JILL

BY
E. A. DILLWYN

IN TWO VOLUMES.—VOL. II.

London
MACMILLAN AND CO.
1884

Printed by R. & R. Clark, Edinburgh.

CONTENTS.

CHAPTER I.
A CHAPELLE MORTUAIRE.

Immediate preparations were made for our departure from the spot where we were. A couple of coarse handkerchiefs were tied across the lower part of our faces, so as to stifle our voices if we should uplift them on the remote chance of any one being in hearing who would assist us. Next our feet were untied to enable us to walk. We were warned that if we attempted to escape or to call out, we should be instantly stabbed. And in order to convince us that this was no empty threat, a wicked-looking, dagger-like article, known in Corsica as a vendetta-knife, was dashed before our eyes, and we were shown that each of our captors had one of these knives stowed away in a little inside coat-pocket, where it was ready to hand at a moment's notice.

Then we moved off in single file. Napoleon went in front, with Kitty close at his heels; I came third, and César brought up the rear.

The robbers naturally selected to travel through the maquis rather than along the open road; and we two captives, whose hands were bound, sorely missed the assistance of those members to push aside the numerous boughs and twigs by which our progress was impeded. Now and then the man in front stopped to hold back obstacles in some very thick place, where we should otherwise have probably altogether stuck fast; but such an attention was exceptional, and, as a rule, we were left to make our way unaided as best we could, regardless of the scratches and bruises which we continually received, and whereby the discomfort and fatigue of the journey was greatly increased. Napoleon led us first down to the mouth of the valley; then branched off in a direction away from that which the carriage and Mrs. Rollin would take; then climbed a steep hill, and proceeded along the ridge of it for some distance; then descended abruptly into another valley, and we were kept trudging over hill and dale alternately in this way during the whole afternoon. Many of the places we passed were such as might have roused a lover of fine scenery to enthusiasm; but neither Kitty nor I were in a humour to appreciate that sort of thing just then, and the beauties of the landscape were quite wasted upon us, as we toiled wearily along obscure and seldom-used tracks, through desolate wild districts, without ever once approaching a human dwelling.

My having made the men believe that neither of us understood Italian caused them to converse together in that language as unreservedly as if they had been alone, and, thanks to this, I was able to discover what were their intentions for disposing of us for the present. I learnt that we were being taken to a cave up in the hills, which had been their headquarters since their escape from prison. Here we were to be left under care of one of the robbers, whilst the other descended to the lower lands to seek out Mrs. Rollin, and open negotiations with her on the important subject of the ransom.

This cave of theirs, wherever it might be, was evidently an unpleasantly long way off from the scene of our capture. On and on we went without ever pausing for a moment; and I grew so tired that I could hardly drag myself along, and began to speculate on the chances of having to be carried before the appointed resting-place would be reached. A slackening of speed or a halt would have been a most welcome relief to me; but of that there was no hope, as our progress was already too slow to satisfy the robbers, who kept constantly urging us to hurry on faster, lest we should all be benighted on the way. As daylight diminished, so did their impatience increase, and many were the angry oaths they uttered at the distance still to be traversed before attaining the cave.

Suddenly Napoleon stood still, and looked back at his comrade joyfully. "César," cried he, "I have a good idea! At the rate we go now, we shall not get home till midnight; whereas if you and I were alone, and not hampered by these women, we should arrive in half the time. Is not that so?"

"Obviously," grumbled César; "but what's the use of stopping to tell me what I know already?"

"Why this," returned the other; "that I propose we should disembarrass ourselves of them at once."

"Stupid!" rejoined César, irritably; "don't you see that the only way of doing that is to kill them, or else to let them go; and that in either of those cases we should be throwing away all chance of deriving further gain from them?"

"Ah, but I have thought of another method of getting rid of them," answered Napoleon—"a method which will enable us to keep them alive, and in our power too. I did a good deal of business in this part of the country formerly, and learnt to know it well; thus I came to know of a place near here, which I have only just recollected, and which will be most convenient to us at this moment. It is not exactly such a place as I would myself care to stay at, but it will do admirably for shutting up these two women in, and when we have disposed of them there, you and I can travel home as fast as we please. A famous safe prison it is, where there will be no need for one of us to stay and keep guard over them, as there would be if they were housed in the cave. Thus we shall be free to go together and see about the business with the ransom—which will, of course, be a great advantage, since two heads are better than one, you know."

César seemed still incredulous. "I believe you are talking nonsense," said he; "I cannot think of any possible prison about here to answer to your description."

"Nonsense, indeed!" retorted his companion; "no, in truth! A short distance from here, on the side of a hill, far from any inhabited house or public road, I remember that there is an old mortuary chapel. Years ago the family to whom it belonged left their country-house and went to live in Ajaccio, and since then it has never been used. This is the place in which I propose to imprison our captives. There will be no chance of their being heard, however much noise they may make; for the walls are thick, and there is nothing to bring any one into the vicinity. And as they will certainly not be able to get out unaided, we shall have no need to trouble ourselves more about them, except to supply them with food."

"A deserted mortuary chapel!" said César, reflectively; "'tis a good idea, no doubt. Only—it is getting late; and—well, to say the truth, I am not at any time over-fond of the company of the dead, and like it least of all by night. Still—it would be very convenient to do what you propose—the light is not gone yet—the chapel is close by, you say. Yes! there will be time to shut up the women, and remove ourselves to a pleasanter neighbourhood before dark. Go on, then, and let us get the job over as soon as possible."

Our course was resumed accordingly. The thought of the grim kind of hotel that Napoleon had found for us reminded me forcibly of Schubert's song Das Wirthshaus, and I seemed to hear its wild plaintive melody sounding in my ears as we hurried over the broken ground through the fast-increasing dusk. Horrible as was the idea of being immured alive in a tomb, yet I shrank from it less then than I should have done ordinarily. And for these two reasons: First, because the long march had reduced me to such a state of exhaustion that the prospect of rest was welcome anywhere—even in a chapelle mortuaire. Secondly, because it seemed safer and in every way preferable to be with the dead than with the two ruffians who had us in their power, and whom I regarded with the most profound distrust.

The chapel being near at hand, we reached it while there was still sufficient light to show something of the exterior of our prison.

We came first to a high wall, with no other opening in it than an iron gate, which was wide enough to admit a carriage. The bolt by which the gate was fastened was forced back without difficulty, and then a short straight bit of road brought us to the door of the chapel itself. This door was situated exactly opposite to the gate in the outer wall, and was secured by a great iron bar across the outside, and also by a chain and rusty padlock. With the help of a stone the men easily broke open the padlock, and then they lifted the ponderous external bar off its supports. There was now no further obstacle to opening the door before which we stood, but our captors—being not insensible to superstitious fears—did not wish to keep the entrance to the charnel-house open longer than was absolutely necessary, and therefore postponed unclosing it till the last moment.

They set our hands at liberty, and delivered to us such provisions as they had with them—consisting of a morsel of sausage, a slice of rye-bread, a good-sized piece of extremely strong-smelling cheese, a couple of onions and apples, and a gourd half-full of wine. Having thus provided us against famine, César made us a profound bow of mocking deference, and said in French: "Adieu for the present, ladies. You see our desire to treat you with distinguished consideration induces us to place you here, with a good roof and strong walls to shelter you, rather than to take you to the rough cave which serves us for a habitation. We do not intend remaining to share this splendid dwelling with you, lest we should intrude on your privacy; therefore we shall now, however unwillingly, tear ourselves away, but first thing to-morrow morning we will return with a supply of food, before departing to seek out and communicate with the other lady." Then, addressing himself to his comrade, he said: "Look sharp, Napoleon; open a bit of the door, and in with them!"

The door, which only opened outwards, was pulled just far enough apart to admit a human body. The men, without adventuring their own persons an inch within the building, thrust Kitty and me roughly in, and at once closed the entrance behind us again. Then came a scraping, grating noise, which told that the great iron bar was being replaced on its supports outside, and immediately afterwards we heard the steps of César and Napoleon hurrying away at full speed from the uncanny neighbourhood of the tomb to which they had consigned us.

At first we stood without moving from the spot to which we had been pushed, just inside the door, waiting to see if we should be able to distinguish anything when our eyes had become accustomed to the darkness; for the interior of the building was perfectly dark. Meanwhile we profited by the liberty that had been restored to our hands to remove the handkerchiefs across our mouths, which had hitherto prevented us from speaking.

Kitty's knowledge of Italian being limited, she had not comprehended what the men had been saying to one another; consequently she did not now know the nature of our abode, as I discovered from the first words she uttered when her mouth was free of its gag:

"I wonder what sort of place this is," she said; "don't you? It's a bore to have no light; however, I'm going on a bit further, to explore without it, as we can't possibly have it."

I laid my hand upon her arm, and checked her as she was about to advance.

"You had better be careful how you move," I said; "we are shut up in a chapelle mortuaire."

"A chapelle mortuaire" she echoed, interrogatively; "let me see—what is that? Oh I remember! Wasn't that the name of those buildings which you told me you had seen near Ajaccio, and which you called 'villa residences for the dead?'"

