Mr. Laurence Fairfax insisted that his niece should live at Abbotsmead, and continue in possession of the white suite until she was of age. He was her guardian, and would take no denial.

"It wants but three months to that date," she told him.

"Your home is here until you marry, Elizabeth," he rejoined in a tone that forbade contradiction. "You shall visit Lady Latimer, but subject to permission. Remember you are a Fairfax. Though you may go back to the Forest, it is a delusion to imagine that you can live comfortably in the crowded household where you were happy as a child. You have been six years absent; three of them you have spent in the luxurious ease of Abbotsmead. You have acquired the tastes and habits of your own class—a very different class. You must look to me now: your pittance is not enough for the common necessaries of life."

"Not so very different a class, Uncle Laurence, and fortunately I am not in bondage to luxurious ease," Bessie said. "But I will not be perverse. Changes come without seeking, and I am of an adaptable disposition. The other day I was supposed to be a great heiress—to-day I have no more than a bare competence."

"Not even that, but if you marry suitably you may be sure that I shall make you a suitable settlement," rejoined her kinsman. Bessie speculated in silence and many times again what her uncle Laurence might mean by "suitably," but they had no explanation, and the occasion passed.

Bessie's little fortune was vested in the hands of trustees, and settled absolutely to her own use. She could not anticipate her income nor make away with it, which Mr. Carnegie said was a very good thing. Beyond that remark, and a generous reminder that her old nest under the thatch was ready for her whenever she liked to return and take possession, nothing was said in the letters from Beechhurst about her grandfather's will or her new vicissitude. She had some difficulty in writing to announce her latest change to Harry Musgrave, but he wrote back promptly and decisively to set her heart at rest, telling her that to his notions her fortune was a very pretty fortune, and avowing a prejudice against being maintained by his wife: he would greatly prefer that she should be dependent upon him. Bessie, who was a loving woman far more than a proud or ambitious one, was pleased by his assurance, and in answering him again she confessed that would have been her choice too. Nevertheless, she became rather impatient to see him and talk the matter over—the more so because Harry manifested little curiosity to learn anything of her family affairs unless they immediately affected herself. He told her that he should be able to go down to Brook at the end of August, and he begged her to meet him there. This she promised, and it was understood between them that if she was not invited to Fairfield she would go to the doctor's house, even though the boys might be at home for their holidays.

Bessie was long enough at Abbotsmead after her grandfather's death to realize how that event affected her own position there. The old servants had been provided for by their old master, and they left—Jonquil, Macky, Mrs. Betts, and others their contemporaries. Bessie missed their friendly faces, and dispensed with the services of a maid. Then Mrs. Fairfax objected to Joss in the house, lest he should bite the children, and Janey and Ranby were not entirely at her beck and call as formerly. The incompetent Sally, who sang a sweet cradle-song, became quite a personage and sovereign in the nursery, and was jealous of Miss Fairfax's intrusion into her domain. It was inevitable and natural, but Bessie appreciated better now the forethought of her grandfather in wishing to provide her with a roof of her own. Abbotsmead under its new squire, all his learning and philosophy notwithstanding, promised to become quite a house of the world again, for his beautiful young wife was proving of a most popular character, and attracted friends about her with no effort. Instead of old Lady Angleby, the Hartwell people and the Chivertons, came the Tindals, Edens, Raymonds, Lefevres, and Wynards; and Miss Fairfax felt herself an object of curiosity amongst them as the young lady who had been all but disinherited for her obstinate refusal to marry the man of her grandfather's choice. She was generally liked, but she was not just then in the humor to cultivate anybody's intimacy. Mrs. Stokes was still her chief resource when she was solitary.

She had a private grief and anxiety of her own, of which she could speak to none. One day her expected letter from Harry Musgrave did not come; it was the first time he had failed her since their compact was made. She wrote herself as usual, and asked why she was neglected. In reply she received a letter, not from Harry himself, but from his friend Christie, who was nursing him through an attack of inflammation occasioned by a chill from remaining in his wet clothes after an upset on the river. She gathered from it that Harry had been ill and suffering for nearly a fortnight, but that he was better, though very weak, and that if Christie had been permitted to do as he wished, Mrs. Musgrave would have been sent for, but her son was imperative against it. He did not think it was necessary to put her to that distress and inconvenience, and as he was now in a fair way of recovery it was his particular desire that she should not be alarmed and made nervous by any information of what he had passed through. But he would not keep it from his dear Bessie, who had greater firmness, and who might rest assured he was well cared for, as Christie had brought him to his own house, and his old woman was a capital cook—a very material comfort for a convalescent.

With a recollection of the warnings of a year and a half ago, Bessie could not but ponder this news of Harry's illness with grave distress. She wrote to Mr. Carnegie, and enclosed the letter for his opinion. Mr. Carnegie respected her confidence, and told her that from the name of the physician mentioned by Christie as in attendance on his patient he was in the best possible hands. She confessed to Harry what she had done, and he found no fault with her, but his next letter was in a vein of melancholy humor from beginning to end. He was going back, he said, to his dismal chambers, his law-books and his scribbling, and she was to send him a very bright letter indeed to cheer him in his solitude. How Bessie wished she could have flown herself to cheer him! And now, too, she half regretted her poverty under her grandfather's will, that deferred all hope of his rescue from London smoke and toil till he had made the means of rescue for himself. But she gave him the pleasure of knowing what she would do if she could.

Thus the summer months lapsed away. There was no hiatus in their correspondence again, but Harry told her that he had a constant fever on him and was longing for home and rest. Once he wrote from Richmond, whither he had gone with Christie, "The best fellow in the universe—love him, dear Bessie, for my sake"—and once he spoke of going to Italy for the winter, and of newspaper letters that were to pay the shot. He was sad, humorous, tender by turns, but Bessie missed something. There were allusions to the vanity of man's life and joy, now and then there was a word of philosophy for future consolation, but of present hope there was nothing. Her eyes used to grow dim over these letters: she understood that Harry was giving in, that he found his life too hard for him, and that he was trying to prepare her and himself for this great disappointment.

When Parliament rose Mr. Cecil Burleigh came down to Norminster and paid a visit to Abbotsmead. He was the bearer of an invitation to Brentwood and his sister's wedding, but Miss Fairfax was not able to accept it. She had just accepted an invitation to Fairfield.



CHAPTER XLVI.

TENDER AND TRUE.

Lady Latimer was in possession of all the facts and circumstances of her guest's position when she arrived at Fairfield. Her grandfather's will was notorious, and my lady did not entirely disapprove of it, as Bessie's humbler friends did, for she still cherished expectations in Mr. Cecil Burleigh's interest, and was not aware how far he was now from entertaining any on his own account. Though she had convinced herself that there was an unavowed engagement between Mr. Harry Musgrave and Miss Fairfax, she was resolved to treat it and speak of it as a very slight thing indeed, and one that must be set aside without weak tenderness. Having such clear and decided views on the affair, she was not afraid to state them even to Bessie herself.

Harry Musgrave had not yet arrived at Brook, but after a day devoted to her mother Bessie's next opportunity for a visit was devoted to Harry's mother. She mentioned to Lady Latimer where she was going, and though my lady looked stern she did not object. On Bessie's return, however, she found something to say, and cast off all reserves: "Mr. Harry Musgrave has not come, but he is coming. Had I known beforehand, I should have preferred to have you here in his absence. Elizabeth, I shall consider that young man very deficient in honorable feeling if he attempt to interfere between you and your true interest."

"That I am sure he never will," said Bessie with animation.

"He is not over-modest. If you are advised by me you will be distant with him—you will give him no advantage by which he may imagine himself encouraged. Any foolish promise that you exchanged when you were last here must be forgotten."

Bessie replied with much quiet dignity: "You know, Lady Latimer, that I was not brought up to think rank and riches essential, and the experience I have had of them has not been so enticing that I should care to sacrifice for their sake a true and tried affection. Harry Musgrave and I are dear friends, and, since you speak to me so frankly, I will tell you that we propose to be friends for life."

Lady Latimer grew very red, very angry: "Do you tell me that you will marry that young man—without birth, without means, without a profession even? What has he, or is he, that should tempt you to throw away the fine position that awaits your acceptance?"

"He has a real kindness for me, a real unselfish love, and I would rather be enriched with that than be ever so exalted. It is an old promise. I always did love Harry Musgrave, and never anybody else."

Lady Latimer fumed, walked about and sat down again: "How are you to live?"

"I don't know," said Bessie cheerfully. "Like other young people—partly on our prospects. But we do not talk of marrying yet."

"It is a relief to hear that you do not talk of marrying yet, though how you can dream of marrying young Mr. Musgrave at all, when you have Mr. Cecil Burleigh at your feet, is to me a strange, incomprehensible infatuation."

"Mr. Cecil Burleigh is not at my feet any longer. He has got up and gone back to Miss Julia Gardiner's feet, which he ought never to have left. Grandpapa's will has the effect of making two charming people happy, and I am glad of it."

