he but have known how little all this had to do with Cheveleigh!



CHAPTER XX.

WESTERN TIDINGS.

O lady! worthy of earth's proudest throne! Nor less, by excellence of nature, fit Beside an unambitious hearth to sit Domestic queen, where grandeur is unknown— Queen and handmaid lowly. WORDSWORTH.

A house in the Terrace was let, and the rent was welcome; and shortly after, Clara had an affectionate letter from her old school-enemy, Miss Salter, begging her to come as governess to her little brother, promising that she should be treated like one of the family, and offering a large salary.

Clara was much afraid that it was her duty to accept the proposal, since her uncle seemed very fairly contented, and was growing very fond of 'Roland,' and the payment would be so great an assistance, but James and Isabel were strongly averse to it; and her conscience was satisfied by Miss Mercy Faithfull's discovery of a family at the Baths in search of a daily governess.

Miss Frost was not a person to be rejected, and in another week she found herself setting out to breakfast with a girl and three boys, infusing Latin, French, and geography all the forenoon, dining with them, sometimes walking with them, and then returning to the merry evening of Dynevor Terrace.

Mr. Dynevor endured the step pretty well. She had ascendancy enough over him always to take her own way, and he was still buoyed up by the hope of recovering enough to rectify his affairs in Peru. He was better, though his right side remained paralysed, and Mr. Walby saw little chance of restoration. Rising late, and breakfasting slowly, the newspaper and visits from James wiled away the morning. He preferred taking his meals alone; and after dinner was wheeled out in a chair on fine days. Clara came to him as soon as her day's work was over; and, when he was well enough to bear it, the whole party were with him from the children's bedtime till his own. Altogether, the invalid-life passed off pretty well. He did not dislike the children, and Kitty liked anything that needed to be waited on. He took Clara's services as a right, but was a little afraid of 'Mrs. Dynevor,' and highly flattered by any attention from her; and with James his moods were exceedingly variable, and often very trying, but, in general, very well endured.

Peruvian mails were anticipated in the family with a feeling most akin to dread. The notice of a vessel coming in was the signal for growlings at everything, from the post-office down to his dinner; and the arrival of letters made things only worse. As Clara said, the galleons were taken by the pirates; the Equatorial Company seemed to be doing the work of Caleb Balderston's thunderstorm, and to be bearing the blame of a deficit such as Oliver could not charge on it. The whole statement was backed by Mr. Ponsonby, whose short notes spoke of indisposition making him more indebted than ever to the exertions of Robson. This last was gone to Guayaquil to attempt to clear up the accounts of the Equatorial Company, leaving the office at Lima in the charge of Madison and the new clerk, Ford; and Mr. Dynevor was promised something decisive and satisfactory on his return. Of Mary there was no mention, except what might be inferred in a postscript:—'Ward is expected in a few weeks.'

Mr. Dynevor was obliged to resign himself; and so exceedingly fractious was he, that Clara had been feeling quite dispirited, when her brother called her to tell her joyously that Lord Ormersfield and Louis were coming home, and would call in on their way the next evening. Those wretched children must not take her for a walk.

Nevertheless, the wretched children did want to walk, and Clara could not get home till half-an-hour after she knew the train must have come in; and she found the visitors in her uncle's room. Louis came forward to the door to meet her, and shook her hand with all his heart, saying, under his breath,

'I congratulate you!'

'Thank you!' she said, in the same hearty tone.

'And now, look at him! look at my father! Have not we made a good piece of work of keeping him abroad all the winter? Does not he look as well as ever he did in his life?'

This was rather strong, for Lord Ormersfield was somewhat grey, and a little bent; but he had resumed all his look of health and vigour, and was a great contrast to his younger, but far older-looking cousin. He welcomed Clara with his tone of courteous respect, and smiled at his son's exultation, saying, Fitzjocelyn deserved all the credit, for he himself had never thought to be so patched up again, and poor Oliver was evidently deriving as much encouragement as if rheumatism had been paralysis.

'I must look in at the House Beautiful,' said Louis, presently. 'Clara, I can't lose your company. Won't you come with me?'

Of course she came; and she divined why, instead of at once entering the next house, he took a turn along the Terrace, and, after a pause, asked, 'Clara, when did you last hear from Lima?'

'Not for a long time. I suppose she is taken up by her father's illness.'

He paused, collected himself, and asked again, 'Have you heard nothing from your uncle?'

'Yes,' said Clara, sadly, 'but Louis,' she added, with a lively tone, 'what does not come from herself, I would not believe.'

'I do not.'

'That's right, don't be vexed when it may be nothing.'

'No; if she had found any one more worthy of her, she would not hesitate in making me aware of it. I ought to be satisfied, if she does what is best for her own happiness. Miss Ponsonby believes that this is a man of sterling worth, probably suiting her better than I might have done. She was a good deal driven on by circumstances before, and, perhaps, it was all a mistake on her side.' And he tried to smile.

Clara exclaimed that 'Mary could not have been all he had believed, if—'

'No,' he said, 'she is all, and more than all. I comprehend her better now, and could have shown her that I do. She has been the blessing of my life so far, and her influence always will be so. I shall always be grateful to her, be the rest as it may, and I mean to live on hope to the last. Now for the good old ladies. Really, Clara, the old Dynevor Terrace atmosphere has come back, and there seems to be the same sort of rest and cheering in coming into these old iron gates! After all, Isabel is growing almost worthy to be called Mrs. Frost.' And in this manner he talked on, up to the very door of the House Beautiful, as if to cheat himself out of despondency.

'That was a very pretty meeting,' said Isabel to her husband, when no witness was present but little Fanny.

'What, between his lordship and my uncle?'

'You know better.'

'My dear, your mother once tried match-making for Fitzjocelyn. Be warned by her example.'

'I am doing no such thing. I am only observing what every one sees.'

'Don't be so common-place.'

'That's all disdain—you must condescend. I have been hearing from Mr. Dynevor of the excellent offers that Clara refused.'

'Do you think Uncle Oliver and Clara agree as to excellence?'

'Still,' continued Isabel, 'considering how uncomfortable she was, it does not seem improbable that she would have married, unless some attachment had steeled her heart and raised her standard. I know she was unconscious, but it was Fitzjocelyn who formed her.'

'He has been a better brother to her than I have been; but look only at their perfect ease.'

'Now it is my belief that they were made for each other, and can venture to find it out, since she is no longer an heiress, and he is free from his Peruvian entanglement.'

'Fanny, do you hear what a scheming mamma you have? I hope she will have used it all upon Sir Hubert before you come out as the beauty of the Terrace!'

'Well, I mean to sound Clara.'

'You had better leave it alone.'

'Do you forbid me?'

'Why, no, for I don't think you have the face to say anything that would distress her, or disturb the friendship which has been her greatest benefit.'

'Thank you. All I intend is, that if it should be as I suppose, the poor things should not miss coming to an understanding for want—'

'Of a Christmas-tree,' said James, laughing. 'You may have your own way. I have too much confidence in your discretion and in theirs to imagine that you will produce the least effect.'

Isabel's imagination was busily at work, and she was in haste to make use of her husband's permission; but it was so difficult to see Clara alone, that some days passed before the two sisters were left together in the sitting-room, while James was writing a letter for his uncle. Isabel's courage began to waver, but she ventured a commencement.

'Mr. Dynevor entertains me with fine stories of your conquests, Clara.'

Clara laughed, blushed, and answered bluntly, 'What a bother it was!'

'You are very hard-hearted.'

'You ought to remember the troubles of young ladyhood enough not to wonder.'

'I never let things run to that length; but then I had no fortune. But seriously, Clara, were all these people objectionable?'

'Do you think one could marry any man, only because he was not objectionable? There was no harm in one or two; but I was not going to have anything to say to them.'

'Really, Clara, you make me curious. Had you made any resolution?'

'I know only two men whom I could have trusted to fulfil my conditions,' said Clara.

'Conditions?'

'Of course! that if Cheveleigh was to belong to any of us, it should be to the rightful heir.'

'My dear, noble Clara! was that what kept you from thinking of marriage?'

'Wasn't it a fine thing to have such a test? Not that I ever came to trying it. Simple no answered my purpose. I met no one who tempted me to make the experiment.'

'Two men!' said Isabel, 'if you had said one, it would have been marked.'

'Jem and Louis, of course,' said Clara.

'Oh! that is as good as saying one.'

'As good as saying none,' said Clara, with emphasis.

'There may be different opinions on that point,' returned Isabel, not daring to lift her eyes from her work, though longing to study Clara's face, and feeling herself crimsoning.

'Extremely unfounded opinions, and rather—'

'Rather what?'

'Impertinent, I was going to say, begging your pardon, dear Isabel.'

'Nay, I think it is I who should beg yours, Clara.'

'No, no,' said Clara, laughing, but speaking gravely immediately after, 'lookers-on do not always see most of the game. I have always known his mind so well that I could never possibly have fallen into any such nonsense. I respect him far too much.'