"Yes," I replied, doing my best to speak unconcernedly and carelessly, and to conceal from her the feeling of disgust and aversion with which the place inspired me, and which was growing stronger every moment; "rather an appropriate place for me too, I think, seeing that I'm nearly dead with fatigue. I haven't the least wish to move about, and intend to sit down just where I am now. The door will make a capital back to lean against."

I was not sure but what the knowledge of where she was might perhaps prove a shock to Kitty's nerves. But there was no trace of discomposure to be detected in her voice or manner as she answered me. "So it will," she said, "and I vote that we have dinner at once. Those wretches never offered us any five o'clock tea; and what with that and the long walk, I'm quite ravenous! You've no idea what a relief to my mind it was to find that they didn't intend to leave us all night without food."

Of course we both wanted to seem as happy and as much at our ease as possible, in order thus to help to keep up each other's spirits. I, however, was not very successful in the effort; for though I was perfectly free from any dread of the supernatural, yet there were material horrors attached to the position which I could not forget. I thought of the sights that would be revealed if there were light; of the grinning skulls, mouldering bodies, crumbling coffins, and ghastly relics of mortality, which might be expected in a tomb; and I remembered that these things must be so close to me that I might perhaps at any moment strike my hand against them. There was a gruesomeness and eeriness about the place, to which my state of bodily exhaustion rendered me unwontedly susceptible, and I felt more nervous and creepy than I had ever done in my life before.

"I don't think that I can eat in this terrible place," I said, with an involuntary shiver, in response to Kitty's suggestion of dinner.

Whether or not she was at all inclined to be affected by our dismal surroundings, as I was, I do not know; at all events she did not show it, and redoubled her efforts to raise my spirits when she perceived how much disposed I was to break down.

"Oh yes—you'll not think of where you are in a few minutes more, when you've got used to it," she returned, seating herself beside me, and proceeding to distribute the food. "What a funny idea to have a picnic in the dark—quite novel, too; I daresay no one ever did it before. Where is the bread? Oh you've got it. As for the cheese, there's no need to ask where that is, because one's nose may safely be trusted to supply the requisite information. I must say a knife would be rather handy; but I'm afraid we must do the best we can without, for I left my pocket-knife where I was sketching, and Messieurs César and Napoleon have omitted to provide for our wants in that respect. How lucky that my aunt is not with us, and obliged to dine in this primitive fashion, without any proper appurtenances! If she were, I verily believe she'd be unhappy lest any acquaintance should behold her in the act of committing such an enormity—even though the fact of the spectator would involve light to see by, and a chance of assistance; both of which I should consider to be most desirable things at this moment."

Thus she ran on, joking, laughing, making light of every discomfort, and chatting to me as if she had thought me her equal, as if the tomb had been a leveller of ranks to the living as well as to the dead, and as if in entering it all social differences between her and me had been annihilated. She could have devised nothing better adapted to accomplish her object, and help me to shake off the gloomy influences that oppressed me. Her example of bright good humour and courage was irresistible, and before our unilluminated repast had progressed far I became myself again, and eager to show a spirit as brave as her own. To this desirable result, too, the creature comforts of which I partook tended not a little to contribute. Though the victuals were hardly to be called choice, and the wine had acquired a nasty flavour from the gourd in which it was contained, nevertheless they revived me as well as the most sumptuous cates could have done; and when dinner was at an end I was a different creature from what I had been before. Kitty made no comment on the change in me, but I have little doubt that she perceived it, all the same, as she now, for the first time, turned the conversation seriously to the predicament in which we found ourselves.

"It seems to me, Jill," she said, "that you and I are having to do penance, with a vengeance, for our disbelief in escaped penitenciers! We must give our minds now to what we are to do next; but before entering on that subject I want to tell you how very sorry I am to have been the means of bringing you into this scrape. I can't help feeling that it is all my doing, and that if I had not gone on to sketch, or had not taken you with me, you, at all events, would be in safety at this moment."

Proud as she might be, pride had not yet taken enough hold of her to crush the naturally generous disposition which was more distressed at being the cause of another person's sufferings than at having to suffer itself. I was touched at the thoughtfulness on my account evinced by her last speech; and as I did not wish her to blame herself unfairly, I assured her that I had accompanied her quite as much for my own pleasure as hers. And in order to prove that we should not in any case have got off scot-free, I repeated to her the conversation I had overheard before we were captured, from which it appeared that the carriage would have been attacked if she and I had not separated from it and walked on alone.

"Thank you," she said, when I had completed my tale. "I can't tell you what a comfort it is to me to know all that, and to think that I am not the sole cause of this bother! And now to consider our next proceedings. The two things chiefly borne in upon my mind at this moment are—first, that it's no use blinking the fact of our being in an extremely awkward position; and second, that it won't do to be afraid, because fear, as Solomon says, 'is nothing else but a betraying of the succours which reason offereth.'"

This was no doubt true. But, unluckily, no amount of calmness and courage would show us any reasonable prospect of escape—look at the situation in what way we would.

It was no use to hope that our friends would rescue us, since it was manifestly impossible for them to have an idea where we were. When Mrs. Rollin continued her journey from the place where we had left her, she would, we knew, have reckoned on my remaining on the road, whether Kitty did or not. Consequently she would have gone on driving contentedly towards St. Lucie di Tallano without the least fear of leaving us behind; and there was no saying how long it might have been before either she or the driver became uneasy at not overtaking us. Then, when they did take alarm—as they must have done, sooner or later—there was nothing to make them suspect what had really happened. They would probably suppose we had simultaneously expired, tumbled over cliffs, sprained our ankles, or fallen victims to some other likely or unlikely catastrophe; and then they would have begun hunting about vaguely for us, without the slightest clue to where we were. Thus it was in vain to trust to external aid reaching us, and the question was, Could we anyhow manage to escape by our own unassisted exertions? Alas! the prospect was no better in that direction either. The door through which we had entered was the only outlet apparent, and that was, as we knew, fastened on the outside by a great heavy bar, which rendered exit in that way impossible. Shouting was of no avail, because the place was so solitary that we might have screamed till we were hoarse without a chance of producing any other effect.

Altogether, therefore, we saw no possible means of getting away from our prison, and came reluctantly to the conclusion that we had no alternative but to resign ourselves to stay where we were, and await the course of events patiently. This was by no means a satisfactory termination of our deliberations, and, having arrived at it, we sat in melancholy silence for a minute. The silence was broken by Kitty who said cheerily: "I'm sure we shall both be the better for some rest, so let us lie down and go to sleep."

"Lie down!" repeated I; "surely that won't be safe, will it? It's too dark to see, and there might be—well—things that one wouldn't care to touch, knocking about in a place of this kind, you know. I should think we'd best try and go to sleep without changing our present position."

"No; we shouldn't rest nearly as well sitting upright, as we should lying down," answered Kitty; "and it won't do for us to play tricks with our strength in any way, or to risk losing an atom of it that is to be had. Very likely there may be nothing disagreeable up the middle of the floor, or, at all events, nothing that we cannot easily clear away. Let us stoop down and feel our way straight before us till we have a space to lie down in."

There seemed a tacit agreement between us that the ghastly objects by which we knew we must surely be surrounded were not to be defined in words, but to be kept strictly to ourselves, lest the imagination of one should supply some additional detail which had not occurred to that of the other, by which means the horrors of the situation might have been considerably increased. I am sure this was a wise precaution. As it was, I know I found my imagination vivid enough to picture a good deal more than was at all agreeable to think of; and it would, no doubt, have been still more troublesome if supplemented by that of Kitty also.

I did not by any means relish her proposal that we should clear sufficient space to lie down on; for I could not help shuddering at the thought of the things one might expect to come in contact with when groping about without light in a chapelle mortuaire. Still, I was not going to have her despise me as a fool or a coward, so I made no objection, and set to work heroically to perform my share of the unpleasant task.

The only suspicious thing which I met with in the course of my explorations was some small-sized object, whose substance was cold and clammy, and whose identity I could not at all determine by touch. An exclamation of disgust rose to my lips when my fingers came against this unknown horror; but I managed to restrain any outward manifestation of emotion, and merely pushed the obstruction aside quietly, without letting Kitty know that I had found anything unpleasant.

As I made this effort to spare her feelings, I was struck by the quaint probability of her being at the same instant engaged in a similar endeavour to spare mine, and I realised that the common danger to which we were exposed was a link which united us so firmly that our separate identities were, for the time being, well-nigh merged into one. Whatever affected the condition of one of us must necessarily affect that of the other also; whence it followed that the bodily and mental welfare of both was a matter of mutually vital consequence, and that each was as anxious to shield the other as herself from any annoyance or shock that could possibly be avoided. Truly a queer sort of selfish unselfishness!

It did not take us long to make sure that we had room to lie down without fear of coming against any repulsive relics of mortality; then we extended ourselves upon the ground, pressing closely together for warmth, as the night was cold. Hard and rough as was the couch, and perilous as was our situation, we were too tired to be kept waking by either discomfort or anxiety, and were speedily asleep.

CHAPTER II.
A NEW USE FOR A BIER.

As I had no means of knowing the time, I cannot say exactly how long my slumbers lasted, but, as near as I can guess, it must have been about a couple of hours before I awoke. On opening my eyes I saw, with much surprise, that the moon had found its way into the tomb, as there was a patch of yellow light shining upon the opposite wall, and relieving the profound obscurity that reigned elsewhere. This was a most cheering and hope-inspiring spectacle; for, as the door was still closed as before, the moonlight certainly could not be entering in that way; and the obvious deduction was, that the chapel walls must have some second opening which we had not yet discovered. Whatever it was, might we not escape through it?

