'I did not mean to do that, Regie; but you all say that poor Mary was fond of this man and helped him.'

'That she did!' said Lord Rotherwood, 'and very much against the grain it went with Maurice.'

'Then don't you see that this poor child, who probably never had the matter explained to her, may have felt it a great hardship to be cut off from the man her mother taught her to care for; and that may have led her into concealments?'

'Well!' said Colonel Mohun, 'at that rate, at least one may be thankful never to have married.'

'One—or two, Regie?' said Jane, as they all laughed at his sally. 'I think I had better go up and see whether I can get anything out of the child. Do you mean to have her down to dinner, Lily,' she added, glancing at the clock.

'Oh yes, certainly. I don't want to put her to disgrace before all the children and servants—that is, if she is not crying herself out of condition to appear, poor child.'

'Not she,' said Uncle Reginald.

On opening the door, the children were all discovered in the hall, in anxious curiosity, not venturing in uncalled, but very much puzzled.

Gillian came forward and said, 'Mamma, may we know what is the matter?'

'I hardly understand it myself yet, my dear, only that Dolores and Constance Hacket have let themselves be taken in by a sort of relation of Dolores's mother, and Uncle Maurice has lost a good deal of money through it. It would not have happened if there had been fair and upright dealing towards me; but we do not know the rights of it, and you had better take no notice of it to her.'

'I thought,' said Valetta, sagaciously, 'no good could come of running after that stupid Miss Constance.'

'Who can't pull a cracker, and screams at a daddy long-legs,' added Fergus.

'But, mamma, what shall we do?' said Gillian. 'I came away because Uncle Regie told us, and Constance was crying so terribly; but what is poor Miss Hacket to do? There is the tree only half dressed, and all the girls coming to-night, unless she puts them off.'

'Yes, you had better go down alone as soon as dinner is over, and see what she would like,' said Lady Merrifield. 'We must not leave her in the lurch, as if we cast her off, though I am afraid Constance has been very foolish in this matter. Oh, Gillian, I wish we could have made Dolores happier amongst us, and then this would not have happened.'

'She would never let us, mamma,' said Gillian.

But Mysie, coming up close to her mother as they all went up the broad staircase to prepare for the midday meal, confessed in a grave little voice, 'Mamma, I think I have sometimes been cross to Dolly-more lately, because it has been so very tiresome.'

Lady Merrifield drew the little girl into her own room, stooped down, and kissed her, saying, 'My dear child, these things need a great deal of patience. You will have to be doubly kind and forbearing now, for she must be very unhappy, and perhaps not like to show it. You might say a little prayer for her, that God will help us to be kind to her, and soften her heart.'

'Oh yes, mamma; and, please, will you set it down for me?'

'Yes, my dear, and for myself too. You shall have it before bed-time.'

Aunt Jane had followed Dolores to her own room the girl, who was sitting on her bed, dazed, regretted that she had not bolted her door, as her aunt entered with the words, 'Oh, Dolores, I am very sorry I could not have thought you would so have abused the confidence that was placed in you.'

To this Dolores did not answer. To her mind she was the person ill-used by the prohibition of correspondence, but she could not say so. Every one was falling on her; but Aunt Jane's questions could not well help being answered.

'What will your father think of if?'

'He never forbade me to write to Uncle Alfred' said Dolores.

'Because he never thought of your doing such a thing. Did he give you this cheque?'

'Yes.'

'For yourself?'

'N-n-o. But it was the same.'

'What do you mean by that?'

'It was to pay a man—a man's that's dead.'

'That may be; but what right did that give you to spend the money otherwise? Who was the man?'

'Professor Muhlwasser, for some books of plates.'

'How do you know he is dead! Who told you so? Eh! Was it Flinders? Ah! you see what comes of trusting to an unprincipled man like that. If you had only been open and straightforward with Aunt Lily, or with any of us, you would have been saved from this tissue of falsehood; forfeiting your Uncle Reginald's good opinion, and enabling Flinders to do your father this great injury.' She paused, and, as Dolores made no answer, she went on again—'Indeed, there is no saying what you have not brought on yourself by your deceit and disobedience. If Flinders is apprehended, you will have to appear against him in court, and publicly avow that you gave away what your father trusted to you.'

Dolores gave a little moan and start, and her aunt, perceiving that she had touched an apparently vulnerable spot, proceeded—'The only thing left for you to do is to tell the whole story frankly and honestly. I don't say so only for the sake of showing Aunt Lily that you are sorry for having abused her confidence. I wish I could think that you are; but, unless we know all, we cannot shield you from any further consequences, and that of course we should wish to do, for your father's sake.'

Dolores did not feel drawn to confession, but she knew that when Aunt Jane once set herself to ask questions, there was no use in trying to conceal anything. So she made answers, chiefly 'Yes' or No,' and her aunt, by severe and diligent pumping, had extracted bit by bit what it was most essential should be known, before the gong summoned them. Dolores would rather have been a solitary prisoner, able to chafe against oppression, than have been obliged to come down and confront everybody; but she crept into the place left for her between Mysie and Wilfred. She had very little appetite, and never found out how Mysie was fulfilling her resolution of kindness by baulking Wilfred of sundry attempts to tease; by substituting her own kissing-crust for Dolly's more unpoetical piece of bread; and offering to exchange her delicious strawberry-jam tartlet for the black-currant one at which her cousin was looking with reluctant eyes.

Mysie and Valetta were grievously exercised about their chances of returning to the G.F.S. Tree. Indeed Gillian went the length of telling them that Fly was behaving far better in her disappointment as to the Butterfly's Ball than they were as to this 'old second-hand tree.' Fly laughed and observed, 'Dear me, things one would like are always being stopped. If one was to mind every time, how horrid it would be! And there's always something to make up!'

Then it occurred to Gillian, though not to her younger sisters, that Lady Phyllis Devereux lived in general a much less indulged, and more frequently disappointed, life than did herself and her sisters.

However, there was great delight at that dinner-table. Jasper had ridden to get the letters of the second post, and Lord Rotherwood had his hands and his head full of them when he came in to luncheon—there being what Lady Merrifield called a respectable dinner in view. In the first place. Lord Ivinghoe was getting on very well, and was up, sitting by the fire, playing patience. Nobody was catching the measles, and quarantine would be over on the 9th of January. Secondly, 'Fly, shall you be very broken-hearted if I tell you.'

'Oh, daddy, you wouldn't look like that if it was anything very bad! Lion isn't dead?'

'No; but I grieve to say your unnatural grand-parents don't want you! Grandmamma is nervous about having you without mamma. What did we do last time we were there, Fly?'

'Don't you remember, daddy? they said there was nothing for me to ride to the meet, and you and Griffin put the side-saddle on Crazy Kate, and we went out with the hounds, and I've got the brush up in my room!'

'I don't wonder grandmamma is nervous,' observed Lady Merrifield.

'Will you be nervous, Lily,' said Lord Rotherwood, 'if this same flyaway mortal is left on your hands till the 9th?'

Dinner, manners, silence before company, and all, could not repress a general scream of ecstacy, which called forth the reply. 'I should think you and her mother were the people to be nervous.

'Oh! my lady has been duly instructed in Merrifield perfections, and esteems you a model mother.'

The children's nods and smiles said 'Hear, hear!'

'Well, you've got it all in her own letter,' continued Lord Rotherwood. 'You see, they've got a caucus at High Court, and a dinner, and I must go up there on Monday; but if you'll keep this dangerous Fly—'

'I can answer for the pleasure it will give,'

'Well then, I'll come back for her by the 9th, and you've Victoria's letter, haven't you?'

'Yes, it is very kind of her.'

'Then I shall expect you to be ready to start with me for the Butterfly's Ball. Eh, young ladies, what will you come out as?'

'Oh daddy, daddy, is it? Has mamma asked them? Oh! it is more delicious than anything ever was. Mysie, Mysie, what will you be?'

'The sly little dormouse crept out of his hole,' quoted Mysie, in a very low, happy voice.

'And I will be a jolly old frog,' shouted Fergus, finding the ordinance of silence broken and making the most of it, on the presumption that the whole family were invited. However, the tone, rather than the uncomprehended words of his mother's answer, 'Nobody asked you, sir,' she said, reduced him to silence, and it became understood, through Fly's inquiries, that the invitation included Lady Merrifield must make her acceptance doubtful. And besides, the question which three were to go was the unspoken drawback to full bliss, and yet the delight was exceedingly great in the prospect, great enough to make the contrast of gloom in poor Dolores's spirit all the darker, as she sat, left out of everything, and she could not now say, with absolute injustice, though she still clung to the belief that there was more misfortune than fault in her disgrace.

She crept away, shivering with unhappiness, to the schoolroom, while the others frisked off discussing the wonderful Butterfly's Ball. Lady Merrifield looked in on her, and she hardened herself to endure either another probing or fresh reproaches, but all she heard was, 'My dear, I cannot talk over this sad affair now, as I have to go out. But, if you can, I think you had better write to your father about it, and let him understand exactly how it happened. Or, if you had rather write than speak in explaining it to me, you can do so, and we can consider tomorrow what is to be done about it.'

Then she went out with her brother and cousin to drive to some Industrial schools which Lord Rotherwood wanted to see.



CHAPTER XV.

THE BUTTERFLY'S BALL.



