Excitements were, however, not yet over for the day. A telegram was put into Alda's hands, containing the words—

'A. T. is an unmitigated brute. I sail for N. Y. to-night. All will be right when I come back.'

The mysterious hint restored Alda at once to all the privileges of the reigning heroine!



CHAPTER XX

VALE LESTON



'The way to make thy son rich is to fill His mind with rest before his trunk with riches; For wealth without contentment climbs a hill, To feel those tempests that fly over ditches, But if thy son can make ten pounds his measure, Then all thou addest may be called his treasure.' GEORGE HERBERT.

'I say, Felix, you've not told me about Vale Leston.'

The two brothers were established under the lee of an old boat, beneath the deep shadow of the red earth cliffs, festooned with ivy, wild clematis, everlasting pea, thrift, and samphire. Not far off, niched beneath the same cliff, were two or three cottage lodging- houses, two-storied, with rough grey slate roofs, glaring white walls, and green shutters to the windows that looked out over the shingly beach to the lazily rippling summer sea.

Ewmouth was a lazy place. Felix had felt half asleep through the earlier days of his stay, and Lance seemed to be lulled into a continual doze whenever he was unoccupied, and that was almost always. It had grieved his elder brother to see this naturally vivacious being so inert and content with inaction, only strolling about a little in early morning and late evening, and languid and weary, if not actually suffering, during the heat and glare of the day. He was now, with his air-pillow and a railway rug, lying on the beach beside Felix, who with his safety inkstand planted in the sand, was at work condensing the parliamentary debates for the Pursuivant, and was glad to perceive that he was so far alive as to be leaning on his elbow, slowly shovelling the sand or smaller pebbles with the frail tenement of a late crab, and it was another good sign to hear his voice in a voluntary inquiry about Vale Leston.

'I have not been there yet.'

'Not there?'

'No. Old Abednego Tripp comes over here every market day, and he's the only person I wanted to see.'

'I thought you came here because you wanted to see the place?'

'Yes; but I was not up to the walk when I came here; and while you were ill I never durst go out of reach of the telegraph, and latterly I waited for you. After all, I have not much mind to it. I don't see the good of setting oneself a coveting one's neighbour's house.'

'It wouldn't be my house, any way,' said Lance quaintly. 'How far is it?'

'Rather more than three miles. We'll get a boat some day and do it.'

'That will be jolly!' and after shovelling a little longer, Lance added, 'How came we to be turned out?'

'That's just what I can't tell. I was only seven, you know, and my father never would talk of it. Sibby used to revile the mane nagur, Misther Fulbert, till it was current in the nursery that he was a black man who expelled us vi et armis. One day, my father found four or five of us in a row slashing at an old black doll, by way of killing Misther Fulbert, and prohibited such executions. I think, too, that he quashed an attempt to call our own Fulbert by his other name.'

'I wonder what the nagur did?'

'By the light of maturer nature, I imagine that he may have succeeded as heir-at-law, and that his maneness may have consisted in not giving the living to my father; but I cannot tell. It always seemed my father's great desire to put it out of our minds. I remember before we left the place his catching me in a furious rage with some one who told me my pony was to be sold. He carried me off, and told me it was all true, and we were going away, and he trusted to me to be brave and make it as little hard to Mamma and the little girls as could be. He said the place had belonged to old Uncle Underwood, and that we had no right to stay there after his death. That was all the explanation he gave me, first or last; and I don't think we thought much about it after the neck of the change was broken.'

'You remember it, though.'

'I believe I know every step of the house and garden. I have never ceased to dream of them; and I am as much afraid of disturbing old impressions as of reviving wishes.'

'Holloa! what's up?' exclaimed Lance, as the landlady was seen coming in quest of them. 'I thought I saw a tidy little tiger going in there just now.'

'A note from Mr. Staples, if you please, Sir, and they wait for an answer.'

'I didn't know you had any acquaintance here.'

'Mr. Staples is the solicitor who did the business about Admiral Chester's legacy. He is retired now, and only holds some county office. He found me out last week, I believe, from some letters of mine going wool-gathering to the other F. Underwood. He called and said he knew my father, and was very civil and friendly. He sent to inquire after you the day you came. This is what he says:—

MY DEAR MR. FELIX UNDERWOOD—Your relative at Vale Leston wishes me to dine with him to-morrow evening. If you and your brother would like to accompany me on the drive, meet me at six o'clock on the top of the cliff. If you would prefer to return earlier than I do, I can direct you to a boatman to take you down by the river.—Believe me, yours truly, C. STAPLES.

'Hurrah! that's not half a bad fellow for an attorney,' cried Lance.

'Shall not you be tired? Will it not be too hot for you?'

'Not a bit of it. He,' indicating the sun, 'can only get at me asquint by that time, and I'm a match for him with my blue umbrella. Come, fire away, you tardy Norseman. Say we are good for it. Fancy boating back!'

And Lance whistled a few bars of 'The Hardy Norseman,' the liveliest thing he had done since his illness.

At the appointed hour, the brothers were standing on the top of the cliff, with a broad estuary before them; on the opposite side of which lay the town of Ewmouth at the foot of the old castle, with fresh modern fortifications towards the sea. The town, with its church towers and gas chimneys, sloped away from it; vessels thronged the harbour; and a long weird-looking thready suspension-bridge spanned the broad tide-river to East Ewmouth, the village fast growing into a suburb. There had not been more than time to point out the details to Lance before a waggonet drove up from one of the roads that branched among pleasant 'villa residences;' and in it appeared a white-haired but hearty-looking gentleman, prepossessing and merry, very unlike Lance's notion of attorneys, who shook hands with them warmly, and took care to put the boy under the shade of the driving- seat.

It was a pretty drive, through rich meadows, shut in by the sloping wooded hills which gradually closed nearer; and by and by over the shoulder of one looked a very tall church tower, whereat Felix started with a thrill of responsive recognition, and suddenly faltered in the political discussion Mr. Staples had started, but dropped at once, looking at the young man's face with kindly interest.

At the same time road and river both made a sudden turn into a much narrower and wilder valley, the hills beyond more rough and rocky; but the river still broad and smooth, and crossed by a handsome high- backed five-arched bridge, the centre arch grandly high and broad, the other two rapidly diminishing on either side. Over this the carriage turned; and from the crown Lance beheld an almost collegiate-looking mass of grey building, enclosing sunny lawns and flower-beds, and surrounded by park-like grounds and trees, all sloping towards the river, and backed by steep hills of wood and moorland, whence a little brook danced with much impetus down to the calm steady main stream of Ewe. The church and remnants of the old priory occupied the forefront of a sort of peninsula, the sweep of the Ewe on the south and east, and the little lively Leston on the north. There was slope enough to raise the buildings beyond damp, and display the flower-beds beautifully as they lay falling away from the house. The churchyard lay furthest north, skirted by the two rivers, and the east end with the lovely floriated window of the Lady Chapel rising some thirty yards from the bank of the Ewe, the outline a little broken by an immense willow tree that wept its fountain-like foliage into the river. The south transept was cloistered, and joined to the building beyond, a long low grey house with one row of windows above the sloping roof of the cloister, and this again connected with a big family mansion, built of the same gray stone with the rest, but in the style of the seventeenth century, and a good deal modernised upon that. A great plate-glass window looked out on the river in the east front, which projected nearly as far as did the Lady Chapel, the space between being, as before said, laid out in a formal parterre, with stone steps leading down to the river.

'Oh, what a place! what a place!' shouted Lance, starting up in the carriage. 'It's like the minster, and the jolly old river besides! Two of them! Oh! what fishing there must be!'

'I did not know it was really so beautiful,' said Felix in a low voice.

'You remember it?' said Mr. Staples.—'I suppose you can't?' to Lance.

'Oh no! I wasn't born! More's the pity! Do the salmon come up here, Sir?'

'Yes, since the fisheries have been protected; but young Mr. Underwood is a great fisherman, and I fear it is not easy to get a card.'

'Oh, I wasn't thinking about leave, Sir, thank you. I've got no tackle nor anything; but I am glad we have salmon,' said Lance, as though he had acquired an accession of dignity.

Descending from the bridge, they were in a road skirting the river, and on which presently opened the lodge gates of the Rectory. Here Mr. Staples got out, telling his servant to drive the young gentlemen round to the village.

'I say, Felix,' said Lance, as they were whirled on along the lane which swept round the long wall overhung by trees, 'that old party must know all about it.'

'Most likely,' said Felix; 'but if there had been any good in my hearing, my father could have told me himself. How well I remember his giving me my first ride along this lane! Do you smell the bean field? I don't believe I have thought of the scent since.'

Felix seemed absorbed in the pleasures of recognition; and Lance, amazed at the beauty and what seemed to him the splendour of the place, looked up at his brother with a kind of romantic feeling for a disinherited knight, as he contrasted the scene with the counter and printing-office.

The lane led to the village street, a very pretty one sloping upwards, and lying on each side of the Leston, which rippled along as clear as crystal, crossed every here and there by footbridges, some wooden, some a single stone; while the cottages on the opposite side were perched on a high shelf or terrace, and were approached by charming irregular flights of stairs with low walls or balustrades. Over the rail of one, smoking a pipe in summer evening enjoyment, was seen Abednego Tripp, with long nose, brown parchment cheeks, and lank hair not yet grey—one of the genuine almost extinct species of parish clerk. As the carriage stopped, he began to descend, keys in hand, for the church was a lion, and many carriages did stop there; but it was not till Felix jumped out and hailed him that he knew who were his visitors.

'Bless me, if it is not Master Felix after all! I did think you was never coming, Sir. And this is the young gentleman as has been so ill. You're kindly welcome, Sir. I think he'd favour poor Master Eddard if he didn't look so nesh.'

'I shall get well here,' said Lance. 'If it is not my native air, it ought to be.'

'Will you come and rest a bit, Sir? or would you like to go to the church?'

'The church,' they said. Felix first explained what he knew would give pleasure—that they had come depending on him for a cup of tea, and a cast in his boat which was wont to convey the marketables of Vale Leston twice a week to Ewmouth.