I aroused the still sleeping Kitty to point out to her the pleasant sight, and we got upon our feet to examine into the matter more nearly. The light was evidently admitted through some aperture situated in the gable of the roof just above the doorway, and the shadows by which the patch of light was traversed proved that the aperture was defended by bars. What the object of the opening may have been I know not,—perhaps ornament, perhaps ventilation, perhaps some whim of the architect's. Anyhow, there it was; and though darkness had prevented our seeing it on our first arrival at the chapel, yet now the friendly moon had come to our assistance, and was indicating it as a possible means of regaining liberty. Never in my life had I felt such a sincere admiration for the moon, and such a conviction of its utility to the world, as I did then.

We were at that time standing where we had lain down, close to the door, and the aperture was too immediately over our heads for us to see it very well, so we advanced cautiously a few steps farther towards the middle of the floor, in order to obtain a better view. On looking up from this new point of observation, we saw that though the hole was small, it nevertheless appeared to be large enough for an ordinary sized person to be able to squeeze through, provided the bars were out of the way. This was encouraging. But it remained to be proved, first, whether we could get up so high without having any ladder or other means of raising ourselves; and secondly, whether, if we surmounted that difficulty, we should be able to remove the obstructing bars without having tools to assist us.

It was very certain that the window was too high up for us to get at it from the ground, since it was above the door, and I, who was taller than Kitty, could only just touch the top of the door with my finger-tips when I stretched out my arm to its fullest extent. How on earth, then, were we to elevate ourselves to the height of the window? The first suggestion was, that if one of us was lifted up, perhaps she might be able to reach the desired niche, and we at once put the idea into execution. I, being the strongest and heaviest of the two, was naturally appointed to be the lifter; so I took hold of Kitty round the knees, and raised her up as far as I could. My utmost efforts, however, failed to get her to the required height, and I had to set her down again without having advanced an atom towards the accomplishment of our purpose.

"I'm sure I wasn't far short of touching the ledge of the window," she said, whilst I stood panting after my exertions; "if only I could get hold of that, and you were to help me by shoving, I expect I could pull myself right up, and manage to hitch on somehow to examine the bars. What we want is some kind of elevation for you to stand on when you lift me. Do try and invent some hoisting contrivance or other; it would be too provoking not to get up to the window now we've found it."

For a while we racked our brains vainly without discovering any solution of the problem. At last an idea flashed across my mind. No!—I would not mention such a thing—it was too horrible. Yet what I had thought of was a method whereby we might perhaps supply such an elevation as we wanted. And the unpleasantness of that method was no sufficient reason for being silent about it, when the urgent peril in which we were made it absurd to allow mere sentimental considerations to stand in the way of any possible chance of escape. Therefore I conquered my repugnance for the idea that had occurred to me, and said: "There must be coffins in this place. Very likely they are all more or less fallen to pieces, for Napoleon said that it had not been used for a long time; but yet some of the wood may still be sound, and perhaps if we grope about we may be able to collect enough boards to make a stage that would serve our purpose."

Kitty did not answer immediately. I daresay that she recoiled from the idea at first, as I had done. But if so, no doubt second thoughts showed her, as they had me, the imperative necessity of regarding matters from an exclusively practical, stern, and unimaginative point of view, and of absolutely ignoring any fanciful objections to whatever promised to aid our flight. She replied, after a short pause:

"Well, it is not a very attractive plan, certainly; but as there doesn't seem to be any other, I suppose we had better try it, and endeavour to forget its unpleasantness by looking forward to the delights of liberty if it succeeds. So now let's go to work. It's a pity neither of us was ever inside a chapelle mortuaire before, isn't it? because then we should have some notion of how such places are generally arranged, which would be a great assistance to us just now in this pitchy darkness. As it is, however, I suppose we must imagine what the plan of the interior is likely to be like, and then proceed according to that idea. If I were an undertaker I think I should first deposit the coffins in a row along the wall, then pile them up, two or three deep perhaps, and only take up the middle of the floor when the sides were all occupied. Therefore I recommend our exploring the sides first, as likely to afford the largest supply of wood. Do you go to the right, whilst I take the left—unless you have anything better to suggest?"

I had not; so we separated, and went off to the right and left respectively, as she wished. But I had hardly got a yard away from the door when she exclaimed, "Come here, Jill; I want you!"

"Yes; what is it?" inquired I, as I crossed over to her.

"I've found something that seems to me promising," she replied eagerly. "I struck my hand against it directly I had got beyond the doorway. What it is I don't know; but it's pretty big anyhow, and it's not part of a coffin, and it's made of wood. I want you to help me feel it over, and see if we can make it out."

We began carefully investigating the unknown object with our fingers, and endeavouring to recognise by touch its shape and construction. For a while it puzzled us; then suddenly Kitty had an idea and said:

"Do you think it's a bier? I never handled one before, but I daresay it would feel something like this does. And it's not unlikely that it might have been left here and forgotten after the last funeral, is it?"

"No; that's it, depend upon it!" cried I; "and it's a grand discovery, for a bier will help to raise us capitally, if only it's not got rotten, lying here so long."

To ascertain its condition was our first anxiety. Accordingly we took hold of the handles, lifted it off the ground, and gave it a smart shake, though not without considerable misgivings lest it should come to pieces in our hands. Fortunately it stood the test tolerably well, and did not break down. At the same time, however, it quivered and cracked in a way that did not give the impression of its being in very first-rate order; and we decided that it would be imprudent to expose it to the trial of bearing both of us simultaneously. If it would support one at a time, we would make no further demands upon its powers of endurance; and consequently we must utilise it in some other way than by my standing on it and lifting Kitty up to the window, as was our first idea.

Instead of that we raised it lengthwise, and placed it so that the handles at one end rested on the ground, whilst those at the other were against the door. When thus erected the upper part of the body of the bier was, of course, a good deal elevated, and made a foothold whence the window could easily be attained. To mount to this foothold was now our intention; and Kitty, being the lightest, was selected to ascend first. The only question was, How was she to get her foot to the top of the bier, which was too high up for any legs of ordinary length to step up to from the ground. But this obstacle was quickly smoothed away by my stooping down and converting myself into a stepping-stone. Mounted on me, and steadying herself against the door, she put one foot cautiously on the edge of the bier, and began to press upon it. The heavier she leant on it, the more ominously did it crack and tremble; still it did not give way, even when she at last stood upon it altogether, and it had to bear the whole of her weight. Hurrah! now we should know what the window looked like at close quarters; and whether the bars were wooden or iron, loose or tight, removable or not.

Kitty's report was satisfactory. She said that the window had a ledge on the inside which was broad and deep enough for a person to sit on by crouching a good deal, and that the bars were only wooden.

"Are they breakable?" I asked anxiously.

"Don't know yet," she returned; "I shall be able to tell better if I get right up on the ledge. They don't feel very solid; but I'm afraid of trying them from here. You see I'm not very confident of the stability of my present foothold, and don't care to indulge in violent exertions till I get to a safer situation. Wrestling with the bars where I am now might lead to an upset. If you'll help me by pushing below, I will draw myself up on to the ledge."

By dint of our united efforts, the further ascent was accomplished successfully. The ledge did not afford a very comfortable resting-place, as she had to sit bent nearly double, with her feet hanging down against the wall. But the position, though cramped and inconvenient, was secure, and was a firm point of vantage from which to attack the bars. She took hold of one, and shook it. Being completely rotted through, it came in two in her hand at once. The next offered a more obstinate resistance; in this also, however, as well as in the others, decay had begun, and had gone too far for the wood to withstand her vigorous jerks, pushes, pulls, shakes, and blows. Therefore it was not very long before she announced triumphantly that there was now nothing to hinder our egress through the window, which was, as we had thought, big enough for us to pass through.

"There's one thing I don't quite see, though," she said, after poking out her head and reconnoitring the exterior; "that is, how we're to get down on the other side. It looks to me rather far for a drop. I should say it would be a toss up whether we did it safely, or whether we broke our legs. Of course we must risk it if there's nothing else to be done; but if there is any other way of descending—why, I think it would be better."

"Is there room for us both to be on the ledge at the same time?" I inquired, after a moment's reflection; "because if I were up there by you, I might break the fall considerably by reaching down and holding you up when you drop. And then when you are down, you may be able to find some way of breaking the fall for me. Even if not, it would not matter so much for me. I think I could drop the distance without hurting myself; for when I was a child I used to do a deal of jumping and climbing, and was always good at falling light."

"Well—we might try that, at all events," she answered, "if the ledge is large enough to hold us both at the same time. I'm doubtful whether it is—but we can soon see. Wait a moment and I'll make more room by turning round, and sitting with my feet out instead of in. There—now they're out of the way. Come and stand on the top of the bier, and see if you can stow yourself away up here by my side."

It now for the first time struck us that it was by no means sure whether I should be able to get to the top of the bier without having any one to assist me from below as I had assisted Kitty. Yet if I failed to reach that point, I must give up the idea of reaching the window; and as that was equivalent to resigning my hopes of liberty, it was evidently of the utmost importance that I should accomplish the ascent.

