Rogues and Vagabonds

by George R. Sims

His first impulse had been to leave the whole of his estate to charity, but the pride of race was strong upon him.

Since the days when Cromwell rewarded his bravest followers with the lands of the Royalists, the Heritages had been lords of the old hall and the land about it. If he left all to charity the estates would have to be sold. After a long and anxious consideration the squire determined on leaving his property to preserve the name, and yet to leave his fortune where it would be well used.

He had never renewed his old friendship with John Adrian, which had been interrupted when they both fell in love with the gentle lady Heritage afterwards married.

John had not broken his heart when pretty Ruth Patmore gave the preference to the wealthy young country squire. He had taken the defeat like a sensible fellow, and later on had himself married and been comparatively happy. But that a remembrance of the old romance survived was evident when he named his little daughter Ruth.

Though the Heritages and the Adrians never met, they heard of each other from mutual friends, and after his wife’s death the squire had once or twice inquired especially after Ruth.

He had heard that she had met with a disappointment in love, and also of her pure end noble life, her labours among the poor, and the extent to which she tried to do good with the means at her command.

There was something of sentiment in it, perhaps, but he could not help thinking how fortunate Adrian had been in his daughter and how unfortunate he had been in his son.

Brooding over the past, and comparing it with the present, it was not wonderful that the image of Ruth Adrian rose before him often as he thought of his ungrateful son.

When he was brooding over the scheme of the new will which he had determined to make, and had abandoned the idea of leaving his fortune to charitable institutions, again his mind reverted to Ruth Adrian.

Gradually a vague idea formed itself, which by degrees assumed a definite shape. There would be something of poetic justice in benefiting the daughter of his old rival, the girl who bore his dead wife’s name. Had God granted him a daughter he would have named her Ruth too—Ruth Heritage. The name lingered in his mind, and the sweet memories flowed ones more over the grave ox the buried years.