Abednego sped up his stairs like a lamplighter, to cause his grand- daughter to make preparations, and was speedily down again, delighted to hear Felix prove his memory by inquiries after the inhabitants of the old dwellings.

'Ha! the Miss Hepburns!' said Felix, looking at a tall narrow house completely embowered in trailing roses, and with the rails of the bridge of entrance wreathed with clematis. 'Are they there still?'

'Oh yes. Sir, all the four on 'em; and a sight of good they does to the poor!'

'I wonder whether I ought to call?' said Felix; 'they used to be very kind to me.'

'What, is that Rob's godmother, that never gave her anything but that queer name?' asked Lance.

'I shouldn't think they were rich,' said Felix. 'I fancy they used to be very fond of my mother, and made her promise that the next girl should be named for one of them. There was Miss Bridget, and Miss Martha, and something else as bad, and Robina was the least objectionable of the lot. I think they used to write to my mother; but it is late in the day for calling.'

'Here comes Miss Bridget,' said the clerk, as there appeared in sight a tall, rigid, angular figure, with a big brown hat and long straight cloak, and a decidedly charity-looking basket in her hand.

Felix stepped forward with his hand to his hat. 'Miss Hepburn, I believe. I must introduce myself—Felix Underwood'

The lady's first move had been a startled shy drawing herself up and into herself, at being addressed by a stranger. Then she looked up with an amazed 'Felix Underwood! Little Felix!' and as he smiled and bowed, she rumbled and put out a hesitating hand.

'Yes. Tripp did tell us something—something of your being at Ewmouth, but we were not sure.'

'We had not been able to come over before,' said Felix, thinking she meant to imply that he ought to have called. 'We came for health and have not been equal to the walk.'

'Oh, indeed. Nothing infectious, I hope?'

'Oh no,' he said, explaining in a few words the total want of connection between his case and Lance's.

'I am glad. I'll—I'll tell my sisters. I'm glad to have seen you.'

There was something faltering and ill-assured in her manner, and in a moment she turned back with 'Mr. Underwood, where are you stopping?'

He answered; and with 'I'll tell my sisters,' she parted with them again.

'That's Miss Bridget,' commented old Tripp. 'She's the one as allys says, "I'll tell my sisters." They do say as Miss Isabella, she be the master on 'em all.'

Felix and Lance smiled to one another the assurance that every family had it's Wilmet; but while the younger brother shrugged his shoulders, the elder felt a certain chill in the contrast with those days of old, when the sugar-plums and picture-books of the whole sisterhood were all at his service, and bethought him that times were changed.

They entered the churchyard by a little side-gate. The church was a grand pile of every style of architecture that had prevailed since the Cistercians had settled in Vale Leston, and of every defacement that the alternate neglect and good-will of the Underwoods could perpetrate. The grand tower at the west end was, however, past their power to spoil, and they had not done much damage to the exterior, except in a window or buttress here and there. But within! The brothers, used to the heavy correctness of the St. Oswald's restoration, stood aghast when Abednego admitted them by the door of excommunication, straight into the chancel, magnificently deep, but with the meanest of rails, a reredos where Moses and Aaron kept guard over the Commandments in black and gold, and walls bristling with genii and angels of all descriptions, weeping over Underwoods of different generations. Lance stood open-mouthed before a namesake of his own, whose huge monumental slab was upborne by the exertions of a kind of Tartarean cherub, solely consisting of a skull and a pair of bats' wings!

'My stars! where did that brute come from?' muttered Lance under his breath. 'He's got no trifle of a piece of work!'

However, Felix had taken in that the chancel had respectable poppy- headed benches, though the lower part of the church was completely 'emparoked in pues,' such as surprised Lance out of all bounds when he withdrew his eyes from the white marble death's head.

'My stars!' again he said, 'this is what I've heard of, but never saw.'

'Ay, Sir,' said Mr. Tripp, 'every one that come here do be crying out upon the pews; and to be sure, I see the folk sleepin' in them as is shameful!'

'Well he might, for his place was the lowest in a lofty three-decker, against one pier of the chancel arch, surmounted by a golden angel blowing a trumpet, and with lettering round the sounding-board, recording it to have been the gift of the Reverend Lancelot Underwood, Rector and Vicar of this parish—the owner of the mural slab before mentioned. That angel recalled to Felix that the sight of it had been his great pleasure in going to church, only marred by the fact that he was out of sight of it in the chancel.

'Why, you weren't in the choir then?' said Lance.

'Choir! no, Sir,' said the clerk. 'They sits in the gallery. The chancel is for Mr. Underwood's family—the Rector, Sir. They seats was just put up instead of the red baize pew before old Mr. Underwood as was then died, and your poor papa went away. And that there font was put, as 'tis there, just when the twin young ladies was christened.'

'Where was I christened, then?'

'In the bowl as we used to have on the Communion, Sir.'

It was plain how far Edward Underwood had dared to work at renovation, and that nothing had since been done. The Lady-chapel, with a wonderful ceiling of Tudor fans and pendants, was full of benches and ragged leaves of books for such Sunday schooling as took place there, the national school having been built half a mile off, that the children might not be obnoxious to the Rectory. The church was a good way behind the ordinary churches of 1861, and struck the two brothers the more from the system in which they had been brought up.

'What a state Clem would be in!' uttered Lance, as they came out.

'It is of no use to think about it,' said Felix. 'Let us enjoy the beautiful exterior.'

'Ay, Sir,' said old Tripp, 'parties do be saying as how it is a mortial pity to see such a church go to wrack; and I do believe the Squire wouldn't be so hard to move if it warn't for the Passon— that's young Mr. Fulbert, the vicar.'

'I don't understand all these rectors and vicars,' said Lance. 'I thought they never hung out together.'

'Why, you see, Master Lancelot, as how this is what they calls a lay rectory, as goes like a landed estate from father to son, without there being any call for 'em to be clergy; and the Vicar, he is just put in to do Passon's work, only he gets his situation for life, like I do, not like them curates.'

'I see,' said Felix; 'and the rectors have generally taken Holy Orders, and presented themselves to the vicarage.'

'Yes, Sir, that's how it ought to be; only this here Squire—not being no Passon, though Rector he be—he puts in a gentleman to keep it warm till his son, young Mr. Fulbert, our Vicar as is, was growed up, and hard work they say it was to get him to bend his mind to it; nor he'd not have done it at last, but for his father's paying of his bills, and giving consent to his marrying Miss Shaw. And since that, bless you, Sir, the curates have done nothing but change, change, change, till 'tis enough to ruin a good clerk. You knows what that is, Master Felix, you that be one of the cloth.' (For Felix allowed himself no unprofessional coats.)

'It is only the cloth, Mr. Tripp; don't you see I sport a blue tie! I am a bookseller.'

'A bookseller!' The old man recoiled. 'You'll not be passing your jokes on me, Sir. A book-writer—I understands.'

'No, a bookseller in earnest. I have a share in a very good business at Bexley; I've been at it ever since I was sixteen.'

The old clerk was quite overcome; he leant upon a headstone and stared at Felix without speaking, and then it was a sort of soliloquy. 'To think of poor dear Master Eddard's son being come to that! and he looking a dozen times more like a clergyman and a gentleman than ever this young Mr. Fulbert will!

'Never mind, Mr. Tripp,' said Felix; 'there's one of us on the way to be a clergyman—Edward Clement, you know, that I wrote to you about; and maybe this fellow too. Don't look so angry with me. I was obliged to do the best I could to bring in something for the thirteen of us. '

'And we're as proud of him as can be!' added Lance, affectionately and indignantly.

'Ah, well,' said the old aristocrat, 'that may be, for you never knew them he came of. There was my old Lady Geraldine, as was his great- grandmother, who gave a new coat or new gown to every poor body in the parish at Christmas, and as much roast beef as they could eat; and wore a shawl as come from the Injies and cost two hundred pounds! She was a lady! Bless me, what would she have said to see the day—'

'That she was glad to have a great-grandson good for something,' stoutly answered Lance. 'I declare, Mr. Tripp, you'd have liked him better if he had come a begging!'

'So I do,' said Felix; 'and what's more, Mr. Tripp is going to refuse me because he is too fine to sit down to tea with a tradesman!'

'No, no, sir,' said old Tripp, with tears in his eyes. 'You'll not go for to say that. If it was the last morsel I had, I'd be proud to share it with one of Master Eddard's sons; but I can't but think as how we rung the bells and drunk your health when you was born, just as we did for the Prince of Wales, and how proud poor Master Eddard looked. No doubt he was spared the knowing of it.'

'No,' said Felix, 'it was settled with his full consent.'

Abednego seemed more distressed than ever. 'Poor Master Eddard! he must have been brought very low. Such a gentleman as he was! Never spoke a proud or rude word, Sir, but used to hold up his head like the first lord in the land, and fire and colour up and start like one of young Mr. Fulbert's thoroughbreds if any one said an impudent word.'

'That no one ever ventured,' said Felix. 'He was as much respected at Bexley—yes, and is still—as ever he could be here. I wish you could see my brother Edgar, he is more like him than either of us. Ah, here's the old garden gate, I wish we could go into the shrubbery.

Tripp was rather for trying it. He said the gardeners would be gone home, and the elder master at dinner—the younger, with his wife, was absent; but Felix could not bear the sense of spying, though he did not withhold Lance from a rush into the garden paths, where he did not discover much. Then they looked into the eddy at the meeting of the waters; and turning back to Tripp's neatest of kitchens, were there regaled upon shrimps, rashers hissing from the fire, and the peculiar native species of hot-buttered cake, which Felix recollected as viewed in the nursery as the ne plus ultra of excellence, probably because it was an almost prohibited dainty. Lance was in his element, delighting himself and Miss Kerenhappuch Tripp by assisting her to toast, to butter, and even to wash up, calling Felix to witness that he always helped Cherry in the holidays; when just as they were rising to seek the boat, Mr. Staples came climbing up the steps.

'I thought I should find you here,' he said. 'Mr. Underwood very much wishes you would come and spend the rest of the evening with him.'

