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She began to read Mrs. Fagg with this new key, and she wondered at her own blindness; while she had been fretting and murmuring at every cross laid on her, the wife of poor, ignorant, afflicted Dennis had taken all her sorrows

gladly as from a loving Father's hand, and all had turned to blessing.

"And I thought I had a loving nature," she said. "I have loved myself, that's all. I see now, if love is true, it must conquer."

Nuna only called in St. John Street, and then she drove off to Bellamount Terrace. She felt strangely puzzled that she had not before thought of consulting Roger Westropp. She was surprised at her own calm when she reached his house.

The old woman opened the door. "The master's not a-bed," she said; "but he's too weak to move about."

Roger lay on the faded green sofa. He was very white and ghastly; and the shadows in his face had that bluish tint which gives an awfulness to the expression.

On the table in the middle of the room were the two brass candlesticks that had once stood, as Nuna well remembered, on the mantelshelf in Carvingswood Lane.

Roger smiled as Mrs. Whitmore took his wasted hand between hers.

A sense of comfort stole over the old man when she seated herself close beside him, and placed the pillow more easily under his shoulders.

"Thank ye kindly, ma'am. I think I'm going this time; but there be no knowing; still it may happen suddenways, and there's just a thing or two I'd like to put in charge o' you." He paused between his words.

"I shall be very glad to be of use, but"-she spoke cheerfully-"I don't think you seem so ill as when I saw you before, Roger. Your voice is so much stronger."

A faint flush came up in his face. "That's maybe along of a parson as comes now and again and sees me. He says I live too low, so last night he sends in a small bottle o' port wine.

I

s'pose he thinks I'm wanting food and such like."

He looked ashamed, but he indulged in a grim smile at the simplicity of the clergyman.

"Roger, why don't you say you are not poor?" Nuna was horrified at his coolness.

"Bless you, ma'am, the parson gives it, accordin' to what he says, more for the sake of his own soul than for my needs. Why should I baulk him? it have done me no harm, and it may be does him a sight of good."

Nuna wished Mrs. Fagg was present, she did not feel capable of rebuking Roger.

"You see, ma'am, these are the two things I want to speak about. I've a feeling I wouldn't like them "-he pointed to the candlesticks-"as my missus took such a pride in, to be sold, maybe, for a few pence to some drunken hussy or another. I'd be fain if you'd see they was put alongside of me, that's first. The next's this"he put his hand inside his waistcoat, fumbled a few minutes, and then drew out a creased, soiled paper. "I want you to be so good, ma'am, as to hand this to my daughter Martha; it's the letter as came from Watty with the news of the money. I'd like Patty to read it careful, and to take heed the words in it don't come true." He stopped, and lay looking at Nuna while she put the paper carefully away.

"If I'd lived to see her again," said Roger, "I meant to have told her a thing that's been on my mind. You think, ma'am, along of me taking that wine, that I'm not a stickler for truth-it ain't that; I knows parsons and the ways they gets in London, they're free-handed to the poor, and may God bless them for it, but they takes it out o' those they thinks have any to spare. If I was to go and let that good young gentleman know I'd ever so little put by, he'd be wanting me to subscribe to no end of new-fangled schemes he's got on hand, and he'd say it would be for my good to do it. It's not that; but, ma'am, the thing I'm meaning's this."-He raised himself a little while he spoke.-"I

gave my countenance to a lie when Patty married, and now, as I'm lying here, it's heavy on my mind I did it. No wife ought to have a secret of her own to keep, and I'm afeard Patty's got too many."

"Could you write to her?"
Roger moved his head.

"She wouldn't heed my writing, but I'd like her to know it troubled me. She's far off now; she mayn't be back afore winter."

Nuna could not restrain her eagerness any longer.

"Then you hear from her. Where are they now?"

There was again the same movement of his head.

"No, ma'am. I've an old letter from Miss Coppock, but there can't be any news in it you bean't acquainted with. It lies in that there table-drawer, ma'am" -he looked at a rickety table that stood beneath the window. Roger closed his eyes, exhausted; he did not see how eagerly Nuna opened the letter, as if she could not read it quickly enough.