Isabel felt as if she must hazard a few words more—'Can you guess what he will do if Mr. Ponsonby's reports prove true?'

'I do not mean to anticipate misfortunes,' said Clara.

Isabel could say no more; and when Clara next spoke, it was to ask for another of James's wristbands to stitch. Then Isabel ventured to peep at her face, and saw it quite calm, and not at all rosy; if it had been, the colour was gone.

Thus it was, and there are happily many such friendships existing as that between Louis and Clara. Many a woman has seen the man whom she might have married, and yet has not been made miserable. If there be neither vanity nor weak self-contemplation on her side, nor trifling on his part, nor unwise suggestions forced on her by spectators, the honest, genuine affection need never become passion. If intimacy is sometimes dangerous, it is because vanity, folly, and mistakes are too frequent; but in spite of all these, where women are truly refined, and exalted into companions and friends, there has been much more happy, frank intercourse and real friendship than either the romantic or the sagacious would readily allow. The spark is never lighted, there is no consciousness, no repining, and all is well.

Fresh despatches from Lima arrived; and after a day, when Oliver had been so busy overlooking the statement from Guayaquil that he would not even take his usual airing, he received Clara with orders to write and secure his passage by the next packet for Callao.

'Dear uncle, you would never dream of it! You could not bear the journey!' she cried, aghast.

'It would do me good. Do not try to cross me, Clara. No one else can deal with this pack of rascals. Your brother has not been bred to it, and is a parson besides, and there's not a soul that I can trust. I'll go. What! d'ye think I can live on him and on you, when there is a competence of my own out there, embezzled among those ragamuffins?'

'I am sure we had much rather—'

'No stuff and nonsense. Here is Roland with four children already—very likely to have a dozen more. If you and he are fools, I'm not, and I won't take the bread out of their mouths. I'll leave my will behind, bequeathing whatever I may get out of the fire evenly between you two, as the only way to content you; and if I never turn up again, why you're rid of the old man.'

'Very well, uncle, I shall take my own passage at the same time.'

'You don't know what you are talking of. You are a silly child, and your brother would be a worse if he let you go.'

'If Jem lets you go, he will let me. He shall let me. Don't you know that you are never to have me off your hands, uncle? No, no, I shall stick to you like a burr. You may go up to the tip-top of Chimborazo if you please, but you'll not shake me off.'

It was her fixed purpose to accompany him, and she was not solicitous to dissuade him from going, for she could be avaricious for James's children, and had a decided wish for justice on the guilty party; and, besides, Clara had a private vision of her own, which made her dance in her little room. Mary had written in her father's stead—there was not a word of Mr. Ward—indeed, Mr. Ponsonby was evidently so ill that his daughter could think of nothing else. Might not Clara come in time to clear up any misunderstanding—convince Mr. Ponsonby—describe Louis's single-hearted constancy during all these five years, and bring Mary home to him in triumph? She could have laughed aloud with delight at the possibility; and when the other alternative occurred to her, she knit her brows with childish vehemence, as she promised Miss Mary that she would never be her bridesmaid.

Presently she heard Fitzjocelyn's voice in the parlour, and, going down, found him in consultation over a letter which Charlotte had brought to her master. It was so well written and expressed, that Louis turned to the signature before he could quite believe that it was from his old pupil. Tom wrote to communicate his perplexity at the detection of the frauds practised on his employers. He had lately been employed in the office at Lima, where much had excited his suspicion; and, finally, from having 'opened a letter addressed by mistake to the firm, but destined for an individual, he had discovered that large sums, supposed to be required by the works, or lost in the Equatorial failure, had been, in fact, invested in America in the name of that party.' The secret was a grievous burthen. Mr. Ponsonby was far too ill to be informed; besides that, he should only bring suspicion on himself; and Miss Ponsonby was so much occupied as to be almost equally inaccessible. Tom had likewise reason to believe that his own movements were watched, and that any attempt to communicate with her or her father would be baffled; and, above all, he could not endure himself to act the spy and informer. He only wished that, if possible, without mentioning names, Charlotte could give a hint that Mr. Dynevor must not implicitly trust to all he heard.

James was inclined to suppress such vague information, which he thought would only render his uncle more restless and wretched in his helplessness, and was only questioning whether secrecy would not amount to deceit.

'The obvious thing is for me to go to Peru,' said Louis.

'My uncle and I were intending to go,' said Clara.

'How many more of you?' exclaimed James.

'I would not change my native land For rich Peru and all her gold;'

chanted little Kitty from the corner, where she was building houses for the 'little ones.'

'Extremely to the purpose,' said Louis, laughing. 'Follow her example, Clara. Make your uncle appoint me his plenipotentiary, and I will try what I can to find out what these rogues are about.'

'Are you in earnest?'

'Never more so in my life.'

James beckoned him to the window, and showed him a sentence where Tom said that the best chance for the firm was in Miss Ponsonby's marriage with Mr. Ward, but that engagement was not yet declared on account of her father's illness.

'The very reason,' said Louis, 'I cannot go on in this way. I must know the truth.'

'And your father?'

'It would be much better for him that the thing were settled. He will miss me less during the session, when he is in London with all his old friends about him. It would not take long, going by the Isthmus. I'll ride back at once, and see how he bears the notion. Say nothing to Mr. Dynevor till you hear from me; but I think he will consent. He will not endure that she should be left unprotected; her father perhaps dying, left to the mercy of these rascals.'

'And forgive me, Louis, if you found her not needing you!'

'If she be happy, I should honour the man who made her so. At least, I might be of use to you. I should see after poor Madison. I have sent him to the buccaneers indeed! Good-bye! I cannot rest till I see how my father takes it!'

It was long since Louis had been under an excess of impetuosity; but he rode home as fast as he had ridden to Northwold to canvass for James, and had not long been at Ormersfield before his proposition was laid before his father.

It was no small thing to ask of the Earl, necessary as his son had become to him; and the project at first appeared to him senseless. He thought Mary had not shown herself sufficiently sensible of his son's merits to deserve so much trouble; and if she were engaged to Mr. Ward, Fitzjocelyn would find himself in an unpleasant and undignified position. Besides, there was the ensuing session of Parliament! No! Oliver must send out some trustworthy man of business, with full powers.

Louis only answered, that of course it depended entirely on his father's consent; and by-and-by his submission began to work. Lord Ormersfield could not refuse him anything, and took care, on parting for the night, to observe that the point was not settled, only under consideration.

And consideration was more favourable than might have been expected. The Earl was growing anxious to see his son married, and of that there was no hope till his mind should be settled with regard to Mary. It would be more for his peace to extinguish the hope, if it were never to be fulfilled. Moreover, the image of Mary had awakened the Earl's own fatherly fondness for her, and his desire to rescue her from her wretched home. Even Mr. Ponsonby could hardly withstand Louis in person, he thought, and must be touched by so many years of constancy. The rest might be only a misunderstanding which would be cleared up by a personal interview. Added to this, Lord Ormersfield knew that Clara would not let her uncle go alone, and did not think it fit to see her go out alone with an infirm paralytic; James could not leave his wife or his chaplaincy, and the affair was unsuited to his profession; a mere accountant would not carry sufficient authority, nor gain Madison's confidence; in fact, Fitzjocelyn, and no other, was the trustworthy man of business; and so his lordship allowed when Louis ventured to recur to the subject the next morning, and urge some of his arguments.

The bright clearing of Louis's face spoke his thanks, and he began at once to detail his plans for his father's comfort, Lord Ormersfield listening as if pleased by his solicitude, though caring for little until the light of his eyes should return.

'The next point is that you should give me a testimonial that I am a trustworthy man of business.'

'I will ride into Northwold with you, and talk it over with Oliver.'

Here lay the knotty point; but the last five years had considerably cultivated Fitzjocelyn's natural aptitude for figures, by his attention to statistics, his own farming-books, and the complicated accounts of the Ormersfield estate,—so that both his father and Richardson could testify to his being an excellent man of business; and his coolness, and mildness of temper, made him better calculated to deal with a rogue than a more hasty man would have been.

They found, on arriving, that James had been talking to Mr. Walby, who pronounced that the expedition to Lima would be mere madness for Mr. Dynevor, since application to business would assuredly cause another attack, and even the calculations of the previous day had made him very unwell, and so petulant and snappish, that he could be pleased with nothing, and treated as mere insult the proposal that he should entrust his affairs to 'such a lad.'

Even James hesitated to influence him to accept the offer. 'I scruple,' he said, drawing the Earl aside, 'because I thought you had a particular objection to Fitzjocelyn's being thrown in the way of speculations. I thought you dreaded the fascination.'

'Thank you, James; I once did so,' said the Earl. 'I used to believe it a family mania; I only kept it down in myself by strong resolution, in the very sight of the consequences, but I can trust Fitzjocelyn. He is too indifferent to everything apart from duty to be caught by flattering projects, and you may fully confide in his right judgment. I believe it is the absence of selfishness or conceit that makes him so clear-sighted.'