'The old humbug!' burst out Lance. 'You won't go, will you, Felix?'

Felix thought a moment, then walked with Mr. Staples to the corner of the narrow ledge in front of the cottage. 'Mr. Staples,' he said, 'I know nothing about it. I trust to you to tell me whether this man treated my father so that I ought not to accept attention from him.'

'Hm? ha? I should not say so. He treated him unkindly, ungenerously, but he hardly knew how much so, and he had the letter of the law on his side. I verily believe he regrets it, and that your father, being what he was, would be the last to wish you to hold aloof.'

'Most likely,' said Felix. 'I am sure he forgave whatever there was to forgive.'

'It is not my doing, I assure you. He spoke of your letters that had gone astray, and that led to more, till when he found you were in the village, he said he should like to see you. He is breaking up; his son has given him a good deal of trouble, and I believe he is altogether concerned for what has passed.'

'And he will not suppose we want anything from him?' said Felix, with something of the almost unavoidable pride of independent poverty.

'Certainly not. I have guarded against that.'

'Then I suppose we must.—That is, how is your head? are you too much tired, Lance?'

'No,' said Lance, almost sulkily; for he was much inclined to make fatigue a plea for escaping the 'mane nagur' and enjoying the boat, and was rather unreasonably disposed to think it all a plot on the part of Mr. Staples for spoiling the evening. Felix might have been equally glad of the excuse, but he believed his father would have thought this act of conciliation a duty, and followed Mr. Staples across the churchyard, where all the little boys in the place seemed to be playing marbles on the flagged paths. Its neglected state was a painful contrast to the exquisitely laid-out shrubbery, as trim as gardeners could make it, and improved and altered beyond Felix's recognition.

Entering the house, Mr. Staples led the way to the dining-room, where there was a large empty table in the middle of the room, and in the deep bay of the window a smaller one, laid out with wine and dessert, where sat 'old Fulbert.' Having always heard him so called, the brothers were surprised to find him no more than elderly. He must have been originally a thorough florid handsome Underwood, and had the remains of military bearing, though with an air of feebleness and want of health, and a good deal of asthmatic oppression on his breath. He did not rise, but held out his hand, saying, 'Good evening. Thank you for coming to see a sick man.'

'I am sorry to see you so unwell, Sir.'

'Thank you, I'm on the mend. Sit down. Take a glass of wine—claret?'

Felix accepted, wondering if his father would regard it as an act of pardon.

'And you?'

'No thank you, Sir.'

'No wine? You are the one that has been so ill? No objection to melon, eh?'

And Lancelot, whose illness had left a strong hankering for fruit, was considerably appeased by the first cut into the cool buff flesh.

'Is he the next brother to you?'

'Oh no. There are three brothers and three sisters between us.'

'And what are they doing? There were one or two with Tom Underwood. Didn't the young fellow offend him and turn out idle?'

'Not that, Sir,' said Felix, his colour rising: 'but he had no turn for a clerkship, and a good deal for art. He is studying at the Royal Academy, but there never was any quarrel; he is often at Thomas Underwood's.'

'And the rest?'

'One has the Ewshire Scholarship at St. Cadoc's; and there's one in Australia.'

'And this lad—what's his name?'

'Lancelot. He is in the choir school at Minsterham Cathedral, and hopes to get a scholarship.'

'Is that all of you?'

'Two more boys, quite little, and the six girls.'

'Any of them able to do anything for themselves?'

'The eldest is a teacher in a school at Bexley,' said Felix, not delighted with the cross-examination; and Alda, the one that lived with the Tom Underwoods, is engaged to a man of good fortune. Then two of the younger ones are at schools, where an allowance is made for poor clergyman's daughters.'

'How long has your mother been dead?'

'Four years and a half.'

'And you have managed all single-handed?'

'With my eldest sister's help, Sir.'

'Taken to the press, have you?' (Mr. Staples must have made the best of his vocation.) 'What's your paper?'

'The Bexley Pursuivant. Most likely you never heard of it. It is only a little county paper;' and then feeling that to stop there was a subterfuge, he added, 'Our main business is the retail trade.'

Mr. Underwood was chiefly intent on the next question, the politics of the paper, though he said he need hardly ask. 'All you young stuck-up fellows run in one team—all destructives.'

'No, no, Sir,' broke in Mr. Staples eagerly. 'Mr. Felix is staunch to the back-bone.'

Felix was never more tempted to deny his principles than when he found them brought forward as a recommendation; but he could only explain that the Pursuivant was an old established county gentleman's style of paper, in the agricultural interest. Whereupon the Squire mounted his political hobby in such sort and with such abusive violence, especially as to the local representatives of the adverse party, that Felix could not help feeling that if such were indeed the opinions of his own side, he should certainly be on the other. One good effect was the sparing him any more personal catechising. Mr. Underwood shouted himself weary, without requiring any reply save what Mr. Staple's local knowledge supplied; and when the carriage was announced, the guests were dismissed with a hearty shake of the hands, and invitation to call again—'It was a comfort to talk of public matters to a young man of sense;' and Lance found a sovereign in his hand. He was not sure that he was obliged.

'Well,' said Mr. Staples, rubbing his hands with satisfaction as they drove off, 'what do you think of the Squire?'

'He talks very loud,' said Felix, who had for some time been watching the increase of Lance's headache, and now was trying to give him a rest on shoulder and arm.

Mr. Staples gave what help he could towards making the tired boy comfortable, and then returned to the subject in all their minds. 'So your father never told you those particulars?'

'No; I think it was his great object not to dwell on them, nor let us look back with regret or anger.'

'Just like him. I never saw such a case, never! I'll show you a remarkable letter of his. But, first, you ought to understand the way the matter stood. To begin with the relationship.'

'I know nothing about them, only that my father and mother were second cousins; but I don't even know to which of them my great-uncle Underwood was really uncle.'

'To your mother. He had very strong feelings as to the duty of the head of a family, and made his house a home for all that needed it. When Miss Mary was sent home an orphan from India—James's, his favourite brother's, child—he asked his cousin's widow, Mrs. Edward Underwood, to bring her boy, superintend the house, and look after the little girl; and she was glad enough, for the captain had died of his wounds at Waterloo, and she had little but her widow's pension.'

'I know,' said Felix. 'Then whose son is the Squire?'

'The son of Lancelot, who was the second brother, between the Reverend Fulbert (your great-uncle) and James, your mother's father. So he was heir-at-law, but he was a wildish sort of lad, unfit to take Holy Orders; and there came to be an understanding that if his uncle would buy his commission and purchase his steps, he would not look for the Rectory and the estate. On that understanding your father took Orders and married; but on old Mr. Underwood's death there was only a draught of a will, which he had not been in a state to execute, leaving a handsome legacy to Fulbert, but the whole property to your father and mother. It seemed a matter of course that, as the only compensation, Fulbert should have presented his cousin Edward to the vicarage—400 pounds a year; but as ill-luck would have it, he took offence at some sermon—a Lent one about self-indulgence, I believe it was—swore he wouldn't have a Puseyite parson preaching at him, and went into such a rage that it is thought to be partly by way of getting off giving him the living, and getting it held for his son.'

'I see, said Felix.

'It was a dirty trick; and I was a younger man at the time, and it struck me that if your father chose to try the case, the testator's intentions being clear, and instructions in his own hand extant, it was ten to one it might be given in his favour. I even took a counsel's opinion, thinking that at any rate an intimation that the case was to be tried before possession was given up might bring Fulbert to terms with regard to the living.'

'And he would not?'

'No. I should like to show you his letter. Would you do me the honour of dining with me to-morrow?'

Felix was obliged to mutter something about ladies and no dress- coats, but this was silenced, and he made a promise contingent on Lance's fitness. He was puzzled by the relations in which Mr. Staples seemed to stand with the lay-rector; but he found that they were not of business, only that elections and county affairs brought them together, and that Mr. Underwood was regarded with a sort of compassion by the men of his own standing, who used to go and visit him whenever they could be secure of not encountering the cold welcome and ill-breeding of his daughter-in-law—the grievance of his life.

'Did you see any one you remembered?' further asked Mr. Staples.

'One of the Miss Hepburns, who did not seem very well to know whether to acknowledge me or not.'

'Ha, ha!' chuckled Mr. Staples. 'Queer old girls they are. Very high. Very good to the poor. All the good that is done in Vale Leston is by them; but anything between a swell and a pauper don't exist for them. They're as poor as Job, and their pride is all they have, so they make the most of it.'

So, after all, the day had not been quite without mortification, and Felix felt it a little more than he thought it was worth.

Lance was a good deal excited by the sight of his ancestral home. He had an eye for scenery, and longed to bask in it again; boating seemed delightful; and he was amazed, not to say elated, by the grandeur of the house, which exceeded any—save Centry Park—in his limited experience. His mind was set on explorations there, and on the whole history; while Felix, to whom all was less new and more sorrowful, was inclined to hang back from any unwise awakening of unsettling regrets; but there was no declining Mr. Staples' kindness, and he had much desire to see the letter. So the two youths put on their Sunday coats, assisted one another's ties, and looked each other well over before encountering the formidable mass of ladies Felix had seen in church, and about whom he was far more shy than Lance, who had seen a good deal more of the species at Minsterham.

It turned out very pleasant; the frank good-natured mother and daughters made themselves very agreeable, and though no one was as pretty as Alice Knevett, they were all so far superior to her in manner and cultivation that the mixing with them could not fail to soften any sting of disappointment that might remain. Lance was made much of as an invalid, and very much liked the privileges that did not hinder an evening game of croquet, since Mr. Staples evidently intended his conference with Felix to be tete-a-tete.

It took place in a pleasant little study, fitted with green morocco and walnut, that spoke well for the solicitor's taste and prosperity, and looking out on the pretty lawn, with the long shadows of the trees, the croquet players flitting about, and the sea glittering in the distance.

The letter was ready, folded up lengthwise and docketed, business fashion; but when opened, the familiar handwriting seemed to bring back the father, even to the sound of his voice.

Vale Leston Rectory, 18th January.

