INTERFERENCE.

A Novel.

BY
B. M. CROKER,
AUTHOR OF
“PROPER PRIDE,” “PRETTY MISS NEVILLE,”
“A BIRD OF PASSAGE,” “DIANA BARRINGTON,”
“TWO MASTERS,” &c.

IN THREE VOLUMES.
VOL. II.

London:
F. V. WHITE & CO.,
31, SOUTHAMPTON STREET, STRAND, W.C.
1891.

PRINTED BY
KELLY & CO., MIDDLE MILL, KINGSTON-ON-THAMES;
AND GATE STREET, LINCOLN’S INN FIELDS, W.C.

CONTENTS.

INTERFERENCE.

CHAPTER I.
“INTERRUPTED.”

“It is a familiar beast to man, and signifies love.”

—Merry Wives of Windsor.

Betty had been unremitting in her attention to Miss Dopping all through the winter, and her virtue was not to be her sole reward! The old lady hired a pair of posters, and drove out to Noone in her mother’s green chariot, and had a long private interview with Mrs. Redmond. She was going to the Moores of Roskeen for a week, and they had asked her to bring Betty.—It would be by no means Betty’s first visit to that part of the world. She and Kathleen Moore were bosom friends; indeed she was a great favourite with the whole family. But this visit would be a more solemn occasion; as Miss Dopping represented to Mrs. Redmond, her young friend was now eighteen, it was manifestly high time she came out; she might make her début at Lord Enniscorthy’s ball. She might go with the Moores, and Miss Dopping herself would chaperone her, and provide her dress! Mrs. Redmond hesitated. Ought not Betty to come out under her wing?

“Not at all, my good creature,” replied the other promptly. “You have your own chick to look after” (“and a pretty old chick too,” she remarked inwardly). “I’ve known Betty long before you ever heard of her existence. She is my child. I owe her many a pleasant hour, and she shall owe some pleasant hours to me.”

Miss Dopping was fully determined to carry her point, and when she took her leave, Mrs. Redmond had given her a promise to “see about it,” and let her know before post time next day.

Now promising to “see about it,” really meant consulting Belle. What would she say to Betty’s coming out? Strange to say Belle bore the news surprisingly well! It was true that she was a little jealous of her cousin appearing with éclat in the suite of the Moores, for the Moores were great social magnates, and took but scant notice of Belle and her mother. (They were strangers in a county where it takes ten years at least to ingratiate yourself with the old residents.)

It was a triumphant fact that Lady Mary Moore had left cards at Noone, thanks to Miss Dopping’s good offices, but a slight lowering of the eyelids was the only salutation she ever vouchsafed to Bel and the Dragon.

She had seen the former at a fancy ball, clothed in smiles and a little tulle, and had taken a prejudice against her on the spot—the prejudice of a prudent mother with two marriageable sons.

“Of course Betty must come out some time or other,” thought Belle as she carefully considered the situation; and Miss Dopping and Maria Finny had been making disagreeable speeches about her costumes, and her occupations. For instance, Maria had said in her most aggressive manner: “I suppose your mother is making a fine purse for Betty! We all know she has two hundred a year of her own, and her dress and board cannot cost thirty; indeed she is as good as two servants—and saves that much.”

“What a kind interest you take in our concerns!” returned Belle, with blazing eyes, and a quiver in her voice.

“I do,” replied Maria with fearless frankness, “and it’s your interest to know that every one in the place is talking of the shabby way that Betty is dressed; they say she wears your cast-off dresses, but I cannot believe that, for I’ve seen you in things that I daren’t offer to a beggar woman.”

Belle had made a mental note of this conversation. It would never do to have people gossiping, or to be supposed to ill-use Betty, who was a popular favourite—that would be very bad policy; unpleasant hints might come to George’s ears, and it was essential that he should only hear complimentary remarks about Noone. Betty, if she went to Roskeen, would be staying in his neighbourhood; possibly he would be at Roskeen itself! She would be able to report on his doings, and tell her if he was flirting with anyone! Unsophisticated Betty should be her spy in the land. Moreover the ball would be no expense. Miss Dopping had guaranteed that; her cousin could never be her rival, no matter how she was dressed. And after revolving all these matters in her mind, she came to the gracious conclusion that “Betty might go.”

Happy Betty! who had never suspected that her fate was trembling in the balance, was all gay chatter and high spirits, as she and her adviser laid their heads together, to choose a gown from patterns, and Belle (who could be most generous and unselfish at other people’s expense) selected a most recherché and elegant white ball dress, not forgetting such important details as shoes, and fan, and gloves. She even offered to endow her beaming relative with some of her own less becoming belongings.

“There’s my grey dress would fit you, with very little alteration, and you can have my red bonnet if you like.”

“No, no,” returned Betty hastily, “I shall do very well; you know the Moores don’t dress much, and I have my new serge, and my black lace for the evenings, and you can re-trim my brown hat.”

These two respectable frocks were the immediate result of Maria Finny’s warning; her conversation (considerably watered down) had been repeated to Mrs. Redmond, with this insignificant issue.

“They do dress,” repeated Belle, “and there is that little American heiress there. She is certain to be a swell. I wonder if she will set her cap at George Holroyd; or Kathleen Moore may take his fancy! Mind you write and let me know if he makes love to any of the girls over there. Now promise me this, Betty!” she urged impressively.

“But I am only going for a week,” objected Betty, “and you will see him at the ball yourself.”

“Well, at any rate promise to write and tell me all the news.”

“I don’t suppose there will be much news, but of course I shall write you if you wish, though I hate writing letters.”

A few days later, Betty was driving down Ballingoole, seated beside Miss Dopping in the old green chariot; they were on their way to Roskeen, a distance of fifteen miles.

Roskeen was a fine country place, kept up in suitable style, thanks to Lady Mary’s comfortable fortune in the Three per Cents; the shooting was well preserved, the stables were full, the house luxuriously furnished in a modern fashion. Soft Persian carpets covered the floors, velvet portières draped the doors, the walls were lined with fine paintings, there was a music-room, a billiard-room, a winter garden, and a French cook! and there was never an instant’s hesitation in people’s minds about accepting an invitation to Roskeen. Betty faithfully fulfilled her promise. A few days after her departure, her anxious cousin received the following letter:—

“My dear Belle,—We arrived on Monday in time for dinner, and are the only people staying here, besides Sir James and Lady Lucas, Mr. Holroyd and Miss Pink, the American girl; she is engaged to a cousin at home, and is going to be married when she has enough of travelling and seeing the world. She has been all round the globe once with her brother, and says she had a perfectly splendid time, and she feels as if she would like to go again. She is slight, plain, and dark, and plays and sings beautifully and talks a great deal; her tongue and fingers are always busy and she has the energy of half-a-dozen. I like her, so does everyone. We are very busy getting up tableaux vivants. Fred is at home on leave, and more conceited than ever. Miss Pink has taken him in hand. She told him to his face that she called him very ugly, and that one of his eyes was certainly larger than the other! Ghosty is almost quite well, but still wears his arm in a sling. I think Kathleen is much admired by Mr. Blake of Blakestown, at any rate he comes here nearly every day on some transparent excuse. We have had a good deal of rain, but we do not mind, for we play games, and have music, and billiards, and go for long walks when it clears, and in the evenings we dance. The ball is, as you know, on Tuesday. I am looking forward to it with great pleasure. My dress fits like a glove. I have tried it on, and it looks lovely. Flora Pink says that it is as well made as her Paris frocks, and she never saw anything so cunning as the cut of the sleeves! Miss Dopping is enjoying herself just as much as I am—in her own way. She and Granny Moore discuss old times for hours together. It seems so queer to hear them calling each other Sally and Polly. Katie is screaming for me to come and play hide-and-go-seek, so good-bye for the present.

“Your affectionate cousin,
“Elizabeth Redmond.”

“Dancing and games, and hide-and-go-seek!” muttered Belle. “There is nothing like a few days in a country house for bringing people together, and promoting intimacy. Three days, above all three wet days, are better than a hundred balls. However there is luckily no one for George Holroyd to fall in love with. Katie is as good as engaged, the heiress is disposed of—and there is no one else!”

