He accordingly sent a telegram to Mrs. Chichester, acquainting her with the pleasant news that she might expect that distinguished lawyer on July 1, to render an account of her stewardship of the Irish agitator's child.

As he entered a first-class carriage on the Great Northern Railway at King's Cross station next day, bound for Scarboro, he found himself wondering how the experiment, dictated by Kingsnorth on his death-bed, had progressed. It was a most interesting case. He had handled several, during his career as a solicitor, in which bequests were made to the younger branches of a family that had been torn by dissension during the testator's lifetime, and were now remembered for the purpose of making tardy amends.

But in those cases the families were all practically of the same caste. It would be merely benefiting them by money or land. Their education had already been taken care of. Once the bequest was arranged all responsibility ended.

The O'Connell-Kingsnorth arrangement was an entirely different condition of things altogether. There were so many provisions each contingent on something in the character of the beneficiary. He did not regard the case with the same equanimity he had handled the others. It opened up so many possibilities of difficulty, and the object of Mr. Kingsnorth's bequest was such an amazing young lady to endeavour to do anything with. He had no preconceived methods to employ in the matter. It was an experiment where his experience was of no use. He had only to wait developments, and, should any real crisis arise, consult with the Chief Executor.

By the time he reached Scarboro he had arranged everything in his mind. It was to be a short and exceedingly satisfactory interview and he would be able to catch the afternoon express back to London.

He pictured Miss O'Connell as being marvellously improved by her gentle surroundings and eager to continue in them. He was sure he would have a most satisfactory report to make to the Chief Executor.

As he walked up the beach-walk he was humming gaily an air from "Girofle-Girofla." He was entirely free from care and annoyance. He was thinking what a fortunate young lady Miss O'Connell was to live amid such delightful surroundings. It would be many a long day before she would ever think of leaving her aunt.

All of which points to the obvious fact that even gentlemen with perfectly-balanced legal brains, occasionally mis-read the result of force of character over circumstances.

He was shown into the music-room and was admiring a genuine Greuze when Mrs. Chichester came in.

She greeted him tragically and motioned him to a seat beside her.

"Well?" he smiled cheerfully. "And how is our little protegee?"

"Sit down," replied Mrs. Chichester, sombrely.

"Thank you."

He sat beside her, waited a moment, then, with some sense of misgiving, asked: "Everything going well, I hope?"

"Far from it." And Mrs. Chichester shook her head sadly.

"Indeed?" His misgivings deepened.

"I want you to understand one thing, Mr. Hawkes," and tears welled up into the old lady's eyes: "I have done my best."

"I am sure of that, Mrs. Chichester," assured the lawyer, growing more and more apprehensive.

"But she wants to leave us to-day. She has ordered cab. She is packing now."

"Dear, dear!" ejaculated the bewildered solicitor. "Where is she going?"

"Back to her father."

"How perfectly ridiculous. WHY?"

"I had occasion to speak to her severely—last night. She grew very angry and indignant—and—now she has ordered a cab."

"Oh!" and Hawkes laughed easily. "A little childish temper. Leave her to me. I have a method with the young. Now—tell me—what is her character? How has she behaved?"

"At times ADMIRABLY. At others—" Mrs. Chichester raised her hands and her eyes in shocked disapproval.

"Not quite—?" suggested Mr. Hawkes.

"Not AT ALL!" concluded Mrs. Chichester.

"How are her studies?"

"Backward."

"Well, we must not expect too much," said the lawyer reassuringly. "Remember everything is foreign to her."

"Then you are not disappointed, Mr. Hawkes?"

"Not in the least. We can't expect to form a character in a month. Does she see many people?"

"Very few. We try to keep her entirely amongst ourselves."

"I wouldn't do that. Let her mix with people. The more the better. The value of contrast. Take her visiting with you. Let her talk to others—listen to them—exchange opinions with them. Nothing is better for sharp-minded, intelligent and IGNORANT people than to meet others cleverer than themselves. The moment they recognise their own inferiority, they feel the desire for improvement."

Mrs. Chichester listened indignantly to this, somewhat platitudinous, sermon on how to develop character. And indignation was in her tone when she replied:

"Surely, she has sufficient example here, sir?"

Hawkes was on one of his dearest hobbies—"Characters and Dispositions." He had once read a lecture on the subject. He smiled almost pityingly at Mrs. Chichester, as he shook his head and answered her.

"No, Mrs. Chichester, pardon me—but NO! She has NOT sufficient example here. Much as I appreciate a HOME atmosphere, it is only when the young get AWAY from it that they really develop. It is the contact with the world, and its huge and marvellous interests, that strengthens character and solidifies disposition. It is only—" he stopped.

Mrs. Chichester was evidently either not listening, or was entirely unimpressed. She was tapping her left hand with a lorgnette she held in her right, and was waiting for an opportunity to speak. Consequently, Mr. Hawkes stopped politely.

"If you can persuade her to remain with us, I will do anything you wish in regard to her character and its development."

"Don't be uneasy," he replied easily, "she will stay. May I see her?"

Mrs. Chichester, rose crossed over to the bell and rang it. She wanted to prepare the solicitor for the possibility of a match between her son and her niece. She would do it NOW and do it tactfully.

"There is one thing you must know, Mr. Hawkes. My son is in love with her," she said, as though in a burst of confidence.

Hawkes rose, visibly perturbed.

"What? Your son?"

"Yes," she sighed. "Of course she is hardly a suitable match for Alaric—as YET. But by the time she is of age—"

"Of age?"

"By that time, much may be done."

Jarvis came in noiselessly and was despatched by Mrs. Chichester to bring her niece to her.

Hawkes was moving restlessly about the room. He stopped in front of Mrs. Chichester as Jarvis disappeared.

"I am afraid, madam, that such a marriage would be out of the question."

"What do you mean?" demanded the old lady. "As one of the executors of the late Mr. Kingsnorth's will, in my opinion, it would be defeating the object of the dead man's legacy."

Mrs. Chichester retorted, heatedly: "He desires her to be TRAINED. What training is better than MARRIAGE?"

"Almost any," replied Mr. Hawkes. "Marriage should be the union of two formed characters. Marriage between the young is one of my pet objections. It is a condition of life essentially for those who have reached maturity in nature and in character. I am preparing a paper on it for the Croydon Ethical Society and—"

Whatever else Mr. Hawkes might have said in continuation of another of his pet subjects was cut abruptly short by the appearance of Peg. She was still dressed in one of Mrs. Chichester's gifts. She had not had an opportunity to change into her little travelling suit.

Hawkes looked at her in delighted surprise. She had completely changed. What a metamorphosis from the forlorn little creature of a month ago! He took her by the hand and pressed it warmly, at the same time saying heartily:

"Well, well! WHAT an improvement."

Peg gazed at him with real pleasure. She was genuinely glad to see him. She returned the pressure of his hand and welcomed him:

"I'm glad you've come, Mr. Hawkes."

"Why, you're a young lady!" cried the astonished solicitor.

"Am I? Ask me aunt about that!" replied Peg, somewhat bitterly.

"Mr. Hawkes wishes to talk to you, dear," broke in Mrs. Chichester, and there was a melancholy pathos in her voice and, in her eyes.

If neither Alaric nor Mr. Hawkes could deter her, what would become of them?

"And I want to talk to Mr. Hawkes, too," replied Peg. "But ye must hurry," she went on. "I've only, a few minutes."

Mrs. Chichester went pathetically to the door, and, telling Mr. Hawkes she would see him again when he had interviewed her niece, she left them.

"Now, my dear Miss Margaret O'Connell—" began the lawyer.

"Will ye let me have twenty pounds?" suddenly asked Peg.

"Certainly. NOW?" and he took out his pocket-book.

"This minnit," replied Peg positively.

"With pleasure," said Mr. Hawkes, as he began to count the bank-notes.

"And I want ye to get a passage on the first ship to America. This afternoon if there's one," cried Peg, earnestly.

"Oh, come, come—" remonstrated the lawyer.

"The twenty pounds I want to buy something for me father—just to remember England by. If ye think me uncle wouldn't like me to have it because I'm lavin', why then me father'll pay ye back. It may take him a long time, but he'll pay it."

"Now listen—" interrupted Mr. Hawkes.

"Mebbe it'll only be a few dollars a week, but father always pays his debts—in time. That's all he ever needs—TIME."

"What's all this nonsense about going away?"

"It isn't nonsense. I'm goin' to me father," answered Peg resolutely.

"Just when everything is opening out for you?" asked the lawyer.

"Everything has closed up on me," said Peg. "I'm goin' back."

"Why, you've improved out of all knowledge."

"Don't think that. Me clothes have changed—that's all. When I put me thravellin' suit back on agen, ye won't notice any IMPROVEMENT."

"But think what you're giving up."

"I'll have me father. I'm only sorry I gave HIM up—for a month."

"The upbringing of a young lady!"

"I don't want it. I want me father."

"The advantages of gentle surroundings."

"New York is good enough for me—with me father."

"Education!"

"I can get that in America—with me father."

"Position!"

"I don't want it. I want me father."

"Why this rebellion? This sudden craving for your father?"

"It isn't sudden," she turned on him fiercely. "I've wanted him all the time I've been here. I only promised to stay a month anyway. Well, I've stayed a month. Now, I've disgraced them all here an' I'm goin' back home."

"DISGRACED them?"

"Yes, disgraced them. Give me that twenty pounds, please," and she held out her hand for the notes.

"How have you disgraced them?" demanded the astonished lawyer.

"Ask me aunt. She knows. Give me the money, please."