Miss Mohun went to the Casement Cottages with Gillian to see what the elder Miss Hacket might wish and whether they could be of use to her; the young people being left to exercise themselves within call in case the Tree was to be continued.

This proved to be an act of great kindness, for poor Mary Hacket was suffering all the distress of an upright and honourable woman at her sister's abuse of confidence; and had felt as if Colonel Mohun's summons to his nieces was the close of all intimacy with such an unworthy household. Moreover, the evenings entertainment could not be given up and Gillian was despatched to summon the eager assistants, while Aunt Jane repeated her assurances that Lady Merrifield perfectly understood Miss Hacket's ignorance of the doings in Constance's room— listening patiently even when the tender-hearted woman began to excuse her sister for having accepted Dolores's lamentations at being cut off from her so. called uncle. 'Dear Connie is so romantic, and so easily touched,' she said, 'though, of course, it was very wrong of her to suppose that Lady Merrifield could do anything harsh or unkind. She is in great grief now, poor darling, she feels so bitterly that her friend led her into it by deceiving her about the relationship and character.'

This, Aunt Jane did not think the worst part of the affair, and she said that the girl had been brought up to call the man Uncle Alfred, and very possibly did not understand that he was only so by courtesy, nor that he was so utterly untrustworthy.

'I thought so,' said Mary Hacket. 'I told Connie that such a child could not possibly have been a willing party to his fraud—for fraud, I fear, it was—Miss Mohun. Do you think there is any hope of her recovering the sum she advanced.'

'I am afraid there is not, even if the wretched man is apprehended.'

'Ah! if she had only told me what she wanted it for!'

'I hope it was all her own.'

'Oh, Miss Mohun, no doubt you know that two sisters living together must accommodate one another a little, and Connie's dress expenses, at her age, are necessarily more than mine. But here come the dear children, and we ought to dismiss all painful subjects, though I declare I am so nervous I hardly know what I am about.'

However, by Miss Mohun's help, the good lady rose to the occasion, and when once busy, the trouble was thrown off, so that no guests would have detected how unhappy she had been in the forenoon. Constance soon came down, and confided to Gillian a parcel directed to Miss D. Mohun, containing all the notes written to her, and all the books lent to her, by the false friend whom she had cast off, after which she threw herself into the interests of the present.

The London ornaments, and the residue of the gifts and bonbons, made the Christmas-tree a most memorable one to the G.F.S. mind.

As to Fly, she fraternized to a great extent with a very small maid, in a very long, brown dress, and very thick boots, who did not taste a single bonbon, and being asked whether she understood that they were good to eat, replied that she was keeping them for 'our Bertie and Minnie;' and, on encouragement, launched into such a description of her charges—the blacksmith's small children—that Lady Phyllis went back, not without regrets that she could not be a little nurse who had done with school at twelve years old, and spent her days at the back of a perambulator.

'Oh, daddy,' she said, 'I do wish you had come down; it was such lovely fun—the best tree I ever saw. Why wouldn't you come?'

'If thirty odd years should pass over that little head of yours, my Lady Fly, and you should then meet with Mysie and Val, maybe you will then learn the reason why.'

'We will recollect that in thirty years' time.'

'When our children go to a Christmas-tree.'

'And we sit over the fire instead.'

'Oh! but should we ever not care for a dear, delightful Christmas- tree?'

'If we had each other instead.'

'Then we would all go still together!'

'And tell our little boys and girls all about this one, and the Butterfly's Ball!'

'Perhaps our husbands would want us, and not let us go.'

'Oh! I don't want a husband. He'd be in the way. We'd send him off to India or somewhere, like Aunt Lily's.'

'Don't, Fly; it is not at all nice to have papa away.'

'Oh yes, it would be ten hundred times better if he were at home.'

Such were the mingled sentiments of the triad, as they went upstairs to bed, linked together in their curious fashion.

Some time later, a bedroom discussion of affairs was held by Lady Merrifield and Miss Mohun, who had not had a moment alone together all day, to converse upon the two versions of the disaster which the latter had extracted from Dolores and Constance, and which fairly agreed, though Constance had been by far the most voluble, and somewhat ungenerously violent against her former friend, at least so Lady Merrifield remarked.

'You should take into account the authoress's disappointed vanity.'

'Yes, poor thing! How he must have nattered her!'

'Besides, there is the loss of the money, which, I fear, falls as seriously on good Miss Hacket as on the goose herself.'

'Does it, indeed? That must not be. How much is it?'

'Fifteen pounds; and that foolish Constance fancies that poor Dolores assisted in duping her. I really had to defend the girl; though I am just as angry myself when I watch her adamantine sullenness.'

'I am the person to be angry with for having allowed the intimacy, in spite of your warnings, Jenny.'

'You were too innocent to know what girls are made of. Oh yes, you are very welcome to have six of your own, but you might have six dozen without knowing what a girl brought up at a second-rate boarding-school is capable of, or what it is to have had no development of conscience. What shall you do? send her to school?'

'After that recommendation of yours?'

'I didn't propose a second-rate boarding-school, ma'am. There's a High School starting after the holidays at Rockstone. Let me have her, and send her there.'

'Ada would not like it.'

'Never mind Ada, I'll settle her. I would keep Dolly well up to her lessons, and prevent these friendships.'

'I suppose you would manage her better than I have been able to do,' said Lady Merrifield, reluctantly. 'Yet I should like to try again; I don't want to let her go. Is it the old story of duty and love, Jane? Have I failed again through negligence and ignorance, and deceived myself by calling weakness and blindness love?'

'You don't fail with your own, Lily. Rotherwood runs about admiring them, and saying he never saw a better union of freedom and obedience. It was really a treat to see Gillian's ways tonight; she had so much consideration, and managed her sisters so well.'

'Ah, but there's their father! I do so dread spoiling them for him before he comes home; but then he is a present influence with us all the time.'

'They would all clap their hands if I carried Dolly off.'

'Yes, and that is one reason I don't want to give her up; it seems so sad to send Maurice's child away leaving such an impression. One thing I am. thankful for, that it will be all over before grandmamma and Bessie Merrifield come.'

At that moment there was a knock at the door, and a small figure appeared in a scarlet robe, bare feet, and dishevelled hair.

'Mysie, dear child! What's the matter? who is ill?'

'Oh, please come, mamma, Dolly is choking and crying in such a dreadful way, and I can't stop her.'

'I give up, Lily. This is mother-work,' said Miss Mohun.

Hurrying upstairs, Lady Merrifield found very distressing sounds issuing from Dolores's room; sobs, not loud, but almost strangled into a perfect agony of choking down by the resolute instinct, for it was scarcely will.

'My dear, my dear, don't stop it!' she exclaimed, lifting up the girl in her arms. 'Let it out; cry freely; never mind. She will be better soon, Mysie dear. Only get me a glass of water, and find a fresh handkerchief. There, there, that's right!' as Dolores let herself lean on the kind breast, and conscious that the utmost effects of the disturbance had come, allowed her long-drawn sobs to come freely, and moaned as they shook her whole frame, though without screaming. Her aunt propped her up on her own bosom, parted back her hair, kissed her, and saying she was getting better, sent Mysie back to her bed. The first words that were gasped out between the rending sobs were, 'Oh! is my—he—to be tried?'

'Most likely not, my dear. He has had full time to get away, and I hope it is so.'

'But wasn't he there? Haven't they got him? Weren't they asking me about him, and saying I must be tried for stealing father's cheque?'

'You were dreaming, my poor child. They have not taken him, and I am quite sure you will not be tried anyway.'

'They said—Aunt Jane and Uncle Reginald and all, and 'that dreadful man that came—'

'Perhaps they said you might have to be examined, but only if he is apprehended, and I fully expect that he is out of reach, so that you need not frighten yourself about that, my dear.'

'Oh, don't go!' cried Dolores, as her aunt stirred.

'No, I'm not going. I was only reaching some water for you. Let me sponge your face.'

To this Dolores submitted gratefully, and then sighed, as if under heavy oppression, 'And did he really do it?'

'I am afraid he must have done so.'

'I never thought it. Mother always helped him.'

'Yes, my dear, that made it very hard for you to know what was right to do, and this is a most terrible shock for you,' said her aunt, feeling unable to utter another reproach just then to one who had been so loaded with blame, and she was touched the more when Dolores moaned, 'Mother would have cared so much.'

She answered with a kiss, was glad to find her hand still held, and forgot that it was past eleven o'clock.

'Please, will it quite ruin father?' asked Dolores, who had not out- grown childish confusion about large sums of money.

'Not exactly, my dear. It was more than he had in the bank, and Uncle Regie thinks the bankers will undertake part of the loss if he will let them. It is more inconvenient than ruinous.'

'Ah!' There was a faintness and oppression in the sound which made Lady Merrifield think the girl ought not to be left, and before long, sickness came on. Nurse Halfpenny had to be called up, and it was one o'clock before there was a quiet, comfortable sleep, which satisfied the aunt and nurse that it was safe to repair to their own beds again.

The dreary, undefined self-reproach and vague alarms, intensified by the sullen, reserved temper, and culminating in such a shock, alienating the only persons she cared for, and filling her with terror for the future, could not but have a physical effect, and Dolores was found on the morrow with a bad head-ache, and altogether in a state to be kept in bed, with a fire in her room.

