"Howsoever I shall die a thief, yet you may assure yourself your innocence is such, that but if you die by reason of your imprisonment, you shall die a martyr. [From this point the letter is in Latin.] 'The time is come that judgment must begin at the house of God.' Farewell, my ever beloved in Christ, and pray for me." [Domestic State Papers, James the First, volume 20, article 11.]

Yet a few words were to be written before the end. The execution of Hall, which took place at Worcester on the 7th of April, unnerved Garnet as nothing else had done. He wrote, a fortnight later, to her who was his last and had always been his truest friend—a few hurried, incoherent words, which betray the troubled state of his mind.

"It pleaseth God daily to multiply my crosses. I beseech Him give me patience and perseverance to the end. I was, after a week's hiding, taken in a friend's house, where our confessions and secret conferences were heard, and my letters taken by some indiscretion abroad;—then the taking of yourself;—after, my arraignment;—then the taking of Mr Greenwell;—then the slander of us both abroad;—then the ransacking anew of Erith and the other house;—then the execution of Mr Hall;—and now, last of all, the apprehension of Richard and Robert: with a cipher, I know not of whose, laid to my charge, and that which was a singular oversight, a letter in cipher, together with the ciphers—which letter may bring many into question.

"'The patience of Job ye have heard, and have seen the end of the Lord,—that the Lord is very pitiful, and of tender mercy.' Blessed be the name of the Lord! [These quotations are in Latin]—Yours, eternally, as I hope, H.G."

"21st April—I thought verily my chamber in Thames Street had been given over, and therefore I used it to save Erith; but I might have done otherwise."

At the end of the letter is a symbolic sketch. The mystic letters I.H.S. within a circle, are surmounted by a cross, and beneath them is a heart pierced by three nails. Underneath is written, in Latin—"God is [the strength] of my heart, and God is my portion for ever."

So end the last words which passed between the unhappy pair.

In his sixth examination, four days later, Garnet admitted that as often as he and Greenway had met, he had asked concerning the plot, "being careful of the matter;" and that "in general" he had inquired who was to be chosen protector after the explosion; Greenway having answered that this "was to be deferred until the blow was passed, and then the protector to be chosen out of the noblemen that should be saved." This completely settles the question as to Garnet's guilty knowledge of the plot before he received Digby's letter. Greenway is here shown to be Garnet's informant; whereas the letter was addressed to Garnet himself, and the occasion on which he received it was the last time that he ever saw Greenway!

A few days before his execution, the prisoner received a visit from three Deans, who essayed to converse with him upon various points of doctrine. Garnet, however, declined any discussion, on the ground that "it was unlawful for him." He was asked whether he thought that he should die a martyr.

"I a martyr!" exclaimed Garnet, with a deep sigh. "Oh, what a martyr should I be! God forbid! If, indeed, I were really about to suffer death for the sake of the Catholic religion, and if I had never known of this project except by the means of sacramental confession, I might perhaps be accounted worthy of the honour of martyrdom, and might deservedly be glorified in the opinion of the Church. As it is, I acknowledge myself to have sinned in this respects and deny not the justice of the sentence passed upon me." Then, after a moment's pause, he added with apparent earnestness, "Would to God that I could recall that which has been done! Would to God that anything had happened rather than that this stain of treason should hang upon my name! I know that my offence is most grievous, though I have confidence in Christ to pardon me on my hearty penitence: but I would give the whole world, if I possessed it, to be able to die without the weight of this sin upon my soul."

The 1st of May had been originally fixed for the execution, but it was delayed until the 3rd. To the last moment, when he received notice of it, which was on the 29th of April, Garnet fully expected a reprieve. He "could hardly be persuaded to believe" in approaching death. Yet even then, on the very night before his execution—if we may believe the testimony of his keepers—he drank so copiously that the gaoler thought it necessary to inform the Lieutenant, who came to see for himself, and was invited, in thick and incoherent accents, to join Garnet in his potations. Sir William Wade was not the man to allow such a fact to rest in silence; and Garnet is neither the first nor the last whose words have been better than his actions.

On the 3rd of May, he was drawn on a hurdle to the west end of Saint Paul's Churchyard, where the first conspirators had suffered, and where the scaffold was again set up. His conduct on the scaffold was certainly not that of a martyr, nor that of a penitent thief: the impenitent thief appeared rather to be his model. Advised by the attendant Deans of Saint Paul's and Winchester to "prepare and settle himself for another world, and to commence his reconciliation with God by a sincere and saving repentance," Garnet answered that he had already done so. He showed himself very unwilling to address the people; but being strongly urged by the Recorder, he uttered a few sentences, the purport of which was that he considered all treason detestable; that he prayed the King's pardon for not revealing that of which he had a general knowledge from Catesby, but not otherwise; that he never knew anything of the design of blowing up the Parliament House. The Dean of Winchester reminded him that he had confessed that Greenway told him all the circumstances in Essex. "That was in secret confession," said Garnet, "which I could by no means reveal." The Dean having reminded him that he had already allowed the contrary, the Recorder was about to read his written confessions to the people—a course commanded by the King if Garnet should deny his guilt upon the scaffold: but Garnet stopped this conviction from his own mouth, by telling the Recorder that he might spare himself that trouble; he would stand to the confessions he had signed, and acknowledge himself justly condemned for not having declared his general knowledge of the plot. He then spoke of Anne Vaux, and denounced as slander all the injurious reports concerning his relations with her: then he asked what time would be permitted him for prayer. He was told that he should choose his own time, and should not be interrupted. Kneeling down at the foot of the ladder, Garnet proceeded to his devotions in such a manner as to show that they were to him the purest formalities: as the words fell from his lips, he was gazing at the crowd, listening to the attendants, sometimes even replying to remarks they made. When he rose from his knees, he was urged once more to confess his guilt in plain terms. He answered that he had no more to confess; his guilt had been exaggerated. As he undressed for execution, he said in a low voice to those nearest to him, "There is no salvation for you, unless you hold the Catholic faith." Their reply was that they were under the impression they did hold it. "But the only Catholic faith," responded Garnet, "is that professed by the Church of Rome." Having ascended the ladder, he addressed the people. He expressed in these closing words his grief that he had offended the King, and that he had not used more diligence in preventing the execution of the plot; he was sorry that he had dissembled with the Lords of the Council, and that he did not declare the truth until it was proved against him: "but," he said, "I did not think they had such sure proofs against me"! He besought all men "not to allow the Catholics to fare worse for his sake," and bade the latter keep out of sedition. Then he crossed himself, and added—"Jesus Maria! Mary, mother of grace, mother of mercy! Save me from mine enemies, and receive me in the hour of death. In Thine hands I commend my spirit: Thou hast redeemed me, O Lord God of truth!" Crossing himself once more, he added—always in Latin—"By this sign of the cross, may all evil things be dispersed. Plant Thy cross, Lord, in mine heart!" But his last words were, "Jesus Maria! Mary, mother of grace!" Then the ladder was drawn away, and Henry Garnet, the conspirator and liar, stood before that Lord God of truth who will by no means clear the guilty. By express command of the King, the after-horrors of a traitor's death were omitted.

Three months after that sad close of life, the Tower gates opened again—this time to release a prisoner. The Hon. Anne Vaux was bidden to go whither she would. Whither she would!—what a mockery to her to whom all the earth and the heavens had been made one vaulted grave—who had no home left anywhere in the world, for her home had been in the heart of that dead man. To what part of that great wilderness of earth she carried her bitter grief and her name of scorn, no record has been left to tell us, except one.

Thirty years later, in 1635, a Jesuit school for "Catholic youths of the nobility and gentry" was dispersed by authority. It was at Stanley, a small hamlet about six miles to the north-east of Derby, a short distance from the Nottingham road. The house was known as Stanley Grange, and it was the residence of the Hon. Anne Vaux.

So she passes out of our sight, old and full of days, true to the end to the faith for which she had so sorely suffered, and to the memory of the friend whom she had loved too well.

"O solitary love that was so strong!"

Let us leave her to the mercy of Him who died for men, and who only can presume to sit in judgment on that faithful, passionate, broken heart.

————————————————————————————————————

Note 1. This word is plainly sin, though Mr Lemon in his copy tried to read it him—an interpretation which he was obliged to abandon.



CHAPTER TWELVE.

THE FRUIT OF HIS OWN WAY.

"Say not, This brackish well I will not taste; Ere long thou may'st give thanks that even this Is left for thee in such a burning waste."

Reverend Horatius Bonar.

"Tell Mr Louvaine that I desire speech of him."

The page who received this order looked up in apprehension. So exceedingly stern were Lady Oxford's tone, and so frowning her aspect, that he trembled for himself, apart from Aubrey. Escaping from that awful presence at the earliest moment possible, he carried the message to Aubrey, who when he received it was lounging on a day-bed, or sofa, with his arms crossed behind his head.

"And you'd best go soon, Sir," said the page, "for her Ladyship looks as though she could swallow me in two bites."

"Then I rather count I'd best not," said Aubrey, looking very much indisposed to stir. "What on earth would she have of me? There's no end to the whims and conceits of women."

He unwreathed his arms and stood up, yawned, and very slowly went upstairs to the gallery where he had learned that the Countess was awaiting him. Aubrey Louvaine was at that moment a most unhappy young man. The first sensation of amazement and horror at the discovery of the treachery and wickedness of his chosen friends was past, but the apprehensions for his own safety were not; and as the time went on, the sense of loss, weariness, and disgust of life, rather grew than lessened. Worst of all, and beyond all, were two better feelings—the honest affection which Aubrey had scarcely realised before that he entertained for Thomas Winter, and the shock and pain of his miserable fate: and even beyond this, a sense of humiliation, very wholesome yet very distressing, at the folly of his course, and the wreck which he had made of his life. How complete a wreck it was he had not discovered even now: but that he had been very foolish, he knew in his inmost heart. And when a man is just making that valuable discovery is not the best time for other men to tell him of it.

That Fate was preparing for him not a sedative but a stimulant, he had little doubt as he went slowly on his way to the gallery: but of the astringent nature of that mixture he had equally small idea, until he turned the last corner, and came in sight of the Countess's face. There was an aspect of the avenging angel about Lady Oxford, as she stood up, tall and stately, in that corner of the gallery, and held out to Aubrey what that indiscreet young gentleman recognised as a lost solitaire that was wont to fasten the lace ruffles on his wrist.