MY DEAR STAPLES—My wife and I feel greatly obliged, to you for your good-will and zeal on our behalf, and have not for a moment justified your dread of being thought officious. In other circumstances, I might be tempted to fight the battle; but it is impossible for several reasons. Were we the losers, we should be totally unable to pay the costs, and a load either of debt or obligation would be a burthen we have no right to assume. Moreover, the uncertainty of our position pending the decision would be as mischievous to myself as to the parishioners. It would destroy any fitness to be their Vicar, whether we gained or not. The holding the Rectory is in itself an abuse; and now that the grapes are sour, I am glad not to encounter the question of conscience, and so shall not adopt any means—to my mind doubtful—for bringing it on myself. This being the case, you will see that the idea of alarming Fulbert Underwood falls to the ground. Supposing he were coerced into the compromise, what a pleasing pair—squire and parson—would be the result! No, my kind friend, be content to see things remain as they are. We carry with us the certainty of our good uncle's kindness, and the non-fulfilment of his intentions is clearly providential. I have heard of a promising curacy, where I shall get the training I need after feeling my wilful way as I have done here. My wife, being the expectant heiress and lay-rectoress, shall write to satisfy you that she is not suffering from my coercion.—Yours, most sincerely obliged, E. F. UNDERWOOD.

And on another sheet followed:—

DEAR MR. STAPLES—I think my husband is quite right, and that to go to law would only make things much worse. It is very kind in you, but I really do not care about anything so long as I have my husband and children, and can feel that my dear uncle meant all that was kind. Indeed, I really think my husband enjoys the prospect of a new and more active kind of work. He is sure to be happy anywhere, and as long as that is the case, all will be right; and he says that it will be much better for the children not to grow up in luxury. With many warm thanks.— Yours very truly, M. W. UNDERWOOD.

'May I copy them?' asked Felix, looking up with his eyes fuller of tears than suited his reserved disposition.

His father's letter, full of his constant brave cheerfulness in self- abnegation, had not overcome him like the few words that brought back the lovely young mamma he now remembered at Vale Leston, but whom he had too soon known only as the patient, over-tasked, drudging mother, and latterly in the faded helpless invalid. How little she had guessed the life that was before her!

Mr. Staples readily supplied him with the materials, adding, 'I will take care you have the letters by and by. I value them too much to part with them in my lifetime.' And presently he interrupted Felix's writing by saying, 'I much wished to have seen Mr. and Mrs. Edward Underwood again, but it seemed to me that they were unwilling to keep up a correspondence.'

'They were so busy,' said Felix.

'No doubt; and I thought they might feel a visit an intrusion. Otherwise, I often thought of running down from town.'

'My father would have been very glad.'

'I did wish to have seen him again—and your mother, almost a child as she was even at that time, with her flock of pretty children. I shall never forget her—the beauty and darling of all the neighbourhood as she used to be. All we young men used to rave about her long before she was out.' Mr. Staples smiled at some recollection, and added, 'I never spoke to her four times in my life; but I was as bad as any of them—presumptuous as you may think it.'

'I am glad you did not see her again,' burst from Felix, the tears starting forth as he copied her hopeful words. 'She altered sadly.'

'Ah! indeed.'

The concerned tone forced Felix to add, 'It came so much more heavily on her than on any of us, care and work and years of seeing my father's health failing; and in the last week of his life she had a fall, that brought on softening of the brain.'

Somehow, the whole had never struck him as so piteous before as in the contrast with her youthful brightness, and when he saw Mr. Staples greatly affected. He could only write on through a mist of tears, while the solicitor walked about the room, blowing his nose violently, and muttering sentences never developed; till at last he came behind Felix's chair, and laying his hand on his shoulder, said, 'After all, it will come round. You are next heir.'

'Heir? There's Fulbert Underwood!' exclaimed Felix.

'True; but he's been some years married, and there's no sign of a family. Depend upon it, we shall see Vale Leston come back yet.'

'It would make no difference now,' muttered Felix, as he traced his mother's fearless lines; nay, if he had a personal thought, it was of what he might have ventured towards Alice Knevett.

'Not to them,' said Mr. Staples, 'but a good deal to you, my young friend.'

'Now, Mr. Staples,' said Felix, smiling, 'aren't you doing our best to unsettle a young man in business?'

'Well, well, you are too reasonable. A contingency—only a contingency. But I should like to show you.' And he hastily sketched a pedigree that had at least the advantage of showing Felix his relationships.

Rev. Lancelot. _________ Rev. Fulbert. Lancelot Rev. Fulbert.__Lancelot__James U. Lancelot__Thomas d 1843. Fulbert Mary Wilmet Thomas Rev. Edward m. Edward U. m. Mary Kedge m. Mary Wilmet Underwood Rev. Fulbert Felix, etc. Mary Alda Underwood



'There! Through your mother you stand next in the line—are heir-at- law, you see. May I live to see that day! That's all.'

The thought did not affect Felix much at the moment. He was too full of what might have been, and the 'contingency' was such a remote one! So after answering to the best of his ability whether any of his sisters were like his mother, he was glad to get out, and forget it all in croquet. His musical capacities were discovered too; but the attempt to profit by them proved quite too much for Lance, to whose brain the notes of the piano were absolute and severe pain.

A formal little note came on the ensuing morning, in which 'the Misses Hepburn'—in the third person—requested the favour of the company of Mr. Felix Underwood and his brother at luncheon. Felix felt a little stung. He could recollect warm passages between the ladies and his mother, and had been their pet long enough to wonder at this cold reception, and question whether it were not more dignified to reject advances made in such a manner; but his heart yearned towards those who had been kind to him in his youth, and he believed that his mother would have wished him to renew the intercourse, and therefore decided upon going, but it was too hot and sunny a day for Lance to walk, and Felix so entirely expected the visit to be wearisome and disagreeable, if not mortifying, that he could only resolve on it as a duty, and would not expose his brother to it.

So he plodded off alone, and a curious visit he had. It was not easy for him to guess at the sacredness of those traditions of gentility and superiority that the 'Misses Hepburn' held—not so much for their own sakes as in faithful loyalty to the parents many years dead, and to the family duty that imposed a certain careful exclusiveness on them in deference to the noble lineage they could reckon, and the head of the house, whom none of them had ever seen. He could not have guessed the warm feeling towards 'dear Mary' that had struggled so hard with the sense of duty, and had gained the victory over the soreness at the dropping of correspondence, and the idea that it was a dereliction to bend to one 'who had lowered himself,' as Mrs. Fulbert Underwood said he had.

What he saw was a tiny drawing-room, full of flowers and gimcracks, and fuller of four tall angular women, in dark dresses in the rear of the fashion, and sandy hair. They had decided in council, or rather Miss Isabella had decided for them, that since he was to be received, they would remember only his gentle blood; and therefore they shook hands with him, and the difference of the clasp alone could have shown the difference of character—the patronising, the nervous, the tenderly agitated, the hearty.

He found them better informed than the Squire had been as to the condition of the family—at least, so he presumed from the text of their inquiries. Not a word did they say of his own employment—it was to be treated as a thing not to be spoken of; but the welfare of the others was inquired after, and especially of Robina—who was the name-child of the eldest sister, the gentlest of the set, and the most in the background, quiet and tearful—pleased to hear that her godchild was at school, and as Felix emphatically said 'a very good girl,' anxious that he should take charge of 'a little token' for her.

The little token turned out to be Ministering Children; and this gave Felix a further hint, which prepared him for the tone in which some of his information was received, when he had only mentioned Geraldine as gone for health's sake to the St. Faith's Sisterhood.

The ladies looked at one another, Miss Isabella cleared her throat, and he knew a warning was coming; so he quickly said, 'One of the ladies, a clergyman's widow, was very kind to my father in his illness, and is really the best friend we have left in England.'

'Your dear father was too much inclined to those specious doctrines that are only too fascinating to youth. I hope you do not outrun him.'

'I hope not,' said Felix, very sincerely; and he then succeeded in interesting his monitor by speaking of Fulbert, and using him as a bridge to lead to an account of Mr. Audley's Australian doings.

It was altogether a stiff uncomfortable visit; the very politeness of the good ladies made Felix feel that they viewed his position as altered, and he could not but feel a strong hope that he should never again have to make this offering at the shrine of ancient friendship.

On coming home in the evening, Felix found a note on the table.

'Croquet to wit?' asked Lance, as Felix tried to read it by the almost vanished twilight.

'What's this?'

'We hope you and your brother will join us in a picnic at Kitt's Head on Saturday.

'Having discharged my ladies' commission, I proceed to that which I have authority from your relation for intimating to you—namely, that failing heirs of his own son, he has entailed the Vale Leston property upon you, thus rendering its alienation by the Reverend Fulbert impossible. I believe the arrangement was made within the last week. Congratulations would hardly be suitable, but I cannot refuse myself the pleasure of saying how sincerely I rejoice.'

'What—what?' cried Lance, jumping up. 'You to have that splendiferous river, and the salmon, and all. Won't you get a magnificent organ for that church?'

'My dear Lance, don't you see that all this means is, that if young Fulbert has no children, I shall come after him.'

'Oh, he won't! I'm sure he won't. Things always do come right. Oh, what a coup d'etat mine was after all! Things always do come right. You, that were born to it! Didn't old Tripp say how they had had the bells rung for you? I should like to set them going this minute!'

'They should be on your own cap, then!' said Felix, laughing and yet sharing in a castle or two—how Cherry should have a pony-carriage! how Clement should be turned loose upon the Church! how Lance should pursue the salmon at home and the humanities at the University! how Bernard should have a real good gentleman's education—but Felix soon brought himself back again. 'Remember, Lance, not a word of this at home or anywhere else.'

'Not tell any one ?' cried the boy, crest-fallen.

'Don't you see, Lance, besides the impropriety of talking of what involves two deaths, it would be the most senseless thing in the world to let this make the least difference. Old Fulbert may change his mind, or young Fulbert have a son; at any rate, he is not five- and-thirty, and just as likely as not to outlive me.'