Hawkes hunted through his mind for the cause of this upheaval in the Chichester home. He remembered Mrs. Chichester's statement about Alaric's affection for his young cousin. Could the trouble have arisen from THAT? It gave him a clue to work on. He grasped it.

"Answer me one question truthfully, Miss O'Connell."

"What is it? Hurry. I've a lot to do before I go."

"Is there an affair of the heart?"

"D'ye mean LOVE?"

"Yes."

"Why d'ye ask me that?"

"Answer me," insisted Mr. Hawkes.

Peg looked down on the ground mournfully and replied:

"Me heart is in New York—with me father."

"Has anyone made love to you since you have been here?"

Peg looked up at him sadly and shook her head. A moment later, a mischievous look came into her eyes, and she said, with a roguish laugh:

"Sure one man wanted to kiss me an' I boxed his ears. And another—ALMOST man—asked me to marry him."

"Oh!" ejaculated the lawyer.

"Me cousin Alaric."

"And what did you say?" questioned Hawkes.

"I towld him I'd rather have 'Michael.'"

He looked at her in open bewilderment and repeated:

"Michael?"

"Me dog," explained Peg, and her eyes danced with merriment.

Hawkes laughed heartily and relievedly.

"Then you refused him?"

"Of course I refused him. ME marry HIM! What for, I'd like to know?"

"Is he too young?"

"He's too selfish, an' too silly too, an' too everything I don't like in a man!" replied Peg.

"And what DO you like in a man?"

"Precious little from what I've seen of them in England."

As Hawkes looked at her, radiant in her spring-like beauty, her clear, healthy complexion, her dazzling teeth, her red-gold hair, he felt a sudden thrill go through him. His life had been so full, so concentrated on the development of his career, that he had never permitted the feminine note to obtrude itself on his life. His effort had been rewarded by an unusually large circle of influential clients who yielded him an exceedingly handsome revenue. He had heard whispers of a magistracy. His PUBLIC future was assured.

But his PRIVATE life was arid. The handsome villa in Pelham Crescent had no one to grace the head of the table, save on the occasional visits of his aged mother, or the still rarer ones of a married sister.

And here was he in the full prime of life.

It is remarkable how, at times, in one's passage through life, the throb in a voice, the breath of a perfume, the chord of an old song, will arouse some hidden note that had so far lain dormant in one's nature, and which, when awakened into life, has influences that reach through generations.

It was even so with Hawkes, as he looked at the little Irish girl, born of an aristocratic English mother, looking up at him, hand outstretched, expectant, in all her girlish pudicity.

Yielding to some uncontrollable impulse, he took the little hand in both of his own. He smiled nervously, and there was a suspicious tremor in his voice:

"You would like a man of position in life to give you what you most need. Of years to bring you dignity, and strength to protect you."

"I've got HIM," stated Peg unexpectedly, withdrawing her hand and eyeing the bank-notes that seemed as far from her as when she first asked for them.

"You've got him?" ejaculated the man-of-law, aghast.

"I have. Me father. Let ME count that money. The cab will be here an' I won't be ready—" Hawkes was not to be denied now. He went on in his softest and most persuasive accents:

"I know one who would give you all these—a man who has reached the years of discretion! one in whom the follies of youth have merged into the knowledge and reserve of early middle-age. A man of position and of means. A man who can protect you, care for you, admire you—and be proud to marry you."

He felt a real glow of eloquent pleasure, as he paused for her reply to so dignified and ardent an appeal.

If Peg had been listening, she certainly could not have understood the meaning of his fervid words, since she answered him by asking a question:

"Are ye goin' to let me have the money?"

"Do not speak of MONEY at a moment like this!" cried the mortified lawyer.

"But ye said ye would let me have it!" persisted Peg.

"Don't you wish to know who the man is, whom I have just described, my dear Miss O'Connell?"

"No, I don't. Why should I? With me father waitin' in New York for me—an' I'm waitin' for that—" and again she pointed to his pocket-book.

"Miss O'Connell—may I say—Margaret, I was your uncle's adviser—his warm personal friend. We spoke freely of you for many weeks before he died. It was his desire to do something for you that would change your whole life and make it full and happy and contented. Were your uncle alive, I know of nothing that would give him greater pleasure than for his old friend to take you, your young life—into his care. Miss O'Connell—I am the man!"

It was the first time this dignified gentleman had ever invited a lady to share his busy existence, and he felt the warm flush of youthful nervousness rush to his cheeks, as it might have done had he made just such a proposal, as a boy. It really seemed to him that he WAS a boy as he stood before Peg waiting for her reply.

Again she did not say exactly what he had thought and hoped she would have said.

"Stop it!" she cried. "What's the matther with you men this morning? Ye'd think I was some great lady, the way ye're all offerin' me yer hands an' yer names an' yer influences an' yer dignities. Stop it! Give me that money and let me go."

Hawkes did not despair. He paused.

"Don't give your answer too hastily. I know it must seem abrupt—one might almost say BRUTAL. But I am alone in the world—YOU are alone. Neither of us have contracted a regard for anyone else. And in addition to that—there would be no occasion to marry until you are twenty-one. There!"

And he gazed at her with what he fondly hoped were eyes of sincere adoration.

"Not until I'm twenty-one! Look at that now!" replied Peg—it seemed to Mr. Hawkes, somewhat flippantly.

"Well! What do you say?" he asked vibrantly.

"What do I say, to WHAT?"

"Will you consent to an engagement?"

"With YOU?"

"Yes, Miss O'Connell, with me."

Peg suddenly burst into a paroxysm of laughter.

Hawkes' face clouded and hardened.

The gloomier he looked, the more hearty were Peg's ebullitions of merriment.

Finally, when the hysterical outburst had somewhat abated, he asked coldly:

"Am I to consider that a refusal?"

"Ye may. What would I be doin', marryin' the likes of you? Answer me that?"

His passion began to dwindle, his ardour to lessen.

"That is final?" he queried.

"Absolutely, completely and entirely final."

Not only did all HOPE die in Mr. Hawkes, but seemingly all REGARD as well.

Ridicule is the certain death-blow to a great and disinterested affection.

Peg's laugh still rang in his ears and as he looked at her now, with a new intelligence, unblinded by illusion, he realised what a mistake it would have been for a man, of his temperament, leanings and achievements to have linked his life with hers. Even his first feeling of resentment passed. He felt now a warm tinge of gratitude. Her refusal—bitter though its method had been—was a sane and wise decision. It was better for both of them.

He looked at her gratefully and said:

"Very well. I think your determination to return to your father, a very wise one. I shall advise the Chief Executor to that effect. And I shall also see that a cabin is reserved for you on the first out-going steamer, and I'll personally take you on board."

"Thank ye very much, sir. An' may I have the twenty pounds?"

"Certainly. Here it is," and he handed her the money.

"I'm much obliged to ye. An' I'm sorry if I hurt ye by laughin' just now. But I thought ye were jokin', I did."

"Please never refer to it again."

"I won't—indade I won't. I am sure it was very nice of ye to want to marry me—"

"I beg you—" he interrupted, stopping her with a gesture.

"Are you goin' back to London to-day?"

"By the afternoon express."

"May I go with you?"

"Certainly."

"Thank ye," cried Peg. "I won't kape ye long. I've not much to take with me. Just what I brought here—that's all."

She hurried across the room to the staircase. When, she was halfway up the stairs, Jarvis entered and was immediately followed by Jerry.

Peg stopped when she saw him come into the room.

As Jarvis went out, Jerry turned and saw Peg looking down at him. The expression on her face was at once stern and wistful and angry and yearning.

He went forward eagerly.

"Peg!" he said gently, looking up at her.

"I'm goin' back to me father in half an hour!" and she went on up the stairs.

"In half an hour?" he called after her.

"In thirty minutes!" she replied and disappeared.

As Jerry moved slowly away from the staircase, he met Montgomery Hawkes.



CHAPTER XVI

THE CHIEF EXECUTOR, APPEARS UPON THE SCENE

"Why, how do you do, Sir Gerald?" and Hawkes went across quickly with outstretched hand.

"Hello, Hawkes," replied Jerry, too preoccupied to return the act of salutation. Instead, he nodded in the direction Peg had gone and questioned:

"What does she mean—going in a few minutes?"

"She is returning to America. Our term of guardianship is over."

"How's that?"

"She absolutely refuses to stay here any longer. My duties in regard to her, outside of the annual payment provided by her late uncle, end to-day," replied the lawyer.

"I think not, Hawkes."

"I beg your pardon?"

"As the Chief Executor of the late Mr. Kingsnorth's will, I must be satisfied that its conditions are complied with in the SPIRIT as well as to the LETTER," said Jerry, authoritatively.

"Exactly," was the solicitor's reply. "And—?"

"Mr. Kingsnorth expressly stipulated that a year was to elapse before any definite conclusion was arrived at. So far only a month has passed."

"But she insists on returning to her father!" protested Mr. Hawkes.

"Have you told her the conditions of the will?"

"Certainly not. Mr. Kingsnorth distinctly stated she was not to know them."

"Except under exceptional circumstances. I consider the circumstances most exceptional."

"I am afraid I cannot agree with you, Sir Gerald."

"That is a pity. But it doesn't alter my intention."

"And may I ask what that intention is?"

"To carry out the spirit of Mr. Kingsnorth's bequest."

"And what do you consider the spirit?"

"I think we will best carry out Mr. Kingsnorth's last wishes by making known the conditions of his bequest to Miss O'Connell and then let her decide whether she wishes to abide by them or not."

"As the late Mr. Kingsnorth's legal adviser, I must strongly object to such a course," protested the indignant lawyer.