"Is this yours, Mr Louvaine?" Her voice said, "Guilty or not guilty?" so plainly that he was almost ready to respond, "Of what?"

Aubrey gave the garnet solitaire a more prolonged examination than it needed. He felt no doubt of its identity.

"Yes, Madam, I think it is," he answered slowly. "At the least, I have lost one that resembles it."

"I think it is, too," said the Countess no less sternly. "Do you know where this was found, Mr Louvaine?"

Aubrey began to feel thoroughly alarmed.

"No, Madam," he faltered.

"In the chamber of Thomas Winter, the traitor and Papist, at the sign of the Duck, in the Strand. Perhaps you can tell me how it came thither?"

Aubrey was silent, from sheer terror. A gulf seemed to yawn before his feet, and the Countess appeared to him in the light of the minister of wrath waiting to push him into it. With the rapidity of lightning, his whole life seemed to pass in sudden review before him—his happy childhood and guarded youth at Selwick Hall, the changed circumstances of his London experiences, his foolish ways and extravagant expenditure, his friendship with Winter, the quiet home at the White Bear into which his fall would bring such disgrace and sorrow, the possible prison and scaffold as the close of all. Was it to end thus? He had meant so little ill, had done so little wrong. Yet how was he to convince any one that he had not meant the one, or even that he had not done the other?

In that moment, one circumstance of his early life stood out bright and vivid as if touched with a sunbeam:—an act of childish folly, done fifteen years before, for which his grandfather had made him learn the text, "Thou God seest me." It came flashing back upon him now. Had God seen him all this while? Then He knew all his foolishness—ay, and his innocence as well. Could He—would He—help him in this emergency? Aubrey Louvaine had never left off the outward habit of saying prayers; but it was years since he had really prayed before that unheard cry went up in the gallery of Oxford House—"Lord, save me, for my grandmother's sake!" He felt as if he dared not ask it for his own.

All these thoughts followed each other in so short a time that Lady Oxford was conscious of little more than a momentary hesitation, before Aubrey said—

"I suppose I can, Madam."

He had made up his mind to speak the plain, full truth. Even that slight touch of the hem of Christ's garment had given him strength.

"Then do so. Have you visited this man?"

"I have, Madam."

"How many times?"

"Several times, Madam. I could not say with certainty how many."

"How long knew you this Thomas Winter?"

"Almost as long as I have dwelt in your Ladyship's house—not fully that time."

"Who made you acquaint with him?"

"Mr Percy."

"What, the arch-traitor?" Percy was then supposed to be what Catesby really was—the head and front of the offending.

"He, Madam. I will not deceive your Ladyship."

"And pray who made you acquaint with him?" demanded the Countess, grimly. In her heart, as she looked into the eyes honestly raised to hers, she was saying, "The lad is innocent of all ill meaning—a foolish daw that these kites have plucked:" but she showed no sign of the relenting she really felt.

"Madam, that was Mr Thomas Rookwood."

"He that dwells beside the Lady Lettice?"

"His son, Madam."

"Were you acquaint with any of their wicked designs?"

"Not one of them, Madam, nor I never imagined no such a thing of any of those gentlemen."

"Who of them all have you seen?"

"Madam, I have seen divers of whom I knew no more than to see them, whose names—but no more—I can specify if your Ladyship desire it. But those that I did really know and at all consort with were three only beside Mr Tom Rookwood—to wit, Mr Percy, Mr Catesby, and Mr Thomas Winter: and I saw but little save of the last."

"The boy's telling truth," said Lady Oxford to herself. "He has been exceedingly foolish, but no worse." Then aloud she asked,—"Saw you ever any priests there?"

"Not to know them for such, Madam."

"Tampered they with you in any wise as to religion?"

"Never, Madam."

"And you are yet at heart a true Protestant, and loyal to King James?"

"As much so as I ever was, Madam."

But as Aubrey spoke, the question arose in his conscience,—What had he ever cared about either? Not half as much as he had cared for Tom Winter,—nay, not so much as he had cared for Tom Winter's tobacco.

"Mr Louvaine," said the Countess, suddenly, "have you discovered that you are a very foolish young man?"

Aubrey flushed red, and remained silent.

"It seems to me," she continued, "that you speak truth, and that you have been no worser than foolish. Yet, so being, you must surely guess that for your own sake, no less than for the Earl's, you must leave this house, and that quickly."

He had not guessed it, and it came upon him like a bomb-shell. Leave Oxford House! What was to become of him?

"And if you will take my advice, you will not essay to win into any other service. Tarry as still as you can some whither, till matters be blown over, and men begin to forget the inwards of this affair: not in Town. Have you no friend in the country that would take you in for a while? 'Tis for your own good, and for my Lady Lettice' sake, that I give you this counsel."

"Lie hidden in the country!" Aubrey's tones were perfectly aghast. Such an expectation had never visited his least coherent dreams.

"Mr Louvaine," said Lady Oxford in a kinder voice, "I can see that you have never reckoned till this moment whither your course should lead you, nor what lay at the end of the road you traversed. I am sorry for you, rather than angered; for I believe you thought no ill: you simply failed to think at all, as so many have done before you. Yet is it the truest kindness not to cover your path by a deluding mist, but to point out to you plainly the end of the way you are going. Trust me, if this witness in mine hand were traced to you by them in power, they should not take your testimony for truth so easily as I may. I know you, and the stock whence you come; to them, you were but one of a thousand, without favour or distinction. Maybe you think me hard; yet I ensure you, you have no better friend, nor one that shall give you truer counsel than this which I have given. Go you into the country, the further from London the better, and lie as quiet as you may, till the whole matter be blown over, and maybe some time hence, it shall be possible to sue you a pardon from his Majesty to cover all."

"Some time!" broke from Aubrey's lips.

"Ay, and be thankful it is no worse. He that leaps into a volcano, counting it but a puddle, shall not find it a puddle, but a volcano. You have played with firebrands, Mr Louvaine, and must not marvel nor grumble to feel the scorching of your fingers."

Aubrey's silence was the issue of sheer despair.

"You must leave this house to-day," said the Countess firmly, "and not as though you went on a journey. Go forth this afternoon, as for a walk of pleasure, and carrying nothing save what you can put in your pockets. When you have set a few miles betwixt yourself and the town, you may then hire an horse, and ride quickly. I would counsel you not to journey too direct—if you go north or south, tack about somewhat to east and west; one may ride with far more safety than many. I am not, as you know, over rich, yet I will, for my Lady Lettice' sake, lend you a sufficiency to carry you an hundred miles—and if it fall out that you are not able to return the loan, trouble yourself not thereabout. I am doing my best for you, Mr Louvaine, not my worst."

"I thank your Ladyship," faltered the unhappy youth. "But—must I not so much as visit my grandmother?"

It was no very long time since the White Bear had been to Aubrey a troublesome nuisance. Now it presented itself to his eyes in the enticing form of a haven of peace. He was loved there: and he began to perceive that love, even when it crossed his wishes, was better worth having than the due reward of his deeds.

"Too great a risk to run," said the Countess, gravely. "If any inquiration be made for you, and you not found here, the officers of justice should go straight thither. No: I will visit my Lady Lettice myself, and soften the thing as best I may to her and to Mrs Louvaine. The only thing," she paused a moment in thought. "What other friends have you in London?"

"Truly, none, Madam, save my cousin David—"

"Not a relative. Is there no clergyman that knows you, who is of good account, and a staunch Protestant?"

"There is truly Mr Marshall, a friend of my grandmother, and an ejected Puritan."

"Where dwelleth he?"

"In Shoe Lane, Madam."

"Is he a wise and discreet man?"

"I think, Madam, my grandmother holds him for such."

"It is possible," said Lady Oxford, meditatively, "that you might be safe in his house for a day or two, and your friends from the White Bear could go as if to see him and his wife—hath he a wife?"

"He buried his wife this last summer, Madam: he hath a daughter that keeps his house, of about mine own years."

"If you think it worth to run the risk, you might ask this good gentleman to give you a day's shelter, so as to speak with your friends ere you depart. It were a risk: yet not, perchance, too great. You must judge for yourself. If you choose this way, I will take it on myself to let your friends know how it is with you."

It was a bitter pill to swallow. Mr Marshall was about the last man in his world to whom Aubrey felt any inclination to lay himself under an obligation. Both as a clergyman, a Puritan, and an ejected minister, this undiscerning youth had looked down exceedingly upon his superior. The popular estimate of the clergy was just then at the lowest ebb, and it required some moral courage for any man to take holy orders, who was neither very high up in rank, nor very low down. This was the result partly of the evil lives, and partly of the gross ignorance, of the pre-Reformation priests; the lives were now greatly amended, but too much of the ignorance, remained, and the time had not been sufficient to remove the stigma. A clergyman was expected to apprentice his children to a trade, or at best to place them in domestic service; and he would have been thought forward and impertinent if, when dining with laymen in a good position, he had not spontaneously taken his departure before dessert made its appearance. To be indebted, therefore, for an essential service to one of this lowly class, Aubrey was sufficiently foolish to account a small degradation.

Happily for him, he had just enough sense left, and had been sufficiently humiliated, to perceive that he could not escape the necessity of devouring this unpalatable piece of humble pie, and that the only choice left him was a choice of bitters. The false manliness which he had been diligently cultivating had vanished into thin air, and something of the child's spirit, so long despised, was coming back to him,—the longing for the sound of a familiar voice, and the touch of a tender hand. Even Aunt Temperance would have received, just then, a welcome which might have astonished her. But it showed the character of the women of his family that in this emergency Aubrey's thoughts scarcely touched his mother, and dwelt longingly on his grandmother and his Aunt Edith.

The wise Countess waited quietly till Aubrey's meditations had taken time to settle themselves into resolution.

"Madam, I thank your Ladyship," he said at last, as he looked up, with an expression which had not dwelt for many a month in his eyes. "I think I perceive now how matters stand. Suffer me to say that I never knew, until now, how foolish I have been. Under your Ladyship's leave, I will take your kindly counsel, and seek aid of Mr Marshall. I would like to see them again."

His voice faltered as the last words were spoken.