'What a change! what a testimony!' triumphantly thought James. It might be partial, but he was not the man to believe so.

That day was one of defeat; but on the following, a note from James advised Fitzjocelyn to come and try his fortune again; Mr. Dynevor would give no one any rest till he had seen him.

Thereupon Louis was closeted with the old merchant, who watched him keenly, and noted every question or remark he made on the accounts; then twinkled his eyes with satisfaction as he hit more than one of the very blots over which Oliver had already perplexed himself. So clear-headed and accurate did he show himself, that he soon perceived that Mr. Dynevor looked at him as a good clerk thrown away; and he finally obtained from him full powers to act, to bring the villain to condign punishment, and even, if possible, to dispose of his share in the firm.

Miss Ponsonby was much relieved to learn that Lord Fitzjocelyn was going out, though fearing that he might meet with disappointment; but, at least, her brother would be undeceived as to the traitor in whom he was confiding. No letters were to announce Louis's intentions, lest the enemy should take warning; but he carried several with him, to be given or not, according to the state of affairs; and when, on his way through London, he went to receive Miss Ponsonby's commissions, she gave him a large packet, addressed to Mary.

'Am I to give her this at all events!' he asked, faltering.

'It would serve her right.'

'Then I should not give it to her. Pray write another, for she does not deserve to be wounded, however she may have decided.'

'I do not know how I shall ever forgive her,' sighed Aunt Melicent.

'People are never so unforgiving as when they have nothing to forgive.'

'Ah! Lord Fitzjocelyn, that is not your case. This might have been far otherwise, had I not misjudged you at first.'

'Do not believe so. It would have been hard to think me more foolish than I was. This probation has been the best schooling for me; and, let it end as it may, I shall be thankful for what has been.'

And in this spirit did he sail, and many an anxious thought followed him, no heart beating higher than did that of little Charlotte, who founded a great many hopes on the crisis that his coming would produce. Seven years was a terrible time to have been engaged, and the little workhouse girl thought her getting almost as old as Mrs. Beckett. She wondered whether Tom thought so too! She did not want to think about Martha's first cousin, who was engaged for thirty-two years to a journeyman tailor, and when they married at last, they were both so cross that she went out to service again at the end of a month. Charlotte set up all her caps with Tom's favourite colour, and 'turned Angelina' twenty times a-day.

Then came the well-known Peruvian letters, and a thin one for Charlotte. Without recollecting that it must have crossed Lord Fitzjocelyn on the road, she tore it open the instant she had carried in the parlour letters. Alas! poor Charlotte!

'I write to you for the last time, lest you should consider yourself any longer bound by the engagements which must long have been distasteful. When I say that Mr. Ford has for some months been my colleague, you will know to what I allude, without my expressing any further. I am already embarked for the U. S. My enemies have succeeded in destroying my character and blighting my hopes. I am at present a fugitive from the hands of so-called justice; but I could have borne all with a cheerful heart if you had not played me false. You will never hear more of one who loved you faithfully.

'TH. MADISON.'

Poor Charlotte! The wound was a great deal too deep for her usual childish tears, or even for a single word. She stood still, cold, and almost unconscious till she heard a step, then she put the cruel letter away in her bosom, and went about her work as usual.

They thought her looking very pale, and Jane now and then reproached her with eating no more than a sparrow, and told her she was getting into a dwining way; but she made no answer, except that she 'could do her work.' At last, one Sunday evening, when she had been left alone with the children, her mistress found her sitting at the foot of her bed, among the sleeping little ones, weeping bitterly but silently. Isabel's kindness at length opened her heart, and she put the letter into her hand. Poor little thing, it was very meekly borne: 'Please don't tell no one, ma'am,' she said; 'I couldn't hear him blamed!'

'But what does he mean? He must be under some terrible error. Who is this Ford?'

'It is Delaford, ma'am, I make no doubt, though however he could have got there! And, oh dear me! if I had only told poor Tom the whole, that I was a silly girl, and liked his flatteries now and then, but constant in my heart I always was!'

Isabel could not but suppose that Delaford, if it were he, might have exaggerated poor Charlotte's little flirtation; but there was small comfort here, since contradiction was impossible. The U. S., over which the poor child had puzzled in vain, was no field in which to follow him up—he had not even dated his letter; and it was a very, very faint hope that Lord Fitzjocelyn might trace him out, especially as he had evidently fled in disgrace; and poor Charlotte sobbed bitterly over his troubles, as well as her own.

She was better after she had told her mistress, though still she shrank from any other sympathy. Even Jane's pity would have been too much for her, and her tender nature was afraid of the tongues that would have discussed her grief. Perhaps the high-toned nature of Isabel was the very best to be brought into contact with the poor girl's spirit, which was of the same order, and many an evening did Isabel sit in the twilight, beside the children's beds, talking to her, or sometimes reading a few lines to show her how others had suffered in the same way. 'It is my own fault,' said poor Charlotte; 'it all came of my liking to be treated like one above the common, and it serves me right. Yes, ma'am, that was a beautiful text you showed me last night, I thought of it all day, and I'll try to believe that good will come out of it. I am sure you are very good to let me love the children! I'm certain sure Miss Salome knows that I'm in trouble, for she never fails to run and kiss me the minute she comes in sight; and she'll sit so quiet in my lap, the little dear, and look at me as much as to say, 'Charlotte, I wish I could comfort you.' But it was all my own fault, ma'am, and I think I could feel as if I was punished right, so I knew poor Tom was happy.'

'Alas!' thought Isabel, after hearing Charlotte's reminiscences; 'how close I have lived to a world of which I was in utter ignorance! How little did we guess that, by the careless ease and inattention of our household, we were carrying about a firebrand, endangering not only poor Walter, but doing fearful harm wherever we went!'



CHAPTER XXI.

STEPPING WESTWARD.

On Darien's sands and deadly dew. Rokeby.

Enterprise and speed both alike directed Fitzjocelyn's course across the Isthmus of Panama, which in 1853 had newly become practicable for adventurous travellers. A canal conducted him as far as Cruces, after which he had to push on through wild forest and swamp, under the escort of the muleteers who took charge of the various travellers who had arrived by the same packet.

It was a very novel and amusing journey, even in the very discomforts and the strange characters with whom he was thrown, and more discontented travellers used to declare that Don Luis, as he told the muleteers to call him, always seemed to have the best success with the surly hotel-keepers, though when he resigned his acquisitions to any resolute grumbler, it used to be discovered that he had been putting up with the worst share.

A place called Guallaval seemed to be the most squalid and forlorn of all the stations—outside, an atmosphere of mosquitoes; inside, an atmosphere of brandy and smoke, the master an ague-stricken Yankee, who sat with his bare feet high against the wall, and only deigned to jerk with his head to show in what quarter was the drink and food, and to 'guess that strangers must sleep on the ground, for first-comers had all the beds'—hammocks slung up in a barn, or unwholesome cupboards in the wall.

At the dirty board sat several of the party first arrived, washing down tough, stringy beef with brandy. Louis was about to take his place near a very black-bearded young man, who appeared more civilized than the rest, and who surprised him by at once making room for him, leaving the table with an air of courtesy; and when, in his halting Spanish, he begged 'his Grace' not to disturb himself, he was answered, in the same tongue, 'I have finished.'

After the meal, such as it was, he wandered out of the hut, to escape the fumes and the company within; but he was presently accosted by the same stranger, who, touching his slouched Panama hat, made him a speech in Spanish, too long and fluent for his comprehension, at the same time offering him a cigar. He was civilly refusing, when, to his surprise, the man interrupted him in good English. 'These swamps breed fever, to a certainty. A cigar is the only protection; and even then there is nothing more dangerous than to be out at sunset.'

'Thank you, I am much obliged,' said Louis, turning towards the hut. 'Have you been long out here?'

'The first time on the Isthmus; but I know these sort of places. Pray go in, my Lord.'

The title and the accent startled Louis, and he exclaimed, 'You must be from the Northwold country?'

He drew back, and said bluntly, 'Never mind me, only keep out of this pestiferous air.'

But the abrupt surliness completed the recognition, and, seizing his hand, Louis cried, 'Tom! how are you?' You have turned into a thorough Spaniard, and taken me in entirely.'

'Only come in, my Lord; I would never have spoken to you, but that I could not see you catching your death.'

'I am coming: but what's the matter? Why avoid me, when you are the very man I most wished to see?'

'I'm done for,' said Tom. 'The fellows up there have saddled their rogueries on me, and I'm off to the States. I—'

'What do you say? There, I am coming in. Be satisfied, Tom; I am come out with a commission from Mr. Dynevor, to see what can be arranged.'

'That's right,' cried Tom, 'now poor Miss Ponsonby will have one friend.'