Strange as it may appear, she never cast a thought to Betty. Her remark about wet days in a country house was perfectly just. In those wet days, Betty was the life of Roskeen. She had known the Moores for years; they all—even Ghosty and Fred—called her by her Christian name; she was invariably gay, obliging, and good-tempered, ready for anything, from a game of fox and geese, to a drive on the box seat of Colonel Moore’s drag. George Holroyd saw her now in a new light! A favoured guest, among luxurious surroundings, bright and pretty, and admired (too much admired to please him, for Ghosty followed her about like her shadow), Katie appealed to her opinion on every occasion, Lady Mary stroked her hair affectionately, and Flora Pink was loud in her praises, and said that she “just adored her.”

“I do like you,” said Flora, with a childlike frankness as they sat over the fire in Betty’s room; “and shall I tell you something—some one likes you better than I do, and that’s Mr. Holroyd. You see I know all the signs and tokens, for I have gotten a lover of my own.”

“Nonsense, Flora, how can you be so silly!”

“Yes, I noticed how he looked at you, when you were dressed up in that splendid old brocade, with your hair powdered, the night of the tableaux, do you mind? And he is so jealous when you are talking to Ghosty; he is a perfectly lovely young man—Great Scott! Betty! you needn’t look so angry. Have some candy.”

The evening of the dance came at last, and as George Holroyd leisurely descended the stairs, previous to taking his seat in the Moores’ comfortable family omnibus, he noticed a charming figure flitting down before him—a girl in her ball dress! She paused to take one last fond look in the great glass on the first landing. It was Betty, beautified—a fashionable young lady, in a misty, white gown, a pearl necklace, and long gloves. She carried a bouquet, too; now who had given her this bouquet? He approached softly on the Turkey carpet, and looking over her shoulder observed:

“Most satisfactory, is it not?”

“Oh!” blushing and turning round, “how you startled me, and I am quite nervous enough as it is.”

“Really you must find that an entirely new sensation! Pray allow me to feel your pulse?”

“No, no, thank you,” with a smile, “I am not quite so bad as that, but I have never been to any kind of dance—except the school breaking-up dances, and I have not an idea of what a ball will be like!” and she looked at him with bright, excited eyes.

“Shall I tell you?” he said, as they reached the great carpeted hall, with its two generous fireplaces, and seated themselves on a large Eastern divan. “A native syce, who had the good luck to obtain a peep of his master in a ball-room, was overheard describing his performances, something in this way—to a brother syce:

“‘First he gallops her about, then he walks her slowly round to cool her, then he gives her water, then he gives her gram’—(that is to say, refreshments)—‘then he goes and gallops some one else.’”

“I don’t think many people will gallop me,” said Betty, laughing, “I know so few! But, at any rate, I shall not do like a friend of Miss Pink’s. She goes and stays in the ladies’ dressing-room, when she is not engaged—lest people should see her sitting out!”

“There is no fear that you will be driven to such a desperate expedient,” returned George with twinkling eyes. “I hope you are going to give me the first waltz.”

“No, I promised it to Fred a week ago. You know I did.”

“The first dance, then,” he urged, “even if it is a square. I am not proud.”

She shook her head emphatically as she replied, “Ghosty bespoke that a year ago.”

“Hang Ghosty! I am sorry I did not leave him at the bottom of that ditch! At any rate you will give me two waltzes, and the supper dance to begin with?”

“Yes, to begin with and end with. Miss Dopping says that in her day it was not correct to dance with any one more than twice.”

“Minuets I presume! and as they took up best part of an hour, I am with her there. Here comes Fred, chortling to himself as he walks. Look at his beautiful shoes, and the gold buttons on his waistcoat.”

“Hullo,” he exclaimed, “down first; Betty, you are an early bird—we will not say anything about the worm,” glancing at George. “What a ripping bouquet! Now I know what old Ghosty was fuming and fussing about, he got it over from Covent Garden.”

“From Covent Garden,” echoed the young lady, “when there are lovely flowers in the hothouses here.”

“Yes, but it’s more swagger to get ’em from town. Remember the first waltz is ours—we will show them how it ought to be done.”

“Speak for yourself! I know I dance abominably. I only hope that I shall not make too humbling an exhibition of myself.”

“At least you don’t waltz as if you were going to sit down, nor cling to a fellow as if you were drowning,” said Fred consolingly. “Here they come at last. Miss Pink, you are the pink of perfection. I guess you are going to give me 2, and 5 and 9.”

“No, I expect you will have to guess again,” said Miss Pink drily.

“Of course I know you are engaged. The knowledge has aged me by years.”

“I wonder you ain’t ashamed, Mr. Fred! I truly do. Your jokes throw a gloom over the whole place—why should you try to damp our little pleasure?”

By this time the hall was full—Lady Mary, in a blaze of family diamonds, Colonel Moore in a sad, dejected state of mind, Miss Dopping in black velvet, with magnificent Mechlin lace—who would suppose this somewhat stately old lady to be the self-same Sally, who wore a poke bonnet, short woollen skirts, and was followed in her walks by a train of hungry beggars, instead of these yards of the finest Genoa pile? The party from Roskeen drove over to Lord Enniscorthy’s seat, the scene of the festivity, in a comfortable, well-warmed private omnibus. Flora Pink, Kathleen, and Fred, kept the ball of conversation rolling, but Betty was too nervous, and too full of delightful anticipations to talk much. How her heart beat, as they drove under the grand entrance porch, and stepped out upon red cloth! Ghosty Moore gave her his sound arm, and a programme; in another moment she was among the crowd of strange faces—and presented to Lady Enniscorthy, a stout elderly woman, with a large nose, who smiled on her graciously, and then they passed on into the ball-room. She danced the first lancers with Ghosty, and this gave her time to compose herself, look about her, and regain her self-possession. Several pairs of eyes were fixed on her, and people asked: “Who was the pretty, tall girl who had come with the Moores?” To hear that “she was nobody in particular, only Mrs. Redmond’s niece,” was rather a disappointment. After the dance, Betty and her partner walked about and recognised their acquaintances—the Malones for instance, who seized on Betty as upon a long lost friend—Mrs. Malone looking flushed and nervous, in a new black brocade, the Major pompous and talkative, Denis in gloves much too large, and shoes much too small, holding his nose high in the air, and affecting to look down upon the whole thing.

Then there were the Finnys, in a retired nook, which commanded a good view—Mrs. Finny pitifully abject, Maria grim and defiant, hardly knowing a soul in the room, save by sight.

Here the sensible reader will naturally ask, “Why did they come?” They came to protest their gentility; their right to be classed among the “county” gentry, and more particularly, Mrs. Finny came, because Maria made her—and Maria came, because the scene gave her food for discourse for the next twelve months. She enjoyed the delights of sitting in Jane Bolland’s back parlour, and vivisecting the present gay and unsuspecting company. The Major was in his element, and in considerable request among luckless elderly spinsters, whom he made happy by his attentions—by giving them one dance, so that they could say, “Oh, dear me, yes, it was a capital floor, I danced of course.” He took starving dowagers into the refreshment room, and quite a convoy of old ladies (of position) down to supper; whilst Mrs. Malone watched her son (her eldest son) with proud and eager eyes, and pointed him out with undisguised triumph to her immediate neighbours: “That’s my son George, coming this way now with Lady Armine Fitzmaurice,” or “that is my eldest son, dancing with Betty Redmond.” It was agreed—even by Maria Finny—that Betty looked well, was one of the prettiest girls in the room—in short that she was a great credit to Ballingoole. She was in enviable request, surrounded by would-be partners, and Fred—who had not been quite certain as to how she would “take”—now pestered her for half the dances on her programme, and advertised his intimacy by calling her “Betty” across a set of lancers. George did not mind him, but he was really jealous of Ghosty. An innocent hunting friend had pointed him out to him, as “Booked for pretty Betty Redmond. It was true she had next to no fortune, but the Moores all liked her, and it was a settled thing.” His waltz with Betty came at last; it was only number five, so the evening was not so very far advanced, but for him, it was only just about to begin.

“I did not know that the Major danced,” he exclaimed, as he watched his step-father revolving round the room like a big humming-top.

“Yes—he is very fond of balls,” replied Betty, “and, until lately, he wore his full dress tunic on every possible occasion, until it was agony to him, and he said he could not put the tip of his finger inside his waist-belt; now he is at a loss to know what to do with his uniform. What can you suggest?”

“He might stuff it, and set it up in his study, as an effigy of himself,” returned George shortly. “Our next dance is number twelve, is it not? May I see your card?”