"So will you do well," said the Countess, more kindly than before. "All is not yet lost, Mr Louvaine. You have been foolish, but there is time before you wherein you may be wise."

Aubrey bowed, took his leave, and went to his own room, where he filled his pockets with a few immediate necessaries and what little money he had. It was hard to bear, this going forth into the wilderness, not at God's call, but as the consequence of his own folly—Egypt left behind, and no Canaan in prospect. He must take leave of none save Lady Oxford—must appear to none to be what he was—a homeless fugitive with his life in his hand. As he came down-stairs, he was met in the hall by the same page who had previously summoned him.

"My Lady would speak a word with you in her cabinet ere you walk forth."

Aubrey found Lady Oxford at her desk, busied with household accounts, and a little pile of gold beside her. When she had reminded him that she was not rich, she had spoken very truly. That deceased husband of hers, as wanting in reason in his age as in his youth, having reduced the great Vere estates to almost nothing, his second wife, the Countess Elizabeth, and her young son Earl Henry, had to sustain the dignity of the House upon a very insufficient number of gold pieces. Twenty months had elapsed since the death of Earl Edward, and the excellent management and strict economy of the widowed Countess had done something to retrieve the ruined fortunes of the family, but much still remained to do.

Lady Oxford glanced up at Aubrey as he entered.

"Mr Louvaine, I owe you your quarter's wages," she said; "at least, so little time remains that it need not tarry, and 'tis to my conveniency to reckon with you this afternoon." This was said in a voice that the page could hear. Then, as Aubrey came up to her, with a significant look, she laid another ten pounds in his hand, with a few words for his private ear. "Let me hear of you in time to come as a good man. God go with you! Farewell."

Ten minutes later, Aubrey closed the door of Oxford House for the last time, and went out, truly not knowing whither he went. His primary destination of course was Shoe Lane; but after that—whither?

Through back streets he made his way to Aldersgate, and passed through it out of the City; over Snow Hill and Holborn Bridge, and down Shoe Lane to the small house where Mr Marshall "had his lodging"—to use the phrase of the time—in other words, where he and Agnes made their home in three rooms, the kitchen being open to all the lodgers to cook for themselves. Two of the rooms were moderately large; these formed the sitting-room, and the clergyman's bedroom and study, the bedroom end being parted from the study end by a curtain between the two. The remaining room, a mere closet, was his daughter's bedchamber. Pleasantest of the three was the sitting-room, the front half of which was the general and public portion, while the back was reserved as Agnes's boudoir, where her little work-table and stool were set by a small window, looking out over the little garden towards Fetter Lane, bounded on the right hand by the wall of Saint Andrew's Church. The door was opened by a rather slipshod girl, the landlady's daughter.

"Pray you, is Mr Marshall at home?"

"He's not, Sir; he's gone for a country walk."

"What time look you for him?"

"Well, about dark, I dare say. Mrs Agnes, she's in."

"Thank you; I will come again about dusk." Aubrey walked up the lane, turned aimlessly to the left, and sauntered on towards Bloomsbury. It was no matter where he went—no matter to any one, himself least of all. Passing Saint Giles's Church, he turned to the right, up a broad country road lined by flowery banks, wherein the first primroses of spring were just beginning to appear. There are primroses there yet—in flower-girls' baskets: they bloom now no otherwise in Tottenham Court Road.

When he had gone some little distance, Aubrey grew tired. It was a warm day for the season; he sat down to rest on the flowery bank, and lost himself in unhappy thought.

A mile further on, Mr Marshall was coming home down the same road, in a more despondent mood than was usual with him. Things were going badly for the Puritans abroad, and for the Marshalls at home. An ejected minister was at all times an unfashionable person, and usually a very poor man. His income was small, was growing smaller, and was not at all likely to take a turn and increase. His wife was gone, and he felt her loss rather more than less as time passed on; and Agnes had her private trouble, for her affianced husband, a young tradesman to whom she had been engaged for two years, had jilted her when he heard of her father's ejectment. Altogether, the prospect before the Marshalls was not pleasant. Rent was due, and clothes were needed, and money was exceedingly scanty.

In the outside world, too, the sky was dull and gloomy. The Puritans were in no greater favour than they had been, though the Papists were at the lowest ebb. That there was any inconsistency in their conduct did not apparently occur to the authorities, nor that the true way to repress Popery was by cultivating Puritanism. Believing the true principles of the Church of England to be the golden mean between the two, they acted under the pleasing illusion that when both halves were cut off, the middle would be left intact, and all the better for the operation.

As Mr Marshall walked on in the Tottenham road, he saw a figure seated on the grassy bank at some distance before him. When he came nearer, he perceived that it was a young man, who sat with his head cast down, in an attitude of meditation, and a light cane in his hand, with which now and then he switched off the head of an unoffending dandelion. Drawing nearer still, the minister began to suspect that the youth's face was not unfamiliar; and when he came close, instead of passing the sitter on the bank, he stepped down, and took a seat beside him.

The youth had paid no apparent attention to his companion until that moment. His face was turned away northward, and only when Mr Marshall sat down close to him did he seem to perceive that he was not alone.

"How goes the world with you this afternoon, Mr Louvaine?"

"Mr Marshall! I ask your pardon. I had not seen you."

"I thought not. You have taken a long walk."

Aubrey made no reply.

"Now, how am I to get at this shut-up heart?" said Mr Marshall to himself. "To say the wrong thing just now may do considerable harm. Yet what is the right one?" Aloud he said only,—"I hope my Lady Lettice is well? I know not whether you or I saw her last."

"I have not seen her for months," said Aubrey, curtly.

"Then I am happier than you, for I saw her three weeks since. I thought her looking somewhat frail and feeble, even more so than her wont; yet very ripe for Heaven, when as it shall please God to take her."

There was no answer again. Aubrey's cane applied itself diligently to making a plantain leaf lie to the right of its neighbour instead of the left.

"Mr Louvaine, did you ever hear that my mother and your grandfather were friends of old time?"

For the first time Aubrey turned his head fully, and looked at his companion. The face which Mr Marshall saw was not, as he had imagined it might be, sullen and reluctant to converse. It was only very, very weary and sad, with heavy eyes as though they had slept little, or were holding back unshed tears.

"No, never," was all he said.

"My mother," said Mr Marshall, "was an Oxfordshire woman, of Minster Lovel by her birth, but she wedded a bookseller in Oxford town, where she was in service to a lady. I think you were not present when I told this to my Lady Lettice. But do you remember your old friend Mrs Elizabeth Wolvercot, that she told me you were wont to call Cousin Bess?"

"Remember Cousin Bess! Of course I do," said Aubrey, a tone of interest coming into his voice. "What of her?"

"My mother was her sister Ellen."

"Why, Mr Marshall! are you my cousin?"

"If it please you to acknowledge me, Cousin Aubrey."

"That I will, indeed!" said Aubrey, clasping the hand of the ejected minister. Then, with a sudden and complete change of tone,—"But, maybe, if you knew all I know, you were not over ready to acknowledge me."

"You are in trouble, my friend," answered Mr Marshall sympathisingly. "Can I help you thereout? At least I can feel for you in it, if I may do no more."

There was another minute of dead silence. The next question came suddenly and bluntly.

"Mr Marshall, did you ever in your life feel that you had been a grand fool?"

"Yes," was the short, quiet answer.

"I am glad to hear it, though I should not have thought so. I thought you had always been a precisely proper person, and I did not suppose you could feel for me a whit. But I must tell my trouble to somebody, or I shall grow desperate. Look you, I have lost my place, and I can get none other, and I have not twenty pounds in the world, and I owe an hundred pounds, and I can't go home."

"Thank God!" was the strange answer.

"Well, to be sure,—Mr Marshall, what on earth are you thanking God for?"

"That your husks have lost their flavour, my son. So long as the prodigal finds the husks sweet, there is little hope of him. But let him once discover that they are dry husks, and not sweet fruits, and that his companions are swine, and not princes—then he is coming to himself, and there is hope of making a man of him again. I say therefore, Thank God!"

"I shall never make anything better than a fool."

"A man commonly ceases to be a fool when he begins to reckon himself one."

"You know not the worst yet. But—Mr Marshall, if I tell it you, you will not betray me, for my poor old grandmother's sake? I never gave her much cause to love me, but I know she doth, and it would grieve her if I came to public hurt and shame."

"It would grieve me, my cousin, more than you know. Fear not, but speak freely."

"Well,—I know not if my grandmother told you that I was intimate with some of these poor gentlemen that have paid the penalty of their treason of late?"

"I know that you knew Percy and Winter—and, I dare say, Rookwood."

"I knew them all, and Catesby too. And though I was not privy to the plot—not quite so bad as that!—yet I would have followed Mr Tom Winter almost anywhere,—ay, even into worse than I did."

"Surely, Aubrey Louvaine, you never dreamed of perversion!"

"Mr Marshall, I was ready to do anything Tom Winter bade me; but he never meddled with my religion. And—come, I may as well make a clean breast, as I have begun—I loved Dorothy Rookwood, and if she had held up a finger, I should have gone after. You think the Rookwoods Protestants, don't you? They are not."

Mr Marshall sat in dismayed silence, for a moment.

"I doubted them somewhat," he said: "but I never knew so much as you have told me. Then Mrs Dorothy—"

"Oh, she would have none of me. She told me I was a beggar and a fool both, and she spake but the bitter truth. Yet it was bitter when she said it."

"My poor boy!" said Mr Marshall, compassionately.

"I thought Hans but a fool when he went and bound himself to yon mercer—he, the son of a Dutch Baron! But I see now—I was the fool, not he. Had I spent my days in selling silk stockings instead of wearing them, and taken my wages home to my mother like a good little boy, it had been better for me. I see, now,—now that the doors are all shut against me, and I dare not go home."

"Yet tell me, Aubrey, for I scarce understand it—why dare you not go home?"

As Aubrey laid the matter before him from the point of view presented by Lady Oxford, Mr Marshall's face grew graver every moment. He began to see that the circumstances were much more serious than he had apprehended. There was silence for a few minutes when Aubrey finished his account. Then the clergyman said—

"'Tis a tangle, and a tight one, my boy. Yet, by God's blessing, we may see our way out. Let us take one point at a time. These debts of yours—will you tell me, are they 'debts of honour,' falsely so-called?"

