"Don't disturb them, unless I can be of use," said Mr Wentworth. The look of the house, and the atmosphere of distress and anxiety about it, chilled him suddenly. His visions and hopes seemed guilty and selfish as he went slowly up those familiar steps and into the house, over which the shadow of death seemed already lying. He went by himself into the forsaken drawing-room, where two neglected candles were burning feebly in a corner, and the wistful sky looking in as if to ask why the domestic temple was thus left open and uncared for. After the first moment he went hastily to the windows, and drew down the blinds in a kind of tender impatience. He could not bear that anything in the world, even her father's danger, should discompose the sweet, good order of the place where Lucy's image dwelt. There was a chair and her basket of work, and on the little table a book marked with pencil-marks, such as youthful readers love to make; and by degrees that breath of Lucy lingering in the silent room overcame its dreariness, and the painful sense of desertion which had struck him at first. He hovered about that corner where her usual place was, feeling in his heart that Lucy in trouble was dearer, if possible, than Lucy in happiness, and hung over her chair, with a mixture of reverence and tenderness and yearning, which could never be expressed in words. It was the divinest phase of love which was in his mind at the moment; for he was not thinking of himself, but of her, and of how he could succour and comfort her, and interpose his own true heart and life between her and all trouble. It was at this moment that Lucy herself entered the room; she came in softly, and surprised him in the overflowing of his heart. She held out her hand to him as usual, and smiled, perhaps less brightly, but that of course arose from the circumstances of the house; and her voice was very measured and steady when she spoke, less variable than of old. What was it she said? Mr Wentworth unconsciously left the neighbourhood of that chair over which he had been bending, which, to tell the truth, he had leaned his head upon, lover-like, and perhaps even kissed for her sake, five minutes before, and grew red and grew pale with a strange revulsion and tumult of feeling. He could not tell what the difference was, or what it meant. He only felt in an instant, with a sense of the change that chilled him to the heart, as if somehow a wall of ice had risen between them. He could see her through the transparent veil, and hear her speak, and perceive the smile which cast no warmth of reflection on him; but in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, everything in heaven and earth was changed. Lucy herself, to her own consciousness, trembled and faltered, and felt as if her voice and her looks must betray an amount of emotion which she would have died rather than show; but then Lucy had rehearsed this scene before, and knew all she intended by it; whereas upon the Curate, in his little flush and overflow of tenderness, it fell like a sudden earthquake, rending his fair edifice of happiness asunder, and casting him out into unexpected darkness. Sudden confusion, mortification, even a sense of injury and bitterness, came swelling over his heart as he set a chair for her as far away as possible from the corner in which he had been indulging such vain and unwarrantable dreams.

"It happened yesterday," said Lucy; "we have not been quite able to make out what was the cause; at least I have not been able to find it out. The clerks at the office say it was something about—but that does not matter," she went on, with her sweet politeness: "you don't care for the details. I sometimes fancy Mary knows more than she tells me, and I think you are in her confidence, Mr Wentworth. But I am not going to ask you any questions. The doctors say he is not suffering so much as he seems to be. It is terrible to see him lie there not knowing any of us," said Lucy, with a tremble in her voice.

"But you thought him better some time ago?" said the Curate, whose words choked him, and who could not endure to speak.

"Yes, about six o'clock," said Lucy, "he tried to speak, and put Mary in a great fright, I cannot tell why. Would you be good enough, Mr Wentworth," she went on hastily, with a strange mixture of earnestness and coldness, "if you know of anything she is keeping secret, to bid her tell me? I am able to bear anything there may be to bear—surely as well as she is, who has had no trouble," said Lucy, softly; and for a moment she wavered in her fixed composure, and the wall of ice moved as if it might fall.

"Nor you?" said the Curate, bending anxiously forward to look into her eyes. He was inexpressibly moved and agitated by the inference, which perhaps no listener less intensely concerned would have drawn from what Lucy said. He could not bear that she should have any trouble which he might not do something to relieve her of.

"Oh, no, nor I," said Lucy, quickly, and in that moment the softening of tone disappeared entirely. "Mary will be pleased to see you, Mr Wentworth. I will go and relieve her presently. Papa is asleep just now, and I was down-stairs giving some directions when you came in. I wanted to ask you to look after that poor woman at No. 10. She still keeps living on, and I have not been able to see her today. She misses me when I don't go," said Lucy, with a very little unconscious sigh. "Would you see her, please, to-morrow, if you have time?"

"Yes, certainly," said the Curate; and then there was a pause. "Is there nothing but this that you will let me do for you?" he asked, trusting to his looks to show the heart, which at this moment he was so much tempted to disclose to her, but dared not. And even in all her trouble Lucy was too much of a woman to neglect an opportunity so tempting.

"Thank you," she said. "Yes, there are those poor little Bertrams I was to have seen today—if you would be so very good as to send some one to them." Lucy lifted her eyes only as she ended this little speech. She had meant it cruelly, to be sure, and the arrow had gone home; but when she met the look that was fixed on her after her little shaft was fired, Lucy's resolution faltered. The tears came rushing to her eyes so hot and rapid that she could not restrain them. Some trouble of her own gave poignancy to that outbreak of filial grief. "Papa is so very ill!" she said, with a sob, as a scalding drop fell upon her hand; and then got up suddenly, afraid of the consequences. But the Curate, mortified, wounded, and disheartened as he was, had no comprehension either of the bitterness or the relenting that was in Lucy's thoughts. Rosa Elsworthy did not so much as occur to him in all his confused wonderings. He went after her to the door, too much perplexed and distressed to be indignant, as his first impulse was. She turned half round, with a tremulous little inclination of her head, which was all the good-night she could venture on. But the young man was too much disturbed to permit this.

"You will give me your hand, surely," he said, taking it, and holding it fast—a hand so different from that weak woman's hand that clung to Gerald without any force to hold him, in Wentworth Rectory. Those reluctant fingers, so firm and so soft, which scorned any struggle to withdraw themselves, but remained passive in his with a more effectual protest still against his grasp, wrung the very heart of the Perpetual Curate. He let them go with a sigh of vexation and disappointment. "Since that is all I can do, I will do it," he said—"that or anything else." She had left him almost before the words were said; and it was in a very disconsolate mood that he turned back into the deserted drawing-room. To tell the truth, he forgot everything else for the moment, asking himself what it could mean; and walked about stumbling over the chairs, feeling all his little edifice of personal consolation falling to the winds, and not caring much though everything else should follow. He was in this state of mind when Miss Wodehouse came to him, moving with noiseless steps, as everybody did in the stricken house.

"Oh, Mr Wentworth, I am so glad you have come," said that mild woman, holding out both her hands to him. She was too much agitated to say anything more. She was not equal to the emergency, or any emergency, but sank down on a chair, and relieved herself by tears, while the Curate stood anxiously by, waiting for what she had to say to him. "My father is very ill," she said, like Lucy, through her crying; "I don't know what good anybody can do; but thank God you've come home—now I shall feel I have somebody to apply to, whatever happens," said poor Miss Wodehouse, drying the eyes that were suffused again the next moment. Her helpless distress did not overwhelm the spectator, like Lucy's restrained trouble, but that was natural enough.

"Tell me about it," said Mr Wentworth; "the cause—can I guess at the cause? it is something about your—"

"Oh hush! don't say his name," cried Miss Wodehouse. "Yes, yes, what else could it be? Oh, Mr Wentworth, will you close the door, please, and see that there's no one about. I dare not speak to you till I am sure there's no one listening; not that I suspect anybody of listening," said the distressed woman; "but one never knows. I am afraid it is all my fault," she continued, getting up suddenly to see that the windows were closed. "I ought to have sent him away, instead of putting my trouble upon you; and now he is in greater danger than ever. Oh, Mr Wentworth, I meant it for the best; and now, unless you can help us, I don't know what I am to do."

"I cannot help you unless you tell me what is wrong," said the Curate, making her sit down, and drawing a chair close to her. He took her hand, by way of compelling her attention—a fair, soft hand, too, in its restless, anxious way. He held it in a brotherly grasp, trying to restore her to coherence, and induce her to speak.

"I don't know enough about business to tell you," she said. "He was in danger when I threw him upon your charity; and oh, Mr Wentworth, thank you, thank you a thousand times, for taking him in like a brother. If Lucy only knew! But I don't feel as if I dared to tell her—and yet I sometimes think I ought, for your—I mean for all our sakes. Yes, I will try to explain it if I can; but I can't—indeed I don't understand," cried the poor lady, in despair. "It is something about a bill—it was something about a bill before; and I thought I could soften papa, and persuade him to be merciful; but it has all turned to greater wretchedness and misery. The first one was paid, you know, and I thought papa might relent;—but—don't cast us off, Mr Wentworth—don't go and denounce him; you might, but you will not. It would be justice, I acknowledge," cried the weeping woman; "but there is something higher than justice even in this world. You are younger than I am, and so is Lucy; but you are better than me, you young people, and you must be more merciful too. I have seen you going among the poor people and among the sick, and I could not have done it; and you won't forsake me—oh, Mr Wentworth, you won't forsake me, when you know that my trouble is greater than I can bear!"