"All the same, Mr. Hawkes, I feel compelled to take it, and I must ask you to act under my instructions."

"Really," exclaimed Mr. Hawkes; "I should much prefer to resign from my executorship."

"Nonsense. In the interests of all parties, we must act together and endeavour to carry out the dead man's wishes."

The lawyer considered a moment and then in a somewhat mollified tone, said:

"Very well, Sir Gerald. If you think it is necessary, why then by all means, I shall concur in your views."

"Thank you," replied the Chief Executor.

Mrs. Chichester came into the room and went straight to Jerry. At the same time, Alaric burst in through the garden and greeted Jerry and Hawkes.

"I heard you were here—" began Mrs. Chichester.

Jerry interrupted her anxiously: "Mrs. Chichester, I was entirely to blame for last night's unfortunate business. Don't visit your displeasure on the poor little child. Please don't."

"I've tried to tell her that I'll overlook it. But she seems determined to go. Can you suggest anything that might make her stay? She seems to like you—and after all—as you so generously admit—it was—to a certain extent your fault."

Before Jerry could reply, Jarvis came down the stairs with a pained—not to say mortified—expression on his face. Underneath his left arm he held tightly a shabby little bag and a freshly wrapped up parcel: in his right hand, held far away from his body, was the melancholy and picturesque terrier—"Michael."

Mrs. Chichester looked at him in horror.

"Where are you going with those—THINGS?" she gasped.

"To put them in a cab, madam," answered the humiliated footman. "Your niece's orders."

"Put those articles in a travelling-bag—use one of my daughter's," ordered the old lady.

"Your niece objects, madam. She sez she'll take nothing away she didn't bring with her."

The grief-stricken woman turned away as Jarvis passed out. Alaric tried to comfort her. But the strain of the morning had been too great. Mrs. Chichester burst into tears.

"Don't weep, mater. Please don't. It can't be helped. We've all done our best. I know I have!" and Alaric put his mother carefully down on the lounge and sat beside her on the arm. He looked cheerfully at Jerry and smiled as he said:

"I even offered to marry her if she'd stay. Couldn't do more than that, could I?"

Hawkes listened intently.

Jerry returned Alaric's smile as he asked: "YOU offered to marry her?"

Alaric nodded:

"Poor little wretch. Still I'd have gone through with it."

"And what did she say?" queried Jerry.

"First of all she laughed in my face—right in my face—the little beggar!"

Hawkes frowned gloomily as though at some painful remembrance.

"And after she had concluded her cachinnatory outburst, she coolly told me she would rather have 'MICHAEL.' She is certainly a remarkable little person and outside of the inconvenience of having her here, we should all be delighted to go on taking care of her. And if dancing is the rock we are going to split on, let us get one up every week for her. Eh, Jerry? You'd come, wouldn't you?"

Down the stairs came Peg and Ethel. Peg was holding one of Ethel's hands tightly. There seemed to be a thorough understanding between them. Peg was dressed in the same little black suit she wore when she first entered the Chichester family and the same little hat.

They all looked at her in amazement, amusement, interrogation and disgust respectively.

When they reached the bottom of the stairs, Ethel stopped Peg and entreated:

"Don't go!"

"I must. There's nothin' in the wurrld 'ud kape me here now. Nothin'!"

"I'll drive with you to the station. May I?" asked Ethel.

"All right, dear." Peg crossed over to Mrs. Chichester:

"Good-bye, aunt. I'm sorry I've been such a throuble to ye."

The poor lady looked at Peg through misty eyes and said reproachfully:

"WHY that dress? Why not one of the dresses I gave you?"

"This is the way I left me father, an' this is the way I'm goin' back to him!" replied Peg sturdily. "Goodbye, Cousin Alaric," and she laughed good-naturedly at the odd little man. In spite of everything he did, he had a spice of originality about him that compelled Peg to overlook what might have seemed to others unpardonable priggishness.

"Good-bye—little devil!" cried Alaric, cheerfully taking the offered hand. "Good luck to ye. And take care of yerself," added Alaric, generously.

As Peg turned away from him, she came face to face with Jerry—or as she kept calling him in her brain by his new name—to her—Sir Gerald Adair. She dropped her eyes and timidly held out her hand:

"Good-bye!" was all she said.

"You're not going, Peg," said Jerry, quietly and positively.

"Who's goin' to stop me?"

"The Chief Executor of the late Mr. Kingsnorth's will."

"An' who is THAT?"

"'Mr. Jerry,' Peg!"

"YOU an executor?"

"I am. Sit down—here in our midst—and know why you have been here all the past month."

As he forced Peg gently into a chair, Mrs. Chichester and Alaric turned indignantly on him. Mr. Hawkes moved down to listen, and, if necessary, advise.

There was pleasure showing on one face only—on Ethel's.

She alone wanted Peg to understand her position in that house.

Since the previous night the real womanly note awakened in Ethel.

Her heart went out to Peg.



CHAPTER XVII

PEG LEARNS OF HER UNCLE'S LEGACY

Peg looked up wonderingly from the chair.

"Me cab's at the door!" she said, warningly to Jerry.

"I am sorry to insist, but you must give me a few, moments," said the Chief Executor.

"MUST?" cried Peg.

"It is urgent," replied Jerry quietly.

"Well, then—hurry;" and Peg sat on the edge of the chair, nervously watching "Jerry."

"Have you ever wondered at the real reason you were brought here to this house and the extraordinary interest taken in you by relations who, until a month ago, had never even bothered about your existence?"

"I have, indeed," Peg answered. "But whenever I've asked any one, I've always been told it was me uncle's wish."

"And it was. Indeed, his keenest desire, just before his death, was to atone in some way for his unkindness to your mother."

"Nothin' could do that," and Peg's lips tightened.

"That was why he sent for you."

"Sendin' for me won't bring me poor mother back to life, will it?"

"At least we must respect his intentions. He desired that you should be given the advantages your mother had when she was a girl."

"'Ye've made yer bed; lie in it'! That was the message he sent me mother when she was starvin'. And why? Because she loved me father. Well, I love me father an' if he thought his money could separate us he might just as well have let me alone. No one will ever separate us."

"In justice to yourself," proceeded Jerry, "you must know that he set aside the sum of one thousand pounds a year to be paid to the lady who would undertake your training."

Mrs. Chichester covered her eyes to hide the tears of mortification that sprang readily into them.

Alaric looked at Jerry in absolute disgust.

Hawkes frowned his disapproval.

Peg sprang up and walked across to her aunt and looked down at her.

"A thousand pounds a year!" She turned to Jerry and asked: "Does she get a thousand a year for abusin' me?"

"For taking care of you," corrected Jerry.

"Well, what do ye think of that?" cried Peg, gazing curiously at Mrs. Chichester. "A thousand pounds a year for makin' me miserable, an' the poor dead man thinkin' he was doin' me a favour!"

"I tell you this," went on Jerry, "because I don't want you to feel that you have been living on charity. You have not."

Peg suddenly blazed up:

"Well, I've been made to feel it," and she glared passionately at her aunt. "Why wasn't I told this before? If I'd known it I'd never have stayed with ye a minnit Who are YOU, I'd like to know, to bring me up any betther than me father? He's just as much a gentleman as any of yez. He never hurt a poor girl's feelin's just because she was poor. Suppose he hasn't any money? Nor ME? What of it? Is it a crime? What has yer money an' yer breedin' done for you? It's dried up the very blood in yer veins, that's what it has! Yer frightened to show one real, human, kindly impulse. Ye don't know what happiness an' freedom mean. An' if that is what money does, I don't want it. Give me what I've been used to—POVERTY. At least I can laugh sometimes from me heart, an' get some pleasure out o' life without disgracin' people!"

Peg's anger gave place to just as sudden a twinge of regret as she caught sight of Ethel, white-faced, and staring at her compassionately. She went across to Ethel and buried her face on her shoulder and wept as she wailed.

"Why WASN'T I told! I'd never have stayed! Why wasn't I told?"

And Ethel comforted her:

"Don't cry, dear," she whispered. "Don't. The day you came here we were beggars. You have literally, fed and housed us for the last month."

Peg looked up at Ethel in astonishment.

She forgot her own sorrow.

"Ye were beggars?"

"Yes. We have nothing but the provision made for your training."

Poor Mrs. Chichester looked at her daughter reproachfully.

Alaric had never seen his sister even INTERESTED much less EXCITED before. He turned to his mother, shrugged his shoulders and said:

"I give it up! That's all I can say! I simply give it up!"

Peg grasped the full meaning of Ethel's words:

"And will ye have nothin' if I go away?"

Peg paused: Ethel did not speak.

Peg persisted: "Tell me—are ye ralely dependin' on ME? Spake to me. Because if ye are, I won't go. I'll stay with ye. I wouldn't see ye beggars for the wurrld. I've been brought up amongst them, an' I know what it is."

Suddenly she took Ethel by the shoulders and asked in a voice so low that none of the others heard her:

"Was that the reason ye were goin' last night?"

Ethel tried to stop her.

The truth illumined Ethel's face and Peg saw it and knew.

"Holy Mary!" she cried, "and it was I was drivin' ye to it. Ye felt the insult of it every time ye met me—as ye said last night. Sure, if I'd known, dear, I'd never have hurt ye, I wouldn't! Indade, I wouldn't!"

She turned to the others:

"There! It's all settled. I'll stay with ye, aunt, an' ye can tache me anythin' ye like. Will some one ask Jarvis to bring back me bundles an' 'Michael.' I'm goin' to stay!"

Jerry smiled approvingly at her. Then he said:

"That is just what I would have expected you to do. But, my dear Peg, there's no need for such a sacrifice."