“Yes, of course.”

“You are dancing the next with Denis. What sort of a performer is he?”

“Well,” smiling, “I may tell you in confidence, that Fred Moore says in a small room he is dangerous, but he will have lots of scope here.”

“Why do you not give him a square?” expostulated his step-brother.

“I offered him a square—I begged of him, almost with tears in my eyes, but he would not hear of it; as it is, he is offended; ‘out’ with me, as they say.”

“Although you have agreed to sacrifice yourself,” returned George as he led her into a passage. “He deserves to be put to death to slow music.”

In this passage they came face to face with Mrs. Redmond and Belle. Belle, in a yellow gown, was looking quite her best; a slight soupçon of rouge set off her dark eyes—eyes that sparkled with unusual brilliancy.

“Oh, Betty, so there you are!” accosting her, with much animation. “And Mr. Holroyd! We have only just arrived; we had Casey’s covered car, and it is so slow! I know scarcely anyone here, Mr. Holroyd; so I have put you down for three waltzes and an extra,” holding out her programme playfully. “Now you must leave Betty to talk to mother, and to tell her all she has been doing, and who gave her that lovely bouquet, and take poor me round the rooms.” And before George could realize the fact, she had walked him away, with her neatly gloved hand on his arm, leaving Betty in her own place—yes, Belle was undoubtedly a clever girl. It would have fared ill with Betty, had not Ghosty Moore (with the eye of love) discovered her—for Mrs. Redmond had towed her off to the white drawing-room—the haunt of dowagers only—and there she seated herself on a sofa beside her victim, and proceeded to cross-examine her, whilst at the same time she endeavoured to “catch the eye” and recognition of various haughty, high-fed old ladies. As long as Belle was enjoying herself, what did it matter about Betty? And she did not choose to sit alone; by and by she hoped to figuratively harpoon a substantial county magnate, who would take her down to supper, but she was certainly not going to herd with the Finnys and Malones! However, her young kinswoman was speedily carried off by an eligible young man, to take part in the ensuing waltz, and she was left to the tender mercies of Maria Finny, who had just discovered her—and who, perceiving that the old lady wished to ignore her acquaintance as much as possible, attached herself to her like a social “burr”—for the remainder of the evening!

Betty watched Belle, and her partner, floating round; they were admirable dancers both. What a pretty figure Belle had, and how wonderfully long-winded she must be, for her lips were moving incessantly. She talked as it were into her partner’s ear the whole time she was dancing, and as she subsequently walked about with him, in conspicuous companionship, her vivacity, her sparkling dark beauty, and smart ball dress, made her the cynosure of many eyes. Mr. Holroyd danced once more with Betty, the dance before supper. He had been, he thought, rather clever about this, as he led her, when it was over, into a little boudoir; there was no one in it but themselves. Now was his opportunity! Now he would put his fate in her hands. He stood on the hearth-rug, and lent his elbow firmly on the chimneypiece—but in spite of that, his arm shook; whilst she fanned herself slowly with her new white feather fan, and gazed into the fire.

“I hope you did not mind my leaving you that time,” he began nervously.

“Not at all,” she returned looking up at him; “why should I? Of course it was quite natural that you should go with Belle.”

“You think it quite natural that I should leave you for her?”

“Yes, of course I do,” she answered with a little nod and smile, but her pulses were throbbing fast.

“Then you are mistaken, Betty,” he said leaning towards her. “If I had my own way I would never leave you as long as I——”

“Here she is! the very girl I want!” exclaimed Fred Moore, pushing back the portière.

George turned and looked at him. At this moment he had never seen anyone he disliked as much as Fred, with his round fair head, pink shiny face, comfortable little figure, gold buttons, and grin.

“Come along, Bet, you are engaged to me; come along,” he called out masterfully. “I am going to take you in to supper. Why, Betty”—scanning her curiously—“what’s this; you are as red as a rose; you are actually blushing. I never saw you blush before. Betty, you have performed a feat!”

“I—I—how can you be so silly,” she stammered. “I don’t want any supper, but if you like I’ll go with you and look on.”

“Nonsense; you need not be showing off before Holroyd. You have as fine an appetite as any girl I know; Holroyd, you come along too—you may. We will get to a little table by ourselves, and do a good business with oysters, and truffled boar’s head, and champagne—you could not be in better hands than mine—and that’s sound.”

Perhaps George would have accepted this invitation to the unpopular post of “third” party, but for Belle, who entered with a partner at this moment, and said with an air of playful proprietorship:

“Oh, Mr. Holroyd, this is most fortunate! I know I can depend upon you to look after poor mamma—here she is—she says she is quite faint with hunger.”

Mrs. Redmond—who had at last shaken off Maria—was in a bland and chatty frame of mind, although intensely occupied with various toothsome comestibles—soup, salmon, ducklings, pâté de foie gras, all of which received her very best attention. She remained a long time in the supper-room—with George, so to speak, chained to the stake, and never noticed how silent and preoccupied he was; how often his eyes wandered to a little table, at which sat Betty, Miss Pink, and the brothers Moore, nor how restless he became, after they had risen and departed. Lady Mary was a fussy chaperon, and by the time Mr. Holroyd and his charge had returned to the ball-room, she and her young ladies were nowhere to be seen—they had gone home!

Poor George! He had never wished Mrs. Redmond at Jericho! Never!

CHAPTER II.
“FOXY JOE TELLS TALES.”

“For every inch that is not a fool is a rogue.”

—Dryden.

Miss Pink, who was in the highest spirits, followed Betty into her bed-room, when they arrived home from the ball, and offered to unlace her dress, if Betty would do the same kind office for her.

“You looked perfectly beautiful,” she exclaimed, kissing her, “and did you not have a lovely time. Oh, my!”

Betty agreed that she had had a lovely time, and when, after an hour’s thorough discussion of the events of the evening, she had got rid of her vivacious companion, she wrapped herself in a shawl, and put out the candles, and went and sat in a deep window seat, to watch for the dawn, and to think. Never before had Betty’s thoughts kept her out of bed.

She was not the same gay careless Betty that we had figuratively handed into the old green chariot a week ago. No, her little simple heart now beat with delicious dazzling hopes and then fluttered with dismal dreadful fears. She had made a discovery; she found that she was continually thinking of George Holroyd, and that she liked him. Not as she liked Denis Malone, and Fred and Ghosty Moore. No, quite differently. She had a guilty knowledge that she never was so happy as when he was talking to her, and that when he was not present she was continually and secretly watching the door. Alas! poor Betty, this latter is a truly fatal symptom.

Miss Dopping was a lady who never allowed anything to interfere with her plans. When she fixed an hour for her arrival or departure, nothing less than an earthquake could alter her arrangements. At ten o’clock, the morning after the dance, she and her protégée were trotting smartly down the Roskeen avenue, behind a pair of posters, en route home. Strange to say, Mr. Holroyd made a pretext for returning to Ballingoole the following day, although pressed to remain for a most tempting meet. When he had taken his leave, Fred Moore imparted some of his ideas to his brother, over a quiet cigar in the smoking-room.

“I tell you what, Ghosty, that chap Holroyd is head over ears in love with Betty Redmond.”

“Not he,” returned his brother, contemptuously. “It’s Belle you are thinking of; did you not see him dancing with her, and towing the mother in to supper? What an old woman she is; she reminds me of a walrus shuffling about in black satin.”

“Belle asked Holroyd to dance. She has brass enough for anything, and she told him off to her mother.”

“He is always at Noone,” persisted Ghosty, “and every one says that he is after Belle; why, Betty is a mere child; it was only the other day she went into long dresses.”

“Child or not, when I went into the oak room the night of the ball, I started a fine covey, or I’m greatly mistaken. He was leaning towards her, speaking as if his life and soul depended on her answer, and her face was as red as fire. She ate no supper, not even lobster salad, and strawberry ice! That’s a very bad sign in a girl.”

But to all this his brother Augustus turned a scornful face, and a deaf ear.

Foxy Joe was no friend to Denis Malone. Denis laughed at him openly, and made a butt of him at Nolan’s, and Foxy Joe was fully resolved “to have it in for him,” as he expressed it, “yet,” although he carried his messages meanwhile, and took his money; for that matter he took every one’s messages, from dainty little pink notes from Noone, to a couple of pounds of steak for Mrs. Maccabe. She was his most constant patroness, and he saw a good deal of her, and her niece and book-keeper, pretty Lizzie, who looked so demure, as she sat behind a kind of railed-in desk, peering through the bars, with her bright dark eyes, and shovelling out greasy coppers, with her lady-like white fingers.

