out a..y pause for thought, with that sudden and impassioned energy which is often more subtle than the craftiest calculation. Even while his heart beat thus wildly with awakened passion, Rollo answered the feeble resistance of his conscience by asking himself what harm could it do her? it would not interfere with her career. As for Lottie, she raised herself up within his arm and threw back her head and looked at him, not shrinking from him nor showing any horror of the suggestion. There was a pause only for a moment, but it felt like half an hour, while wild excitement, love, and terror coursed through his veins. Surely she understood him, and was not alarmed? If she had understood him and flung away from him in outraged virtue, Rollo would have been abject in guilt and penitence. For the moment, however, though his heart beat with alarm, there was a sense of coming triumph in all his being. Lottie raised her drooping shoulders, she threw back her head and looked at him, into the glowing face that was so close to her. Her heart had given one answering leap of excitement, but was not beating like his. At that moment, so tremendous to him, it was not passion but reflection that was in her eyes. gratitude for a danger escaped; he was safe, but he scarcely dared breathe. Had she understood him as he meant her to understand him, what vengeance would have flashed upon him, what thunderbolt scathed him! But for very terror he would have shrunk and hid his face now in the trembling of the catastrophe escaped. "More than that, even," said Lottie going on all unawares; "I have nothing, you know; and how could I take money money to live upon - from you!- till I was married to you? No! it is impossible, impossible, Rollo. Oh, thank you, thank you a thousand times for having thought more of me than of anything else; but you see, don't you see, how impossible it is? I will never forget," said the girl softly, drawing a little closer to him who had fallen away from her in the strange tumult of failure - yet deliverancewhich took all strength from him, “I will never forget that you were ready to forget everything that was reasonable, everything that was sensible, and even your own credit, for me!" Another pause, but this time indescribable. In her bosom gratitude, tender love, and that sweet sense of calmer judg ment, of reason less influenced by passion than it would be fitting or right for his to be, which a woman loves to feel within herself - her modest prerogative in the supreme moment; in his tumult of love, disappointment, relief, horror of himself, anger, and shame, and the thrill of a hair"breadth escape. Let me think-let us think," she said. "Oh, Rollo ! it is a great temptation. To go away, to be safe with you "My darling, my own darling! you shall never have cause to fear, never to doubt me; my love will be as steady, as true So high had the excitement of suspense grown, that he had scarcely breath to get out the words. "Do you think I doubt that?" she said, her voice sounding so calm, so soft to his excited ear. "That is not the question; there are so many other things to think of. If you will not think for yourself, I must think for you. Oh, Rollo, no! I don't see how it could be. Listen to me; you are too eager, oh! thank you, dear Rollo, too fond of me, to take everything into consideration but I must. Rollo! no, no; it would never do; how could it ever do, if you will only think? Supposing even that it did not matter for me, how could you marry your wife from any place but her home? It would not be creditable," said Lottie, shaking her head with all the gentle superiority of reason, "it would not be right or becoming for you." His arm relaxed round her; he tried to say something, but it died away in his throat. For the moment the man was conscious of nothing but a positive pang of VOL. XXIV, 1243 LIVING AGE. He could not say a word; what he had done seemed incredible to him. The most tremendous denunciation would not have humbled him as did her unconsciousness. He had made her the most villanous proposal, and she had not even known what it meant; to her it had seemed all generosity, love, and honor. His arm dropped from around her, he had no force to hold her, and some inarticulate exclamation — he could not tell what sounded hoarsely in utter confusion and shame in his throat. "You are not angry?" she said, almost wooing him in her turn. Rollo, it is not that I do not trust you, you know; who should I trust but you? If that was all, I would put my hand in yours, you should take me wherever you pleased. But then there are the other things to be considered. And, Rollo, don't be angry," she said, drawing his arm within hers, "I can bear anything now. After talking to you, after feeling your sympathy, I can bear anything. What do I care for a woman like that? Of course I knew," said Lottie, with tears in her eyes, "that