"Susanna and I," said the aunt, "have thrown in our lot together, and we mean to remain so; don't we, dear?"

"If mamma will let me."

"I'm sure it's very good of you to take one off my hands," said the mother, "for even one will be felt."

Then came a note to Miss Mackenzie from Lady Ball, asking her to spend a few days at the Cedars before she returned to Littlebath,—that is, if she did return,—and she consented to do this. While she was there Mr Slow could prepare the necessary arrangements for the division of the property, and she could then make up her mind as to the manner and whereabouts of her future life. She was all at sea again, and knew not how to choose. If she were a Romanist, she would go into a convent; but Protestant convents she thought were bad, and peculiarly unfitted for the followers of Mr Stumfold. She had nothing to bind her to any spot, and something to drive her from every spot of which she knew anything.

Before she went to the Cedars Mr Rubb came to Gower Street and bade her farewell.

"I had allowed myself to hope, Miss Mackenzie," said he, "I had, indeed; I suppose I was very foolish."

"I don't know as to being foolish, Mr Rubb, unless it was in caring about such a person as me."

"I do care for you, very much; but I suppose I was wrong to think you would put up with such as I am. Only I did think that perhaps, seeing that we had been partners with your brother so long— All the same, I know that the Mackenzies are different from the Rubbs."

"That has nothing to do with it; nothing in the least."

"Hasn't it now? Then, perhaps, Miss Mackenzie, at some future time—"

Miss Mackenzie was obliged to tell him that there could not possibly be any other answer given to him at any future time than that which she gave him now. He suggested that perhaps he might be allowed to try again when the first month or two of her grief for her brother should be over; but she assured him that it would be useless. At the moment of her conference with him, she did this with all her energy; and then, as soon as she was alone, she asked herself why she had been so energetical. After all, marriage was an excellent state in which to live. The romance was doubtless foolish and wrong, and the tearing of the papers had been discreet, yet there could be no good reason why she should turn her back upon sober wedlock. Nevertheless, in all her speech to Mr Rubb she did do so. There was something in her position as connected with Mr Maguire which made her feel that it would be indelicate to entertain another suitor before that gentleman had received a final answer.

As she went away from Gower Street to the Cedars she thought of this very sadly, and told herself that she had been like the ass who starved between two bundles of hay, or as the boy who had fallen between two stools.



CHAPTER XVI

Lady Ball's Grievance

Miss Mackenzie, before she left Gower Street, was forced to make some arrangements as to her affairs at Littlebath, and these were ultimately settled in a manner that was not altogether palatable to her. Mr Rubb was again sent down, having Susanna in his charge, and he was empowered to settle with Miss Mackenzie's landlady and give up the lodgings. There was much that was disagreeable in this. Miss Mackenzie having just rejected Mr Rubb's suit, did not feel quite comfortable in giving him a commission to see all her stockings and petticoats packed up and brought away from the lodgings. Indeed, she could give him no commission of the kind, but intimated her intention of writing to the lodging-house keeper. He, however, was profuse in his assurances that nothing should be left behind, and if Miss Mackenzie would tell him anything of the way in which the things ought to be packed, he would be so happy to attend to her! To him Miss Mackenzie would give no such instructions, but, doubtless, she gave many to Susanna.

As to Susanna, it was settled that she should remain as a boarder at the Littlebath school, at any rate for the next half-year. After that there might be great doubt whether her aunt could bear the expense of maintaining her in such a position.

Miss Mackenzie had reconciled herself to going to the Cedars because she would thus have an opportunity of seeing her lawyer and arranging about her property, whereas had she been down at Littlebath there would have been a difficulty. And she wanted some one whom she could trust to act for her, some one besides the lawyer, and she thought that she could trust her cousin, John Ball. As to getting away from all her suitors that was impossible. Had she gone to Littlebath there was one there; had she remained with her sister-in-law, she would have been always near another; and, on going to the Cedars, she would meet the third. But she could not on that account absolutely isolate herself from everybody that she knew in the world. And, perhaps, she was getting somewhat used to her suitors, and less liable than she had been to any fear that they could force her into action against her own consent. So she went to the Cedars, and, on arriving there, received from her uncle and aunt but a moderate amount of condolence as to the death of her brother.

Her first and second days in her aunt's house were very quiet. Nothing was said of John's former desires, and nothing about her own money or her brother's family. On the morning of the third day she told her cousin that she would, on the next morning, accompany him to town if he would allow her. "I am going to Mr Slow's," said she, "and perhaps you could go with me." To this he assented willingly, and then, after a pause, surmised that her visit must probably have reference to the sale of her houses to the railway company. "Partly to that," she said, "but it chiefly concerns arrangements for my brother's family."

To this John Ball said nothing, nor did Lady Ball, who was present, then speak. But Miss Mackenzie could see that her aunt looked at her cousin, opening her eyes, and expressing concern. John Ball himself allowed no change to come upon his face, but went on deliberately with his bread and butter. "I shall be very happy to go with you," he said, "and will either come and call for you when you have done, or stay with you while you are there, just as you like."

"I particularly want you to stay with me," said she, "and as we go up to town I will tell you all about it."

She observed that before her cousin left the house on that day, his mother got hold of him and was alone with him for nearly half an hour. After that, Lady Ball was alone with Sir John, in his own room, for another half hour. The old baronet had become older, of course, and much weaker, since his niece had last been at the Cedars, and was now seldom seen about the house till the afternoon.

Of all the institutions at the Cedars that of the carriage was the most important. Miss Mackenzie found that the carriage arrangement had been fixed upon a new and more settled basis since her last visit. Then it used to go out perhaps as often as three times a week. But there did not appear to be any fixed rule. Like other carriages, it did, to a certain degree, come when it was wanted. But now there was, as I have said, a settled basis. The carriage came to the door on Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays, exactly at two o'clock, and Sir John with Lady Ball were driven about till four.

On the first Tuesday of her visit Miss Mackenzie had gone with her uncle and aunt, and even she had found the pace to be very slow, and the whole affair to be very dull. Her uncle had once enlivened the thing by asking her whether she had found any lovers since she went to Littlebath, and this question had perplexed her very much. She could not say that she had found none, and as she was not prepared to acknowledge that she had found any, she could only sit still and blush.

"Women have plenty of lovers when they have plenty of money," said the baronet.

"I don't believe that Margaret thinks of anything of the kind," said Lady Ball.

After that Margaret determined to have as little to do with the carriage as possible, and on that evening she learned from her cousin that the horses had been sold to the man who farmed the land, and were hired every other day for two hours' work.

It was on the Thursday morning that Miss Mackenzie had spoken of going into town on the morrow, and on that day when her aunt asked her about the driving, she declined.

"I hope that nothing your uncle said on Tuesday annoyed you?"

"Oh dear, no; but if you don't mind it, I'd rather stay at home."

"Of course you shall if you like it," said her aunt; "and by-the-by, as I want to speak to you, and as we might not find time after coming home, if you don't mind it I'll do it now."

Of course Margaret said that she did not mind it, though in truth she did mind it, and was afraid of her aunt.

"Well then, Margaret, look here. I want to know something about your brother's affairs. From what I have heard, I fear they were not very good."

"They were very bad, aunt,—very bad indeed."

"Dear, dear; you don't say so. Sir John always feared that it would be so when Thomas Mackenzie mixed himself up with those Rubbs. And there has gone half of Jonathan Ball's money,—money which Sir John made! Well, well!"

Miss Mackenzie had nothing to say to this; and as she had nothing to say to it she sat silent, making no attempt at any words.

"It does seem hard; don't it, my dear?"

"It wouldn't make any difference to anybody now—to my uncle, I mean, or to John, if the money was not gone."

"That's quite true; quite true; only it does seem to be a pity. However, that half of Jonathan's money which you have got, is not lost, and there's some comfort in that."

Miss Mackenzie was not called upon to make any answer to this; for although she had lost a large sum of money by lending it to her brother, nevertheless she was still possessed of a larger sum of money than that which her brother Walter had received from Jonathan Ball.

"And what are they going to do, my dear—the children, I mean, and the widow? I suppose there'll be something for them out of the business?"

"I don't think there'll be anything, aunt. As far as I can understand there will be nothing certain. They may probably get a hundred and twenty-five pounds a-year." This she named, as being the interest of the money she had lent—or given.

"A hundred and twenty-five pounds a-year. That isn't much, but it will keep them from absolute want."

"Would it, aunt?"

"Oh, yes; at least, I suppose so. I hope she's a good manager. She ought to be, for she's a very disagreeable woman. You told me that yourself, you know."

Then Miss Mackenzie, having considered for one moment, resolved to make a clean breast of it all, and this she did with the fewest possible words.

"I'm going to divide what I've got with them, and I hope it will make them comfortable."

"What!" exclaimed her aunt.

"I'm going to give Sarah half what I've got, for her and her children. I shall have enough to live on left."

"Margaret, you don't mean it?"

"Not mean it? why not, aunt? You would not have me let them starve. Besides, I promised my brother when he was dying."