Gillian and Mysie were much impressed by the intelligence of their cousin's illness when they came to their mother's room on the way to breakfast, and Mysie turned to her sister, saying, 'There Gill, you see she did care, though she didn't cry like us. Being ill is more than crying.'

'Well,' said Gillian, 'it is a good deal more than such things as you and Val cry for, Mysie.'

'It was a trial such as you don't understand, my dears,' said Lady Merrifield. 'I don't, of course, excuse much that she did, but she had been used to see her mother make every exertion to help the man.'

'That does make a difference,' said Gillian, 'but she shouldn't have taken her father's money. And wasn't it dreadful of Constance to smuggle her letters? I'm quite glad Constance gets part of the punishment.'

'Certainly, that might be just, Gillian, but unfortunately the loss falls infinitely more heavily upon Miss Hacket, who cannot afford the loss at all.'

'Oh dear!' cried Mysie.

'I'm very sorry,' said Gillian.

'And, my dear girls, in all honour and honesty, we must make it up to her.'

'Can't we save it out of our allowance?' said Mysie.

'Sixpence a month from you, a shilling perhaps from Gill, how long would that take? No, my dear girls, I am going to put you to a heavy trial.'

'Oh, mamma, don't!' cried Gillian, seeing what she was driving at. 'Don't give up the Butterfly's Ball.'

'Oh, don't!' implored Mysie, tears starting in her eyes. 'We never saw a costume ball, and Fly wishes it so.'

'And I thought you had promised,' said Gillian.

'Cousin Rotherwood assumes that I did; but I did not really accept. I told him I could not tell, for you know your Grandmamma Merrifield talked of coming here, and I cannot put her off. And now I see that it must be given up.'

'It need only be calico!' sighed Gillian, sticking pins in and out of the pincushion.

'Fancy dresses even in calico are very expensive. Besides, I could not go to a place like Rotherwood without at least two new dresses, and it is not right to put papa to more expense.'

'Oh, mamma! couldn't you? You always do look nicer than any one,' said Mysie.

'My dear, I am afraid nothing I have at present would be suitable for a General's wife at Lady Rotherwood's party, and we must think of what would be fitting both towards our hostess and papa. Don't you see?'

'Ah! your velvet dress!' sighed Gillian.

'My poor old faithful state apparel,' smiled Lady Merrifield. 'Poor Gill, you did not think again to have to mourn for it, but I don't know that even that could have been sufficiently revivified, though it was my cheval de bataille for so many years.

For Lady Merrifield's black velvet of many years' usefulness, had been put on for her p.p.c. party at Belfast, when Gillian, in abetting Jasper in roasting chestnuts over a paraffin-lamp, had set herself and the tablecloth on fire, and had been extinguished with such damages as singed hair, a scar on Jasper's hands, and the destruction of her mother's 'front breadth.' There had been such relief and thankfulness at its being no worse that the 'state apparel' had not been much mourned, especially as the remains made a charming pelisse for Primrose; and in the retirement of Silverton, it had not been missed till the present occasion.

'Do gowns cost so very much?' said Mysie.

'Indeed they do, my poor Mouse. The lamented cost more than twenty pounds. I had been thinking whether I could afford the requisite garments—not quite so costly—and thought I might get them for about sixteen, with contrivance; but you see I feel it my fault that I let Dolores go and lead Constance to get cheated, and I cannot take the money out of what papa gives for household expenses and your education, so it must come out of my own personal allowance. Don't you see?'

'Ye—es,' said Gillian, apparently intent on getting a big, black- headed pin repeatedly into the same hole, while Mysie was trying with all her might not to cry.

'You are thinking it is very hard that you should suffer for Dolly's faults. Perhaps it is, but such things may often happen to you, my dears. Christians bear them well for love's sake, you know.'

'And it is a little my fault,' said Gillian, thoughtfully; 'for it was I that let the chestnut fall into the lamp.'

'I—I don't think I should have minded so much,' said Mysie, almost crying, 'if we had done it our own selves—and Fly too—for some very poor woman in the snow.'

'I know that very well, Mysie, and this is a much harder trial, as you don't get the honour and glory of it; and, besides, you will have to take care to say not a word of this reason to Fly or Valetta, or any one else.'

'Val will be awfully disappointed,' said Gillian.

'Poor Val! But I should not have taken her anyway, so that matters the less. I should have taken Jasper, for that would have been more convenient than so many girls. In fact, I did not mean anybody to have heard of it till I had made up my mind, so that there would have been no disappointment; but that naughty Cousin Rotherwood could not keep it to himself; and so, my poor maidens, you have to bear it with a good grace, and to be treated as my confidential friends.'

Mysie smiled and kissed her mother—Gillian cleared somewhat, but observing, 'I only wish it wasn't clothes;' tried to dismiss the subject as the gong began to sound, but Mysie caught her mother's dress, and said, 'Mayn't I tell Fly, for a great secret?'

'No, my dear, certainly not. Fly is a dear little girl, but we don't know how she can keep secrets, and it would never do to let the Rotherwoods know; papa and Uncle William would be exceedingly annoyed. And only think of Miss Hacket's feelings if it came round. It will be hard enough to get her to take it now.'

'Perhaps she won't,' flashed into the minds of both girls; but Mysie said entreatingly, 'One moment more, mamma, please! What can I say to Fly that will be the truth?'

'Say that I find we cannot go, and that I had never promised,' said Lady Merrifield. 'I trust you, my dears.'

And as she opened the door to hurry down to prayers, the two sisters felt the words very precious and inspiriting. Mysie lingered on the step and bravely asked Gillian whether her eyes looked like crying—

'No, only a little twinkly,' answered the elder sister; 'they will be all right after prayers if you don't rub them.'

'No, I won't, said Mysie; "I'll try to mean 'Thy will be done.' For I suppose it is His will, though it is mamma's."

'I'm glad you thought of that, Mysie,' said Gillian; 'you see it is mamma's goodness.' And Gillian added to herself, "dear little Mysie too. If it had not been for her, I believe I should have 'grizzled' all prayer-time, and now I hope I shall attend instead."

When everybody rose up from their knees, Lady Merrifield was glad to see two fairly cheerful faces. She tried to lessen the responsibility of the confidants, and to get the matter settled by telling Lord Rotherwood at once and publicly that she had thought his kind invitation over, and that she found she must not accept it. Perhaps she warily took the moment after she had seen the postman coming up the drive, for he had only time to say, 'Now, that's too bad, Lily, you don't mean it,' and she to answer, 'Yes, in sad earnest, I do,' before the letters came in, and the attention of the elders was taken off by the distribution.

But Valetta whispered to Gillian, 'Not going; oh why?'

'No; never mind, you wouldn't have gone, anyway—hush—' said Gillian, beginning, it may be, a little sharply, but then becoming dismayed as Valetta, perhaps a little unhinged by the late pleasures, burst forth into such a fit of crying as made everybody look up, and her mother tell her to go away if she could not behave better. Gillian, understanding a sign of the head as permission, led her away, hearing Lord Rotherwood observe,—

'There, you cruel party!' before again becoming absorbed in his letter.

'Oh dear!' sighed Fly, turning to Mysie as they rose from table, 'I am so sorry! It would have been so nice; and I thought we were safe, as mamma had written herself!'

'Ah! but my mamma hadn't accepted,' said Mysie.

Phyllis seemed to take this as final, and sighed, but Mysie presently exclaimed, 'I say! can't we all play at Butterfly's Ball in the hall after lessons?'

'Lessons?' said Fly; 'but it's holiday-time?'

'Mamma always makes us do a sort of little lesson, even in the holidays, as she says we get naughty. But I suppose you need not; and perhaps she will not make us now you are here.'

Colonel Mohun and Lord Rotherwood were going to Darminster to see what was the state of the investigation about Mr. Flinders. They set out directly after breakfast, and after the feeding of the pets, where Valetta joined them, much consoled by the prospect of the extemporary Butterfly's Ball at home, Lady Phyllis, with her usual ready adaptability, repaired with the others to the schoolroom, where the Psalms and Lessons were read, and a small amount of French reading in turn from 'En Quarantaine' followed, with accompaniment of needlework or drawing, after which the children were free.

Aunt Jane was going home to her Sunday school and the Rockstone festivities. She came down for her final talk with her sister just in time to perceive the folding up of three five-pound notes.

'Lily,' she said, with instant perception, 'I could beat myself for what I told you yesterday.'

Lady Merrifield laughed. 'The girls are very good about it!' she said. 'Now you have found it out, see whether that note will make Miss Hacket swallow it.'

'Can't be better! But oh. Lily, it is disgusting! Could not I rig up something fanciful for the children?'

'That's not so much the point. 'The General's lady,' as Mrs. Halfpenny would say, is bound not to look like 'ane scrub,' as she would be unwelcome to Victoria, and what would be William's feelings? I could hardly have accomplished it even with this, and the catastrophe settles the matter.'

'You could not get into my black satin?'

'No, I thank you, my dear little Brownie,' said Lady Merrifield, elongating herself like a girl measuring heights.

'Ada has a larger assortment, as well as a taller person,' continued Miss Jane, 'but then they are rather 'henspeckle,' and they have all made their first appearance at Rotherwood.'

'No, no, thank you, my dear, Jasper would not like the notion—even if there was not more of me than of Ada. I have no doubt it is much better for us.'

'Should you have liked it, Lily?'

'For once in a way. For Rotherwood's sake, dear old fellow. Yes, I should.'