'Fee! Fee! you are quite well, you wretched Norseman!'

'Oh! I didn't mean that; but anybody may outlive anybody for that matter. Anyway, there's no chance of any of these schemes coming to pass while we are young enough to care, even if they ever do; and if they unsettle us now, it would be unmitigated damage.'

'I see that,' said Lance; 'but as, by good luck, I'm No. 8, it can't do me much harm to think about it, and I don't see why the others should not.'

'Do you think some of them would be content to go on as we are doing, with this in their heads? And if any one in the town knew it, whatever I might do, people would think I was getting above my business. I doubt whether even Froggy himself would have the same reliance on me.'

'Then shan't you even tell Wilmet and Cherry?'

'I hope not. I don't think Wilmet could keep it from Alda, or Cherry from Edgar; and just imagine what it would be to have it come round through Kensington Palace Gardens that we were reckoning on it! Besides, it will make no earthly difference to anybody, unless, maybe, to Edgar's son.'

The mention of such a being brought Felix somehow to a sudden silence; and in the meantime supper and a candle were brought in, revealing a thick letter from Geraldine, which had at first escaped notice. There were two enclosures; but as Felix read her writing, he broke out with an exclamation of consternation that startled Lance.

'Hollo! What is it?' And as he received no answer—'Wilmet's not given up Jack? Eh? Nor Cherry fallen in love next? Clem hasn't turned bare-footed friar?' crowding together the wildest suggestions he could think of to force answer.

'Hush! That dear child—'

'She doesn't want to be a sister? You'll tell her you'd see her at Jericho first!'

'No. It is about her foot.'

'Not worse!'

'No; but, dear little thing, she wants to have it taken off, because she fancies if she was more effective, it might be one difficulty out of Wilmet's way!'

'She's a blessed little brick! But would it be so?'

'Well, I remember in the time of the measles, the last time I ever let that fellow Rugg come near her, he thought proper to tell somebody in her hearing that if she was in a fit state of health, it would be the only remedy. She wasn't, and it was quite uncalled for, and it put the poor little thing in such an agony, that at last Sibby came and wrapped me up in a blanket to sit by her, and talk very big about nobody being able to do it without my leave, and my not intending to consent to any such thing. I thought she had forgotten all about it, but it seems that she has not; and she imagines that, as she says, "with a cork foot that I could stand upon, instead of always keeping this one up in fear of hurting it, I could get about the house with only a stick, and be of some use, and then dear Mettie's happiness might not be so far off."'

'And what does Mettie say?'

'She knows nothing; Cherry implores me not to tell her, for she says that it would be impossible for Mettie to come and nurse her, and she would rather have Sister Constance than any one.'

'Than Mettie! Deluded child!' cried Lance.

'Her great wish is to have it done now at St. Faith's. She told Clement before she left home, because she thought they would insist on some one at home knowing; but "Don't think me very sly," she says; "I would not tell Sister Constance what was in my head till I came here, for fear she should think it her duty to speak to Wilmet; and now, they will not hear of it without your knowing. I did wish to have surprised you all! About the cost I have thought. You know Dr. Lee attends me for nothing while I am here, and I told you that Sister Constance has sent up all my book of illustrations of Queen Isabel, and some of the water-coloured drawings, to her sister, Lady Liddesdale, and how much she has been getting for them—quite enough to set me up with a foot that will not be half such a nuisance as this old dead-alive one, which has never let me have any peace these twelve years. I am trying to be good; but indeed I feel as if it might be wrong to try to be rid of my cross. So I abide by your decision, dear Felix. You are my king, and I put myself in your hands; only you must not be anxious. You should have known nothing if I could have helped it."'

'Go on,' grunted Lance, with his face hidden, as Felix paused.

'That's all; but here are notes from Sister Constance and Dr. Lee.'

The Sister's explanation was that it had been entirely Geraldine's own thought, and that her willingness and eagerness made a great difference in such a nature as hers. She told Felix not to think of coming—the fewer the better; and he could come in a few hours in case of need. It was advisable that the decision should be made quickly, since to nervous sensitiveness like Cherry's the very effort to bear suspense reacted on the bodily frame. 'If you know what I mean,' concluded Sister Constance, 'heroism is likely to carry the little creature through what would be far more trying if this were proposed to her for her own sake.'

And Dr. Lee's letter gave the medical view, decidedly inclining to the opinion that the probabilities were in favour of the operation, and that the conditions were never likely to be more promising than at present.

'Dear child! I wish I were there!'

'Can't we go?'

'What, you? Think of the train.'

Lance shook his head. 'Couldn't I stay by myself, and you run up?'

'I don't think I can help it.

But the excitement of the evening broke Lance's sleep, and the next day he was quite ill; while Felix not only saw that he must not be left, but perceived after the first that Sister Constance's warning ought to be respected, and that an arrival would only agitate Cherry's nerves. So he wrote his sanction with a very heavy heart, betraying as little emotion as was consistent with the tenderness so essential to support brave but fragile little Geraldine.

The anxiety seemed to have swallowed up the recollection of Mr. Staples' message; indeed, it was not willingly that Felix answered his note, and made a half engagement to the picnic.

Felix was struck by seeing how much, under the circumstances, Lance missed the daily service to which he had been used all his life.

'I didn't mind it at first,' said the chorister, 'it seemed a part of the holiday; but somehow the day seems all stupid and astray without it.'

But there was no church with it to be heard of; and indeed one attempt on Sunday at East Ewmouth resulted in Lance's collapsing into some of his most distressing symptoms, caused, as he declared, by the overpowering might and untuneableness of the singing, but quite bad enough to make Felix resolve against permitting further experiments, and thus walk off by himself on the next Wednesday forenoon when he heard the bell.

There was a long lecture that he had not bargained for, and when he came out with a slightly impatient impulse, the first thing he saw was a blue umbrella, a white hat, and a hand waving a paper. In silence Felix read—

'Constance Somerville to Felix Underwood.—11.30. Favourably over. No cause for anxiety.'

They were rather grave and awe-struck, and scarcely spoke all the way home—indeed, Felix was chiefly thinking how to get Lance home out of the sun without hurrying or over-heating him, but after dinner came a reaction; the boy went frantic with admiration of a beautiful yacht that was standing into the bay, and Felix, with his letter to Sister Constance to write, one to Australia to finish, and his leading articles to draw up, was forced to command peace in something of the old rough-and-ready style; and even when Lance vanished, he was to be heard singing scraps of comic songs in the distance.

By and by he came in carrying a board taller than himself. 'Please your Majesty, I'll be as mute as a mole; but I must do this here, for Mrs. Pettigrew is baking.'

'What in the name of wonder, have you got there?' asked Felix, as Lance proceeded to lay his board on the sofa (his day and Felix's night—bed) and place on it a white and soppy mass.

'A little dab out, as Sibby calls it,' said Lance. 'It's my puggery. Ever since it fell overboard it has been a disgrace to human nature, so I have been washing it, and now I've got an iron heating.'

'What a mess you will make of it!' observed Felix, with a grimace of disgust, as Lance returned again from the kitchen, holding the iron scientifically near his cheek.'

'That's all you know about it! Why, I've ironed dozens of pocket- handkerchiefs—at least, not dozens, but my own, dozens of times—in the Harewood tubs.'

'I thought the Chapter washed you?'

'So it does, in reason; but last spring there was a doom on my pocket-handkerchiefs. The Harewood puppy ate up one; one dropped into the canal; I tied up a fellow that had got a cut with one, and the beggar never returned it; and two or three more went I don't know how. I knew W. W. would be in a dreadful state if I asked for a fresh lot, so I used to wash out the last two by turns, till I got some tip and bought some fresh ones—such jolly ones, all over acrobats and British flags; and after all, didn't I catch it? Wilmet was no end of disgusted to miss her little stupid speckotty ones, vowed these weren't decent for the Cathedral, and boned them all for Theodore! Now, hush! or I shall come to grief!'

Felix held his pen suspended to watch the dexterity that reduced the crude mass to smooth muslin, which in its expanded state looked as impracticable as before.

'Now, do you mean to get Mrs. Pettigrew to put it on in those elegant festoons?'

'You just mind your leader, Blunderbore! A man who has had women to do for him all his life is a pitiable being!'

And Lance, according to instructions obtained from John Harewood, wreathed his hat triumphantly in the white drapery, and completed Felix's surprise and amusement by producing a needle and thread, and setting to work on various needful repairs of his own buttons and his brother's, over which he shook his head in amusement as he chuckled at the decay which had befallen the garments of so neat a personage as Felix, and which had been very distressing to himself.

'Ah! thank you. I never knew what Robinson Crusoe felt like before!' said Felix, as Lance came on a wrist-band minus button.

'Robinson Crusoe! You'd soon have been like Man Friday before he caught him.'

'But doesn't the matron mend for you?'

'She pretends; but I should like to see her face if one brought her a chance thing to do. My eyes! if that isn't old Staples! I must absquattilate.'

Which after all he had no time to effect, with all his works, before their friend came to ask whether they were relieved about their sister, and was amused at the handy little schoolboy's ingenious preparations. 'After all, I find it is to be more of an affair than I expected; I thought it was to be only ourselves and the Brandons, but they are the kind of people who always pick up every one.'

'Does that yacht belong here?' eagerly asked Lance.

'That! It is the Kittiwake—Captain Audley's.'

'Ha! That's what Fulbert went to Alexandria in! What fun!'

'He is the son of Sir Robert Audley. Do you know him?'

'His brother was my father's fellow-curate,' said Felix, 'and is our guardian and kindest friend. I have seen this one in London. Will he be at this picnic?'

'Not likely. He is shy and uncertain, very hearty and friendly when you do meet him, but reluctant to go into society, and often taking no notice one day, when he has seemed like one's best friend the day before. They say he has never got over the loss of his wife; but I don't like such manners.'

'Does he live here, then!'

'He rents the little Tudor cottage under the cliff year by year, for the sake of his yachting—for he won't go near the regular stations. He's got his boy at school at Stoneborough, and stays here all the winter.'