"Sure, why not?" cried Peg, excitedly. "Let me, sacrifice meself. I feel like it this minnit."

"There is no occasion."

He walked over to Mrs. Chichester and addressed her:

"I came here this morning with some very good news for you. I happen to be one of the directors of Gifford's bank and I am happy to say that it will shortly reopen its doors and all the depositors' money will be available for them in a little while."

Mrs. Chichester gave a cry of joy as she looked proudly at her two children:

"Oh, Alaric!" she exclaimed: "My darling Ethel!"

"REOPEN its doors?" Alaric commented contemptuously. "So it jolly well ought to. What right had it to CLOSE 'em? That's what I want to know. What right?"

"A panic in American securities, in which we were heavily interested, caused the suspension of business," explained Jerry. "The panic is over. The securities are RISING every day. We'll soon be on easy street again."

"See here, mater," remarked Alaric firmly, "every ha'penny of ours goes out of Gifford's bank and into something that has a bottom to it. In future, I'LL manage the business of this family."

The Chichester family, reunited in prosperity, had apparently forgotten the forlorn little girl sitting on the chair, who a moment before had offered to take up the load of making things easier for them by making them harder for herself. All their backs were turned to her.

Jerry looked at her. She caught his eye and smiled, but it had a sad wistfulness behind it.

"Sure, they don't want me now. I'd better take me cab. Good day to yez." And she started quickly for the door.

Jerry stopped her.

"There is just one more condition of Mr. Kingsnorth's will that you must know. Should you go through your course of training satisfactorily to the age of twenty-one, you will inherit the sum of five thousand pounds a year."

"When I'm twenty-one, I get five thousand pounds year?" gasped Peg.

"If you carry out certain conditions."

"An' what are they?"

"Satisfy the executors that you are worthy of the legacy."

"Satisfy you?"

"And Mr. Hawkes."

Peg looked at the somewhat uncomfortable lawyer, who reddened and endeavoured to appear at ease.

"Mr. Hawkes! Oho! Indade!" She turned back to Jerry: "Did he know about the five thousand? When I'm twenty-one?"

"He drew the will at Mr. Kingsnorth's dictation," replied Jerry.

"Was that why ye wanted me to be engaged to ye until I was twenty-one?" she asked the unhappy lawyer.

Hawkes tried to laugh it off.

"Come, come, Miss O'Connell," he said, "what nonsense!"

"Did YOU propose to Miss Margaret?" queried Jerry.

"Well—" hesitated the embarrassed lawyer—"in a measure—yes."

"That's what it was," cried Peg, with a laugh. "It was very measured. No wondher the men were crazy to kape me here and to marry me."

She caught sight of Alaric and smiled at him. He creased his face into a sickly imitation of a smile and murmured:

"Well, of course, I mean to say!" with which clear and well-defined expression of opinion, he stopped.

"I could have forgiven you, Alaric," said Peg, "but Mr. Hawkes, I'm ashamed of ye."

"It was surely a little irregular, Hawkes," suggested Jerry.

"I hardly agree with you, Sir Gerald. There can be nothing irregular in a simple statement of affection."

"Affection is it?" cried Peg.

"Certainly. We are both alone in the world. Miss O'Connell seemed to be unhappy: the late Mr. Kingsnorth desired that she should be trained—it seemed to me be an admirable solution of the whole difficulty."

Peg laughed openly and turning to Jerry, said "He calls himself a 'solution.' Misther Hawkes—go on with ye—I am ashamed of ye."

"Well, there is no harm done," replied Mr. Hawkes, endeavouring to regain his lost dignity.

"No!" retorted Peg. "It didn't go through, did it?"

Hawkes smiled at that, and taking Peg's hand, protested:

"However—always your friend and well-wisher."

"But nivver me husband!" insisted Peg.

"Good-bye."

"Where are ye goin' without me?"

"You surely are not returning to America now?" said Hawkes, in surprise.

"Why, of course, I'm goin' to me father now. Where else would I go?"

Hawkes hastened to explain:

"If you return to America to your father, you will violate one of the most important clauses in the will."

"If I go back to me father?"

"Or if he visits you—until you are twenty-one," added Jerry.

"Is that so?" And the blood rushed up to Peg's temples. "Well, then, that settles it. No man is goin' to dictate to me about me father. No dead man—nor no livin' one nayther."

"It will make you a rich young lady in three years, remember. You will be secure from any possibility of poverty."

"I don't care. I wouldn't stay over here for three years with" she caught Mrs. Chichester's eyes fastened on her and she checked herself.

"I wouldn't stay away from me father for three years for all the money in the wurrld," she concluded, with marked finality.

"Very well," agreed Jerry. Then he spoke to the others: "Now, may I have a few moments alone with my ward?"

The family expressed surprise.

Hawkes suggested a feeling of strong displeasure.

"I shall wait to escort you down to the boat, Miss O'Connell."

Bowing to every one, the man of law left the room.

Peg stared at Jerry incredulously.

"WARD? Is that ME?"

"Yes, Peg. I am your legal guardian—appointed by Mr. Kingsnorth!"

"You're the director of a bank, the executor of an estate, an' now ye're me guardian. What do ye do with yer spare time?"

Jerry smiled and appealed to the others:

"Just a few seconds—alone."

Mrs. Chichester went to Peg and said coldly "Good-bye, Margaret. It is unlikely we'll meet again. I hope you have a safe and pleasant journey."

"I thank ye, Aunt Monica." Poor Peg longed for at least one little sign of affection from her aunt. She leaned forward to kiss her. The old lady either did not see the advance or did not reciprocate what it implied. She went on upstairs out of sight.

Mingled with her feeling of relief that she would never again be slighted and belittled by Mrs. Chichester, she was hurt to the heart by the attitude of cold indifference with which her aunt treated her.

She was indeed overjoyed to think now it was the last she would ever see of the old lady.

Alaric held out his hand frankly:

"Jolly decent of ye to offer to stay here—just to keep us goin'—awfully decent. You are certainly a little wonder. I'll miss you terribly—really I will."

Peg whispered:

"Did ye know about that five thousand pounds when I'm twenty-one?"

"'Course I did. That was why I proposed. To save the roof." Alaric was nothing if not honest.

"Ye'd have sacrificed yeself by marryin' ME?" quizzed Peg.

"Like a shot."

"There's somethin' of the hero about you, Alaric!"

"Oh, I mustn't boast," he replied modestly. "It's all in the family."

"Well, I'm glad ye didn't have to do it," Peg remarked positively.

"So am I. Jolly good of you to say 'No.' All the luck in the world to you. Drop me a line or a picture-card from New York. Look you up on my way to Canada—if I ever really go. 'Bye!" The young man walked over to the door calling over his shoulder to Jerry: "See ye lurchin' about somewhere, old dear!" and he too went out of Peg's life.

She looked at Ethel and half entreated, half commanded Jerry:

"Plaze look out of the window for a minnit. I want to spake to me cousin." Jerry sauntered over to the window and stood looking at the gathering storm.

"Is that all over?" whispered Peg.

"Yes," replied Ethel, in a low tone.

"Ye'll never see him again?"

"Never. I'll write him that. What must you think of me?"

"I thought of you all last night," said Peg eagerly. "Ye seem like some one who's been lookin' for happiness in the dark with yer eyes shut. Open them wide, dear, and look at the beautiful things in the daylight and then you'll be happy."

Ethel shook her head sadly:

"I feel to-day that I'll never know happiness again."

"Sure, I've felt like that many a time since I've been here. Ye know three meals a day, a soft bed to slape in an' everythin' ye want besides, makes ye mighty discontented. If ye'd go down among the poor once in a while an' see what they have to live on, an' thry and help them, ye might find comfort and peace in doin' it."

Ethel put both of her hands affectionately on Peg's shoulders.

"Last night you saved me from myself—and then; you shielded me from my family."

"Faith I'd do THAT for any poor girl, much less me own cousin."

"Don't think too hardly of me, Margaret. Please!" she entreated.

"I don't, dear. It wasn't yer fault. It was yer mother's."

"My mother's?"

"That's what I said. It's all in the way, we're brought up what we become aftherwards. Yer mother, raised ye in a hot house instead of thrustin' ye out into the cold winds of the wurrld when ye were young and gettin' ye used them. She taught ye to like soft silks and shining satins an' to look down on the poor, an' the shabby. That's no way to bring up anybody. Another thing ye learnt from her—to be sacret about things that are near yer heart instead of encouragin' ye to be outspoken an' honest. Of course I don't think badly of ye. Why should I? I had the advantage of ye all the time. It isn't ivery girl has the bringin' up such as I got from me father. So let yer mind be aisy, dear. I think only good of ye. God bless ye!" She took Ethel gently in her arms and kissed her.

"I'll drive down with you," said Ethel, brokenly, and hurried out.

Peg stood looking after her for a moment, then she turned and looked at Jerry, who was still looking out of the window.

"She's gone," said Peg, quietly.

Jerry walked down to her.

"Are you still determined to go?" he asked.

"I am."

"And you'll leave here without a regret?"

"I didn't say that sure."

"We've been good friends, haven't we?"

"I thought we were," she answered gently. "But friendship must be honest. Why didn't ye tell me ye were a gentleman? Sure, how was I to know? 'Jerry' might mean anybody. Why didn't ye tell me ye had a title?"

"I did nothing to get it. Just inherited it," he said simply. Then he added: "I'd drop it altogether if I could."

"Would ye?" she asked curiously.