'Your letter to Charlotte brought me out—' began Louis; but Madison broke in with an expression of dismay and self-reproach at seeing him walking somewhat lame.

'It is only when I am tired, and not thinking of it,' said Louis; 'do you know that old ash stick, Tom, my constant friend? See, here are the names of all the places I have seen cut out on it.'

'I knew it, and you, the moment you sat down by the table,' said Tom, in a tone of the utmost feeling, as Louis took his arm. 'You are not one to forget.'

'And yet you were going to pass me without making yourself known.'

'A disgraced man has no business to be known,' said Tom, low and hoarsely. 'No, I wish none of them ever to hear my name again; and but for the slip of the tongue that came so naturally, you should not, but I was drawn to you, and could not help it. I am glad I have seen you once more, my Lord—'

He would have left him at the entrance, but Louis held him fast.

'You are the very man I depend on for unravelling the business. A man cannot be disgraced by any one but himself, and that is not the case with you, Tom.'

'No, thank Heaven,' said Tom, fervently; 'I've kept my honesty, if I have lost all the rest.'

Little more was needed to bring Madison to a seat on a wooden bench beside Fitzjocelyn, answering his anxious inquiries. The first tidings were a shock—Mr. Ponsonby was dead. He had long been declining, and the last thing Tom had heard from Lima was, that he was dead; but of the daughter there was no intelligence; Tom had been too much occupied with his own affairs to know anything of her. Robson had returned from Guayaquil some weeks previously, and in the settlement of accounts consequent on Mr. Ponsonby's death, Tom had demurred giving up all the valuable property at the mines under his charge, until he should have direct orders from Mr. Dynevor or Miss Ponsonby. A hot dispute ensued, and Robson became aware that Tom was informed of his nefarious practices, and had threatened him violently; but a few hours after he had returned, affecting to have learnt from the new clerk, Ford, that Madison's peculations required to be winked at with equal forbearance, and giving him the alternative of sharing the spoil, or of being denounced to the authorities. He took a night to consider; and, as Louis started at hearing of any deliberation, he said, sadly, 'You would not believe me, my Lord, but I had almost a mind. They would take away my character, any way; and what advantage was my honesty without that? And as to hurting my employers, they would only take what I did not; and such as that is thought nothing of by very many. I'd got no faith in man nor woman left, and I'd got nothing but suspicion by my honesty; so why should I not give in to the way of the world, and try if it would serve me. But then, my Lord, it struck me that if I had nothing else, I had still my God left.'

Louis grasped his hand.

'Yes, I'm thankful that Miss Ponsonby asked me to read to the Cornish miners,' said Madison. 'One gets soon heathenish in a heathenish place; and but for that I don't believe I should ever have stood it out. But Joseph's words, 'How can I do this great wickedness, and sin against God,' kept ringing in my ears like a peal of bells, all night, and by morning I sent in a note to Mr. Robson, to say No to what he proposed.'

Every other principle would have cracked in such a conflict, and Louis looked up at Tom with intense admiration, while the young man spoke on, not conscious that it had been noble, but ashamed of owning himself to have been brought to a pass where mere integrity had been an effort.

He had gone back at once to his mines, in some hopes that the threats might yet prove nothing but blustering; but he had scarcely arrived there when an Indian muleteer, to whom he had shown some kindness, brought him intelligence that la justida was in quest of him, but in difficulties how to get up the mountains. The poor Indians guided his escape, conducting him down wonderful paths only known to themselves, hiding him in strange sequestered huts, and finally guiding him safely to Callao, where he had secretly embarked on board an American vessel bound for Panama. Louis asked why he had fled, instead of taking his trial, and confuting Robson; but he smiled, and said, my Lord knew little of foreign justice; besides, Ford was ready to bear any witness that Robson might put into his mouth;—and his face grew dark. Who was this Ford? He could not tell; Mr. Robson had picked him up a few months back, when there was a want of a clerk; like loved like, he supposed, but it was no concern of his. Would it be safe for him to venture back to Peru, under Fitzjocelyn's protection, and assist him in unmasking the treacherous Robson! To this he readily agreed, catching at the hope of establishing his innocence; but declaring that he should then go at once to the States.—'What, not even go home to see Charlotte? I've got a letter for you, when I can get at it.'

Tom made no answer, and Fitzjocelyn feared that, in spite of all his good qualities, his fidelity in love had not equalled his fidelity to his employers. He could not understand his protege during the few days of their journey. He was a great acquisition to his comfort, with his knowledge of the language and people, and his affectionate deference. At home, where all were courtly, he had been almost rude; but here, in the land of ill manners, his attentions were so assiduous that Louis was obliged to beg him to moderate them lest they should both be ridiculous. He had become a fine-looking young man, with a foreign air and dress agreeing well with his dark complexion; and he had acquired much practical ability and information. Mountains, authority, and a good selection of books had been excellent educators; he was a very superior and intelligent person, and, without much polish, had laid aside his peasant rusticities, and developed some of the best qualities of a gentleman. But though open and warm-hearted on many points with his early friend, there was a gloom and moodiness about him, which Louis could only explain by thinking that his unmerited disgrace preyed on him more than was quite manly. To this cause, likewise, Louis at first attributed his never choosing to hear a word about Charlotte; but as the distaste—nay almost sullenness, evoked by any allusion to her, became more apparent, Louis began unwillingly to balance his suspicions between some fresh attachment, or unworthy shame at an engagement to a maidservant.

The poor little damsel's sweet blushing face and shy courtesy, and all her long and steady faithfulness, made him feel indignant at such a suspicion, and he resolved to bring Madison to some explanation; but he did not find the opportunity till after they had embarked at the beautiful little islet of Toboga for Callao. On board, he had time to find in his portmanteau the letter with which she had entrusted him, and, seeking Madison on deck, gave it to him. He held it in his hand without opening it; but the sparkle in his dark eye did not betoken the bashfulness of fondness, and Louis, taking a turn along the deck to watch him unperceived, saw him raise his hand as if to throw the poor letter overboard at once. A few long steps, and Louis was beside him, exclaiming, 'What now, Tom—is that the way you treat your letters?'

'The little hypocrite! I don't want no more of her false words,' muttered Tom, returning, in his emotion, to his peasant's emphatic double negative.

'Hypocrite! Do you know how nobly and generously she has been helping Mr. and Mrs. Frost through their straits? how faithfully—'

'I know better,' said Tom, hoarsely; 'don't excuse her, my Lord; you know little of what passes in your own kitchens.'

'Too true, I fear, in many cases,' said Louis; 'but I have seen this poor child in circumstances that make me feel sure that she is an admirable creature. What misunderstanding can have arisen?'

'No misunderstanding, my Lord. I saw, as plain as I see you, her name and her writing in the book that she gave to Ford—her copying out of his love-poems, my Lord, in the blank pages,—if I had wanted any proof of what he alleged.'

And he had nearly thrown the letter into the Pacific; but Louis caught his arm.

'Did you ever read Cymbeline, Tom?'

'Yes, to be sure I have,' growled Tom, in surprise.

'Then remember Iachimo, and spare that letter. What did he tell you?'

With some difficulty Fitzjocelyn drew from Madison that he had for some time been surprised at Ford's knowledge of Northwold and the neighbourhood; but had indulged in no suspicions till about the epoch of Robson's return from Guayaquil. Chancing to be waiting in his fellow-clerk's room, he had looked at his books, and, always attracted by poetry as the rough fellow was, had lighted on a crimson watered-silk volume, in the first page of which he had, to his horror, found the name of Charlotte Arnold borne aloft by the two doves, and in the blank leaves several extremely flowery poems in her own handwriting.

With ill-suppressed rage he had demanded an explanation, and had been met with provokingly indifferent inuendoes. The book was the gift of a young lady with whom Ford had the pleasure to be acquainted; the little effusions were trifles of his own, inscribed by her own fair hands. Oh, yes! he knew Miss Arnold very well—very pretty, very complaisant! Ah! he was afraid there were some broken hearts at home! Poor little thing! he should never forget how she took leave of him, after forcing upon him her little savings! He was sorry for her, too; but a man cannot have compassion on all the pretty girls he sees.

'And you could be deceived by such shallow coxcombry as this!' said Louis.

'I tell you there was the book,' returned Tom.

'Well, Tom, if Mr. Ford prove to be the Ford I take him to be, I'll undertake that you shall see through him, and be heartily ashamed of yourself. Give me back the letter,—you do not deserve to have it.'

'I don't want it,' said Tom, moodily; 'she has not been as true to me as I've been to her, and if she isn't what I took her for, I do not care to hear of her again. I used to look at the mountain-tops, and think she was as pure as they; and that she should have been making herself the talk of a fellow like that, and writing so sweet to me all the time!—No, my Lord, there's no excusing it; and 'twas her being gone after the rest that made it so bitter hard to me! If she had been true, I would have gone through fire and water to be an honest man worthy of her; but when I found how she had deceived me, it went hard with me to cut myself off from the wild mountain life that I'd got to love, and my poor niggers, that will hardly have so kind a master set over them.'