"Then I must say he was very wrong, very wicked, I may say, to exact any such promise from you; and no such promise is binding. If you ask Sir John, or your lawyer, they will tell you so. What! exact a promise from you to the amount of half your income. It was very wrong."

"But, aunt, I should do the same if I had made no promise."

"No, you wouldn't, my dear. Your friends wouldn't let you. And indeed your friends must prevent it now. They will not hear of such a sacrifice being made."

"But, aunt—"

"Well, my dear."

"It's my own, you know." And Margaret, as she said this, plucked up her courage, and looked her aunt full in the face.

"Yes, it is your own, by law; but I don't suppose, my dear, that you are of that disposition or that character that you'd wish to set all the world at defiance, and make everybody belonging to you feel that you had disgraced yourself."

"Disgraced myself by relieving my brother's family!"

"Disgraced yourself by giving to that woman money that has come to you as your fortune has come. Think of it, where it came from!"

"It came to me from my brother Walter."

"And where did he get it? And who made it? And don't you know that your brother Tom had his share of it, and wasted it all? Did it not all come from the Balls? And yet you think so little of that, that you are going to let that woman rob you of it—rob you and my grandchildren; for that, I tell you, is the way in which the world will look at it. Perhaps you don't know it, but all that property was as good as given to John at one time. Who was it first took you by the hand when you were left all alone in Arundel Street? Oh, Margaret, don't go and be such an ungrateful, foolish creature!"

Margaret waited for a moment, and then she answered—

"There's nobody so near to me as my own brother's children."

"As to that, Margaret, there isn't much difference in nearness between your uncle and your nephews and nieces. But there's a right and a wrong in these things, and when money is concerned, people are not justified in indulging their fancies. Everything here has been told to you. You know how John is situated with his children. And after what there has been between you and him, and after what there still might be if you would have it so, I own that I am astonished—fairly astonished. Indeed, my dear, I can only look on it as simple weakness on your part. It was but the other day that you told me you had done all that you thought necessary by your brother in taking Susanna."

"But that was when he was alive, and I thought he was doing well."

"The fact is, you have been there and they've talked you over. It can't be that you love children that you never saw till the other day; and as for the woman, you always hated her."

"Whether I love her or hate her has nothing to do with it."

"Margaret, will you promise me this, that you will see Mr Slow and talk to him about it before you do anything?"

"I must see Mr Slow before I can do anything; but whatever he says, I shall do it all the same."

"Will you speak to your uncle?"

"I had rather not."

"You are afraid to tell him of this; but of course he must be told. Will you speak to John?"

"Certainly; I meant to do so going to town to-morrow."

"And if he tells you you are wrong—"

"Aunt, I know I am not wrong. It is nonsense to say that I am wrong in—"

"That's disrespectful, Margaret!"

"I don't want to be disrespectful, aunt; but in such a case as this I know that I have a right to do what I like with my own money. If I was going to give it away to any other friend, if I was going to marry, or anything like that,"—she blushed at the remembrance of the iniquities she had half intended as she said this—"then there might be some reason for you to scold me; but with a brother and a brother's family it can't be wrong. If you had a brother, and had been with him when he was dying, and he had left his wife and children looking to you, you would have done the same."

Upon this Lady Ball got up from her chair and walked to the door. Margaret had been more impetuous and had answered her with much more confidence than she had expected. She was determined now to say one more word, but so to say it that it should not be answered—to strike one more blow, but so to strike it that it should not be returned.

"Margaret," she said, as she stood with the door open in her hands, "if you will reflect where the money came from, your conscience will tell you without much difficulty where it should go to. And when you think of your brother's children, whom this time last year you had hardly seen, think also of John Ball's children, who have welcomed you into this house as their dearest relative. In one sense, certainly, the money is yours, Margaret; but in another sense, and that the highest sense, it is not yours to do what you please with it."

Then Lady Ball shut the door rather loudly, and sailed away along the hall. When the passages were clear, Miss Mackenzie made her way up into her own room, and saw none of the family till she came down just before dinner.

She sat for a long time in the chair by her bed-side thinking of her position. Was it true after all that she was bound by a sense of justice to give any of her money to the Balls? It was true that in one sense it had been taken from them, but she had had nothing to do with the taking. If her brother Walter had married and had children, then the Balls would have not expected the money back again. It was ever so many years,—five-and-twenty years, and more since the legacy had been made by Jonathan Ball to her brother, and it seemed to her that her aunt had no common sense on her side in the argument. Was it possible that she should allow her own nephews and nieces to starve while she was rich? She had, moreover, made a promise,—a promise to one who was now dead, and there was a solemnity in that which carried everything else before it. Even though the thing might be unjust, still she must do it.

But she was to give only half her fortune to her brother's family; there would still be the half left for herself, for herself or for these Balls if they wanted it so sorely. She was beginning to hate her money. It had brought to her nothing but tribulation and disappointment. Had Walter left her a hundred a year, she would, not having then dreamed of higher things, have been amply content. Would it not be better that she should take for herself some modest competence, something on which she might live without trouble to her relatives, without trouble to her friends she had first said,—but as she did so she told herself with scorn that friends she had none,—and then let the Balls have what was left her after she had kept her promise to her brother? Anything would be better than such persecution as that to which her aunt had subjected her.

At last she made up her mind to speak of it all openly to her cousin. She had an idea that in such matters men were more trustworthy than women, and perhaps less greedy. Her cousin would, she thought, be more just to her than her aunt had been. That her aunt had been very unjust,—cruel and unjust,—she felt assured.

She came down to dinner, and she could see by the manner of them all that the matter had been discussed since John Ball's return from London. Jack, the eldest son, was not at home, and the three girls who came next to Jack dined with their father and grandfather. To them Margaret endeavoured to talk easily, but she failed. They had never been favourites with her as Jack was, and, on this occasion, she could get very little from them that was satisfactory to her. John Ball was courteous to her, but he was very silent throughout the whole evening. Her aunt showed her displeasure by not speaking to her, or speaking barely with a word. Her uncle, of whose voice she was always in fear, seemed to be more cross, and when he did speak, more sarcastic than ever. He asked her whether she intended to go back to Littlebath.

"I think not," said she.

"Then that has been a failure, I suppose," said the old man.

"Everything is a failure, I think," said she, with tears in her eyes.

This was in the drawing-room, and immediately her cousin John came and sat by her. He came and sat there, as though he had intended to speak to her; but he went away again in a minute or two without having uttered a word. Things went on in the same way till they moved off to bed, and then the formal adieus for the night were made with a coldness that amounted, on the part of Lady Ball, almost to inhospitality.

"Good-night, Margaret," she said, as she just put out the tip of her finger.

"Good-night, my dear," said Sir John. "I don't know what's the matter with you, but you look as though you'd been doing something that you were ashamed of."

Lady Ball was altogether injudicious in her treatment of her niece. As to Sir John, it made probably very little difference. Miss Mackenzie had perceived, when she first came to the Cedars, that he was a cross old man, and that he had to be endured as such by any one who chose to go into that house. But she had depended on Lady Ball for kindness of manner, and had been tempted to repeat her visits to the house because her aunt had, after her fashion, been gracious to her. But now there was rising in her breast a feeling that she had better leave the Cedars as soon as she could shake the dust off her feet, and see nothing more of the Balls. Even the Rubb connection seemed to her to be better than the Ball connection, and less exaggerated in its greediness. Were it not for her cousin John, she would have resolved to go on the morrow. She would have faced the indignation of her aunt, and the cutting taunts of her uncle, and have taken herself off at once to some lodging in London. But John Ball had meant to be kind to her when he came and sat close to her on the sofa, and her soft heart relented towards him.

Lady Ball had in truth mistaken her niece's character. She had found her to be unobtrusive, gentle, and unselfish; and had conceived that she must therefore be weak and compliant. As to many things she was compliant, and as to some things she was weak; but there was in her composition a power of resistance and self-sustenance on which Lady Ball had not counted. When conscious of absolute ill-usage, she could fight well, and would not bow her neck to any Mrs Stumfold or to any Lady Ball.



CHAPTER XVII

Mr Slow's Chambers

She came down late to breakfast on the following morning, not being present at prayers, and when she came down she wore a bonnet.

"I got myself ready, John, for fear I should keep you waiting."

Her aunt spoke to her somewhat more graciously than on the preceding evening, and accepted her apology for being late.

Just as she was about to start Lady Ball took her apart and spoke one word to her.

"No one can tell you better what you ought to do than your cousin John; but pray remember that he is far too generous to say a word for himself."

Margaret made no answer, and then she and her cousin started on foot across the grounds to the station. The distance was nearly a mile, and during the walk no word was said between them about the money. They got into the train that was to take them up to London, and sat opposite to each other. It happened that there was no passenger in either of the seats next to him or her, so that there was ample opportunity for them to hold a private conversation; but Mr Ball said nothing to her, and she, not knowing how to begin, said nothing to him. In this way they reached the London station at Waterloo Bridge, and then he asked her what she proposed to do next.

"Shall we go to Mr Slow's at once?" she asked.