"I would. And as for being a gentleman, why one of the finest I ever met drove a cab in Piccadilly. He was a GENTLE MAN—that is—one who never willingly hurts another. Strange in a cabman, eh?"

"Why did ye let me treat ye all the time as an equal?"

"Because you ARE—superior in many things. Generosity, for instance."

"Oh, don't thry the comther on me. I know ye now. Nothin' seems the same."

"Nothing?"

"Nothin'!"

"Are we never to play like children again?" he pleaded.

"No," she said firmly. "Ye'll have to come out to New York to do it. An' then I mightn't."

"Will nothing make you stay?"

"Nothing. I'm just achin' for me home."

"Such as this could never be home to you?"

"This? Never," she replied positively.

"I'm sorry. Will you ever think of me?" He waited. She averted her eyes and said nothing.

"Will you write to me?" he urged.

"What for?"

"I'd like to hear of you and from you. Will you?"

"Just to laugh at me spellin'?"

"Peg!" He drew near to her.

"Sir Gerald!" she corrected him and drew a little away. "Peg, my dear!" He took both of her hands in his and bent over her.

Just for a moment was Peg tempted to yield to the embrace.

Had she done so, the two lives would have changed in that moment. But the old rebellious spirit came uppermost, and she looked at him defiantly and cried:

"Are you goin' to propose to me, too?"

That was the one mistake that separated those two hearts. Sir Gerald drew back from her—hurt.

She was right—they were not equals.

She could not understand him, since he could never quite say all he felt, and she could never divine what was left unsaid.

She was indeed right.

Such as this could never be a home for her.

Jarvis came quietly in:

"Mr. Hawkes says, Miss, if you are going to catch the train—"

"I'll catch it," said Peg impatiently; and Jarvis went out.

Peg looked at Jerry's back turned eloquently toward her, as though in rebuke.

"Why in the wurrld did I say that to him?" she muttered. "It's me Irish tongue." She went to the door, and opened it noisily, rattling the handle loudly—hoping he would look around.

But he never moved.

She accepted the attitude as one of dismissal.

Under her breath she murmured:

"Good-bye, Misther Jerry—an' God bless ye—an' thank ye for bein' so nice to me." And she passed out.

In the hall Peg found Ethel and Hawkes waiting for her.

They put her between them in the cab and with "Michael" in her arms, she drove through the gates of Regal Villa never to return.

The gathering storm broke as she reached the station. In storm Jerry came into her life, in storm she was leaving his.

The threads of what might have been a fitting addition to the "LOVE STORIES OF THE WORLD" were broken.

Could the break ever be healed?



CHAPTER XVIII

PEG'S FAREWELL TO ENGLAND

Many and conflicting were Peg's feelings as she went aboard the ship that was to carry her from England forever.

In that short MONTH she had experienced more contrasted feelings than in all the other YEARS she had lived.

It seemed as if she had left her girlhood, with all its keen hardships and sweet memories, behind her.

When the vessel swung around the dock in Liverpool and faced toward America Peg felt that not only was she going back to the New World, but she was about to begin a new existence. Nothing would ever be quite the same again. She had gone through the leavening process of emotional life and had come out of it with her courage still intact, her honesty unimpaired, but somehow with her FAITH abruptly shaken. She had believed and trusted, and she had been—she thought—entirely mistaken, and it hurt her deeply.

Exactly why Peg should have arrived at such a condition—bordering as it was on cynicism—was in one sense inexplicable, yet from another point of view easily understood. That Jerry had not told her all about himself when they first met, as she did about herself to him, did not necessarily imply deceit on his part. Had she asked any member or servant in the Chichester family who and what "Jerry" was they would readily have told her. But that was contrary to Peg's nature. If she liked anyone, she never asked questions about them. It suggested a doubt, and doubt to Peg meant disloyalty in friendship and affection. Everyone had referred to this young gentleman as "Jerry." He even introduced himself by that unromantic and undignified name. No one seemed to treat him with any particular deference, nor did anything in his manner seem to demand it. She had imagined that anyone with a title should not only be proud of it, but would naturally hasten to let everyone they met become immediately aware whom they were addressing.

She vividly remembered her father pointing out to her a certain north-of-Ireland barrister who—on the strength of securing more convictions under the "Crimes Act" than any other jurist in the whole of Ireland—was rewarded with the Royal and Governmental approval by having conferred on him the distinction and dignity of knighthood. It was the crowning-point of his career. It has steadily run through his life since as a thin flame of scarlet. He lives and breathes "knighthood." He thinks and speaks it. He DEMANDS recognition from his equals, even as he COMPELS it from his inferiors. Her father told Peg that all the servants were drilled carefully to call him—"Sir Edward."

His relations, unaccustomed through their drab lives to the usages of the great, found extreme difficulty in acquiring the habit of using the new appellation in the place of the nick-name of his youth—"Ted." It was only when it was made a condition of being permitted an audience with the gifted and honoured lawyer, that they allowed their lips to meekly form the servile "Sir!" when addressing their distinguished relation.

When he visited Dublin Castle to consult with his Chiefs, and any of his old-time associates hailed him familiarly as "Ted!" a grieved look would cross his semi-Scotch features, and he would hasten to correct in his broad, coarse brogue: "Sir Edward, me friend! Be the Grace of Her Majesty and the British Government—Sir Edward—if—ye plaze!"

THERE was one who took pride in the use of his title.

He desired and exacted the full tribute due the dignity it carried. Then why did not "Jerry" do the same?

She did not appreciate that to him the prefix having been handed down from generations, was as natural to him as it was unnatural to the aforementioned criminal lawyer. The one was born with it, consequently it became second nature to him. The other had it conferred on him for his zeal in procuring convictions of his own countrymen, and never having in his most enthusiastic dreams believed such a condition would come to pass—now that it was an accomplished fact, he naturally wanted all to know and respect it.

They were two distinct breeds of men.

Peg had occasionally met the type of the honoured lawyer. They sprang up as mushrooms over night during the pressure of the "Crimes Act," and were liberally rewarded by the government—some were even transferred to the English Bar. And they carried their blatant insistence even across the channel.

But the man of breeding who exacted nothing; of culture, who pretended not to have acquired it; of the real power and dignity of life, yet was simplicity itself in his manner to others—that kind of man was new to Peg.

She burned with shame as she thought of her leave-taking. What must Sir Gerald think of her?

Even to the end she was just the little "Irish nothin'," as she had justly, it seemed to her now, described herself to him. She had hurt and offended him. In that one rude, foolish, unnecessary question, "Are you goin' to propose too?" she had outraged common courtesy, and made it impossible for him to say even a friendly "Good bye" to her. She did not realise the full measure of the insult until afterwards. She had practically insinuated that he was following the somewhat sordid example of cousin Alaric and Montgomery Hawkes in proposing for her hand because, in a few years, she would benefit by her uncle's will. Such a suggestion was not only unworthy of her—it was an unforgivable thing to say to him. He had always treated her with the greatest courtesy and consideration, and because he did not flaunt his gentility before her, she had taken unwarranted umbrage and had said something that raised an impassable barrier between them.

All the way across the Atlantic poor lonely Peg had many opportunities of reviewing that brief glimpse of English life. She felt now how wrong her attitude had been to the whole of the Chichester family. She had judged them at first sight. She had resolved that they were just selfish, inconsiderate, characterless people. On reflection, she determined that they were not. And even if they had been, why should Peg have been their accuser? And after all, is there not an element of selfishness in every nature? Was Peg herself entirely immune?

And in a family with traditions to look back on and live up to, have they not a greater right to being self-centred than the plebeian with nothing to look back on or forward to? And, all things considered, is not selfishness a thoroughly human and entirely natural feeling? What right had she to condemn people wholesale for feeling and practising it?

These were the sum and substance of Peg's self-analysis during the first days of her voyage home.

Then the thought came to her,—were the Chichesters really selfish? Now that she had been told the situation, she knew that her aunt had undertaken her training to protect Ethel and Alaric from distress and humiliation. She realised how distasteful it must have been to a lady of Mrs. Chichester's nature and position to have occasion to receive into her house, amongst her own family, such a girl as Peg. And she had not made it easy for her aunt. She had regarded the family as being allied against her.

Was it not largely her own fault if they had been? Peg's sense of justice was asserting itself.

The thought of Alaric flashed through her mind, and with it came a little pang of regret for the many occasions she had made fun of him—and in his mother's presence. His proposal to her had its pathetic as well as its humorous side. To save his family he would have deliberately thrown away his own chance of happiness by marrying her. Yet he would have done it willingly and cheerfully and, from what she had seen of the little man, he would have lived up to his obligations honourably and without a murmur.

Alaric's sense of relief at her refusal of him suddenly passed before her, and she smiled broadly as she saw, in a mental picture, his eager and radiant little face as he thanked her profusely for being so generous as to refuse him. Looking back, Alaric was by no means as contemptible as he had appeared at first sight. He had been coddled too much. He needed the spur of adversity and the light of battle with his fellowmen. Experience and worldly wisdom could make him a useful and worthy citizen, since fundamentally there was nothing seriously wrong with him.

Peg's outlook on life was distinctly becoming clarifled.

Lastly, she thought of Ethel. Poor, unhappy, lonely Ethel! In her little narrow ignorance, Peg had taken an intense dislike to her cousin from the beginning. Once or twice she had made friendly overtures to Ethel, and had always been repulsed. She placed Ethel in the category of selfish English-snobdom that she had heard and read about and now, apparently, met face to face. Then came the vivid experience at night when Ethel laid bare her soul pitilessly and torrentially for Peg to see. With it came the realisation of the heart-ache and misery of this outwardly contented and entirely unemotional young lady. Beneath the veneer of repression and convention Peg saw the fires of passion blazing in Ethel, and the cry of revolt and hatred against her environment. But for Peg she would have thrown away her life on a creature such as Brent because there was no one near her to understand and to pity and to succour.