'You have stood the fiery ordeal well,' said Louis; 'and I verily believe that you will soon find that it was only an ordeal.'

The care of Tom was a wholesome distraction to the suspense that became almost agony as Louis approached Peru, and beheld the gigantic summits of the more northern Andes, which sunset revealed shining out white and fitfully, like the Pilgrim's vision of the Celestial City, although, owing to their extreme distance, even on a bright noonday, nothing was visible but clear deep-blue sky. They seemed to make him realize that the decisive moment was near, when he should tread the same soil with Mary, and yet, as he stood silently watching those glorious heights, human hopes and cares seemed to shrink into nothing before the eternity and Infinite Greatness of which the depth and the height spoke. Yet He remembereth the hairs of our heads, Who weigheth the mountains in the balance, and counteth the isles as a very little thing. Louis took comfort, but nerved himself for resignation; his prayer was more, that he might bear rightly whatever might be in store, than that he should succeed. He could hardly have made the latter petition with that submissiveness and reserve befitting all entreaty for blessings of this passing world.



CHAPTER XXII.

RATHER SUDDEN.

O! would you hear of a Spanish lady, How she woo'd an Englishman? Garments gay, as rich as may be, Decked with jewels she had on. Old Ballad.

The white buildings of Callao looked out of the palm gardens, and, with throbbing heart, Fitzjocelyn was set on shore, leaving Madison on board until he should hear from him that evening or the next morning.

Hiring a calesa, he drove at once to Lima, to the house of the late Mr. Ponsonby. The heavy folding gates admitted him to the archway, where various negroes were loitering; and as he inquired for the ladies, one of them raised a curtain, and admitted him into the large cool twilight hall, so dark that, with eyes dazzled by the full glare of day, he could hardly discern at the opposite end of the hall, where a little more light was admitted from one of the teatina windows, two figures seated at a table covered with ledgers and papers. As if dreaming, he followed his barefooted guide across the soft India matting, and heard his Spanish announcement, that, might it please her Grace, here was a Senor from England.

Both rose; the one a well-dressed man, the other—it was the well-known action—'Mary!' it was all that he had the power to say; he was hardly visible, but what tone was ever like that low, distinct, earnest voice?

Mary clasped her hands together as if in bewilderment.

'Xavier should not—I will speak,' whispered her companion to her, and beginning, 'Address yourself to me, sir!'

But Mary sprang forward, signing him back with her hand. 'It is my cousin, Lord Fitzjocelyn!' she said, as if breath and effort would serve no more, and she laid her hand in that of Louis.

'Mr. Ward?' said Louis, barely able to frame the question, yet striving for a manner that might leave no thorns behind.

'No; oh, no! Mr. Robson.'

The very sound of the 'No' made his heart bound up again, and his hand closed fast on that which lay within it, while a bow passed between him and Robson.

'And you are come?' as if it were too incredible.

'I told you I should,' he answered.

'I will leave you, Miss Ponsonby,' said Robson; 'we will continue our little business when you are less agreeably engaged.'

He began to gather the papers together, an action which suddenly recalled Louis to the recollection of Tom's cautions as to prudence and alertness, and he forced himself to a prompt tone of business.

'I hope to be able to be of use,' he said, turning to Mary. 'Mr. Dynevor has given me a commission to look into his affairs,' and he put into Robson's hands the letter written by James, and signed by Oliver.

'Thank you, Lord Fitzjocelyn, I shall be very happy to give any explanations you may wish,' said Robson, measuring with his eye his youthful figure and features, and piling up the books.

'I should prefer having these left with me,' said Louis; 'I have but little time before me, and if I could look them over to-night, I should be prepared for you to-morrow.'

'Allow me. You would find it impossible to understand these entries. There is much to be set in order before they would be ready for the honour of your lordship's inspection.'

'I particularly wish to have them at once. You give me authority to act for you, Miss Ponsonby?' he added, looking at her, as she stood holding by the table, as one half awake.

'Oh! yes, I put the whole into your hands,' she answered, mechanically, obeying his eye.

'Allow me, my Lord,' said Robson, as Fitzjocelyn laid the firm hand of detention on the heavy ledgers, and great leathern pocket-book.

'Yes; we had better know exactly what you leave in my charge, Mr. Robson,' said Louis, beginning to suspect that the clerk fancied that the weight and number of the books and bundles of bills might satisfy his unpractised eye, and that the essential was to be found in the pocket-book, on which he therefore retained a special hold; asking, as Robson held out his hand for it, 'is this private property?'

'Why, yes; no, it is and it is not,' said Robson, looking at the lady, as though to judge whether she were attending. 'I only brought it here that Miss Ponsonby might have before her—always a satisfaction to a lady, you know, sir—though Miss Ponsonby's superior talents for business quite enable her to comprehend. But our affairs are not what I could wish. The Equatorial bubble was most unfortunate, and that unfortunate young man, who has absconded after a long course of embezzlement, has carried off much valuable property. I was laying the case before Miss Ponsonby, and showing her what amount had been fortunately secured.'

'What is in the pocket-book?' asked Louis of Mary; and, though she was apparently conscious of nothing around her, he obtained a direct reply.

'The vouchers for the shares.'

'In the Equatorial. Unlucky speculation—so much waste paper,' interrupted Robson. 'Your lordship had better let me clear away the trash, which will only complicate the matter, and distract your understanding.'

'Thank you; as you say there has been fraud, I should be better satisfied to be able to tell Mr. Dynevor that the papers have never been out of my hands. I will call on you early to-morrow.'

Mr. Robson waited to make many inquiries for Mr. Dynevor's health, and to offer every attention to Lord Fitzjocelyn, to introduce him to the Consul, to find apartments for him, &c.; but at last he took leave, and Louis was free to turn to the motionless Mary, who had done nothing all this time but follow him with her eyes.

All his doubts had returned, and, in the crisis of his fate, he stood irresolute, daring neither to speak nor ask, lest feelings should be betrayed which might poison her happiness.

'Is it you?' were her first words, as though slowly awakening.

'It is I, come to be whatever you will let me be,' he answered, as best he could.

'Oh, Louis!' she said, 'this is too much!' And she hid her face in her hands.

'Tell me—one word, Mary, and I shall know what to do, and will not harass nor grieve you.'

'Grieve me! You!' exclaimed Mary, in an inexpressibly incredulous tone.

'Enough! It is as it was before!' and he drew her into his arms, as unresistingly as five years ago, and his voice sank with intense thankfulness, as he said, 'My Mary—my Mary! has He not brought it to pass?'

The tears came dropping from her eyes, and then she could speak.

'Louis, my dear father withdrew his anger. He gave full consent and blessing, if you still—'

'Then nothing is wanting—all is peace!' said Louis. 'You know how you are longed for at home—'

'That you should have come—come all this way! That Lord Ormersfield should have spared you!' exclaimed Mary, breaking out into happy little sentences, as her tears relieved her. 'Oh, how far off all my distress and perplexity seem now! How foolish to have been so unhappy when there you were close by! But you must see Dona Rosita,' cried she, recollecting herself, after an interval, 'I must tell her.'

Mary hurried into another room by a glass door, and Louis heard her speaking Spanish, and a languid reply; then returning, she beckoned to him to advance, whispering, 'Don't be surprised, these are the usual habits. We can talk before her, she never follows English.'

He could at first see no one, but presently was aware of a grass hammock swung from the richly-carved beams, and in it something white; then of a large pair of black eyes gazing full at him with a liquid soft stare. He made his bow, and summoned his best Spanish, and she made an answer which he understood, by the help of Mary, to be a welcome; then she smiled and signed with her head towards him and Mary, and said what Mary only interpreted by colouring, as did Louis, for such looks and smiles were of all languages. Then it was explained that only as a relation did she admit his Excellency el Visconde, before her evening toilette in her duelos was made—Mary would take care of him. And dismissing them with a graceful bend of her head, she returned to her doze and her cigarito.

Mary conducted Louis to the cool, shaded, arched doorway, opening under the rich marble cloister of the court-yard, where a fountain made a delicious bubbling in the centre. She clapped her hands—a little negro girl appeared, to whom she gave an order, and presently two more negroes came in, bringing magnificent oranges and pomegranates, and iced wine and water, on a silver tray, covered with a richly-embroidered napkin. He would have felt himself in the Alhambra, if he could have felt anything but that he was beside Mary.

'Sit down, sit down, you have proved yourself Mary enough already by waiting on me. I want to look at you, and to hear you. You are not altered!' he cried joyfully, as he drew her into the full light. 'You have your own eyes, and that's your very smile! only grown handsomer. That's all!'

She really was. She was a woman to be handsomer at twenty-seven than at twenty-one; and with the glow of unexpected bliss over her fine countenance, it did not need a lover's eye to behold her as something better than beautiful.