To this he assented, and at her proposition they agreed to walk to the lawyer's chambers. These were on the north side of Lincoln's Inn Fields, near the Turnstile, and Mr Ball remarked that the distance was again not much above a mile. So they crossed the Strand together, and made their way by narrow streets into Drury Lane, and then under a certain archway into Lincoln's Inn Fields. To Miss Mackenzie, who felt that something ought to be said, the distance and time occupied seemed to be very short.

"Why, this is Lincoln's Inn Fields!" she exclaimed, as she came out upon the west side.

"Yes; this is Lincoln's Inn Fields, and Mr Slow's chambers are over there."

She knew very well where Mr Slow's chambers were situated, but she paused on the pavement, not wishing to go thither quite at once.

"John," she said, "I thought that perhaps we might have talked over all this before we saw Mr Slow."

"Talked over all what?"

"About the money that I want to give to my brother's family. Did not my aunt tell you of it?"

"Yes; she told me that you and she had differed."

"And she told you what about?"

"Yes," said he, slowly; "she told me what about."

"And what ought I to do, John?"

As she asked the question she caught hold of the lappet of his coat, and looked up into his face as though supplicating him to give her the advantage of all his discretion and all his honesty.

They were still standing on the pavement, where the street comes out from under the archway. She was gazing into his face, and he was looking away from her, over towards the inner railings of the square, with heavy brow and dull eye and motionless face. She was very eager, and he seemed to be simply patient, but nevertheless he was working hard with his thoughts, striving to determine how best he might answer her. His mother had told him that he might model this woman to his will, and had repeated to him that story which he had heard so often of the wrong that had been done to him by his uncle Jonathan. It may be said that there was no need for such repetition, as John Ball had himself always thought quite enough of that injury. He had thought of it for the last twenty years, almost hourly, till it was graven upon his very soul. He had been a ruined, wretched, moody man, because of his uncle Jonathan's will. There was no need, one would have said, to have stirred him on that subject. But his mother, on this morning, in the ten minutes before prayer-time, had told him of it all again, and had told him also that the last vestige of his uncle's money would now disappear from him unless he interfered to save it.

"On this very day it must be saved; and she will do anything you tell her," said his mother. "She regards you more than anyone else. If you were to ask her again now, I believe she would accept you this very day. At any rate, do not let those people have the money."

And yet he had not spoken to Margaret on the subject during the journey, and would now have taken her to the lawyer's chambers without a word, had she not interrupted him and stopped him.

Nevertheless he had been thinking of his uncle, and his uncle's will, and his uncle's money, throughout the morning. He was thinking of it at that moment when she stopped him—thinking how hard it all was, how cruel that those people in the New Road should have had and spent half his uncle's fortune, and that now the remainder, which at one time had seemed to be near the reach of his own children, should also go to atone for the negligence and fraud of those wretched Rubbs.

We all know with how strong a bias we regard our own side of any question, and he regarded his side in this question with a very strong bias. Nevertheless he had refrained from a word, and would have refrained, had she not stopped him.

When she took hold of him by the coat, he looked for a moment into her face, and thought that in its trouble it was very sweet. She leaned somewhat against him as she spoke, and he wished that she would lean against him altogether. There was about her a quiet power of endurance, and at the same time a comeliness and a womanly softness which seemed to fit her altogether for his wants and wishes. As he looked with his dull face across into the square, no physiognomist would have declared of him that at that moment he was suffering from love, or thinking of a woman that was dear to him. But it was so with him, and the physiognomist, had one been there, would have been wrong. She had now asked him a question, which he was bound to answer in some way:—"What ought I to do, John?"

He turned slowly round and walked with her, away from their destination, round by the south side of the square, and then up along the blank wall on the east side, nearly to the passage into Holborn, and back again all round the enclosed space. She, while she was speaking to him and listening to him, hardly remembered where she was or whither she was going.

"I thought," said he, in answer to her question, "that you intended to ask Mr Slow's advice?"

"I didn't mean to do more than tell him what should be done. He is not a friend, you know, John."

"It's customary to ask lawyers their advice on such subjects."

"I'd rather have yours, John. But, in truth, what I want you to say is, that I am right in doing this,—right in keeping my promise to my brother, and providing for his children."

"Like most people, Margaret, you want to be advised to follow your own counsel."

"God knows that I want to do right, John. I want to do nothing else, John, but what's right. As to this money, I care but little for it for myself."

"It is your own, and you have a right to enjoy it."

"I don't know much about enjoyment. As to enjoyment, it seems to me to be pretty much the same whether a person is rich or poor. I always used to hear that money brought care, and I'm sure I've found it so since I had any."

"You've got no children, Margaret."

"No; but there are all those orphans. Am I not bound to look upon them as mine, now that he has gone? If they don't depend on me, whom are they to depend on?"

"If your mind is made up, Margaret, I have nothing to say against it. You know what my wishes are. They are just the same now as when you were last with us. It isn't only for the money I say this, though, of course, that must go a long way with a man circumstanced as I am; but, Margaret, I love you dearly, and if you can make up your mind to be my wife, I would do my best to make you happy."

"I hadn't meant you to talk in that way, John," said Margaret.

But she was not much flurried. She was now so used to these overtures that they did not come to her as much out of the common way. And she gave herself none of that personal credit which women are apt to take to themselves when they find they are often sought in marriage. She looked upon her lovers as so many men to whom her income would be convenient, and felt herself to be almost under an obligation to them for their willingness to put up with the incumbrance which was attached to it.

"But it's the only way I can talk when you ask me about this," said he. Then he paused for a moment before he added, "How much is it you wish to give to your brother's widow?"

"Half what I've got left."

"Got left! You haven't lost any of your money have you, Margaret?"

Then she explained to him the facts as to the loan, and took care to explain to him also, very fully, the compensatory fact of the purchase by the railway company. "And my promise to him was made after I had lent it, you know," she urged.

"I do think it ought to be deducted; I do indeed," he said. "I am not speaking on my own behalf now, as for the sake of my children, but simply as a man of business. As for myself, though I do think I have been hardly used in the matter of my uncle's money, I'll try to forget it. I'll try at any rate to do without it. When I first knew you, and found—found that I liked you so much, I own that I did have hopes. But if it must be, there shall be an end of that. The children don't starve, I suppose."

"Oh, John!"

"As for me, I won't hanker after your money. But, for your own sake, Margaret—"

"There will be more than enough for me, you know; and, John—"

She was going to make him some promise; to tell him something of her intention towards his son, and to make some tender of assistance to himself; being now in that mind to live on the smallest possible pittance, of which I have before spoken, when he ceased speaking or listening, and hurried her on to the attorney's chambers.

"Do what you like with it. It is your own," said he. "And we shall do no good by talking about it any longer out here."

So at last they made their way up to Mr Slow's rooms, on the first floor in the old house in Lincoln's Inn Fields, and were informed that that gentleman was at home. Would they be pleased to sit down in the waiting-room?

There is, I think, no sadder place in the world than the waiting-room attached to an attorney's chambers in London. In this instance it was a three-cornered room, which had got itself wedged in between the house which fronted to Lincoln's Inn Fields, and some buildings in a narrow lane that ran at the back of the row. There was no carpet in it, and hardly any need of one, as the greater part of the floor was strewed with bundles of dusty papers. There was a window in it, which looked out from the point of the further angle against the wall of the opposite building. The dreariness of this aspect had been thought to be too much for the minds of those who waited, and therefore the bottom panes had been clouded, so that there was in fact no power of looking out at all. Over the fireplace there was a table of descents and relationship, showing how heirship went; and the table was very complicated, describing not only the heirship of ordinary real and personal property, but also explaining the wonderful difficulties of gavelkind, and other mysteriously traditional laws. But the table was as dirty as it was complicated, and the ordinary waiting reader could make nothing of it. There was a small table in the room, near the window, which was always covered with loose papers; but these loose papers were on this occasion again covered with sheets of parchment, and a pale-faced man, of about thirty, whose beard had never yet attained power to do more than sprout, was sitting at the table, and poring over the parchments. Round the room, on shelves, there was a variety of iron boxes, on which were written the names of Mr Slow's clients,—of those clients whose property justified them in having special boxes of their own. But these boxes were there, it must be supposed, for temporary purposes,—purposes which might be described as almost permanently temporary,—for those boxes which were allowed to exist in absolute permanence of retirement, were kept in an iron room downstairs, the trap-door into which had yawned upon Miss Mackenzie as she was shown into the waiting-room. There was, however, one such box open, on the middle of the floor, and sundry of the parchments which had been taken from it were lying around it.

There were but two chairs in the room besides the one occupied by the man at the table, and these were taken by John Ball and his cousin. She sat herself down, armed with patience, indifferent to the delay and indifferent to the dusty ugliness of everything around her, as women are on such occasions. He, thinking much of his time, and somewhat annoyed at being called upon to wait, sat with his chin resting on his umbrella between his legs, and as he did so he allowed his eyes to roam around among the names upon the boxes. There was nothing on any one of those up on the shelves that attracted him. There was the Marquis of B——, and Sir C. D——, and the Dowager Countess of E——. Seeing this, he speculated mildly whether Mr Slow put forward the boxes of his aristocratic customers to show how well he was doing in the world. But presently his eye fell from the shelf and settled upon the box on the floor. There, on that box, he saw the name of Walter Mackenzie.