'Ah, well! You are a bit of a grande dame yourself. Ada enjoys it, too, or I don't think I ever should go there.'

'Surely Victoria behaves well to you?'

'Far be it from me to say she is not exemplary in her perfect civility to all her husband's relations. Ada thinks her charming; but oh. Lily, you've never found out what it is to be a little person in a great person's house, and to feel one's self scrupulously made one of the family, because her husband is so much attached to all of them. There's nothing spontaneous about it! I dare say you would get on better, though You are not a country-town old maid; you would have an air of the world and of distinction even if you went in your old grey poplin.'

'Well, I thought better of my lady.'

'You ought not! She makes great efforts, I am sure, and is a pattern of graciousness and cordiality—only that's just what riles one, when one knows one is just as well born, and all the rest of it. And then I'm provided with the clever men, and the philanthropical folk to talk to. I know it's a great compliment, and they are very nice, but I'd ten times rather take my chance among them. However, now I've made the grapes sour for you, what do you think about Dolores? Will you send her to us?'

'Not immediately, at any rate, dear Jane. It is very kind in you to wish to take her off our hands, but I do want to try her a little longer. I thought she seemed to be softening last night.'

'She was as hard as ever when I went in to wish her good-bye.'

'I thought she had too much headache for conversation when I went in last; I think this is a regular upset from unhappiness and reserve.'

'Alias temper and deceitfulness.'

'Something of both. You know the body often suffers when things are not thrown out in a wholesome explosion at once, but go simmering on; and I mean to let this poor child alone till she is well.'

'Ah! here comes the pony-carriage. Well, Lily, send her to me if you repent.'

The sisters came out to find the Butterfly's Ball in full action. Fly had become a Butterfly by the help of a battered pair of fairy wings, stretched on wire, which were part of the theatrical stock. 'The shy little Dormouse' was creeping about on all fours under a fur jacket, with a dilapidated boa for a long tail, but her 'blind brother the Mole' had escaped from her, and had been transformed into the Frog, by means of a spotted handkerchief over his back, and tremendous leap-frog jumps. Primrose, in another pair of fairy wings, was personating the Dragon-fly and all his relations, 'green, orange, and blue.' Valetta, in perfect content with the present, with a queer pair of ears, and a tail made of an old brush, sat up and nibbled as Squirrel. The Grasshopper was performing antics which made him not easily distinguishable from the Frog, and the Spider was actually descending by a rope from the balusters, while his mother, standing somewhat aghast, breathed a hope that 'poor Harlequin's' fall was not part of the programme. But she did not interfere, having trust in the gymnastics that were studied at school by Jasper, who had been beguiled into the game by Fly's fascinations.

'A far more realistic performance than the Rotherwood Butterfly's Ball is likely to be,' said Aunt Jane, aside, as the various guests came up for her departing kiss. 'And much more entertaining, if they could only think so. Where's Gillian?'

Gillian appeared on the stairs in her own person at the moment. She said Mrs. Halfpenny had called her, and told her that 'Miss Dollars' was crying, and that she did not think the child ought to be left alone long to fret herself, but Saturday morning needments called away nurse herself, so she had ordered in Miss Gillian as her substitute. Gillian was reading to her, and had only come away to make her farewells to Aunt Jane.

'That is right, my dear,' said her mother; 'I will come and sit with her after luncheon.'

For the whole youthful family were to turn out to superintend the replantation of the much-enduring fir, which, it was hoped, might survive for many another Christmas.

However, Lady Merrifield could not keep her promise, for a whole party of visitors arrived just after the children's dinner was over.

'And it's old Mrs. Norgood,' sighed Gillian, looking over the balusters, 'and she always slays for ages!'

'One of you young ladies must bide with Miss Dollars,' said Nurse Halfpenny, decidedly, 'or we shall have her fretting herself ill again.'

'Oh, nursie, can't you?' entreated Gillian.

'Me, Miss Gillian! How can I, when Miss Primrose is going out with the whole clamjamfrie, and all the laddies, into the wet plantations? Na— one of ye maun keep the lassie company. Ye've had your turn, Miss Gillian, so it should be Miss Mysie. It winna hurt ye, bairn, ye that hae been rampaging ower the house all the morning.'

Mysie knew it was her turn, but she also knew that nurse always favoured Gillian and snubbed her. She had a devouring longing to be with her dear Fly, and a certain sense that she was the preferred one. Must another pleasure be sacrificed to that very naughty Dolores, whose misdemeanours had deprived them of the visit to Rotherwood. She looked so dismal that Gillian said good-naturedly, 'Really, Mysie, I don't think mamma would mind Dolores's being left a little while; I must go down to see about the Tree, because mamma gave me a message to old Webb, but I'll come back directly. Or perhaps Dolly is going to sleep, and does not want any one. Go and see.'

Mysie on this crept quietly into the room, full of hope of escape, but Dolores was anything but asleep. 'Oh, are you come, Mysie? Now you'll go on with the story. I tried, but my eyes ache at the back of them, and I can't.'

Mysie's fate was sealed. She sat down by the fire and took up the book, 'A Story for the Schoolroom,' one of the new ones given from the Tree. It was the middle of the story, and she did not care about it at first, especially when she heard Fly's voice, and all the others laughing and chattering on the stairs.

'Didn't they care for her absence?' and her voice grew thick, and her eyes dim; but Dolores must not think her cross and unwilling, and she made a great effort, became interested in the girls there described, and wondered whether staying with Fly would have turned her head, after the example of the heroine of the book.

Dolores did not seem to want to talk. In fact, she was clinging to the reading, because she could not bear to speak or think of the state of affairs, and the story seemed, as it were, to drown her misery. She knew that her aunt and cousins were far less severe with her than she expected, but that could only be because she was ill. Had not Uncle Reginald turned against her, and Constance? It would all come upon her as soon as she came out of her room, and she was rather sorry to believe that she should be up and. about to-morrow morning.

Mysie read on till the short, winter day showed the first symptoms of closing in. Then Lady Merrifield came up. 'You here, little nurse?' she said. 'Run out now and meet the others. I'll stay with Dolly.' Mysie knew by the kiss that her mother was pleased with her; but Dolores dreaded the talk with her aunt, and made herself sleepy.



CHAPTER XVI

THE INCONSTANCY OF CONSTANCE.



The two gentlemen who had gone to Darminster brought home tidings that the police who had been put on the track of Flinders had telegraphed that it was thought that a person answering to his description had embarked at Liverpool in an American-bound steamer.

This idea, though very uncertain, was a relief, at least to all except the boys, who thought it a great shame that such a rascal should escape, and wanted to know whether the Americans could not be made to give him up. They did not at all understand their elders being glad, for the sake of Maurice Mohun and his dead wife, that the man should not be publicly convicted, and above all that Dolores should not have to bear testimony against him in court, and describe her own very doubtful proceedings. Besides, there would have been other things to try him for, since he had cheated the publishing house which employed him of all he had been able to get into his hands. There was reason to believe that he had heavy debts, especially gambling ones, and that he had become desperate since he no longer had his step-sister to fall back upon.

Looking into his room, among other papers, a half-burnt manuscript was found upon his grate among some exhausted cinders, as if he had been trying to use the unfortunate 'Waif of the Moorland' to eke out his last fire. Moreover, the proprietor of the Politician told Colonel Mohun of having remonstrated with him on the exceeding weakness and poorness of the 'Constantia' poetry, 'which,' as that indignant personage added, 'was evidently done merely as a lure to the unfortunate young lady.'

The fifteen pounds had been accepted in an honourable and ladylike manner by the elder sister—but without any overpowering expression of gratitude. No doubt it was a bitter pill to her, forced down by necessity, and without guessing that it cost the donors anything.

Dolores's mind was set at rest as to Flinders's evasion before night, and on the Sunday morning even Nurse Halfpenny could find out nothing the matter with her, so that she was obliged to make her appearance as usual. Uncle Reginald did not kiss her, he only gave a cold nod, and said 'Good morning.' Otherwise all went on as usual, and it was pleasant to find that Fly was as entirely used as they were to learning Collect and hymn, and copying out texts illustrating Catechism, and that she was expected to have them ready to repeat them to her mother some time in the afternoon. There was something, too, that Mysie could not have described, but which she liked, in the manner in which, on this morning, Dolores accepted small acts of good nature, such as finding a book for her, getting a new pen and helping her to the whereabouts of a Scriptural reference. It seemed for the first time as if she liked to receive a kindness, and her 'thank you' really had a sound of thanks, instead of being much more like 'I wish you would not.' Mysie felt really encouraged to be kind, and when, on setting forth to church, everybody was crowding round trying to walk with Fly, and Dolores was going along lonely and deserted, Mysie resigned her chance of one side of the favourite Phyllis, and dropped back to give her company to the solitary one. To her surprise and gratification, Dolores took hold of her hand, and listened quite willingly to her chatter about the schemes for the fortnight that Fly was to be left with them. Presently Constance was seen going markedly by the other gate of the churchyard, quite out of her usual way, and not even looking towards them.

It was the last day of the old year, and, in the midst of the Christmas joy, there were allusions to it in the services and hymns. Something in the tune of 'Days and moments quickly flying,' touched some chord in Dolores's spirit, and set her off crying. She would have done anything to stop it, but there was no helping it, great round splashes came down, and the more she was afraid of being noticed, the worse the choking grew. At last, the very worst person—she thought—to take notice. Uncle Reginald, did so, and, under cover of a general rising, said sternly, 'Stop that, or go out.'