you did feel | but who could tell what spectator might for me, that you thought of me, that you suddenly appear. She took his role in the were always on my side. But one wants eagerness of her heart to make up to him to have it said over again to make assur- for any vexation her refusal might have ance sure. Now I can bear anything, now given. "Don't come any further," she I can go home — though it is not much whispered; "let us part here; some one like home and wait, till you come and might see us." In her eagerness to make fetch me, Rollo, openly, in the light, in the up to him for her own unkindness, she day." allowed the necessity for keeping that secret-though to think of it as a secret had wounded her before. Nevertheless, when he took her at her word and left her, Lottie, like the fanciful girl she was, felt a pang of disappointment and painfully realized her own desolateness, the dismal return all alone to the house out of which every quality of kindness had gone. Her heart sank, and with reluctant, lingering steps she came out of the Abbey shadow and began to cross the Dean's Walk, her forlorn figure moving slowly against the white line of the road and the grey of the wintry sky. Here, because she was so happy, Lottie put her hands up to her face and laid those hands upon his shoulder and cried there in such a heavenly folly of pain and blessedness as words could not describe. That he should not claim her at once, that was a pain to her; and to think of that strange, horrible house to which she must creep back, that was pain which no happiness could altogether drive out of her thoughts. But yet, how happy she was! What did it matter if for the moment her heart was often sore? A little while and all would be well; a little while and she would be delivered out of all these troubles. It was Some one was standing at the door as only a question of courage, of endurance, she came in sight of her father's house. of fortitude, and patience; and Lottie had It was Captain Despard himself, looking got back her inspiration, and felt herself out. "Is that you, Lottie?" he called out, capable of bearing anything, everything, peering into the gloom. "Come in, come with a stout heart. But Rollo had neither in; where have you been? You must not recovered his speech nor his self-posses-stay out again, making everybody anxious.” sion; shame and anger were in his heart. He had not been found out, but the very awe of escape was mingled with intolerable anger; anger no doubt chiefly against himself but also a little against her, though why he could not have said. The unconsciousness of her innocence, which had impressed him so deeply at first and confounded all his calculations, began to irritate him. How was it possible she did not understand? was there stupidity as well as innocence in it? Most people would have had no difficulty in understanding, it would have been as clear as noonday- or, rather, as clear as gaslight; as evident as any "intention" could be. He could not bear this superiority, this obtuseness of believing; it offended him, notwithstanding that he had made by it what he felt to be the greatest escape of his life. They parted after this not with the same enthusiasm on Rollo's part as that which existed on Lottie's. She was chilled, too, thinking he was angry with her for not yielding to his desire, and this overcast her happiness, but not seriously. They stole down by the side of the Abbey, in the shadow Lottie talking, Rollo silent. When they came within sight of the cloister gate and the line of the lodges opposite, Lottie withdrew her hand from his arm. The road looked empty and dark, - Then he came out a step or two from his door and spoke in a whisper: "You know what a woman's tongue is," he said; "they have a great deal to answer for; but when they get excited, what can stop them? You must try not to pay any attention; be sensible, and don't mind - no more than I do," Captain Despard said. CHAPTER XXXV. FAMILY DUTY: ACCORDING TO MRS. DESPARD. THERE are some victories which feel very much like defeats. When Polly had scattered her adversaries on every side, driven forth Lottie and got rid of Law, and silenced Captain Despard—who sat in his room and heard everything but thought it wisest not to interfere she retired upstairs to her drawing-room and celebrated her triumph by shedding torrents of tears. She had intended to make everybody very wretched, and she had done so; supposing, perhaps (though she did not really know what her motive was), that some pleasure would come to herself out of the discomfiture of the others. But pleasure rarely comes by that means, and when she had thus chased everybody out of her way, Polly threw herself down and burst forth into angry sobs and tears. It is not to be supposed that Captain Despard entertained any romantic illusions about his bride; he knew very well what Polly