"Is it possible?" said Lady Latimer in a low, chagrined voice. "Then you have lost him. I presume that you felt the strain of such high companionship too severe for you? Early habits cling very close."

"He had no fascination for me; it was an effort sometimes."

"You must have been carrying on a correspondence with Mr. Harry Musgrave all this while."

"We have corresponded during the last year," said Bessie calmly.

"I blame myself that I ever gave the opportunity for a renewal of your old friendliness. That is the secret of your wilfulness."

"I loved Harry best—that is the secret of it," said Bessie; and she turned away to close the discussion.

It was a profound mortification to Lady Latimer to hear within the week from various quarters that Mr. Cecil Burleigh was at Ryde, and to all appearance on the happiest terms with Miss Julia Gardiner. And in fact they were quietly married one morning by special license, and the next news of them was that they were travelling in the Tyrol.

It was about a week after this, when Bessie was spending a few hours with her mother, that she heard of Harry Musgrave's arrival at Brook. It was the doctor who brought the intelligence. He came into the little drawing-room where his wife and Bessie were sitting, and said, "I called at Brook in passing and saw poor Harry."

"Well, Thomas, and how is he?" inquired Mrs. Carnegie in the anxious tone a kind voice takes when asking after the health of a friend who may be in a critical way. Bessie dropped her work and looked from one to the other.

The doctor did not answer directly, but, addressing Bessie, he said, "You must not be shocked, my dear, when you see Harry Musgrave."

"What is the matter? I have heard nothing: is he ill again?" cried Bessie.

"He must never go back to London," said Mr. Carnegie with a great sigh.

"Is it so bad as that? Poor Harry!" said his wife in a sad, suppressed tone. Bessie said nothing: her throat ached, her eyes burnt, but she was too stunned and bewildered to inquire further, and yet she thought she had been prepared for something like this.

"He asked after you, Bessie, and when you would go to see him," the doctor went on.

"I will go now. It is not too late? he is not too tired? will he be glad?" Bessie said, all in a breath.

"Yes, he wants to talk to you; but you will have to walk all the way, dear, and alone, for I have to go the other road."

"Oh, the walk will not hurt me. And when I have seen him I will go back to Fairfield. But tell me what ails him: has he been over-working, or is it the results of his illness?" Bessie was very earnest to know all there was to be known.

"Work is not to blame: the lad was always more or less delicate, though his frame was so powerful," Mr. Carnegie said with gravity. "He is out of spirits, and he has had a warning to beware of the family complaint. That is not to say it has marked him yet—he may live for years, with care and prudence live to a good old age—but there is no public career before him; and it is a terrible prospect, this giving up and coming down, to a young fellow of his temper. His mother sits and looks at him, beats on her knee, deplores the money spent on his college education, and frets; you must try your hand at some other sort of consolation, Bessie, for that will never do. Now, if you are going, my dear, you had better start."

Mrs. Carnegie wished she could have offered herself as Bessie's companion, but she would have been an impediment rather than a help, and Bessie set out alone. She had gone that way to Brook many and many a time, but never quite alone before. It seemed, at first, strange to her to be walking across the open heath by herself, and yet she felt, somehow, as if it had all happened before—perhaps in a dream. It was a warm afternoon towards six o'clock, and the August glow of the heather in blossom spread everywhere like a purple sea. At the gate of the Forest Farm the cows were gathered, with meek patience expecting their call to the milking-shed; but after she passed under the shade of the trees beyond Great-Ash Ford she met not a creature until she came in sight of the wicket opening into the wood from the manor-garden. And there was Harry Musgrave himself.

Approaching over the turf with her light swift foot, Bessie drew quite near to him unheard, and saw him before he saw her. He had seated himself on a fallen tree, and leant his head on his hand in an easy attitude; his countenance was abstracted rather than sad, and his eyes, fixed on the violet and amber of the sky in the west, were full of tranquil watching. Bessie's voice as she cried out his name was tremulous with joy, and her face as he turned and saw her was beautiful with the flush of young love's delight.

"I was waiting for you. I knew you would come, my dear, my dear!" was his greeting. They went into the garden hand in hand, silent: they looked at each other with assured happiness. Harry said, "You are all in black, Bessie."

"Yes, for poor grandpapa: don't you remember? I will put it off to-morrow if you dislike it."

"Put it off; I do dislike it: you have worn it long enough." They directed their steps to their favorite seat under the beeches, but Mrs. Musgrave, restless since her son's arrival, and ever on the watch, came down to them with a plea that they would avoid the damp ground and falling dew. The ground was dry as dust, and the sun would not set yet for a good hour.

"There is the sitting-room if you want to be by yourselves," she said plaintively. "Perhaps you'll be able to persuade Harry to show some sense, Bessie Fairfax, and feeling for his health: he won't listen to his mother."

She followed them into the spacious old room, and would have shut the lattices because the curtains were gently flapping in the evening breeze, but Harry protested: "Mother dear, let us have air—it is life and pleasure to me. After the sultry languor of town this is delicious."

"There you go, Harry, perverse as ever! He never could be made to mind a draught, Bessie; and though he has just been told that consumption is in the family, and carried off his uncle Walter—every bit as fine a young man as himself—he pays no heed. He might as well have stopped on the farm from the beginning, if this was to be the end. I am more mortified than tongue can tell."

Harry stood gazing at her with a pitiful patience, and said kindly, "You fear too much, mother. I shall live to give you more trouble yet."

"Even trouble's precious if that's all my son is likely to give me. I would rather have trouble than nothing." She went out, closing the door softly as if she were leaving a sick room. Bessie felt very sorry for her, and when she looked at Harry again, and saw the expression of helpless, painful regret in his face, she could have wept for them both.

"Poor mother! she is bitterly disappointed in me, Bessie," he said, dropping into one of the huge old elbow-chairs.

"Oh, Harry, it is all her love! She will get over this, and you will repay her hurt pride another day," cried Bessie, eager to comfort him.

"Shall I, Bessie? But how? but when? We must take counsel together. They have been telling me it is selfish and a sacrifice and unmanly to bind Bessie to me now, but I see no sign that Bessie wants her freedom," he said, looking at her with laughing, wistful eyes—always with that sense of masculine triumph which Bessie's humility had encouraged.

"Oh, Harry, I want no freedom but the freedom to love and serve you!" cried she with a rush of tears and a hand held out to him. And then with an irresistible, passionate sorrow she fell on her knees beside him and hid her face on his shoulder. He put his arm round her and held her fast for several minutes, himself too moved to speak. He guessed what this sudden outburst of feeling meant: it meant that Bessie saw him so altered, saw through his quiet humor into the deep anxiety of his heart.

"I'll conceal nothing from you, Bessie: I don't think I have felt the worst of my defeat yet," were his words when he spoke at last. She listened, still on her knees: "It is a common thing to say that suspense is worse to bear than certainty, but the certainty that destroys hope and makes the future a blank is very like a millstone hanged round a man's neck to sink him in a slough of despondency. I never really believed it until Dr. Courteney told me that if I wish to save my life it must be at the cost of my ambition; that I can never be an advocate, a teacher, a preacher; that I shall have to go softly all my days, and take care that the winds don't blow on me too roughly; that I must be an exile from English fogs and cold, let me prefer home ever so dearly; that I must read only a little, and write only a little, and avoid all violent emotions, and be in fact the creature I have most despised—a poor valetudinarian, always feeling my own pulse and considering my own feelings."

"You will have to change much more before you will come to that; and I never knew you despise anybody, Harry," Bessie said with gentle deprecation. "You had a tender heart from a boy, and others feel kindly towards you."

"And come what may, my dear little Bessie will keep her faith to me?" said Harry looking down into her sweet eyes.

"Yes, Harry."

After a pause he spoke again: "You have done me good, dear; I shall rest better for having talked to you to-night. It is in the night-time that thought is terrible. For months past, ever since I was ill in the spring, the foreshadow of failure has loomed dark and close upon me like a suffocating weight—what I must do; how I must live without being a tax on my father, if I am to live; what he and my mother would feel; what old friends would say; who could or would help me to some harmless occupation; and whether I should not, for everybody's sake, be better out of the world."

"Oh, Harry, but that was faint-hearted!" said Bessie with a touch of reproach. "You forgot me, then?"

"I have had several strokes of bad luck lately, or perhaps I ought to suspect that not being in good case my work was weak. Manuscript after manuscript has been returned on my hands. Surely this was discouraging. There on the table is a roll of which I had better hopes, and I found it awaiting me here."

"May I take it to Fairfield and read it?" Bessie asked. "It is as big as a book."

"Yes; if it were printed and bound it would be a book. Read it, and let me know how it impresses you."

Bessie looked mightily glad. "If you will let me help you, Harry, you will make me happy," said she. "What is it about?"

"It is a story, for your comfort—a true story. I could not devise a plot, so I fell back on a series of pathetic facts. Life is very sad, Bessie. Why are we so fond of it?"