This did not astonish him, as he immediately said to himself that these papers were being searched with reference to the business on which his cousin was there that day; bur suddenly it occurred to him that Margaret had given him to understand that Mr Slow did not expect her. He stepped over to her, therefore, one step over the papers, and asked her the question, whispering it into her ear.

"No," said she, "I had no appointment. I don't think he expects me."

He returned to his seat, and again sitting down with his chin on the top of his umbrella, surveyed the parchments that lay upon the ground. Upon one of them, that was not far from his feet, he read the outer endorsements written as such endorsements always are, in almost illegible old English letters—

"Jonathan Ball, to John Ball, junior—Deed of Gift."

But, after all, there was nothing more than a coincidence in this. Of course Mr Slow would have in his possession all the papers appertaining to the transfer of Jonathan Ball's property to the Mackenzies; or, at any rate, such as referred to Walter's share of it. Indeed, Mr Slow, at the time of Jonathan Ball's death, acted for the two brothers, and it was probable that all the papers would be with him. John Ball had known that there had been some intention on his uncle's part, before the quarrel between his father and his uncle, to make over to him, on his coming of age, a certain property in London, and he had been told that the money which the Mackenzies had inherited had ultimately come from this very property. His uncle had been an eccentric, quarrelsome man, prone to change his mind often, and not regardful of money as far as he himself was concerned. John Ball remembered to have heard that his uncle had intended him to become possessed of certain property in his own right the day that he became of age, and that this had all been changed because of the quarrel which had taken place between his uncle and his father. His father now never spoke of this, and for many years past had seldom mentioned it. But from his mother he had often heard of the special injury which he had undergone.

"His uncle," she had said, "had given it, and had taken it back again,—had taken it back that he might waste it on those Mackenzies."

All this he had heard very often, but he had never known anything of a deed of gift. Was it not singular, he thought, that the draft of such a deed should be lying at his foot at this moment.

He showed nothing of this in his face, and still sat there with his chin resting on his umbrella. But certainly stronger ideas than usual of the great wrongs which he had suffered did come into his head as he looked upon the paper at his feet. He began to wonder whether he would be justified in taking it up and inspecting it. But as he was thinking of this the pale-faced man rose from his chair, and after moving among the papers on the ground for an instant, selected this very document, and carried it with him to his table. Mr Ball, as his eyes followed the parchment, watched the young man dust it and open it, and then having flattened it with his hand, glance over it till he came to a certain spot. The pale-faced clerk, accustomed to such documents, glanced over the ambages, the "whereases," the "aforesaids," the rich exuberance of "admors.," "exors.," and "assigns," till he deftly came to the pith of the matter, and then he began to make extracts, a date here and a date there. John Ball watched him all the time, till the door was opened, and old Mr Slow himself appeared in the room.

He stepped across the papers to shake hands with his client, and then shook hands also with Mr Ball, whom he knew. His eye glanced at once down to the box, and after that over towards the pale-faced clerk. Mr Ball perceived that the attorney had joined in his own mind the operation that was going on with these special documents, and the presence of these two special visitors; and that he, in some measure, regretted the coincidence. There was something wrong, and John Ball began to consider whether the old lawyer could be an old scoundrel. Some lawyers, he knew, were desperate scoundrels. He said nothing, however; but, obeying Mr Slow's invitation, followed him and his cousin into the sanctum sanctorum of the chambers.

"They didn't tell me you were here at first," said the lawyer, in a tone of vexation, "or I wouldn't have had you shown in there."

John Ball thought that this was, doubtless, true, and that very probably they might not have been put in among those papers had Mr Slow known what was being done.

"The truth is," continued the lawyer, "the Duke of F——'s man of business was with me, and they did not like to interrupt me."

Mr Slow was a grey-haired old man, nearer eighty than seventy, who, with the exception of a fortnight's holiday every year which he always spent at Margate, had attended those same chambers in Lincoln's Inn Fields daily for the last sixty years. He was a stout, thickset man, very leisurely in all his motions, who walked slowly, talked slowly, read slowly, wrote slowly, and thought slowly; but who, nevertheless, had the reputation of doing a great deal of business, and doing it very well. He had a partner in the business, almost as old as himself, named Bideawhile; and they who knew them both used to speculate which of the two was the most leisurely. It was, however, generally felt that, though Mr Slow was the slowest in his speech, Mr Bideawhile was the longest in getting anything said. Mr Slow would often beguile his time with unnecessary remarks; but Mr Bideawhile was so constant in beguiling his time, that men wondered how, in truth, he ever did anything at all. Of both of them it may be said that no men stood higher in their profession, and that Mr Ball's suspicions, had they been known in the neighbourhood of Lincoln's Inn, would have been scouted as utterly baseless. And, for the comfort of my readers, let me assure them that they were utterly baseless. There might, perhaps, have been a little vanity about Mr Slow as to the names of his aristocratic clients; but he was an honest, painstaking man, who had ever done his duty well by those who had employed him.

Is it not remarkable that the common repute which we all give to attorneys in the general is exactly opposite to that which every man gives to his own attorney in particular? Whom does anybody trust so implicitly as he trusts his own attorney? And yet is it not the case that the body of attorneys is supposed to be the most roguish body in existence?

The old man seemed now to be a little fretful, and said something more about his sorrow at their having been sent into that room.

"We are so crowded," he said, "that we hardly know how to stir ourselves."

Miss Mackenzie said it did not signify in the least. Mr Ball said nothing, but seated himself with his chin again resting on his umbrella.

"I was so sorry to see in the papers an account of your brother's death," said Mr Slow.

"Yes, Mr Slow; he has gone, and left a wife and very large family."

"I hope they are provided for, Miss Mackenzie."

"No, indeed; they are not provided for at all. My brother had not been fortunate in business."

"And yet he went into it with a large capital,—with a large capital in such a business as that."

John Ball, with his chin on the umbrella, said nothing. He said nothing, but he winced as he thought whence the capital had come. And he thought, too, of those much-meaning words: "Jonathan Ball to John Ball, junior—Deed of gift."

"He had been unfortunate," said Miss Mackenzie, in an apologetic tone.

"And what will you do about your loan?" said Mr Slow, looking over to John Ball when he asked the question, as though inquiring whether all Miss Mackenzie's affairs were to be talked over openly in the presence of that gentleman.

"That was a gift," said Miss Mackenzie.

"A deed of gift," thought John Ball to himself. "A deed of gift!"

"Oh, indeed! Then there's an end of that, I suppose," said Mr Slow.

"Exactly so. I have been explaining to my cousin all about it. I hope the firm will be able to pay my sister-in-law the interest on it, but that does not seem sure."

"I am afraid I cannot help you there, Miss Mackenzie."

"Of course not. I was not thinking of it. But what I've come about is this." Then she told Mr Slow the whole of her project with reference to her fortune; how, on his death-bed, she had promised to give half of all that she had to her brother's wife and family, and how she had come there to him, with her cousin, in order that he might put her in the way of keeping her promise.

Mr Slow sat in silence and patiently heard her to the end. She, finding herself thus encouraged to speak, expatiated on the solemnity of her promise, and declared that she could not be comfortable till she had done all that she had undertaken to perform. "And I shall have quite enough for myself afterwards, Mr Slow, quite enough."

Mr Slow did not say a word till she had done, and even then he seemed to delay his speech. John Ball never raised his face from his umbrella, but sat looking at the lawyer, whom he still suspected of roguery. And if the lawyer were a rogue, what then about his cousin? It must not be supposed that he suspected her; but what would come of her, if the fortune she held were, in truth, not her own?

"I have told my cousin all about it," continued Margaret, "and I believe that he thinks I am doing right. At any rate, I would do nothing without his knowing it."

"I think she is giving her sister-in-law too much," said John Ball.

"I am only doing what I promised," urged Margaret.

"I think that the money which she lent to the firm should, at any rate, be deducted," said John Ball, speaking this with a kind of proviso to himself, that the words so spoken were intended to be taken as having any meaning only on the presumption that that document which he had seen in the other room should turn out to be wholly inoperative and inefficient at the present moment. In answer to these side-questions or corollary points as to the deduction or non-deduction of the loan, Mr Slow answered not a word; but when there was silence between them, he did make answer as to the original proposition.

"Miss Mackenzie," he said, "I think you had better postpone doing anything in this matter for the present."

"Why postpone it?" said she.

"Your brother's death is very recent. It happened not above a fortnight since, I think."

"And I want to have this settled at once, so that there shall be no distress. What's the good of waiting?"

"Such things want thinking of, Miss Mackenzie."

"But I have thought of it. All I want now is to have it done."