"I will not forsake you," said the Curate; "but tell me what it is. I have been summoned to Carlingford by my brother, and I am bewildered and disturbed beyond what I can tell you—"

"By your brother?" said Miss Wodehouse, with her unfailing instinct of interest in other people. "I hope there is no trouble in your own family, Mr Wentworth. One gets so selfish when one is in great distress. I hope he is not ill. It sounds as if there was comfort in the very name of a brother," said the gentle woman, drying her tears, "and I hope it is so with you; but it isn't always so. I hope you will find he is better when you get home. I am very, very sorry to hear that you are in trouble too."

Mr Wentworth got up from his chair with a sigh of impatience. "Will nobody tell me what is the matter?" he said. "Mr Wodehouse is ill, and there is some mysterious cause for it; and you are miserable, and there is a cause for that too; and I am to do something to set things right without knowing what is wrong. Will you not tell me? What is it? Has your—"

"Oh, Mr Wentworth, don't say anybody's name—don't speak so loud. There may be a servant in the staircase or something," cried Miss Wodehouse. "I hear somebody coming now." She got up to listen, her face growing white with panic, and went a few steps towards the door, and then tottered into another chair, unable to command herself. A certain sick thrill of apprehension came over the Curate, too, as he hastened forward. He could not tell what he was afraid of, or whether it was only the accumulated agitation of the day that made him weak. Somebody was coming up the stairs, and towards the room, with a footstep more careless than those stealthy steps with which all the servants were stealing about the house. Whoever he was, he stopped at the door a moment, and then looked cautiously in. When he saw the figure of the Curate in the imperfect light, he withdrew his head again as if deliberating with himself, and then, with a sudden rush, came in, and shut the door after him. "Confound these servants, they're always prowling about the house," said the new-comer. He was an alarming apparition in his great beard and his shabbiness, and the fugitive look he had. "I couldn't help it," he broke forth, with a spontaneous burst of apology and self-defence. "I heard he was ill, and I couldn't keep quiet. How is he? You don't mean to say that's my fault. Molly, can't you speak to me? How could I tell I should find you and the parson alone here, and all safe? I might have been risking my—my—freedom—everything I care for; but when I heard he was ill, I couldn't stay quiet. Is he dying?—what's the matter? Molly, can't you speak?"

"Oh, Mr Wentworth, somebody will see him," cried Miss Wodehouse, wringing her hands. "Oh Tom, Tom, how could you do it? Suppose somebody was to come in—John or somebody. If you care for your own life, oh, go away, go away!"

"They can't touch my life," said the stranger, sullenly. "I daresay she doesn't know that. Nor the parson need not look superior—there are more people concerned than I; but if I've risked everything to hear, you may surely tell me how the old man is."

"If it was love that brought you," said poor Miss Wodehouse; "but oh, Tom, you know I can't believe that. He is very, very ill; and it is you that have done it," cried the mild woman, in a little gush of passion—"you whom he has forgiven and forgiven till his heart is sick. Go away, I tell you, go away from the house that you have shamed. Oh, Mr Wentworth, take him away," she cried, turning to the Curate with clasped hands—"tell him to hide—to fly—or he'll be taken: he will not be forgiven this time; and if my father—if my dear father dies—" But when she got so far her agitation interrupted her. She kept her eyes upon the door with a wild look of terror, and waved her helpless hands to warn the intruder away.

"If he dies, matters will be altered," said the stranger: "you and I might change places then, for that matter. I'm going away from Carlingford. I can't stay in such a wretched hole any longer. It's gout or something?" said the man, with a tone of nature breaking through his bravado—"it's not anything that has happened? Say so, and I'll never trouble you more."

"Oh, if Lucy were to see him!" said poor Miss Wodehouse. The words came unawares out of her heart without any thought; but the next thing of which she was conscious was that the Perpetual Curate had laid his hand on the stranger's arm, and was leading him reluctantly away. "I will tell you all you want to know," said Mr Wentworth, "but not here;" and with his hand upon the other's arm, moved him somehow with an irresistible command, half physical, half mental, to the door. Before Miss Wodehouse could say anything they were gone; before she could venture to draw that long sighing breath of relief, she heard the door below close, and the retreating footsteps in the garden. But the sound, thankful though she was, moved her to another burst of bitter tears. "To think I should have to tell a stranger to take him away," she sobbed, out of the anguish of her heart; and sat weeping over him with a relenting that wrung her tender spirit, without power to move till the servant came up with alarmed looks to ask if any one had come in in his absence. "Oh, no; it was only Mr Wentworth—and a—gentleman who came to fetch him," said Miss Wodehouse. And she got up, trembling as she was, and told John he had better shut up the house and go to bed. "For I hope papa will have a better night, and we must not waste our strength," she said, with a kind of woeful smile, which was a wonder to John. He said Miss Wodehouse was a tender-hearted one, to be sure, when he went down-stairs; but that was no very novel piece of information to anybody there.

Meantime the Curate went down Grange Lane with that strange lodger of Mrs Hadwin's, who had broken thus into Miss Wodehouse's solitude. They did not say much to each other as they went sullenly side by side down the silent road; for the stranger, whose feelings were not complicated by any very lively sense of gratitude, looked upon his companion as a kind of jailer, and had an unspeakable grudge against the man who exercised so calm an ascendancy over him; though to be sure it might have been difficult to resist the moral force of the Curate of St Roque's, who was three inches taller than himself, and had the unbroken vigour of youth and health to back him. As for Mr Wentworth, he went on without speaking, with a bitterness in his heart not to be expressed. His own personal stronghold of happiness and consolation had shattered in pieces in that evening's interview; and as he went to his own house he asked himself what he should find in it? This wretched man, with whose sins he had been hitherto but partially acquainted; and Jack, with whom the other had heaven knew what horrible connection. Should he find a den of thieves where he had left only high thoughts and lofty intentions? It was thus, after his three days' absence, that he returned home.



CHAPTER XXII.

When Mr Wentworth entered Mrs Hadwin's garden in the dark, his first glance up at the house showed him that a certain change had passed on it also. The decorous little house had been turned inside out. The windows of his own sitting-room were open, the blind drawn up to the top, and in addition to his usual lamp some candles were flaring wildly in the draught. He could see into the room as he paused at the garden-door, and was able to distinguish that the table was still covered as for dinner, and to catch the purple gleam of the light in the claret-jug which occupied the place of honour; but nobody was visible in the room. That wildly-illuminated and open apartment stood in strange contrast with the rest of the house, where everything was dark, save in Mrs Hadwin's own chamber. The Curate proceeded on his way, after that moment's pause, with hasty and impatient steps. On the way up he encountered Sarah the housemaid, who stopped in the middle of the stairs to make a frightened little curtsy, and utter an alarmed "La!" of recognition and surprise. But Sarah turned round as soon as she had recovered herself, to say that her missis wanted very bad to see Mr Wentworth as soon as he came home; but she was gone up to bed now, and didn't he think it would be a pity to wake her up? The Curate gave her only a little nod of general acquiescence, as he hurried on; but felt, notwithstanding, that this prompt request, ready prepared for his arrival, was a tacit protest against his guests, and expression of disapproval. Mrs Hadwin was only his landlady, an old woman, and not a particularly wise one, but her disapproval vexed the Perpetual Curate. It was a kind of sign of the times—those times in which it appeared that everybody was ready to turn upon him and embarrass his path. He had forgotten all about his companion as he hurried into the familiar room which was so little like itself, but yet was somehow conscious with annoyance that the stranger followed him through its half-shut door. The scene within was one which was never effaced from Mr Wentworth's memory. There were several bottles upon the table, which the poor Curate knew by sight, and which had been collected in his little cellar more for the benefit of Wharfside than of himself. Removed out of the current of air which was playing freely through the apartment, was some one lying on a sofa, with candles burning on a table beside him. He was in a dressing-gown, with his shirt open at the throat, and his languid frame extended in perfect repose to catch the refreshment of the breeze. Clouds of languid smoke, which were too far out of the way to feel the draught between the windows, curled over him: he had a cigar in one hand, which he had just taken from his lips, and with which he was faintly waving off a big night-moth which had been attracted by the lights; and a French novel, unmistakable in its paper cover, had closed upon the other. Altogether a more languid figure never lay at rest in undisturbed possession of the most legitimate retirement. He had the Wentworth hair, the golden-brown, which, like all their other family features, even down to their illnesses, the race was proud of, and a handsome silky beard. He had lived a hard life of pleasure and punishment; but though he had reached middle age, there was not a hair on the handsome reprobate's head which had changed out of its original colour. He looked languidly up when the door opened, but did not stop the delicate fence which he was carrying on against the moth, nor the polyglot oaths which he was swearing at it softly half under his breath.

"Frank, I suppose," he said, calmly, as the Curate came hastily forward. "How d'ye do? I am very glad you've come back. The country was very charming the first day, but that's a charm that doesn't last. I suppose you've dined: or will you ring and order something?" he said, turning slowly round on his sofa. "Accidente! the thing will kill itself after all. Would you mind catching it in your handkerchief before you sit down? But don't take away the candles. It's too late to make any exertion," said the elegant prodigal, leaning back languidly on his sofa; "but I assure you that light is half my life."