And for her! who shall tell the marvel of scarcely-credited joy, every time she heard the music of his softly-dropped distinct words, and looked up at the beloved face, perhaps a little less fair, with rather less of the boyish delicacy of feature, but more noble, more defined—as soft and sweet as ever, but with all the indecision gone; all that expression that had at times seemed like weakness. He was not the mere lad she had loved with a guiding motherly love, but a man to respect and rely on—ready, collected, dealing with easy coolness with the person who had domineered over that house for years. He was all, and more than all, her fondest fancy had framed; and coming to her aid at the moment of her utmost difficulty, brought to her by the love which she had not dared to confide in nor encourage! No wonder that she feared to move, lest she should find herself awakened from a dream too happy to last.

'But oh, Louis,' said she, as if it were almost a pledge of reality to recollect a vexation, 'I must tell you first, for it will grieve you, and we did not take pains enough to keep him out of temptation. That unhappy runaway clerk—'

'Is safe at Callao,' said Louis, 'and is to help me to release you from the meshes they have woven round you. Save for the warning he sent home, I could never have shown cause for coming to you, Mary, while you would not summon me. That was too bad, you know, since you had the consent.'

'That was only just at last,' faltered Mary. 'It was so kind of him, for I had disappointed him so much!'

'What? I know, Mary; his letters kept me in a perpetual fright for the last year; and not one did you write to poor little Clara to comfort us.'

'It was not right in me,' said Mary; 'but I thought it might be so much better for you if you were never put in mind of me. I beg your pardon, Louis.'

'We should have trusted each other better, if people would have let us alone,' said Louis. 'In fact, it was trust after all. It always came back again, if it were scared away for a moment.'

'Till I began to doubt if I were doing what was kind by you,' said Mary. 'Oh, that was the most distressing time of all; I thought if I were out of the way, you might begin to be happy, and I tried to leave off thinking about you.'

'Am I to thank you?'

'I could not,—that is the truth of it,' said Mary. 'I was able to keep you out of my mind enough, I hope, for it not to be wrong; but as to putting any one else there—I was forced at last to tell poor papa so, when he wanted to send for Mr. Ward; and then—he said that if you had been as constant, he supposed it must be, and he hoped we should be happy; and he said you had been a pet of my mother, and that Lord Ormersfield had been a real friend to her. It was so kind of him, for I know it would have been the greatest relief to his mind to leave things in Mr. Ward's charge.'

Mary had been so much obliged to be continually mentioning her father, that, though the loss was still very recent, she was habituated to speak of him with firmness; and it was an extreme satisfaction to tell all her sorrows, and all the little softening incidents, to Louis. Mr. Ponsonby had shown much affection and gratitude to her during the few closing days of his illness, and had manifested some tokens of repentance for his past life; but there had been so much pain and torpor, that there had been little space for reflection, and the long previous decline had not been accepted as a warning. Perhaps the intensity of Mary's prayers had been returned into her bosom, in the strong blindness of filial love; for as she dwelt fondly on the few signs of better things, the narration fell mournfully on Louis's ears, as that of an unhopeful deathbed.

An exceeding unwillingness to contemplate death, had prevented Mr. Ponsonby from making a new will. By one made many years back, he had left the whole of his property, without exception, to his daughter, his first wife having been provided for by her marriage settlements, and now, with characteristic indolence and selfishness, he had deferred till too late the securing any provision for his Limenian wife; and only when he found himself dying, had he said to Mary, 'You will take care to provide for poor Rosita!'

So Mary had found herself heiress to a share in the miserably-involved affairs of Dynevor and Ponsonby; and as soon as she could think of the future at all, had formed the design of settling Rosita in a convent with a pension, and going herself to England.

But Rosita was not easily to be induced to give up her gaieties for a convent life; and, moreover, there was absolutely such a want of ready money, that Mary did not see how to get home, though Robson assured her there was quite enough to live upon as they were at present. Nor was it possible to dispose of the mines and other property without Mr. Dynevor's consent, and he might not be in a state to give it.

The next stroke was young Madison's sudden disappearance, and the declaration by Robson that he had carried off a great deal of property—a disappointment to her even greater than the loss. Robson was profuse in compliments and attentions, but continually deferred the statement of affairs that he had promised; and Mary could not bear to accept the help of Mr. Ward, the only person at hand able and willing to assist her. She had at last grown desperate, and, resolved to have something positive to write to Mr. Dynevor, as well as not to go on living without knowing her means, she had insisted on Robson bringing his accounts. She knew just enough to be dissatisfied with his vague statements; and the more he praised her sagacity, the more she saw that he was taking advantage of her ignorance, which he presumed to be far greater than it really was. At the very moment when she was most persuaded of his treachery, and felt the most lonely and desolate—when he was talking fluently, and she was seeking to rally her spirits, and discover the path of right judgment, where the welfare of so many was concerned—it was then that Fitzjocelyn's voice was in her ear.

She had scarcely explained to Louis why his coming was, if possible, doubly and trebly welcome, when the negro admitted another guest, whom Rosita received much as she had done his predecessor, only with less curiosity. Mary rose, blushing deeply, and crossing the room held out her hand, and said simply, but with something of apology, 'Mr. Ward, this is Lord Fitzjocelyn.'

Mr. Ward raised his eyes to her face for one moment. 'I understand,' he said, in a low, not quite steady voice. 'It is well. Will you present me?' he added, as though collecting himself like a brave man after a blow.

'Here is my kindest friend,' she said, as she conducted him to Louis, and they shook hands in the very manner she wished to see, learning mutual esteem from her tone and each other's aspect.

'I am sorry to have intruded,' said Mr. Ward. 'I came in the hope that you might find some means of making me of use to you; and, perhaps, I may yet be of some assistance to Lord Fitzjocelyn.'

He enforced the proposal with so much cordiality, and showed so plainly that it would be his chief pleasure and consolation to do anything for Miss Ponsonby, that they did not scruple to take him into their counsels; and Mary looked on with exulting wonder at the ability and readiness displayed by Louis in the discussion of business details, even with a man whose profession they were. In remote space, almost beyond memory, save to enhance the present joy of full reliance, was the old uncomfortable sense of his leaning too much upon her. To have him acting and thinking for her, and with one touch carrying off her whole burthen of care, was comfort and gladness beyond what she had even devised in imagination. The only drawback, besides compassion for Mr. Ward, was the shock of hearing of the extent of the treachery of Robson, in whom her father had trusted so implicitly, and to whom he had shown so much favour.

They agreed that they would go to the Consul, and concert measures; Mary only begging that Robson might not be hardly dealt with, and they went away, leaving her to her overwhelming happiness, which began to become incredible as soon as Louis was out of sight.

By-and-by, he came back to the evening meal, when Rosita appeared, with her uncovered hair in two long, unadorned tresses, plaited, and hanging down on each shoulder, and arrayed in black robes, which, by their weight and coarseness, recalled Eastern fashions of mourning, which Spain derived from the Moors. She attempted a little Spanish talk with El Visconde, much to his inconvenience, though he was too joyous not to be doubly good-natured, especially as he pitied her, and regarded her as a very perplexing charge newly laid on him.

He had time to tell Mary that he was to sleep at the Consul's, whence he had sent a note and a messenger to fetch Tom Madison, since it appeared that the prosecution, the rumour of which had frightened the poor fellow away, had not been actually set on foot before he decamped; and even if it had been, there were many under worse imputations at large in the Peruvian Republic.

Fitzjocelyn had appointed that Robson should call on him early in the morning, and, if he failed to detect him, intended to confront him with Madison before the Consul, when there could be little doubt that his guilt would be brought home to him. He found that the Consul and Mr. Ward had both conceived a bad opinion of Robson, and had wondered at the amount of confidence reposed in him; whereas Madison had been remarked as a young man of more than average intelligence and steadiness, entirely free from that vice of gambling which was the bane of all classes in Spanish South America. Mary sighed as she heard Louis speak so innocently of 'all classes'—it was too true, as he would find to his cost, when he came to look into their affairs, and learn what Rosita had squandered. Next, he asked about the other clerk, Ford, of whom Mary knew very little, except that she had heard Robson mention to her father, when preparing to set out for Guayaquil, that in the consequent press of business he had engaged a new assistant, who had come from Rio as servant to a traveller. She had sometimes heard Robson speak in praise of his acquisition, and exalt him above Madison; and once or twice she had seen him, and fancied him like some one whom she had known somewhere, but she had for many months seldom left her father's room, and knew little of what passed beyond it.

Louis took his leave early, as he had to examine his prize, the pocket-book, and make up his case before confronting Robson; and he told Mary that he should refrain from seeing her on the morrow until the 'tug of war should be over.' 'Mr. Ward promises to come to help me,' he added. 'Really, Mary, I never saw a more generous or considerate person. I am constantly on the point of begging his pardon.'