Peg shuddered as she thought of the rash act Ethel had been saved from—blackening her life in the company of that satyr.

How many thousands of girls were there in England today, well-educated, skilled in the masonry of society—to all outward seeming perfectly contented, awaiting their final summons to the marriage-market—the culmination of their brief, inglorious careers. Yet if one could penetrate beneath the apparent calm, one might find boiling in THEIR blood and beating in THEIR brains the same revolt that had driven Ethel to the verge of the Dead Sea of lost hopes and vain ambitions—the vortex of scandal.

When from time to time a girl of breeding and of family elopes with an under-servant or a chauffeur, the unfortunate incident is hushed up and the parents attribute the unhappy occurrence primarily to some mental or moral twist in the young lady. They should seek the fault in their own hearts and lives. It is the home life of England that is responsible for a large portion of the misery that drives the victims to open revolt. The children are not taught from the time they can first speak to be perfectly frank and honest about everything they think and feel. They are too often left in the care of servants at an age when parental influence has the greatest significance. On the rare occasions when they are permitted to enter the august presence of their parents, they are often treated with a combination of tolerant affection and imperial severity. Small wonder the little ones in their development to adolescence evade giving confidences that have neither been asked for nor encouraged. They have to learn the great secrets of life and of nature from either bitter experience or from the lips of strangers. Children and parents grow up apart. It often takes a convulsion of nature or a devastating scandal to awaken the latter to the full realisation of their responsibility.

During their talk the morning following that illuminating incident, Peg learned more of Ethel's real nature than she had done in all of the four weeks she had seen and listened to her daily.

She had opened her heart to Peg, and the two girls had mingled confidences. If they had only begun that way, what a different month it might have been for both! Peg resolved to watch Ethel's career from afar: to write to her constantly: and to keep fresh and green the memory of their mutual regard.

At times there would flash through Peg's mind—what would her future in America be—with her father? Would he be disappointed? He so much wanted her to be provided for that the outcome of her visit abroad would be, of a certainty, in the nature of a severe shock to him. What would be the outcome? How would he receive her? And what had all the days to come in store for her with memory searching back to the days that were? She had a longing now for education: to know the essential things that made daily intercourse possible between people of culture. She had been accustomed to look on it as affectation. Now she realised that it was as natural to those who had acquired the masonry of gentle people as her soft brogue and odd, blunt, outspoken ways were to her.

From, now on she would never more be satisfied with life as it was of old. She had passed through a period of awakening; a searchlight had been turned on her own shortcomings and lack of advantages. She had not been conscious of them before, since she had been law unto herself. But now a new note beat in on her. It was as though she had been colour-blind and suddenly had the power of colour-differentiation vouchsafed her and looked out on a world that dazzled by its new-found brilliancy. It was even as though she had been tone-deaf and, by a miracle, had the gift of sweet sounds given her, and found herself bathed in a flow of sweet music. She was bewildered. Her view of life had changed. She would have to rearrange her outlook by her experience if she hoped to find happiness.

And always as she brooded and argued with and criticised herself and found things to admire in what had hitherto been wrong to her—always the face of Jerry rose before her and the sound of his voice came pleasantly to her ears and the memory of his regard touched gently at her heart, and the thought of her final mistake burnt and throbbed in her brain.

And with each pulsation of the giant engines she was carried farther and farther away froze the scene of her first romance. One night she made her "farewell" to England and all it contained that had played a part in her life.

It was the night before she reached New York.

As she came nearer and nearer to America, the thought of one who was waiting for her—who had never shown anger or resentment toward her—whatever she did; who had never shown liking for any but her; who had always given her the love of his heart and the fruit of his brain; who had sheltered and taught and loved and suffered for her,—rose insistently before her and obliterated all other impressions and all other memories.

As she spoke her "farewell" to England, Peg turned her little body toward the quickly nearing shores of America and thanked God that waiting to greet her would be her father, and entreated Him that he would be spared to her, and that when either should die that she might be called first; that life without him would be barren and terrible! and above all, she pleaded that He would keep her little heart loyal always to her childhood hero, and that no other should ever supplant her father in her love and remembrance.

When she awoke nest day amid the bustle of the last morning on board, it seemed that her prayer had been answered.

Her farewell to England was indeed final.

She had only one thought uppermost—she was going to see her father.



BOOK V

PEG RETURNS TO HER FATHER

CHAPTER I

AFTER MANY DAYS

Frank O'Connell stood on the quay that morning in July, and watched the great ship slowly swing in through the heads, and his heart beat fast as he waited impatiently while they moored her.

His little one had come back to him.

His fears were at rest.

She was on board that floating mass of steel and iron, and the giant queen of the water had gallantly survived storm and wave and was nestling alongside the pier.

Would she be the same Peg? That was the thought beating through him as he strained his eyes to see the familiar and beloved little figure. Was she coming back to him—transformed by the magic wand of association—a great lady? He could scarcely believe that she WOULD, yet he had a half-defined fear in his soul that she might not be the same.

One thing he made up his mind to—never again would he think of separation. Never again would he argue her into agreeing to go away from him. He had learned his lesson and by bitter experience. Never again until SHE wished it.

Amid the throngs swarming down the gangways he suddenly saw his daughter, and he gave a little gasp of surprised pleasure, and a mist swam before his eyes and a great lump came into his throat and his heart beat as a trip-hammer. It was the same Peg that had gone away a month ago. The same little black suit and the hat with the berries and the same bag and "Michael" in her arms.

Their meeting was extraordinary. It was quite unlike what either had supposed it would be. There was a note of strangeness in each. There was—added to the fulness of the heart—an aloofness—a feeling that, in the passage of time, life had not left either quite the same.

How often that happens to two people who have shared the intimacy of years and the affection of a lifetime! After a separation of even a little while, the break in their joint-lives, the influence of strangers, and the quick rush of circumstance during their parting, creates a feeling neither had ever known. The interregnum had created barriers that had to be broken down before the old relationship could be resumed.

O'Connell and Peg made the journey home almost in silence. They sat hand in hand in the conveyance whilst Peg's eyes looked at the tall buildings as they flashed past her, and saw the daring advertisements on the boardings and listened to the ceaseless roar of the traffic.

All was just as she had left it.

Only Peg had changed.

New York seemed a Babel after the quiet of that little north of England home. She shivered as thoughts surged in a jumbled mass through her brain.

They reached O'Connell's apartment.

It had been made brilliant for Peg's return.

There were additions to the meagre furnishings Peg had left behind. Fresh pictures were on the walls. There were flowers everywhere.

O'Connell watched Peg anxiously as she looked around. How would she feel toward her home when she contrasted it with what she had just left?

His heart bounded as he saw Peg's face brighten as she ran from one object to another and commented on them.

"It's the grand furniture we have now, father!"

"Do ye like it, Peg?"

"That I do. And it's the beautiful picture of Edward Fitzgerald ye have on the wall there!"

"Ye mind how I used to rade ye his life?"

"I do indade. It's many's the tear I've shed over him and Robert Emmet."

"Then ye've not forgotten?"

"Forgotten what?"

"All ye learned as a child and we talked of since ye grew to a girl?"

"I have not. Did ye think I would?"

"No, Peg, I didn't. Still, I was wondherin'—"

"What would I be doin' forgettin' the things ye taught me?"

He looked at her and a whimsical note came in his voice and the old look twinkled in his eyes.

"It's English I thought ye'd be by now. Ye've lived so long among the Saxons."

"English! is it?" And her tone rang with disgust and her look was one of disdain. "English ye thought I'd be! Sure, ye ought to know me betther than that!"

"I do, Peg. I was just tasin' ye."

"An' what have ye been doin' all these long days without me?"

He raised the littered sheets of his manuscript and showed them to her.

"This."

She looked over her shoulder and read:

"From 'BUCK-SHOT' to 'AGRICULTURAL ORGANISATION.' "THE HISTORY OF A GENERATION OF ENGLISH MISRULE, by Frank Owen O'Connell."

She looked up proudly at her father.

"It looks wondherful, father."

"I'll rade it to you in the long evenin's now we're together again."

"Do, father."

"And we won't separate any more, Peg, will we?"

"We wouldn't have this time but for you, father."

"Is it sorry ye are that ye went?"

"I don't know. I'm sorry o' coorse, and GLAD, too, in some ways."

"What made yez come back so sudden-like?"

"I only promised to stay a month."

"Didn't they want ye any longer?"

"In one way they did, an' in another they didn't. It's a long history—that's what it is. Let us sit down here as we used in the early days and I'll tell ye the whole o' the happenin's since I left ye."

She made him comfortable as had been her wont before, and, sitting on the little low stool at his feet, she told him the story of her month abroad and the impelling motive of her return.

She softened some things and omitted others—Ethel entirely. That episode should be locked forever in Peg's heart.

Jerry she touched on lightly.

O'Connell asked her many questions about him, remembering the tone of her later letters. And all the time he never took his eyes from her face, and he marked how it shone with a warm glow of pleasure when Jerry's name occurred, and how the gleam died away and settled into one of sadness when she spoke of her discovery that he had a title.

"They're queer people, the English, Peg."

"They are, father."

"They're cool an' cunnin' an' crafty, me darlin'."

"Some o' them are fine an' honourable an' clever too, father."

"Was this fellow that called himself 'Jerry'—an' all the while was a Lord—that same?"

"Ivery bit of it, father."