The Curate was tired, heated, and indignant. He lifted the candles away from the table, and then put them back again, too much excited to think of the moth. "Your arrival must have been very sudden," he said, throwing himself into the nearest chair. "I was very much surprised by your message. It looks inhospitable, but I see you make yourself quite at home—"

"Perfectly," said the elder brother, resuming his cigar. "I always do. It is much more agreeable for all parties. But I don't know how it is that a man's younger brothers are always so rapid and unreasonable in their movements. Instead of saving that unhappy insect, you have precipitated its fate. Poor thing—and it had no soul," said the intruder, with a tone of pathos. The scene altogether was a curious one. Snugly sheltered from the draught, but enjoying the coolness of the atmosphere which it produced, lay the figure on the sofa at perfect ease and leisure, with the light shed brightly upon him, on his shining beard, the white cool expanse of linen at his breast, and the bright hues of his dressing-gown. Near him, fatigued, dusty, indignant, and perplexed, sat the Curate, with the night air playing upon him, and moving his disordered hair on his forehead; while at the other end of the room hovered the stranger who had followed Mr Wentworth—a broad, shabby, indistinct figure, who stood with his back to the others, looking vaguely out of the window into the darkness. Over these two the night air blew with no small force between the open windows, making the candles on the centre table flare wildly, and flapping the white tablecloth. An occasional puff from the cigar floated now and then across the room. It was a pause before the storm.

"I was about to say," said the Perpetual Curate, "that though it might seem inhospitable, the first thing I had to ask was, What brought you here—and why did you send for me?"

"Don't be abrupt, pray," said Jack, taking his cigar from his mouth, and slightly waving the hand that held it. "Don't let us plunge into business all at once. You bring a sense of fatigue into the room with you, and the atmosphere was delightful a little while ago. I flatter myself I know how to enjoy the cool of the evening. Suppose you were to—ah—refresh yourself a little," he said, with a disapproving glance at his brother's dusty boots, "before we begin to talk of our affairs."

The Curate of St Roque's got up from his chair, feeling that he had an unchristian inclination to kick the heir of the Wentworths. As he could not do that, he shut the window behind him emphatically, and extinguished the flaring candles on the centre table. "I detest a draught," said the Perpetual Curate, which, unfortunately, was not a statement entirely founded on fact, though so far true in the present instance that he hated anything originated by the intruder. "I have hurried home in reply to your message, and I should be glad to know what it means, now that I am here—what you are in trouble about—and why you come to me—and what you have to do with him?"

"But you need not have deranged the temperature," said Jack. "Impetuosity always distresses me. All these are questions which it will take some time to answer. Let me persuade you, in the first place, to make yourself comfortable. Don't mind me; I am at the crisis of my novel, which is very interesting. I have just been thinking how it might be adapted for the stage—there's a character that Fechter could make anything of. Now, my dear fellow, don't stand on ceremony. Take a bath and change your dress, and in the mean time there will be time to cook something—the cookery here is not bad for the country. After that we'll discuss all our news. I daresay our friend there is in no hurry," said the elder brother, opening his book and puffing slowly towards the Curate the languid smoke of his cigar.

"But, by Jove, I am in a hurry, though," said that nameless individual, coming forward. "It's all very well for you: you put a man up to everything that's dangerous, and then you leave him in the lurch, and say it don't matter. I daresay it don't matter to you. All that you've done has been to share the profit—you've nothing to do with the danger; but I'm savage to-night, and I don't mean to stand it any more," said the stranger, his great chest expanding with a panting breath. He, too, looked as if he would have liked to seize the languid spectator in his teeth and shake some human feeling into him. Jack Wentworth raised his eyebrows and looked at him, as he might have looked at a wild beast in a rage.

"Sit down, savage, and be quiet," he said. "Why should I trouble myself about you?—any fool could get into your scrape. I am not in the habit of interfering in a case of common crime. What I do, I do out of pity," he continued, with an air of superiority, quite different from his tone to his brother. But this look, which had answered before, was not successful to-night.

"By Jove, I am savage!" said the other, setting his teeth, "and I know enough of your ways to teach you different behaviour. The parson has treated me like a gentleman—like what I used to be, though he don't like me; but you!—By Jove! It was only my own name I signed, after all," he continued, after a pause, lowering his voice; "but you, you blackleg—"

"Stop a little," said the Curate, rising up. "Though you seem both to have forgotten it, this is my room. I don't mean to have any altercations here. I have taken you in for the sake of your—family," said Mr Wentworth, with a momentary gasp, "and you have come because you are my brother. I don't deny any natural claims upon me; but I am master of my own house and my own leisure. Get up, Jack, and tell me what you want. When I understand what it is, you can lounge at your will; but in the mean time get up and explain: and as for you, Wodehouse—"

Jack Wentworth faced round on his sofa, and then, with a kind of involuntary motion, slid his feet to the ground. He looked at his brother with extreme amazement as he closed his novel and tossed away the end of his cigar. "It's much better not to mention names," he said, in a half-apologetic way. "Our friend here is under a temporary cloud. His name, in fact, is—Smith, I think." But as he spoke he sat upright, a little startled to find that Frank, whom he remembered only as a lad, was no longer to be coerced and concussed. As for the other, he came forward with the alacrity of a man who began to see some hope.

"By Jove, my name is Wodehouse, though," he said, in the argumentative tone which seemed habitual to him; his voice came low and grumbling through his beard. He was not of the class of triumphant sinners, whatever wickedness he might be capable of. To tell the truth, he had long, long ago fallen out of the butterfly stage of dissipation, and had now to be the doer of dirty work, despised and hustled about by such men as Jack Wentworth. The wages of sin had long been bitter enough, though he had neither any hope of freeing himself, nor any wish to do so; but he took up a grumbling tone of self-assertion as soon as he had an opening. "The parson treats me like a gentleman—like what I used to be," he repeated, coming into the light, and drawing a chair towards the table. "My name is Wodehouse—it's my own name that I have signed after all, by Jove!" said the unlucky prodigal. It seemed to give him a little comfort to say that over again, as if to convince himself.

"As for Wodehouse, I partly understand what he has done," said the Curate. "It appears likely that he has killed his father, by the way; but I suppose you don't count that. It is forgery in the mean time; I understand as much."

"It's my name as well as his, by Jove!" interrupted, hastily, the stranger, under his breath.

"Such strong terms are unnecessary," said Jack; "everybody knows that bills are drawn to be renewed, and nursed, and taken care of. We've had a great failure in luck as it happens, and these ones have come down to this deuced place; and the old fellow, instead of paying them like a gentleman, has made a row, and dropped down dead, or something. I suppose you don't know any more than the women have told you. The old man made a row in the office, and went off in fire and flame, and gave up our friend here to his partner's tender mercies. I sent for you, as you've taken charge of him. I suppose you have your reasons. This is an unlikely corner to find him in, and I suppose he couldn't be safer anywhere. That's about the state of the case. I came down to look after him, out of kind feeling," said the heir of the Wentworths. "If you don't mean to eat any dinner, have a cigar."

"And what have you to do with each other? what is the connection between you?" said the Curate of St Roque's. "I have my reasons, as you say, for taking an interest in him—but you—"

"I am only your elder brother," said Jack, shrugging his shoulders and resuming his place on the sofa. "We understand that difference. Business connection—that's all," he said, leisurely selecting another cigar from his case. When he had lighted it, he turned round and fixed his eyes upon the stranger. "We don't want any harm to happen to him," he said, with a little emphasis. "I have come here to protect him. If he keeps quiet and doesn't show, it will blow over. The keenest spy in the place could scarcely suspect him to be here. I have come entirely on his account—much to my own disgust—and yours," said the exquisite, with another shrug. He laid back his head and looked up at the ceiling, contemplating the fragrant wreaths of smoke with the air of a man perfectly at his ease. "We don't mean him to come to any harm," said Jack Wentworth, and stretched out his elegant limbs on the sofa, like a potentate satisfied that his protection was enough to make any man secure.

"I'm too much in their secrets, by Jove!" said poor Wodehouse, in his beard. "I do know their secrets, though they talk so big. It's not any consideration for me. It's to save themselves, by Jove, that's what it is!" cried the indignant drudge, of whom his superior deigned to take no notice. As for Mr Wentworth, he rose from his seat in a state of suppressed indignation, which could not express itself merely in words.

"May I ask what share I am expected to play in the drama?" he asked, pushing his chair aside in his excitement. The elder brother turned instinctively, and once more slid his feet to the ground. They looked at each other for a moment; the Curate, pale with a passion which he could not conceal, had something in his eyes which brought shame even to Jack Wentworth's face.

"You can betray him if you like," he said, sulkily. "I have no—particular interest in the matter; but in that case he had better make the best of his time and get away. You hear?" said the master-spirit, making a sign to Wodehouse. He had roused himself up, and looked now like a feline creature preparing for a spring—his eyes were cast down, but under the eyelids he followed his brother's movements with vigilant observation. "If you like, you can betray him," he repeated, slowly, understanding, as bad men so often do, the generosities of the nature to which his own was so much opposed.

And perhaps there was an undue degree of exasperation in the indignant feelings which moved Mr Wentworth. He kicked off his dusty boots with an indecorum quite unusual to him, and hunted up his slippers out of the adjoining room with perhaps an unnecessary amount of noise and haste. Then he went and looked out of the window into the serene summer darkness and the dewy garden, getting a little fresh air upon his heated face. Last of all he came back, peremptory and decided. "I shall not betray him," said the Perpetual Curate; "but I will have no further schemes concocted nor villany carried on in my house. If I consent to shield him, and, if possible, save him from the law, it is neither for his sake—nor yours," said the indignant young man. "I suppose it is no use saying anything about your life; but both of you have fathers very like to die of this—"

"My dear fellow," said Jack Wentworth, "we have gone through that phase ages ago. Don't be so much after date. I have brought down my father's grey hairs, &c., a hundred times; and, I daresay, so has he. Don't treat us as if we were in the nursery—a parson of advanced views like you should have something a little more novel to say."