"Only twenty pounds. The rest is due partly to Patrick the tailor and others for goods, and partly to Tom Rookwood for money I borrowed of him."

"How much to Tom Rookwood?"

"Twenty pounds."

"I will see what I can do with him," said Mr Marshall, thoughtfully. "If these Rookwoods are in no wise dragged into the plot, so that they have no land escheated, nor fines to pay, then I think he can afford to wait for his money—better, very like, than the tradesfolk. But, Aubrey, you must get another place. Bear with me if I ask you,—Could you bring your pride down to serve in a shop?"

The young shapely head went up suddenly, as if in proud protest against this most unacceptable proposal. Then it dropped again, and the cane toyed with the plantain.

"I thought my pride was down," he said in a low voice? "but I see it might be lowered yet further. Mr Marshall, I will try to humble myself even to that, if it be needful."

Aubrey did not suspect that Mr Marshall had never come so near respecting him as at that moment.

"Well," he said, quietly, "I will do what I can to help you. I will see Tom Rookwood; and I know a bookseller in Oxford town to whom I could speak for you if you wish it. The question for you at this moment is not, What is easy and pleasant?—but, What is right? 'Facilis descensus Averni'—you know—'sed revocare gradum!' It is always hard work turning back. There is a bitter cup to be drunk; and if you would win back your lost self-respect—if you would bring help and comfort to your grandmother in her old age—if you would light up the lamp of joy where hitherto you have wrought darkness—nay, if you would win a smile from the blessed lips which said 'Father, forgive them' for you—then, Aubrey Louvaine, be a man, and drink off that bitter draught. You will find it sweeter afterwards than all the dainties you have been searching after for so long."

Aubrey sat still and silent for some time, and his companion let him alone to consider his ways. Mr Marshall was a wise man; and never gave more strokes to a nail than were needful to drive it in. At last the question came, in low, unsteady tones—

"Mr Marshall, did God send you up this road this afternoon?"

"I have no doubt He did, my friend, if anything I say or do can help you to the right way. You see, I knew not of your being here, and He did."

"When you came up," said the low voice, "I thought all was over, and my mind was very near made up to enlist as a common soldier, and leave no trace behind. I see now, it should have been an ill deed to do."

"An ill deed in truth for your poor friends, if the only news they had ever heard of you were your name in a list of the dead."

"Yes, I wished to be killed as soon as might be—get to the end as fast as possible."

"Would that have been the end, Aubrey?"

The reply was barely audible. "No, I suppose not."

"Take up your burden instead, my son, and bear it by God's grace. He does not refuse that, even when the burden is heaped and bound by our own hands. Unlike men, His compassion faileth never. He has maybe emptied thine heart, Aubrey, that He may fill it with Himself."

Aubrey made no reply, but Mr Marshall did not think that a bad sign.

"Well, come now," said he, rising from the bank, and in a more cheerful tone. "Let us go to Shoe Lane, and see if Agnes hath any supper for us. The prodigal son was not more welcome to his old father than you shall be to my poor lodging, for so long a time as may stand with your safety and conveniency. My Lady Oxford, you say, was to give my Lady Lettice to know how things went with you? but methinks it shall do none ill if I likewise visit her this evening. 'Two heads are better than one,' and though 'tis said 'o'er many cooks spoil the broth,' yet three may be better than two."

The feeling of humiliation which grew and deepened in Aubrey's mind, was one of the best things which could have come to him. Vanity and self-sufficiency had always been his chief failings; and he was now finding, to his surprise, that while his chosen friends surrounded him with difficulties, the people whom he had slighted and despised came forward to help him out of them. He had looked down on no one more than on Mr Marshall, and Agnes had received a share of his contempt, partly because of her father's calling and comparative poverty, partly because she was not pretty, and partly because she showed no power of repartee or spirit in conversation. In Aubrey's eyes she had been "a dull, humdrum thing," only fit to cook and sew, and utterly beneath the notice of any one so elevated and spirituel as himself.

During the last few hours, Aubrey's estimate of things in general had sustained some rude shocks, and his hitherto unfaltering faith in his own infallibility was considerably shaken. It suffered an additional blow when Mr Marshall led him into his quiet parlour, and he saw Agnes seated at her work, the supper-table spread, and a cheerful fire blazing upon a clean hearth. An expression of slight surprise came into her eyes as she rose to greet Aubrey.

"You see, daughter, I have brought home a guest," said her father. "He will tarry with us a little season."

Then, stepping across the room, he opened a closed door, and showed Aubrey another chamber, the size of the first, across which a red curtain was drawn.

"This is my chamber, and shall be also yours," said he: "I pray you use it freely. At this end is my study, and beyond the curtain my bedchamber. I somewhat fear my library may scarce be to your liking," he added, an amused smile playing round his lips; "but if you can find therein anything to please you, I shall be glad.—Now, daughter, what have we here? We so rarely have guests to supper, I fear Mr Louvaine may find our fare somewhat meagre: though 'better is a dinner of herbs where love is, than a stalled ox and hatred therewith.'"

"It is a dinner of herbs, Father," said Agnes, echoing the smile; "for 'tis a bit of gammon of bacon and spinach, with eggs in poach."

"How say you, my friend?" asked Mr Marshall of Aubrey. "Can you make your supper of so simple a dish?"

"Indeed I can, Sir, and thankfully," was the answer.

Agnes Marshall, though very quiet, was observant, and she perceived in a moment that something was wrong with the magnificent youth who had scarcely deigned to look at her when they had met on previous occasions. She saw also that his manner had greatly changed, and very much for the better. He spoke to her now on terms of equality, and actually addressed her father in a tone of respect. Something must have happened.

Aubrey, naturally the less observant of the two, was looking on just now with quickened senses; and discovered, also to his surprise, that the simple supper was served with as much dainty neatness as at Lord Oxford's table; that Mr Marshall could talk intelligently and interestingly on other than religious subjects; that Agnes really was not dull, but quite able to respond to her father's remarks; that her eyes were clear and bright, her complexion not at all bad, and her smile decidedly pleasant: and lastly, that both his hosts, though take a thus unawares, were exceedingly kind to him, and ready to put themselves to any trouble or inconvenience in order to accommodate him. He had learned more, when he lay down to sleep that night, in twelve hours than in any previous twelve months of his life, since his infancy. The lessons were of higher value, and they were not likely to be lost.

When supper was over, Mr Marshall repaired to the White Bear, and Aubrey was left to Agnes as entertainer. She was sewing a long seam, and her needle went in and out with unfailing regularity. For a few minutes he watched her in silence, discovering a sunny gleam on her hair that he had never before noticed. Then he suddenly spoke out one of his thoughts.

"Don't you find that exceeding wearisome?"

Agnes looked up with amused surprise.

"Truly," she said, "I never thought about it."

"I am sure I could not work at it ten minutes," replied Aubrey.

Agnes laughed—a low, soft, musical laugh, which struck pleasantly on the ear.

"My father would be ill off for shirts if I could not," she answered. "You see, Mr Louvaine, things have to be done. 'Tis to no good purpose to be impatient with them. It doth but weary more the worker, and furthers not the work a whit."

"Would you not like to lead a different life?—such a life as other young maids do—amid flowers, and sunshine, and jewels, and dancing, and laughter, and all manner of jollity?"

He was curious to hear what she would say to the question.

Agnes answered by a rather wondering smile. Then her eyes went out of the window, to the steeple of Saint Andrew's, and the blue sky beyond it.

"I might well enjoy some of them," she said slowly, as if the different ideas were passing in review before her. "I love sunshine, and flowers. But there is one thing I love far better."

"And that is—?"

A light "that never was from sun nor moon" flooded the grave grey eyes of Agnes Marshall. Her voice was very low and subdued as she answered.

"That is, to do the will of God. There is nothing upon earth that I desire in comparison of Him."

"Is not that a gloomsome, dismal sort of thing?"

There was Divine compassion, mingled with human amusement, in the smile which was on Agnes's lips as she looked up at him.

"Have you tried it, Mr Louvaine?"

Aubrey shook his head. "I have tried a good many things, but not Puritan piety. It ever seemed to me a most weary and dreary matter,—an eternal 'Thou shalt not' carved o'er the gate of every garden of delight that I would fain enter. They may be angels that stand there, but they bear flaming swords."

He spoke lightly, yet there was an accent in his voice which revealed to Agnes a deep unfilled void in his heart.

"Don't try piety," she said quietly. "Try Jesus Christ instead. There are no flaming swords in the way to Him, and the truest and deepest satisfaction cannot be reached without Him."

"Have you found it thus, Mrs Agnes?"

"I have, Mr Louvaine."

"But, then,—you see,—you have not tried other fashions of pleasure, maybe," said Aubrey, slowly.

"Have you?" said Agnes.

"Ay—a good many."

"And did you find them satisfying? I say not, pleasant at the moment, but satisfying?"

"Well, that is a large word," said Aubrey.

"It is a large word," was the reply, "yet Christ can fill it: and none can do it but He. Know you any thing or creature else that can?"

"I cannot say, for I have not needed it."

"That is, you have not been down yet into deep places, methinks, where the floods have overflowed you. I have not visited many, in truth; yet have I been in one or two where I should have lost my footing, had not my Lord held me up."

A very sorrowful look came into the gentle eyes. Agnes was thinking of the faithless Jonas Derwent, who had cast her off in the day of her calamity. Aubrey made no answer. He was beginning to find out that life was not, as he had always imagined it, a field of flowers, but a very sore and real battlefield, wherein to lose the victory meant to lose his very self, and to win it meant to reign for ever and ever.

And then Mr Marshall's voice said on the other side of the door,—"This is the way,"—and another voice, dearly welcome to Aubrey, responded as Aunt Edith came into the room—

"Mine own dear boy! God be thanked that we see thee safe from harm!"

And again, for the twentieth time, Aubrey felt as he kissed her that he had not deserved it.



CHAPTER THIRTEEN.

WHICH IS FULL OF SURPRISES.

"Ah, who am I, that God hath saved Me from the doom I did desire, And crossed the lot myself had craved, To set me higher?"

Jean Ingelow.

As Mr Marshall approached the White Bear that evening, he was unexpectedly pounced upon by Silence Abbott.