"And he trated ye dacent-like?"

"Sure, I might have been a LADY, the way he behaved to me."

"Did he iver smile at ye?"

"Many's the time."

"Do ye remember the proverb I taught ye as a child?"

"Which wun, father? I know a hundred, so I do."

"'Beware the head of a bull, the heels of a horse, of the smile of an Englishman!'"

He paused and looked at her keenly.

"Do you remember that, Peg?"

"I do. There are Englishmen AND Englishmen. There are PLENTY o' bad Irish, and by the same token there are SOME good Englishmen. An' he is wun o' them."

"Why didn't he tell ye he was a Lord?"

"He didn't think it necessary. Over there they let ye gather from their manner what they are. They don't think it necessary to be tellin' everyone."

"It's the strange ones they are, Peg, to be rulin' us."

"Some day, father, they'll go over to Ireland and learn what we're really like, and then they'll change everything. Jerry said that."

"They've begun to already. Sure, there's a man named Plunkett has done more in a few years than all the governments have accomplished in all the years they've been blunderin' along tryin' to thrample on us. An' sure, Plunkett has a title, too!"

"I know, father. Jerry knows him and often spoke of him."

"Did he, now?"

"He did. He said that so long as the English government 'ud listen to kindly, honourable men like Plunkett, there was hope of makin' Ireland a happy, contented people, an' Jerry said—"

"It seems Misther Jerry must have said a good deal to yez."

"Oh, he did. Sure, it was HE started me learnin' things, an' I am goin' on learnin' now, father. Let us both learn."

"What?" cried the astonished father.

"O' coorse, I know ye have a lot o' knowledge, but it's the little FINE things we Irish have got to learn. An' they make life seem so much bigger an' grander by bein' considerate an' civil an' soft-spoken to each other. We've let the brutality of all the years that have gone before eat into us, and we have thrown off all the charm and formality of life, and in their place adopted a rough and crude manner to each other that does not come really from our hearts, but from the memory of our wrongs."

Unconsciously Peg had spoken as she had heard Jerry so often speak when he discussed the Irish. She had lowered her voice and concluded with quiet strength and dignity. The contrast to the beginning of the speech was electrical. O'Connell listened amazed.

"Did the same Jerry say that?"

"He did, father. An' much more. He knows Ireland well, an' loves it. Many of his best friends are Irish—an'—"

"Wait a minnit. Have I ever been 'rough an' crude' in me manner to you, Peg?"

"Never, father. But, faith, YOU ought to be a Lord yerself. There isn't one o' them in England looks any betther than you do. It's in their MANNER that they have the advantage of us."

"And where would I be gettin' the manner of a Lord, when me father died the poorest peasant in the village, an' me brought up from hand to mouth since I was a child?"

"I'm sorry I said anythin', father. I wasn't reproachin' ye."

"I know that, Peg."

"I'm so proud of ye that yer manner manes more to me than any man o' title in England."

He drew her gently to him.

"There's the one great danger of two people who have grown near to each other separatin'. When they, meet again, they each think the other has changed. They look at each other with different eyes, Peg. An' that's what yer doin' with me. So long as I was near ye, ye didn't notice the roughness o' me speech an' the lack o' breedin' an' the want o' knowledge. Ye've seen and listened to others since who have all I never had the chance to get. God knows I want YOU to have all the advantages that the wurrld can give ye, since you an' me counthry—an' the memory of yer mother—are all I have had in me life these twenty years past. An' that was why I urged ye to go to England on the bounty of yer uncle. I wanted ye to know there was another kind of a life, where the days flowed along without a care or a sorrow. Where poverty was but a word, an' misery had no place. An' ye've seen it, Peg. An' the whole wurrld has changed for ye, Peg. An' from now you'll sit in judgment on the dead and gone days of yer youth—an' in judgment on me—"

She interrupted him violently:

"What are ye sayin' to me at all! I sit in judgment on YOU! What do ye think I've become? Let me tell ye I've come back to ye a thousand times more yer child than I was when I left ye. What I've gone through has only strengthened me love for ye and me reverence for yer life's work. I MAY have changed. But don't we all change day by day, even as we pass them close to each other. An' if the change is for the betther, where's the harm? I HAVE changed, father. There's somethin' wakened in me I never knew before. It's a WOMAN I've brought ye back instead o' the GIRL I left. An' it's the WOMAN'LL stand by ye, father, even as the child did when I depended on ye for every little thing. There's no power in the wurrld'll ever separate us!"

She clung to him hysterically.

Even while she protested the most, he felt the strange new note in her life. He held her firmly and looked into her eyes.

"There's one thing, Peg, that must part us, some day, when it comes to you."

"What's that, father?"

"LOVE, Peg."

She lowered her eyes and said nothing.

"Has it come? Has it, Peg?"

She buried her face on his breast, and though no sound came, he knew by the trembling of her little body that she was crying.

So it HAD come into her life.

The child he had sent away a month ago had come back to him transformed in that little time—into a woman.

The Cry of Youth and the Call of Life had reached her heart.



CHAPTER II

LOOKING BACKWARD

That night Peg and her father faced the future. They argued out all it might mean. They would fight it together. It was a pathetic, wistful little Peg that came back to him, and O'Connell set himself the task of lifting something of the load that lay on his child's heart.

After all, he reasoned with her, with all his gentility and his advantages to have allowed Peg to like him and then to deliberately hurt her at the end, just as she was leaving, for a fancied insult, did not augur well for the character of Jerry.

He tried to laugh her out of her mood.

He chided her for joking with an Englishman at a critical moment such as their leave-taking.

"And it WAS a joke, Peg, wasn't it?"

"Sure, it was, father."

"You ought to have known betther than that. During all that long month ye were there did ye meet one Englishman that ever saw a joke?"

"Not many, father. Cousin Alaric couldn't."

"Did ye meet ONE?"

"I did, father."

"Ye did?"

"I did."

"THERE was a man whose friendship ye might treasure."

"I do treasure it, father."

"Ye do?"

"Yes, father."

"Who was it?"

"Jerry, father."

O'Connell took a long breath and sighed.

Jerry! Always Jerry!

"I thried several jokes on him, an' he saw most of 'em."

"I'd like to see this paragon, faith."

"I wish ye could, father. Indade I do. Ye'd be such good friends."

"WE'D be friends? Didn't ye say he was a GINTLEMAN?"

"He sez a GENTLEMAN is a man who wouldn't willingly hurt anybody else. And he sez, as well, that it doesn't matther what anybody was born, if they have that quality in them they're just as much gintleman as the people with ancestors an' breedin'. An' he said that the finest gintleman he ever met was a CABMAN."

"A cabman, Peg?"

"Yes, faith—that's what he said. The cabman couldn't hurt anybody, and so he was a gintlemaa."

"Did he mane it?"

"He meant everything he said—to ME."

"There isn't much the matther with him, I'm thinkin'."

"There's nothin' the matther with him, father."

"Mebbe he is Irish way back. It's just what an Irishman would say—a RALE Irishman."

"There's no nationality in character or art, or sport or letthers or music. They're all of one great commonwealth. They're all one brotherhood, whether they're white or yellow or red or black. There's no nationality about them. The wurrld wants the best, an' they don't care what colour the best man is, so long as he's GREAT."

O'Connell listened amazed.

"An' where might ye have heard that?"

"Jerry towld me. An' it's thrue. I believe it."

They talked far into the night.

He unfolded his plans.

If his book was a success and he made some little money out of it, they would go back to Ireland and live out their lives there. And it was going to be a wonderful Ireland, too, with the best of the old and ceaseless energy of the new.

An Ireland worth living in.

They would make their home there again, and this time they would not leave it.

"But some day we might go to England, father, eh?"

"What for?"

"Just to see it, father."

"I was only there once. It was there yer mother an' me were married. It was there she gave her life into me care."

He became suddenly silent, and the light of memory shone in his eyes, and the sigh of heart-ache broke through his lips.

And his thoughts stretched back through the years, and once again Angela was beside him.

Peg saw the look and knew it. She kept quite still. Then, as of old, when her father was in trouble, she did as she was wont in those old-young days—she slipped her little hand into his and waited for him to break the silence.

After a while he stood up.

"Ye'd betther be goin' to bed, Peg."

"All right, father."

She went to the door. Then she stopped.

"Ye're glad I'm home, father?"

He pressed her closely to him for answer.

"I'll never lave ye again," she whispered.

All through the night Peg lay awake, searching through the past and trying to pierce through the future.

Toward morning she slept and, in a whirling dream she saw a body floating down a stream. She stretched out her hand to grasp it when the eyes met hers, and the eyes were those of a dead man—and the man was Jerry.

She woke trembling with fear and she turned on the light and huddled into a chair and sat chattering with terror until she heard her father moving in his room. She went to the door and asked him to let her go in to him. He opened the door and saw his little Peg wild eyed, pale and terror-stricken, standing on the threshold. The look in her eyes terrified him.

"What is it, Peg, me darlin'? What is it?"

She crept in, and looked up into his face with her startling gaze, and she grasped him with both of her small hands, and in a voice dull and hopeless, cried despairingly:

"I dreamt he was dead! Dead! and I couldn't rache him. An' he went on past me—down the stream—with his face up-turned—" The grasp loosened, and just as she slipped from him, O'Connell caught her in his strong arms and placed her gently on the sofa and tended her until her eyes opened again and looked up at him.

It was the first time his Peg had fainted.

She had indeed come back to him changed.

He reproached himself bitterly.

Why had he insisted on her going?

She had a sorrow at her heart, now, that no hand could heal—not even his.