Kitty was the first to suggest a way out of the difficulty.

"Can you alter the position of the bier," said she, "so as to make it slant, instead of standing almost upright as it does now? Because then you might manage to creep up it."

"I've no doubt I can, only I hadn't thought of it," replied I, proceeding to drag the two lower handles away from the door, till the steepness of the incline was much less than before. Then I grasped the upper edge of the bier, and tried, partly by pulling and partly by crawling, to bring my feet up to where my hands were. Alas! the woodwork that was firm enough to support Kitty, standing upon it quietly, had not strength to bear a person of my greater weight, scrambling up it as I was doing. Collapsing altogether, it brought me violently to the ground with a crash which alarmed Kitty, who, on her perch overhead, half in and half out, could not see what was happening in the darkness beneath.

"Oh, Jill!" she exclaimed, "what is it? Are you hurt?"

"No," I answered, feeling ready to cry with vexation, as I rose, and cleared away the débris of broken wood with which I was covered. "I wasn't far enough off the ground for that. But the old bier has smashed all to pieces; and however I'm to get up to the window now, I'm sure I don't know!"

"Are you certain," she returned, "that there isn't any sound corner still holding together, which would do for you to stick up, and stand on? It's worth while for you to feel about on chance of such a thing, at all events."

This was true; and I explored carefully amongst the splintered fragments in hopes of discovering some solid bit. But my efforts were in vain.

"It's no use," said I, ruefully; "the thing is gone to pieces completely."

Neither of us spoke for a while after this. First I exhausted my ingenuity in vain endeavours to discover some means of raising myself to the window. Then, when I made up my mind that I was doomed to remain a captive, I began to reflect enviously on the superior good fortune of Kitty. The only thing between her and freedom was the trivial difficulty of getting down safely on the other side. Once that was overcome, she would be off, and leave me by myself in this abominable place. I did not at all like the idea of her going. For one thing, I preferred having a companion in misfortune to being solitary. And for another thing, her absence would greatly aggravate my danger, as the penitenciers would be sure to be rendered furious by her having given them the slip, and would vent their wrath upon me. Of course, if she were to fall in with efficient succour, and return before they did, it would be a different matter. But then the chance of that seemed too remote to be worth reckoning on; and I thought it was decidedly more to my interest that she should stay with me than that she should regain her liberty alone.

Why did she sit up there silently without saying anything about her departure? I wondered. Ah! probably she hadn't yet discovered a satisfactory method of managing the descent outside, which she seemed to think difficult. I could tell her how it was to be done, if I chose—but then I wasn't going to chose anything of the kind. If her own wits couldn't show her how to profit by her advantages, then let her stay where she was, and keep me company!

These were the thoughts that first crossed my mind, when I recognised the melancholy fact that I had no chance of escape. Yet, somehow or other, I did not eventually hold my tongue, as I had intended to do, about the means by which her descent might be accomplished. What induced me to change my mind about it I don't exactly know. Perhaps the fancy that I had for her may have been stronger than I realised, and have made it impossible for me to refrain from doing whatever I could to get her out of the power of two such ruffians as César and Napoleon. Or perhaps I may have been influenced by the obvious unreasonableness of allowing two people to be exposed to a danger from which one of them might escape. Anyhow, the upshot of it was that I said—though not without an effort:

"I've thought of a way for you to get down from the window without damaging yourself. We'll tie our dresses, jackets—petticoats too, if need be—into a rope which must be long enough to go through the window and dangle down outside, whilst I keep hold of one end in here. The outside end must have a loop for you to put your feet in; and with the help of that, I'm pretty sure we can make the drop safe. Then, if you should be lucky about falling in with respectable people soon, perhaps you may be able to come back and get me away before the penitenciers reappear in the morning."

As I believed her to be only staying there because she did not know how to get away, I took it for granted that she would be delighted at my suggestion, and be in a desperate hurry to avail herself of it. Instead of that, however, she only said coolly:

"Thank you, Jill; but I think it's perfectly impossible that I should find help and return in time to rescue you, so I don't at all contemplate going off alone, and leaving you to face the indignation of César and Napoleon at my departure. Goodness knows what they wouldn't do to you! No; I was the means of getting you into this scrape, and I don't seem to see leaving you to shift for yourself now. If there's no alternative between deserting you or taking up my abode again inside the chapel—why, I prefer the latter. But it's too soon to despair yet. Having got one of us up here is something; and it won't do to abandon that advantage until we're quite positive that we can't turn it to account. There's your first plan of trying to get enough wood to make a platform—why not take to that again?"

"For two reasons," said I, with a thrill of indescribable happiness and comfort at finding that she was too staunch and plucky for there to be a chance of her deserting me. "In the first place there isn't time, because I should only get on at half the pace by myself that we should have done working together. And besides that, I think that the rottenness of the bier and bars is a conclusive proof that there isn't likely to be any sound wood discoverable here."

"True," she returned. Immediately afterwards she added, exultingly, "What idiots we are! As the men hadn't a key, they can't possibly have locked us in, and there can't be any fastening except the bar across the outside of the door. We never thought of that! As soon as I get down and take away the bar, you can march out without trouble. Off with your dress, and let's make that rope you talked of to let me down with!"

It seems extraordinary that neither of us had remembered this simple solution of the difficulty sooner; yet so it was. Now that it had at last occurred to us, however, we lost no time in going to work. Our garments were instantly put into requisition, and twisted and knotted into as good an imitation of a rope as we could construct out of such materials. The end which had a loop to it was hung out of the window, whilst I retained the other end in my hands, and Kitty, placing her feet in the loop, began to lower herself gently.

As long as she could keep hold of the window her weight was thrown partly on her hands; thus I had not the whole of it to support until during the last few seconds, when, taking her feet out of the loop, letting go of the window, and clinging only to the rope, she descended as near as she could to the ground. I held on to the rope with might and main, till the tension relaxed with a sudden jerk that threw me down, and informed me that she had regained terra firma.

"Sprained ankle, broken bones, or anything of that kind?" I asked, anxiously.

"No, not hurt a bit," was the welcome response. "I'll get the door open as quickly as I can; will you begin undoing the rope meanwhile?"

"All right!" I returned, commencing to restore it to its normal condition of clothes as fast as I could in the dark. As I worked I listened hopefully to the scratching and fumbling that went on outside, and expected every moment to hear the downfall of the bar. But the minutes passed on, and still the looked-for sound did not come. I could not understand what could be causing so much delay about so simple a matter as removing a bar from across a door, and I began to grow feverishly nervous lest any unforeseen obstacle should even now intervene, and deprive me of the freedom I had begun to anticipate confidently. My alarm was not unfounded, for, to my dismay, she called out:

"This bar is so dreadfully heavy that I can't raise it. I can only move one end at a time, and lift it up a very small way above the support it stands on; but not high enough for what I want."

Then it was all over with me, and I was fated to stay there alone to be cut to pieces, or murdered in any way that might seem good to those two ruffians! And when I had thought, too, that I was so sure of getting away! The bitterness of the disappointment seemed to choke me for a minute, so that I could not speak. However, when I could control my voice, I shouted to her:

"There's no help for it! You can't get back inside again now, even if you wish to. So you've no choice about going away. Goodbye!"

"I'm not at an end of my resources yet," she replied. "I've thought of something fresh. I'm going away for a few minutes, but I shall be back directly."

The sound of her steps gave me notice of her departure from and return to the chapel. Then ensued much scraping, scratching, and other noises, to which I listened with intense anxiety, longing to know what she was about, yet fearing to ask, lest, if I interrupted her with questions, I might perhaps hinder my deliverance.

Her operations meanwhile, as I afterwards learnt, were as follows:—First, she went to fetch a supply of stones of various sizes. Returning with these, she put her shoulder underneath one end of the bar, and exerting all her strength, raised it as high as she could above the broad projecting piece of iron on which it rested. Then, before removing her shoulder, she inserted between the iron support and the bar enough stones to maintain the latter at the place to which she had raised it. This performance many times repeated, at last elevated that end so far above the other that the bar was all slanting, and only needed one vigorous push to set it in motion, sliding downwards across the iron projection on which the opposite end was supported. Moving slowly at first, the massive bar went faster and faster every instant as its own weight gave it additional impetus, till it dashed on to the ground with a resounding clang that seemed to me the sweetest music that ever gladdened the ears of mortal man or woman. I immediately pushed against the door. It yielded slowly, and next minute I was emancipated from that horrible chapelle mortuaire, and standing beside Kitty, free in the open air once more.

To describe the rapture of that moment is beyond my powers. If any one wants to know true bliss for once in their lives, I recommend them to go through a similar experience. Only they must take into account the possibility of not escaping after all; which is evidently a serious drawback, since a failure in that respect would be quite fatal to the object of the experiment.

CHAPTER III.
OFF FROM CORSICA.

We had no means of knowing how far advanced the night might be, but we knew that our enemies intended to return early in the morning; we saw that the moon was waning, and we naturally wished to get away from the vicinity of the chapelle mortuaire with all possible expedition. Having been obliged to partially undress ourselves in order to find materials for the rope, we began hastily resuming such articles of attire as had been taken off; whilst thus engaged Kitty said:

"It seems to me rather a chance that we don't run straight into the arms of those two villains when we leave this place. I don't the least know which way to go; for, except that we're in Corsica, I have uncommonly little notion of where we are. Have you?"