“A good girl,” said her aunt, in confidence to Jane Bolland (consequently in confidence to the town), “with a great head for figures, and worth her weight in gold, and though I’m against cousins marrying, if she and Dan were to set up together, it would not be a bad thing, and she might drop into my shoes!” Ridiculous idea! as if coquettish Lizzie, with her smart dresses and high heels, would ever harangue her customers in a black poke bonnet, much less wield the ox tail with a vigorous arm, and personally visit the slaughter yard!

No! Lizzie in her heart loathed the business; she was rather romantic, and there was no poetry about a butcher’s shop, and ribs and briskets. Yes, Lizzie was decidedly romantic, and it was passing sweet to her, to meet a young gentleman, by stealth, heir to a good old name and property (Heaven help your innocence, Lizzie!) and to walk along lonely lanes, with her head on his shoulder, and his arm round her waist; she was exceedingly sly, cautious and clever to have kept her secret for a whole year from lynx-eyed Ballingoole. Poor Ballingoole; that was so badly in want of some new topic of conversation. She frequently sent and received notes, placing them under a certain stone, on a certain wall, that was her private post office. Latterly Lizzie had grown bolder, and during a visit to Dublin she and Denis had had the audacity to go to the theatre, and to the circus in company, and to take a Sunday stroll on Kingstown pier; and so far they were undiscovered. The evening after Betty had returned home, from ease, and idleness, and play, to economy, and more economy and work, she went for a long walk up what was called “the bog road,” to give the dogs a run. This was their favourite direction; the cabins were few and far between, and contained a fair supply of active cats and not too many furious, ferocious lurchers, only too ready to rush out and attack three peaceable, gentlemanlike little white dogs. On her way home, in a lane not far from Bridgetstown, Betty saw two figures standing near the hedge. At first she scarcely noticed them, but on nearer approach she perceived that they were lovers—a man—a gentleman—and a girl; the girl’s hand was on his shoulder; and she seemed to be speaking to him eagerly, he replying with expressive nods, and then he suddenly raised her face by the chin, kissed her hastily, and disappeared through an adjacent gap.

They were totally unconscious of a spectator, and as the girl turned back, she came almost face to face with Betty—the girl was Lizzie Maccabe.

“Good evening, miss,” she said in some confusion.

“Lizzie, who was that you were speaking to?” enquired the young lady, in a tone of austere displeasure.

“Indeed, Miss Elizabeth, it was just a friend.”

“I could see that, but who was it?”

“Well, then, indeed, Miss Elizabeth, I don’t see what right you have to ask.”

“The same right as I would have to try and put you out, if I saw your clothes on fire, or to throw you a rope if you were drowning. You were walking with a gentleman, Lizzie.”

“And if I was, miss?” returned Lizzie, flippantly, “sure the road is not mine!”

“If you won’t tell me, I shall speak to your aunt; she had better look after you.”

“Oh, she knows I am very well able to take care of myself,” returned the other pertly, “and since you are so anxious to know, I may as well tell you, that the gentleman was just Mr. Holroyd.”

“Mr. Holroyd,” gasped Betty, who had been almost certain that she had recognised Denis.

“Yes,” continued Lizzie, who lied boldly and well, “why not him as well as another? He means no harm, nor do I; a girl must have a bit of fun, as well as young ladies.”

“He kissed you, Lizzie,” said Betty tragically.

“Well, miss, and if he did, you need not pick me eyes out! We tradespeople are not so particular as the quality; he gives me a gold locket, and I give him a kiss, where’s the harm?”

“There is great harm, Lizzie; you are not the girl I took you for.”

“Maybe then, miss, if you were to look at home you would not be so shocked at your neighbours. Maybe there’s a worse than me—maybe there’s a young lady as Mr. Holroyd can kiss for the asking.”

“I have known you for years, Lizzie, and you and I were in the same class in Sunday school; rude as you are, I cannot forget that. Promise me that you will give up meeting Mr. Holroyd, and I will keep what I have seen to myself.”

“Well then, miss,” after a moment’s hesitation, and with a curious smile, “I don’t mind if I do give up meeting Mr. Holroyd, just to oblige you. I am not so dead set upon him as some people, and Ballingoole is a shocking place for gossip. And as for Jane Bolland, I wonder the ground does not crack under her! I must be going now, Miss Elizabeth, and so I will wish you good evening,” and she flounced off, tossing her head and swinging her parasol as she went.

Betty walked home very, very slowly; she was more unhappy than she had ever been in all her life; her illusions were dispelled; her little demi-god had fallen from his pedestal, and lay shattered in the dust. A man who could court a pert, vulgar girl like Lizzie Maccabe, was not worth a second thought, nor would he be likely to think of her, but as an unsophisticated country mouse, with whom he could flirt and amuse himself.

Her heart was unusually sore, and she was both silent and depressed, as she took her place at her aunt’s scantily-spread board. Various sayings of George’s came back to her now, with an entirely new interpretation! He had once told her that he thought “Elizabeth” the most beautiful name in the world, and that it exactly suited her, doubtless he thought that it suited Lizzie Maccabe still better! When Mr. Holroyd came over the next afternoon, ostensibly to talk about the ball—in reality to steal (if possible) a few moments with Betty—lo!—she was an ice maiden! His eager greetings, his anxious efforts to continue where he had left off, were cruelly repudiated, and silenced. What was the reason of her cold, altered manner?

He could not imagine what had happened to pretty, smiling Betty, within forty-eight hours. Who was this freezingly polite, this pale, and rather silent young lady; not Betty surely?

Oh no, this was a member of the family he had never met before; this was Miss Elizabeth Redmond.

As Lizzie tripped home, giggling at her own cleverness, and at the recollection of Betty’s stern, shocked face, she little knew that a Nemesis was on her track, in the shape of Foxy Joe!

Foxy Joe went further afield than most people; he saw a good deal, he made excellent use of his cunning eyes and capacious ears, and he did not deserve his name for nothing. Denis had recently placed figuratively the last straw on the camel’s back, and Joey, screaming with passion, his face grey with fury, had sworn a frightful oath that he would pay him out soon. And Denis had laughed derisively! Would Denis laugh if he knew that Joey had witnessed more than one stolen interview, that he had appropriated more than one note, and that even now he was sniggering in his sleeve as he followed Lizzie home? Lizzie halted in the town, and had a long and interesting gossip with her bosom friend, the dressmaker, whilst Joey slipped down the street, and walked into Mrs. Maccabe’s establishment. Mrs. Maccabe was reading the Freeman’s Journal by the light of a lamp in the front shop, and glowered at Joey and his empty basket, over her horn spectacles.

“Ye left it?” she enquired curtly.

“Be Gob I did.”

“And brought no word about beef for corning?”

“Devil a word,” scratching his head, “I handed in the basket, and passed no remark.”

“That’s strange! for mostly ye have as much jaw as a sheep’s head,” sneered his employer. “And what kept you?”

“Faix—I was just watching Miss Lizzie.”

“For what? What was she doing? She went to confession at four o’clock.”

“Confession, how are ye? And did she tell ye who confesses her?” And he looked under his eyebrows, with an unpleasant expression.

“Father Connell, you unfortunate natural, and who else?”

“No—but Father Denis Malone; I saw him confessing her, and sluthering and kissing her, in the lane by the horse park, not twenty minutes ago.”

Mrs. Maccabe rose hastily, and felt round for the ox tail. Many a time it had descended heavily on the dwarf’s shrinking shoulders.

“Joey! I’ll give you a lathering that you’ll remember to your dying day,” advancing between him and the door. “How dar you tell your black lies on a respectable girl like Lizzie?”

“Before the mother of God, and all the blessed saints, I swear I saw her,” howled Joey, holding a chair between himself and the virago, and trembling in every limb; but the thought of Denis spurred his flagging courage, and he added, “Sure Miss Betty saw them too, and hasn’t it been going on this year or more!”

“Ye little lying baste!” she screamed, swinging the tail, and bringing it down with a resounding whack. “Take that, and that, and that.”