"And so I have," said Mr Wentworth, with a heightened colour. "There are capital rooms at the Blue Boar, which you will find very comfortable, I am sure. I don't remember that we have ever been more than acquaintances; and to take possession of a man's house in his absence argues a high degree of friendship, as you are aware. It will be with difficulty that I shall find room for myself to-night; but to-morrow, I trust, if business requires you to remain in Carlingford, you will be able to find accommodation at the Blue Boar."

The elder brother grew very red all over his face. "I will go at once," he said, with a little start; and then he took a second thought. "It is a poor sort of way of winning a victory," he said, in contemptuous tones, after he had overcome his first impulse; "but if you choose that, it is no matter to me. I'll go to-morrow, as you say—to pack up to-night is too much for my energies. In the mean time it won't disturb you, I hope, if I go on with my novel. I don't suppose any further civilities are necessary between you and me," said Jack, once more putting up his feet on the sofa. He arranged himself with an indifference which was too genuine for bravado, opening his book, and puffing his cigar with great coolness. He did all but turn his back upon the others, and drew the little table nearer to him, in utter disregard of the fact that the Curate was leaning his arm on it. In short, he retired from the contest with a kind of grandeur, with his cigar and his novel, and the candles which lighted him up placidly, and made him look like the master of the house and the situation. There was a pause for some minutes, during which the others looked on—Mr Wentworth with a perfectly unreasonable sense of defeat, and poor Wodehouse with that strange kind of admiration which an unsuccessful good-for-nothing naturally feels for a triumphant rascal. They were in the shade looking on, and he in the light enjoying himself calmly in his way. The sight put an end to various twinges of repentance in the bosom of the inferior sinner. Jack Wentworth, lying on the sofa in superb indifference, victorious over all sense of right, did more to confirm his humble admirer in the life which he had almost made up his mind to abandon, than even his own inclination towards forbidden pleasure. He was dazzled by the success of his principal; and in comparison with that instructive sight, his father's probable deathbed, his sisters' tears, and even his own present discomfort, faded into insignificance. What Jack Wentworth was, Tom Wodehouse could never be; but at least he could follow his great model humbly and afar off. These sentiments made him receive but sulkily the admonitions of the Curate, when he led the way out of the preoccupied sitting-room; for Mr Wentworth was certainly not the victor in this passage of arms.

"I will do what I can to help you out of this," said the Curate, pausing within the door of Wodehouse's room, "for the sake of your—friends. But look here, Wodehouse; I have not preached to you hitherto, and I don't mean to do so now. When a man has done a crime, he is generally past preaching. The law will punish you for forging your father's name—"

"It's my name as well as his, by Jove!" interrupted the culprit, sullenly; "I've a right to sign it wherever I please."

"But the law," said Mr Wentworth, with emphasis, "has nothing to do with the breaking of your father's heart. If he dies, think whether the recollection will be a comfortable one. I will save you, if I can, and there is time, though I am compromised already, and it may do me serious injury. If you get free and are cleared from this, will you go away and break off your connection with—yes, you are quite right—I mean with my brother, whatever the connection may be? I will only exert myself for you on condition that you promise. You will go away somehow, and break off your old habits, and try if it is possible to begin anew?"

Wodehouse paused before he answered. The vision of Jack in the Curate's sitting-room still dazzled him. "You daren't say as much to your brother as you say to me," he replied, after a while, in his sulky way; "but I'm a gentleman, by Jove, as well as he is." And he threw himself down in a chair, and bit his nails, and grumbled into his beard. "It's hard to ask a fellow to give up his liberty," he said, without lifting his eyes. Mr Wentworth, perhaps, was a little contemptuous of the sullen wretch who already had involved him in so much annoyance and trouble.

"You can take your choice," he said; "the law will respect your liberty less than I shall;" and all the Curate's self-control could not conceal a certain amount of disdain.

"By Jove!" said Wodehouse, lifting up his eyes, "if the old man should die, you'd change your tone;" and then he stopped short and looked suspiciously at the Curate. "There's no will, and I'm the heir," he said, with sullen braggadocio. Mr Wentworth was still young, and this look made him sick with disgust and indignation.

"Then you can take your chance," he said, impatiently, making a hasty step to the door. He would not return, though his ungrateful guest called him back, but went away, much excited and disgusted, to see if the fresh air outside would restore his composure. On his way down-stairs, he again met Sarah, who was hovering about in a restless state of curiosity. "I've made a bed for you, please, sir, in the little dressing-room," said Sarah; "and, please, Cook wants to know, wouldn't you have anything to eat?" The question reminded Mr Wentworth that he had eaten nothing since luncheon, which he took in his father's house. Human nature, which can bear great blows with elasticity so wonderful, is apt to be put out, as everybody knows, by their most trifling accessories, and a man naturally feels miserable when he had had no dinner, and has not a place to shelter him while he snatches a necessary mouthful. "Never mind; all the rooms are occupied to-night," said the Perpetual Curate, feeling thoroughly wretched. But Cook and Sarah had arranged all that, being naturally indignant that their favourite clergyman should be put "upon" by his disorderly and unexpected guests.

"I have set your tray, sir, in missis's parlour," said Sarah, opening the door to that sanctuary; and it is impossible to describe the sense of relief with which the Perpetual Curate flung himself down on Mrs Hadwin's sofa, deranging a quantity of cushions and elaborate crochet-work draperies without knowing it. Here at least he was safe from intrusion. But his reflections were far from being agreeable as he ate his beef-steak. Here he was, without any fault of his own, plunged into the midst of a complication of disgrace and vice. Perhaps already the name of Lucy Wodehouse was branded with her brother's shame; perhaps still more overwhelming infamy might overtake, through that means, the heir and the name of the Wentworths. And for himself, what he had to do was to attempt with all his powers to defeat justice, and save from punishment a criminal for whom it was impossible to feel either sympathy or hope. When he thought of Jack up-stairs on the sofa over his French novel, the heart of the Curate burned within him with indignation and resentment; and his disgust at his other guest was, if less intense, an equally painful sensation. It was hard to waste his strength, and perhaps compromise his character, for such men as these; but on the other hand he saw his father, with that malady of the Wentworths hanging over his head, doing his best to live and last, like a courageous English gentleman as he was, for the sake of "the girls" and the little children, who had so little to expect from Jack; and poor stupid Mr Wodehouse dying of the crime which assailed his own credit as well as his son's safety. The Curate of St Roque's drew a long breath, and raised himself up unconsciously to his full height as he rose to go up-stairs. It was he against the world at the moment, as it appeared. He set himself to his uncongenial work with a heart that revolted against the evil cause of which he was about to constitute himself the champion. But for the Squire, who had misjudged him—for Lucy who had received him with such icy smiles, and closed up her heart against his entrance;—sometimes there is a kind of bitter sweetness in the thought of spending love and life in one lavish and prodigal outburst upon those to whom our hearts are bound, but whose affections make us no return.



CHAPTER XXIII.

The Curate went to breakfast next morning with a little curiosity and a great deal of painful feeling. He had been inhospitable to his brother, and a revulsion had happened such as happens invariably when a generous man is forced by external circumstances to show himself churlish. Though his good sense and his pride alike prevented him from changing his resolution of the previous night, still his heart had relented toward Jack, and he felt sorry and half ashamed to meet the brother to whom he had shown so much temper and so little kindness. It was much later than usual when he came down-stairs, and Jack was just coming out of the comfortable chamber which belonged of right to his brother, when the Curate entered the sitting-room. Jack was in his dressing-gown, as on the previous night, and came forth humming an air out of the 'Trovatore,' and looking as wholesomely fresh and clean and dainty as the most honest gentleman in England. He gave his brother a good-humoured nod, and wished him good morning. "I am glad to see you don't keep distressingly early hours," he said, between the bars of the air he was humming. He was a man of perfect digestion, like all the Wentworths, and got up accordingly, in a good temper, not disposed to make too much of any little incivility that might have taken place. On the contrary, he helped himself to his brother's favourite omelet with the most engaging cheerfulness, and entered into such conversation as might be supposed to suit a Perpetual Curate in a little country town.

"I daresay you have a good many nice people about here," said Jack. "I've done nothing but walk about since I came—and it does a man good to see those fresh little women with their pink cheeks. There's one, a sister of our friend's, I believe," he continued, with a nod towards the door to indicate Wodehouse—"an uncommonly pretty girl, I can tell you; and there's a little rosebud of a creature at that shop, whom, they tell me, you're interested in. Your living is not worth much, I suppose? It's unlucky having two clergymen in a family; but, to be sure, you're going in for Skelmersdale. By the way, that reminds me—how are the aunts? I have not heard anything of them for ages. Female relations of that description generally cling to the parsons of the race. I suppose they are all living—all three? Some people never seem to die."

"They are here," said the Curate, succinctly, "living in Carlingford. I wonder nobody has told you."

A sudden bright spark lighted in the prodigal's eyes. "Ah, they are here, are they?" he said, after a momentary pause; "so much the better for you; but in justice you ought to be content with the living. I say so as your elder brother. Gerald has the best right to what they've got to leave. By the by, how are Gerald and the rest? you've just been there. I suppose our respected parent goes on multiplying. To think of so many odious little wretches calling themselves Wentworth is enough to make one disgusted with the name."