"Well, only this much," I replied; "in coming here we travelled a good deal more uphill than down, so I expect we must be in rather high ground. And when our captors left us I heard them say they were going to a cave in the mountains, so they will be coming here from somewhere above. Therefore, I think, we must obviously guide ourselves by the rule of going always downhill, if we want to reach a safe district, and keep out of harm's way."

"Yes; there's sense in that," answered she. "Downhill shall be our rule, as you say. But first of all, here's this enclosing wall to be got out of. We shall have to find some way of climbing over it, unless we can open the gate."

Luckily, however, the gate had only been swung to, and not fastened; so we had no difficulty in passing through it. Outside there was a roughly made road, much overgrown in consequence of long disuse, and going in two opposite directions.

"Come along," said Kitty; "roads almost always lead somewhere, and it is to be hoped this one is no exception; then we shall find ourselves at some inhabited locality or other at last. The way to the right goes downwards, I think."

Off we set to the right, therefore, at full speed, and ran ourselves out of breath; then we walked till we had got enough fresh wind to begin running again; then ran till we were blown again; and so on, recommencing as before, and ever and anon listening anxiously for any sounds of pursuit. For though it was not yet the time when the robbers had announced they would return to us, yet our fears suggested the possibility of their having changed their minds, and gone back to the chapelle sooner than they had intended. Presently the moon set; and after that the unevenness of the track and the darkness combined caused us to stumble, slip, and fall several times. But we did not slacken pace on that account, and continued our headlong flight, till at last we came to a road which was so much broader and better than the one we had hitherto been following, that we had little doubt of its being the route nationale.

We had now a comfortable sensation of being once more within reach of protection; and shortly afterwards we were yet further cheered by a sound behind us of wheels, horses' feet, and jingling bells, which announced that some vehicle was approaching. We hailed it as soon as it came up to us; but found, to our disgust, that our shouts produced no effect; for no one paid the slightest attention to them, and the thing lumbered heavily past in the darkness, giving a general impression of length and bulk which made us guess it to be a diligence, though we could not see it clearly. Having no fancy to be thus ignored and left behind, we gave chase, and quickly overtook the slowly-moving conveyance as it crawled up a hill. Being one of the mail diligences it had a letter-box hanging at the back, just above a broad low step, which it was easy to mount and descend from whilst the vehicle was in motion; thus any one with letters to post could jump up, consign them to the box, and get down again without causing any stoppage, so that the diligence was a sort of moving post-office. This step was most convenient to us at this moment. There was room enough for us both to sit upon it, and we very soon established ourselves in this muddy but not uncomfortable situation, rejoicing greatly at the welcome rest and security which it afforded. None of the people inside the diligence attempted to dislodge us, or took any notice of us, so I imagine either that our proceeding must have been too ordinary a one to attract attention, or else that they were all fast asleep. On the horses trotted again when the top of the hill was reached; the mud-splashes bespattered us freely, and we had to hold tight for fear of being shaken off by some severer jolt than usual; but we maintained our position till the carriage, after travelling some distance, came to a standstill, and some one began to get down. Then, fearing lest gratuitous conveyance might be objected to, we got off and stood aside to reconnoitre before showing ourselves.

It appeared that the reason of the halt was our having reached an inn at which some one in the diligence was going to alight. The house door stood wide open, which indicated, I suppose, that accommodation might be had within by any one who could manage to awake one of the inhabitants; but otherwise there was no sign of readiness for guests; the premises were totally unlighted; there was no guardian—human or canine—to give notice of the arrival of either friend or foe, nor was there any bell or other means of summons.

The diligence having drawn up opposite to this primitive hotel, one of the passengers got out with a bag in his hand, and the conducteur descended from his perch bearing a lantern. Then they entered the house, and as they did so the lantern went out, and we heard them go stumbling and groping their way in the dark upstairs to the first floor. Here there was a fastened door, which prevented a further advance, and a considerable amount of knocking, kicking, and bawling ensued, till some inmate was at last aroused to come and see what was wanted. Up to this moment the conducteur had appeared to consider himself as to some extent bound to look after the passenger whom his vehicle had conveyed there; but the instant his ears had assured him of the fact of there being a living person in the inn, he evidently felt that his duty in the matter was at an end, and all responsibility for the traveller henceforth transferred to the landlord. No sooner, therefore, were the first sounds audible of some one stirring within than the conducteur left his charge to take care of himself and came clattering downstairs and out into the road again, without troubling himself to wait for the inner door to be opened, in order to find out whether the new-comer could be accommodated, or whether, perhaps, the little hostelry might be already full—in which case the visitor would have had no option about passing the rest of the night in the street, unless he had preferred going on again in the diligence.

"Not much like English ideas of travelling and arriving at a hotel, is it?" whispered Kitty to me, with much truth.

As soon as the conducteur returned to the road, we stepped up to him, and Kitty asked if he would kindly tell us the name of this place, and also what was the destination of the diligence, as we were strangers who had got lost, and did not know where we were. He looked at us with no little surprise, and answered that our present situation was St. Marie Sicché, and that the diligence was on its way to Ajaccio.

This was a welcome piece of information. St. Marie Sicché was, it will be remembered, the village where we had slept on the first night of our driving-tour; consequently we were not in an altogether strange district, and knew that we were within three or four hours of Ajaccio, where the best part of our luggage was left, and where we were more at home than in any other part of the island. There could be no doubt that the best thing for us to do was to get there and make ourselves comfortable at the hotel as soon as possible; and then, when the telegraph offices should be open in the morning, we would find out where Mrs. Rollin was, and relieve her mind as to our safety. The only obstacle was that we had no money to pay for our conveyance to Ajaccio; for the penitenciers had carried off everything valuable that we possessed; and, therefore, unless we could get credit, we must evidently be involved in a good deal of bother and delay before we should be able to leave our present situation, or do anything that we wanted to do.

In this difficulty Kitty appealed to the conducteur, telling him that as we had been robbed, we were at that moment penniless; and asking him whether he would take us in his diligence to Ajaccio, and let us pay for our places after arriving there. She also told him the name of the hotel where our baggage was left, and assured him that we should have no difficulty in having our respectability guaranteed there. The man hesitated, hummed and hawed, looked suspiciously at us—muddy and untidy as we were—and did not seem much inclined to believe her story. But after some trouble, she persuaded him to consent to her request by promising to pay double the ordinary fare.

Having thus settled the matter satisfactorily with him, we anticipated no further difficulty, and were about to enter the interior of the vehicle—both coupé and banquette being full—when we were unexpectedly opposed by one of the passengers already established there. The conversation had roused him from his slumbers; and when Kitty attempted to get in, he started forward and protested energetically against our admission. It was a shame to take up any one else, he said, when he and his fellows were already "pressés comme des anchois"; they had been crowded to the very verge of possibility by the person who had just alighted; it was absurd to think of cramming us two individuals into the space that that one had occupied; he objected—he would complain to the authorities—it was disgraceful to treat travellers in that way. Another diligence was due in about ten or twelve hours, and we ought to wait, and take our chance of finding places in that.

The prospect of waiting at St. Marie Sicché for another ten or twelve hours was by no means to our mind, and we were alarmed to see that the conducteur seemed inclined to listen to the irate passenger. But Kitty showed herself equal to the emergency. Turning promptly to the conducteur, she whispered to him that she hardly supposed he was going to leave us for the benefit of any rival vehicle; and that as it was important to her to get to Ajaccio at once, she would give him treble the proper fare if he took us, instead of only double, as previously agreed. He was evidently quite alive to the fact that an extra high fare would give him the opportunity of pocketing a nice little profit, by only paying the diligence company a single fare and keeping the rest for himself; and her increased offer put an end to his hesitation about introducing us into the already full conveyance. Therefore he turned a deaf ear to the other man's expostulations—thoroughly well-founded though they were—proceeded to make room somehow or other, and finally stowed us away without heeding the discontented sleepy grunts and growls of the victims whom we had forced to compress themselves into an unnaturally small space. Then he shut us all in, climbed back to his place, and the journey was resumed.

The interior of a hot, crowded, stuffy diligence, packed closely with garlic-eating Corsicans clad in strong-smelling garments, would not generally be deemed a very inviting haven of repose. Yet it seemed so to us just then; for we were tired enough to find rest anywhere delicious, and were too full of joy at having escaped from serious danger to grumble at such trifling annoyances as mere discomfort and unpleasant odours.

A couple of hours' jolting brought us to Cauro, where the horses were changed; thence we continued our course to Ajaccio, which was reached soon after seven in the morning. Stiff and fatigued as we were, we should have been glad of a fiacre to take us from the diligence-bureau to the hotel; but no fiacre was to be had at that early hour, so we set off walking, accompanied (I need hardly say) by an envoy sent by the conducteur to find out whether the account we had given of ourselves was a true one.

As we were going up the street I saw a couple of smart-looking sailors coming towards us. The sight of them suddenly reminded me that there was a chance of Lord Clement's being still at Ajaccio, which possibility I had till then forgotten. If he were within reach, would Kitty turn willingly to him as a protector and counsellor, I wondered?