Stop that! Much did the colonel know about a girl's tears, or how she would have given anything to check them. But here was Aunt Lily edging down to her, taking her by the hand, leading her out, she did not know how, stopping all who would have come after them with help—then pausing a little in the open, frosty air.

'Oh, Aunt Lily! I am very sorry!'

'Never mind that, my dear. Do you feel poorly?'

'Oh no; I'm quite well—only—'

'Only overcome—I don't wonder—my dear—can you walk quietly home with me?'

'Yes, please.'

Nothing was said till they had passed the 'idle corner,' where men and half-grown lads smoked their pipes in anything but Sunday trim; and stared at the lady making her exit, till they were through the short street with shop windows closed, and a strong atmosphere of cooking, and had come into the quiet lane leading to the paddock. Then Lady Merrifield laid her hand on the girl's shoulder very gently, and said, 'It was too much for you, my dear, you are not quite strong yet.'

'Oh yes; I'm well. Only I am so very—very miserable,' and the gust of sobs and tears rushed on her again.

'Dear child, I should like to be able to help you!'

'You can't! I've done it! And—and they'll all be against me always— Uncle Regie and all!'

'Uncle Regie was very much hurt, but I'm sure he will forgive you when he sees how sorry you are. You know we all hope this is going to be a fresh start. I am sure you were deceived.'

'Yes,' said Dolores. 'I never could have thought he—Uncle Alfred—was such a dreadful man'

'I expect that since he lost your mother's influence and help he may have sunk lower than when you had seen him before. Did your father give you any directions about him?'

'No. Father hated to hear of him' and never spoke about him if he could help it; and we thought it was all Mohun high notions because he wasn't quite a gentleman.'

'I see. Indeed, my dear, though you have done very wrong, I have already felt that there was great excuse for you in trying to keep up intercourse with a person who belonged to your mother. I wish you had told me, but I suppose you were afraid.'

'Yes' said Dolores. 'And I thought you were sure to be cross and harsh,' she muttered. And then suddenly looking up, 'Oh, Aunt Lily! everybody is angry but you—you and Mysie! Please go on being kind! I believe you've been good to me always.'

'My dear, I've tried,' said Lady Merrifield, with fears in her brown eyes and a choke in her voice caressing the hand that had been put into hers. 'I have wished very much to make you happy with us; but the ways of a large family must be a trial to a new-comer.'

Dolores raised her face for a kiss, and said, 'I see it now. But I did not like everything always, and I thought aunts were sure to be unkind.'

'That was very hard. And why?'

She was heard to mutter something about aunts in books always being cross.

'Ah! my dear! I suppose there are some unkind aunts, but I am sure there are a great many more who wish with all their hearts to make happy homes for their nieces. I hope now we may do so. I have more hope than ever I had, and so I shall write to your father.'

'And please—please,' cried Dolores, 'don't let Uncle Regie write him a very dreadful letter! I know he will.'

'I think you can prevent that best yourself, by telling Uncle Regie how sorry you are. He was specially grieved because he thinks you told him two direct falsehoods.'

'Oh! I didn't think they were that,' said Dolores, 'for it was true that father did not leave anything with me for Uncle Alfred. And I did not know whether it was me whom he saw at Darminster. I did tell you one once, Aunt Lily, when you asked if I gave Constance a note. At least, she gave it to me, and not I to her. Indeed, I don't tell falsehoods, Aunt Lily—I mean I never did at home, but Constance said everybody said those sort of things at school, and that one was driven to it when one was—-'

'Was what, my dear?'

'Tyrannized over,' Dolores got out.

'Ah! Dolly, I am afraid Constance was no real friend. It was a great mistake to think her like Miss Hacket.'

'And now she has sent back all my notes, and won't look at me or speak to me,' and Dolores's tears began afresh.

'It is very ungenerous of her, but very likely she will be very sorry to have done so when her first anger is over, and she understands that you were quite as much deceived as she was.'

'But I shall never care for her again. It is not like Mysie, who never stopped being kind all the time—nor Gillian either. I shall cut her next time!'

'You should remember that she has something to forgive. I don't want you to be intimate with her but I think it would be better if, instead of quarrelling openly, you wrote a note to say that you were deceived and that you are very sorry for what you brought on her.'

'I should not have gone on with it but for her and Her stupid poems!'

'Can you bear to tell me how it all was, my dear? I do not half understand it.'

And on the way home, and in Lady Merrifield's own room Dolores found it a relief to pour forth an explanation of the whole affair, beginning with that meeting with Mr. Flinders at Exeter, of which no one had heard, and going on to her indignation at the inspection of her letters; and how Constance had undertaken to conduct her correspondence, 'and that made it seem as if she must write to some one,'—so she wrote to Uncle Alfred. And then Constance, becoming excited at the prospect of a literary connection, all the rest followed. It was a great relief to have told it all, and Lady Merrifield was glad to see that the sense of deceit was what weighed most heavily upon her niece, and seemed to have depressed her all along. Indeed, the aunt came to the conclusion that though Dolores alone might still have been sullen, morose and disagreeable, perhaps very reserved, she never would have kept up the systematic deceit but for Constance. The errors, regarded as sin, weighed on Lady Merrifield's mind, but she judged it wiser not to press that thought on an unprepared spirit, trusting that just as Dolores had wakened to the sense of the human love that surrounded her, hitherto disbelieved and disregarded, so she might yet awake to the feeling of the Divine love and her offence against it.

The afternoon was tolerably free, for the gentlemen, including the elder boys, walked to evensong at a neighbouring church noted for its musical services, and Lady Merrifield, as she said, 'lashed herself up' to go with Gillian, carry back the remnant of the unhappy 'Waif,' and 'have it out' with Constance, who would, she feared, never otherwise understand the measure of her own delinquency, and from whom, perhaps, evidence might be extracted which would palliate the poor child's offence in the eyes of Colonel Mohun. Both the Hacket sisters looked terribly frightened when she appeared, and the elder one made an excuse for getting her outside the door to beseech her to be careful, dear Constance was so nervous and so dreadfully upset by all she had undergone. Lady Merrifield was not the least nervous of the two, and she felt additionally displeased with Constance for not having said one word of commiseration when her sister had inquired for Dolores. On returning to the drawing-room, Lady Merrifield found the young lady standing by the window, playing with the blind, and looking as if she wanted to make her escape.

'I do not know whether you will be sorry or glad to see this,' said Lady Merrifield, producing a half-burnt roll of paper. 'It was found in Mr. Flinders's grate, and my brother thought you would be glad that it should not get into strange hands.'

'Oh, it was cruel! it was base! What a wicked man he is!' cried Constance, with hot tears, as she beheld the mutilated condition of her poor 'Waif.'

'Yes, it was a most unfortunate thing that you. should have run into intercourse with such an utterly untrustworthy person.'

'I was grossly deceived, Lady Merrifield!' said Constance, clasping her hands somewhat theatrically.

'I shall never believe in any one again!'

'Not without better grounds, I hope,' was the answer. 'Your poor little friend is terribly broken down by all this.'

'Don't call her my friend. Lady Merrifield. She has used me shamefully! What business had she to tell me he was her uncle when he was no such thing?'

'She had been always used to call him so.'

'Don't tell me, Lady Merrifield,' said Constance, who, after her first fright, was working herself into a passion. 'You don't know what a little viper you have been warming, nor what things she has been continually saying of you. She told me—'

Lady Merrifield held up her hand with authority.

'Stay, Constance. Do you think it is generous in you to tell me this?'

'I am sure you ought to know.'

'Then why did you encourage her?'

'I pitied her—I believed her—I never thought she would have led me into this!'

'How did she lead you?'

'Always talking about her precious, persecuted uncle. I believe she was in league with him all the time!'

'That is nonsense,' said Lady Merrifield, 'as you must see if you reflect a little. Dolores was too young to have been told this man's real character; she only knew that her mother, who had spent her childhood with him, treated him as a brother, and did all she could for him. Dolores did very wrongly and foolishly in keeping up a connection with him unknown to me; but I cannot help feeling there was great excuse for her, and she was quite as much deceived as you were.'

'Oh, of course, you stand by your own niece, Lady Merrifield. If you knew what horrid things she said about your pride and unkindness, as she called it, you would not think she deserved it.'

'Nay, that is exactly what does most excuse her in my eyes. Her fancying such things of me was what did prevent her from confiding in me.'

Constance had believed herself romantic, but the Christian chivalry of Lady Merrifield's nature was something quite beyond her. She muttered something about Dolores not deserving, which made her visitor really angry, and say, 'We had better not talk of deserts. Dolores is a mere child—a mother-less child, who had been a good deal left to herself for many months. I let her come to you because she seemed shy and unhappy with us, and I did not like to deny her the one pleasure she seemed to care for. I knew what an excellent person and thorough lady your sister is, and I thought I could perfectly trust her with you. I little thought you would have encouraged her in concealment, and—I must say—deceit, and thus made me fail in the trust her father reposed in me.'

'I would never have done it,' Constance sobbed, 'but for what she said about you. Lady Merrifield!'

'Well, and even if I am such a hard, severe person, does that make it honourable or right to help the child I trusted to you to carry on this underhand correspondence?'

