THE SECOND VOLUME

CHAPTER

  1. [The Cub]
  2. [Moonshine and Diamonds]
  3. [Paste]
  4. [The Oxenham Arms]
  5. [A Levée]
  6. [The Shekel]
  7. [Cobbledick's Rheumatics]
  8. [Caught in the Act]
  9. [A Race]
  10. [Between Cup and Lip]
  11. [Joyce's Patient]
  12. [Destitute]
  13. [Transformation]
  14. [Herring's Stockings]
  15. [Beggary]
  16. [Mirelle's Guests]
  17. [A Second Summons]
  18. [A Virgin Martyr]
  19. [Welltown]
  20. [Noel! Noel!]

JOHN HERRING.

CHAPTER XXI.

THE CUB.

Mirelle was conscious of a change in Trecarrel towards her. She ceased to engross his attentions, which were now directed towards Orange. She could not recall anything she had said or done that would account for this change. When the Captain was alone with her, he was full of sympathy and tenderness as before, but this was only when they were alone. Trecarrel argued with himself that it would be unfair and ungentlemanly to throw her over abruptly. He would lower her into the water little by little, but the souse must come eventually. Some of the martyrs were let down inch by inch into boiling pitch, others were cast in headlong, and the fate of the latter was the preferable, and the judge who sentenced to it was the most humane. Mirelle suffered. For the first time in her life her heart had been roused, and it threw out its fibres towards Trecarrel for support. She was young, an exile, among those who were no associates, and he was the only person to whom she could disclose her thoughts and with whom she could converse as an equal. He had met her with warmth and with assurances of sympathy. Of late he had drawn back, and she had been left entirely to herself, whilst his attention was engrossed by Orange Tramplara.

But Orange, with no small spice of vindictiveness in her nature, urged the Captain to show civility to Mirelle. She knew the impression Trecarrel had made on her cousin's heart, and, now that she was sure of the Captain, she was ready to encourage him to play with and torture her rival. Women are only cruel to their own sex, and towards them they are remorseless.

'Do speak to Mirelle, she is so lonely. She does not get on with us. She does not understand our ways, she is Frenchified,' said Orange, with an amiable smile. The Captain thought this very kind of his betrothed, and was not slow to avail himself of the permission. Nevertheless, Mirelle perceived the insincerity of his profession. She was unaware of the engagement. This had not been talked about, and was by her unsuspected. Orange was well aware of the fascination exerted over Trecarrel by Mirelle: she knew that her own position with him had been threatened, almost lost. She was unable to forgive her cousin for her unconscious rivalry. She did not attempt to forgive her. She sought the surest means of punishing her. Mirelle was uneasy and unhappy. She considered all that had passed between her and Trecarrel. He had not professed more than fraternal affection, but his manner had implied more than his words had expressed. She became silent and abstracted, not more than usual towards the Trampleasures, for she had never spoken more than was necessary to them, nor had opened to them in the least, but silent before Trecarrel, and abstracted from her work at all times. The frank confidence she had accorded him was withdrawn, their interchange of ideas interrupted. She found herself now with no one to whom she could unfold, and she suffered the more acutely for having allowed herself to open at all. She began now to wish that John Herring were nearer, and to suspect that she had not treated him with sufficient consideration.

Mirelle was not jealous of Orange: she was surprised that Captain Trecarrel should find attractions in her. Mirelle had formed her own conception of her cousin's character; she thought her to be generous, warm, and impulsive; coarse in mind and feeling, but yet kindly. How could a gentleman such as the Captain find charms in such a person? Mirelle did not see the money, nor did she measure correctly the character of Orange.