A slight smile came across the puckered grey face of the lawyer as he felt the imperative nature of the instruction given to him. The lady had come there not to be advised, but to have her work done for her out of hand. But the smile was very melancholy, and soon passed away.

"Is the widow in immediate distress?" asked Mr Slow.

Now the fact was that Miss Mackenzie herself had been in good funds, having had ready money in her hands from the time of her brother Walter's death; and for the last year she had by no means spent her full income. She had, therefore, given her sister-in-law money, and had paid the small debts which had come in, as such small debts will come in, directly the dead man's body was under ground. Nay, some had come in and had been paid while the man was yet dying. She exclaimed, therefore, that her sister-in-law was not absolutely in immediate want.

"And does she keep the house?" asked the lawyer.

Then Miss Mackenzie explained that Mrs Tom intended, if possible, to keep the house, and to take some lady in to lodge with her.

"Then there cannot be any immediate hurry," urged the lawyer; "and as the sum of money in question is large, I really think the matter should be considered."

But Miss Mackenzie still pressed it. She was very anxious to make him understand—and of course he did understand at once—that she had no wish to hurry him in his work. All that she required of him was an assurance that he accepted her instructions, and that the thing should be done with not more than the ordinary amount of legal delay.

"You can pay her what you like out of your own income," said the lawyer.

"But that is not what I promised," said Margaret Mackenzie.

Then there was silence among them all. Mr Ball had said very little since he had been sitting in that room, and now it was not he who broke the silence. He was still thinking of that deed of gift, and wondering whether it had anything to do with Mr Slow's unwillingness to undertake the commission which Margaret wished to give him. At last Mr Slow got up from his chair, and spoke as follows:

"Mr Ball, I hope you will excuse me; but I have a word or two to say to Miss Mackenzie, which I had rather say to her alone."

"Certainly," said Mr Ball, rising and preparing to go.

"You will wait for me, John," said Miss Mackenzie, asking this favour of him as though she were very anxious that he should grant it.

Mr Slow said that he might be closeted with Miss Mackenzie for some little time, perhaps for a quarter of an hour or twenty minutes. John Ball looked at his watch, and then at his cousin's face, and then promised that he would wait. Mr Slow himself took him into the outer office, and then handed him a chair; but he observed that he was not allowed to go back into the waiting-room.

There he waited for three-quarters of an hour, constantly looking at his watch, and thinking more and more about that deed of gift. Surely it must be the case that the document which he had seen had some reference to this great delay. At last he heard a door open, and a step along a passage, and then another door was opened, and Mr Slow reappeared with Margaret Mackenzie behind him. John Ball's eyes immediately fell on his cousin's face, and he could see that it was very pale. The lawyer's wore that smile which men put on when they wish to cover the disagreeable seriousness of the moment.

"Good morning, Miss Mackenzie," said he, pressing his client's hand.

"Good morning, sir," said she.

The lawyer and Mr Ball then touched each other's hands, and the former followed his cousin down the steps out into the square.



CHAPTER XVIII

Tribulation

When they were once more out in the square, side by side, Miss Mackenzie took hold of her cousin's arm and walked on for a few steps in silence, in the direction of Great Queen Street—that is to say, away from the city, towards which she knew her cousin would go in pursuit of his own business. And indeed the hour was now close at hand in which he should be sitting as a director at the Shadrach Fire Assurance Office. If not at the Shadrach by two, or, with all possible allowance for the shortcoming of a generally punctual director, by a quarter past two, he would be too late for his guinea; and now, as he looked at his watch, it wanted only ten minutes to two. He was very particular about these guineas, and the chambers of the Shadrach were away in Old Broad Street. Nevertheless he walked on with her.

"John," she said, when they had walked half the length of that side of the square, "I have heard dreadful news."

Then that deed of gift was, after all, a fact; and Mr Slow, instead of being a rogue, must be the honestest old lawyer in London! He must have been at work in discovering the wrong that had been done, and was now about to reveal it to the world. Some such idea as this had glimmered across Mr Ball's mind as he had sat in Mr Slow's outer office, with his chin still resting on his umbrella.

But though some such idea as this did cross his mind, his thought on the instant was of his cousin.

"What dreadful news, Margaret?"

"It is about my money."

"Stop a moment, Margaret. Are you sure that you ought to tell it to me?"

"If I don't, to whom shall I tell it? And how can I bear it without telling it to some one?"

"Did Mr Slow bid you speak of it to me?"

"No; he bade me think much of it before I did so, as you are concerned. And he said that you might perhaps be disappointed."

Then they walked on again in silence. John Ball found his position to be very difficult, and hardly knew how to speak to her, or how to carry himself. If it was to be that this money was to come back to him; if it was his now in spite of all that had come and gone; if the wrong done was to be righted, and the property wrested from him was to be restored,—restored to him who wanted it so sorely,—how could he not triumph in such an act of tardy restitution? He remembered all the particulars at this moment. Twelve thousand pounds of his uncle Jonathan's money had gone to Walter Mackenzie. The sum once intended for him had been much more than that,—more he believed than double that; but if twelve thousand pounds was now restored to him, how different would it make the whole tenor of his life; Mr Slow said that he might be disappointed; but then Mr Slow was not his lawyer. Did he not owe it to his family immediately to go to his own attorney? Now he thought no more of his guinea at the Shadrach, but walked on by his cousin's side with his mind intently fixed on his uncle's money. She was still leaning on his arm.

"Tell me, John, what shall I do?" said she, looking up into his face.

Would it not be better for them, better for the interests of them both, that they should be separated? Was it probable, or possible, that with interests so adverse, they should give each other good advice? Did it not behove him to explain to her that till this should be settled between them, they must necessarily regard each other as enemies? For a moment or two he wished himself away from her, and was calculating how he might escape. But then, when he looked down at her, and saw the softness of her eye, and felt the confidence implied in the weight of her hand upon his arm, his hard heart was softened, and he relented.

"It is difficult to tell you what you should do," he said. "At present nothing seems to be known. He has said nothing for certain."

"But I could understand him," she said, in reply; "I could see by his face, and I knew by the tone of his voice, that he was almost certain. I know that he is sure of it. John, I shall be a beggar, an absolute beggar! I shall have nothing; and those poor children will be beggars, and their mother. I feel as though I did not know where I am, or what I am doing."

Then an idea came into his head. If this money was not hers, it was his. If it was not his, then it was hers. Would it not be well that they should solve all the difficulty by agreeing then and there to be man and wife? It was true that since his Rachel's death he had seen no woman whom he so much coveted to have in his home as this one who now leaned on his arm. But, as he thought of it, there seemed to be a romance about such a step which would not befit him. What would his mother and father say to him if, after all his troubles, he was at last to marry a woman without a farthing? And then, too, would she consent to give up all further consideration for her brother's family? Would she agree to abandon her idea of assisting them, if ultimately it should turn out that the property was hers? No; there was certainly a looseness about such a plan which did not befit him; and, moreover, were he to attempt it, he would probably not succeed.

But something must be done, now at this moment. The guinea at the Shadrach was gone for ever, and therefore he could devote himself for the day to his cousin.

"Are you to hear again from Mr Slow?" he said.

"I am to go to him this day week."

"And then it will be decided?"

"John, it is decided now; I am sure of it. I feel that it is all gone. A careful man like that would never have spoken as he did, unless he was sure. It will be all yours, John."

"So would have been that which your brother had," said he.

"I suppose so. It is dreadful to think of; very dreadful. I can only promise that I will spend nothing till it is decided. John, I wish you would take from me what I have, lest it should go." And she absolutely had her hand upon her purse in her pocket.

"No," said he slowly, "no; you need think of nothing of that sort."

"But what am I to do? Where am I to go while this week passes by?"

"You will stay where you are, of course."

"Oh John! if you could understand! How am I to look my aunt in the face. Don't you know that she would not wish to have me there at all if I was a poor creature without anything?" The poor creature did not know herself how terribly heavy was the accusation she was bringing against her aunt. "And what will she say when she knows that the money I have spent has never really been my own?"

Then he counselled her to say nothing about it to her aunt till after her next visit to Mr Slow's and made her understand that he, himself, would not mention the subject at the Cedars till the week was passed. He should go, he said, to his own lawyer, and tell him the whole story as far as he knew it. It was not that he in the least doubted Mr Slow's honesty or judgment, but it would be better that the two should act together. Then when the week was over, he and Margaret would once more go to Lincoln's Inn Fields.

"What a week I shall have!" said she.

"It will be a nervous time for us both," he answered.

"And what must I do after that?" This question she asked, not in the least as desirous of obtaining from him any assurance of assistance, but in the agony of her spirit, and in sheer dismay as to her prospects.

"We must hope for the best," he said. "God tempers the wind to the shorn lamb." He had often thought of the way in which he had been shorn, but he did not, at this moment, remember that the shearing had never been so tempered as to be acceptable to his own feelings.