“Oh! Mrs. Maccabe, ma’am! Oh! holy Moses! Oh! well maybe ye can read their writing,” and out of a very greasy pocket he unearthed three letters—one from Denis, and two in the handwriting of the fair Lizzie, written (were further proof required) on bill paper, with a little picture of a fat ox surmounted by “Bridget Maccabe and Sons, Butchers and Salesmen.”

Mrs. Maccabe became yellow (white she could never be), staggered over to the table, laid her weapon down at her right hand, and slowly perused the letter, whilst Joey, armed with a shield, in the shape of a large round basket, watched her narrowly, with his little sly grey eyes.

“If this is true, Foxy Joe,” she said at last, removing her horn spectacles, with shaking fingers, “ye had better take the hatchet and choppers out of me reach. I don’t want a murder on me soul! for I believe I could kill her. Her that was a pattern in the convent, and that talked of a vocation, and of taking the black veil! Her that can scarcely lift her eyes to a man and that comes of dacent people—her that no one has ever been able to say a word against, and me that has always kept myself so distant, and so high, and that has always been respected. Oh! oh! oh!——” and—sight never seen before! sight that dilated Joey’s narrow eyes—Mrs. Maccabe threw her blue checked apron over her head, for once in her life gave way to her feelings, and lifted up her voice and wept.

This strange paroxysm was of brief duration; she presently dried her eyes, and retreated into her inner parlour, with the letters and the lamp, leaving Joey alone in the dark shop.

An instant later, Lizzie came in, pink-cheeked, brisk, and smiling, and, unaware of her danger, walked straight into the lion’s mouth.

“What’s this I am afther hearing about you, Lizzie Maccabe?” enquired her aunt in a strangely forced voice.

“I am sure I don’t know!” returned Lizzie, tossing her head, but her face became the colour of ashes, as her eyes fell upon the letters.

“Is it true?” demanded the elder woman hoarsely.

“What?” stammered the culprit.

“That you write letters to that blackguard, Denis Malone, and meet him after dark, and kiss him?”

Lizzie glanced appealingly at Joey, who leant against the wall and nodded his head, and looked at her with a grin of satisfied malice; there was no hope from Joey!

“Yes, it’s true,” she answered in a whisper.

“Then my house is no place for the likes of you,” said Bridget Maccabe, rising with an air that would have done credit to Sarah Siddons. “There’s the door; out you go!”

“Oh, aunt, aunt, you don’t mean it?”

“Come!” taking her roughly by the arm, “I’ll never see your brazen face again.”

“Oh, Aunt Bridget!” cried the wretched girl, falling on the floor, and clasping her by the knees. “Don’t be so angry with me. Sure I would have told you long ago; only he would not let me. Sure we—we are married.”

“Ye are what? Get up off the floor, ye shameless hussey.”

“Married,” sobbed Lizzie, “married at a registry office in Dublin last year. Sure haven’t I my ring, and all the papers at the bottom of the little tin cash-box along with your bank book.”

“Then sit there on that chair, where I can see you, that I may have a good look at the biggest fool that ever drew the breath of life,” and Mrs. Maccabe moved back a few steps, and gazed at her weeping niece, with her arms akimbo.

“Lizzie, you are a wicked, low girl—deceiving them that was good to ye. What will Father Connell say, and the Reverend Mother, and (as an afterthought) the Malones?”

“I don’t care what they say,” rejoined Lizzie, plucking up a little spirit. “I am Mrs. Denis Malone, and as good as the best, and Denis is the only son and heir.”

“Heir, indeed!” shouted her aunt, “and what are you going to live on, if I may make bold to ask?”

“The Major——” began Lizzie.

“The Major can’t keep himself—let alone a son and a daughter-in-law. Why I’m keeping the Major! Well, well, to think of it! First and foremost you will bring down your marriage lines to Father Connell, and then we will get you decently married in chapel, and then we will see how your husband is going to support you; for mind one thing, my good girl, you won’t live here; it would ill become the wife of the heir of the Malones, to be chopping mate at her aunt’s the butcher. Aye and maybe cutting off the best loin chops for her lady mother-in-law.”

“Maybe the Malones will take us in.”

“Oh, keep your may bees for honey, and talk sense. I think I see the Major arming you in to dinner; if he does, maybe you’ll remind him of my bill. I think I see Mrs. Malone and Miss Betty making free with the likes of yees——”

“Miss Betty! I saw Miss Betty this evening—she—she—she,” and here Mrs. Denis Malone, frightened and overwrought, suddenly went off into a fit of screaming hysterics, that were quite as protracted and alarming as if she had been born a lady.

CHAPTER III.
MRS. MACCABE HAS IT OUT WITH THE MAJOR.

“He is a fool who thinks, by force or skill,

To turn the current of a woman’s will.”

—S. Tuke.

The following morning, when the first press of business was over, and when she had taken counsel with her sons, and had locked Lizzie into her room, Mrs. Maccabe put on her shawl (she always wore her bonnet except in bed) and stalked up the street, and out to Bridgetstown. She had never visited it before, and her tall commanding figure in the doorway, gave Sara, the parlour maid, what she subsequently described as a “turn.” Doubtless she gave Mrs. Malone a turn also, for she firmly believed that she had come for the balance of her bill—a large balance—and tremulously hinted as much.

“Oh no, Mrs. Malone, ma’am; though in course I’ll be thankful to see my money. I’ve come about something a great deal worse nor that. To make a long story short, your son Denis has destroyed himself.”

“Denis,” shrieked the wretched woman, staggering back against the turf basket. “What is it? Tell me the worst at once! Is he dead? Oh! what, what has happened to him?”

“He has happened to get married to my niece, Lizzie Maccabe, at a registry office in Dublin last October; that’s what’s happened to him!”

For a moment Mrs. Malone was speechless; then she went and sat down very suddenly on the nearest chair, and put both her hands to her head.

“It’s gospel truth,” continued her visitor. “I only found it out last night. I’m sorry for you, and I’m sorry for meself: it’s a terrible disgrace to us both. Such a thing never happened to a Maccabe before. I am going to get shut of her at wance.”

“Denis must have been mad,” said his mother distractedly. “Are you sure he is married?”

Mrs. Maccabe’s brow now became clothed in thunder.

“Better be mad nor bad, nor worse than he is! He is married. I have the lines, and I’ve come up to talk the matter over with the Major, and to see what he will do for his son’s wife. He must take her out of my house.”

“Oh, Mrs. Maccabe, could you not keep it quiet for a little longer, till we think it over. I simply dare not tell his father,” said Mrs. Malone piteously.

“But I dar,” replied this heroic matron, standing squarely before her meek little customer. “I dar a regiment of the likes of him; and I’ll tell him within the next five minutes. Where’s the study?”

“Oh, give me time—a little time,” pleaded Mrs. Malone in tears, “till I consult my eldest son. Oh, there he is! George, come here.”

George, who was equipped for riding, entered, whip in hand, and stared in amazement at his weeping mother, and the butcher’s widow. A bill of course.

“It’s something awful about Denis—and Mrs. Maccabe’s niece. He has married her, and she has been his wife for months,” explained his mother with streaming eyes.

George could not restrain a low whistle.

“It was only discovered yesterday, and Mrs. Maccabe is going to tell his father, and don’t you agree with me, that we might wait a little, and think it over.”

“No, mother, Mrs. Maccabe is right,” returned her son with decision; “there must be no delay; he should be told at once, and the marriage openly acknowledged.”

“You are right, sir,” said Mrs. Maccabe approvingly, “and now I’ll not detain you longer, ma’am, if you will show me the road to the Major’s study.”

“I’ll go with you,” volunteered George gallantly, resolved that the butcher’s widow should not bear the brunt of the fray alone and unprotected. Mrs. Malone was helpless. She stood with her handkerchief to her mouth, and watched them go into the study, saw them close the door, and then rushed back, and buried her head among the sofa cushions, poor coward! The study was next to the drawing-room, and at first there was the steady humming sound of Mrs. Maccabe’s voice, then a roar from the Major, then George spoke, then roar upon roar, like a starving Bengal tiger who sees food.

The Major could not realize the truth at first. He pushed back his chair, thereby capsizing Boozle, who was sleeping comfortably in the paper basket on all the unpaid bills. He gasped, his face became the colour of a boiled beetroot.

“Eh? What? What?” he shouted, and then he rose and figuratively fell upon Mrs. Maccabe, for “a lying, thieving, scheming old harridan, who had ruined his innocent son—an infernal old fosthooke, who had made the match.”