"My father was very ill when I left; he has had another attack," said the Curate. "He does not seem able to bear any agitation. Your telegram upset him altogether. I don't know what you've been about—he did not tell me," continued the younger brother, with a little emotion, "but he is very uneasy about you."

"Ah, I daresay," said Jack; "that's natural; but he's wonderfully tough for such an old fellow. I should say it would take twenty attacks to finish him; and this is the second, isn't it? I wonder how long an interval there was between the two; it would be a pretty calculation for a post-obit. Wodehouse seems to have brought his ancestor down at the first shot almost; but then there's no entail in his case, and the old fellow may have made a will. I beg your pardon; you don't like this sort of talk. I forgot you were a clergyman. I rather like this town of yours, do you know. Sweet situation, and good for the health, I should say. I'll take your advice, I think, about the—how did you call it?—Black Boar. Unless, indeed, some charitable family would take me in," said the elder brother, with a glance from under his eyelids. His real meaning did not in the least degree suggest itself to the Curate, who was thinking more of what was past than of what was to come.

"You seem to take a great interest in Wodehouse?" said Mr Wentworth.

"Yes; and so do you," said Jack, with a keen glance of curiosity—"I can't tell why. My interest in him is easily explained. If the affair came to a trial, it might involve other people who are of retiring dispositions and dislike publicity. I don't mind saying," continued the heir of the Wentworths, laying down his knife and fork, and looking across at his brother with smiling candour, "that I might myself be brought before the world in a way which would wound my modesty; so it must not be permitted to go any further, you perceive. The partner has got a warrant out, but has not put it into execution as yet. That's why I sent for you. You are the only man, so far as I can see, that can be of any use."

"I don't know what you mean," said the Curate, hastily, "nor what connection you can possibly have with Wodehouse; perhaps it is better not to inquire. I mean to do my best for him, independent of you."

"Do," said Jack Wentworth, with a slight yawn; "it is much better not to inquire. A clergyman runs the risk of hearing things that may shock him when he enters into worldly business; but the position of mediator is thoroughly professional. Now for the Black Boar. I'll send for my traps when I get settled," he said, rising in his languid way. He had made a very good breakfast, and he was not at all disposed to make himself uncomfortable by quarrelling with his brother. Besides, he had a new idea in his mind. So he gave the Curate another little good-humoured nod, and disappeared into the sleeping-room, from which he emerged a few minutes after with a coat replacing the dressing-gown, ready to go out. "I daresay I shall see you again before I leave Carlingford," he said, and left the room with the utmost suavity. As for Mr Wentworth, it is probable that his brother's serenity had quite the reverse of a soothing effect upon his mind and temper. He rose from the table as soon as Jack was gone, and for a long time paced about the room composing himself, and planning what he was to do—so long, indeed, that Sarah, after coming up softly to inspect, had cleared the table and put everything straight in the room before the Curate discovered her presence. It was only when she came up to him at last, with her little rustical curtsy, to say that, please, her missis would like to see him for a moment in the parlour, that Mr Wentworth found out that she was there. This interruption roused him out of his manifold and complicated thoughts. "I am too busy just now, but I will see Mrs Hadwin to-night," he said; "and you can tell her that my brother has gone to get rooms at the Blue Boar." After he had thus satisfied the sympathetic handmaiden, the Curate crossed over to the closed door of Wodehouse's room and knocked. The inmate there was still in bed, as was his custom, and answered Mr Wentworth through his beard in a recumbent voice, less sulky and more uncertain than on the previous night. Poor Wodehouse had neither the nerve nor the digestion of his more splendid associate. He had no strength of evil in himself when he was out of the way of it; and the consequence of a restless night was a natural amount of penitence and shame in the morning. He met the Curate with a depressed countenance, and answered all his questions readily enough, even giving him the particulars of the forged bills, in respect to which Thomas Wodehouse the younger could not, somehow, feel so guilty as if it had been a name different from his own which he had affixed to those fatal bits of paper; and he did not hesitate much to promise that he would go abroad and try to make a new beginning if this matter could be settled. Mr Wentworth went out with some satisfaction after the interview, believing in his heart that his own remonstrances had had their due effect, as it is so natural to believe—for he did not know, having slept very soundly, that it had rained a good deal during the night, and that Mrs Hadwin's biggest tub (for the old lady had a passion for rain-water) was immediately under poor Wodehouse's window, and kept him awake as it filled and ran over all through the summer darkness. The recollection of Jack Wentworth, even in his hour of success, was insufficient to fortify the simple soul of his humble admirer against that ominous sound of the unseen rain, and against the flashes of sudden lightning that seemed to blaze into his heart. He could not help thinking of his father's sick-bed in those midnight hours, and of all the melancholy array of lost years which had made him no longer "a gentleman, as he used to be," but a skulking vagabond in his native place; and his penitence lasted till after he had had his breakfast and Mr Wentworth was gone. Then perhaps the other side of the question recurred to his mind, and he began to think that if his father died there might be no need for his banishment; but Mr Wentworth knew nothing of this change in his protege's sentiments, as he went quickly up Grange Lane. Wharfside and all the district had lain neglected for three long days, as the Curate was aware, and he had promised to call at No. 10 Prickett's Lane, and to look after the little orphan children whom Lucy had taken charge of. His occupations, in short, both public and private, were overpowering, and he could not tell how he was to get through them; for, in addition to everything else, it was Friday, and there was a litany service at twelve o'clock at St Roque's. So the young priest had little time to lose as he hurried up once again to Mr Wodehouse's green door.

It was Miss Wodehouse who came to meet the Curate as soon as his presence was known in the house—Miss Wodehouse, and not Lucy, who made way for her sister to pass her, and took no notice of Mr Wentworth's name. The elder sister entered very hurriedly the little parlour down-stairs, and shut the door fast, and came up to him with an anxious inquiring face. She told him her father was just the same, in faltering tones. "And oh, Mr Wentworth, has anything happened?" she exclaimed, with endless unspeakable questions in her eyes. It was so hard for the gentle woman to keep her secret—the very sight of somebody who knew it was a relief to her heart.

"I want you to give me full authority to act for you," said the Curate. "I must go to Mr Wodehouse's partner and discuss the whole matter."

Here Miss Wodehouse gave a little cry, and stopped him suddenly. "Oh, Mr Wentworth, it would kill papa to know you had spoken to any one. You must send him away," she said, breathless with anxiety and terror. "To think of discussing it with any one when even Lucy does not know—!" She spoke with so much haste and fright that it was scarcely possible to make out her last words.

"Nevertheless I must speak to Mr Waters," said the Curate; "I am going there now. He knows all about it already, and has a warrant for his apprehension; but we must stop that. I will undertake that it shall be paid, and you must give me full authority to act for you." When Miss Wodehouse met the steady look he gave her, she veered immediately from her fright at the thought of having it spoken of, to gratitude to him who was thus ready to take her burden into his hands.

"Oh, Mr Wentworth, it is so good of you—it is like a brother!" said the trembling woman; and then she made a pause. "I say a brother," she said, drawing an involuntary moral, "though we have never had any good of ours; and oh, if Lucy only knew—!"

The Curate turned away hastily, and wrung her hand without being aware of it. "No," he said, with a touch of bitterness, "don't let her know. I don't want to appeal to her gratitude;" and with that he became silent, and fell to listening, standing in the middle of the room, if perhaps he might catch any sound of footsteps coming down-stairs.

"She will know better some day," said Miss Wodehouse, wiping her eyes; "and oh, Mr Wentworth, if papa ever gets better—!" Here the poor lady broke down into inarticulate weeping. "But I know you will stand by us," she said, amid her tears; "it is all the comfort I have—and Lucy—"

There was no sound of any footstep on the stair—nothing but the ticking of the timepiece on the mantelshelf, and the rustling of the curtains in the soft morning breeze which came through the open window, and Miss Wodehouse's crying. The Curate had not expected to see Lucy, and knew in his heart that it was better they should not meet just at this moment; but, notwithstanding this, it was strange how bitter and disappointed he felt, and what an impatient longing he had for one look of her, even though it should be a look which would drive him frantic with mortified love and disappointed expectation. To know that she was under the same roof, and that she knew he was here, but kept away, and did not care to see him, was gall to his excited mind. He went away hastily, pressing poor Miss Wodehouse's hand with a kind of silent rage. "Don't talk about Lucy," he said, half to himself, his heart swelling and throbbing at the sound of the name. It was the first time he had spoken it aloud to any ear but his own, and he left the house tingling with an indignation and mortification and bitter fondness which could not be expressed in words. What he was about to do was for her sake, and he thought to himself, with a forlorn pride, that she would never know it, and it did not matter. He could not tell that Lucy was glancing out furtively over the blind, ashamed of herself in her wounded heart for doing so, and wondering whether even now he was occupied with that unworthy love which had made an everlasting separation between them. If it had been any one worthy, it would have been different, poor Lucy thought, as she pressed back the tears into her eyes, and looked out wistfully at him over the blind. She above-stairs in the sick-room, and he in the fresh garden hastening out to his work, were both thinking in their hearts how perverse life was, and how hard it was not to be happy—as indeed they well might in a general way; though perhaps one glance of the Curate's eyes upward, one meeting of looks, might have resulted quite reasonably in a more felicitous train of thinking, at least for that day.