When the brothers were walking part of the way back with their visitor, they met the gentleman in question, with three boys after him, and he was evidently in a cordial mood; for after shaking hands with Mr. Staples, he exclaimed, 'I am sure I ought to know you!'

'Felix Underwood,' said the owner of that name.

'Indeed! Not staying with your worthy relations?'

'No, I am down here with my brother, who has been laid up by a sunstroke, and wanted sea air.'

'I wish I had been at home' said the Captain, who had taken a great fancy to Felix when they had been together in London two years before; 'but I've been giving my boy and his cousins, the two young Somervilles, a trip to the Hebrides; and now, just as I am come home, I fall upon Mrs. Brandon, hounding me out to an abominable picnic, and my youngsters are wild to go. Are you in for it? I believe we shall go round to the cove in the yacht. Can I take you two?'

Felix gladly accepted, aware that their transport was a difficulty to the Stapleses, and that the Kittiwake would be felicity to Lance, who had fraternised with the boys, and went off with them to see the vessel. He returned brimful of delight and fatigue, only just in time to tumble into bed as fast as possible, and Felix was thus able to get his work off his mind by midnight.

The morning's letters set them quite at rest. Sister Constance and Clement both wrote: Geraldine had been calm and resolute from the time Felix's consent arrived, and doubt was over, and Clement, though tender, and striving hard to be firm, had been chiefly useful in calling out her words of encouragement. He had spent the time of the operation in the oratory, and there had been so entirely overcome by the tidings that all was safely over, that he was hardly fit to go to Cherry when he was sent for, and that was not soon, for the effect of chloroform on her had indeed been to annihilate pain, but only half to make her unconscious, for she went on talking to Felix about the expedience all the time, ever repeating the old motto, 'Under Wode, Under Rode;' and the trance had lasted for a good while, though when once over, she remembered nothing of it, and was only so rejoiced and thankful that it was difficult to keep her calm enough. She sent her brothers her love, and entreated them not to say a word at home. Lady Liddesdale had contrived the sale of the book of illustrations—a work that had been Cherry's delight of many years, so that she could feel that she herself had earned what would cover the expense incurred, all but the medical attendance, freely given to an inmate of St. Faith's. 'Tell Felix I am as happy as a queen,' was the final message; 'tell him to give thanks for me.'

Felix's voice trembled, shook, and gave way, as he read; and at last he sprang up, and walked about the room, saying that no one ever had such brothers and sisters as himself. There was something almost oppressive in the relief from so much anxiety, and it was some time before he roused his ordinary senses to say, 'Well! we must finish breakfast, or we shan't be ready for the Captain. How round the world is! Those boys must be Sister Constance's nephews—Lady Liddesdale's sons.'

'Those boys,' said Lance. 'What, Sum and Frank? Well, I did think it queer that the sailors on board the Kittiwake called every one My Lord.'

'Sum, I imagine, must mean Lord Somerville. What did you think of them?'

'Nicish chaps of eleven and twelve. Nothing like such swells as Tom Bruce! The little one wanted to know where I was at school, and his senior snubbed him; so I supposed he saw by the looks of me that I wasn't upper-crust public school; and when I said I was a choir-boy, the other—Charley Audley—said, "Oh, then you're one of the awful lot my father always jaws about when he's out of sorts!" I told him I was very sorry, and it wasn't my fault, but yours; and then we got on like a house on fire.'



CHAPTER XXI

A KETTLE OF FISH



'Our Pursuivant at arms will show Both why we came and when we go.' SCOTT.

The place of the picnic was a good way off, being the point of the promontory that shut in the mouth of the river, a great crag, with a long reef of rocks running out into the sea, playfully called the Kitten's Tail, though the antiquarians always deposed that the head had nothing to do with cats or kits, but with the disposition to erect chapels to St. Christopher on the points of land where they might first greet the mariners' eyes. Beneath this crag, sheltered by the first and larger joints of the Kitten's Tail, was a delightful sandy nook, where appeared a multitude of smart hats, male and female, a great many strangers even to Captain Audley, who would fain have recognised none of them. In a strong access of his almost morbid silence, he devoted himself to Felix, and kept aloof from almost every one. Even at the dinner, spread on a very sloping bit of beach, picnic exigencies enabled him to be nearly tete-a-tete with Felix, who found himself almost back to back to a lady in a brilliant foreign pheasant's plume, with glass dew-drops at the points.

In a pause of their own conversation, they heard the inquiry, 'Do you know who that boy is—that fair delicate-looking lad just opposite, with the white muslin round his hat?'

'Oh—that!' answered the pheasant lady; 'that is young Lord Somerville, son to the Marquess of Liddesdale. He and his brother, Lord Francis, have been out yachting with Captain Audley.'

The Captain smiled as he looked at the boys. 'Ay,' he observed, with a flash of his bright dark eyes,' he has the advantage over Sum.'

For Lance had resumed his lark-like air, and it was perhaps the more striking from the fragility and transparency that remained about his looks; and he was full of animation, as he, with a reinforcement of boys, clustered round a merry sunny-faced girl, full of joyous drollery.

'Very queer and eccentric—quite a bear,' was the next thing they heard; whereat Captain Audley nodded and smiled to Felix. After the general turmoil caused by the change of courses had subsided, that penetrating voice was heard again. 'Yes, we came home sooner than we had intended. The fact was, we found that old Mr. Underwood was being beset by some of those relations. You remember? Oh, yes; they have sunk very low—got into trade, absolutely got into trade! One of them a mere common singing-boy. Mr. Underwood is getting aged—quite past- —and we did not know what advantage might be taken of him.'

'Your turn now,' murmured Captain Audley, with a look of diversion calculated to allay the wounded flush on his neighbour's cheek.

'Do you mean Mr. Edward Underwood's sons?' said a voice on the other side. 'I always understood them to be very respectable and well conducted.'

'Oh, very likely! Only I do happen to know that one of them has been a great trouble and vexation to Tom Underwood; and we didn't want the same over again with the poor old Squire.'

'Did I understand you that any of them were here?' added the other voice; 'for I had just been struck by the likeness of that boy opposite, talking to my sister, to poor Mr. Edward Underwood, as I remember him.'

'Oh no, Mrs. Rivers; I assure you that's young Lord Somerville!'

Captain Audley made an effort, rather difficult in his Turkish position, to crane his head beyond the interposing figures, recognised and bowed to the speaker, who greeted him by name, and thus diminished the flow of Mrs. Fulbert Underwood's conversation by her awe of the high and mighty bear whom she scarcely knew by sight. He had no taste for scenes, and did not put either her or Felix to pain by mentioning his name; but when the last act of the meal was over, and people began to move, he made his way in the direction of the inquiring voice. 'Mrs. Rivers, let me introduce Mr. Felix Underwood.'

'I am very happy—' and there was a cordial smile and a hand held out. 'Are you here for long? My father would be so much pleased to see you.'

It was a rather worn pale face; but the ease and sweetness of manner, and the perfect fitness of the dress, made a whole that gave Felix a sense of the most perfect lady he had met with, except his mother and Sister Constance.

'I am at Ewmouth, with one of my brothers who has been ill.'

'Lord Somerville?' and all three burst out laughing. 'My sister has found him out, I see. She and your little boy are old friends, Captain Audley.'

'Yes, you have been very kind to him. But I am as much surprised to see you here as you can be to see my friend. Are you from home?'

'We go back this evening. We slept at the Crewes' last night. My husband had business there; and when they asked us to this picnic, it was a good opportunity for Gertrude to learn the beauties of her county.'

'Which she seems to be doing under full escort,' laughed Captain Audley, as the young lady and the young boy flock were seen descending to the rocks.

'She has a strong taste for little boys,' said the elder sister.

'You have the Somerville boys here, haven't you, though?'

'Yes; there had been scarlatina or something or other in their school, and their mother was afraid of them among their sisters, till I had purified them by a sea voyage.'

Probably Mrs. Fulbert never found out her mistake; for Lord Somerville reported that he had never been so pitched into in his life as by an old girl in a 'stunning tile,' who found him washing out an empty pie-dish for the benefit of some maritime monsters that he wanted to carry home to his sisters; but that when Lance came up, she was as meek as a mouse. Certainly, the two boys were little sturdy fellows, burnt lobster-like up to the roots of their bleached and rough hair; and their costumes were more adapted to the deck of the Kittiwake in all weathers than to genteel society. Their sisters were in an aquarium fever, and their sport all through their expedition had been researches for what they had learnt in Scotland to call 'beasts'; and now the collection was to be completed from the mouth of the Ewe, and the scrambling and tumbling it involved were enchanting.

Kate Staples, who usually considered Lance her charge, was not sorry to see a croquet player disposed of among his own congeners, for the game seemed such a necessary of life, that it was actually prepared for on the sands, to the extreme contempt of the anemone hunters. 'Play at croquet, forsooth, when rocks aren't to be had to scramble on every day!' And scramble ecstatically they did, up and over slippery stone and rock festooned with olive weed, peeping into pools of crystal clearness, and admiring rosy fans of weed, and jewel-like actinias embellished by the magic beauty of intense clear brightness. The boys took off shoes and stockings, turned up trousers, and scrambled and paddled like creatures to the manner born.

'O dear! I wish I might!' sighed the young lady.

'Why don't you?' said Charlie Audley. 'Kate and Em and Annie always do—don't they, Frank?'

'Of course they do, or how would they ever get on!'

'Come along then, Miss Gertrude,' said Charlie. 'You can't think how jolly it is!'

And soon another pair of little white feet were dancing on the rocks. 'Oh dear! what a blunder of civilisation it is to wear shoes at all! How delicious a hold one gets!'

'I can't think why people do wear them! They never are anything but a bother,' said Lance.

'To play at football with,' suggested Somerville from the top of a rock.

'But women don't,' said Gertrude.

'I think women do it, and make us, that they may have something to worrit about,' said Frank. 'Damp stockings are the bother of creation till one goes to school; and then, isn't it Jolly!'

'Except the chilblains,' called out Charlie.

'I believe,' said Lance, 'chilblains come of shoes.'