“And what would I get, av you please?” drawing herself up with an air of superb enquiry. “For why would I marry me niece, a decent girl, to an idle, drunken scutt, that never earned six-pence, a low-minded rapscallion, heir to nothing but debt and his father’s bad name? A fine thing to tell Bridget Maccabe——” and she looked about her, as if in search of the ox tail.

In vain the Major stormed; here his bellowing and bullying was as water on a rock. To borrow a word from the intrepid widow, she “bested him,” as she subsequently boasted—cowed him, silenced him, yea even him.

George was scarcely able to get in one syllable between such a war of words, and two such champions. It was Greek meeting Greek with a vengeance. The Major assumed an attitude of ferocious antagonism that would have struck terror into the heart of a less valiant opponent, and the battle raged. At last there was a lull; the man was worn down by the woman’s vigorous eloquence, and Mrs. Maccabe calmly stated her ultimatum.

“The girl should be decently married, as soon as possible, before the priest, and before the Rev. Mr. Mahon, too, if they liked, and Denis Malone should take his wife home. If he passed the medical, he might get something to do.”

“But he has not passed,” bawled the Major. “I’ve heard by yesterday’s post he has failed for his final examination, and he is done for. The most I’ll do for him will be to give him a steerage passage to Australia, and a five-pound note.”

“Man, that’s all balderdash and nonsense!”—that the Major should live to be apostrophised as a mere “man”! “Ye can’t turn your only son out into the world as ye would an ass on a bog, and him with a wife on his hands—ye bid to provide for him,” responded the widow in a tone of unshaken resolve.

“Denis might make a good start in Australia,” ventured his step-brother. “You see he likes a country life: he rides well, and he knows a little about stock, and if he had a small share in a run, just a start, he might do very well.”

“Then will you start him?” enquired the Major, turning on him furiously, forgetting the recent plunge he had made into George’s pocket.

“I am quite unable to do anything at present.”

“Av course the Major will assist his only son. It’s not your place, sir,” said Mrs. Maccabe emphatically. “The Major will give at least five hundred pounds, and their passages and outfit, and do the thing respectably, when he is about it,” speaking precisely as if the Major were miles away.

He, with his eyes almost starting out of his head, assured her in forcible language (that cannot here be quoted) that he would not do anything of the sort. But this determined woman made him listen to what she called “reason”; she bargained and chaffered with him, as if she were buying a young stall-fed bullock, and when she had left the study, rather hoarse and breathless, she had gained her end.

The Major would give four hundred pounds down on the nail; she herself (poor woman as she was) would put down two more. This money to be lodged in the hands of a respectable, honest man in Melbourne, who would see that Denis did not make ducks and drakes of it, but invest it prudently. The couple were to be married as soon as possible, and to take ship to Australia. “She would pay her niece’s passage, second class, and give her a sensible outfit, and no one could say but that she had done a handsome thing for a desolate, lorn widow woman, with no one to earn for her but herself, and hard work, and small returns, and bad debts. She would not trouble the Major further at present, but maybe he would spake a word to Mr. Denis and tell him that he was not to go next or nigh Bridget Maccabe, as she would not be answerable for herself.”

“Spake a word to Mr. Denis,” but feebly expresses the scene that awaited that young gentleman, as he strolled into the house in time for dinner. He had given the governor a wide berth since the fatal letter had been received the previous day, and had spent his time most agreeably, in coursing and card playing with some of his boon companions. He had a phlegmatic nature, and an adjustable conscience: it was rather a bore that he had not passed, but he hated the profession, and for the present his mother had assured him that he could live at home, and they would “think it over.” He was certain to get something, some agency; he was only twenty-four; there was lots of time! The Major’s fury would blow itself out like a gale, so he flattered himself, as he prepared for dinner. A sharp knock at the door, and enter Cuckoo, pale and excited-looking, and evidently bursting with some great news.

“Now then,” said Denis, who was belabouring his thick stiff hair with a brush in either hand, “what’s up?”

“Everything is up!” returned his sister tragically. “I thought I would just come in and warn you. Mrs. Maccabe was here this morning; they know you are married to Lizzie.”

Here Denis let fall a hair brush with a clang.

“It’s not true, is it, Denis?—that common girl! I’ve seen her walking with the Police Sergeant, over and over again—and I am sure she greases her hair with suet.”

“Who told?” enquired Denis fiercely, “and how did it come out?”

“From all I can hear, it was Foxy Joe that told.”

“Foxy Joe! Then I’ll break every bone in his crooked body.”

“The Major is raging mad, Denis. I never saw him so bad, and mother has been crying all day. You and Lizzie are to be married in chapel, and to be packed off to Australia. Mrs. Maccabe will help to send you; that’s all I could get out of George.”

This programme was acceptable to Denis; he was sick of Bridgetstown; he would gladly go forth and see the world, and begin a new life. Visions of a free, novel, thoroughly untrammelled existence, where he could play cards whenever he pleased, and with whom he pleased, and gallop over miles of good going, on a well-bred waler, instantly rose before his mind’s eye (an eye that kept a sharp look out on its own interest). After all, “Lizzie’s row,” as he called it, was bound to come some day; best have the two rows together, he said to himself philosophically; the row about his exam., and the row about his wife: as well be hanged for a sheep as a lamb; and he descended, with a certain amount of dogged courage, to face the storm!

A storm indeed! A typhoon, that raged in the latitude of Bridgetstown for ten whole days. During occasional lulls, Denis was married in chapel and in church, passages were taken, money paid in, letters written, outfits procured.

The news of Denis Malone’s match ran through the neighbourhood like wildfire, and people said that “he would never do a day’s good at home; he was well out of the country, and that for once the Major showed some sense.” Here the Major got credit for wisdom that was not his own; his share of the money he had raised by giving a bill on the furniture at Bridgetstown, and he was so furious with his son that he actually thought him a cheap riddance at the price.

But Denis’s mother was heartbroken: she wept, she implored, she even went on her knees to her husband for her poor dear boy. She abased herself before Mrs. Maccabe (who was now a connection), and it was all of no avail; that great woman was inexorable, and the bitterest drop in all her cup was the knowledge that Denis, her darling, was glad to go.

In intervals of pleading and weeping, she prepared his shirts and clothes, and packed up some portion of the household linen and (but this is in strict confidence) some of the Major’s silk socks and handkerchiefs, his second-best top-coat, a rarely remembered gold watch, and a dozen silver forks and spoons, also the pink topazes for Lizzie—or it might be another relative. A few came forward with presents for the young couple. George gave his brother a saddle and bridle, and a gun. Mrs. Finny presented him with an old case of surgical instruments. Maria gave him a piece of her mind. Miss Dopping gave Lizzie a first-rate sewing machine, and a long lecture, concluding with this pleasant little prophecy:

“If you come to want, and to earn your bread, Lizzie Malone, as I honestly believe you will, this machine, if you work it industriously, will keep you from actual starvation. You will have to support your husband too—unless you can keep him away from cards, and whisky.”

“I think I’ll be able to do that, ma’am,” returned young Mrs. Malone confidently; “and if the worst comes to the worst, I can always make my living as a cashier in a shop. I am very fond of Denis, but I’ll never earn his bread.”

In which sentiment Lizzie displayed a flash of her aunt’s high spirit. Betty Redmond presented Lizzie with a warm shawl for the voyage, Belle gave her her photograph, and Mrs. Redmond, with much pomp, presented her with a case of needles (marked two shillings). Thus, endowed with gifts and advice, the young couple set out to seek their fortune in the new world. Major Malone personally conducted them down to Queenstown, saw them on board the steamer (in case they should miss it), and waved them away from the shores of old Ireland with his best red silk pocket-handkerchief.