CHAPTER XXIV.

When Mr Wentworth arrived in the little vestry at St Roque's to robe himself for the approaching service, it was after a long and tough contest with Mr Wodehouse's partner, which had to a great extent exhausted his energies. Mr Wodehouse was the leading attorney in Carlingford, the chief family solicitor in the county, a man looked upon with favourable eyes even by the great people as being himself a cadet of a county family. His partner, Mr Waters, was altogether a different description of man. He was much more clever, and a good deal more like a gentleman, but he had not a connection in the world, and had fought his way up to prosperity through many a narrow, and perhaps, if people spoke true, many a dirty avenue to fortune. He was very glad of the chance which brought his partner's reputation and credit thus under his power, and he was by no means disposed to deal gently with the prodigal son. That is to say, he was quite disinclined to let the family out of his clutches easily, or to consent to be silent and "frustrate the ends of justice" for anything else than an important equivalent. Mr Wentworth had much ado to restrain his temper while the wily attorney talked about his conscience; for the Curate was clear-sighted enough to perceive at the first glance that Mr Waters had no real intention of proceeding to extremities. The lawyer would not pledge himself to anything, notwithstanding all Mr Wentworth's arguments. "Wodehouse himself was of the opinion that the law should take its course," he said; but out of respect for his partner he might wait a few days to see what turn his illness would take. "I confess that I am not adapted for my profession, Mr Wentworth. My feelings overcome me a great deal too often," said the sharp man of business, looking full into the Curate's eyes, "and while the father is dying I have not the heart to proceed against the son; but I pledge myself to nothing—recollect, to nothing." And with this and a very indignant mind Mr Wentworth had been forced to come away. His thoughts were occupied with the contrarieties of the world as he hastened along to St Roque's—how one man had to bear another's burdens in every station and capacity of life, and how another man triumphed and came to success by means of the misfortunes of his friends. It was hard to tell what made the difference, or how humankind got divided into these two great classes, for possibly enough the sharp attorney was as just in his way as the Curate; but Mr Wentworth got no more satisfaction in thinking of it than the speculatists generally have when they investigate this strange, wayward, fantastical humanity which is never to be calculated upon. He came into the little vestry of St Roque's, which was a stony little room with a groined roof and windows too severely English in their character to admit any great amount of light, with a sensation of fatigue and discouragement very natural to a man who had been interfering in other people's affairs. There was some comfort in the litany which he was just going to say, but not much comfort in any of the human individuals who would come into Mr Wentworth's mind as he paused in the midst of the suffrage for "sick persons" and for those who "had erred and were deceived," that the worshippers might whisper into God's ear the names for which their hearts were most concerned. The young priest sighed heavily as he put on his surplice, pondering all the obstinate selfishness and strange contradictions of men; and it was only when he heard a rather loud echo to his breath of weariness that he looked up and saw Elsworthy, who was contemplating him with a very curious expression of face. The clerk started a little on being discovered, and began to look over all the choristers' books and set them in readiness, though, indeed, there were no choristers on Fridays, but only the ladies, who chanted the responses a great deal more sweetly, and wore no surplices. Thinking of that, it occurred to Mr Wentworth how much he would miss the round full notes which always betrayed Lucy's presence to him even when he did not see her; and he forgot Elsworthy, and sighed again without thinking of any comment which might be made upon the sound.

"I'm sorry to see, sir, as you aint in your usual good spirits?" said that observant spectator, coming closer up to "his clergyman." Elsworthy's eyes were full of meanings which Mr Wentworth could not, and had no wish to, decipher.

"I am perfectly well, thank you," said the Perpetual Curate, with his coldest tone. He had become suspicious of the man, he could scarcely tell why.

"There's a deal of people in church this morning," said the clerk; and then he came closer still, and spoke in a kind of whisper. "About that little matter as we was speaking of, Mr Wentworth—that's all straight, sir, and there aint no occasion to be vexed. She came back this morning," said Elsworthy, under his breath.

"Who came back this morning?" asked the Curate, with a little surprise. His thoughts had been so much with Lucy that no one else occurred to him at the moment; and even while he asked the question, his busy fancy began to wonder where she could have been, and what motive could have taken her away?

"I couldn't mean nobody but Rosa, as I talked to you about last night," said Elsworthy. "She's come back, sir, as you wished; and I have heard as she was in Carlingford last night just afore you come, Mr Wentworth, when I thought as she was far enough off; which you'll allow, sir, whoever it was she come to see, it wasn't the right thing, nor what her aunt and me had reason to expect."

The Curate of St Roque's said "Pshaw!" carelessly to himself. He was not at all interested in Rosa Elsworthy. Instead of making any answer, he drew on the scarlet band of his hood, and marched away gravely into the reading-desk, leaving the vestry-door open behind him for the clerk to follow. The little dangers that harassed his personal footsteps had not yet awakened so much as an anxiety in his mind. Things much more serious preoccupied his thoughts. He opened his prayer-book with a consciousness of the good of it which comes to men only now and then. At Oxford, in his day, Mr Wentworth had entertained his doubts like others, and like most people was aware that there were a great many things in heaven and earth totally unexplainable by any philosophy. But he had always been more of a man than a thinker, even before he became a high Anglican; and being still much in earnest about most things he had to do with, he found great comfort just at this moment, amid all his perplexities, in the litany he was saying. He was so absorbed in it, and so full of that appeal out of all troubles and miseries to the God who cannot be indifferent to His creatures, that he was almost at the last Amen before he distinguished that voice, which of all voices was most dear to him. The heart of the young man swelled, when he heard it, with a mingled thrill of sympathy and wounded feeling. She had not left her father's sick-bed to see him, but she had found time to run down the sunny road to St Roque's to pray for the sick and the poor. When he knelt down in the reading-desk at the end of the service, was it wrong, instead of more abstract supplications, that the young priest said over and over, "God bless her," in an outburst of pity and tenderness? And he did not try to overtake her on the road, as he might have done had his heart been less deeply touched, but went off with abstracted looks to Wharfside, where all the poor people were very glad to see him, and where his absence was spoken of as if he had been three months instead of three days away. It was like going back a century or two into primitive life, to go into "the district," where civilisation did not prevail to any very distressing extent, and where people in general spoke their minds freely. But even when he came out of No. 10, where the poor woman still kept on living, Mr Wentworth was made aware of his private troubles; for on the opposite side of the way, where there was a little bit of vacant ground, the Rector was standing with some of the schismatics of Wharfside, planning how to place the iron church which, it was said, he meant to establish in the very heart of the "district." Mr Morgan took off his hat very stiffly to the Perpetual Curate, who returned up Prickett's Lane with a heightened colour and quickened pulse. A man must be an angel indeed who can see his work taken out of his hands and betray no human emotion. Mr Wentworth went into Elsworthy's, as he went back, to write a forcible little note to the Rector on the subject before he returned home. It was Rosa who handed him the paper he wanted, and he gave her a little nod without looking at her. But when he had closed his note, and laid it on the counter to be delivered, the Curate found her still standing near, and looked at the little blushing creature with some natural admiration. "So you have come back," he said; "but mind you don't go into Grange Lane any more after dark, little Rosa." When he had left the shop and finished this little matter, he bethought himself of his aunts, whom he had not seen since he returned. Aunt Dora was not at her usual sentinel window when he crossed Grange Lane towards their garden-door; and the door itself was open, and some one from the Blue Boar was carrying in a large portmanteau. Mr Wentworth's curiosity was strangely excited by the sight. He said, "Who has come, Lewis?" to Miss Wentworth's man, who stood in the hall superintending the arrival, but ran up-stairs without waiting for any answer. He felt by instinct that the visitor was some one likely to increase the confusion of affairs, and perplex matters more and more to himself.

But even this presentiment did not prepare him for the astonishing sight which met his eyes when he entered the drawing-room. There the three ladies were all assembled, regarding with different developments of interest the new-comer, who had thrown himself, half-reclining, on a sofa. Aunt Dora was sitting by him with a bottle of eau-de-Cologne in her hand, for this meeting had evidently gone to the heart of the returned prodigal. Aunt Dora was ready to have sacrificed all the veal in the country in honour of Jack's repentance; and the Curate stood outside upon the threshold, looking at the scene with the strangest half-angry, half-comical realisation of the state of mind of the elder brother in the parable. He had himself been rather found fault with, excused, and tolerated, among his relations; but Jack had at once become master of the position, and taken possession of all their sympathies. Mr Wentworth stood gazing at them, half-amused, and yet more angry than amused—feeling, with a little indignation, as was natural, that the pretended penitence of the clever sinner was far more effective and interesting than his own spotless loyalty and truth. To be sure, they were only three old ladies—three old aunts—and he smiled at the sight; but though he smiled, he did not like it, and perhaps was more abrupt than usual in his salutations. Miss Leonora was seated at her writing-table, busy with her correspondence. The question of the new gin-palace was not yet decided, and she had been in the middle of a letter of encouragement to her agents on the subject, reminding them that, even though the licence was granted, the world would still go on all the same, and that the worst possibilities must be encountered, when Jack the prodigal made his appearance, with all the tokens of reformation and repentance about him, to throw himself upon the Christian charity of his relations. A penitent sinner was too tempting a bait for even Miss Leonora's good sense to withstand, and she had postponed her letter-writing to hear his explanations. But Jack had told his story by this time, and had explained how much he wanted to withdraw out of the world in which he had been led astray, and how sick he was of all its whirl of temptations and disappointment; and Miss Leonora had returned to her letter when her younger nephew arrived. As for Miss Wentworth, she was seated placidly in her usual easy-chair, smiling with equable smiles upon both the young men, and lifting her beautiful old cheek for Frank to kiss, just as she had lifted it to Jack. It was Miss Dora who was most shaken out of her allegiance; she who had always made Frank her special charge. Though she had wept herself into a day's headache on his behalf so short a time ago, aunt Dora for a moment had allowed the more effusive prodigal to supersede Frank. Instead of taking him into her arms as usual, and clinging to him, she only put the hand that held the eau-de-Cologne over his shoulder as she kissed him. Jack, who had been so dreadfully, inexpressibly wicked, and who had come back to his aunts to be converted and restored to his right mind, was more interesting than many curates. She sat down again by her penitent as soon as she had saluted his brother; and even Miss Leonora, when she paused in her letter, turned her eyes towards Jack.