"DEAR MR. WESTROPP,

"I have intended to write to you more than once, but the extreme rapidity with which we have traversed this interesting country, has hitherto prevented the accomplishment of my wishes. I am far from happy about Mrs. D; she appears to treat her admirable husband with culpable neglect and indifference, and to devote herself to the amusement of a foolish young nobleman; also, she bestows more attention on our other travelling companion, Mr. W- than I think you would approve. He, however, left us some days ago; he stayed at Clermont while we made this détour to Le Puy. I am not sure he will join us again, though he talks of a meeting at Montpellier. I think he is very injudicious; he says he shall explore the country in his sketching expeditions, and I should not be surprised if he is attacked and robbed. I gave him a hint of my suspicions, but he seemed to think my advice unnecessary. He must take his chance.

Serve him right, in my opinion, for leaving poor Mrs. Whitmore at home by herself."

Clermont-Montpellier. Nuna found herself saying the words over and over as if she could never fix them in memory.

"May I keep this letter?" she said, "there is something about their journey which I did not know."

"Yes, yes, surely;" but Roger was half asleep.

Nuna knelt down beside the old man. "Good-bye, now," she said, "I'll come again to-morrow if I can."

She closed the door, softly; and then she went to the top of the kitchen stairs and called the old woman.

Her dirty, hag-like appearance distressed Nuna.

"Don't leave Mr. Westropp alone in the house," she said. "You shall be paid for your care. Go in and look at him every now and then. I will come or send to-morrow."

She tried to keep calm and collected, but it was hard work. Paul might be ill, dying perhaps. He had said he would write when he came to a halt, and Miss Coppock's letter was dated a fortnight ago, and yet there was more hope than sorrow in Nuna's heart. She was going to Paul; her long exile was ended; her brain seemed to spin in the excitement that lay before her. But she mastered the impulsive wish to start at once in pursuit of her husband. There was yet time to write to her father, and to seek his advice about her journey; for he had been, as Nuna knew, much of a traveller in early life.

She calculated that if her father answered her note at once, she should be able to start on her journey next evening.

Timid as she was, wholly unused to depend on herself for protection, still Nuna resolved to travel alone. She felt sure the journey would be expensive, and she thought an English maid would be a useless encumbrance. She could only think of Paul; her mind saw only the end of her journey, and re

fused to take in any obstacles there might be in its accomplishment.

"I don't think there's much use in going to bed," she said; "I feel as if rest would never come till I am fairly on my way."

To her surprise she slept soundly. She felt calm and refreshed next morning; but there was still a long weary day to get through before her father's letter could reach her.

She finished her packing, and then she resolved to go and see Roger.

"I must try and persuade him to havo a nurse," she thought.

The door opened, and there was Will Bright.

Nuna did not know how helpless she had really felt till she saw Will; she sprang forward and greeted him so heartily, that a flush of pleasure spread over his handsome face.

"You can guess why I'm here," he said; "I got to Ashton this morning just after your letter came. The rector was in a sad way about it; he can't stand your going alone at all. I don't believe he likes your going any way, only Mrs. Beaufort said it was the right thing for you to do-but it's all right now. You'll let me take care of you, won't you, and we'll start to-night."

He had held Nuna's hand while he spoke; his heart was just then as full of love for her as ever.

"You!"-Nuna pressed his hand affectionately, and then drew hers away-"you good, kind Will-oh, no; indeed, I could not take you away, just now, too, when you are so much wanted on the farm, and-"

"Confound the farm," said Will, stubbornly, "I'm going with you, Nuna, whether you like it or not. I told Mr. Beaufort I would."

He stood looking at her with both hands in his pockets, and a determined, rather surly expression in his eyes.

Nuna was puzzled; but she had learned how to manage Will in her childhood. A woman can usually manage the lover she does not love, however much she may fail with the man she loves herself.

