Rogues and Vagabonds

by George R. Sims

It was Marston’s first visit to the Adrians for some time. He had been engaged on ‘important business,’ but he had not allowed Ruth’s little note to remain unanswered.

He had written, telling her that he had been successful in a great undertaking, and that now he was in a position to offer her a home and devote himself solely to making her happy.

He had met Ruth, too, and the old romance of their lives had been reopened at a second volume.

It is in the third volume that everybody is generally made happy, and it was to the third volume which Marston was now anxious to turn.

He had conquered the fortress once more. It had been but weakly defended. One by one, the barriers had gone down before the weapons which Marston brought to bear upon it. The old love had never died out—it had but languished awhile; and now that Ruth believed Marston to be leading a new life, and to be the brave, honest-hearted, good fellow she once prayed that he might become, she was thankful he had never met that good woman she had once prayed might be flung in his path.

Who can explain the workings of a woman’s heart? Who can dissect it, and show the complex machinery which governs its marvellous performances? To attempt such a task would be to court ignominious failure. I only know that Ruth Adrian, pure, good, and noble as she was, loved Edward Marston, and trusted him as blindly and devotedly as ever, in spite of the rude shock her faith had once received, in spite of the many doubts with which her heart had been beset since his reappearance on the horizon that bounded her little world. Her love was strengthened and confirmed by the very fact that once he had led an evil life, that once she had been compelled to snap the link, and bid him go his way and leave her to go hers.

She found herself now hungering for a word from him, waiting about where he was to pass, meeting him under all the romantic circumstances of a first courtship. At twenty-eight her heart beat as quickly when he came as it had done when she was eighteen. It seemed to her that their separation and the long ordeal through which they had both passed had but purified and intensified their love.

Even the element of secrecy which, as much for her own sake as for his, Marston imported into the romance was not without its harm. Ruth knew now that both her mother and father would be opposed to her match. She saw that Gurth Egerton was in high favour, and, so far as they were concerned, would be a formidable rival to her poor Ned. But she was her own mistress now, and could decide for herself. Gurth Egerton was a very pleasant gentleman, but he came too late. She had no heart left to give. Marston had won it long ago, and now he had the right to claim it.

When Marston called, he did so by Ruth’s advice. She didn’t want Gurth Egerton to have the field entirely to himself. She was sure Marston was quite as agreeable as he was.

Of course she had told Marston about Gurth—about the tea-party and his constant visits. Of the interview with her father she herself knew nothing. Marston was seriously alarmed. He remembered his interview with Gurth, and he felt that it would not do to despise such a foe too much.