"So Gerald is actually going over to Rome," said the strong-minded aunt. "I never expected anything else. I had a letter from Louisa yesterday, asking me to use my influence: as if I had any influence over your brother! If a silly wife was any justification for a man making an idiot of himself, Gerald might be excused; but I suppose the next thing we shall hear of will be that you have followed him, Frank. Did you hear anything further about Janet and that lover of hers? In a large family like ours there is always something troublesome going on," said Miss Leonora. "I am not surprised to hear of your father's attack. My father had a great many attacks, and lived to eighty; but he had few difficulties with the female part of his household," she continued, with a grim little smile—for Miss Leonora rather piqued herself upon her exemption from any known sentimental episode, even in her youth.

"Dear Jack's return will make up for a great deal," said aunt Dora. "Oh, Frank, my dear, your brother has made us all so happy. He has just been telling us that he means to give up all his racing and betting and wickedness; and when he has been with us a little, and learned to appreciate a domestic circle—" said poor Miss Dora, putting her handkerchief to her eyes. She was so much overcome that she could not finish the sentence. But she put her disengaged hand upon Jack's arm and patted it, and in her heart concluded that as soon as the blanket was done for Louisa's bassinet, she would work him a pair of slippers, which should endear more and more to him the domestic circle, and stimulate the new-born virtue in his repentant heart.

"I don't know what Jack's return may do," said Mr Wentworth, "but I hope you don't imagine it was Gerald who caused my father's illness. You know better, at least," said the indignant Curate, looking at the hero on the sofa. That interesting reprobate lifted his eyes with a covert gleam of humour to the unresponsive countenance of his brother, and then he stroked his silky beard and sighed.

"My dear aunt, Frank is right," said Jack, with a melancholy voice. "I have not concealed from you that my father has great reason to be offended with me. I have done very much the reverse of what I ought to have done. I see even Frank can't forgive me; and I don't wonder at it," said the prodigal, "though I have done him no harm that I know of;" and again the heir of the Wentworths sighed, and covered his face for a moment with his hand.

"Oh, Frank," cried Miss Dora, with streaming eyes—"oh, my dear boy!—isn't there joy in heaven over one sinner that repenteth? You're not going to be the wicked elder brother that grudged the prodigal his welcome—you're not going to give way to jealousy, Frank?"

"Hold your tongue, Dora," said the iron-grey sister; "I daresay Frank knows a great deal better than you do; but I want to know about Gerald, and what is to be done. If he goes to Rome, of course you will take Wentworth Rectory; so it will not be an unmingled evil," said Miss Leonora, biting her pen, and throwing a keen glance at the Curate of St Roque's, "especially as you and we differ so entirely in our views. I could not consent to appoint anybody to Skelmersdale, even if poor Mr Shirley were to die, who did not preach the Gospel; and it would be sad for you to spend all your life in a Perpetual Curacy, where you could have no income, nor ever hope to be able to marry," she continued steadily, with her eyes fixed upon her nephew. "Of course, if you had entered the Church for the love of the work, it would be a different matter," said the strong-minded aunt. "But that sort of thing seems to have gone out of fashion. I am sorry about Gerald—very sorry; but after what I saw of him, I am not surprised; and it is a comfort to one's mind to think that you will be provided for, Frank." Miss Leonora wrote a few words of the letter as she finished this speech. What she was saying in that epistle was (in reference to the gin-palace) that all discouragements were sent by God, and that, no doubt, His meaning was, that we should work all the harder to make way against them. After putting down which encouraging sentiment, she raised her eyes again, and planted her spear in her nephew's bosom with the greatest composure in the world.

"My Perpetual Curacy suits me very well," said Mr Wentworth, with a little pride; "and there is a good deal to do in Carlingford. However, I did not come here to talk about that. The Rector is going to put up an iron church in my district," said the young man, who was rather glad of a subject which permitted a little of his indignation to escape. "It is very easy to interfere with other people's work." And then he paused, not choosing to grumble to an unsympathetic audience. To feel that nobody cares about your feelings, is better than all the rules of self-control. The Perpetual Curate stopped instinctively with a dignified restraint, which would have been impossible to him under other circumstances. It was no merit of his, but he reaped the advantage of it all the same.

"But oh, my dear," said Miss Dora, "what a comfort to think of what St Paul says—'Whether it be for the right motive or not, Christ is still preached.' And one never knows what chance word may touch a heart," said the poor little woman, shaking her limp curls away from her cheeks. "It was you being offended with him that made dear Jack think of coming to us; and what a happiness it is to think that he sees the error of his ways!" cried poor Miss Dora, drying her tears. "And oh, Frank, my dear boy, I trust you will take warning by your brother, and not run into temptation," continued the anxious aunt, remembering all her troubles. "If you were to go wrong, it would take away all the pleasure of life."

"That is just what I was thinking," said aunt Cecilia from her easy-chair.

"For, oh, Frank, my dear," said Miss Dora, much emboldened by this support, "you must consider that you are a clergyman, and there are a great many things that are wrong in a clergyman that would not matter in another man. Oh, Leonora, if you would speak to him, he would mind you," cried the poor lady; "for you know a clergyman is quite different;" and Miss Dora again stopped short, and the three aunts looked at the bewildered Curate, who, for his part, sat gazing at them without an idea what they could mean.

"What have I been doing that would be right in another man?" he said, with a smile which was slightly forced; and then he turned to Jack, who was laughing softly under his breath, and stroking his silky beard. The elder brother was highly amused by the situation altogether, but Frank, as was natural, did not see it in the same light. "What have you been saying?" said the indignant Curate; and his eyes gave forth a sudden light which frightened Miss Dora, and brought her in to the rescue.

"Oh, Frank, he has not been saying anything," cried that troubled woman; "it is only what we have heard everywhere. Oh, my dear boy, it is only for your good I ever thought of speaking. There is nobody in the world to whom your welfare is so precious," said poor Miss Dora. "Oh, Frank, if you and your brother were to have any difference, I should think it all my fault—and I always said you did not mean anything," she said, putting herself and her eau-de-Cologne between the two, and looking as if she were about to throw herself into the Curate's arms. "Oh, Frank, dear, don't blame any one else—it is my fault!" cried aunt Dora, with tears; and the tender-hearted foolish creature kept between them, ready to rush in if any conflict should occur, which was a supposition much resented by the Curate of St Roque's.

"Jack and I have no intention of fighting, I daresay," he said, drawing his chair away with some impatience; and Jack lay back on the sofa and stroked his beard, and looked on with the greatest composure while poor Miss Dora exhausted her alarm. "It is all my fault," sobbed aunt Dora; "but, oh, my dear boy, it was only for your good; and I always said you did not mean anything," said the discomfited peacemaker. All this, though it was highly amusing to the prodigal, was gall and bitterness to the Perpetual Curate. It moved him far more deeply than he could have imagined it possible for anything spoken by his aunt Dora to move him. Perhaps there is something in human nature which demands to be comprehended, even where it is aware that comprehension is impossible; and it wounded him in the most unreasonable way to have it supposed that he was likely to get into any quarrel with his brother, and to see Jack thus preferred to himself.

"Don't be a fool," said Miss Leonora, sharply: "I wish you would confine yourself to Louisa's bassinet, and talk of things you can understand. I hope Frank knows what he is doing better than a set of old women. At the same time, Frank," said Miss Leonora, rising and leading the way to the door, "I want to say a word to you. Don't think you are above misconception. Most people believe a lie more readily than the truth. Dora is a fool," said the elder sister, pausing, when she had led her nephew outside the drawing-room door, "but so are most people; and I advise you to be careful, and not to give occasion for any gossip; otherwise, I don't say I disapprove of your conduct." She had her pen in one hand, and held out the other to him, dismissing him; and even this added to the painful feeling in the Curate's heart.

"I should hope not," he said, somewhat stiffly; "good-bye—my conduct is not likely to be affected by any gossip, and I don't see any need for taking precautions against imaginary danger." Miss Leonora thought her nephew looked very ungracious as he went away. She said to herself that Frank had a great deal of temper, and resembled his mother's family more than the Wentworths, as she went back to her writing-table; and though she could not disapprove of him, she felt vexed somehow at his rectitude and his impatience of advice; whereas, Jack, poor fellow! who had been a great sinner, was, according to all appearance, a great penitent also, and a true Wentworth, with all the family features. Such were Miss Leonora's thoughts as she went back to finish her letters, and to encourage her agents in her London district to carry on the good work.