"I must go alone, Will, for several reasons. Now, sit down and listen, won't you, like a good reasonable Will; all you want is to help me, isn't it? Well then, isn't it much kinder to help me in my way than in yours? If you will take me to Folkestone, and put me safe on board the steamer, you will do all I need; and then I want you to do something else, which will help me very much."

Will looked like a mastiff, unwilling to yield up a stick he has been told to guard.

"You know I can't refuse you anything," he said, at last, sadly.

"Will,”—there was a reproach in her voice, and he looked sheepish-"you won't tell even my father what I am going to tell you?"

He looked up hopefully; the idea of sharing a secret with Nuna was cheering to his dog-like faithfulness.

"It's about Roger Westropp. He is in London. I've seen him; he's ill, and he wants taking care of. Will you see after him while I am away? I can tell you what I want about him presently. Now, you really must have something to eat."

Will's curiosity was excited about Roger, but he was still unwilling to let Nuna travel without him.

Before they reached Folkestone she had convinced him that he must yield to her wishes.

"Good-bye, Nuna," he said, when the ringing of the bell warned all outsiders to leave the steamer; "you have been harder on me to day than you know. You don't know what it would have been to me to have watched over you to the end, you poor dear, lonely girl; now, don't look vexed; I may as well say my mind out this once; you've had your way, remember, but I'd like to be sure what that husband of yours is at; if he's not ill, Nuna, very ill, mind,—I should like to horsewhip him."

"Poor Will!" Nuna watched the tall stalwart figure, till the boat glided out of the harbour. "Dear, faithful Will, how heartless I am! I don't seem to care a bit for him, or to think of all

the trouble he has taken. Oh, my darling! my darling! am I really going to you at last?"

At last! and then came the doubt, should she find him?

CHAPTER LXII.

"SHALL I be able to move in a week?" an English voice said this in French to a small buttoned-up Frenchman, a man with a spectacled wizened face; there was a brown curly wig above the face, and a red silk handkerchief under it.

The doctor shrugged his shoulders. "Ma foi," he smiled, "if you were my countryman I make answer, 'no ;' you stay where you are a fortnight, what do I know, three weeks, perhaps; but you English are different, you have the strength of horses not of men; I say to you," he stopped to take a large pinch of snuff and spilled some of it on the table, then blew his nose obstreperously in a red pocket-handkerchief nearly as big as himself-"I say to you Monsieur," he shook a dirty finger at his patient," that a man who refuses to be bled for fever and yet recovers, is beyond my calculations; he may relapse, or get well at once, or die after all, what do I know. I have the honour to wish Monsieur good-day."

Doctor Gerder took his leave; he was very much huffed at his patient's strictures on the treatment to which he had refused to submit.

When the party of travellers reached Auvergne, Paul had been much struck with the wild grandeur of the extinct volcanoes, and he proposed to Lord Charles Seton to stay behind the others.

But Lord Charles's love of art and his great desire to sketch in Paul's company had, seemingly, cooled. "I am not particularly attracted by the Auvergne scenery," he said; "I would rather defer my sketching attempts till we reach the Spanish frontier."

Paul felt a secret relief, and yet he was chafed, too. Something in Mrs. Downes's manner towards himself irritated him profoundly; if he could

credit such a belief, he could fancy that Patty tried in Lord Charles Seton's presence to patronise him; she and the young lord were inseparable companions. Strangely enough, the travelling companion from whom he had shrunk at the outset with positive dislike, had been the only one he was sorry to part from; he had grown first to pity and then to like Mr. Downes.

He had never seen a man evince such unwearying devotion to a woman, and Paul was too keen an observer not to see how carelessly it was repaid. There had been a look of trouble and sadness lately in Mr. Downes's face; Paul felt sure he was not happy with his wife.

He stopped behind at Clermont; then he went on to a little village some leagues distant, and there, after painting in the heat of the sun beside a pool of stagnant mud, he sickened with low typhoid fever.