"Those two look like sailors from a yacht," said I; "if they should happen to belong to La Catalina, I suppose you will send word by them to Lord Clement that you have returned, won't you?"

"No! what would be the good of that?" she answered sharply, and not at all as if she was in any hurry to meet her noble admirer again. But second thoughts made her change her mind, for she added: "Well, yes; perhaps it would be as well to let him know we're back, if he does happen to be still here. Both you and I are dead tired; and he could go and see to telegraphing, and all that's got to be done, while we rest. Besides that, in spite of the principles of equality of these republicans, I strongly suspect that a person who is rich, a man, and an earl, stands a better chance of being attended to by the authorities than a mere commonplace woman. So, on the whole, I daresay he would be useful just now to act as agent for me."

When we were close to the sailors we saw that they were part of the crew of La Catalina, as her name was visible upon their hats and jerseys.

"Is Lord Clement on board La Catalina?" asked Kitty.

The two tars stopped and stared in evident surprise at being accosted in their own tongue in the streets of Ajaccio at that early hour in the morning.

"Ay, ay," answered one of them.

"Just go back to the yacht at once then," returned Kitty, "and tell him that Miss Mervyn has returned here, and has gone to the hotel where she was staying before, and will be glad to see him there as soon as possible."

The men, who did not in the least recognise us, stared more than ever at hearing themselves ordered about in this fashion by one of two strange women presenting the extraordinary appearance which Kitty and I did at that moment. For it must be remembered that we had been splashed with mud from head to foot as we sat on the step of the diligence; that our clothes were torn, rumpled, and put on anyhow; that our hair was horribly disheveled; and that we were altogether as untidy-looking objects as could well be imagined.

Evidently the sailors did not know what to make of us, and were undecided, for a moment, whether to do what they were told, or to be impertinent. But Kitty bore the stamp of high birth and breeding marked too plainly for it to be concealed by disreputable externals; and she spoke with the calmly-commanding manner of a person who is accustomed to be obeyed. The sailors were not insensible to this influence, and could not help recognising her as a legitimate authority, notwithstanding the peculiarity of her appearance. When, therefore, she repeated what she had said before, and again told them to be off at once, they looked at one another sheepishly, touched their hats, and departed obediently in the direction of the harbour. And that they executed their commission faithfully was proved by the promptitude with which Lord Clement arrived at our hotel and asked for Miss Mervyn.

Poor young man! thought I, as I watched him going upstairs to her room. I do not suppose you will be very pleased at what you are going to hear; for your Mrs. Grundy-loving nature is sure to abhor eccentric adventures; and I do not expect you will enjoy that your lady-love should be known to have been the heroine of such an unusual experience as Kitty has just gone through! Judging by the annoyed and disturbed expression on his countenance when the interview with her was over, and he left the hotel, I imagine that my anticipations were not far wrong, and that his sense of propriety and of the fitness of things was greatly shocked at what had occurred to the young lady whom he desired to marry. His annoyance, however, did not prevent him from taking all trouble off her shoulders as far as possible; and he made himself useful by telegraphing to various places till he had discovered Mrs. Rollin; then informing her that we were safe at Ajaccio; and also giving notice to the police of the nefarious proceedings of César and Napoleon.

Our loss had thrown Mrs. Rollin into a state of anxiety, nervousness, and discomposure, which none of the French novels she had with her had sufficed to calm. She had gone on hourly exciting herself more and more against Corsica and all its people, until she had worked herself into an unreasoning aversion to it and them. Consequently, when she rejoined us at Ajaccio, which she did on the evening of the day that we had returned there, the one fixed idea in her mind was, that she would never know a moment's ease or happiness as long as she remained in the island, and that we must get away from it immediately.

On hearing our adventures she declared that what had happened was fearful, ghastly, and shocking, but yet no more than was to be expected in an out-of-the-way, uncivilised, poverty-stricken country where nobody went, where the inhabitants lived without milk and butter, and where every one was a savage or thief, or both. She very deeply regretted having let herself be overpersuaded to come to this Corsica; but, at all events, no power on earth should induce her to stay in such a vile, odious, unsafe, abominable place any longer. Besides, though the two penitenciers would probably never be captured, yet still, supposing by any accident that they were caught, and Kitty was within reach, then the girl would be wanted to give evidence against them, and that was another reason for taking flight at once. Else there would be the risk of Kitty's having to appear in a police-court, take oaths, be cross-examined and badgered by vulgar lawyers, and all that sort of thing, which was quite unfit for a lady to undergo. And what depths the vulgarity of lawyers in a republican country might reach, she, Mrs. Rollin, was afraid to think! Of course she by no means expected that the robbers would be taken; but as there was a possibility of such a thing, it was her duty to provide for it.

When she stopped to take breath, Kitty inquired why she was so certain that the culprits would not be recaptured, and that set her off again. She had seen, she said, enough of Corsicans by this time to convince her that they were all rogues alike, and all in collusion with one another. In hopes of keeping us staying on and on, and spending money amongst them, they might perhaps talk big, and declare that the offenders would soon be under lock and key; but meanwhile they would be let to escape quietly; or, if caught, good care would be taken that they should not be convicted. But she wasn't going to be so silly as to be made a fool of by these Corsicans, and to play into their hands by remaining there longer. No, thank you! She had discovered that there would be a steamer to Marseilles on the following day, and by that steamer she intended to go. And besides everything else, there was yet another reason, she averred, why she must now begin to make her way homewards. She found, from letters she had just received, that matters of business made it necessary for her to return to England sooner than she had expected. She must positively have a week's shopping in Paris on the way back, and she would not have time for this unless she started at once. Therefore it was, in every respect, out of the question that we should prolong our visit to this detestable island.

Her mind was made up too firmly to be shaken, and on the next day we quitted Ajaccio in La Catalina—Lord Clement having again placed that vessel at my two ladies' disposal. I am afraid, however, that this act of civility did not bring him the satisfaction that he probably expected. For Kitty, instead of making herself agreeable during the voyage, professed to be headachy, and remained alone in a cabin; and as soon as Marseilles was reached, she and her aunt said goodbye to him, and set off for Paris by the next rapide. Very possibly he would have liked to accompany them there. But then yachting was his ostensible occupation at the present time; and if he deserted his yacht to go to Paris, people would be sure to talk, shrug shoulders, and say that there certainly was something on between him and Kitty. Though all this would not matter supposing it to be followed promptly by the announcement that they were engaged, yet, under other circumstances, it would in his eyes be highly undesirable; therefore he stuck to La Catalina.

As for me, I was a good deal disappointed, for I had been looking forward with vindictive pleasure to the chance of bearing witness against Messrs. César and Napoleon, and I grudged the hasty departure from Corsica which deprived me of this chance. A few days later I saw in a newspaper that they had been caught, and relegated to their former quarters in prison at Chiavari. That was some comfort, no doubt; but nothing like as satisfactory as it would have been to have contributed, in my own person, to bring about their punishment.

CHAPTER IV.
CAPTAIN NORROY APPEARS.

I have already said that the circumstances connected with the photograph which I had found in Kitty's purse had made me fancy that there was some secret reason for her regarding Captain Edward Norroy differently from the rest of mankind; and I have said, also, that I was hoping some day to see him and her together, on chance that I might then succeed in discovering a clue to a right comprehension of what the relations between them were. This opportunity which I desired came unexpectedly on the day after our arrival in Paris, and was brought about in the following manner.

Mrs. Rollin was determined that she and Kitty must be photographed by a Paris photographer named Raoul, who was at that time so much the rage amongst fashionable people that to be in his town and not profit by the opportunity of having her likeness done by him, would have been a sin of omission which would have lain heavy on her conscience for the rest of her existence—or, at all events, for as long as he continued to be the fashion. It was, of course, necessary in the first place to ascertain when it would suit the great man to take the photograph. For this purpose she had intended to go to his studio in person on the day after reaching Paris; but as she happened to be a little out of sorts on that day, she preferred to stay at home reading Rocambole, and send Kitty in her stead, under my escort, to make the requisite appointment. At the studio we found a polite assistant, who was quite in despair to think that the ladies should be obliged to wait; but as his patron was just then engaged, he feared it was inevitable that they should do so, unless their business was of a nature which he, the assistant, could transact for them. If so, he should be proud and honoured to receive their commands.

Now Mrs. Rollin, having been much exercised in her mind as to whether it would be more chic to be done in morning or evening attire, had particularly instructed Kitty to refer the matter to Raoul, and find out his opinion about it. Consequently she declined the assistant's offer of his services with thanks, and said that she would wait till Monsieur Raoul was disengaged. On this we were shown into the waiting-room, which was as dreary as the rest of its kind, and where we endeavoured to find amusement by inspecting the various specimens of the patron's art that were dispersed on the table.

We were thus employed, and I was standing with my back to the door, when it opened to admit some one; at the same instant I saw Kitty—who was looking that way—flush violently and suddenly, and, on turning round, I perceived that the new-comer was Captain Norroy.

I need hardly say that I was immediately all eyes and ears for what would take place; and that my subsequent inspection of photographs was a mere pretence, which I kept up in order that the young couple might not suspect how attentively I was studying them.