"God moves in a mysterious way, His wonders to perform," she wrote apropos of the gin-palace, and set very distinctly before her spiritual retainers all that Providence might intend by this unexpected hindrance; and so quite contented herself about her nephew, whose views on this and many other subjects were so different from her own.

Meanwhile Mr Wentworth went about the rest of the day's work in a not unusual, but far from pleasant, frame of mind. When one suddenly feels that the sympathy upon which one calculated most surely has been withdrawn, the shock is naturally considerable. It might not be anything very great while it lasted, but still one feels the difference when it is taken away. Lucy had fallen off from him; and even aunt Dora had ceased to feel his concerns the first in the world. He smiled at himself for the wound he felt; but that did not remove the sting of it. After the occupations of the day were over, when at last he was going home, and when his work and the sense of fatigue which accompanied it had dulled his mind a little, the Curate felt himself still dwelling on the same matter, contemplating it in a half-comic point of view, as proud men are not unapt to contemplate anything that mortifies them. He began to realise, in a humorous way, his own sensations as he stood at the drawing-room door and recognised the prodigal on the sofa; and then a smile dawned upon his lip as he thought once more of the prodigal's elder brother, who regarded that business with unsympathetic eyes and grudged the supper. And from that he went into a half-professional line of thought, and imagined to himself, half smiling, how, if he had been Dr Cumming or the minister of Salem Chapel, he might have written a series of sermons on the unappreciated characters of Scripture, beginning with that virtuous uninteresting elder brother; from which suggestion, though he was not the minister of Salem nor Dr Cumming, it occurred to the Perpetual Curate to follow out the idea, and to think of such generous careless souls as Esau, and such noble unfortunates as the peasant-king, the mournful magnificent Saul—people not generally approved of, or enrolled among the martyrs or saints. He was pursuing this kind of half-reverie, half-thought, when he reached his own house. It was again late and dark, for he had dined in the mean time, and was going home now to write his sermon, in which, no doubt, some of these very ideas were destined to reappear. He opened the garden-gate with his latch-key, and paused, with an involuntary sense of the beauty and freshness of the night, as soon as he got within the sheltering walls. The stars were shining faint and sweet in the summer blue, and all the shrubs and the grass breathing forth that subdued breath of fragrance and conscious invisible life which gives so much sweetness to the night. He thought he heard whispering voices, as he paused glancing up at the sky; and then from the side-walk he saw a little figure run, and heard a light little footstep fluttering towards the door which he had just closed. Mr Wentworth started and went after this little flying figure with some anxiety. Two or three of his long strides brought him up with the escaping visitor, as she fumbled in her agitation over the handle of the door. "You have come again, notwithstanding what I said to you? but you must not repeat it, Rosa," said the Curate; "no good can come of these meetings. I will tell your uncle, if I ever find you here again."

"Oh no, no, please don't," cried the girl; "but, after all, I don't mind," she said, with more confidence: "he would think it was something very different;" and Rosa raised her eyes to the Curate's face with a coquettish inquiry. She could not divest herself of the thought that Mr Wentworth was jealous, and did not like to have her come there for anybody but himself.

"If you were not such a child, I should be very angry," said the Curate; "as it is, I am very angry with the person who deludes you into coming. Go home, child," he said, opening the door to her, "and remember I will not allow you on any pretext to come here again."

His words were low, and perhaps Rosa did not care much to listen; but there was quite light enough to show them both very plainly, as he stood at the door and she went out. Just then the Miss Hemmings were going up Grange Lane from a little tea-party with their favourite maid, and all their eyes about them. They looked very full in Mr Wentworth's face, and said How d'ye do? as they passed the door; and when they had passed it, they looked at each other with eyes which spoke volumes. Mr Wentworth shut the door violently with irrepressible vexation and annoyance when he encountered that glance. He made no farewells, nor did he think of taking care of Rosa on the way home as he had done before. He was intensely annoyed and vexed, he could not tell how. And this was how it happened that the last time she was seen in Carlingford, Rosa Elsworthy was left standing by herself in the dark at Mr Wentworth's door.



CHAPTER XXV.

The Curate got up very early next morning. He had his sermon to write and it was Saturday, and all the events of the week had naturally enough unsettled his mind, and indisposed him for sermon-writing. When the events of life come fast upon a man, it is seldom that he finds much pleasure in abstract literary composition, and the style of the Curate of St Roque's was not of that hortatory and impassioned character which sometimes gives as much relief to the speaker as excitement to the audience. So he got up in the early sweetness of the summer morning, when nobody but himself was astir in the house, with the sense of entering upon a task, and taking up work which was far from agreeable to him. When he came into the little room which he used as a study, and threw the window open, and breathed the delicious air of the morning, which was all thrilling and trembling with the songs of birds, Mr Wentworth's thoughts were far from being concentrated upon any one subject. He sat down at his writing-table and arranged his pens and paper, and wrote down the text he had selected; and when he had done so much, and could feel that he had made a beginning, he leaned back in his chair, and poised the idle pen on his finger, and abandoned himself to his thoughts. He had so much to think about. There was Wodehouse under the same roof, with whom he had felt himself constrained to remonstrate very sharply on the previous night. There was Jack, so near, and certainly come to Carlingford on no good errand. There was Gerald, in his great perplexity and distress, and the household at home in their anxiety; and last, but worst of all, his fancy would go fluttering about the doors of the sick chamber in Grange Lane, longing and wondering. He asked himself what it could be which had raised that impalpable wall between Lucy and himself—that barrier too strong to be overthrown, too ethereal to be complained of; and wondered over and over again what her thoughts were towards him—whether she thought of him at all, whether she was offended, or simply indifferent?—a question which any one else who had observed Lucy as closely could have solved without any difficulty, but which, to the modest and true love of the Perpetual Curate, was at present the grand doubt of all the doubts in the universe. With this matter to settle, and with the consciousness that it was still only five o'clock, and that he was at least one hour beforehand with the world, it is easy to understand why Mr Wentworth mused and loitered over his work, and how, when it was nearly six o'clock, and Sarah and the cook were beginning to stir from their sleep, there still remained only the text written upon the sermon-paper, which was so nicely arranged before him on the table. "When the wicked man turneth away from the evil of his ways, and doeth that which is lawful and right."—This was the text; but sitting at the open window, looking out into the garden, where the birds, exempt, as they seemed to think, for once from the vulgar scrutiny of man, were singing at the pitch of all their voices as they prepared for breakfast; and where the sweet air of the morning breathed into his mind a freshness and hopefulness which youth can never resist, and seduced his thoughts away from all the harder problems of his life to dwell upon the sweeter trouble of that doubt about Lucy,—was not the best means of getting on with his work. He sat thus leaning back—sometimes dipping his pen in the ink, and hovering over the paper for two or three seconds at a time, sometimes reading over the words, and making a faint effort to recall his own attention to them; for, on the whole, perhaps, it is not of much use getting up very early in the morning when the chief consequence of it is, that a man feels he has an hour to spare, and a little time to play before he begins.

Mr Wentworth was still lingering in this peaceful pause, when he heard, in the stillness, hasty steps coming down Grange Lane. No doubt it was some workmen going to their work, and he felt it must be nearly six o'clock, and dipped his pen once more in the ink; but, the next moment, paused again to listen, feeling in his heart a strange conviction that the steps would stop at his door, and that something was going to happen. He was sure of it, and yet somehow the sound tingled upon his heart when he heard the bell ring, waking up echoes in the silent house. Cook and Sarah had not yet given any signs of coming down-stairs, and nobody stirred even at the sound of the bell. Mr Wentworth put down his pen altogether, and listened with an anxiety which he could scarcely account for—knowing, as he said to himself, that it must be the milk, or the baker, or somebody. But neither the milk nor the baker would have dared to knock, and shake, and kick the door as the new arrivals were doing. Mr Wentworth sat still as long as he could, then he added to the din they were making outside by an indignant ring of his own bell; and finally getting anxious, as was natural, and bethinking himself of his father's attack and Mr Wodehouse's illness, the Curate took the matter into his own hands, and hastened down-stairs to open the door. Mrs Hadwin called to him as he passed her room, thinking it was Sarah, and begging for goodness gracious sake to know directly what was the matter; and he felt himself growing agitated as he drew back the complicated bolts, and turned the key in the door, which was elaborately defenced, as was natural. When he hurried out into the garden, the songs of the birds and the morning air seemed to have changed their character. He thought he was about to be summoned to the deathbed of one or other of the old men upon whom their sons had brought such misery. He was but little acquainted with the fastenings of the garden-door, and fumbled a little over them in his anxiety. "Wait a moment and you shall be admitted," he called out to those outside, who still continued to knock; and he fancied, even in the haste and confusion of the moment, that his voice caused some little commotion among them. Mr Wentworth opened the door, looking anxiously out for some boy with a telegram, or other such mournful messenger; but to his utter amazement was nearly knocked down by the sudden plunge of Elsworthy, who entered with a spring like that of a wild animal, and whose face looked white and haggard as he rushed in. He came against the Curate so roughly as to drive him a step or two farther into the garden, and naturally aroused somewhat sharply the temper of the young man, who had already begun to regard him with disagreeable sensations as a kind of spy against himself.