The news about Denis Malone fell like a thunderbolt at Noone. Juggy brought up the intelligence from the gate lodge to the kitchen, and from the kitchen it flew upstairs. Mrs. Redmond wagged her head, and cast up her eyes, and said “that, after that, nothing would surprise her.” Belle laughed maliciously: she was glad of a bit of excitement. She was delighted that Denis was in trouble and going to “get the sack,” for she knew that he bore her no good will, and might possibly interfere with her prospects; and Betty, who was deeply relieved, was both glad and sorry. She had been almost rude to Mr. Holroyd—thanks to Lizzie’s daring falsehood; and how was she to excuse herself? How could she explain that she had mistaken him for Denis? She must make amends for her blunder at the first opportunity; but this opportunity never occurred. An urgent, nay an angry invitation, summoned him to stay with his Uncle Godfrey. When he came over to make his adieux at Noone, he found all the ladies at home. Betty was herself again, and her bright face was all smiles. But it was now his turn to be cold and irresponsive. He did not understand nor respect a girl who could change like a weather-cock. She would be an uncomfortable sort of wife; if she meant to have accepted him, she must have known what was trembling on his lips that night at Lord Enniscorthy’s ball, and her manner, when they next met, had been intended to show him unmistakably that she did not wish to hear what he had to say—and he would now be for ever silent. He was glad to go away from her neighbourhood, to where, among new scenes, he might forget her. He was glad to leave that miserable home, where a weeping mother, an irascible step-father, an intolerable brother, had recently made him their confidante, go-between and victim.

“Yes,” in answer to Belle’s pathetic enquiries. “He was coming back, of course, before his leave was up: he had got an extension: he did not return to India till July—the end of July.” Belle sighed a heart-breaking sigh, as she placed her hand timidly in his, and breathed a fervent inward prayer, that when he returned to the gorgeous East he would take her with him.

CHAPTER IV.
THE MAJOR RECEIVES HIS LAST TELEGRAM.

“He that dies pays all debts.”

—The Tempest.

The winter waned, spring came in with showers and lambs and primroses, but brought few changes in Ballingoole. Mrs. Redmond’s health was now failing perceptibly. She rarely went forth in the bath-chair, and leant more and more on Betty.

Mrs. Malone complained incessantly of face-ache and looked proportionately wretched, and was occasionally seen stealing out of Mrs. Maccabe’s parlour, where she had been “having a read” of one of Lizzie’s letters, for Denis was a miserable correspondent. The young people were doing well, and Lizzie proudly informed her aunt that “no one out there knew her from a real lady,” but this was a mistake on Lizzie’s part, and ignorance is bliss.

The Major was more from home than formerly, and received more telegrams and more bills than of yore, was as red in the face as a Christmas turkey-cock, and was waited on by his household with an even greater amount of assiduous apologetic attention. Cuckoo and Betty scoured the country with the dogs, or sat with their heads bent over an atlas or a French dictionary, and Miss Dopping, a prisoner in the fetters of rheumatism, occupied her usual seat in the window, and watched passing events, and delivered powerful and pungent criticisms on men, women, and things. As for Belle, she read novels and drank tea, and wrote letters (George Holroyd was frequently favoured), refurbished her wardrobe against his return, and mentally—oh, happiest moments! made an extravagant catalogue of her trousseau and Indian outfit.

One evening, as Mrs. Redmond and her two companions were sitting at tea, the door burst open, and Maria Finny hurried in unannounced. She wore an old garden hat and shawl, and had evidently come in by the back way, and kitchen entrance.

“There’s terrible work at Bridgetstown,” she panted, “and I have just run over to tell you.”

“What, what has happened this time?” enquired Belle, with bright excited eyes.

“The Major is dead.”

“Dead!” echoed Mrs. Redmond. “Nonsense!”

“Yes, went off in an apoplexy, or a stroke. Mrs. Malone looked into the study an hour after lunch (indeed it was about Jane Bolland’s bill), and you know he was always a heavy eater. She saw him lying face downwards on the table, with a telegram in his hand. She screamed to Jane, and between them they lifted him up, and he was dead, stone dead, with the red cat sitting beside him. Mrs. Malone has been from one faint into another ever since, and I just ran over to tell you,” and she gasped for breath.

After this announcement there was a profound silence for some seconds, and then Betty said:

“How dreadful! How sudden! Why I was speaking to him this morning as he drove past the gate.”

“Well, you will never speak to him again,” returned Maria, emphatically.

“Poor Mrs. Malone,” continued Betty. “Who is with her and Cuckoo?”

“No one, so I just come to fetch you, Betty; you know the ways of the house; they are used to you, and there must be some one to keep things together. They say Mrs. Malone is in for some illness from the shock, and you know what Cuckoo is. She has been screeching and crying ever since it was found, at three o’clock.”

Yes, the big, burly, loud-voiced Major that had driven past the gate flourishing his whip a few hours ago was now merely “it,” and had been laid out on the study sofa, awaiting the county coroner.

“May I go, Aunt Emma?” enquired Betty. “I think I might be of some use. I can nurse a little, and I know all the keys.”

“To be sure you can go,” returned her cousin promptly, “get ready at once.”

Betty’s services at such a time would cement the intimacy between the families, and draw the houses of Noone and Bridgetstown more closely together; of course George would be coming home. Then, to Maria: “Have you telegraphed for Mr. Holroyd?”

“No, I never thought of him. I am glad you reminded me.”

“Shall I telegraph?” said Belle eagerly.

“Oh no, just give me his address, and I will send a wire as I pass the post office. Dr. Moran is up there. He can do no harm to a man once he is dead, but we shall want some one with some sense. From what I can gather, affairs are in an awful state. I should not be surprised if the creditors seized the body; there will be nothing but debts coming in to the widow.”

“Oh, I hope not, poor woman,” said Mrs. Redmond sympathetically.

“This was the Derby day, you know, and the Major has lost tremendously. He backed some horse for a great deal, and the telegram in his hand said: ‘King Canute not placed.’”

“You don’t think he—he made away with himself?” said Mrs. Redmond in a mysterious manner.

“Oh, no; it was just this bad news on the top of a very heavy lunch that killed him. Dr. Moran said it was—not that he knows much about it.”

“Still, I suppose he knows apoplexy from suicide,” said Belle briskly.

Leaving Maria to enlarge on the tragedy and the dismal prospects of the Malones, Betty hurried away to put on her hat, and to pack a small hand-bag with necessary articles, and in a very short time she and Maria were walking over to Bridgetstown in the cool summer night. At Bridgetstown all was confusion; lights were flitting from window to window, and crowds of “well-wishers to the family,” pervaded the kitchen, passages and hall. Luckily Miss Dopping and Mrs. Maccabe had arrived upon the scene. The former locked the study, and then cleared the upper passages of sympathetic and excited neighbours, whilst Mrs. Maccabe made very short work of the lower regions; even Jane Bolland (who almost represented the local press) was swept out as mercilessly as Foxy Joe. By twelve o’clock at night, Betty was left alone, and was the temporal head of that large, silent, disorganised mansion. Cuckoo had cried herself to sleep, and Mrs. Malone was in a kind of restless slumber. She went round the house with a candle in one hand, and a bunch of keys in the other, carefully bolting doors and windows, and locking up presses and drawers. Next day the inquest was held, and Mrs. Malone was seriously ill, rambling in her mind, and calling for Denis, or thanking George in extravagant terms for his great generosity, pleading with the creditors for time, and with the Major for money, and showing threatening symptoms of brain fever. On Betty fell all the responsibility until George’s arrival. She answered notes of enquiry, saw people, wrote letters, ordered mourning, nursed Mrs. Malone, and managed the housekeeping. Belle strolled up in the afternoon and looked over the house, critically examined the old silver wine coolers, and branch candlesticks, wondered if they were Malone or Holroyd heirlooms? and then returned to Noone to practise some songs for George, specially that one of almost deadly significance:

“Si vous n’avez rien à me dire.”

The following morning George arrived, pale, dusty, and haggard from incessant travelling.

“You here,” he said to Betty, as she met him on the stairs. “How good of you; I half expected to find you.” He went up immediately, and saw his mother in her darkened room. She stretched out both her thin, hard-worked hands, and exclaimed, “Denis! No, it’s George.”

“George, I am thankful you have come. Betty is here too. You and she must manage everything. Oh, my poor head! Oh, George, wasn’t it dreadful? I think I am going mad, I am sure I am;” and then she began to wander and talk about Denis. “Oh, my dear boy, such a bill from Nolan’s for you. I don’t know what I am to do about it. I can never, never squeeze it out of the housekeeping money. Last time, you know, I sold two dozens of the large silver forks and an old teapot, but I am always in terror lest they should be missed.”