'No, they can't,' argued Charlie, 'for one has them on one's hands.'

'Well,' said Gertrude, 'let's form ourselves into a society for the suppression of shoes and stockings!'

'Hurrah!' cried Lance. 'I know one person at least that it would be a blessing to.

The question was, how the five bold reformers were to begin. Frank suggested drowning all the present stock, and pretended to be about to begin, but was of course prevented by a scream.

'Public opinion must be prepared first,' said Lance.

'And that,' said Gertrude, 'we'd better do by a great example! Here, well show what can be done. Why shouldn't we get out to the end of the Kitten's Tail?'

'One can't to the end,' said Charlie; 'there's a place big enough for a gig to go through half way out.'

'And about the tide?' said Lance.

'Tide,' said Charlie, looking at his watch—'tide wouldn't think of playing us such a dirty trick as turning for an hour and a half.'

'And the jolliest beasts of all always live in places like that,' added Somerville. 'Come on, President of the Society for the Suppression of Shoeses—to the front!'

On moved the august Society, now scrambling to a dry flat, now threading a mauvais pas, clinging to festoons of sea-weed; the three little boys climbed like monkeys or sailors; but Lance, agile as he was, had not had the same amount of training, and felt besides that it was requisite to be ready to give a helping hand to Miss Gertrude. She got on very well, being full of lightness and springiness, only she was a little inclined to be adventurous, and to chatter at critical moments.

'We must have got out a quarter of a mile.'

'Oh no, not that!'

'No? I'm sure it is! How small they look on the beach! I wonder if they can see us! Hark! they're singing—'

'"Drink to me only with thine eyes:" that's Felix's crack glee,' said Lance, 'what fun for him!'

'This is much better fun!' cried the general voice. 'They'll never see us if we wave now!'

'No, no; don't let's wave now! Wait till we get to the farthest point.'

'And there we'll plant our ensign!'

'What shall we do for a flag? We haven't got the Britisher here!'

'No; it must be the flag of the SSSS's.'

'That ought to be a bit of bare skin.'

'No, no—a pair of feet—motto, "Off, vile lendings!"'

'I say, I don't think you can get any farther,' interposed Somerville. 'I've been on four rocks farther, and I'm sure you will never get back again if you go on.'

'Oh, that's base! I'm sure this one isn't so hard.'

She was creeping along a ledge, holding the sea-weed with one hand and Lance by the other.

'I really don't think it passable,' he said; 'there's scarcely the width of one's foot beyond.'

'Hurrah!' shouted Frank. 'Here's the father of all the Daisianas!'

'Oh! oh! he's my cousin. I must see him!' cried Gertrude, with a scramble and a laugh, which ended in a sudden slip—luckily, not into the open sea, but into a very steep-sided bath-like pool; and Lance, whom of course she gripped hard, was pulled after her, both over head and ears; and though they scrambled on their feet in a moment, there they stood up to their shoulders in water.

'Get the Daisiana now you are there!' shouted Frank.

'How are we ever to get out?' said Gertrude, looking up the walls, six feet at least on the lowest side.

'If we had a rope,' said Charlie.

'Make signals—call,' said Somerville, all suiting the action to the word. 'No, they don't hear! they are all singing away. You, Franky, you're too little to be any good, make the best of your way to call somebody.'

'The tide will come in!' said Frank. 'Mamma and Aunt Emmie were once shut in by the tide, and Uncle Edwin. And there was a fellow who was quite drowned—dead—and that was why I was named Francis.'

'That's what you may call a cheering reminiscence at a happy moment,' said Lance, recollecting that he was far more nearly a man than any one present, and instinctively feeling the need of brightening all into cheerful activity, for the girl looked thoroughly frightened. 'Yes, Lord Frank, the best thing you can do is to go for somebody; but we'll be out long first. Can't we make a rope! Have you a sash or anything Miss Gertrude? Don't fear, we'll soon be out.'

Happily she had both a sash and a broad ribbon round her hat; and Lance tore off his puggery.

'I can do it best,' called Charlie. 'I know all the sailors' knots.'

'It will never bear,' said Gertrude.

'Oh yes, it will. You'll not trust your whole weight to it. Is it done?'

'Besides, how can they draw me up?'

'We'd best get behind that rock, Sum,' suggested Charlie, 'then she won't pull us in.'

Charlie's sailor experience was very useful; and he shouted advice to Lance, who was tying the extemporary rope round Gertrude, not very easily, owing to the material, and to its being done under water.

'Now, then, you do your best at climbing—here,' he said. 'They'll pull you; and look! There, first my knee—yes—now my shoulder— now—' And standing for a moment on his shoulder, Gertrude was really able with a desperate grapple to surmount the wall of her prison, and scramble out beside the two cousins, whose pulls had been very helpful.

Lance's clambering was a harder matter, for he did not venture to trust much to the rope, though the girl's strength was added to that of the two boys; and it was a severe climb up the scarcely indented, slippery, moist, slimy rock, where his hands and feet could hardly find any hold; and when at length he reached the top, he was so panting and dizzy, that Somerville at first held him to hinder his slipping backward into the sea. No one could get at King or Queen Daisiana, so it was left in its glory; while the young people struggled back over rocks that seemed much steeper, and pools far deeper, than in their advance; Lance still trying to be helpful, but with a mazed sense of the same sort of desperate effort with which he had run back with Bill's verses; for not only had his small strength been overtaxed, but the immersion in water was affecting his head.

Lord Francis had made much quicker progress; and boy as he was, showed his breeding by not rushing open-mouthed on the party with his intelligence, but seeking the Captain, who was smoking the pipe of solitude upon a rock apart. He at once sent Frank to the servants, who were enjoying the relics of the feast, to fetch some wine, and tell the boat's crew to make ready at once, and then went off himself to seek Mrs. Rivers. Felix, who had spied the little messenger speeding up to the Captain, was already on his way to the rocks, and reached the party in good time; for draggled, drenched, and with clinging garments, they were so slow in getting on, that it was no delusion that the water was higher, and the rocks lower; and even Gertrude had neither breath nor spirits to gabble when that grave anxious face met her, and a strong careful hand lifted and helped, first her, then Lance, up and down every difficulty; and when she perceived how the newcomer avoided point-blank looking at the bare ancles that had sometimes to make long stretches, a burning red came up into her face, half of shame, half of indignation at being made ashamed. And after all, when the place where her hose and shoon had been left was reached, the niched shelf in the rock turned out to have been surrounded by the tide, so that they were quite unattainable either by herself or the little boys; and Felix, putting the arm by which Lance had held by him over Somerville's shoulder told them to go on before, and himself made two long strides and a scramble before he could reach the boots and stockings, and give them to the young lady, unable to help looking nearly as grave and vexed as if it had been Angela herself; indeed, he was vexed, for he had an ideal of the young ladyhood of his mother's old native region, and did not like it to be disturbed. He moved away far enough for her to think he had left her to her fate, till she was on her feet and coming on, and then there he was again, in a moment the attentive squire. Revived by her short rest, and on less perilous ground, she glanced at his face in readiness to disperse her discomfort with something saucy, but somehow, it would not do; and she was tamely conducted to terra firma, where her sister saluted her with 'O Daisy! what a child you are to have charge of!'

That restored her enough to answer, 'I'm quite delighted something should have happened under your keeping! No harm done. Salt water never gives cold.'

'I don't mind it for you,' said the elder sister; 'you have not been ill.—But indeed, Mr. Underwood, I am very sorry,' she added. 'What will be best for your brother?'

'Here!' said Captain Audley, taking from Frank a flask of sherry, and overruling the objection made by the brothers that stimulants were forbidden. He further insisted on taking Lance at once to his own berth on board the yacht while Mrs. Rivers meant to conduct her sister to the preventive house.

'So,' said Lance, rather ruefully, as he shook hands, 'there ends the SSSS.'

'Not at all! Its use is proved. We should have been cooked by this time in the Daisiana cauldron, if we had had great cumbrous boots on.'

It was a valiant effort, and she cast a glance out of the corner of her eye at the elder brother, but it had not relaxed a muscle of his grave anxious face, which was in truth chiefly bent on watching Lance's involuntary shiverings; and she again turned crimson, perhaps from her share of the chill, and was dragged off, muttering, 'What intolerable folks guardian brothers are! Henry Ward was a mild specimen compared to this one!'

About noon on the following day, Mrs. Pettigrew's little girl abruptly opened the parlour door, and with 'Please, ye're wanted,' turned in a tall, thin, grey-haired, spectacled gentleman, who, as Lance started up from the sofa, exclaimed, 'Don't disturb yourself; I came to thank you, and inquire after you after the adventure my mad- cap daughter led you into.'

'I hope she is all right,' said Lance, solicitously.

'As right as Daisiana himself; more so than I fear you are. Let me see you comfortable. Lie down again, pray.'

'Oh, I don't care about lying down, thank you, Sir; I only sleep for want of something to do;' but though he did not put his feet up, he was feeling far too languid not to relax his bolt-upright attitude, and lean back on his pillows.

'That will do. Bad headache?'

'It is nearly gone off now, thank you, Sir; it was bad all night, but it is much better since I have been asleep.'

'Let me see,' laying his left hand on the wrist that hung over the edge of the sofa. 'Ay, I hope that wicked little siren has done no great damage. Pulled you below, true mermaid fashion—eh?'

'I meant to have pulled her out.'

'Instead of which she made a lad into a ladder to climb out on.' Which bad pun served the purpose of making the boy laugh enough to be at his ease. 'She is much indebted, and so am I. I like to meet an old friend's son. Are you alone?'

'My brother is only gone to the post-office. He will be in before long; but it saves a post to take the letters before twelve, and he ought to be out as much as he can.'

'Is he here on his own account, or yours?'

'He came down first, before I was ill. It was bother and overwork and a cough. Everything always does come to worry him, whenever he ought to have rest or pleasure.' And Lance who was thoroughly weary and dispirited, was nearly ready to cry.

'Even when he goes out for a picnic, young ladies must needs drown themselves!'