"Eh, Parson, I declare it's you! How fares Mrs Agnes this cold even? Marry, I do believe we shall have snow ere the day break again. The White Bear'll be a bit whiter, I reckon, if he be well snowed o'er. Are you going in there? You'll have some work to peace Mrs Louvaine; she's lamenting and weeping, you never heard!—and all for her son as cometh not home, and she is fair sure he'll be hung, because she saith he was in with those rogues yonder."

"He was nothing of the sort," said Mr Marshall, breaking in sternly on the flow of Silence's tide of words: "and let me tell you, Mrs Abbott, if you spread such a lie, you may have a death at your door, as like as not. Mr Louvaine, I have no doubt, is safe and well, and had no more ado with the Gunpowder Plot than you had: and I saw you with mine own eyes talking with Fawkes, that rascal that called himself Johnson."

"Eh deary, Parson, but you'd never go to tell on a poor woman, and as honest as any in Westminster, if I did pass the time o' day to a fellow, that I never guessed to be a villain? I do assure you, on my truth as—"

"I hope you are an honest woman, Mrs Abbott; and so is Mr Louvaine an honest man; and if you would have me keep my tongue off your doings, see that you keep yours off his. Now I have given you warning: that is a bargain."

"Eh deary, deary! but I never heard Parson i' such a way afore!" lamented Mrs Abbott to her daughter Mary, the only listener she had left, for Mr Marshall had walked straight into the White Bear. "I'll say the lad's a Prince of the Blood, or an angel, or anything he's a mind, if he'll but let me be. Me talk to Guy Fawkes, indeed! I never said no worser to him than 'Fine morning,' or 'Wet, isn't it?' as it might be: and to think o' me being had up afore the Lords of the Council for just passing a word like that—and the parson, too! Eh, deary me! whatever must I say to content him, now?"

"I fancy, Mother," said Mary, who took after her quiet father, "he'll be content if you'll hold your peace."

Mr Marshall found the ladies at the White Bear all assembled in the parlour. Mrs Louvaine had the ear of the House as he entered.

"So unfeeling as you are, Temperance, to a poor widow! and my only child as good as lost, and never found again. And officers and third-boroughs and constables all going about, making all manner of inquirations, trying to bring folks to justice, and Aubrey in with those wicked people, and going to sup with them, and all—and nobody ever trying to prevent him, and not a soul to care but me whether he went right or wrong—I do believe you thought more of the price of herrings than you ever did of the dear boy—and now, he's completely lost and nobody knows what has become of him—"

Mr Marshall's quiet voice effected a diversion.

"Mrs Louvaine, pardon me. Aubrey is at my house, safe and sound. There is no need for your trouble."

"Of course!" responded Temperance. "I told her so. Might as well talk to the fire-bricks, when she takes a fancy of this sort. If the lad had come to any harm, we should have heard it. Faith never will think that 'no news is good news.'"

"I am glad Aubrey is with you, Mr Marshall," said the gentle voice of Lady Louvaine.

"I met with him, Madam, in a walk this afternoon, and brought him so far with me."

"And why not a bit further, trow?" asked Temperance.

"That am I come to say. Madam,"—and he addressed himself to Lady Louvaine,—"having told you that your grandson is well in body, and safe at my lodging, I trust it shall not greatly touch you to learn that he is in some trouble of mind."

"Didn't I tell you?" demanded Mrs Louvaine, in tones suited to Cassandra amid the ruins of Troy. "I said I was sure some harm had come to the boy, and you laughed me to scorn, and not one of you went to see—"

"Nobody laughed at you but me, my dear," said her sister: "and as to going to see, when his mother did not reckon it worth while to budge, I don't see why his aunts should not sit quiet."

"Why, you never looked for me to go?" responded Mrs Louvaine, with a faint scream of horror. "Me, a poor widow, and with my feeble health! When I haven't been out of the door except to church for nigh a month!"

"More's the pity! If you knocked about a bit more, and went to market of a morrow, and such like, maybe your health would not be so feeble."

"Temperance, you barbarous creature, how can you?"

"Well, I know there are folks that can, Faith, and there are folks that can't. You never heard me ask my Lady Lettice why she didn't stir up and go a-marketing. She can't; she'd be only too glad if she could, and would want no asking. But you could if you would—it's true, my dear, and you don't need to stare, as if you'd never seen me before this evening. As for looking for you to go, I didn't indeed; I never look for aught but cumber, and so I'm not disappointed.—Mr Marshall, I ask your pardon; I'm staying you from speaking."

Mr Marshall accepted the apology with a smile.

"Well, the upshot of the matter is this. Mr Louvaine, though in truth, as I do verily believe, innocent of all ill, is in danger to fall in some suspicion through a certain jewel of his being found in the lodging of one of the caitiffs lately execute. He saith that he knew not where he had lost it: no doubt it dropped out of his apparel when he was there, as he allows he hath been divers times. He never heard, saith he, a word of any traitorous designs, nor did they tamper at all with his religion. But this jewel being carried to my Lady Oxford—truly, whether by some suspicion that it should be Mr Louvaine's, or how, I know not, nor am sure that he doth himself—she charged him withal, yet kindly, and made haste to have him forth of the house, warning him that he must in no wise tarry in the town, but must with all haste hie him down into the country, and there lie squat until all suspicion had passed. She would not even have him come hither, where she said he should be sought if any inquiry were made. The utmost she would suffer was that he should lie hid for a day or twain in my lodging, whither you might come as if to speak with Agnes, and so might agree whither he should go, and so forth. My Lady paid him his wage, well-nigh nine pound, and further counted ten pounds into his hand to help him on his journey. Truly, she gave him good counsel, and dealt well with him. But the poor lad is very downcast, and knows not what to do; and he tells me he hath debts that he cannot pay. So I carried him to my lodging, where he now lieth: and I wait your further wishes."

"I thank you right truly for that your goodness," said Lady Louvaine.

"There, now! didn't I say the boy was sure to run into debt?" moaned Mrs Louvaine.

"How much be these debts, Mr Marshall?" asked the old lady.

"Twenty pounds borrowed from Mr Thomas Rookwood; twenty lost at play; and about sixty owing to tailors, mercers, and the like."

"Ay, I reckoned that velvet would be over a penny the yard."

"I see, the lad hath disburdened himself to you," said Lady Louvaine, with a sad smile. "Truly, I am sorry to hear this, though little astonied. Mr Marshall, I have been much troubled at times, thinking whether, in suffering Aubrey to enter my Lord Oxford's service, I had done ill: and yet in very deed, at the time I could see nothing else to do. It seemed to be the way wherein God meant us to go—and yet—"

"Madam, the Lord's mercies are great enough to cover our mistakes along with our sins. And it may be you made none. I have never seen Mr Louvaine so softened and humbled as he now looks to be."

"May the Lord lead him forth by the right way! What do you advise, true friend?"

"I see two courses, Madam, which under your good leave I will lay before you. Mr Louvaine can either lie hid in the country with some friend of yours,—or, what were maybe better, some friend of your friend: or, if he would be doing at once towards the discharging of his debts, he can take the part Mr Floriszoon hath chosen, and serve some tradesman in his shop."

"Trade! Aubrey!" shrieked Mrs Louvaine in horror. "He never will! My boy hath so delicate a soul—"

"He said he would," answered Mr Marshall quietly, "and thereby won my high respect."

"Nay, you never mean it!" exclaimed Temperance. "Bless the lad! I ne'er gave him credit for half the sense."

"If Aubrey be brought down to that, he must have learned a good lesson," said his grandmother. "Not that I could behold it myself entirely without a pang."

Edith, who had hitherto been silent, now put in a suggestion.

"Our Charity is true as steel," she said. "Why not let Aubrey lie close with her kindred, where none should think to look for him?"

"In Pendle?—what, amid all the witches!" said Temperance.

"Edith, I'm amazed at you! I could never lie quiet in my bed!" wailed Mrs Louvaine. "Only to think of the poor boy being bewitched by those wicked creatures! Why, they spend Sunday nights dancing round the churchyard with the devil."

"And the place is choke-full of 'em, Charity says," added Temperance. "She once met Mother Demdike her own self, muttering under her breath, and she gave her the evillest look as she passed her that the maid ever saw."

"Ay, saying the Lord's Prayer backwards, of course."

"Well, I can't say," said Temperance, dubiously: "it did not seem to do Charity any ill. I shouldn't wonder, truly—"

"For mercy's sake, stop her!" cried Mrs Louvaine. "She's going to say something wicked—I know she is! She'll say there are no witches, or no devil, or something horrible."

"Nay, I'll say nought o' the sort," responded Temperance. "Whether there be witches or no, the Lord knows, and there I leave it; but that there is a devil I'm very sure, for he has tempted me over and over again. All I say is, if Charity could meet a witch, and get no ill, why should not Aubrey too?"

"I won't have it!" cried Mrs Louvaine in an agony. "My poor darling boy! I won't have it! My fatherless child shall not go among snakes and witches and demons—"

"Now, Faith, do be quiet, or you'll have a fit of the mother [hysterics]. Nobody wants to send the lad amongst snakes—I don't know that there's so much as an adder there. As to devils, he'll find them where'er he goeth, and some of them in men's and women's bodies, or I mistake."

"If your Ladyship liked better," suggested Mr Marshall, quietly, "to take the other road I named, I am acquaint with a bookseller in Oxford town, that is a cousin of my sister's husband, a good honest man, and a God-fearing, with whom, if you so pleased, he might be put. 'Tis a clean trade, and a seemly, that need not disgrace any to handle: and methinks there were no need to mention wherefore it were, save that the place were sought for a young gentleman that had lost money through disputes touching lands. That is true, and it should be sufficient to account for all that the master might otherwise note as strange in a servant."

"My poor fatherless boy!" sobbed Mrs Louvaine, with her handkerchief at her eyes. "Servant to a tradesfellow!"

"We are all servants," answered Mr Marshall: "and we need think no scorn thereof, since our Lord Himself took on Him the form of a servant. Howbeit, for this even, the chief question is, Doth any of you gentlewomen desire to return with me?—Mrs Louvaine?"

"I could not bear it!" came in a stifled voice from behind the handkerchief. "To see my poor child in his misery—it would break mine heart outright. 'Tis enough to think of, and too-too [exceedingly] great to brook, even so."

