Haworth's

by Frances Hodgson Burnett

"It is to Haworth after all that you owe the fact that the place is growing," said Ffrench.

There came an evening, when on entering the drawing-room of a county potentate with whom she and her father were to dine, Rachel Ffrench found herself looking directly at Haworth, who stood in the center of a group of guests. They were talking to him with an air of great interest and listening to his off-hand replies with actual respect. Suddenly the tide had turned. Before the evening had passed the man was a lion, and all the more a lion because he had been so long tabooed. He went in to dinner with the lady patroness, and she afterward announced her intention of calling upon his mother in state.

"There is a rough candor about the man, my dear," she said, "which one must respect, and it appears that he has really reformed."

There was no difficulty after this. Mrs. Haworth had visitors every day, who came and examined her and wondered, and, somehow, were never displeased by her tender credulity. She admired them all and believed in them, and was always ready with tears and relief for their pensioners and charities.

"Don't thank me, ma'am," she would say. "Don't never thank me, for it's not me that deserves it, but him that's so ready and generous to every one that suffers. There never was such a kind heart before, it seems to me, ma'am, nor such a lovin' one."

Haworth's wealth, his success, his open-handedness, his past sins, were the chief topics of conversation. To speak of Broxton was to speak of the man who had made it what it was by his daring and his power, and who was an absolute ruler over it and its inhabitants.

Ffrench was a triumphant man. He was a potentate also; he could ride his hobby to the sound of applause. When he expatiated upon "processes," he could gain an audience which was attentive and appreciative. He had not failed this time, at least, and was put down as a shrewd fellow after all.

In the festivities which seemed, somehow, the result of this sudden revulsion of feeling, Rachel Ffrench was naturally a marked figure. Among the women, with whom she was not exactly a favorite, it was still conceded that she was not a young woman whom it was easy to ignore. Her beauty—of which it was impossible to say that she was conscious—was of a type not to be rivaled. When she entered a room, glancing neither to right nor left, those who had seen her before unavoidably looked again, and those who had not were silent as she passed. There was a delicate suggestion of indifference in her manner, which might be real or might not. Her demeanor toward Haworth never altered, even to the extent of the finest shadow of change.

When they were in a room together his eye followed her with stealthy vigilance, and her knowledge of the fact was not a disturbing one. The intensity of her consciousness was her great strength. She was never unprepared. When he approached her she met him with her little untranslatable smile. He might be bold, or awkward, or desperate, but he never found her outwardly conscious or disturbed, or a shade colder or warmer.

It was only natural that it should not be long before others saw what she, seeing, showed no knowledge of. It was easily seen that he made no effort at concealment. His passion revealed itself in every look and gesture. He could not have controlled it if he would, and would not if he could.