Betty hurried George away, before his mother began to talk about him. He and Belle seemed a good deal on her mind, and she would urge him imploringly to “have nothing to say to Belle Redmond. She is just a garrison hack, and very selfish, giddy, and ill-tempered. I wish you would fall in love with Betty;” it would never do for this constant appeal to come to George’s ears. Next to Denis’s debts it was ever on her tongue. “George, you have been so good to me, I wish you had a nice wife! I wish you would marry Betty Redmond. She may not be as handsome as Belle; but she is young and pretty, and good; oh, do marry Betty Redmond.”

Betty, who had almost driven him out of his mother’s room, said with her finger on her lips:

“She must be kept perfectly quiet and know nothing. Her mind has had a great shock, but if left quite undisturbed she will rally; so Dr. Moran says. Now if you will come downstairs, I will get you some breakfast. I daresay you are very hungry.”

Whilst he sat over his meal, Betty gave him a hasty outline of what had occurred; of what she had done; of what there was to do; and handed him a truly formidable packet of letters—chiefly bills.

“And now that you have arrived,” she concluded, “I think I shall go home. I can come up here every day, and stay from morning till evening.”

“No, no, please do not,” he interrupted hastily. “I could never get along alone. You would not expect me to do the housekeeping. Who is to nurse my mother, and befriend Cuckoo, and look after the servants? If you will only stay for a short time, you will be doing us the greatest kindness. My mother is so fond of you. You said you were her eldest daughter, and I am sure you would not desert her now.”

And Betty remained. Pale-faced hysterical Cuckoo was her shadow, helpless but affectionate, following her in and out of the rooms, and in and out of the house, like a dog. Betty wrote, and sewed, and nursed, and personally interviewed anxious callers, undertook all arrangements about the luncheon after the funeral, hemmed black hat-bands, and made Cuckoo’s frock. At first it seemed strange to George, that he and Betty should be virtually the head of this large, disorderly house, sitting opposite to each other at meals, just as if they were the real master and mistress, and laying their heads together in many anxious consultations over grave matters. Betty was an invaluable nurse, so light-footed, cheerful and firm; she spent a good deal of her time in the invalid’s room, and George passed many weary hours in the study, endeavouring to evolve some order out of chaos. Each morning the post-bag was heavy with bills, large, clamouring, and alarming. There were bills to take up and renew, there were mortgages, there was every description of angry dun. Major Malone’s creditors had long passed from the obsequious to the formally polite, the polite to the freezingly-laconic, from the freezingly-laconic to the threatening stage.

George’s cheek burnt, as he glanced at some of these effusions, and his head ached, and his heart sank, as he went over them. Dozen after dozen. What were company’s accounts or mess accounts in comparison to these? At length he called in the aid of the family solicitor, and between them they endeavoured to reach the bottom of affairs. After groping for several days, among a perfect sea of debts, they came to the conclusion that Major Malone—who had never known any personal inconvenience from want of money, who had brow-beaten all his creditors, and who had the most imposing funeral that had been seen for years in those parts—had died as much a pauper as if he had breathed his last in the county workhouse. The place was gone from the Malones for ever. Also the farms, the stock, the silver, and the furniture. All that Mrs. Malone could claim or carry from her home was her own exceedingly shabby wardrobe. She and Cuckoo were literally penniless; her jointure had been disposed of, and gambled away; she had not a pound in the world; her very bed was the property of a money-lender; there was not a scrap of salvage out of the wreck. Loud-voiced angry men and women, some with hooked noses, pervaded the avenue and grounds, and the house was almost in a state of siege!

“What was to be done?” George asked himself, as with a burning head he walked up and down the long garden walk in the cool June evening, after hours spent in writing letters, and holding interviews. He must get his mother and Cuckoo away to some quiet suburb near Dublin, where Cuckoo could be sent to school, and where they could live cheaply. To ensure their existing at all, he must at once hand over almost the whole of his own private income; four hundred a year would be little enough for them to live upon, for his mother was a bad manager, and had caught her husband’s craze for running up bills. Yes, he saw nothing for it but to relinquish his own small fortune. This he could contemplate with equanimity; he could live without it.

But another duty was ten times more difficult. He must give up Betty. How could he relinquish Betty? How was he to live without her?

Betty had long ago made her peace, though she had never breathed a word of her mistake that evening in the meadow lane. Absence had not obliterated her image from his mind—quite the reverse. He saw her now in the fierce light that beats upon people with whom you live in hourly contact. He saw her devotion to his mother. Her unselfishness and energy, and cheerfulness, were all made known to him. She was not merely a very pretty acquaintance, with lovely grey eyes and a merry laugh, who sat a horse to perfection. She was something more in his eyes; she was the girl he loved.

He never cast a thought to Belle. Betty had swept her out of his mind, and, so to speak, closed the door. She came to Noone, almost daily, and looked into his face with a tender sisterly sympathetic gaze, and asked for his dear mother, and sighed, and “hoped that Betty was of some use! She was a good, willing child, and fond of nursing, though, perhaps, a little brusque and rough. Now I myself,” said Belle, “am so exquisitely sensitive, that I cannot bear to see grief or pain; it makes me ill, but I have felt for you acutely. I have thought so much of you, dear Mr. Holroyd, in all your trouble,” and tears actually trembled on her lashes—theatrical tears.

“Words are cheap,” thought George as he walked with her to the avenue gate, when she bade him a lingering good-bye. Give him deeds—one night of watching, against fifty pretty speeches. His eyes were opened widely now, and he appraised pretty, worldly, selfish, Belle at her true value.

CHAPTER V.
THE HOUR AND THE MAN.

“Meet me by moonlight alone,

And then I will tell you a tale.”

—J. A. Wade.

It was the very last evening at Bridgetstown, a lovely one, towards the end of June; never had the place (now passing for ever from the Malones) looked to greater advantage. The pleasure-ground was quite a blaze of roses, and all the garden walks were bordered by fragrant mignonette, wallflower and sweet pea. Mrs. Malone, who was now convalescent, and able to be downstairs, was holding a melancholy and final interview with Miss Dopping and the Finnys—she and Mrs. Finny mingling their tears, whilst Maria and Miss Dopping kept up a cross fire of would-be consolatory remarks. The Malones were leaving for Dublin the next morning, and Betty, who had been packing hard for three days, came out with Cuckoo for a breath of air, and a farewell round of the pleasure-grounds and garden. But Cuckoo was presently summoned indoors, and Betty was left alone—she was tired, very tired, and seating herself on the steps inside the garden gate, with her chin resting on her hand, looked up at the full silver moon, with a face almost as white as her dress.

George, who had been solacing himself with a cigar, descried her from a distance, and hastened to join her; he scarcely ever got a chance of having a word with her alone now, and here was a long-sought opportunity. The evening breezes blew across their faces, and brought with them the scents of thousands of roses, the very spirit of summer seemed riding on the night, and summoning all people out of doors—to come and do her homage, but the only two at Bridgetstown who stood among the moon-lit flowers were George Holroyd and Betty Redmond.

“Well, this is the last night at Bridgetstown!” he said, “and the old place is looking its best, as if it was determined to haunt our memories. There is the yellow rose I helped you to nail up—do you remember? I think I deserve one—as a memento.”

“Then I am sure you may help yourself,” she returned composedly.

“No, I want you to give me one.”

“Very well,” rising and breaking off a heavy-headed yellow rose.

“I shall never see this old tree again,” he said, as he took it from her. “Nor the house and grounds of Bridgetstown—nor—nor——”

“Nor any one in Ballingoole,” she added, without raising her eyes.

“Do not say that,” he returned gravely; “I hope to see every one, and above all to see you, Betty. What should we have done without you?”

“It was nothing,” she replied, reseating herself wearily. “I have always been at home here, long,” looking at him with a somewhat watery smile, “before you came! When are you going back to India? Soon?”

“As soon as I have settled my mother comfortably in Dublin.”

“Then to-morrow will be good-bye?”

“No, I shall run down again for a day. Betty, I want to ask you something;” he latterly called her by her Christian name quite naturally. “You remember when we came back from Roskeen, where we had always been such good friends—had we not?”

Betty nodded, and stared at an enormous bush of lavender, with a somewhat fixed expression.

“Afterwards, when I met you at home, you would scarcely speak to me, or even look at me—will you tell me the reason of this? for I know you are a girl who always has a reason for her actions.”

“Yes—if you wish it very much—I will,” she answered, drawing a pattern in the gravel with the toe of her shoe, “but I would much rather not tell you.”