Constance hung her head. Her sister had said the same to her, but she still felt herself the most injured party, and thought it very hard that she should be so severely blamed for what the girls at her school treated so lightly. She said, 'I am very sorry. Lady Merrifield,' but it was not exactly the tone of repentance, and it ended with: 'If it had not been for her, I should never have done it.'

'I suppose not, for there would have been no temptation. I was in hopes that you would have shown some kindlier and more generous feeling towards the younger girl, who could not have gone so far wrong without your assistance, and who feels your treatment of her very bitterly. But to find you incapable of understanding what you have done, makes me all the more glad that the friendship—if friendship it can be called— is broken off between you. Good-bye. I think when you are older and wiser, you will be very sorry to recollect the doings of the last few months.'

Lady Merrifield walked away, and found on her return that Dolores had succeeded in writing to her father, and was so utterly tired out by the feelings it had cost her that she was only fit to lie on the sofa and sleep.

Gillian was, of course, not seen till she came home from evening service.

'Oh, mamma,' she said, 'what did you do to Constance?'

'Why?'

'Well, I heard you shut the front door. And presently after there came such a noise through the wall that all the girls pricked up their ears, and Miss Hacket jumped up in a fright. If it had been Val, one would have called it a naughty child roaring.'

'What! did I send her into hysterics?'

'I suppose, as she is grown up, it must have the fine name, but it wasn't a bit like poor Dolly's choking. I am sure she did it to make her sister come! Well, of course, Miss Hacket went away, and I did the best I could, but what could one do with all these screeches and bellowings breaking out?'

'For shame. Gill!'

'I can't help it, mamma. If you had only seen their faces when the uproar came in a fresh gust! How they whispered, and some looked awe- struck. I thought I had better get rid of them, and come home myself; but Miss Hacket met me, and implored me to stay, and I was weak-minded enough to do so. I wish I hadn't, for it was only to be provoked past bearing. That horrid girl has poisoned even Miss Hacket's mind, and she thinks you have been hard on her darling. You did not know how nervous and timid dear Connie is!'

'Well, Gill, I confess she made me very angry, and I told her what I thought of her.'

'And that she didn't choose to hear!'

'Did you see her again?'

'No, I am thankful to say, I did not. But Miss Hacket would go on all tea-time, explaining and explaining for me to tell you how dear Connie is so affectionate and so easily led, and how Dolores came over her with persuasions, and deceived her. I declare I never liked Dolly so well before. At any rate, she doesn't make professions, and not a bit more fuss than she can help. And there was Miss Hacket getting brandy cherries and strong coffee, and I don't know what all, because dear Connie was so overcome, and dear Lady Merrifield was quite under a mistake, and so deceived by Dolores. I told Miss Hacket you were never under a mistake nor deceived.'

'You didn't, Gillian!'

'Yes, I did, and the stupid woman only wanted to kiss me (but I wouldn't let her) and said I was very right to stand up for my dear mamma. As if that had anything to do with it! What are you laughing at, mamma? Why, Uncle Regie is laughing, and Cousin Rotherwood! What is it?'

'At the two partisans who never stand up for their own families,' said Uncle Regie.

'But it's true!' cried Gillian.

'What! that I am never mistaken nor deceived?' said Lady Merrifield.

'Except when you took Miss Constance for a sensible woman, eh?' said her brother.

'That I never did! But I did take her for a moderately honourable one.'

'Well, that was a mistake,' owned Gillian. 'And Miss Hacket is as bad! There's no gratitude—-'

'Hush!' broke in her mother; and Gillian stopped abashed, while Lady Merrifield continued, 'I won't have Miss Hacket abused. She is only blinded by sisterly affection.'

'I don't think I can go there again,' said Gillian, 'after what she said about you.'

'Nonsense!' said her mother. 'Don't be as bad as Constance in trying to make me angry by telling me all poor Dolly's grumblings.'

'Follow your mother's example, Gillian,' said Lord Rotherwood, 'and, if possible, never hear, certainly never attend to, what any one says of you behind your back.'

'Is said to have said of you, you should add, Rotherwood,' put in the colonel. 'It is a decree worse than eavesdropping.'

'Oh, Regie!' exclaimed his sister.

'Well, not perhaps for your own honour and conscience, but the keyhole is a more trustworthy medium than the reporter.'

'That's a strong way of stating it, but, at any rate, the keyhole has no temper nor imagination, or prejudice of its own,' said Lady Merrifield.

'No, and as far as it goes, it enables you to judge of the frame in which the words, even if correctly reported, were spoken,' added Colonel Mohun.

'The moral of which is,' said Lord Rotherwood, drolly, 'that Gillian is not to take notice of anyone's observations upon her unless she has heard them through the keyhole.'

'And so one would never hear them at all.'

'Q. E. D.,' said Lord Rotherwood. 'And now, Lily, do you. ever sing the two evening-hymns. Ken and Keble, now, as the family used to do on Sundays at the Old Court, long ere the days of 'Hymns Ancient and Modern'?

'Don't we?' said Lady Merrifield. 'Only all our best voices will be singing it at Rawul Pindee!'

And, as she struck a note on the piano, all the younger people still up, Mysie, Phyllis, Wilfred and Valetta, gathered round from the outer room to join in their evening Sunday delight. Fly put her hand into her father's and whispered, 'You told me about it, daddy.' He began to sing, but his voice thickened as he missed the tones once associated with it. And Lady Merrifield, too, nearly broke down as with all her heart she sang, hopefully,

'Now Lord, the gracious work begin.'



CHAPTER XVII.

THE STONE MELTING.



It was with a strange feeling that Dolores woke on the New Year's morning, that something was very sad and strange, and yet that there was a sense of relief. For one thing, that terrible confession to her father was written, and was no longer a weight hanging over her. And though his answer was still to come, that was months away. There was Uncle Regie greatly displeased with her; there was Constance treating her as a traitor; there was the mischief done, and yet something hard and heavy was gone? Something sweet and precious had come in on her! Surely it was, that now she knew and felt that she could trust in Aunt Lilias—yes, and in Mysie. She got up, quite looking forward to meeting those gentle, brown eyes of her aunt's, that she seemed never before to have looked into, and to feeling the sweet, motherly kiss which had so mud, more meaning in it now, as almost to make up for Uncle Reginald's estrangement.

She even anticipated gladly those ten minutes alone with her aunt, which she used to dislike so much, hoping that the holiday-time would not hinder them. Really wishing to please her aunt, she had learnt her portion perfectly, and Lady Merrifield showed that she appreciated the effort, though still it was more a lesson than a reality.

'My dear!' she said, 'I am afraid this is another blow for you—it came this morning.'

It was the account from Professor Muhlwasser's German publisher, amounting to a few shillings more than six pounds. And an announcement that the books were on the way.

'Oh,' cried Dolores, 'I thought he was dead! He told me so! Uncle Alfred, I mean! And it was only to get the money! How could he be so wicked?'

'I am afraid that was all he cared for.'

'And what shall I do. Aunt Lily? Will you pay it, please, and take all my allowance till it is made up?'

'I think it will be more comfortable for you if I do something of that sort, though I don't think you should go entirely without money. You have a pound a quarter. I was going to give you yours at once.'

'Oh, take it—pray—'

'Suppose I give you five shillings, instead of twenty. I do not think it well to leave you with nothing for a year and a half, and this is nearly what Mysie has.'

'A shilling a month—very well. I wish I could pay it all at once!'

'No doubt you do, my dear, but this will keep you in mind for a long time what a dangerous thing you did in giving away money you had no right to dispose of.'

'Yes,' said Dolores. 'Mother earned money for him. I know she never took father's without asking him; but I couldn't earn, and couldn't ask.'

Lady Merrifield kissed her, for very joy, to hear no sullenness in her tone; and then all went to church together on the New Year's day that was to be the beginning of better things. Lord Rotherwood had just time to go before meeting the train which was to take him to High Court, leaving his Fly too much used to his absences to be distressed about them, and, in fact, somewhat crazy about a notion which Gillian had started that morning, of getting up a little play to surprise him when he came back for Twelfth Day, as he promised to do.

Mamma declared that if it was in French, and the words were learnt every morning before half-past eleven, it should supersede all other lessons; but such was the hatred of the whole boy faction to French, that they declared they had rather do rational sensible lessons twice over than learn such rot, and this carried the day. The drama proposed was that one in an old number of 'Aunt Judy,' where the village mayor is persuaded by the drummer to fine the girls for wearing lace caps. The French original existed in the house, and Fly started the idea that the male performers should speak English and the female French; but this was laughed down.

In the midst Uncle Reginald came to the door and called, 'Lilias, can you speak to me a minute?'

Lady Merrifield went out into the hall to him.

'Here's a policeman come over, Lily. They have got the fellow!' 'Flinders?'

'Yes; arrested him on board a steamer at Bristol.'

'Oh, I wish they had let it alone!'

'So do I. They are bringing him back. The Darminster City bench sits to-day, and they want that unlucky child over there to make her deposition for his committal.'

'Can't they commit him without her?'

'Not for the forgery. The bank people are bent on prosecuting for that, and we can't stop them. I suppose she can be depended on?'

'Reginald, don't! I told you the deceit was an unnatural growth from Constance's pseudo sentiment.'

'Well, get her ready to come with me,' said the colonel, with a gesture of doubt; 'we must catch the 12.50. The superintendent brought a fly.'