"We take it in detail, as we take the hours of the day and the days of the year, and it is very endurable. It has seemed to me sometimes that those whom we call fortunate are the least happy, and that the hard lot is often lifted into the sphere of blessedness. Consider Mr. and Mrs. Moxon; they appear to have nothing to be thankful for, and yet in their devotion to one another what perfect peace and consolation!"

"Oh, Bessie, but it is a dreadful fate!" said Harry. "Poor Moxon! who began life with as fine hopes and as solid grounds for them as any man,—there he is vegetating at Littlemire still, his mind chiefly taken up with thinking whether his sick wife will be a little more or a little less suffering to-day than she was yesterday."

"I saw them last week, and could have envied them. She is as near an angel as a woman can be; and he was very contented in the garden, giving lessons to a village boy in whom he has discovered a genius for mathematics. He talked of nothing else."

"Poor boy! poor genius! And are we to grow after the Moxons' pattern, Bessie—meek, patient, heavenly?" said Harry.

"By the time our hair is white, Harry, I have no objection, but there is a long meanwhile," replied Bessie with brave uplooking face. "We have love between us and about us, and that is the first thing. The best pleasures are the cheapest—we burden life with too many needless cares. You may do as much good in an obscure groove of the world as you might do if your name was in all men's mouths. I don't believe that I admire very successful people."

"That is lucky for us both, since I am a poor fellow whose health has given way—who is never likely to have any success at all."

"You don't know, Harry; but this is not the time to remember pride and ambition—it is the time to recover all the health and strength you can; and with them hope and power will return. What do you most enjoy in the absence of work?"

"Fresh air, fine scenery, and the converse of men. To live plainly is no hardship to me; it would be a great hardship to fall on lower associations, which is the common destiny of the poor and decayed scholar. You will save me, Bessie?"

"Indeed I will!" And on this they clasped hands fervently.

"Bessie, can we go to Italy together this winter? I dare not go alone: I must have you to take care of me," pleaded Harry.

"I will take care of you, Harry." Bessie was smiling, tearful, blushing, and Harry said she was a dear, good girl, and he thanked her.

After that there was some exposition of ways and means, and Bessie, growing rosier and rosier, told Harry the story of that famous nest-egg, concerning which she had been put to the blush before. He was very glad to hear of it—very glad indeed, and much relieved, for it would make that easy which he had been dwelling on as most of all desirable, but hampered with difficulties that he could not himself remove. To see him cheer up at this practical point was delightful to Bessie; it was like his generous warm heart, equally open to give and to receive. She felt almost too happy, and blessed the simple forethought of the doctor which would justify them in remitting all care and anxiety to a future at least two years off, and afford Harry leisure and opportunity to regain his health and courage, and look about him for another vocation than that he had chosen originally.

"And you will find it, Harry, and perhaps you will love it better than London and dusty law. I am sure I shall," prophesied Bessie gayly.

Harry laughed at her obstinate prejudice; she pointed out that the result had proved it a shrewd prejudice; and then they fell upon Italy and talked travel-talk with the sanguine anticipations of young people endowed with limitless curiosity and a genuine taste for simple pleasures and each other's society. Harry's classical learning would be everywhere available for the enhancement of these pleasures.

At this stage of their previsions Mrs. Musgrave intervened, and Bessie became conscious that the shades of evening were stealing over the landscape. Mrs. Musgrave had on her bonnet, and was prepared to walk with Bessie on the road to Fairfield until they should meet Mr. Musgrave returning from Hampton, who would accompany her the rest of the way. Harry wished to go in his mother's stead, but she was peremptory in bidding him stay where he was, and Bessie supported her. "No, Harry, not to-night—another time," she said, and he yielded at once.

"I'm sure his mother thanks you," said Mrs. Musgrave as they went out. "He was so jaded this morning when he arrived that the tears came into his eyes at a word, and Mr. Carnegie said that showed how thoroughly done he is."

Tears in Harry's eyes! Bessie thought of him with a most pitiful tenderness. "Oh," she said, "we must all be good to him: he does not look so ill to me as he looks tired. We must keep up his spirits and his hope for himself. I see no cause for despair."

"You are young, Bessie Fairfax, and it is easy for you to hope that everything will turn out for the best, but it is a sore trial for his father and me to have our expectation taken away. If Harry would have been advised when he left college, he would never have gone to London. But it is no use talking of that now. I wish we could see what he is to do for a living; he will fret his heart out doing nothing at Brook."

"Oh, Mrs. Musgrave, with a quire of paper and one of your gray goosequills Harry will be preserved from the mischief of doing nothing. You must let me come over and cheer him sometimes."

"If things had turned out different with my poor son, all might have been different. You have a good, affectionate disposition, Bessie, and there is nobody Harry prizes as he prizes you; but a young man whose health is indifferent and who has no prospects—what is that for a young lady?" Mrs. Musgrave began to cry.

"Don't cry, dear Mrs. Musgrave; if you cry, that will hurt Harry worse than anything," said Bessie energetically. "He feels his disappointment more for his father and you than for himself. His health is not so bad but that it will mend; and as for his prospects, it is not wise to impress upon him that the cloud he is under now may never disperse. 'A cheerful heart doeth good like a medicine.' Have a cheerful heart again. It will come with trying."

They had not yet met Mr. Musgrave, though they were nearly a mile on the road, but Bessie would not permit the poor mother to walk any farther with her. They parted with a kiss. "And God for ever bless you, Bessie Fairfax, if you have it in your heart to be to Harry what nobody else can be," said his mother, laying her tremulous hands on the girl's shoulders. Bessie kissed her again and went on her way rejoicing. This was one of the happiest hours her life had ever known. She was not tempted to dwell wantonly on the dark side of events present, and there were so many brighter possibilities in the future that she could entirely act out the divine precept to let the morrow take thought for the things of itself.

When Bessie Fairfax reached Fairfield, Roberts informed her in a depressed manner that her ladyship was waiting dinner. Bessie started at this view of her impolite absence, and hastened to the drawing-room to apologize. But Lady Latimer coldly waived her explanations, and Bessie felt very self-reproachful until an idea occurred to her what she would do. After a brief retreat and rapid toilet she reappeared with Harry's manuscript in her hand, and with simple craft displaying the roll, she said, "This is for us to read—a true story. It is not in print yet, but Mr. Harry Musgrave writes a plain hand. We are to give him our opinion of it. I believe that, after all, he will be a poor author—one of my heroes, Lady Latimer."

"One of your heroes, Elizabeth? There is nothing very heroic in Mr. Logger," rejoined my lady softening, and holding out her hand for the manuscript. "Is the young man very ill?"

"No, no—not so ill that we need fear his dying inglorious without giving the world something to remember him by, but discouraged by the dicta of friends and physicians, who consign him to idleness and obscurity for a year or two."

"Which idleness and obscurity I presume it is your wish to alleviate?" said Lady Latimer with half-contemptuous resignation. "Come to dinner now: we will read your hero's story afterward."

Lady Latimer's personal interests were so few that it was a necessity for her generous soul to adopt the interests of other people. She kept Bessie reading until eleven o'clock, when she was dismissed to bed and ordered to leave the manuscript below, lest she should sit up and read it when she ought to be asleep. But what Bessie might not do my lady was quite at liberty to do herself, and she made an end of the tale before she retired. And not only that. She wrote to Mr. Logger to recommend a publisher, and to ask how proper payment could be assured to a young and unknown author. She described the story to the veteran critic as a sad, pretty story of true love (which people go on believing in), sensibly written, without serious flaws of taste or grammar, and really worth reading if one had nothing else to do. In the morning she informed Bessie of what she had done. Bessie was not quite sure that Harry would feel gratified at being placed under the protection of her ladyship and Mr. Logger; but as she could not well revoke the letter that was written, she said nothing against it, and Lady Latimer was busy and happy for a week in the expectation that she was doing something for "the unfortunate young man." But at the week's end Mr. Logger dashed her confidence with the answer that he had not been able to meet with any publisher willing to pay money down for a sad, pretty story of true love by an unknown author: sad, pretty stories of true love were a drug in the literary market. She was grievously disappointed. Bessie was the same, and as she had confessed a hope to Harry, she had to carry to him the tidings of failure. If he was sorry, it was for her regret, but they soon began to talk of other things. They had agreed that if good luck came they would be glad, and if bad luck they would pass it lightly over.



CHAPTER XLVII.

GOODNESS PREVAILS.

Desirous as Lady Latimer was to do Mr. Harry Musgrave a service, her good-will towards him ended there. She perversely affected to believe that Miss Fairfax's avowed promise to him constituted no engagement, and on this plea put impediments in the way of her visits to Brook, lest a handle should be given to gossip. Bessie herself was not concerned to hinder gossip. With the exception of Lady Latimer, all her old friends in the Forest were ready to give her their blessing. The Wileys were more and more astonished that she should be so short-sighted, but Mr. Phipps shook her by both hands and expressed his cordial approbation, and Miss Buff advised her to have her own way, and let those who were vexed please themselves again.