"And in God only can I trust," she answered. As she said this, her mind went away to Littlebath, and the Stumfoldians, and Mr Maguire. Was there not great mercy in the fact, that this ruin had not found her married to that unfortunate clergyman? And what would they all say at Littlebath when they heard the story? How would Mrs Stumfold exult over the downfall of the woman who had rebelled against her! how would the nose of the coachmaker's wife rise in the air! and how would Mr Maguire rejoice that this great calamity had not fallen upon him! Margaret Mackenzie's heart and spirit had been sullied by no mean feeling with reference to her own wealth. It had never puffed her up with exultation. But she calculated on the meanness of others, as though it was a matter of course, not, indeed, knowing that it was meanness, or blaming them in any way for that which she attributed to them. Four gentlemen had wished to marry her during the past year. It never occurred to her now, that any one of these four would on that account hold out a hand to help her. In losing her money she would have lost all that was desirable in their eyes, and this seemed to her to be natural.

They were still walking round Lincoln's Inn Fields. "John," she exclaimed suddenly, "I must go to them in Gower Street."

"What, now, to-day?"

"Yes, now, immediately. You need not mind me; I can get back to Twickenham by myself. I know the trains."

"If I were you, Margaret, I would not go till all this is decided."

"It is decided, John; I know it is. And how can I leave them in such a condition, spending money which they will never get? They must know it some time, and the sooner the better. Mr Rubb must know it too. He must understand that he is more than ever bound to provide them with an income out of the business."

"I would not do it to-day if I were you."

"But I must, John; this very day. If I am not home by dinner, tell them that I had to go to Gower Street. I shall at any rate be there in the evening. Do not you mind coming back with me."

They were then at the gate leading into the New Square, and she turned abruptly round, and hurried away from him up into Holborn, passing very near to Mr Slow's chambers. John Ball did not attempt to follow her, but stood there awhile looking after her. He felt, in his heart, and knew by his judgment, that she was a good woman, true, unselfish, full of love, clever too in her way, quick in apprehension, and endowed with an admirable courage. He had heard her spoken of at the Cedars as a poor creature who had money. Nay, he himself had taken a part in so speaking of her. Now she had no money, but he knew well that she was a creature the very reverse of poor. What should he do for her? In what way should he himself behave towards her? In the early days of his youth, before the cares of the world had made him hard, he had married his Rachel without a penny, and his father had laughed at him, and his mother had grieved over him. Tough and hard, and careworn as he was now, defiled by the price of stocks, and saturated with the poison of the money market, then there had been in him a touch of romance and a dash of poetry, and he had been happy with his Rachel. Should he try it again now? The woman would surely love him when she found that he came to her in her poverty as he had before come to her in her wealth. He watched her till she passed out of his sight along the wall leading to Holborn, and then he made his way to the City through Lincoln's Inn and Chancery Lane.

Margaret walked straight into Holborn, and over it towards Red Lion Square. She crossed the line of the omnibuses, feeling that now she must spend no penny which she could save. She was tired, for she had already walked much that morning, and the day was close and hot; but nevertheless she went on quickly, through Bloomsbury Square and Russell Square, to Gower Street. As she got near to the door her heart almost failed her; but she went up to it and knocked boldly. The thing should be done, let the pain of doing it be what it might.

"Laws, Miss Margaret! is that you?" said the maid. "Yes, missus is at home. She'll see you, of course, but she's hard at work on the furniture."

Then she went directly up into the drawing-room and there she found her sister-in-law, with her dress tucked up to her elbows, with a cloth in her hand, rubbing the chairs.

"What, Margaret! Whoever expected to see you? If we are to let the rooms, it's as well to have the things tidy, isn't it? Besides, a person bears it all the better when there's anything to do."

Then Mary Jane, the eldest daughter, came in from the bedroom behind the drawing-room, similarly armed for work.

Margaret sat down wearily upon the sofa, having muttered some word in answer to Mrs Tom's apology for having been found at work so soon after her husband's death.

"Sarah," she said, "I have come to you to-day because I had something to say to you about business."

"Oh, to be sure! I never thought for a moment you had come for pleasure, or out of civility, as it might be. Of course I didn't expect that when I saw you."

"Sarah, will you come upstairs with me into your own room?"

"Upstairs, Margaret? Oh yes, if you please. We shall be down directly, my dear, and I dare say Margaret will stay to tea. We tea early, because, since you went, we have dined at one."

Then Mrs Tom led the way up to the room in which Margaret had watched by her dying brother's bed-side.

"I'm come in here," said Mrs Tom, again apologising, "because the children had to come out of the room behind the drawing-room. Miss Colza is staying with us, and she and Mary Jane have your room."

Margaret did not care much for all this; but the solemnity of the chamber in which, when she last saw it, her brother's body was lying, added something to her sadness at the moment.

"Sarah," she said, endeavouring to warn her sister-in-law by the tone of her voice that her news was bad news, "I have just come from Mr Slow."

"He's the lawyer, isn't he?"

"Yes, he's the lawyer. You know what I promised my brother. I went to him to make arrangements for doing it, and when there I heard—oh, Sarah, such dreadful news!"

"He says you're not to do it, I suppose!" And in the woman's voice and eyes there were signs of anger, not against Mr Slow alone, but also against Miss Mackenzie. "I knew how it would be. But, Margaret, Mr Slow has got nothing to do with it. A promise is a promise; and a promise made to a dying man! Oh, Margaret!"

"If I had it to give I would give it as surely as I am standing here. When I told my brother it should be so, he believed me at once."

"Of course he believed you."

"But Sarah, they tell me now that I have nothing to give."

"Who tells you so?"

"The lawyer. I cannot explain it all to you; indeed, I do not as yet understand it myself; but I have learned this morning that the property which Walter left me was not his to leave. It had been given away before Mr Jonathan Ball died."

"It's a lie!" said the injured woman,—the woman who was the least injured, but who, with her children, had perhaps the best excuse for being ill able to bear the injury. "It must be a lie. It's more than twenty years ago. I don't believe and won't believe that it can be so. John Ball must have something to do with this."

"The property will go to him, but he has had nothing to do with it. Mr Slow found it out."

"It can't be so, not after twenty years. Whatever they may have done from Walter, they can't take it away from you; not if you've spirit enough to stand up for your rights. If you let them take it in that way, I can't tell you what I shall think of you."

"It is my own lawyer that says so."

"Yes, Mr Slow; the biggest rogue of them all. I always knew that of him, always. Oh, Margaret, think of the children! What are we to do? What are we to do?" And sitting down on the bedside, she put her dirty apron up to her eyes.

"I have been thinking of them ever since I heard it," said Margaret.

"But what good will thinking do? You must do something. Oh! Margaret, after all that you said to him when he lay there dying!" and the woman, with some approach to true pathos, put her hand on the spot where her husband's head had rested. "Don't let his children come to beggary because men like that choose to rob the widow and the orphan."

"Every one has a right to what is his own," said Margaret. "Even though widows should be beggars, and orphans should want."

"That's very well of you, Margaret. It's very well for you to say that, who have friends like the Balls to stand by you. And, perhaps, if you will let him have it all without saying anything, he will stand by you firmer than ever. But who is there to stand by me and my children? It can't be that after twenty years your fortune should belong to anyone else. Why should it have gone on for more than twenty years, and nobody have found it out? I don't believe it can come so, Margaret, unless you choose to let them do it. I don't believe a word of it."

There was nothing more to be said upon that subject at present. Mrs Tom did indeed say a great deal more about it, sometimes threatening Margaret, and sometimes imploring her; but Miss Mackenzie herself would not allow herself to speak of the thing otherwise than as an ascertained fact. Had the other woman been more reasonable or less passionate in her lamentations Miss Mackenzie might have trusted herself to tell her that there was yet a doubt. But she herself felt that the doubt was so small, and that, in Mrs Tom's mind, it would be so magnified into nearly a certainty on the other side, that she thought it most discreet not to refer to the exact amount of information which Mr Slow had given to her.

"It will be best for us to think, Sarah," she said, trying to turn the other's mind away from the coveted income which she would never possess—"to think what you and the children had better do."

"Oh, dear! oh, dear! oh, dear!"

"It is very bad; but there is always something to be done. We must lose no time in letting Mr Rubb know the truth. When he hears how it is, he will understand that something must be done for you out of the firm."

"He won't do anything. He's downstairs now, flirting with that girl in the drawing-room, instead of being at his business."

"If he's downstairs, I will see him."

As Mrs Mackenzie made no objection to this, Margaret went downstairs, and when she came near the passage at the bottom, she heard the voices of people talking merrily in the parlour. As her hand was on the lock of the door, words from Miss Colza became very audible. "Now, Mr Rubb, be quiet." So she knocked at the door, and having been invited by Mr Rubb to come in, she opened it.

It may be presumed that the flirting had not gone to any perilous extent, as there were three or four children present. Nevertheless Miss Colza and Mr Rubb were somewhat disconcerted, and expressed their surprise at seeing Miss Mackenzie.

"We all thought you were staying with the baronet's lady," said Miss Colza.

Miss Mackenzie explained that she was staying at Twickenham, but that she had come up to pay a visit to her sister-in-law. "And I've a word or two I want to say to you, Mr Rubb, if you'll allow me."