'You will frighten her out of her senses. I can't let her go alone with you in this mood.'

'As you please, if you choose to knock yourself up. I'll tell the superintendent, and walk on to the station. You've not a moment to lose, so don't let her stand dawdling and crying.'

It was a hard task for Lady Merrifield. She called Dolores, whom Mysie was inviting to be one of the village maidens, and bade her put on her things quickly. She ordered cold meat and wine into the dining-room, called Gillian into her room, and explained while dressing, and bade her keep the others away. Then, meeting Dolores on the stairs took her into the dining-room and made her swallow some cold beef, and drink some sherry, before telling her that the magistrates at Darminster wanted to ask her some questions. Dolores looked pale and frightened, and exclaimed,

'Oh, but he has got away!'

'My dear, I am grieved to say that he has not.'

Dolores understood, and submitted more quietly and resignedly than her aunt had feared. She was a barrister's daughter, and once or twice her father had taken her and her mother part of the way on circuit with him, and she had been in court, so that she had known from the first that if her uncle were arrested there was no choice but that she must speak out. So she only trembled very much and said—

'Aunt Lily, are you going with me?'

'Indeed I am, my poor child. Uncle Regie is gone on.'

No more was spoken then, but Dolores put her cold hand into her aunt's muff.

Gillian kept all the flock prisoned in the schoolroom. Wilfred, Val, and Fergus rushed to the window, and were greatly disappointed not to see a policeman on the box, 'taking Dolores to be tried'—as Fergus declared, and Wilfred insisted, just because Gillian and Mysie contradicted it with all their might. He continued to repeat it with variations and exaggerations, until Jasper heard him, and declared that he should have a thorough good licking if he said so again, administering a cuff by way of earnest. Wilfred howled, and was ordered not to be such an ape, and Fly looked on in wonder at the domestic discipline.

The superintendent had, in fact, walked on with Uncle Reginald, and Dolores saw nothing of him, but was put into an empty first-class carriage, into which her aunt followed her, but her uncle, observing, 'You know how to manage her, Lily,' betook himself to a smoking- carriage, and left them to themselves.

Dolores was never a very talking girl, and the habit of silence had grown upon her. She leant against her aunt and she put her arm round her, and did not attempt to say anything till she asked,

'Will he be there?'

'I don't know, I am afraid he will. It is very sad for you, my poor Dolly; but we must recollect that, after all, it may be much better for him to be stopped now than to go on and get worse and worse in some strange country.'

Dolores did not ask what she was to do, she knew enough already about trials to understand that she was only to answer questions, and she presently said,

'This can't be his trial. There are no assizes now.'

'No, this is only for the committal. It will very soon be over, if you will only answer quietly and steadily. If you do so, I think Uncle Regie will be pleased, and tell your father! I am sure I shall!'

Dolores pressed up closer and laid her cheek against the soft sealskin. In the midst of her trouble there was a strange wonder in her. Could this be really the aunt whom she had thought so cruel, unjust, and tyrannical, and from whom she had so carefully hidden her feelings? Nobody got into the carriage, and just before reaching Darminster, Lady Merrifield made a great effort over her own shyness and said,

'Now, Dolly, we will pray a little prayer that you may be a faithful witness, and that God may turn it, all to good for your poor uncle.'

Dolores was very much surprised, and did not know whether she liked it or not, but she saw her aunt's closed eyes and uplifted hands, and she tried to follow the example.

The train stopped, and her uncle came to the door, looking inquiringly at her.

'She will be good and brave,' said her aunt; and quickly passing across the platform, Dolores found herself beside her aunt, with her uncle opposite in another fly.

Things had been arranged for them considerately, and after they came to the Guildhall, where the city magistrates were sitting, Colonel Mohun went at once into court; the others were taken to a little room, and waited there a few minutes before Colonel Mohun came to call for his niece. It was a long room, with a rail at one end, and Dolores knew, with a strange thrill which made her shudder, that Mr. Flinders was there, but she could not bear to look at him, and only squeezed hard at the hand of her aunt, who asked, in a somewhat shaky voice, if she might come with her niece.

'Certainly, certainly. Lady Merrifield,' said one of the magistrates, and chairs were set both for her and Colonel Mohun.

'You are Miss Mohun, I think—may I ask your Christian name in full?' And then she had to spell it, and likewise tell her exact age, after which she was put on oath—as she knew enough of trials to expect.

'Are you residing with Lady Merrifield?'

'Yes.'

'But your father is living?'

'Yes, but he is in the Fiji Islands.'

'Will you favour us with his exact name?'

'Maurice Devereux Mohun.'

'When did he leave England?'

'The fifth of last September.'

'Did he leave any money with you?'

'Yes.'

'In what form?'

'A cheque on W——'s Bank.

'To bearer or order?'

'To order.'

'What was the date?'

'I think it was the 31st of August, but I am not sure.'

'For how much?'

'For seven pounds.'

'When did you part with it?'

'On the Friday before Christmas Day.'

'Did you do anything to it first?'

'I wrote my name on the back.'

'What did you do with it.'

'I sent it to—' her voice became a little hoarse, but she brought out the words—'to Mr. Flinders.'

'Is this the same?'

'Yes—only some one has put 'ty' to the 'seven' in writing, and 0 to the figure 7.'

'Can you swear to the rest as your father's writing and your own?'

The evidence of the banker's clerk as to the cashing of the cheque had been already taken, and the magistrate said, 'Thank you. Miss Mohun, I think the case is complete, and we need not trouble you any more.'

But the prisoner's voice made Dolores start and shudder again, as he said,

'I beg your pardon, sir, but you have not asked the young lady'—there was a sort of sneer in his voice—'how she sent this draft.'

'Did not you send it direct by the post?' demanded the magistrate.

'No; I gave it to—' Again she paused, and the words 'Gave it to—?' were authoritatively repeated, so that she had no choice.

'I gave it to Miss Constance Hacket to send.'

'You will observe, sir,' said Flinders, in a somewhat insolent tone, 'that the evidence which the witness has been so ready to adduce is incomplete. There is another link between her hands and mine.'

'You may reserve that point for your defence on your trial,' rejoined the magistrate. 'There is quite sufficient evidence for your committal.'

There was already a movement to let Dolores be taken away by her uncle and aunt, so as to spare her from any reproach or impertinence that Flinders might launch at her. She was like some one moving in a dream, glad that her aunt should hold her hand as if she were a little child, saying, as they came out into the street, 'Very clearly and steadily done, Dolly! Wasn't it, Uncle Regie?'

'Yes,' he said, absently. 'We must look out, or we shan't catch the 4.50 train.'

He almost threw them into a cab, and made the driver go his quickest, so that, after all, they had full ten minutes to spare. It made Dolores sick at heart to go near the waiting and refreshment-rooms where she and Constance had spent all that time with Flinders; but she could not bear to say so before her uncle, and he was bent on getting some food for Lady Merrifield.

'Not soup, Regie; there might not be time to swallow it. A glass of milk for us each, please; we can drink that at once, and anything solid that we can take with us. I am sure your mouth must be dry, my dear.'

Very dry it was, and Dolores gladly swallowed the milk, and found, when seated in the train, that she was really hungry enough to eat her full share of the sandwiches and buns which the colonel had brought in with him; and then she sat resting against her aunt, closed her eyes, and half dozed in the rattle of the train, not moving in the pause at the stations, but quite conscious that Colonel Mohun said, 'Not a spark of feeling for anybody, not even for that man! As hard as a stone!'

'For shame, Regie!' said her aunt. 'How angry you would have been if she had made a scene.'

'I should have liked her better.'

'No, you wouldn't, when you come to understand. There's stuff in her, and depth too.'

'Aye, she's deep enough.'

'Poor child!' said Lady Merrifield, tenderly. And then the train went on, and the noise drowned the voices, so that Dolores only partly heard, 'You will see how she will rise,' and the answer, 'You may be right; I hope so. But I can't get over deliberate deceit.'

He settled himself in his corner, and Lady Merrifield durst not move nor raise her voice lest she should break what seemed such deep slumber, but which really was half torpor, half a dull dismay, holding fast eyes, lips, and limbs, and which really became sleep, so that Dolores did not hear the next bit of conversation during the ensuing halt.

'I say, Lily, I did not like the fellow's last question. He means to give trouble about it.'

'I was sorry the other name was brought in, but it must have come sooner or later.'

'That's true; but if she can't swear to the figures on the draft, ten to one that the fellow will get off.'

'You don't doubt—'

'No, no; but there's the chance for the defence, and he was sharp enough to see it.'

'There is nothing to be said or done about it, of course.'

'Of course not. There's nothing for it but to let it alone.'

They went on again, and when the train reached Silverton, Dolly was dreaming that her father had come, and that he said Uncle Alfred should be hanged unless she found the money for Professor Muhlwasser. She even looked about for him, and said, 'Where's father?' when she was wakened to get out.

Gillian came up to her mother's room to hear what had happened, and to give an account of the day, which had gone off prosperously by Harry's help. He had kept excellent order at dinner, and 'there's something about Fly which makes even Wilfred be mannerly before her.' And then they had gone out and had made Fly free of the Thorn Fortress.

'My dear, that must have been terribly damp and cold at this time of year.'