"Let her pass; she'll be ne'er a bit of good," said Temperance in a contemptuous whisper. Then raising her voice, she added,—"Now, Lady Lettice, don't you think thereof. There's no need, for Edith and I can settle everything, and you'd just go and lay yourself by, that you should have no good of your life for a month or more. Be ruled by me, and let Edith go back and talk matters o'er with Aubrey, and see whether in her judgment it were better he lay hid or went to the bookseller. She's as good a wit as any of us, yourself except. Said I well?"

"If your Ladyship would suffer me to add a word," said the clergyman, "I think Mrs Temperance has well spoken."

There was a moment's hesitation, as if Lady Louvaine were balancing duties. Mr Marshall noticed how her thin hand trembled, and how the pink flush came and went on her delicate cheek.

"Well, children, have it as you will," said the old lady at last. "It costs me much to give it up; but were I to persist, maybe it should cost more to you than I have a right to ask at your hands. Let be: I will tarry."

"Dearest Mother, you have a right to all that our hands can give you," answered Edith, tenderly: "but, I pray you, tarry until the morrow, and then if need be, and your strength sufficient, you can ride to Shoe Lane."

So Edith went with Mr Marshall alone. Even after all she had heard, Aubrey's condition was a delightful surprise. Never before had she seen him in so softened, humbled, grateful a mood as now. They talked the matter over, and in the end decided that, subject to Lady Louvaine's approval, Aubrey should go to the bookseller.

When the White Bear was reached on her return, Edith found Lady Oxford in the parlour. The sternness with which the Countess had treated Aubrey was quite laid aside. To Lady Louvaine she showed a graceful and grateful mixture of sympathy and respect, endeavoured to reassure her, hoped there would be no search nor inquiry, thought it was almost too late, highly approved of Edith's decision, promised to send over all Aubrey's possessions to the White Bear, and bade them let her know if she could do them any service.

"Will you suffer me to ask you one thing?" she said. "If Mr Louvaine go to Oxford, shall you tarry here, or no?"

"Would it be safe for us to follow him?"

"Follow him—no! I did but think you might better love to be forth of this smoky town."

"Amen, with all my heart!" said Temperance. "But, Madam, and saving your Ladyship's presence, crowns bloom not on our raspberry bushes, nor may horses be bought for a groat apiece down this way."

Mrs Louvaine, behind the cambric, was heard to murmur something about a sordid spirit, people whose minds never soared, and old maids who knew nothing of the strength of maternal love.

"Strength o' fiddlesticks!" said Temperance, turning on her. "Madam, I ask your Ladyship's pardon."

"My dear lady, I cannot answer you as now," was Lady Louvaine's reply. "The pillar of cloud hath not moved as yet; and so long as it tarrieth, so long must I also. It may be, as seemeth but like, that my next home will be the churchyard vault, that let my Father judge. If it had been His will, that I might have laid my bones in mine own country, and by the side of my beloved, it had been pleasant to flesh and blood: but I know well that I go to meet him, wherever my dust may lie. I am well-nigh fourscore years old this day; and if the Lord say, 'Go not over this Jordan,' let Him do as seemeth Him good. Methinks the glory of the blessed City burst no less effulgent on the vision of Moses, because he had seen the earthly Canaan but far off. And what I love the best is not here, but there."

Temperance and Edith accompanied Lady Oxford to her coach. She paused a moment before stepping in.

"Mrs Edith," she said, "methinks your good mother would fain see Mr Louvaine ere he depart. If so, she shall not be balked thereof. I have made inquiry touching Mr Marshall's house, and I find there is a little gate from the garden thereof into Saint Andrew's churchyard. I will call for her as to-morrow in my coach, and carry her to take the air. An ancient servant of mine, that is wedded to the clerk of Saint Andrew's, dwelleth by the churchyard, and I will stay me there as though to speak with her, sending away the coach upon another errand that I can devise. Then from her house my Lady may safely win to Mr Marshall's lodging, and be back again ere the coach return."

"Your Ladyship is most good unto us," responded Edith, thankfully. "I am assured it should greatly comfort my dear mother."

Lady Oxford turned with a smile to Temperance.

"It seems to me, Mrs Temperance, that your words be something sharp."

"Well, Madam, to tell truth, folks do put me out now and again more than a little. Many's the time I long to give Faith a good shaking; and I could have laid a stick on Aubrey's back middling often,—I'll not say I couldn't: but if the lad sees his blunders and is sorry for 'em, I'll put my stick in the corner."

"I think I would leave it tarry there for the present," said Lady Oxford, with a soft little laugh. "God grant you a good even!"

The coach had only just rolled away, and four youthful Abbotts, whom it had glued to the window, were still flattening their noses against the diamond panes, when a clear, strong, sweet voice rang out on the evening air in the back road which led by the palings of Saint James's Park. Both Edith and Temperance knew well whose voice it was. They heard it every night, lifted up in one of the Psalms of David, as Hans Floriszoon came home from his work with the mercer. Hans was no longer an apprentice. Mr Leigh had taken such a fancy to him, and entertained so complete a trust both in his skill and honesty, that six months before he had voluntarily cancelled his indentures, and made him his partner in the business. Nothing changed Hans Floriszoon. He had sung as cheerily in his humble apprenticeship, and would have done so had he been Lord Mayor of London, as now when he came down the back road, lantern in hand, every evening as regularly as the clock struck four, Mrs Abbott declared that she set her clock by Hans whenever it stopped, which it did frequently, for it was an ancient piece of goods, and suffered from an asthmatic affection.

"There's Mestur 'Ans!" said Charity. "See thee, Rachel, I'll teem them eggs into th' pan; thou doesn't need to come."

Rachel sat by the window, trying to finish making a new apron before supper.

"That's a good lass," she said. "Eh, but it's a dark day; they'll none see a white horse a mile off to-night." [Note 1.]

"They'd have better e'en nor me to see it any night," said Charity, breaking the eggs into the pan.

"Hearken to th' lad!" said Rachel. "Eh, it's gradely [excellent, exactly right] music, is that!"

"He sings well, does Mestur 'Ans."

The words were audible now, as the singer unlatched the gate, and turned into the garden.

"And in the presence of my foes My table Thou shalt spread: Thou shalt, O Lord, fill full my cup, And eke anoint mine head.

"Through all my life Thy favour is So frankly showed to me, That in Thy house for evermore My dwelling-place shall be."

Hans lifted the latch and came into the kitchen.

"Here's a clean floor, Rachel! Tarry a minute, while I pluck off my shoes, and I will run across in my stocking-feet. It shall be 'February Fill-dyke,' methinks, ere the day break."

"He's as good as my Lady and Mrs Edith, for not making work," said Charity as Hans disappeared.

"I would we could set him i' th' garden, and have a crop on him," responded Rachel. "He's th' only man I ever knew that 'd think for a woman."

"Eh, lass, yo' never knew Sir Aubrey!" was Charity's grave comment.

There was a good deal for Hans to hear that evening, and he listened silently while Edith told the tale, and Temperance now and then interspersed sarcastic observations. When at last the story was told, Hans said quietly—

"Say you that you look to see Aubrey again to-orrow?"

"Lady Lettice doth, and Edith. Not I," said Temperance. "'Tis a case wherein too many cooks might spoil the broth, and the lad shall be all the easier in his mind for his old crusty Aunt Temperance to tarry at home. But I say, Edith, I would you had asked him for a schedule of his debts. 'Tailors and silkmen' is scarce enough to go to market withal, if we had the means to pay them."

"So did I, Temperance, and he told me—twenty pounds to Mr Tom Rookwood, and forty to Patrick at the Irish Boy; fifteen to Cohen, of the Three Tuns in Knightriders' Street; and about ten more to Bennett, at the Bible in Paternoster Row."

"Lancaster and Derby! Why, however many suits can the lad have in his wardrobe? It should fit me out for life, such a sum as that."

"Well! I would we could discharge them," said Lady Louvaine with a sigh. "Twenty to Tom Rookwood, and forty to Patrick!"

"Make your mind easy, Madam," came in the quietest tones from Hans: "not a penny is owing to either."

"What can you mean, Hans?"

"I am sure of it."

"Who told you so much?"

"Nay, ask Mr Rookwood, and see what he saith."

"I'll go this minute," said Temperance, rising, "I wis not what bee thou hast in thy bonnet, but I don't believe thee, lad."

"Maybe you will when you come back," was the calm response.

Away flashed Temperance, and demanded an interview with Mr Thomas Rookwood, if he were at home. Mr Thomas was at home, and did not express the surprise he felt at the demand. But when the subject of Aubrey's debt was introduced, Mr Thomas's eyebrows went up.

"Mr Louvaine owes me nothing, I do ensure you."

"I heard you had lent him twenty pounds?"

"I did; but it was repaid a month ago."

"By Aubrey?"

"So I suppose. I understood so much," was the answer, in a slightly puzzled tone.

"He repaid it not himself, then?"

"Himself, nay—he sent it to me; but I gave the quittance as to Mr Louvaine."

"I thank you, Mr Rookwood. Then that ends the matter."

Out of the Golden Fish, and into the White Bear, ran Temperance, with drops of rain lying on her gown and hood.

"Madam," she announced in a stern voice, "I am that flabbergasted as never was! Here's Mr Tom Rookwood saith that Aubrey paid him his money a month gone."

"Why, Aubrey told me this afternoon that he owed him twenty pounds," replied Edith in a tone of astonished perplexity.

"Hans, what meaneth this?"

"Methinks, Madam, it means merely that I told you the truth. Mr Rookwood, you see, bears me out."

"He saith Aubrey sent the money by a messenger, unto whom he gave the quittance. Dear heart, but if he lost it!"

"Yet Aubrey must have known, if he sent the money," said Edith in the same tone as before.

"The messenger lost not the quittance," said Hans. "It is quite safe."

He had been out of the room for a minute while Temperance was away, and now, passing his hand into his pocket, he took out a slip of paper, which he laid in the hand of Lady Louvaine.

She drew forth her gold spectacles, and was fitting them on, when Edith impulsively sprang up, and read the paper over her mother's shoulder.

"Received of Mr Aubrey Louvaine, gent, the sum of twenty pounds, for moneys heretofore lent by me, this fifteenth of January, the year of our Lord God 1605, according to the computation of the Church of England.

"Thomas Rookwood."