was. He had, as facts proved, been sufficiently fond of her to marry her, but he did not expect of her more than Polly could give, nor was he shocked to find that she had a temper and could give violent utterance to its vagaries; all this he had known very well before. Knowing it, however, he thought it wise to keep out of the way and not mix himself up in a fray with which evidently he had nothing to do. Had she gone a step further with Lottie it is possible that he might have interfered, for, after all, Lottie was his child; and though he might himself be hard upon her at times, there is generally a mingled sentiment of family pride and feeling which makes us unwilling to allow one who belongs to us to be roughly treated by a stranger. But when Law put himself in the breach, his father sat close and took no notice; he did not feel impelled to turn his wife's batteries upon himself out of consideration for Law. Nor did it make any impression upon the captain when he heard her angry sobs overhead. "She will come to if she is left to herself," he said, and he did not allow himself to be disturbed. Polly, in her passion, threw herself on the carpet, leaning her head upon a chair. She had changed the room after her own fashion. She had lined the curtains with pink muslin, and fastened her crochet-work upon the chairs with bows of pink ribbon; she had covered the old piano with a painted cover, and adorned it with vases and paper flowers. She had made the faded little room which had seemed a fit home enough, in its grey and worn humility, for Lottie's young beauty, into something that looked very much like a dressmaker's ante-room, or that terrible chamber, "handsomely fitted up with toilet requisites," where the victims of the photographic camera prepare for the ordeal. But the loveliness of her handiwork did not console Polly; she got no comfort out of the pink bows, nor even from the antimacassars -a point in which Lottie's room was painfully deficient. She flung herself upon the carpet and sobbed. What was the use of being a lady, a chevalier's wife, and living here in the heart of the Abbey, if no one called upon her or took any notice of her? Polly was not of a patient nature; it did not occur to her even that there was still time for the courtesies she had set her heart upon gaining. She had looked every day for some one to come, and no one had ever come; no one had made any advances to her at the Abbey, which was the only place in which she could assert her position as a lady and a chevalier's wife. Even Mrs. O'Shaughnessy, who had risen from the ranks, who lived next door, who was not a bit better, nay, who was much less good than Polly to begin with (for what is a trooper's wife? and she had been nothing but a trooper's wife)-even Mrs. O'Shaughnessy had passed the door as if she did not see it, and had waited outside till Miss Lottie came to her. Polly's dreams had been very different. She had seen herself in imagination the admired of all admirers; she was by far the youngest of all the chevalier's wives, and the gentlemen, at least, she was sure would rally round her. Women might be spiteful, but men always did justice to a woman when she was handsome and young. We not that written in all the records? She expected that the ladies would be spiteful, that would be indeed a part of her triumph. They would be jealous of her superior attractions, of her youth, of her husband's adoration of her; the old things would be in a flutter of alarm lest their old men should come within her influence. But Polly had felt pretty sure that the old gen. tlemen would admire her and rally round her. To make the women envious and the men enthusiastic, was not that always the way? Certainly such was the course of events in the Family Herald. The heroine might have one friend devoted to her fortunes, a confidant more admiring, more faithful even than her lover; but all the rest of womankind was leagued against her. And so it had been in most of the novels Polly had read. But that neither men nor women should take any notice, that was a thing for which she was not prepared, and which she declared to herself she would not bear. She had seen enough already from her windows to make her furious. She had seen Mrs. O'Shaughnessy ostentatiously waiting for Lottie, walking up and down outside, making signs to the girl up-stairs. She had seen Captain Temple pass and repass, looking up at the same window. She had seen the greetings that met Lottie wherever she appeared. The chevaliers and their wives had not always looked upon Miss Despard with such favorable eyes. They had thought her proud, and they had resented her pride; but now that Lottie was in trouble it was round her they had all rallied. It was the party at the Deanery, however, which had been the last drop in Polly's cup. How was she to know that on the highest elevation she "Well, what is it now?" he said, with a smile. "I want you to come out with me," Polly said. "I want to buy some things. My old muff is shabby, I couldn't wear it in the Abbey. Though they're a set of old frights and frumps, I don't wish your wife to be looked down upon by them, Harry. I can see them looking at all my things, counting up what everything costs, and whispering behind my back. That old Mrs. Jones has trimmed her bonnet exactly like mine, though she looks as if she was too grand to see me. They ain't above copying me, that's one thing." could reach as the lady of a chevalier, she | him. He looked upon her follies with was still beneath the notice of Lady Caro- much more indulgence than he had ever line, and as far as ever from the heaven of felt for Lottie, who did not give him the the highest society? Polly did not know. same consolation. The elevation to which she herself had risen was so immense in her own consciousness that there seemed no distinction of ranks above her. She thought, as Lottie had once thought, though from a different point of view, that gentlefolks were all one; that a gentleman's wife, if not so rich or so grand, was still on a level with Lady Caroline herself, and within the circle which encompassed the queen. "You can't be no better than a gentleman," Polly said to herself. You might, it was true, be a lord, which some people thought better, but even a lord was scarcely above an officer. All this glorious ambition, however, what was it going to end in? She watched the carriages going to the Deanery, and with still more furious feelings she watched Lotre in her white dress crossing the Dean's Walk. And she left at home, at the window, neglected, left out, though she was Mrs. Despard, and the other nobody! Was it possible that it might be better even to be a dressmaker, forewoman in the workroom, acknowledged to have the best eye for cutting out, and to be the quickest worker of the lot, superior so far among her equals than to be ignored and neglected and treated as the dust under their feet by a set of poor gentlefolks? Polly felt that she must wreak her vengeance on somebody. "No wonder," said the admiring husband; "for it is long since anything so young and so handsome has been among them before. Don't they wish they could copy your face as well as your bonnet! that's all." "Oh, get along!" said Polly, well pleased; "you're always flattering. Come and buy me a muff. I don't know what kind to get. Grebe is sweetly pretty and ermine is delicious, but sealskin, perhaps, is the most genteel; that always looks ladylike. Did you see Mrs. Daventry go by in her carriage? Ah!" Polly sighed; how could she help it? She was very fine in her blue silk, but Augusta was finer. "She has just come from France, you know, and then, of course, they are rich. She had on a velet with sable that deep! Ah! it's hard to see folks that are no better than you with things that are so much better," cred Polly; very nice, give me sealskin- that' always ladylike. A sealskin jacket, if I had that, I don't think there is anything nore I should wish for in the world." "Are they very dear?" said the capin, with a sudden fit of liberality. He ha a native love of buying, which is very g eral with impecunious persons, and present was in a prodigal mood. When she had got her fit of crying over accordingly, she jumped up to her feet and hurried to her room to put on her "things." It was her "best things" that she put on. Indeed, Polly had been wearing her best things every day with an ex-"but, after all, though velvet and sable are travagance which rather touched her conscience though it delighted her fancy. She made herself very fine indeed that wintry afternoon, and pattered down-stairs upon a pair of high heels which were more splendid than comfortable, and burst into the little room where Captain Despard sat attentive to all these sounds, and wondering what was coming next. Few people realize the advantage of a silly wife to a man who is not over wise. The captain, though he had a high opinion of himself, was aware at the bottom of his heart that other people scarcely shared that sentiment. And to have a wife whom he was fond of, and whose acquisition flattered his vanity, and who was unmistakably, though clever enough, less clever, less instructed, than he was, gave him a sense of superiority which was very pleasant to "Dear! Oh, not for the good they are said Polly. "You never want anothe winter mantle all your life. You're set up That makes them cheap in the end; bu they cost a deal of money. I haven't seen nobody with one in all the Abbey, except the canon's ladies." "Then you shall have one!" said Captain Despard. He looked like a prince, Polly thought, as he stood there glowing with generous purpose. The sound of the "O-oh!" with which she received the thing that could be done for her husband's offer rang through