'I thought of that, mamma, and so we didn't sit down, and made it a guerrilla war; only Fergus couldn't understand the difference between guerrillas and gorillas, and would thump upon himself and roar when they were in ambush.'

'Rather awkward for the ambush!'

'Yes, Wilfred said he was a traitor, and tied him to a tree, and then Fly found him crying, and would have let him out; but she couldn't get the knots undone; and what do you think? She made Wilfred cut the string himself with his own knife! I never knew such a girl for making every one do as she pleases. Then, when it got dark, we came in, and had a sort of a kind of a rehearsal, only that nobody knew any of the parts, or what each was to be.'

'A sort of a kind, indeed, it must have been!'

'But we think the play will be lovely! You can't think how nice Fly was. You know we settled for her to be Annette, the dear, funny, naughty girl, but as soon as she saw that Val wanted the part, she said she didn't care, and gave it up directly, and I don't think we ought to let her, and Hal thinks so too; and all the boys are very angry, and say Val will make a horrid mess of it. Then Mysie wanted to give up the good girl to Fly, and only be one of the chorus, but Fly says she had rather be one of the chorus ones herself than that. So we settled that you should fix the parts, and we would abide by your choice.'

'I hope there was no quarrelling.'

'N—no; only a little falling upon Val by the boys, and Fly put a stop to that. Oh, mamma, if it were only possible to turn Dolly into Fly! I can't help saying it, we seemed to get on so much better just because we hadn't poor Dolly to make a deadweight, and tempt the boys to be tiresome: while Fly made everything go off well. I can't describe it, she didn't in the least mean to keep order or interfere, but somehow squabbles seem to die away before her, and nobody wants to be troublesome.'

'Dear little thing! It is a very sweet disposition. But, Gill, I do believe that we shall see poor Dolly take a turn now!'

'Well! having quarrelled with that Constance is in her favour!'

'Try and think kindly of her trouble. Gill, and then it will be easier to be kind to her.'

Gillian sighed. Falsehood and determined opposition to her mother were the greatest possible crimes in her eyes; and at her age it was not easy to separate the sin from the sinner.

New Year's night was always held to be one of especial merriment, but Lady Merrifield was so much tired out by her expedition that she hardly felt equal to presiding over any sports, and proposed that instead the young folk should dance. Gillian and Hal took turns to play for them, and Uncle Reginald and Fly were in equal request as partners. It was Mysie who came to draw Dolores out of her corner, and begged her to be her partner—'If you wouldn't very much rather not,' she said, in a pleading, wistful, voice.

Dolores would 'very much rather not;' but she saw that Mysie would be left out altogether if she did not consent, as Hal was playing and Uncle Regie was dancing with Primrose. She thought of resolutions to turn over a new leaf, and not to refuse everything so she said, 'Yes, this once,' and it was wonderful how much freshened she felt by the gay motion, and perhaps by Mysie's merry, good-natured eyes and caressing hand. After that she had another turn with Gillian and one with Hal, and even one with Fergus because, as he politely informed her, no one else would have him for a quadrille. But, just as this was in progress, and she could not help laughing at his ridiculous mistakes and contempt of rules she met Uncle Reginald's eye fixed on her in wonder 'He thinks I don't care,' thought she to herself. All her pleasure was gone, and she moved so dejectedly that her aunt, watching from the sofa, called her and told her she was over-tired, and sent her to bed.

Dolores was tired, but not in the way which made it harder instead of easier to sleep, or, rather, she slept just enough to relax her full consciousness and hold over herself, and bring on her a misery of terror and loneliness, and feeling of being forsaken by the whole world. And when she woke fully enough to understand the reality, it was no better; she felt, then, the position she had put herself into, and almost saw in the dark, Flinders's malicious vindictive glance Constance's anger, Uncle Regie's cold, severe look and, worse than all, her father reading her letter'

She fell again into an agony of sobbing, not without a little hope that Aunt Lily would be again brought to her side. At last the door was softly pushed open in the dark, but it was not Aunt Lily, it was Mysie's little bare feet that patted up to the bed, her arms that embraced, her cheek that was squeezed against the tearful one—'Oh, Dolly, Dolly! please don't cry so sadly!'

'Oh! it is so dreadful, Mysie!'

'Are you ill—like the other night?'

'No—but—Mysie—I can't bear it!'

'I don't want to call mamma,' said Mysie, thoughtfully, 'for she is so much tired, and Uncle Regie and Gill said she would be quite knocked up, and got her to come up to bed when we went. Dolly, would it be better if I got into your bed and cuddled you up?'

'Oh yes! oh yes! please do, there's a dear good Mysie.'

There was not much room, but that mattered the less, and the hugging of the warm arms seemed to heal the terrible sense of being unloved and forsaken, the presence to drive away the visions of angry faces that had haunted her; but there was the longing for fellow-feeling on her, and she said, 'That's nice! Oh, Mysie! you can't think what it is like! Uncle Regie said I didn't care, and he could never forgive deliberate deceit—and I was so fond of Uncle Regie!'

'Oh! but he will, if you never tell a story again,' said Mysie—and, as she felt a gesture implying despair—'Yes, they do; I told a story once.'

'You, Mysie! I thought you never did?'

'Yes, once, when we were crossing to Ireland and nurse wouldn't let Wilfred tie our handkerchiefs together and fish over the side, and he was very angry, and threw her parasol into the sea when she wasn't looking; and I knew she would be so cross, that when she asked me if I knew what was become of it, I said 'No,' and thought I didn't, really. But then it came over me, again and again, that I had told a story, and, oh! I was so miserable whenever I thought of it—at church, and saying my prayers, you know; and mamma was poorly, and couldn't come to us at night for ever so long, but at last I could bear it no longer, I heard her say, 'Mysie is always truthful,' and then I did get it out, and told her. And, oh! she and papa were so kind, and they did quite and entirely forgive me!'

'Yes, you told of your own accord; and they were your own—not Uncle Regie. Ah! Mysie, everybody hates me. I saw them all looking at me.'

'No, no! Don't say such things. Dolly. None of us do anything so shocking.'

'Yes, Jasper does, and Wilfred and Val!'

'No! no! no! they don't hate; only they are tiresome sometimes; but if you wouldn't be cross they would be nice directly—at least Japs and Val. And 'tisn't hating with Willie, only he thinks teasing is fun.'

'And you and Gillian. You can only just bear me.

'No! no! no!' with a great hug, 'that's not true.'

'You like Fly ever so much better!'

'She is so dear, and so funny,' said Mysie, the truthful, 'but somehow, Dolly dear, do you know, I think if you and I got to love one another like real friends, it would be nicer still than even Fly—because you are here like one of us, you know; and besides, it would be more, because you are harder to get at. Will you be my own friend. Dolly?'

'Oh, Mysie, I must!' and there was a fresh kissing and hugging.

'And there's mamma,' added Mysie.

'Yes, I know Aunt Lily does now; but, oh! if you had seen Uncle Alfred's face, and heard Uncle Regie,' and Dolly began to sob again as they returned on her. 'I see them whenever I shut my eyes!'

'Darling,' whispered Mysie, 'when I feel bad at night, I always kneel up in bed and say my prayers again!'

'Do you ever feel bad?'

'Oh yes, when I'm frightened, or if I've been naughty, and haven't told mamma. Shall we do it, Dolly?'

'I don't know what that has to do with it, but we'll try.'

'Mamma told me something to say out of.'

The two little girls rose up, with clasped hands in their bed, and Mysie whispered very low, but so that her companion heard, and said with her a few childish words of confession, pleading and entreating for strength, and then the Lord's Prayer, and the sweet old verse:—

'I lay my body down to sleep, I give my soul to Christ to keep, Wake I at morn, as wake I never, I give my soul to Christ for ever.'

'Ah! but I am afraid of that. I don't like it,' said Dolores, as they lay down again.

'It won't make one never wake,' returned Mysie; 'and I do like to give my soul to Christ. It seems so to rest one, and make one not afraid.'

'I don't know,' said Dolores; 'and why did you say the Lord's Prayer? That hasn't anything to do with it!'

'Oh, Dolly, when He is our Father near, though our own dear fathers are far away, and there's deliver us from evil—all that hurts us, you know-and forgive us. It's all there.'

'I never thought that,' said Dolores. 'I think you have some different prayers from mine. Old nurse taught me long ago. I wish you would always say yours with me. You make them nicer.'

Mysie answered with a hug, and a murmured 'If I can,' and offered to say the 121st Psalm, her other step to comfort, and, as she said it, she resolved in her mind whether she could grant Dolores's request; for she was not sure whether she should be allowed to leave her room before saying her own, and she I knew enough of Dolores by this time to be aware that to say she would ask mamma's leave would put an end to all. 'I know,' was her final decision; 'I'll say my own first, and then come to Dolly's room.'

But by that time Dolores was asleep, even if Mysie had not been too sleepy to speak.

She meant to have rushed to the room she shared with Valetta before it was time to get up, but Lots found the black head and the brown together on Dolores's pillow, wrapped in slumber; and though Mysie flew home as soon as she was well awake, Mrs. Halfpenny descended on her while she was yet in her bath, and inflicted a sharp scolding for the malpractice of getting into her cousin's bed.

'But Dolly was so miserable, nurse, and mamma was too tired to call.'

'Then you should have called me, Miss Mysie, and I'd have sorted her well! You kenned well 'tis a thing not to be done and at your age; ye should have minded your duties better.'