Bessie suffered hours of argument from my lady, who, when she found she could prevail nothing, took refuge in a sort of scornful, compassionate silence. These silences were, however, of brief duration. She appealed to Mr. Carnegie, who gave her for answer that Bessie was old enough to know her own mind, and if that leant towards Mr. Harry Musgrave, so much the better for him; if she were a weak, impulsive girl, he would advise delay and probation, but she was of full age and had a good sensible head of her own; she knew Mr. Harry Musgrave's circumstances, tastes, prejudices, and habits—what she would gain in marrying him, and what she would resign. What more was there to say? Mr. Laurence Fairfax had neither the power nor the will to interpose authoritatively; he made inquiries into Mr. Harry Musgrave's university career, and talked of him to Mr. Cecil Burleigh, who replied with magnanimity that but for the break-down of his health he was undoubtedly one of those young men from whose early achievement and mental force the highest successes might have been expected in after-life. Thereupon Mr. Laurence Fairfax and his gentle wife pitied him, and could not condemn Elizabeth.

Mrs. Carnegie considered that Bessie manifested signal prudence, forethought, and trust in God when she proposed that her nest-egg, which was now near a thousand pounds, should supply the means of living in Italy for a couple of years, without reference to what might come after. But when Elizabeth wrote to her uncle Laurence to announce what manner of life she was preparing to enter upon, and what provision was made for it, though he admired her courage he wrote back that it should not be so severely tested. It was his intention to give her the portion that would have been her father's—not so much as the old squire had destined for her had she married as he wished (that, she knew, had gone another way), but a competence sufficient to live on, whether at home or abroad. He told her that one-half of her fortune ought to be settled on Mr. Harry Musgrave, to revert to her if he died first, and he concluded by offering himself as one of her trustees.

This generous letter made Bessie very glad, and having shown it to Lady Latimer at breakfast, she went off with it to Brook directly after. She found Harry in the sitting-room, turning out the contents of his old desk. In his hand at the moment of her entrance was the white rose that he had taken from her at Bayeux; it kept its fragrance still. She gave him her uncle's letter to read, and when he had read it he said, "If I did not love you so much, Bessie, this would be a burden painful to bear."

"Then don't let us speak of it—let me bear it. I am pleased that my uncle Laurence should be so good to us. When you meet I know you will be friends. He is in elysium when he can get a good scholar to talk to, and he will want you to send him all sorts of archaeological intelligence from Rome."

"I have a piece of news too—hopeful news from Christie," said Harry, producing one of the artist's rapid scratches. "It is to tell me that he is on the committee of a new illustrated magazine of art which is to start at Christmas, and that he is sure I can help them with the letter-press department while we are in Italy."

"Of course you can. And they will require a story: that sweet story of yours has some picture bits that would be exquisite if they fell into the hands of a sympathetic artist. Let us send it to Christie, Harry dear."

"Very well: nothing venture, nothing have. The manuscript is with you. Take Christie's letter for his address; you will see that he wants an answer without loss of time. He is going to be married very shortly, and will be out of town till November."

"I will despatch the story by to-day's post, and a few lines of what I think of it: independent criticism is useful sometimes."

Harry looked at her, laughing and saying with a humorous deprecation, "Bessie's independent criticism!"

Bessie blushed and laughed too, but steadfastly affirmed, "Indeed, Harry, if I did not think it the prettiest story I ever read I would not tell you so. Lady Latimer said it was pretty, and you cannot accuse her of loving you too much."

"No. And that brings me to another matter. I wish you would come away from Fairfield: come here, Bessie. In this rambling old house there is room enough and to spare, and you shall have all the liberty you please. I don't see you as often or for as long as I want, and the order of things is quite reversed: I would much rather set out to walk to you than wait and watch for your appearance."

"Had I not better go home? My little old nest under the thatch is empty, and the boys are away."

"Come here first for a week; we have never stayed in one house together since we were children. I want to see my dear little Bessie every hour of the day. At Fairfield you are caged. When her ladyship puts on her grand manner and towers she is very daunting to a poor lover."

"She has not seen you since you left London, Harry. I should like you to meet; then I think she might forgive us," said Bessie, with a wistful regret. Sometimes she was highly indignant with my lady, but in the depths of her heart there was always a fund of affection, admiration, and respect for the idol of her childish days.

The morning but one after this Bessie's anxious desire that my lady and her dear Harry should meet was unexpectedly gratified. It was about halfway towards noon when she was considering whether or no she could with peace and propriety bring forward her wish to go again to Brook, when Lady Latimer hurried down from her sanctum, which overlooked the drive, saying, "Elizabeth, here is young Mr. Musgrave on horseback; run and bid him come in and rest. He is giving some message to Roberts and going away."

"Oh, please ask him yourself," said Bessie, but at the same moment she hastened out to the door.

It was a sultry, oppressive morning, and Harry looked languid and ill—more ill than Bessie had ever seen him look. She felt inexpressibly shocked and pained, and he smiled as if to relieve her, while he held out a letter that he had been on the point of entrusting to Roberts: "From that excellent fellow, Christie. Your independent criticism has opened his eyes to the beauties of my story, and he declares that he shall claim the landscape bits himself."

Lady Latimer advanced with a pale, grave face, and invited the young man to dismount. There was something of entreaty in her voice: "The morning-room is the coolest, Elizabeth—take Mr. Musgrave there. I shall be occupied until luncheon, but I hope you will be able to persuade him to stay."

Bessie's lips repeated, "Stay," and Harry not unthankfully entered the house. He dropt into a great easy-chair and put up one hand to cover his eyes, and so continued for several minutes. Lady Latimer stood an instant looking at him with a pitiful, scared gaze, and then, avoiding Bessie's face, she turned and left the lovers together. Bessie laid her hand on Harry's shoulder and spoke kindly to him: he was tired, the atmosphere was very close and took away his strength. After a while he recovered himself and said something about Christie's friendliness, and perhaps if he illustrated the story they should see reminiscences of the manor-garden and of Great-Ash Ford, and other favorite spots in the Forest. They did not talk much or eagerly at all, but Christie's commendation of the sad pretty story of true love was a distinct pleasure to them both, and especially to Harry. His mother had begged him to stop at home and let the letter be sent over to Fairfield, but he wanted the gratification of telling Bessie his news himself; and the ride in the hot, airless weather had been too fatiguing. Bessie took up a piece of work and sat by the window, silent, soothing. He turned his chair to face her, and from his position he had a distant view of the sea—a dark blue line on the horizon. He had been fond of the sea and of boats from his first school-days at Hampton, and as he contemplated its great remote calm a longing to be out upon it took possession of him, which he immediately confessed to Bessie. Bessie did not think he need long in vain for that—it was easy of accomplishment. He said yes—Ryde was not far, and a Ryde wherry was a capital craft for sailing.

Just as he was speaking Lady Latimer came back bringing some delicious fruit for Harry's refreshment. "What is that you are saying about Ryde?" she inquired quickly. "I am going to Ryde for a week or two, and as I shall take Elizabeth with me, you can come to us there, Mr. Musgrave, and enjoy the salt breezes. It is very relaxing in the Forest at this season."

Bessie by a glance supplicated Harry to be gracious, and in obedience to her mute entreaty he thanked her ladyship and said it would give him the truest pleasure. My lady had never thought of going to Ryde until that moment, but since she had seen Harry Musgrave and had been struck by the tragedy of his countenance, and all that was meant by his having to fall out of the race of life so early, she was impelled by an irresistible goodness of nature to be kind and generous to him. Robust people, healthy, wealthy, and wise, she could let alone, but poverty, sickness, or any manner of trouble appealed straight to her noble heart, and brought out all her spirit of Christian fellowship. She was prompt and thorough in doing a good action, and when she met the young people at luncheon her arrangements for going to the island were all made, and she announced that the next day, in the cool of the evening, they would drive to Hampton and cross by the last boat to Ryde. This sudden and complete revolution in her behavior was not owing to any change in principle, but to sheer pitifulness of temper. She had not realized before what an immense disaster and overthrow young Musgrave was suffering, but at the sight of his pathetic visage and weakened frame, and of Elizabeth's exquisite tenderness, she knew that such great love must be given to him for consolation and a shield against despair. It was quite within the scope of her imagination to depict the temptations of a powerful and aspiring mind reduced to bondage and inaction by the development of inherited disease: to herself it would have been of all fates the most terrible, and thus she fancied it for him. But in Harry Musgrave's nature there was no bitterness or fierce revolt, no angry sarcasm against an unjust world or stinging remorse for fault of his own. Defeat was his destiny, and he bowed to it as the old Greek heroes bowed to the decree of the gods, and laughed sometimes at the impotence of misfortune to fetter the free flight of his thoughts. And Elizabeth was his angel of peace.



CHAPTER XLVIII.

CERTAIN OPINIONS.