He soon became delirious, but happily for him chiefly at night, so that he had been able to understand and to resist the doctor's wish to bleed him; the two poor women who kept the wretched little cabaret where he was lodged nursed him as carefully as they couldbut care and kindness will not atone for dirt and other discomforts, and in his long, restless nights, Paul longed till his heart sickened, for Nuna's sweet face, for her voice, instead of the hoarse patois of the Frenchwomen; and, above all, he hungered for the love he had again

grown to believe in. For lately, every

hour had been teaching Paul his mistake; in Mr. Downes's tender devotion to his wife he had read his own condemnation-read how selfishly he had returned Nuna's love.

"I had it once," he said, sometimes; "if Patty had never come between us, I believe we should have been all right; but jealousy dwarfs a woman's mind completely. I'm afraid Nuna will never forgive me that concealment about the picture; and it was wrong altogether. I can see at this distance that husbands and wives shouldn't have secrets; she'll never trust me again. If she were a man it would be different."

He repented bitterly that he had not written.

"I cannot write now; it would be selfish and cowardly to ask her, so timid as she is, to come all this way just to nurse me, I couldn't bear her to be in such a place; and perhaps, if she knew I was ill, she would come. No, I must take my chance."

It never occurred to him that all discomfort and privation would have been prized by Nuna, if borne for his sake. Some men know very little of the hearts of the women they call their

own.

Paul felt restless when the doctor left him. He longed to attempt the journey, but the unsteadiness of his limbs and his brain warned him it was possible to meet with worse mischances than a prolonged stay in the dirty little cabaret.

Hitherto he had not realized the dangerous power of his illness. But to day, as the hours passed by, it seemed to him that he was growing weakermore feverish. Would it be better to

send for Nuna?

"And who's to say what may happen; for she will come if I send for her,"-he had a painful pleasure in saying this over and over. "And she might take the fever and die of it."

And yet, as the hours of that weary day went by, and the sun grew hotter, and Paul's languor and depression bore him down to utter prostration, his pale sunken eyes fixed more and more wistfully on the knapsack hanging against the bare deal walls of his room. There were writing materials in it.

How easy it would be to write and summon his wife.

Before morning came the power of writing was gone, the fever had returned; he was again delirious and unconscious.

The women of the house whispered together gravely; they knew too well. the symptoms of the fatal disease, but they did not even know the name of their lodger, and the doctor Gerder had said he would die if the fever returned.

No. 145.-VOL. XXV.

CHAPTER LXIII.

PATIENCE SPEAKS.

PATTY stood at a window in the largest bedroom of the Croix d'Or. She looked tired and worn, for the party had only just reached Bourges, after a long, hurried journey. The journey, too, had been dull. Mr. Downes had been almost always sullen and silent, and yet he was constantly beside her, so that she had not, during the last two days, had any of the long talks with Lord Charles Seton, which had become the chief amusement of the journey.

But it was not only weariness and fatigue that had altered Patty's looks and faded her loveliness. She was very pale; but anger, and fear too, were in her beautiful blue eyes,-a strange, abject fear, that seemed quite out of place on the sweet self-possessed face. She was looking down into the courtyard of the inn. It was empty, except just below the window. Her husband stood there with Patience Coppock. Mr. Downes seemed to be listening with impatience; he held a stick in his hand, and he struck this, as he stood, on the round shining stones of the courtyard; but still, he was listening to his companion's talk, and Mrs. Downes could see how full of eager vehemence this talk was. Patience stood with her back towards the window; but her shoulders heaved, and her right hand enforced her words with quick, impulsive gesture, and Patty read on her husband's face, as on a mirror, the work that Miss Coppock's words were doing. Once she tried to get courage and go boldly down stairs and stop the tongue which she felt was blackening her in her husband's eyes; but fear, sick, helpless fear, was too strong. She grasped at the window-fastening as the thought came; she drew her breath deeply; her lips parted, and showed the small white teeth tightly closed.

"She's been so much more patient lately that I never believed she'd turn on me-the coward; she never so much as threatened. Well, if I come to grief, it's her doing, not mine; that's one

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