the lodges. Such a family? When she had decided upon her shriek of pleasure had not been heard there sealskin, Polly began to shiver. She said, since there had been chevaliers in St. Mi-"It is a very cold day. I don't know why chael's. They went out together, all it should be so cold so early in the year. beaming, arm in arm, the bride clinging fondly to her husband, the captain looking down with delighted protection upon his bride. This sight, which is so pretty in some cases, and calls forth, if much amusement, often a great deal of sympathy, roused anything but friendly feelings in the lodges, where the good people were getting ready for the afternoon service. Old fool was the best name they had for the bridegroom, though he was not very old; and Polly was a grievance which the ladies could not tolerate. They looked after her from their windows with feelings which were far from Christian. It was a thing they ought not to have been exposed to. There should have been an appeal to the queen, if the gentleman had the least energy. "But even the queen, bless her, could not keep a man from marrying," the warden said deprecatingly. He did not like it any more than they did; but it is only when you are yourself of the executive that you know the difficulties of action; that is why the ladies are such critics they have not got it to do. Don't you think it is very cold, Harry? I have come out without any wrap. Do you know I think I will put the sealskin on." Why should not she? The proprietor of the shop accomplished the sale with a pang. He knew Captain Despard well enough and he knew Polly, and he trembled when he thought of his bill. But what could he be but civil? He put it on for her though how any ordinary sealskin could have covered a bosom so swelling with pride and bliss it is hard to say. And the pair went out together as they came in, except that one was almost speechless with the proud consciousness of drawing all eyes. "It is not the appearance," said Polly, "but it is so deliciously warm; there never was any thing like it. And now I am set up. I shall not cost you any more for a winter cloak, not for years and years." "I thought you said it was to last forever," said the captain, equally delighted. They promenaded all the way down St. Michael's hill, the admired of all beholders. If the remarks that were made were not precisely such as Polly hoped, still there was no Captain and Mrs. Captain Despard doubt that remarks were made by every(Polly had got beautiful glazed cards print- body, and that the sealskin had all the ed stiff and strong with this title upon honor it deserved. Sometimes, indeed, them) walked down to the best shop in St. there would be a bitter in the sweet, as Michael's, which is a very good shop in- when the captain took off his hat with deed; and there they bought a beautiful jaunty grace to some lady whom he knew. sealskin. Impossible to tell the pride, the "Who is that?" Polly would ask sharply; happiness, the glory with which Polly ac- but the ladies all hurried by, and never quired this new possession. She had not stopped to be introduced; and no man expected it. These were the days when took off his hat to Polly. Even against sealskins were still a hope, a desire, an this, however, the happiness that wrapped aspiration to the female mind, a property her round defended Mrs. Despard. And which elevated its possessor, and identified how the people stared! - people who had her among her peers. "That lady with seen her going up and down with a little the sealskin," who would think of pointing bundle of patterns on her way to her work, out anybody by so general a description on her way to try on a dress - people in now? are they not even going out of fash- the shops, who had been her equals if not ion? But Polly, for one, could not realize her superiors to see them gazing out at the possibility that such a thing could ever her with big eyes, at her fine sealskin and happen. And she had not anticipated such her fine husband, that comforted her soul. a bliss; the happiness was doubled by be. She walked slowly, getting the full good of ing unforeseen. This, indeed, was a proof her triumph. But when she had got to the of the blessedness of being a married lady, foot of the hill she dismissed her escort. of having bettered herself, of having mar-"Now you may go," she said; "you alried a gentleman. Her mind was in a confusion of delight. Nevertheless she did not forget that she had come out with another and quite distinct purpose. The fact that she had herself been so fortunate did not turn her from her mission. Was it not more her duty than ever to do every ways had plenty to do in the old days. I don't want you to say I tie you to my apronstring. You may go now.' "This is a pretty way to dismiss your husband," said Captain Despard; "and where are you going, may I ask, that you send me away?" |