The house that Lady Latimer always occupied on her visits to Ryde was away from the town and the pier, amongst the green fields going out towards Binstead. It had a shaded garden down to the sea, and a landing-place of its own when the tide was in. A balcony, looking north, made the narrow drawing-room spacious, and my lady and her despatch-box were established in a cool room below, adjoining the dining-parlor. She did not like the pier or the strand, with their shoals of company in the season, and took her drives out on the white roads to Wootton and Newport, Osborne and Cowes, commonly accompanied by some poor friend to whom a drive was an unfrequent pleasure. She never trusted herself to a small boat, and as for the wherry that bore Harry Musgrave and Elizabeth every morning flying before the wind for three delicious hours, she appreciated its boasted safety so slightly that she was always relieved to see them safe back again, whether they landed at the foot of the garden or came through the town. It was beautiful weather, with fine fresh breezes all the week, and Harry looked and felt so much like a new man at the end of it that my lady insisted on his remaining a second week, when they would all return to the Forest together. He had given her the highest satisfaction by so visibly taking the benefit of her hospitality, and had made great way in her private esteem besides. Amongst her many friends and acquaintances then at Ryde, for every day's dinner she chose one gentleman for the sake of good talk that Mr. Harry Musgrave might not tire, and the breadth and diversity of the young man's knowledge and interests surprised her.

One evening after some especially amusing conversation with a travelled doctor, who was great in the scientific study of botany and beetles, she said to Elizabeth when they were alone, "What a pity! what a grievous pity! There is no position brains and energy can win that Mr. Harry Musgrave might not raise himself to if his health were equal to his mental capacity. And with what dignity and fortitude he bears his condemnation to a desultory, obscure existence! I had no idea there could be so much sweet patience in a man. Do you anticipate that it will be always so?"

"Harry is very happy now, and I do not look forward much or far," Elizabeth said quietly. "People say men are so different from women, but after all they must be more like women than like anything else. So I try sometimes to put myself in Harry's place, and I know there will be fluctuations—perhaps, even a sense of waste and blankness now and then, and a waking up of regret. But he has no envious littleness of mind and no irritability of temper: when he is feeling ill he will feel low. But our life need not be dull or restricted, and he has naturally a most enjoying humor."

"And he will have you—I think, after all, Elizabeth, you have found your vocation—to love and to serve; a blessed vocation for those called to it, but full of sorrows to those who take it up when the world and pride have disappointed them."

Elizabeth knew that my lady was reflecting on herself. They were both silent for a few minutes, and then Elizabeth went on: "Harry and I have been thinking that a yacht would be an excellent establishment for us to begin with—a yacht that would be fit to coast along France, and could be laid up at Bordeaux while we rest for the winter at Arcachon—or, if we are of a mind to go farther, that would carry us to the Mediterranean. Harry loves a city, and Bologna attracts his present curiosity: I tell him because it was once a famous school of law."

"Bologna is a most interesting city. He would be well amused there," said my lady. "It has a learned society, and is full of antiquities and pictures. It is in the midst of a magnificent country too. I spent a month there once with Lord Latimer, and we found the drives in the vicinity unparalleled. You cannot do better than go to Bologna. Take your yacht round to one of the Adriatic ports—to Venice. I can supply you with guide-books. I perceive that Mr. Harry Musgrave must be well entertained. A Ryde wherry with you in the morning is the perfection of entertainment, but he has an evident relish for sound masculine discourse in the evening: we must not be too exacting."

Bessie colored slightly and laughed. "I don't think that I am very exacting," she said. "I am sure whatever Harry likes he shall do, for me. I know he wants the converse of men; he classes it with fine scenery and fresh air as one of the three delights that he most inclines to, since hard work is forbidden him. Bologna will be better than Arcachon for the winter."

"Yes, if the climate be suitable. We must find out what the climate is, or you may alter your plans again. I have not heard yet when the great event is to take place—when you are to be married."

"My father thinks that Harry should avoid the late autumn in the Forest—the fall of the leaf," Bessie began with rosy diffidence.

"But you have made no preparations? And there are the settlements!" exclaimed Lady Latimer, anxiously.

"Our preparations are going on. My uncle Laurence and Mr. Carnegie will be our trustees; they have consulted Harry, I know, and the settlements are in progress. Oh, there will be no difficulty."

"But the wedding will be at Abbotsmead, since Mr. Laurence Fairfax gives his countenance?" Lady Latimer suggested interrogatively.

Bessie's blush deepened: "No. I have promised Harry that it shall be at Beechhurst, and very quiet. Therefore when we return to the Forest I shall have to ask you to leave me at the doctor's house."

Lady Latimer was silent and astonished. Then she said with emphasis: "Elizabeth, I cannot approve of that plan. If you will not go to Abbotsmead, why not be married from Fairfield? I shall be glad to render you every assistance."

"You are very, very kind, but Harry would not like it," pleaded Bessie.

"You are too indulgent, Elizabeth. Harry would not like it, indeed! Why should he have everything his own way?"

"Oh, Lady Latimer, I am sure you would not have the heart to cross him yourself!" cried Bessie.

My lady looked up at her sharply, but Elizabeth's face was quite serious: "He has rallied wonderfully during the week—rallied both his strength and his spirits. It is fortunate he has that buoyancy. Every girl loves a gay wedding."

"It would be peculiarly distasteful to Harry under the circumstances, and I would not give him pain for the world," Bessie said warmly.

"He is as well able to bear a little contradiction as the rest of us," said Lady Latimer, looking lofty. "In my day the lady was consulted. Now everything must be arranged to accommodate the gentleman. I'm sure we are grown very humble!"

Bessie looked meekly on the carpet and did not belie my lady's words. Something in her air was provoking—perhaps that very meekness, in certain lights so foreign to her character—for Lady Latimer colored, and continued in her frostiest tone: "If you are ashamed of the connection you are forming, that justifies your not inviting the world to look on at your wedding, which ought to be an hour of pride and triumph to a girl."

Bessie's meekness vanished in a blush: "And it will be an hour of triumph to me. Ashamed! Harry Musgrave is to me the best and dearest heart that breathes," she exclaimed; and my lady was too well advised to prolong the argument, especially as she felt that it would be useless.

Harry Musgrave was not grudging of his gratitude for real kindness, and though, when he was in his stronger mood, Lady Latimer was perhaps still disposed to huff him, the next hour she was as good as she knew how to be. The visit to the island was productive of excellent results in the way of a better understanding, and my lady made no more opposition to Elizabeth's leaving her and taking up her abode in Mr. Carnegie's house until her marriage.

For a day or two the triangular nest under the thatch felt small and confined to Bessie, but one morning the rustic sweetness of honeysuckle blowing in at the open lattice awoke in her memory a thousand happy childish recollections and brought back all the dear home-feelings. Then Harry Musgrave was more like his original self here than elsewhere. Insensibly he fell into his easy boyish pleasantry of manner, and announced himself as more secure of his fate when he found Bessie sitting in company with a work-basket in the pretty, low, old-fashioned drawing-room, perfumed with roses overflowing the china bowl. Bessie had a perfect notion of the fitness of things, and as simplicity of dress seemed best suited to her beauty in that place, she attired herself in her plainest and most becoming gown, and Harry looked her over approvingly and called her his dear little Bessie again. The doctor, her mother, the children, every early friend out of the house, was glad, and congratulated her upon her return to the Forest and to them. And now and then, in the dreamy length of the days when she sat thinking, all the interval of time and all the change of scene, circumstance, and faces since she first went away appeared to her like a dream of the night when it is gone.

Of course she had to listen to the moralities of this last vicissitude from her various friends.

Said Miss Buff confidentially, "There is a vast deal more in surroundings, Bessie, than people like to admit. We are all under their influence. If we had seen you at Abbotsmead, we might have pitied your sacrifice, but when we see you at the doctor's in your sprigged cambric dresses, and your beautiful wavy hair in the style we remember, it seems the most right and natural thing in the world that you should marry Mr. Harry Musgrave—no condescension in it. But I did not quite feel that while you were at Fairfield, though I commended your resolution to have your own way. Now that you are here you are just Bessie Fairfax—only the doctor's little daughter. And that goes in proof of what I always maintain—that grand people, where they are not known, ought never to divest themselves of the outward and visible signs of their grandness; for Nature has not been bountiful to them all with either wit or sense, manners or beauty, though there are toadies everywhere able to discern in them the virtues and graces suitable to their rank."

"Lady Latimer looks her part upon the stage," said Bessie.

"But how many don't! The countess of Harbro', for instance; who that did not know her would take her for anything but a common person? Insolent woman she is! She found fault with the choir to me last Sunday, as if I were a singing-mistress and she paid my salary. Has old Phipps confessed how you have astonished him and falsified his predictions?"

"I am not aware that I have done anything to astonish anybody. I fancied that I had pleased Mr. Phipps rather than otherwise," said Bessie with a quiet smile.

"And so you have. He is gratified that a young lady of quality should have the pluck to make a marriage of affection in a rank so far below her own, considering nothing but the personal worth of the man she marries."