They shook hands, exchanged greetings, and then went on to talk of the weather, the state of the streets, the hotels at which they were staying, etc., just as any ordinary acquaintances would do. There was not the faintest trace of consciousness about Captain Norroy's manner; and he was so evidently free from any kind of special emotion connected with Kitty, that I doubted, for a moment, whether my surmises might after all have been wrong. But then, again, I felt confirmed in them by Kitty, who was certainly not as cool and unembarrassed as was the captain. The first flush caused by his entrance had nearly died out; but there still lingered a tinge of unwonted colour on her cheeks, and a more than commonly brilliant light in her eyes. In both her look and manner of speaking I could detect a shade of nervousness, of pleasure, of restraint, of something different to usual, which I was unable to interpret. It was a difference so slight as to have been, probably, imperceptible to any one who did not know her well; but to me it was so plainly visible that I felt sure I was not mistaken about it.

As it happened, the conversation presently took a turn which supplied me with such a clue as I wanted in order to read the riddle which had been perplexing me, and to arrive at some idea of how matters stood between these two people, in whom my interest had been excited.

The captain, looking at his watch, observed that Raoul was not very punctual, as it was already twenty minutes past the time when he had said that he would be ready to photograph the captain.

"What! are you actually going to be photographed?" said Kitty, laughing. "I can hardly believe it possible when I remember the vehemence with which I have heard you declare that, having gone through the operation once, you never would again. You professed to think it an intolerable bore."

"Yes—so I did, and so I do still," he replied; "but I'm going to sacrifice myself nobly for the sake of other people. You see almost every one, now-a-days, has a carte-de-visite book, which they are desirous of filling by hook or by crook. Consequently, one is constantly being entreated for a photo by even one's most casual acquaintances. One don't like to be always refusing to do what one's asked, because it makes one feel such an ill-natured brute; but at present I can't help saying no when I'm asked for a photo of myself, for the very excellent reason that I haven't such a thing to give."

"Why not?" inquired Kitty. "Haven't you the photos which were taken on the solitary occasion when you were done?"

"Ah! that attempt had no chance, as the French say," he answered. "My batch of copies fell into the fire directly they arrived, and were all burnt except four, which I managed to rescue, and of which I gave three to my mother and sisters, and the fourth to Lady Cantern, who was just then perfectly ravenous for photos, because she and her sister were in the midst of a race as to which could get her photo-book filled the quickest. Of course this left me destitute of cartes, so I at once ordered a fresh lot from the photographer; but the fates were evidently against me, for the original plate had been accidentally cracked, so that no more copies could be struck from it. Curiously enough, too, the bad luck which attended that photographic effort pursued even the copy I gave Lady Cantern. You remember that time you and I, and a lot of other people, were staying with her last winter for balls, don't you? What a pleasant visit it was! and especially that last cotillion you and I danced together—wasn't it delightful?"

As Kitty assented, I noticed that she looked down somewhat nervously, as if she wished to avoid all risk of having the recollections evoked by the mention of that visit read in her face.

"Well," he continued, "she says that she missed my photo out of her book on the very day after her guests departed; and as she is positive it was in its place just before, she declares some one of them must have taken a fancy to it and carried it off. At first she accused me of being the thief—as if it was likely I should care to have such a caricature of myself as I considered it to be! I can't imagine how she could suppose that any one would wish for such an unflattering presentment of himself as long as looking-glasses continue plentiful! However, I undeceived her on that point; and then she said that if it wasn't I who had appropriated the thing, it must have been some one else. My own idea is that she must have put it away somewhere, and forgotten what she'd done with it. But, anyhow, she hadn't discovered it when last I saw her, and I don't believe she will—that batch had no chance, as I said before. Ah! here comes Raoul to lead off his victim. I shall have a few moments of grace whilst you and he fix the date of your execution; and then——"

Raoul's entrance terminated this conversation, to which I—whilst making believe to be engrossed in the study of photographs—had listened with the greatest attention. It seemed to me to throw fresh light upon the matter that had been perplexing me hitherto.

Evidently Kitty possessed a photograph of Captain Norroy of which there were only four copies in existence. As neither of them had been given to her, she must have come by it surreptitiously; and her possession of it was, no doubt, to be explained by the mysterious disappearance of Lady Cantern's copy immediately after Kitty had been staying in her house.

But though I thought there could be no doubt as to Kitty's having been the person who purloined this precious carte-de-visite, I was sorely puzzled to conjecture what possible motive she could have had for doing so. After reflecting deeply on the problem, I could find no solution of it except one, which did not seem to me to be altogether likely. It was this. Had the handsome young captain perhaps touched her heart more deeply than was expedient? and could she have fallen in love with him? If so, that might explain the things that now puzzled me: her stealing the photograph; the care with which it was concealed; the emotion she had betrayed when I suddenly produced it; and also the nervousness and peculiarity of manner I had noticed in her when she met him at Raoul's.

But however probable this theory might have appeared in the case of some girls, it hardly seemed admissible when Kitty was the person concerned. For as it was quite plain that the captain's sentiments towards her were simply those of an ordinary acquaintance, it followed that to suppose her to have a fancy for him involved supposing that she cared for a man who did not return the compliment. And her pride seemed to make such an idea impossible. Kitty Mervyn to have an unrequited attachment, indeed! It was absurd even to think of such a thing.

Yet again, on the other hand, who could tell what caprice might not rule an article so notoriously wayward as a woman's heart? And if love overcomes bolts and bars, why should it not conquer the stiffest pride also? Clearly it was foolish of me to think I could be sure of how any person would act, when there was a possibility of a strange and unknown quantity like love manifesting itself, upsetting the best-founded calculations, and altering the whole aspect of affairs.

Still, I could scarcely bring myself to believe that Kitty would have bestowed her affections on any one who did not seek them. Ah! but then there was the question—had she perhaps imagined that they were sought? This good-looking Captain Norroy was as pleasant in manner as he was in personal appearance; his voice was soft and caressing; he gave me the idea of being a lazy, good-humoured, susceptible man, who would enjoy popularity with women and take pains to be agreeable in their eyes; and who would unintentionally put an appearance of earnestness into a mere passing flirtation, which would make it dangerous to the other party. And possibly he had admired Kitty, and flirted with her mildly, without meaning anything serious; and possibly she had been deceived by his attentions into supposing he was in love with her, and not discovered her error until her heart was already touched.

If that were so, I could not help pitying her; for I knew that the knowledge of her own weakness and folly must be terribly galling to her, and that she must be in a continual state of anxiety lest any one should discover, or even suspect it. Yet I could imagine, too, that the bitterness would be mingled with sweetness, in that she would be always hoping he might some day return her love. It was a hope that it would be most natural for her to entertain; for she could not fail to know how generally attractive she was to his sex; and as he was but a man like other men, was it not reasonable to suppose that he too might be affected by charms which his fellows seemed to find irresistible? And then the recollection of the numerous admirers she had had, and for whom she cared nothing, took my thoughts for a moment into a fresh channel, as I wondered whether those victims would not have thought it a no more than just retribution for her to give her affections without return. For I was aware that some ill-natured people had been known to term her a regular flirt; and I had heard of rejected suitors of hers who had complained bitterly of the impartial amiability with which she behaved to every one, and had declared that she did it with malicious intent to lead men on to propose, in order that she might have the pleasure of refusing them.

Assuming her to be in love with Captain Norroy, I thought I could form a pretty good guess as to what her feeling about Lord Clement would be. Her pride would be all in his favour; for pride would be up in arms at the idea of her waiting to see if the captain would condescend to throw his handkerchief to her, and would urge her to terminate so humiliating a situation by marrying some one else. And thus pride would be a powerful auxiliary to the soaring ambition and desire to be amongst the great ones of the earth, which were marked features of her character. All this would evidently prompt her to accept Lord Clement and the high rank and position he had to offer; and I could only account for her not having done so already, by supposing that the voice of natural inclination had made itself heard on the other side. Perhaps it had pleaded with her not to be in a hurry, and not rashly to render impossible a happiness that might still be hers if she would have the patience to wait awhile longer. Perhaps the struggle between pride and love was going on within her now, and she had not yet determined which voice to listen to. If so, I could by no means hazard an opinion as to what the issue was likely to be; and it seemed to me an even chance which would gain the mastery.

How far were all these speculations and conjectures of mine right? That remained to be proved; and I felt as if fate had kindly assigned to me a good situation in the front row whence to watch the progress of a play which it amused me to look on at. Yet, as it must interfere with one's enjoyment of a play to get excited about its termination, I should certainly have preferred for some other than Kitty to be the chief performer. For I was half afraid that I might find I cared for her too much to remain an altogether indifferent spectator where her happiness was seriously concerned.

CHAPTER V.
A NEWSPAPER PARAGRAPH.

Of course Mrs. Rollin and Kitty had a deal of shopping to do in Paris; for to be in that town and not buy clothes is—to most feminine minds—an unpardonable sinning of one's mercies. The dressmaker whom they elected to give their orders to was a certain Madame Jarrot, much patronised by the fashionable world; and having made an appointment with her at her own residence, they proceeded thither to keep it one day soon after the visit to the photographer which was related in the last chapter.

Now I liked much better to sit in their drawing-room than in the poky little garret which was my bedroom; and when they did not want the sitting-room themselves, I never saw any reason why I should not avail myself of it. No sooner, therefore, were they safe off than I betook myself there, and proceeded to make myself comfortable, according to my usual practice, during their absence. Lying on the table were some English newspapers that had just arrived, and I began to read them. In a column devoted to fashionable intelligence, I presently came upon the following paragraph—to me most entirely unexpected.