"I suppose, then, I'd better make myself scarce," said Miss Colza.

As she was not asked to stay, she did make herself scarce, taking the children with her up among the tables and chairs in the drawing-room. There she found Mary Jane, but she did not find Mrs Mackenzie, who had thrown herself on the bed in her agony upstairs.

Then Miss Mackenzie told her wretched story to Mr Rubb,—telling it for the third time. He was awe-struck as he listened, but did not once attempt to deny the facts, as had been done by Mrs Mackenzie.

"And is it sure?" he asked, when her story was over.

"I don't suppose it is quite sure yet. Indeed, Mr Slow said it was not quite sure. But I have not allowed myself to doubt it, and I do not doubt it."

"If he himself had not felt himself sure, he would not have told you."

"Just so, Mr Rubb. That is what I think; and therefore I have given my sister-in-law no hint that there is a chance left. I think you had better not do so either."

"Perhaps not," said he. He spoke in a low voice, almost whispering, as though he were half scared by the tidings he had heard.

"It is very dreadful," she said; "very dreadful for Sarah and the children."

"And for you too, Miss Mackenzie."

"But about them, Mr Rubb. What can you do for them out of the business?"

He looked very blank, and made no immediate answer.

"I know you will feel for their position," she said. "You do; do you not?"

"Indeed I do, Miss Mackenzie."

"And you will do what you can. You can at any rate ensure them the interest of the money—of the money you know that came from me."

Still Mr Rubb sat in silence, and she thought that he must be stonyhearted. Surely he might undertake to do that, knowing, as he so well knew, the way in which the money had been obtained, and knowing also that he had already said that so much should be forthcoming out of the firm to make up a general income for the family of his late partner.

"Surely there will be no doubt about that, Mr Rubb."

"The Balls will claim the debt," said he hoarsely; and then, in answer to her inquiries, he explained that the sum she had lent had not, in truth, been hers to lend. It had formed part of the money that John Ball could claim, and Mr Slow held in his hands an acknowledgement of the debt from Rubb and Mackenzie. Of course, Mr Ball would claim that the interest should be paid to him; and he would claim the principal too, if, on inquiry, he should find that the firm would be able to raise it. "I don't know that he wouldn't be able to come upon the firm for the money your brother put into the business," said he gloomily. "But I don't think he'll be such a fool as that. He'd get nothing by it."

"Then may God help them!" said Miss Mackenzie.

"And what will you do?" he asked.

She shook her head, but made him no answer. As for herself she had not begun to form a plan. Her own condition did not seem to her to be nearly so dreadful as that of all these young children.

"I wish I knew how to help you," said Samuel Rubb.

"There are some positions, Mr Rubb, in which no one but God can help one. But, perhaps—perhaps you may still do something for the children."

"I will try, Miss Mackenzie."

"Thank you, and may God bless you; and He will bless you if you try. 'Who giveth a drop of water to one of them in my name, giveth it also to me.' You will think of that, will you not?"

"I will think of you, and do the best that I can."

"I had hoped to have made them so comfortable! But God's will be done; God's will be done. I think I had better go now, Mr Rubb. There will be no use in my going to her upstairs again. Tell her from me, with my love, that she shall hear from me when I have seen the lawyer. I will try to come to her, but perhaps I may not be able. Good-bye, Mr Rubb."

"Good-bye, Miss Mackenzie. I hope we shall see each other sometimes."

"Perhaps so. Do what you can to support her. She will want all that her friends can do for her." So saying she went out of the room, and let herself out of the front door into the street, and began her walk back to the Waterloo Station.

She had not broken bread in her sister-in-law's house, and it was now nearly six o'clock. She had taken nothing since she had breakfasted at Twickenham, and the affairs of the day had been such as to give her but little time to think of such wants. But now as she made her weary way through the streets she became sick with hunger, and went into a baker's shop for a bun. As she ate it she felt that it was almost wrong in her to buy even that. At the present moment nothing that she possessed seemed to her to be, by right, her own. Every shilling in her purse was the property of John Ball, if Mr Slow's statement were true. Then, when the bun was finished, as she went down by Bloomsbury church and the region of St Giles's back to the Strand, she did begin to think of her own position. What should she do, and how should she commence to do it? She had declared to herself but lately that the work for which she was fittest was that of nursing the sick. Was it not possible that she might earn her bread in this way? Could she not find such employment in some quarter where her labour would be worth the food she must eat and the raiment she would require? There was a hospital somewhere in London with which she thought she had heard that John Ball was connected. Might not he obtain for her a situation such as that?

It was past eight when she reached the Cedars, and then she was very tired,—very tired and nearly sick also with want. She went first of all up to her room, and then crept down into the drawing-room, knowing that she should find them at tea. When she entered there was a large party round the table, consisting of the girls and children and Lady Ball. John Ball, who never took tea, was sitting in his accustomed place near the lamp, and the old baronet was half asleep in his arm-chair.

"If you were going to dine in Gower Street, Margaret, why didn't you say so?" said Lady Ball.

In answer to this, Margaret burst out into tears. It was not the unkindness of her aunt's voice that upset her so much as her own weakness, and the terrible struggle of the long day.

"What on earth is the matter?" said Sir John.

One of the girls brought her a cup of tea, but she felt herself to be too weak to take it in her hand, and made a sign that it should be put on the table. She was not aware that she had ever fainted, but a fear came upon her that she might do so now. She rallied herself and struggled, striving to collect her strength.

"Do you know what is the matter with her, John?" said Lady Ball.

Then John Ball asked her if she had had dinner, and when she did not answer him he saw how it was.

"Mother," he said, "she has had no food all day; I will get it for her."

"If she wants anything, the servants can bring it to her, John," said the mother.

But he would not trust the servants in this matter, but went out himself and fetched her meat and wine, and pressed her to take it, and sat himself beside her, and spoke kind words into her ear, and at last, in some sort, she was comforted.



CHAPTER XIX

Showing How Two of Miss Mackenzie's Lovers Behaved

Mr Ball, on his return home to the Cedars, had given no definite answer to his mother's inquiries as to the day's work in London, and had found it difficult to make any reply to her that would for the moment suffice. She was not a woman easily satisfied with evasive answers; but, nevertheless, he told her nothing of what had occurred, and left her simply in a bad humour. This conversation had taken place before dinner, but after dinner she asked him another question.

"John, you might as well tell me this; are you engaged to Margaret Mackenzie?"

"No, I am not," said her son, angrily.

After that his mother's humour had become worse than before, and in that state her niece had found her when she returned home in the evening, and had suffered in consequence.

On the next morning Miss Mackenzie sent down word to say she was not well, and would not come down to breakfast. It so happened that John Ball was going into town on this day also, the Abednego Life Office holding its board day immediately after that of the Shadrach Fire Office, and therefore he was not able to see her before she encountered his mother. Lady Ball went up to her in her bedroom immediately after breakfast, and there remained with her for some time. Her aunt at first was tender with her, giving her tea and only asking her gentle little questions at intervals; but as the old lady became impatient at learning nothing, she began a system of cross-questions, and at last grew to be angry and disagreeable. Her son had distinctly told her that he was not engaged to his cousin, and had in fact told her nothing else distinctly; but she, when she had seen how careful he had been in supplying Margaret's wants himself, with what anxious solicitude he had pressed wine on her; how he had sat by her saying soft words to her—Lady Ball, when she remembered this, could not but think that her son had deceived her. And if so, why had he wished to deceive her? Could it be that he had allowed her to give away half her money, and had promised to marry her with the other half? There were moments in which her dear son John could be very foolish, in spite of that life-long devotion to the price of stocks, for which he was conspicuous. She still remembered, as though it were but the other day, how he had persisted in marrying Rachel, though Rachel brought nothing with her but a sweet face, a light figure, a happy temper, and the clothes on her back. To all mothers their sons are ever young, and to old Lady Ball John Ball was still young, and still, possibly, capable of some such folly as that of which she was thinking. If it were not so, if there were not something of that kind in the wind why should he—why should she—be so hard and uncommunicative in all their answers? There lay her niece, however, sick with the headache, and therefore weak, and very much in Lady Ball's power. The evil to be done was great, and the necessity for preventing it might be immediate. And Lady Ball was a lady who did not like to be kept in the dark in reference to anything concerning her family. Having gone downstairs, therefore, for an hour or so to look after her servants, or, as she had said, to allow Margaret to have a little sleep, she returned again to the charge, and sitting close to Margaret's pillow, did her best to find out the truth.

If she could only have known the whole truth; how her son's thoughts were running throughout the day, even as he sat at the Abednego board, not on Margaret with half her fortune, but on Margaret with none! how he was recalling the sweetness of her face as she looked up to him in the square, and took him by his coat, and her tears as she spoke of the orphan children, and the grace of her figure as she had walked away from him, and the persistency of her courage in doing what she thought to be right! how he was struggling within himself with an endeavour, a vain endeavour, at a resolution that such a marriage as that must be out of the question! Had Lady Ball known all that, I think she would have flown to the offices of the Abednego after her son, and never have left him till she had conquered his heart and trampled his folly under her feet.