"Northumberland, Cumberland, Westmoreland, and Durham!" was the comment from Temperance.

"Hans!" said Edith, a light flashing on her, "wert thou the messenger?"

"I was not sent," was the placid answer.

"Hans, thou admirable rascal!" cried Temperance, laying her hands on his shoulders, "I do believe thou didst pay this money. If thou own not the truth, I'll shake thee in twenty bits."

Hans looked up laughingly into her face.

"Methinks, Mrs Temperance, you should shake yourself in forty ere you did it."

"Answer me this minute, thou wicked knave! didst thou pay this money, or no?"

"I was there when it was paid."

"I'll wager my best boots thou wert! Was any else there?"

"Certainly."

"Who beside?"

"The cat, I believe."

Temperance gave him a shake, which he stood with complete calm, only looking a little amused, more about his eyes than his lips.

"Hans, tell me!" said Lady Louvaine. "Is it possible these debts were paid with thy money? How shall I repay thee, my true and dear friend?"

Hans freed himself from Temperance's grasp, and knelt down beside Lady Louvaine.

"Nay, Madam! do you forget that you paid me first—that I owe unto you mine own self and my very life? From the time we came hither I have seen pretty clearly which way Aubrey was going; and having failed to stay him, methought my next duty was to save all I could, that you should not at some after-time be cumbered with his debts. Mr Rookwood's and Patrick's, whereof I knew, have I discharged; and the other, for which I have a sufficiency, will I deal withal to-morrow, so that you can tell Aubrey he is not a penny in debt—"

"Save to thee, my darling boy."

"There are no debts between brothers, Madam, or should not be."

"Hans, thou downright angel, do forgive me!" burst from Temperance.

"Dear Mrs Temperance, I should make a very poor angel; but I will forgive you with all mine heart when I know wherefore I should do it."

"Why, lad, here have I been, like an old curmudgeon as I am, well-nigh setting thee down as a penny-father, because I knew not what thou didst with thy money. It was plain as a pikestaff what Aubrey did with his, for he set it all out on his back; but thy habit is alway plain and decent, and whither thy crowns went could I never tell. Eh, but I am sorry I misjudged thee thus! 'tis a lesson for me, and shall be my life long. I do believe thou art the best lad ever trod shoe-leather."

"Well, 'tis a very proper deed, Hans, and I am glad to see in you so right a feeling," said Mrs Louvaine.

"The Lord bless thee, my boy!" added Lady Louvaine, with emotion. "But how may I suffer thee to pay Aubrey's debts?"

"I scarce see how you shall set about to help it, Madam," said Hans with a little laugh of pleasure. "I thank God I have just enough to pay all."

"And leave thyself bare, my boy?" said Edith.

"Of what, Mrs Edith?" asked Hans with a smile. "'A man's life consisteth not in the abundance of the things which he possesseth.' I am one of the richest men in England, I take it, and my wealth is not of a sort that shall make it hard to enter into the Kingdom of God. The corn and wine and oil may be good things, and are such, being God's gifts: yet the gladness which He giveth is a better, and will abide when they are spent."

Lady Oxford kept her word, and his grandmother and Aunt Edith had a farewell interview with Aubrey. His face was a study for a painter when the receipts were shown him. Tom Rookwood had refused him a second loan only a few weeks earlier, and had pressed him to repay the former: Hans Floriszoon had paid his debts without even letting him know it. Yet he had lent many a gold piece to Tom Rookwood, while the memory of that base, cruel blow given to Hans made his cheek burn with shame. Had he not been treasuring the pebble, and flinging away the pearl?

"Hans has paid my debts!" he said, in an exceedingly troubled voice. "Hans! out of his own pocket? May God forgive me! Tell him,"—and Aubrey's voice was almost choked—"tell him he hath heaped coals of fire on mine head."

Edith asked no questions, but she gave a shrewd guess which was not far off the truth, and she was confirmed in it by the fact that Hans received the message with a smile, and expressed no doubt what it meant.

That night there were twenty-two miles between Aubrey and London: and the next day he rode into Oxford, and delivered Mr Marshall's letter of recommendation to the bookseller, Mr Whitstable, whose shop was situated just inside the West Gate—namely, in close contiguity to that aristocratic part of the city now known as Paradise Square.

Mr Whitstable was a white-haired man who seemed the essence of respectability. He stooped slightly in the shoulders, and looked Aubrey through and over, with a pair of dark, brilliant, penetrating eyes, in a way not exactly calculated to add to that young gentleman's comfort, nor to restore that excellent opinion of his own virtues which had been somewhat shaken of late.

"You are of kin to the writer of this letter, Mr Marshall?"

Aubrey admitted it.

"And you desire to learn my trade?"

"I am afeared I scarce do desire it, Master: but I am content, and needs must."

"What have you hitherto done?"

"Master," said Aubrey, looking frankly at his questioner, "I fear I have hitherto done nothing save to spend money and make a fool of myself. That is no recommendation, I know."

"You have done one other thing, young man," said the old bookseller: "you have told the truth. That is a recommendation. Mr Marshall tells me not that, yet can I read betwixt the lines. I shall ask you no questions, and as you deal with me, so shall I with you. Have you eaten and drunk since you entered the city? Good: take this cloth, and dust that row of books. I shall give you your diet, three pound by the year, and a suit of livery."

And Mr Whitstable walked away into the back part of his shop, leaving Aubrey to digest what he had just heard.

The idea of wearing livery was not in his eyes, what it would be in ours, a part of his humiliation, for it was then customary for gentlemen, as well as servants, to wear the livery of their employers. Even ladies did it, when in the service of royal or noble mistresses. This, therefore, was merely what he might expect in the circumstances: and as his own meanest suit was not in keeping with his new position, it was rather a relief than otherwise. But he was slightly disconcerted to find how accurately his master had read him in the first minute. A little wholesome reflection brought Aubrey to the conclusion that his best plan—nay, his only plan in present circumstances—was to accommodate himself to them, and to do his very best in his new calling. Almost unconsciously, he set Hans before him as a suitable example, and dusted the row of books under this influence in a creditable manner.

His experiences for the evening were new and strange. Now an undergraduate entered for the Epistles of Casaubon or the Paraphrases of Erasmus; now a portly citizen demanded the Mirrour of Magistrates; a labouring man asked for the Shepherd's Calendar; a schoolmaster required a dozen horn-books, and a lady wanted a handsomely-bound Communion Book. Psalters, at two shillings each; grammars, from sixpence to a shilling; Speed's Chronicle at fifty shillings, a map of England at thirty, the Life of Sir Philip Sidney at fourpence, a "paper book" at sixteen pence, an Italian Dictionary at fifteen shillings—classics, song-books, prayer-books, chronicles, law-books—Aubrey learned to handle them all, and to repeat their prices glibly, in a style which astonished himself. At the end of a week, Mr Whitstable told him, in his usual grave and rather curt manner, that if he would go on as he had begun, he should be satisfied with him.

The going on as he had begun was precisely the difficulty with Aubrey. To do some magnificent deed by a sudden spurt of heroism, or behave angelically for a day, might be possible to him; but that quiet daily fulfilment of uninteresting duties—that patient continuance in well-doing, which seemed as if it came naturally to Hans, was to Aubrey Louvaine the hardest thing on earth. Had the lesson been a little less sharp, humanly speaking, he would have failed. But Aubrey's conscience had been startled into life, and he was beginning to see that it would be too little profit to gain the whole world, if in so doing he lost his own soul, which was himself. Men are apt to look on their souls not as themselves, but as a sort of sacred possession, a rich jewel to be worn on Sundays, and carefully put up in cotton-wool for the rest of the week—of immense value, theoretically, of course, yet not at all the same thing as the "me" which is the centre of sensation to each one, and for which every man will give all that he hath. The mountain was terribly steep, but Aubrey climbed it—only God knew with how much inward suffering, and with how many fervent prayers. The Aubrey who sold Mr Whitstable's books that spring in the shop, at the West Gate of Oxford, was a wholly different youth from my Lord Oxford's gentleman only a few weeks before.

Three months had passed by, and no further apprehensions were entertained at the White Bear of any Government inquiries. If Lady Oxford still felt any, she kept them to herself.

It was a summer evening; Hans had come home, and the little family party were seated in the parlour, when a summons of Charity to the front door was followed by her appearance before the ladies.

"Madam," said she, "here's one would have speech of your Ladyship, and he'll not take a civil nay, neither. I told him he might ha' come i' daylight, and he said you'd be just as fain of him i' th' dark. He's none aila [bashful], for sure."

"Well, let him come in, Charity," said Lady Louvaine smiling.

Charity drew back, and admitted a man of about five-and-twenty years, clad in respectable but not fashionable garments, and with an amused look in his eyes.

"I do believe your maid thinks I've come to steal the spoons," said he. "I could scarce win her to let me in. Well, does nobody know me? Don't you, Grandmother?"

"Why, sure! 'tis never David Lewthwaite?" responded Lady Louvaine in some excitement.

"'Tis David Lewthwaite, the son of your daughter Milisent," said he, laughing.

"Why, who was to know you, my boy?" asked his Aunt Edith. "We have not seen you but once since we came, and you have changed mightily since then."

"When last we saw you," said Temperance, "your chin was as smooth as the hearthstone, and now you've got beard enough to fit out a flock of goats."

"Ah! I'd forgot my beard was new. Well, I have been remiss, I own: but I will expound another time the reasons why you saw us not oftener. To-night, methinks, you'll have enough to do to hearken to the cause which has brought me at last."

"No ill news, David, I trust?" asked his grandmother, growing a shade paler.

"None, Madam. And yet I come to bring news of death."

"Of whose death?"

"Of the death of Oswald Louvaine, of Selwick Hall."

There was a cry from Edith—"O David, can you possibly mean—is Selwick come back to us?"

"Oswald Louvaine died unwedded, and hath left no will. His heir-at-law is my cousin Aubrey here."

"May the Lord help him to use it wisely!" said his grandmother, with emotion.

"Amen!" said David, heartily. "And now, Madam, as I have not stolen the spoons, may I let somebody else in, that I left round the corner?—whom, perchance, you may care rather to see than me."

"Prithee bring whom thou wilt, David; there shall be an hearty welcome for him."

