"I begin to think so too, Miss Barham," replied Harry Martin; "and one thing more I will say, which is, that I know what will make me the happiest man alive."
"What is that?" said Helen; "I am sure if it be possible for me to help you I will. I cannot forget that, besides sparing my life when many other people would have taken it, you aided to deliver my brother from the power of those who would have most basely used the means of injuring him which they possessed. Tell me what it is; I am far more capable of doing something to show my gratitude now, than I have ever been before, and if money--"
"No, no!" exclaimed Harry Martin, "it is not money that I want, Miss Barham! All I wish for is an opportunity of serving you. But do you know, Miss Barham," he added, after a moment's pause, "I am almost sorry to hear you have money to spare."
"Why so?" said Helen, in some surprise.
"Why, I don't know well how to tell you what I mean," replied Harry Martin; "but it's this, you see, Miss Barham from what I know, I don't see how you or your brother can have much money to spare, if he gets it in a way that may not some time or another bring you into a worse scrape than the last."
Helen Barham's habit of blushing had not been lost, even in all the painful scenes she had lately gone through, and the blood came warm into her cheek at the man's words, though she knew that they were not intended to offend or pain her. There was something in them, however, which caused her mind instantly to refer to her late position--to the position of danger and temptation in which she had been placed when first she was presented to the reader's eyes--and the very thought made the true modesty of her young and candid heart shrink as if from contamination.
"You are mistaken, in this instance," she said, mildly; "a great change has taken place in our situation. I cannot tell you all the particulars, for I do not know them; and, indeed, I believe on some account I have been purposely kept in the dark--but it has been discovered that a large property rightly belonging to my brother has been kept from him. It was old Mr. Carr who first told me of the facts; since then, the matter has been referred to several London lawyers, who are so perfectly convinced the property cannot be withheld any longer, that the solicitor is quite willing to advance my brother any money that he needs--more so, indeed, than I could wish--for William is yet too young to use it rightly."
"He'll never be old enough," replied Harry Martin; "but, however, whatever is for your good is a blessing; and, I trust, notwithstanding, though God may give you, young lady, the fortune you well deserve, I shall some day be able to show you my gratitude. I wont ask to see your brother, Miss Barham, for the meeting would not be very pleasant to him or to me, but I can tell him one thing, if he would have health or happiness either, he must live a very different life from that which he was following when I knew him. Why, we ourselves, who did not stick at a trifle, as you may well suppose, used to get sick of his way of going on."
Helen Barham cast down her eyes, and for a moment or two made no reply. It was painful enough for her to think that her brother should ever have been the companion of the man who stood before her; but to bear that even the profligates, the lawless, and the reckless, were outdone by the son of her own mother, was terrible indeed. Her silence, however, arose from other sensations, likewise produced in her bosom by the words of Harry Martin. The stores of the past, the things that have been--ay, and the things that are--are often garnered up in our hearts like the inflammable substances of a magazine, apparently cold and lifeless, but requiring only a spark to blaze forth. That spark is frequently a mere accidental word; a look, a tone will sometimes communicate the flame. There had been a deep anxiety preying upon Helen Barham for some weeks, a new anxiety, a fresh grief, which mingled with all the others painful feelings in her bosom, and produced a sort of dread, which cast an additional gloom over every prospect. She had remarked in her brother a bright red spot in the pale cheek, increasing towards nightfall, an eye full of unnatural lustre, a hurried and fluttering respiration, a slight but frequent cough--all of which she had seen once before in another, a few months previous to the time when the turf was laid upon her mother's head. She had questioned him eagerly and often; she had endeavoured to prevent him from committing excess in various ways, but he had always insisted that he was quite well, and any attempt to restrain his inclinations seemed but to irritate him, and to drive him to wild extremes. Lately she had tried hard, and successfully, to shut out his state of health from her mind: she had kept the truth at a distance; but the words of Harry Martin not only opened her eyes, and showed her that her brother was hurrying on towards death, but that it was his own deed.
"I fear," she said, in reply--"I fear that his health has suffered very much! Indeed, he is anything but well; and I trust, when all this business is settled, to induce him to try a better climate."