This made Lance smile; but he added, with a quivering lip, 'He would not go to bed till I could go to sleep last night, and that was not till past two, and he looks quite done up this morning.'

'Is any one attending you?'

'Dr. Manby did at Minsterham—nobody here.'

'What's been amiss with you—fever?'

'Plenty of fever, but it was from sun-stroke.'

'Ah! you boys have thinner skulls than we used to have! How long ago?'

'Seven weeks yesterday,' said Lance, wearily.

'And you are sadly weary of weakness?'

'I don't mind that so much;' and the kindness of face, voice, and gesture made the poor boy's eyes overflow; 'but I'm no good, and I can't tell whether I ever shall be again!'

'It is a great deal too soon to trouble yourself about that.'

'That's what they all tell me!' cried Lance impatiently, and the tears rushed forth again. 'Manby only laughs, and tells me I shall be a Solon yet if I don't vex myself; and how can I tell whether he means it?'

'Well, dear boy, have it all out; I promise to mean whatever I say.'

'You are a doctor then, Sir?'

'What!' the boy doesn't know me, as sure as my name's Dick May!'

'Oh!' cried Lance, 'that was what I heard Felix saying to Captain Audley—that he did so wish Dr. May could look at me!'

'That's all right, then. Come, then, what is weighing on you— weakness?'

'Just not weakness,' said Lance. 'I didn't care so much when I could scarcely get about; but now I can walk any distance, and still I have not a bit more sense!'

'Is your memory gone?'

'I don't think so; only, if I fix my mind to recollect, and it doesn't come by chance, I'm all abroad, and perfectly senseless and idiotic!'

'And it brings on pain?'

'Yes, if I try five minutes together.'

'You don't try to read or write?'

'I can't—and—' then came the tears again— 'music is just like red- hot hammers to me.' There was a great fight with sobs, rather puzzling to one who did not know what music was to the chorister. 'And what is to be the end of it?'

'That rest and patience will make you as well as ever.'

'Do you really think so? But, Sir, I have a little brother seven and a half years old, with no understanding at all—not able to speak; and if there were two of us on Felix's hands like that! If I could only be put away somewhere, so that Felix should not have the burthen of me!'

'My poor little fellow! Is this what is preying on you all this time?'

'Not always—only when I am doing nothing, and that is most times,' he said, dejectedly; but the Doctor smiled.

'Then you may take the very anxiety as a proof that your brain is recovering. You cannot expect to shake off the effects quickly; but if you are only patient with yourself, you will do perfectly well. Are you a son of the clergy?'

'No, I am a chorister at Minsterham. I have another year there, when I can go back, if ever—'

'Don't say if ever! You will, if you only will keep from fretting and hurrying, and will accept that beautiful motto of the Underwoods.'

Lance smiled responsively, and said more cheerfully, 'You are quite sure, Sir.'

'As sure as any man can be, that there is no reason to anticipate what you dread. It is quite possible that you may be more or less liable to bad headaches, and find it needful to avoid exposure to summer sunshine; but I should think you as likely to do your work in the world as any one I ever saw.'

The light on Lance's face did not wholly spring from this reply. With 'There's Felix!' he had bounded out of the room the next moment, and his incautious voice could be heard through the window—'Fee, Fee, here's her father! that brick of a Miss Gertrude's, I mean. He's as jolly as he ought to be, and knew all our people. But just—I say— how's Cherry?'

'All well; here's a note from the dear little thing herself,' said Felix; and in another moment, with his bag strapped over his shoulder, he had brought the bright sedateness of his face into the little parlour. 'Dr. May! how very kind in you!'

'Not kindness, but common propriety, to come and see how much mischief my naughty child had done.'

'I don't think there's any real mischief,' said the elder brother, looking at the much-refreshed face.

'I think not, and so am free to be glad of the catastrophe that has brought me in the way of an old friend. Yes, I may say so, for I must have known you!'

'Yes,' said Felix, 'we used to watch for you when you came to my uncle. You always had some fun with us.'

'I remember a pair of twins, who were an irresistible attraction. I hope they have grown up accordingly. You look as if you ought to have pretty sisters.'

Felix laughed, and said the twins were reckoned as very pretty.

'How many of you are there—was it not thirteen? Did not those boys get the clergy-orphan?'

'One did, thank you. He is on a farm in Australia now, and I am thinking whether to try for little Bernard; but I am afraid his case would be a stale one, being of seven years' standing.'

'If you want it done, my daughter, Mrs. Rivers, is a dragon of diplomacy in canvassing; but why not send him to Stoneborough? Cheviot takes a selection of cleric's sons at 30 pounds, and we would have an eye to him.'

'Thank you, if we can only manage it; but I must see what my sister says—our financier.'

'One of those little apple-blossom twins? Let me look at you. Do you mean to tell me that this fellow has been the whole standby of that long family these seven years?' he added, turning to Lance.

'To be sure he has!' cried Lance, eagerly.

'Lance,' said Felix, rather indignantly. 'You forget Wilmet. And Thomas Underwood entirely educated two of us.'

'And,' said the Doctor, looking oddly but searchingly from one to the other, 'you've been the bundle of sticks in the fable. Never gone together by the ears? Ah!' as both brothers burst out laughing at the question, 'I'd not have asked if I had not seen how you could answer. I've seen what makes me so afraid of brothers in authority that it does me good to look at you two.'

Felix looked up. The Stoneborough murder case was about two years old, and of course he had to study and condense the details, and had come on the names of Dr. May and his son in the evidence.

The further words met his sudden conjecture. 'Ay, boys, you little know what you may be spared by home peace and confidence! Well, and what may you be doing, Felix? Your bag looks as if you had turned postman to the district.'

'There's my chief business, Sir, coupled with bookselling and stationery,' said Felix, as he pushed across a copy of the Pursuivant that lay on the table. 'I have been well paid from the first, and am in partnership now, so we have got along very well.'

'Ay, ay! Very good trade, I should think? You must send me your paper, Felix; I want one I can trust to lie about the house.'

'You will find it very stupid and local, Sir.'

It was curious how what from Mr. Staples was answered with an effort, seemed from Dr. May to draw out confidence. One point was, that Mr. Staples never seemed sure how to treat him, and often betrayed a tear of hurting his feelings; while with Dr. May he was himself and nothing else. The Doctor stayed to share their dinner, such as it was in consideration of their being lodgers as didn't give trouble—i.e. some plain boiled fish, fresh indeed, but of queer name and quality, and without sauce, and some steak not distantly related to an old shoe; but both seemed to think so little about it, that the Doctor, who was always mourning over the daintiness of the present day, approved them all the more.

Just as they had finished Captain Audley came in with his boys, on their way to start off the Somervilles by the train, and it was agreed that when he took his son back to school at Stoneborough, Felix and Lance should come with him and spend the day.

And a pleasant day it was, as pleasant as the unsettled wanderings of a long day in a strange place could be, and memorable for one curious fact—namely, that for the first time in her life Gertrude May was shy!

Not with Lance. She had a good deal of pastime with him in the cool garden, while Felix was being walked over the schoolyards in the sun; and they were excellent friends, though Ethel certainly had a certain repugnance to the discovery of how big a boy it was with whom Gertrude had danced barefooted on the rocks. Of course Ethel was the kindly mistress of the house as usual, but she was worn and strained in spirits just then, and disinclined to exert herself beyond the needful welcome to her father's guests. So she let them all go out, and went on with her own occupations, thinking that it was well that Daisy should take her part in entertaining guests, since 'that boy' was evidently a thorough little gentleman; and then shrinking a little as she heard their voices over Aubrey's museum, including the Coombe Hole curiosities.

No, it was not towards Lance that Daisy was shy; but when all sat round the dinner-table, she was unusually silent, and listened to the conversation far more than was her wont, though it was chiefly political. When Felix spoke to her, she absolutely coloured rosy red and faltered, unable to conquer the shamefacedness that their encounter had left her, and when the party had taken leave, and she was standing in the twilight, Ethel, to her great surprise, found the child quietly crying.

'Nothing!' she said, angry at being detected.

'It can't be nothing.'

'Yes it is. Only I do so hate—hate myself for being a tomboy!'

'One often does go on with that a little too long, and then comes the horrible feel.'

'And that it should have happened with him of all people in the world!'

'Ah, Daisy, I wish I had come out with you!'

'Fudge, Ethel! Not to-day. Do you think I care about that boy? I should think not! But—but—I wanted to think him a nasty prig, but I can't!'

'Who?'

'Why, that eldest brother. When he found me scrambling about with my stockings off, he didn't speak, but he looked, as Richard might, surprised and sorry. I thought it was impertinent—at least I wanted to, but— And now he'll always think me—nasty!'

'My dear, if one must have a lesson of that kind, it is as well it should be from some one that one is never likely to see or hear of again.'

'Oh! but not from the very best and noblest of people one ever will hear of. Yes, Ethel, I'm not gone mad! That boy has been telling me all about his brother; and indeed I never did hear or know about any one who was a real hero in a quiet way! No, whenever I hear of a hero, I shall think of Mr. Underwood. And, oh dear, that I should have made such a goose of myself!'

It was quite unaffected—a spark of real reverence had lighted at last on Gertrude's mind. 'To turn tradesman for the sake of one's brothers and sisters, that I do call heroic!' she said; and maintained his cause, even to putting down F. U. as her 'favourite hero' in lists of likes and dislikes.

But there was no great chance of Gertrude again encountering her hero, for the morning after their day at Stoneborough Lance was beginning to experiment on his powers by skimming newspapers, especially the Pursuivant, because he knew it before, all but the last local items, that could only be added at the moment of going to press. Suddenly he broke out, 'Holloa! you never told me this! Mowbray Smith has put his foot in it this time.'

'What?' said Felix, pausing in the act of opening an envelope from Mr. Froggatt.

'Pocketing the coal and school money—ay, and the alms.'

'Eh? Impossible! Let me look.'

'There. A letter signed "Scrutator." There's a great deal more than I can read, all about under-paid curates and sycophants. My Lady is catching it, I should say! It must be true, or Froggy would not have put it in.'