"I have never been able to discover the hard and fast conventional lines that are supposed to separate ranks. There is an affectation in these matters which practically deludes nobody. A liberal education and the refinements of wealth are too extensively diffused for those whose pride it is that they have done nothing but vegetate on one spot of land for generations to hold themselves aloof as a superior caste. The pretensions of some of them are evident, but only evident to be ridiculous—like the pretensions of those who, newly enriched by trade, decline all but what they describe as carriage-company."

"The poor gentry are eager enough to marry money, but that does not prevent them sneering at the way the money is made," Miss Buff said. "Even Lady Latimer herself, speaking of the family who have taken Admiral Parkins's house for three months, said it was a pity they should come to a place like Beechhurst, for the gentlefolk would not call upon them, and they would feel themselves above associating with the tradespeople. They are the great tea-dealers in Cheapside."

"Oh, if they are not vulgar and ostentatious, Lady Latimer will soon forget her prejudice against the tea."

"And invite them to her garden-parties like the rest of us? No doubt she will; she likes to know everybody. Then some connection with other people of her acquaintance will come out, or she will learn that they are influential with the charitable institutions by reason of their handsome donations, or that they have an uncle high in the Church, or a daughter married into the brewing interest. Oh, the ramifications of society are infinite, and it is safest not to lay too much stress on the tea to begin with."

"Much the safest," Mr. Phipps, who had just come in, agreed. "The tea-dealer is very rich, and money (we have Solomon's word for it) is a defence. He is not aware of needing her ladyship's patronage. I expect, Miss Fairfax, that, drifting up and down and to and fro in your vicissitudes, you have found all classes much more alike than different?"

"Yes. The refinements and vulgarities are the monopoly of no degree; only I think the conceit of moral superiority is common to us all," said Bessie, and she laughed.

"And well it may be, since the axiom that noblesse oblige has fallen into desuetude, and the word of a gentleman is no more to swear by than a huckster's. Tom and Jerry's wives go to court, and the arbitrary edict of fashion constitutes the latest barbaric importation bon ton for a season. I have been giving Harry Musgrave the benefit of my wanderings in Italy thirty years ago, and he is so enchanted that you will have to turn gypsy again next spring, Miss Fairfax."

"It will suit me exactly—a mule or an ox-cart instead of the train, byways for highways, and sauntering for speed. Did I not tell you long ago, Mr. Phipps, that the gypsy wildness was in the Fairfax blood, and that some day it would be my fate to travel ever so far and wide, and to come home again browner than any berry?"

"Why, you see, Miss Fairfax, the wisest seer is occasionally blind, and you are that rare bird, a consistent woman. Knowing the great lady you most admired, I feared for you some fatal act of imitation. But, thank God! you have had grace given you to appreciate a simple-minded, lovable fellow, who will take you out of conventional bonds, and help you to bend your life round in a perfect circle. You are the happiest woman it has been my lot to meet with."

Bessie did not speak, but she looked up gratefully in the face of her old friend.



CHAPTER XLIX.

BESSIE'S LAST RIDE WITH THE DOCTOR.

Mr. Carnegie complained that he had less of his dear Bessie's company than anybody else by reason of his own busy occupation, and one clear September morning, when the air was wonderfully fresh and sweet after a thunderstorm during the night, he asked her to come out for a last ride with him before Harry Musgrave carried her away. Bessie donned her habit and hat, and went gladly: the ride would serve as a leavetaking of some of her friends in the cottages whom otherwise she might miss.

In the village they met Miss Buff, going off to the school to hear the Bible read and teach the Catechism—works of supererogation under the new system, which Mr. Wiley had thankfully remitted to her on account of her popularity with parents and children.

"Your duty to your neighbor and your duty to God and the ten commandments—nothing else, because of the Dissenters," she explained in a bustle. "Imagine the vulgarity of an education for the poor from which the Bible may be omitted! Dreadful! I persuade the children to get certain of the psalms, proverbs, and parables by heart out of school. Bless you! they like that; but as for teaching them such abstract knowledge as what an adverb or an isthmus is, or the height of Mont Blanc, I defy you! And it is all fudge. Will they sweep a room or make an apple-dumpling the better for it? Not they. But fix it in their minds that whatever their hands find to do they must do it with their might, and there is a chance that they will sweep into the corners and pare the apples thin. But I have no time to spare, so good-bye, good-bye!"

The general opinion of Beechhurst was with Miss Buff, who was making a stand upon the ancient ways in opposition to the superior master of Lady Latimer's selection, whose chief tendency was towards grammar, physical geography, and advanced arithmetic, which told well in the inspector's report. Miss Buff was strong also in the matter of needle, work and knitting—she would even have had the boys knit—but here she had sustained defeat.

Mr. Carnegie's first visit was to Mrs. Christie, who, since she had recovered her normal state of health, had resumed her habit of drugging and complaining. Her son was now at home, and when the doctor and Bessie rode across the green to the wheelwright's house there was the artist at work, with a companion under his white umbrella. His companion wore a maize pique dress and a crimson sash; a large leghorn hat, garnished with poppies and wheat-ears, hid her face.

"There is Miss Fairfax herself, Janey," whispered young Christie in an encouraging tone. "Don't be afraid."

Janey half raised her head and gazed at Bessie with shy, distrustful eyes. Bessie, quite unconscious, reined in Miss Hoyden under the shadow of a spreading tree to wait while the doctor paid his visit in-doors. She perceived that there was a whispering between the two under the white umbrella, and with a pleasant recognition of the young man she looked another way. After the lapse of a few minutes he approached her, an unusual modest suffusion overspreading his pale face, and said, "Miss Fairfax, there is somebody here you once knew. She is very timid, and says she dares not claim your remembrance, because you must have thought she had forgotten you."

Bessie turned her head towards the diffident small personage who was regarding her from the distance. "Is it Janey Fricker?" she asked with a pleased, amused light in her face.

"It is Janey Christie." In fact, the artist was now making his wedding-tour, and Janey was his wife.

"Oh," said Bessie, "then this was why your portfolio was so full of sketches at Yarmouth. I wish I had known before."

Janey's face was one universal blush as she came forward and looked up in Miss Fairfax's handsome, beneficent face. There had always been an indulgent protectiveness in Bessie's manner to the master-mariner's little daughter, and it came back quite naturally. Janey expected hasty questions, perhaps reproaches, perhaps coldness, but none of these were in Bessie's way. She had never felt herself ill used by Janey, and in the joy of the sudden rencounter did not recollect that she had anything to forgive. She said how she had lived in the hope of a meeting again with Janey some day, and what a delightful thing it was to meet thus—to find that her dear little comrade at school was married to Harry Musgrave's best friend! Janey had heard from her husband all the story of Bessie's faithful love, but she was too timid and self-doubting to be very cordial or responsive. Bessie therefore talked for both—promised herself a renewal of their early friendship, and expressed an hospitable wish that Mr. Christie would bring his wife to visit them in Italy next year when he took his holiday. Christie promised that he would, and thought Miss Fairfax more than ever good and charming; but Janey was almost happier when Bessie rode away with Mr. Carnegie and she was permitted to retire into seclusion again under the white umbrella. The artist had chosen him a helpmeet who could be very devoted in private life, but who would never care for his professional honors or public reputation. Bessie heard afterward that the master-mariner was dead, and the place in her heart that he had held was now her husband's. With her own more expansive and affectionate nature she felt a genial warmth of satisfaction in the meeting, and as she trotted along with the doctor she told him about Janey at school, and thought herself most fortunate to have been riding with him that morning.

"For I really fear the little shy creature would never have come near me had I not fallen in with her where she could not escape," said she.

"Christie has been even less ambitious in his marriage than yourself, Bessie," was the doctor's reply. "That one-idead little woman may worship him, but she will be no help. She will not attract friends to his house, even if she be not jealous of them; and he will have to go out and leave her at home; and that is a pity, for an artist ought to live in the world."

"She is docile, but not trustful. Oh, he will tame her, and she will try to please him," said Bessie cheerfully. "She fancied that I must have forgotten her, when there was rarely a day that she did not come into my mind. And she says the same of me, yet neither of us ever wrote or made any effort to find the other out."

"Let us hope that you have both contracted a more serviceable friendship in another direction," said the doctor, and Bessie laughed. She was aware that his estimate of feminine friendship was not exalted.

About half a mile farther, where a byroad turned off towards Fairfield, the riders came upon a remarkable group in high debate over a donkey—Lady Latimer, Gampling the tinker, and the rural policeman. My lady instantly summoned Mr. Carnegie to her succor in the fray, which, to judge from her countenance and the stolid visage of the emissary of the law, was obstinate. It appeared that the policeman claimed to arrest the donkey and convey him to the pound. The dry and hungry beast had been tethered by his master in the early morning where a hedge and margin of sward bordered the domain of Admiral Parkins. Uninstructed in modern law, he broke loose and strayed along the green, cropping here and there a succulent shoot of thorn or thistle, until, when approaching repletion, he was surprised by the policeman, reprimanded, captured, and led ignominiously towards the gaol for vagrant animals—a donkey that everybody knew.