'I must thank him some way or other,' said Mary; 'his forbearance has been beautiful. I only wish he would have believed me, for I always told him the plain truth. It would have spared him something; but nobody would trust my account of you.'

The morning came, and with it Madison; but patient as Fitzjocelyn usually was, he was extremely annoyed at finding his precious time wasted by Robson's delay in keeping his appointment. After allowing for differing clocks, for tropical habits, and every other imaginable excuse for unpunctuality, he decided that there must have been some mistake, and set off to call at the counting-house.

A black porter opened the door, and he stepped forward into the inner room, where, leaning lazily back before a desk, smoking a cigar over his newspaper, arrayed in a loose white jacket, with open throat and slippered feet, reposed a gentleman, much transformed from the spruce butler, but not difficult of recognition. He started to his feet with equal alacrity and consternation, and bowed, not committing himself until he should see whether he were actually known to his lordship. Fitzjocelyn was in too great haste to pause on this matter, and quickly acknowledging the salutation, as if that of a stranger, demanded where Mr. Robson was.

In genuine surprise and alarm, Ford exclaimed that he had not seen him; he thought he was gone to meet his lordship at the Consular residence. No! could he be at his own house? It was close by, and the question was asked, but the Senor Robson had gone out in the very early morning. Ford looked paler and paler, and while Louis said he would go and inquire for him at Miss Ponsonby's, offered to go down to the Consul's to see if he had arrived there in the meantime.

Mary came to meet Louis in the sala, saying that she was afraid that they had not shown sufficient consideration for poor Dona Rosita, who really had feeling; she had gone early to her convent, and had not yet returned, though she had been absent two hours.

Louis had but just explained his perplexity and vexation, when the old negro Xavier came in with looks of alarm, begging to know whether La Senora were come in, and excusing himself for having lost sight of her. She had not gone to the convent, but to the cathedral; and he, kneeling in the crowded nave while she passed on to one of the side chapels, had not seen her again, and, after waiting far beyond the usual duration of her devotions, had supposed that she had gone home unattended.

As he finished his story, there was a summons to Lord Fitzjocelyn to speak to Mr. Ford, and on Mary's desiring that he should be admitted, he came forward, exclaiming, 'My Lord, he has not been at the Consul's! I beg to state that he has the keys of all the valuables at the office; nothing is in my charge.'

Louis turned to consult Mary; but, as if a horrible idea had come over her, she was already speeding through the door of the quadra, and appearing there again in a few seconds, she beckoned him, with a countenance of intense dismay, and whispered under her breath, 'Louis! Louis! her jewels are gone! Poor thing! poor thing! what will become of her?'

Mary had more reasons for her frightful suspicion than she would detain him to hear. Robson, always polite, had been especially so to the young Limenian; she had been much left to his society, and Mary had more than once fancied that they were more at ease in her own absence. She was certain that the saya y manto had been frequently employed to enable Rosita to enjoy dissipation, when her husband's condition would have rendered her public appearance impossible; and at the Opera or on the Alameda, Robson might have had every opportunity of paying her attention, and forwarding her amusements. There could be no doubt that she had understood more of their plans than had been supposed, had warned him, and shared his flight.

Pursuit, capture, and a nunnery would be far greater kindness to the poor childish being, than leaving her to the mercy of a runaway swindler; and all measures were promptly taken, Ford throwing himself into the chase with greater ardour and indignation than even Madison; for he had trusted to Robson's grand professions that he could easily throw dust into the young Lord's inexperienced eyes, come off with flying colours, and protect his subordinate. If he had changed his mind since the Senora's warning, he had not thought it necessary to inform his confederate; and Ford was not only furious at the desertion, but anxious to make a merit of his zeal, and encouraged by having as yet seen no sign that he was recognised.

Regardless of heat and fatigue, Fitzjocelyn, Mr. Ward, and the two clerks, were indefatigable throughout the day, but it was not till near sunset that a Spanish agent of Mr. Ward's brought back evidence that a Limenian lady and English gentleman had been hastily married by a village padre in the early morning, and Madison shortly after came from Callao, having traced such a pair to an American vessel, which was long since out of harbour. It was well that the pocket-book had been saved, for it contained securities to a large amount, which Robson, after showing to Mary to satisfy her, doubtless intended to keep in hand for such a start as the present. Without it, he had contrived, as Madison knew, to secure quite sufficient to remove any anxieties as to the Senora Rosita owning a fair share of her late husband's property.

The day of terrible anxiety made it a relief to Mary to have any certainty, though she was infinitely shocked at the tidings, which Louis conveyed to her at once. Mrs. Willis, whom Mr. Ward had sent to be her companion, went to her brother in the outer room, and left the lovers alone in the quadra, where Mary could freely express her grief and disappointment, her sorrow for the insult to her father, and her apprehensions for the poor fugitive herself, whom she loved enough to lament for exceedingly, and to recall every excuse that could be found in a wretched education, a miserable state of society, a childish mind, and religion presented to her in a form that did nothing to make it less childish.

Mary's first recovery from the blow was shown by her remembering how fatigued and heated Louis must be, and when she had given orders for refreshment for him, and had thus resumed something of her ordinary frame, he sat looking at her anxiously, and presently said, 'And what will you do next, Mary!'

'I cannot tell. Mrs. Willis and Mrs. —— have both been asking me very kindly to come to them, but I cannot let Mrs. Willis stay with me away from her children. Yet it seems hard on Mr. Ward that you should be coming to me there. I suppose I must go to Mrs. ——; but I waited to consult you. I had rather be at home, if it were right.'

'It may easily be made right,' quietly said Louis.

'How!' asked Mary.

'I find,' he continued, 'that the whole affair may be easily settled, if you will give me authority.'

'I thought I had given you authority to act in my name.'

'It might be simplified.'

'Shall I sign my name!'

'Yes—once—to make mine yours. If your claims are mine, I can take much better care of the Dynevor interest.'

Mary rested her cheek on her hand, and looked at him with her grave steady face, not very much discomposed after the first glimpse of his meaning.

'Will you, Mary?'

'You know I will,' she said.

'Then there is no time to be lost. Let it be to-morrow. Yes'—going on in the quiet deliberate tone that made it so difficult to interrupt him—'then I could, in my own person, negotiate for the sale of the mines. I find there is an offer that Robson kept secret. I could wind up the accounts, see what can be saved for the Northwold people, and take you safe home by the end of a fortnight.'

'Oh, Louis!' cried Mary, almost sobbing, 'this will not do. I cannot entangle you in our ruinous affairs.'

'Insufficient objections are consent,' said Louis, smiling. 'Do you trust me, Mary?'

'It is of no use to ask.'

'You think I am not to be trusted with affairs that have become my own! I believe I am, Mary. You know I must do my utmost for the Dynevors; and I assure you I see my way. I have no reasonable doubt of clearing off all future liabilities. You mean to let me arrange?'

'Yes, but—'

'Then why not obviate all awkward situations at once?'

'My father! You should not ask it, Louis.'

'I would not hasten you, but for the sake of my own father, Mary. He is growing old, and I could not have left him for anything but the hope of bringing him his own chosen daughter. I want you to help me take care of him, and we must not leave him alone to the long evenings and cold winds.'

Mary was yielding—'I must not keep you from him,' she said, 'but to-morrow—a Sunday, too—'

'Ah! Mary, do you want gaiety! No, if we cannot have it in a holy place, let it at least have the consecration of the day—let us have fifty-two wedding days a year instead of one. Indeed, I would not press you, but that I could take care of you so much better, and it is not as if our acquaintance had not begun—how long ago—twenty-seven years, I think?'

'Settle it as you like,' she managed to say, with a great flood of tears-but what soft bright tears! 'I trust you.'

He saw she wanted solitude; he only stayed for a few words of earnest thanks, and the assurance that secrecy and quietness would be best assured by speed. 'I will come back,' he said, 'when I have seen to the arrangement. And there is one thing I must do first, one poor fellow who must not be left in suspense any longer.'

Tired as he ought to have been, he lightly crossed the sala to the room appropriated to business, where he had desired the two clerks to wait for him, and where Tom Madison stood against the wall, with folded arms, while Ford lounged in a disengaged attitude on a chair, but rose alert and respectful at his appearance.

Louis asked one or two necessary questions on the custody of the office for the night and ensuing day, and Ford made repeated assurances that nothing would be found missing that had been left in his charge. 'I believe you, Mr. Delaford,' said Fitzjocelyn, quietly. 'I do not think the lower species of fraud was ever in your style.'

Delaford tried to open his lips, but visibly shook. Louis answered, what he had not yet said, 'I do not intend to expose you. I think you had what excuse neglect can give, and unless I should be called on conscientiously to speak to your character, I shall leave you to make a new one.'

Delaford began to stammer out thanks, and promises of explaining the whole of Robson's peculations (little he knew the whole of them).