Time only could soften her grief—time—and—



CHAPTER III

AN UNEXPECTED VISITOR

Those first days following Peg's return found father and child nearer each other than they had been since that famous trip through Ireland, when he lectured from the back of his historical cart.

She became O'Connell's amanuensis. During the day she would go from library to library in New York, verifying data for her father's monumental work. At night he would dictate and she would write. O'Connell took a newer and more vital interest in the book, and it advanced rapidly toward completion.

It was a significant moment to introduce it, since the eyes of the world were turned on the outcome of the new measure for Home Rule for Ireland, that Mr. Asquith's government were introducing, and that appeared to have every chance of becoming law.

The dream of so many Irishmen seemed to be within the bounds of possibility of becoming a forceful reality.

Accordingly O'Connell strained every nerve to complete it. He reviewed the past; he dwelt on the present: he attempted to forecast the future. And with every new page that he completed he felt it was one more step nearer home—the home he was hoping for and building on for Peg—in Ireland.

There the colour would come back to her cheeks, the light to her eyes and the flash of merriment to her tongue. She rarely smiled now, and the pallor was always in her cheeks, and wan circles pencilled around her eyes spoke of hard working days and restless nights.

She no longer spoke of England.

He, wise in his generation, never referred to it. All her interest seemed to be centred in his book.

It was a strange metamorphosis for Peg—this writing at dictation: correcting her orthography; becoming familiar with historical facts and hunting through bookshelves for the actual occurrences during a certain period.

And she found a certain happiness in doing it.

Was it not for her father?

And was she not improving herself?

Already she would not be at such a disadvantage, as a month ago, with people.

The thought gratified her.

She had two letters from Ethel: the first a simple, direct one of gratitude and of regret; gratitude for Peg's kindness and loyalty to her, and regret that Peg had left them. The second told of a trip she was about to make to Norway with some friends.

They were going to close the house in Scarboro and return to London early in September.

Alaric had decided to follow his father's vocation and go to the bar. The following Autumn they would settle permanently in London while Alaric ate his qualifying dinners and addressed himself to making his career!

Of Brent she wrote nothing. That incident was apparently closed. She ended her letter with the warmest expressions of regard and affection for Peg, and the hope that some day they would meet again and renew their too-brief intimacy. The arrival of these letters and her daily 'deviling' for her father were the only incidents in her even life.

One evening some few weeks after her return, she was in her room preparing to begin her night's work with her father when she heard the bell ring. That was unusual. Their callers were few. She heard the outer door open—then the sound of a distant voice mingling with her father's.

Then came a knock at her door.

"There's somebody outside here to see ye, Peg," said her father.

"Who is it, father?"

"A perfect sthranger—to me. Be quick now."

She heard her father's footsteps go into the little sitting-room and then the hum of voices.

Without any apparent reason she suddenly felt a tenseness and nervousness. She walked out of her room and paused a moment outside the closed door of the sitting-room and listened.

Her father was talking. She opened the door and walked in. A tall, bronzed man came forward to greet her. Her heart almost stopped. She trembled violently. The next moment Jerry had clasped her hand in both of his.

"How are you, Peg?"

He smiled down at her as he used to in Regal Villa: and behind the smile there was a grave look in his dark eyes, and the old tone of tenderness in his voice.

"How are you, Peg?" he repeated.

"I'm fine, Mr. Jerry," she replied in a daze. Then she looked at O'Connell and she hurried on to say:

"This is my father—Sir Gerald Adair."

"We'd inthroduced ourselves already," said O'Connell, good-naturedly, eyeing the unexpected visitor all the while. "And what might ye be doin' in New York?" he asked.

"I have never seen America. I take an Englishman's interest in what we once owned—"

"—And lost thro' misgovernment—"

"—Well, we'll say MISUNDERSTANDING—"

"—As they'll one day lose Ireland—"

"—I hope not. The two countries understand each other better every day."

"It's taken centuries to do it."

"The more lasting will be the union."

As Peg watched Jerry she was wondering all the time why he was there. This quiet, undemonstrative, unemotional man. Why?

The bell rang again. Peg started to go, but O'Connell stopped her.

"It's McGinnis. This is his night to call and tell me the politics of the town. I'll take him into the next room, Peg, until yer visitor is gone."

"Oh, please—" said Jerry hurriedly and taking a step toward the door. "Allow me to call some other time."

"Stay where ye are!" cried O'Connell, hurrying out as the bell rang again.

Peg and Jerry looked at each other a moment, then she lowered her eyes.

"I want to ask ye something, Sir Gerald," she began.

"Jerry!" he corrected.

"Please forgive me for what I said to ye that day. It was wrong of me to say it. Yet it was just what ye might have expected from me. But ye'd been so fine to me—a little nobody—all that wonderful month that it's hurt me ever since. And I didn't dare write to ye—it would have looked like presumption from me. But now that ye've come here—ye've found me out and I want to ask yer pardon—an' I want to ask ye not to be angry with me."

"I couldn't be angry with you, Peg."

He paused, and, as he looked at her, the reserve of the held-in, self-contained man was broken. He bent over her and said softly:

"Peg, I love you!"

A cry welled up from Peg's heart to her lips, and was stifled. The room swam around her.

Was all her misery to end?

Did this man come back from the mists of memory BECAUSE he loved her?

She tried to speak but nothing came from her parched lips and tightened throat.

Then she became conscious that he was speaking again, and she listened to him with all her senses, with all her heart, and from her soul.

"I knew you would never write to me, and somehow I wondered just how much you cared for me—if at all. So I came here. I love you, Peg. I want you to be my wife. I want to care for you, and tend you, and make you happy. I love you!"

Her heart leaped and strained. The blood surged to her temples.

"Do you love me?" she whispered, and her voice trembled and broke.

"I do. Indeed I do. Be my wife."

"But you have a title," she pleaded

"Share it with me!" he replied.

"Ye'd be so ashamed o' me, ye would!"

"No, Peg, I'd be proud of you. I love you!"

Peg, unable to argue or plead, or strive against what her heart yearned for the most, broke down and sobbed as she murmured:

"I love you, too, Mister Jerry."

In a moment she was in his arms.

It was the first time anyone had touched her tenderly besides her father. All her sturdy, boyish ruggedness shrank from any display of affection. Just for a moment it did now. Then she slowly yielded herself.

But Jerry stroked her hair, and looked into her eyes and smiled down at her lovingly, as he asked:

"What will your father say?"

She looked happily up at him and answered:

"Do you know one of the first things me father taught me when I was just a little child?"

"Tell me!"

"It was from Tom Moore: 'Oh, there's nothin' half so sweet in life As Love's young dream.'"

When O'Connell came into the room later he realised that the great summons had come to his little girl.

He felt a dull pain at his heart.

But only for a moment.

The thought came to him that he was about to give to England his daughter in marriage! Well, had he not taken from the English one of her fairest daughters as his wife?

And a silent prayer went up from his heart that happiness would abide with his Peg and her 'Jerry' and that their romance would last longer than had Angela's and his.



AFTERWORD

And now the moment has come to take leave of the people I have lived with for so long. Yet, though I say "Adieu!" I feel it is only a temporary leave-taking. Their lives are so linked with mine that some day in the future I may be tempted to draw back the curtain and show the passage of years in their various lives.

Simultaneously with the Second-Reading of the Home Rule Bill passing through the English House of Commons, O'Connell published his book.

Setting down clearly, without passion or prejudice, the actual facts of the ancient and modern struggle for Ireland's freedom, and foreshadowing the coming of the New Era of prosperity and enlightenment and education and business integrity—O'Connell found himself hailed, as a modern prophet.

He appealed to them to BEG no longer but to cooperate, to organize—above all to WORK and to work consistently and intelligently. He appealed to the Irish working in factories and work-shops and in civil appointments in the great cities of the world, to come back to Ireland, and, once again to worship at the shrine of the beauty of God's Country! To open their eyes and their hearts to all the light and glory and wonder which God gives to the marvellous world He has made for humanity. To see the Dawn o'er mountain and lake; scent the grass and the incense of the flowers, and the sweet breath of the land. To grasp the real and tumultuous magnificence of their native country.

He appealed to all true Irishmen to take up their lives again in the land from which, they were driven, and to be themselves the progenitors of Ireland's New Nation.

It will not be long before his appeal will be answered and his prophecy fulfilled.

The Dawn of the New Ireland has begun to shed its light over the country, and the call of Patriotism will bring Irishmen from the farthest limits of the world, as it drove them away in the bitter time of blood and strife and ignorance and despotism.

Those days have passed. O'Connell was in the thick o the battle in his youth; in his manhood he now sees the fruit of the conflict.

Some day, with him, we will visit Peg in her English home, and see the marvels time and love have wrought upon her. But to those who knew her in the old days she is still the same Peg O' my Heart—resolute, loyal, unflinching, mingling the laugh with the tear—truth and honesty her bed-rock.

And whilst we are in London we will drop into the Law-Courts and hear Alaric Chichester, now Barrister-at-Law, argue his first case and show the possibility of following in his famous father's footsteps.

We will also visit Mrs. Chichester and hear of her little grand-child, born in Berlin, where her daughter, Ethel, met and married an attache at the Embassy, and has formed a salon in which the illustrious in the Diplomatic world foregather.

It will be a grateful task to revive old memories of those who formed the foreground of the life-story of one whose radiant presence shall always live in my memory: whose steadfastness and courage endeared her to all; whose influence on those who met her and watched her and listened to her was far-reaching, since she epitomized in her small body all that makes woman loveable and man supreme: honour, faith and Love!

Adieu! Peg O' my Heart!

THE END