"He's took the innicent ass into custody, and me he's going to summons and get fined," Gampling exclaimed, his indignation not abated by the appearance of another friend upon the scene, for a friend he still counted the doctor, though he persisted in his refusal to mend his kettles and pots and pans.

"Is not this an excess of zeal, Cobb?" remonstrated Mr. Carnegie. "Suppose you let the ass off this time, and consider him warned not to do it again?"

"Sir, my instructions is not to pass over any infringement of the new h'act. Straying is to be put down," said Cobb stiffly.

"This here ass have earned his living honest a matter of eight year, and naught ever laid agen his character afore by high nor low," pleaded Gampling, growing pathetic as authority grew more stern. "Her ladyship and the doctor will speak a good word for him, and there's others as will."

"Afore the bench it may be of vally and go to lowering the fine," said the invincible exponent of the law; "I ain't nothing to do with that."

"I'll tell you where it is, Cobb," urged Gampling, swelling into anger again. "This here ass knows more o' nat'ral justice than the whole boiling o' new h'acts. He'd never be the man to walk into her ladyship's garden an' eat up her flowerbeds: raason why, he'd get a jolly good hiding if he did. But he says to hisself, he says, when he sees a nice bite o' clover or a sow-thistle by the roadside: "This here's what's left for the poor, the fatherless, and the widder—it ain't much, but thank God for small mercies!'—an' he falls to. Who's he robbed, I should like to know?"

"You must ask the admiral that when you come up before the magistrates on Saturday," rejoined Cobb severely—his professional virtue sustained, perhaps, by the presence of witnesses.

Gampling besides being an itinerant tinker was also an itinerant political preacher, and seeing that he could prevail nothing by secular pleas, he betook himself to his spiritual armory, and in a voice of sour derision that made Bessie Fairfax cringe asked the doctor if he had yet received the Devil's Decalogue according to h'act of Parliament and justices' notices that might be read on every wall?—and he proceeded to recite it: "Thou shalt remove the old landmarks, and enter into the fields of the poor. Thou shalt wholly reap the corners of thy fields and gather the gleanings of thy harvest: thou shalt leave nothing for the poor and the stranger. If a wayfarer that is a-hungered pluck the ears of corn and eat, thou shalt hale him before the magistrates, and he shall be cast into prison. Thou shalt turn away thy face from every poor man, and if thy brother ask bread of thee, thou shalt give him neither money nor food."

Mr. Carnegie made a gesture to silence the tinker, for he had thrown himself into an oratorical attitude, and shouted out the new commandments at the top of his voice, emphasizing each clause with his right fist brought down each time more passionately on the palm of his left hand. But his humor had grown savage, and with his eyes glowing like hot coals in his blackened visage he went on, his tone rising to a hoarse, hysteric yell: "Thou shalt oppress the poor, and forbid to teach the gospel in the schools, lest they learn to cry unto their God, and He hear them, and they turn again and rend thee."

"What use is there in saying the thing that is not, Gampling?" demanded Lady Latimer impetuously. "The Bible is read in our schools. And if you workingmen take advantage of the privileges that you have won, you ought to be strong enough, both in and out of Parliament, to prevent any new act being made in violation of the spirit of either law or gospel."

"I can't argy with your ladyship—it would be uncivil to say you talk bosh," replied the tinker as suddenly despondent as he had been furious. "I know that every year makes this world worse for poor honest folk to live in, an' that there's more an' more h'acts to break one's shins over. Who would ha' thowt as ever my old ass could arn me a fine an' costs o' a summons by nibbling a mouthful o' green meat on the queen's highway, God bless her! I've done."

My lady endeavored to make Gampling hear that she would pay his fine (if fined he were), but he refused to listen, and went off, shaking his head and bemoaning the hard pass the world was come to.

"It is almost incredible the power of interference that is given to the police," said Lady Latimer. "That wretched young Burt and his mother were taken up by Cobb last week and made to walk to Hampton for lying on the heath asleep in the sun; nothing else—that was their crime. Fortunately, the magistrates had the humanity to discharge them."

"Poor souls! they are stamped for vagabonds. But young Burt will not trouble police or magistrates much longer now," said the doctor.

In fact, he had that very morning done with troubling anybody. When Mr. Carnegie pulled up ten minutes later at the door of a forlorn hovel which was the present shelter of the once decent widow, he had no need to dismount. "Ride on, Bessie," he said softly, and Bessie rode on. Widow Burt came out to speak to the doctor, her lean face scorched to the color of a brick, her clothing ragged, her hair unkempt, her eyes wild as the eyes of a hunted animal.

"He's gone, sir," she said, pointing in-doors to where a long, motionless figure seated in a chair was covered with a ragged patchwork quilt. The doctor nodded gravely, paused, asked if she were alone.

"Mrs. Wallop sat up with us last night—she's very good, is Mrs. Wallop—but first thing this morning Bunny came along to fetch her to his wife, and she'd hardly got out o' sight when poor Tom stretched hisself like a bairn that's waked up and is going to drop off to sleep again, an' with one great sigh was dead. Miss Wort comes most mornings: here she is."

Yes, there was Miss Wort, plunging head foremost through the heather by way of making a short cut. She saw at a glance what had happened, and taking both the poor mother's hands in her own, she addressed the doctor with tears in her eyes and tremulous anger in her voice: "I shall always say that it is a bad and cruel thing to send boys to prison, or anybody whose temptation is hunger. How can we tell what we should do ourselves? We are not wiser than the Bible, and we are taught to pray God lest we be poor and steal. Tom would never have come to be what he was but for that dreadful month at Whitchester. Instead of shutting up village-boys and hurting their health if they have done anything wrong, why can't they be ordered to wear a fool's cap for a week, going about their ordinary work? Our eyes would be on them, and they would not have a chance of picking and stealing again; it would give us a little more trouble at first, but not in the long run, and save taxes for prisons. People would say, 'There goes a poor thief,' and they would be sorry for him, and wonder why he did it; and we ought to look after our own things. And then, if they turned out incorrigible, they might be shut up or sent out of the way of temptation. Oh, if those who have the power were only a little more considerate, and would learn to put themselves in their place!"

Mr. Carnegie said that Miss Wort's queer suggestion was capable of development, and there was too much sending of poor and young people to prison for light offences—offences of ignorance often, for which a reprimand and compensation would be enough. Bessie had never seen him more saddened.

Their next and last visit was to Littlemire. Mr. Moxon was in his garden, working without his coat. He came forward, putting the threadbare garment on, and begged Miss Fairfax to go up stairs and see his wife. This was one of her good days, as she called the days when the aching weariness of her perpetual confinement was a degree abated, and she welcomed her visitor with a cry of plaintive joy, kissed her, gazed at her fondly through glittering tears.

Bessie did not know that she had been loved so much. Girl-like, she had brought her tribute of flowers to the invalid's room, had wondered at this half-paralyzed life that was surrounded by such an atmosphere of peace; and when, during her last visit, she had realized what a compensation for all sorrow was this peace, she had not yet understood what an ardor of sympathy kept the poor sufferer's heart warm towards those whose brighter lot had nothing in common with her own.

"Oh, my love," she said in a sweet, thrilling voice, "dear Harry Musgrave has been to tell me of his happiness. I am so glad for you both—so very, very glad!" She did not pause to let Bessie respond, but ran on with her recollections of Harry since he was a boy and came first to read with her husband. "His thoughtfulness was really quite beautiful; he never forgot to be kind. Oh, my dear, you may thoroughly rely on his fine, affectionate temper. Rarely did he come to a lesson without bringing me some message from his mother and little present in his hand—a few flowers, a spring chicken, some nice fruit, a partridge. This queer rustic scaffold for my books and work, Harry constructed it himself, and I would not exchange it for the most elegant and ingenious of whatnots. I could do nothing for him but listen to his long thoughts and aspirations: that was when you were out of hearing, and he could neither talk nor write to his dear little Bessie."

"It was a great gap, but it did not make us strangers," said Bessie.

"When he went to Oxford he sent us word of his arrival, and how he liked his college and his tutor—matters that were as interesting to us as if he had been our own. And when he found how welcome his letters were, he wrote to Mr. Moxon often, and sent him any report or pamphlet that he thought might please him; and several times he gave himself the trouble both at the Bodleian and in London to search for and copy out extracts from works that Mr. Moxon wanted and had no means of procuring here. You can have no idea how helpful he has been to my husband in such things. Poor fellow! what a grief it was to us that term he had to stay away from Oxford on account of his health! Already we began to fear for the future, but his buoyant spirit would not anticipate any permanent hindrance to his progress; and that check did make him more prudent. But it is not to be; he sees himself cut short of the career where he planned to be famous; he gives way, however, to neither anger nor repining. Oh, my love! that I could win you to believe that if you clasp this cross to your heart, as the gift of Him who cannot err, you will never feel it a burden!"