"Well, I rather guess there will be," said David, as he walked out of the parlour. "Dear heart, but who is talking fast enough to shame a race-horse?"

"Well, now, you don't say so!" was what met David's ear as he unlatched the gate of the White Bear. "And you've come from Camberwell, you say? Well, that's a good bit o' walking, and I dare be bound you're weary. I'd—"

"I cry you mercy,—Cumberland," said a silvery voice in amused tones.

"Dear heart! why, that's a hundred mile off or more, isn't it? And how many days did it take you?—and how did you come—o' horseback?—and be the roads very miry?—and how many of you be there?—and what kin are you to my Lady Lettice, now? and how long look you to tarry with her?"

"My mistress," said David, doffing his hat, "an't like you, I am a lawyer; and to-morrow morning, at nine o'clock, if you desire it, will I be at your service in the witness-box, for two shillings the week and my diet. For to-night, I wish you good even."

"Lack-a-daisy!" was all that Mrs Abbott could utter, as David rescued the owner of the silvery voice, and bore her off, laughing, to the White Bear.

"Madam, and my mistresses," he said, as he threw open the door, "I have the honour to announce the most excellent Mistress Milisent Lewthwaite."

Tears and laughter were mixed for more than one present, as Milisent flew into her mother's arms, and then gave a fervent hug to her sister Edith.

"I would come with Robin!" she cried. "It feels like a whole age since I saw one of you!"

"My dear heart, such a journey!" said her mother. "And where is the dear Robin, then?"

"Oh, he shall be here anon. He tarried but to see to the horses, and such like; and I set off with Davie—I felt as though I could not bear another minute."

"Madam, I give you to wit," said David, with fun in his eyes, "this mother of mine, that had not seen me for an whole year, spake but three words to me—'How fare you, my boy?' 'Help me to 'light,' and 'Now let us be off to Westminster.'"

"Well, I had seen thee in a year," answered Milisent, echoing his laugh, "and them not for three years, less a month."

A little soft echoing laugh came from Lady Louvaine.

"Shall I tell thee, my dear heart, what I think Aunt Joyce should say to thee? 'Well done, Lettice Eden's daughter!'"

"Ah, Mother dear!" said Milisent, kissing her mother's hand, "I may be like what you were as a young maid, but never shall I make by one-half so blessed a saint in mine old age."

"That must you ask your grandchildren," said Temperance.

"Nay, I will ask somebody that can judge better," replied Milisent, laughing. "What sayest thou, Robin?"

Mr Lewthwaite had entered so quietly that only his wife's quick eyes had detected his presence. He came forward now, kissed Lady Louvaine's hand, and then laying his hand on Milisent's bright head, he said softly—

"'The heart of her husband doth safely trust in her; she will do him good and not evil all the days of her life. She openeth her mouth with wisdom, and in her tongue is the law of kindness. Her children arise up and call her blessed; her husband also, and he praiseth her.'"

Whether he would have gone further was never to be known, for a sudden rap at the door preceded Charity.

"Madam, here's Mistress Abbott, and hoo will come in. I cannot keep her out. I've done my best."

And they were all feeling so happy, and yet, for various reasons, so humble,—the two are very apt to go together,—that, as Edith observed afterwards, there was charity enough and to spare even for Silence Abbott.

————————————————————————————————————

Note 1. "On Candlemas Day, you should see a white horse a mile off," is a proverb in the North, and perhaps elsewhere.



CHAPTER FOURTEEN.

ENDS WITH JOYCE MORRELL.

"Vanished is each bright illusion; They have faded one by one: Yet they gaze with happy faces, Westwards to the setting sun:—

"Talking softly of the future, Looking o'er the golden sands, Towards a never-fading city, Builded not with earthly hands."

Cyrus Thornton.

"Well, to be sure! My man wouldn't let me come no sooner—'tis his fault, not mine. But I did want to know which of them lads o' ours told his tale the Tightest. Here's Seth will have it you've had a thousand left you by the year, and Ben he saith young Master Floriszoon's to be a lord."

"Dear! I hope not," said Hans.

"Well! but they're a-saying so much all up and down the King's Street, I can tell you."

"How could it have crept forth?" said Edith. "Then 'tis true? Eh, but I'm as glad as if I'd had forty shillings left me,—I am, so!" cried Mrs Abbott; and she was sincere, for a fresh subject for conversation was worth quite that to her. "And is it true, as our Seth said, that you've a fine house and a park in Northamptonshire come to you, and fifteen hundred head o' red deer and a lake to fish in?"

"Quite true," said Robert Lewthwaite, with a grave bow, "allowing, my mistress, of four corrections: there is not a park, it is not in Northamptonshire, there be no red deer, and the lake 'longeth not to the house."

"And jewels worth ever so many thousands, as our Ben saith, for Mistress Lettice, and ten Barbary horses o' th' best, and a caroche fine enough for the King's Majesty?"

"Ah, I would that last were true," said Edith.

"My mistress, the Barbary horses be all there saving ten, and the caroche is a-building in the air: as to the jewels, seeing they be Mistress Lettice's, I leave her to reply."

Lettice was in no condition to do it, for she was suffering torments from suppressed laughter. Her Uncle Robert's preternatural gravity, and Mrs Abbott's total incapacity to see the fun, were barely endurable.

"Eh, but you will be mortal fine!" said Mrs Abbott, turning her artillery on the afflicted Lettice. "I only wish our Mall had such a chance. If she—"

"Mrs Abbott, I cry you mercy, but here comes your Caleb," said Hans calmly. "I reckon he shall be after you."

"I reckon he shall, the caitiff! That man o' mine, he's for ever and the day after a-sending the childer after me."

"I rejoice to hear you have so loving an husband," Mr Lewthwaite was sufficiently inconsiderate to respond.

"Eh, bless you, there's no love about it. Just like them men! they'd shut a woman's mouth up as tight as a fish, and never give her no leave to speak a word, if they had their way. But I'm not one of your meek bag-puddings, that'll take any shape you pinch 'em,—not I, forsooth; and he knows it. I'll have my say, soon or late, and Prissy, she's a downright chatterbox. Not that I'm that, you know—not a bit of it: but Prissy, she is; and I can tell you, when Prissy and Dorcas and Ben they're all at it, the house isn't over quiet, for none on 'em hearkens what t'others are saying, and their father whacks 'em by times—ay, he doth! Now, Caleb, what's to do?"

"Nothing particular, Mother," said slow, deliberate Caleb through the open window: "only there's yon pedlar with the mercery, and he willn't tarry only ten minutes more—"

"Thou lack-halter rascal, and ne'er told me while I asked thee!"

The parlour of the White Bear was free in another moment.

"There's a deliverance!" said Mr Lewthwaite. "Blessed be the pedlar!— Have you been much pestered by that gadfly?"

"There's been a bit of buzzing by times," replied Temperance.

"Now, Mother, darling," said Milisent, "how are we to carry you down home?"

"My dear child!" was the response. "Methinks, if you would do that, it should be only in my coffin. I have one journey to go soon, and it is like to be the next."

"Mother, sweet heart, I won't have it! You shall yet win to Selwick, if I carry you every foot of the way."

"Nay, nay, my dear heart, I cannot hope that at fourscore."

"Fourscore! ay, or forty score!" cried Milisent. "Why, old Mistress Outhwaite journeyed right to the Border but just ere we came, and she's four years over the fourscore—and on horseback belike. Sure, you might go in a waggon or a caroche!"

"Where is the caroche, Milly?"

"Well! but at any rate we might find a waggon."

"There is a travelling waggon," said Hans, "leaves the Chequers in Holborn for York, once in the month—methinks 'tis the first Thursday in every month."

"That is three weeks hence. Why not? Sure, your landlord would suffer you to let this house, and you might leave some behind till it were off your hands. What saith Temperance?—or Hans?"

"That where my Lady goeth, I go," was the answer from Hans.

"Is it needful, Milly, to settle all our futures ere the clock strike?" humorously inquired Mr Lewthwaite. "Methinks we might leave that for the morrow."

Milisent laughed, and let the subject drop.

Mr Lewthwaite and Temperance happened to be the last up that night. When all the rest had departed, and Charity came with the turf to bank up the parlour fire for the night, Temperance was saying—

"One thing can I promise you,—which is, if Aubrey return to Selwick as lord and master, you may trust Faith to go withal. As for me, I live but in other lives, and where I am most needed, there will I be, if God be served: but truly, I see not how we shall move my Lady Lettice. I would fain with all my heart have her back yonder, and so she would herself,—of that am I right sure. But to ride so far on an horse, at her years, and with her often pains—how could she? And though the waggon were safer, it were too long and weary a journey. Think you not so?"

Charity, having now settled her peat-sod to her satisfaction, left the room, with a hearty—"Good-night, Mrs Temperance! Good-night, Mestur Robin!"

"Truly, I think with you," said Mr Lewthwaite, when she was gone: "but there is time to consider the matter. Let us decide nothing in haste."

The next morning, for the first time for many weeks, Charity asked for a holiday. It was granted her, and she was out till twelve o'clock, when she came home with a very satisfied face.

Ways and means were discussed that day, but to little practical purpose. Of course Aubrey must be informed of the good fortune which had fallen to him: and after some consideration, it was settled that if Hans could make arrangements with Mr Leigh, he should be the messenger in this direction, setting forth when Sunday was over. People did not rush off by the next train in those days, and scald their tongues with hot coffee in order to be in time.

The Saturday evening came, and with it the calm quiet which most Puritan families loved to have on the eve of the Lord's Day. While it was not necessary, it was nevertheless deemed becoming to lay aside secular occupations, and to let worldly cares rest. There was therefore some astonishment in the parlour when a sudden rap came on the door, and Charity's face and cap made their appearance.

"If you please, Madam, when'll you be wanting your coach, think you?"

"My coach, Charity!" said Lady Louvaine in amazement.

Everybody was staring at Charity.

"It's ready, Madam," said that damsel with much placidity. "He's only got to put the horses to, hasn't 'Zekiel, and they're at Tomkins' stable yon, by th' Tilt Yard—Spring Gardens, I reckon they call it."

"Charity, lass, are you in your right senses, think you?" demanded Temperance.

"Well, Mrs Temperance, I reckon you'll be best judge o' that," said Charity coolly. "Seems to me I am: but that scarce makes sure, I count."