But she did not conquer Margaret Mackenzie. The poor creature lying there, racked, in truth, with pain and sorrow, altogether incapable of any escape from her aunt's gripe, would not say a word that might tend to ease Lady Ball's mind. If she had told all that she knew, all that she surmised, how would her aunt have rejoiced? That the money should come without the wife would indeed have been a triumph! And Margaret in telling all would have had nothing to tell of those terribly foolish thoughts which were then at work in the City. To her such a state of things as that which I have hinted would have seemed quite as improbable, quite as unaccountable, as it would have done to her aunt. But she did not tell all, nor in truth did she tell anything.

"And John was with you at the lawyer's," said Lady Ball, attempting her cross-examination for the third time. "Yes; he was with me there."

"And what did he say when you asked Mr Slow to make such a settlement as that?"

"He didn't say anything, aunt. The whole thing was put off."

"I know it was put off; of course it was put off. I didn't suppose any respectable lawyer in London would have dreamed of doing such a thing. But what I want to know is, how it was put off. What did Mr Slow say?"

"I am to see him again next week."

"But not to get him to do anything of that kind?"

"I can't tell, aunt, what he is to do then."

"But what did he say when you made such a proposition as that? Did he not tell you that it was quite out of the question?"

"I don't think he said that, aunt."

"Then what did he say? Margaret, I never saw such a person as you are. Why should you be so mysterious? There can't be anything you don't want me to know, seeing how very much I am concerned; and I do think you ought to tell me all that occurred, knowing, as you do, that I have done my very best to be kind to you."

"Indeed there isn't anything I can tell—not yet."

Then Lady Ball remained silent at the bed-head for the space, perhaps, of ten minutes, meditating over it all. If her son was, in truth, engaged to this woman, at any rate she would find that out. If she asked a point-blank question on that subject, Margaret would not be able to leave it unanswered, and would hardly be able to give a directly false answer.

"My dear," she said, "I think you will not refuse to tell me plainly whether there is anything between you and John. As his mother, I have a right to know?"

"How anything between us?" said Margaret, raising herself on her elbow.

"Are you engaged to marry him?"

"Oh, dear! no."

"And there is nothing of that sort going on?"

"Nothing at all."

"You are determined still to refuse him?"

"It is quite out of the question, aunt. He does not wish it at all. You may be sure that he has quite changed his mind about it."

"But he won't have changed his mind if you have given up your plan about your sister-in-law."

"He has changed it altogether, aunt. You needn't think anything more about that. He thinks no more about it."

Nevertheless he was thinking about it this very moment, as he voted for accepting a doubtful life at the Abednego, which was urged on the board by a director, who, I hope, had no intimate personal relations with the owner of the doubtful life in question.

Lady Ball did not know what to make of it. For many years past she had not seen her son carry himself so much like a lover as he had done when he sat himself beside his cousin pressing her to drink her glass of sherry. Why was he so anxious for her comfort? And why, before that, had he been so studiously reticent as to her affairs?

"I can't make anything out of you," said Lady Ball, getting up from her chair with angry alacrity; "and I must say that I think it very ungrateful of you, seeing all that I have done for you."

So saying, she left the room.

What, oh, what would she think when she should come to know the truth? Margaret told herself as she lay there, holding her head between her hands, that she was even now occupying that room and enjoying the questionable comfort of that bed under false pretences. When it was known that she was absolutely a pauper, would she then be made welcome to her uncle's house? She was now remaining there without divulging her circumstances, under the advice and by the authority of her cousin; and she had resolved to be guided by him in all things as long as he would be at the trouble to guide her. On whom else could she depend? But, nevertheless, her position was very grievous to her, and the more so now that her aunt had twitted her with ingratitude. When the servant came to her, she felt that she had no right to the girl's services; and when a message was brought to her from Lady Ball, asking whether she would be taken out in the carriage, she acknowledged to herself that such courtesy to her was altogether out of place.

On that evening her cousin said nothing to her, and on the next day he went again up to town.

"What, four days running, John!" said Lady Ball, at breakfast.

"I have particular business to-day, mother," said he.

On that evening, when he came back, he found a moment to take Margaret by the hand and tell her that his own lawyer also was to meet them at Mr Slow's chambers on the day named. He took her thus, and held her hand closely in his while he was speaking, but he said nothing to her more tender than the nature of such a communication required.

"You and John are terribly mysterious," said Lady Ball to her, a minute or two afterwards. "If there is anything I do hate it's mystery in families. We never had any with us till you came."

On the next day a letter reached her which had been redirected from Gower Street. It was from Mr Maguire; and she took it up into her own room to read it and answer it. The letter and reply were as follows:

Littlebath, Oct., 186—.

DEAREST MARGARET,

I hope the circumstances of the case will, in your opinion, justify me in writing to you again, though I am sorry to intrude upon you at a time when your heart must yet be sore with grief for the loss of your lamented brother. Were we now all in all to each other, as I hope we may still be before long, it would be my sweet privilege to wipe your eyes, and comfort you in your sorrow, and bid you remember that it is the Lord who giveth and the Lord who taketh away. Blessed be the name of the Lord. I do not doubt that you have spoken to yourself daily in those words, nay, almost hourly, since your brother was taken from you. I had not the privilege of knowing him, but if he was in any way like his sister, he would have been a friend whom I should have delighted to press to my breast and carry in my heart of hearts.

But now, dearest Margaret, will you allow me to intrude upon you with another theme? Of course you well know the subject upon which, at present, I am thinking more than on any other. May I be permitted to hope that that subject sometimes presents itself to you in a light that is not altogether disagreeable. When you left Littlebath so suddenly, carried away on a mission of love and kindness, you left me, as you will doubtlessly remember, in a state of some suspense. You had kindly consented to acknowledge that I was not altogether indifferent to you.

"That's not true," said Margaret to herself, almost out loud; "I never told him anything of the kind."

And it was arranged that on that very day we were to have had a meeting, to which—shall I confess it?—I looked forward as the happiest moment of my life. I can hardly tell you what my feelings were when I found that you were going, and that I could only just say to you, farewell. If I could only have been with you when that letter came I think I could have softened your sorrow, and perhaps then, in your gentleness, you might have said a word which would have left me nothing to wish for in this world. But it has been otherwise ordered, and, Margaret, I do not complain.

But what makes me write now is the great necessity that I should know exactly how I stand. You said something in your last dear letter which gave me to understand that you wished to do something for your brother's family. Promises made by the bed-sides of the dying are always dangerous, and in the cases of Roman Catholics have been found to be replete with ruin.

Mr Maguire, no doubt, forgot that in such cases the promises are made by, and not to, the dying person.

Nevertheless, I am far from saying that they should not be kept in a modified form, and you need not for a moment think that I, if I may be allowed to have an interest in the matter, would wish to hinder you from doing whatever may be becoming. I think I may promise you that you will find no mercenary spirit in me, although, of course, I am bound, looking forward to the tender tie which will, I hope, connect us, to regard your interests above all other worldly affairs. If I may then say a word of advice, it is to recommend that nothing permanent be done till we can act together in this matter. Do not, however, suppose that anything you can do or have done, can alter the nature of my regard.

But now, dearest Margaret, will you not allow me to press for an immediate answer to my appeal? I will tell you exactly how I am circumstanced, and then you will see how strong is my reason that there should be no delay. Very many people here, I may say all the elite of the evangelical circles, including Mrs Perch—[Mrs Perch was the coachmaker's wife, who had always been so true to Mrs Stumfold]—desired that I should establish a church here, on my own bottom, quite independent of Mr Stumfold. The Stumfolds would then soon have to leave Littlebath, there is no doubt of that, and she has already made herself so unendurable, and her father and she together are so distressing, that the best of their society has fallen away from them. Her treatment to you was such that I could never endure her afterwards. Now the opening for a clergyman with pure Gospel doctrines would be the best thing that has turned up for a long time. The church would be worth over six hundred a year, besides the interest of the money which would have to be laid out. I could have all this commenced at once, and secure the incumbency, if I could myself head the subscription list with two thousand pounds. It should not be less than that. You will understand that the money would not be given, though, no doubt, a great many persons would, in this way, be induced to give theirs. But the pew rents would go in the first instance to provide interest for the money not given, but lent; as would of course be the case with your money, if you would advance it.

I should not think of such a plan as this if I did not feel that it was the best thing for your interests; that is, if, as I fondly hope, I am ever to call you mine. Of course, in that case, it is only common prudence on my part to do all I can to insure for myself such a professional income, for your sake. For, dearest Margaret, my brightest earthly hope is to see you with everything comfortable around you. If that could be arranged, it would be quite within our means to keep some sort of carriage.

Here would be a fine opportunity for rivalling Mrs Stumfold! That was the temptation with which he hoped to allure her.

But the thing must be done quite immediately; therefore let me pray you not to postpone my hopes with unnecessary delay. I know it seems unromantic to urge a lady with any pecuniary considerations, but I think that under the circumstances, as I have explained them, you will forgive me.