Bessie smiled. She did not feel it a burden now, and Harry was not abandoned to carry its weight alone. She did not speak: she was not apt at the expression of her religious feelings, but they were sincere as far as life had taught her. She could have lent her ears for a long while to Harry Musgrave's praises without growing weary, but the vicar now appeared, followed by the doctor, talking in a high, cheerful voice of that discovery he had made of a remarkable mathematical genius in Littlemire: "A most practical fellow, a wonderful hard head—will turn out an enterprising engineer, an inventor, perhaps; has the patience of Job himself, and an infinite genius for taking pains."

Bessie recollected rather pathetically having once heard the sanguine, good vicar use very similar terms in speaking of her beloved Harry.



CHAPTER L.

FOR BETTER, FOR WORSE.

Towards the end of September, Harry Musgrave and Bessie Fairfax were married. Lady Latimer protested against this conclusion by her absence, but she permitted Dora Meadows to go to the church to look on. The wedding differed but very little from other weddings. Harry Musgrave was attended by his friend Forsyth, and Polly and Totty Carnegie were the bridesmaids. Mr. Moxon married the young couple, and Mr. Carnegie gave the bride away. Mr. Laurence Fairfax was present, and the occasion was further embellished by little Christie and Janey in their recent wedding garments, and by Miss Buff and Mr. Phipps, whose cheerful appearance in company gave rise to some ingenious prophetic remarks. The village folks pronounced the newly-wedded pair to be the handsomest they had seen married at Beechhurst church for many a long year, and perhaps it was lucky that Lady Latimer stayed away, for there was nothing in Mr. Harry Musgrave's air or countenance to cheat her into commiseration.

"Elizabeth looked lovely—so beautifully happy," Dora Meadows reported. "And Mr. Harry Musgrave went through the ceremony with composure: Miss Buff said he was as cool as a cucumber. I should think he is a faithless, unsentimental sort of person, Aunt Olympia."

"Indeed! because he was composed?" inquired my lady coldly.

Dora found it easier to express an opinion than to give her reasons for it: all that Aunt Olympia could gather from her rather incoherent attempts at explanation was that Mr. Harry Musgrave had possibly feigned to be worse than he was until he had made sure of Elizabeth's tender heart, for he appeared to be in very good case, both as to health and spirits.

"He might have died for Elizabeth if she had not loved him; and whatever he is or is not, he most assuredly would never voluntarily have given up the chances of an honorable career for the sake of living in idleness even with Elizabeth. You talk nonsense, Dora. There may be persons as foolish and contemptible as you suppose, but Elizabeth has more wit than to have set her affections on such a one." Poor Dora was silenced. My lady was peremptory and decisive, as usual. When Dora had duly repented of her silly suggestion, Aunt Olympia's natural curiosity to hear everything prevailed over her momentary caprice of ill-humor, and she was permitted to recite the wedding in all its details—even to Mrs. Musgrave's silk gown and the pretty little bridesmaids' dresses. The bridegroom only she prudently omitted, and was sarcastically rebuked for the omission by and by with the query, "And the bridegroom was nowhere, then?"

The bells broke out several times in the course of the day, and the event served for a week's talk after it was over. The projected yacht-voyage had been given up, and the young people travelled in all simplicity, with very little baggage and no attendant except Mrs. Betts. They went through Normandy until they came to Bayeux, where Madame Fournier was spending the long vacation at the house of her brother the canon, as her custom was. In the twilight of a hot autumnal evening they went to call upon her. Lancelot's watering-can had diffused its final shower, and the oleanders and pomegranates, grateful for the refreshing coolness, were giving out their most delicious odors. The canon and madame were sipping their cafe noir after dinner, seated in the verandah towards the garden, and Madame Babette, the toil of the day over, was dozing and reposing under the bowery sweet clematis at the end by her own domain.

The elderly people welcomed their young visitors with hospitable warmth. Two more chairs were brought out and two cups of cafe noir, and the visit was prolonged into the warm harvest moonlight with news of friends and acquaintances. Bessie heard that the venerable cure of St. Jean's still presided over his flock at Caen, and occupied the chintz edifice like a shower-bath which was the school-confessional. Miss Foster was married to a brave fermier, and Bessie was assured that she would not recognize that depressed and neuralgic demoiselle in the stout and prosperous fermiere she had developed into. Mdlle. Adelaide was also married; and Louise, that pretty portress, in spite of the raids of the conscription amongst the young men of her pays, had found a shrewd young innkeeper, the only son of a widow, who was so wishful to convert her into madame at the sign of the Croix Rouge that she had consented, and now another Louise, also very pretty, took cautious observation of visitors before admission through the little trap of the wicket in the Rue St. Jean.

Then Madame Fournier inquired with respectful interest concerning her distinguished pupil, Madame Chiverton, of whose splendid marriage in Paris a report had reached her through her nephew. Was Monsieur Chiverton so very rich? was he so very old and ugly? was he good to his beautiful wife? Monsieur Chiverton, Bessie believed, was perfectly devoted and submissive to his wife—he was not handsome nor youthful—he had great estates and held a conspicuous position. Madame replied with an air of satisfaction that proud Miss Ada would be in her element then, for she was born to be a grand lady, and her own family was so poor that she was utterly without dot—else, added madame with some mystery, she might have found a parti in the imperial court: there had been a brave marshal who was also duke. Here the amiable old lady checked herself, and said with kind reassurance to the unambitious Bessie, "But, ma cherie, you have chosen well for your happiness. Your Harry is excellent; you have both such gayety of heart, like us—not like the English, who are si maussade often."

Bessie would not allow that the English are maussade, but madame refused to believe herself mistaken.

Mr. and Mrs. Harry Musgrave still carry their gayety of heart wherever they go. They are not fashionable people, but people like to know them. They have adopted Italy for their country, and are most at home in Florence, but they do not find their other home in England too far off for frequent visits.

They are still only two, and move about often and easily, and see more than most travellers do, for they charter queer private conveyances for themselves, and leave the beaten ways for devious paths that look attractive and often turn out great successes. It was during one of these excursions—an excursion into the Brianza—that they not long ago fell in with a large party of old friends from England, come together fortuitously at Bellagio. Descending early in the evening from the luxuriant hills across which they had been driving through a long green June day, they halted at the hospitable open gate of the Villa Giulia. There was a pony-carriage at the door, and another carriage just moving off after the discharge of its freight.

"Oh, Aunt Olympia, look here! Mr. Harry Musgrave and Elizabeth!" cried a happy voice, and there, behold! were my Lady Latimer and Dora—Lady Lucas now—and Sir Edward; and turning back to see and asking, "Who? who?" came Mr. Oliver Smith and his sisters, and Mr. Cecil Burleigh and his dear Julia.

To Bessie it was a delightful encounter, and Harry Musgrave, if his enthusiasm was not quite so eager, certainly enjoyed it as much, for his disposition was always sociable. My lady, after a warm embrace and six words to Elizabeth, said, "You will dine with me—we are all dining together this evening;" and she communicated her commands to one of the attendants. It was exactly as at home: my lady took the lead, and everybody was under her orders. Bessie liked it for old custom's sake; Mrs. Cecil Burleigh stood a little at a loss, and asked, "What are we to do?"

The Cecil Burleighs were not staying at the Villa Giulia—they were at another hotel on the hill above—and the Lucases, abroad on their wedding-tour, were at a villa on the edge of the lake. They had been making a picnic with Lady Latimer and her party that day, and were just returning when the young Musgraves appeared. The dinner was served in a room looking upon the garden, and afterward the company walked out upon the terraces, fell into groups and exchanged news. My lady had already enjoyed long conversations with Mr. Cecil Burleigh and Sir Edward Lucas, and she now took Mr. Harry Musgrave to talk to. Harry slipped his hand within his wife's arm to make her a third in the chat, but as it was information on Roman politics and social reforms my lady chiefly wanted, Bessie presently released herself and joined the wistful Dora, who was longing to give her a brief history of her own wooing and wedding. Before the tale was told Sir Edward joined them in the rose-bower whither they had retreated, and contributed some general news from Norminster and Abbotsmead and the neighborhood. Lady Angleby had adopted another niece for spaniel, vice Mrs Forbes promoted to Kirkham vicarage, and her favorite clergyman, Mr. Jones, had been made rural dean; Mrs Stokes had a little girl; Mrs. Chiverton was carrying on a hundred beneficent projects to the Woldshire world's wonder and admiration: she had even prevailed against Morte.

"And I believe she would have prevailed had poor Gifford lived; she is a most energetic woman," Sir Edward said. Bessie looked up inquiringly. "Mr. Gifford died of malignant fever last autumn," Sir Edward told her. "He went to Morte in pursuit of some incorrigible poacher when fever was raging there, and took it in its most virulent form; his death proved an irresistible argument against the place, and Blagg made a virtue of necessity and razed his hovels."

Bessie heard further that her uncle Laurence Fairfax had announced the principle that it is unwise for landowners to expect a direct profit from the cottages and gardens of their laboring tenants, and was putting it into practice on the Kirkham estates, to the great comfort and advantage of his dependants.

"My Edward began it," whispered Dora, not satisfied that her husband should lose the honor that to him belonged.