'There is one earnest of your return to sincerity that I require,' said Louis. 'Explain at once the degree of your acquaintance with Charlotte Arnold.'

Tom Madison still stood moody—affecting not to hear.

'Oh! my Lord, I did not know that you were interested in that young person.'

'I am interested where innocence has been maligned,' said Louis, sternly.

'I am sure, my Lord, nothing has ever passed at which the most particular need take umbrage,' exclaimed Delaford. 'If Mr. Madison will recollect, I mentioned nothing as the most fastidious need—'

Mr. Madison would not hear.

'You only inferred that she had not been insensible to your attractions?'

'Why, indeed, my Lord, I flatter myself that in my time I have had the happiness of not being unpleasing to the sex,' said Delaford, with a sigh and a simper.

'It is a mortifying question, but you owe it to the young woman to answer, whether she gave you any encouragement.'

'No, my Lord. I must confess that she always spoke of a previous attachment, and dashed my earlier hopes to the ground.'

'And the book of poems! How came that to be in your possession?

Delaford confessed that it had been a little tribute, returned upon his hands by the young lady in question.

'One question more, Mr. Delaford: what was the fact as to her lending you means for your voyage?'

Delaford was not easily brought to confession on this head; but he did at length own that he had gone in great distress to Charlotte, and had appealed to her bounty; but he distinctly acknowledged that it was not in the capacity of suitor; in fact, as he ended by declaring, he had the pleasure of saying that there was no young person whom he esteemed more highly than Miss Arnold, and that she had never given him the least encouragement, such as need distress the happy man who had secured her affections.

The happy man did not move till Delaford had left the room, when Louis walked up to him and said, 'I can further tell you, of my own knowledge, that that good girl refused large wages, and a lady's-maid's place, partly because she would not live in the same house with that man; and she has worked on with a faithful affection and constancy, beyond all praise, as the single servant to Mr. and Mrs. Frost in their distress.'

'Don't talk to me, my Lord,' cried Tom, turning away; 'I'm the most unhappy man in the world!'

'I did not ask you to shake hands with Delaford to-night. You will another day. He is only a vain coxcomb, and treated you to a little of his conceit, with, perhaps, a taste of spite at a successful rival; but he has only shown you what a possession you have in her.'

'You don't know what I've done, my Lord. I have written her a letter that she can never forgive!'

'You don't know what I've done, Tom. I posted a letter by the mail just starting from Callao—a letter to Mr. Frost, with a hint to Charlotte that you were labouring under a little delusion; I knew, from your first narration, that Ford could be no other than my old friend, shorn of his beams.'

'That letter—' still muttered Tom.

'She'll forgive, and like you all the better for having afforded her a catastrophe, Tom. You may write by the next mail; unless, what is better still, you come home with us by the same, and speak for yourself. If I am your master then, I'll give you the holiday. Yes, Tom, it was important to me to clear up your countenance, for I want to bespeak your services to-morrow as my friend.'

'My Lord!' cried Tom, aghast. 'If you do require any such service, though I should not have thought it, there are many nearer your own rank, officers and gentlemen fitter for an affair of the kind. I never knew anything about fire-arms, since I gave up poaching.'

'Indeed, Tom, I am very far from intending to dispense with your services. I want you to guide me to procure the required weapon!'

'Surely,' said Tom, with a deep, reluctant sigh, 'you never crossed the Isthmus without one?'

'Yes, indeed, I did; I never saw the party there whom I should have liked to challenge in this way. Why, Tom, did you really think I had come out to Peru to fight a duel on a Sunday morning?'

'That's what comes of living in this sort of place. Duels are meat and drink to the people here,' said Tom, ashamed and relieved, 'and there have been those who told me it was all that was wanting to make me a gentleman. But in what capacity am I to serve you, my Lord!'

'In the first place, tell me where I may procure a wedding-ring! Yes, Tom, that's the weapon! You've no objection to being my friend in that capacity!'

Tom's astonished delight went beyond the bounds of expression, and therefore was compressed into an almost grim 'Whatever you will, my Lord;' but two hot tears were gushing from his eyes. He dashed them away, and added, 'What a fool I am! You'll believe me, my Lord, though I can't speak, that, though there may be many nearer and more your equals, there's none on earth more glad and happy to see you so, than myself.'

'I believe it, indeed, Tom; shake hands, to wish me joy; I am right glad to have one here from Ormersfield, to make it more home-like. For, though it is a hurry at last, you can guess what she has been to me from the first. Knowing her thoroughly has been one of the many, many benefits that Ferny dell conferred on me.'

There was no time for more than to enjoin silence. Louis had to hurry to the Consul and the Chaplain, and to overcome their astonishment.

On the other hand, Mary was, as usual, seeking and recovering the balance of her startled spirits in her own chamber. She saw the matter wisely and simply, and had full confidence in Louis, with such a yearning for his protection that, it may be, the strange suddenness of the proposal cost her the less. She came forth and announced her intention to Mrs. Willis, who was inclined to resent it as derogatory to the dignity of womanhood, and the privileges of a bride; but Mary smiled and answered that, 'when he had taken so much trouble for her, she could not give him any more by things of that sort. She must be as little in his way as possible.'

And Mrs. Willis sighed, and pitied her, but was glad that she should be off her poor brother's mind as soon as might be, and was glad to resign her task of chaperoning her.

Only three persons beyond the Consul's family knew what was about to happen, when Miss Ponsonby, in her deep mourning, attended the morning service in the large hall at the Consul-house; and such eyes as were directed towards the handsome stranger, only gazed at the unwonted spectacle of an English nobleman, not with the more eager curiosity that would have been attached to him had all been known.

Mr. Ward lingered a few moments, and begged for one word with Miss Ponsonby. She could not but comply, and came to meet him, blushing, but composed, in that simple, frank kindness which only wished to soften the disappointment.

'Mary,' he said, 'I am not come to harass you. I have done so long enough, and I would not have tormented you, but on that one head I did not do justice to your judgment. I see now how vain my hope was. I am glad to have met him—I am glad to know how worthy of you he is, and to have seen you in such hands.'

'You are very kind to speak so,' said Mary.

'Yes, Mary, I could not have borne to part with you, if I were not convinced that he is a good man as well as an able man. I might have known that you would not choose otherwise. I shall see your name among the great ladies of the land. I came to say something else. I wished to thank you for the many happy hours I have spent with you, though you never for a moment trifled with me. It was I who deceived myself. Good-bye, Mary. Perhaps you will write to my sister, and let her know of your arrival.'

'I will write to you, if you please,' said Mary.

'It will be a great pleasure,' he said, earnestly. 'And will you let me be of any use in my power to you and Lord Fitzjocelyn?'

'Indeed, we shall be most grateful. You have been a most kind and forbearing friend. I should like to know that you were happy,' said Mary, lingering, and hardly knowing what to say.

'My little nieces are fond enough of their uncle. My sister wants me. In short, you need not vex yourself about me. Some day, when I am an old man, I may come and bring you news of Lima. Meanwhile, you will sometimes wear this bracelet, and remember that you have an old friend. I shall call on Lord Fitzjocelyn at the office to-morrow, and see if we can find any clue to Robson's retreat. Good-bye, and blessings on you, Mary.'

Mary rejoined Louis, to speak to him of the kind and noble man who so generously and resolutely bore the wreck of his hopes. They walked up and down together in the cool shade of the trees in the Consul's garden, and they spoke of the unselfishness which seemed to take away the smart from the wound of disappointment. They spoke sometimes, but the day was for the most part spent in the sweetness of pensive, happy silence, musing with full hearts over this crowning of their long deferred hopes, and not without prayer that the same protecting Hand might guide them, as they should walk together through life.

By-and-by Mary disappeared. She would perhaps have preferred her ordinary dress—but the bridal white seemed to her to be due both to Louis and to the solemn rite and mystery; and when the time came, she met him, in her plain white muslin and long veil, confined by a few sprays of real orange flowers, beneath which her calmly noble face was seen, simple and collected as ever, forgetting in her earnestness all adjuncts that might have been embarrassing or distressing.

The large hall was darkening with twilight, and the flowers and branches that decked it showed gracefully in the subdued light. Prayer and praise had lately echoed there, and Louis and Mary could feel that He was with them who blessed the pair at Cana, far distant as they were from their own church—their own home. Yes, the Church, their mother, their home, was with them in her sacred ritual and her choice blessings, and their consciences were free from self-will, or self-pleasing, such as would have put far from them the precious gifts promised in the name of their Lord.

When it was over, and they first raised their eyes to one another's faces, each beheld in the other a look of entire thankful content, not the less perfect because it was grave and peaceful.

'I think mamma would be quite happy,' said Mary.



CHAPTER XXIII.

THE MARVEL OF PERU.

Turn, Angelina, ever dear, My charmer, turn to see Thy own, thy long-lost Edwin here, Restored to love and thee, GOLDSMITH.