The Heart of a Mystery

by T. W. Speight

There was no need, however, to make any sudden or immediate change at the Cottage. John was to go a month on trial, and should everything prove satisfactory at the end of that time, then would a new home in one of the metropolitan suburbs have to be looked for and settled upon and the dreaded change made. Neither by John nor his sister was the probable change regarded with more apprehension than by Hermia and her lover. They would be parted; they could only hope to see each other at infrequent intervals; the thought was infinitely bitter to both, but it was a bitterness which they kept to themselves and only spoke of to each other. Not for worlds would they have added to the weight of regret which Uncle John and Aunt Charlotte had put up with already.

Monday morning came in due course, and John took his departure for London by the seven o'clock train.

[CHAPTER XXIV.]

ENTER MR. HODGSON.

Mention has been made of a certain Mr. Hodgson, as being the intermediary through whom John Brancker and his sister received into their charge and keeping the little three-years-old child, Hermia Rivers. It has also been told how the said Mr. Hodgson was in the habit of calling upon John once a year, apparently with the object of satisfying himself that Hermia was alive and well, and that everything, as far as she was concerned, was progressing satisfactorily.

Mr. Hodgson's annual visit, the date of which he made a point of communicating to John beforehand, had nearly always taken place during the month of April, but this year he wrote some weeks earlier than usual to announce that he might be looked for at Nairn Cottage on the following day. The letter came to hand about a week after John's departure for London; but Miss Brancker, feeling sure who it was from, made no scruple about opening it.

The notice given was so short that there was no time to communicate with John previously to Mr. Hodgson's arrival, so Miss Brancker, who had met the lawyer several times already, made up her mind to "tackle" him single-handed; indeed, she was rather glad than otherwise that on this occasion her brother happened to be out of the way. More than once since a certain discussion John had avowed his intention of turning over the twelve hundred pounds to Mr. Hodgson when next he saw him, and after explaining to him of what it consisted, telling him in plain terms that he would have nothing more to do with it. Miss Brancker, however, had other views in her mind as to the ultimate destination of the money of which she said nothing to anyone, and she was determined not to touch on the question with Mr. Hodgson.

There was one point as to which she decided that it might be advisable to enlighten her visitor. She would make no secret of Hermia's engagement to Clement Hazeldine. If the girl had any parents or near relatives living, it seemed no more than right--their having discarded her when a child, notwithstanding--that such an important event in her life should be made known to them, although whether it would receive their sanction, supposing them to interest themselves in the matter at all, and what would be the result if it did not, were questions which the future alone could determine.

"In any case," said the spinster to herself, "if my telling Mr. Hodgson results in nothing else, it may, perhaps, have the effect of bringing to light some facts connected with Hermia's parentage and the history of her early years. If the knowledge that she is engaged to be married fails to do so, we may give up all hope of ever learning more than we know at present."

Mr. Hodgson presented himself at the Cottage in due course. He was a thin, dried-up atomy of a man, apparently close on seventy years of age, with a very remarkably developed aquiline nose--a nose which not infrequently caused irreverent boys to make rude remarks as he passed them in the street. Miss Brancker had told Hermia that she was expecting him, and although the girl's color changed for the moment, she received the news with a sort of proud indifference, and as though it were a matter which could be of no possible concern to her.