"The Duke of Murkshire and his family, who are at present in the French metropolis, will probably return at an early date to their ancestral halls, in order to make preparations for the marriage of his Grace's eldest daughter, Lady Emma, to Captain Edward Norroy of the Scots Fusilier Guards. The engagement of the young couple has just been announced, and the wedding is, we understand, to take place shortly."

When I had read this I laid down the paper, feeling perfectly dazed. Captain Norroy going to be married to this Lady Emma! In my speculations about Kitty and her love affairs I had—without being aware of it—invariably put aside as absurd the idea of its being possible that any one whom she might honour with her preference could remain indifferent to her; and therefore I had all along been unconsciously taking it for granted that Captain Norroy must inevitably fall in love with her sooner or later; and that if she did not eventually become his wife, it would not be at any rate for want of the opportunity. I knew well enough that I myself should have been at her feet if she had but held up her little finger to me. And as one is apt to consider it a matter of course that attractions by which one is oneself fascinated must be equally irresistible to other people, it was consequently not much to be wondered at that I should now be utterly taken aback at finding the man whom I believed her to care for was going to marry some one else.

The thing seemed to me hardly credible. He must be blind—a dolt and fool—to have a prize like Kitty within his reach, and let it slip! Why, there was no one so attractive and charming as she was; she was (in my eyes) quite incomparable. And though I had never seen this Lady Emma, and knew nothing whatever about her, I was none the less firmly convinced that she could not hold a candle to Kitty in any single respect.

How would Kitty take the news, I wondered? Had she any expectation of it? Had the possibility of such a thing ever occurred to her? No; I had an intuitive conviction to the contrary. When she had met him at Raoul's her manner had shown not only shyness and nervousness, there had been something more—something indefinable, of pleasure and hope—which made me feel sure that she had believed him to be heart-whole, and not the property of any other girl, or about to become so. Had she been in England, she would no doubt have heard some of the gossip by which the engagements of people conspicuous in society are usually preceded, but her recent absence abroad had, of course, prevented any rumours of a flirtation between Captain Norroy and Lady Emma from reaching her ears, and she must now be totally unprepared to hear they were going to be married. Of course, it would not matter to her an atom if she were fancy-free about him, and if the romance I had constructed was a baseless one. But then I was almost positive that it was not baseless, and that the news would be a blow to her, though she would doubtless strain every nerve to conceal that fact.

My poor Kitty, thought I sorrowfully; and, immediately afterwards, laughed at my own folly. How could I be so silly as to prefix the possessive pronoun singular to the name of a person who was not mine at all? Though she had always been kind and courteous to me, yet her manner showed plainly that she regarded me as one of an inferior order, between whom and herself existed, naturally, an impassable barrier; and knowing this, why should I concern myself about her troubles, as if she and I had been on terms of equality and intimate friendship? It would be ridiculous to do anything of the kind. Had I not resolved before now that I would put a check upon the inclination to be fascinated by her, of which I was conscious? Certainly I had; and yet how was I keeping that resolution if I let myself take her affairs to heart, and feel sorry for her, and indignant with Captain Norroy, as I was inclined to be at that moment? Provoked to see in myself such a disposition to be weakly sentimental, I was glad when my common-sense and turn for ridicule bestirred themselves, and applied mentally a douche of cold water which cooled down my first absurd impulse to be her ardent partisan.

After all, her affairs were no business of mine, and it was mere folly to let myself be vexed about them in any way. It could do no possible good, and I should be simply making myself uncomfortable for nothing. Besides, if she could see into my mind, I might be very sure that she would not approve of her maid's presuming to take so much interest in her affairs, and would consider me impertinent and officious.

Sensible reflections of this kind effectually repressed my previous tendency to a foolish soft-heartedness; and I resumed my interrupted perusal of the newspaper, and amused myself placidly during the rest of the afternoon till nearly dinner-time, when my mistresses returned.

I went to dress Kitty, wondering whether or not she had yet heard of Captain Norroy's engagement. Anyhow, if she had, it had not troubled her at all, for she was evidently in excellent spirits; and in that respect presented a marked contrast to her aunt, who came into her room during toilette operations, and who—as it was easy to see—had something on her mind which disturbed her. At first, I took it into my head, from this uneasiness, that Mrs. Rollin must have some suspicion of her niece's being attached to Captain Norroy, and that, having heard of his engagement to Lady Emma, she must now be worrying herself as to how Kitty would take the news, and as to the unhappiness the girl might suffer on account of it. But, from what was said, I speedily discovered that Mrs. Rollin's disquietude arose from a very different cause—neither more nor less than a pair of stays.

"Do you know, Kitty," she said, "that I've been thinking, ever since we left Jarrot's, of your flat refusal to have anything to do with that pair of stays she wanted you to wear. I cannot feel satisfied that you decided wisely. It's still not too late to change your mind, you know. Are you sure you won't give them a trial, and see how you like them?"

Kitty laughed as if the scene at the dressmaker's was an amusing one to recollect.

"Yes, I'm quite positive I won't," she answered; "they were at least three inches too small for me, and I really couldn't consent to such a wholesale diminution of the circumference of my waist! I suppose you are moved to plead for them by the recollection of Jarrot's horror and distress when she found my objection to them was quite invincible. Really I don't wonder. Her look of shocked and surprised grief would have been pathetic if the cause hadn't made it comic; and I was quite sorry to have to wound her feelings so deeply."

"Oh no, my dear, of course, it isn't that," returned Mrs. Rollin, somewhat pettishly; "what have I got to do with a dressmaker's feelings? But what I was thinking of was, her declaring that small waists are becoming so much the rage as to be almost indispensable; and that no lady who cares to be bien mise ever thinks of objecting to have her waist reduced to the smallest size possible. Jarrot is safe to be a good authority on the subject, because she is employed by quite the crème de la crème of society. I am afraid you think only of what you like; and forget that people who don't do the same as their fellows are sure to be rash, even if not wrong."

"Only, then, one must draw a line somewhere," replied Kitty; "and I draw it at having my internal arrangements shoved out of their places. Not even to possess a small waist will I endure that! Jarrot regarded it as a mere temporary inconvenience, to which I should soon get reconciled, because she thought that what is comfortable is simply whatever one was used to. But there I don't agree with her. It amused me to see how confidently she quoted il faut souffrir pour être belle, as if that must certainly settle the question. Somehow or other, even that argument failed to persuade me to make myself ill, though I am not a whit more deficient in vanity and care for my personal appearance than the rest of my sex."

Mrs. Rollin sighed. "If you won't, you won't, of course," she said; "still I should have thought you might have made the attempt to do as others do, just for a little bit, as she wanted you to."

"You see I'm too fond of my precious comfort," answered Kitty, merrily; "and, do you know, aunty, I've a great idea that I'm not the only person in the family with that weakness, and that you, too, sometimes like to go your own way, even if it isn't exactly the cut-and-dried path followed by every one else."

"Kitty, Kitty, you shouldn't say things like that," expostulated her aunt; "you know that I consider being different from other people to be a proof of an ill-regulated mind; and that, therefore, to accuse me of eccentric tastes is equivalent to saying I deserve blame. Please remember that I strongly object to your speaking in such a most inconsiderate manner."

"All right, aunt," said Kitty, good humouredly; "I'm sorry I vexed you—I'll be more careful another time. I didn't for a moment mean to imply that you aren't all you should be, you know."

But though she said this, I don't think it followed that she believed Mrs. Rollin's mind to be always in absolute conformity with its own standard of perfection. Anyhow, there was a twinkle in Kitty's eye, which made me doubtful on the subject.

Their toilettes being now completed, they descended to dinner, leaving me quite satisfied that Kitty had no secret grief oppressing her. It must be one of two things, then, I thought, as I watched her going downstairs: either my theory is wrong from beginning to end, or else she as yet knows nothing of this approaching marriage. However, it is very likely that she may not have had time to look at the papers yet, as they had only just come before she went out.

When next I saw her it was very different; and I no longer doubted that I had been right in thinking she cared for Captain Norroy. About an hour after dinner was over I was in her room arranging some clothes, when the door opened, and she entered. Her head was drooping, instead of being carried proudly thrown back as usual; her face was deadly pale, and wore an expression of misery. On seeing her like this, I felt sure that she must have just read the paragraph concerning him, and had rushed off to be alone, so that she might be relieved from the irksome restraint imposed by the presence of other people, and might let her features relax for a while into whatever expression of pain came natural to them.

In taking refuge in her own room she had evidently forgotten the possibility of any one being there; for as soon as she saw me she started violently, and seemed to strive to replace the mask, and look the same as usual for a few moments longer.

"You can leave those things for the present, Jill," she said, controlling her voice with an effort; "I have come to lie down, as I have rather a bad headache."

I saw she longed to have me gone, and as I did not want to add to her troubles, I prepared to take myself off as quickly as possible. But I was bound to play my part of lady's-maid; and as I knew that it would be an unheard-of solecism for such an official not to profess sympathy—whether she really felt it or not—with her mistress' ailments, I was obliged to pause a moment before departing, that I might express concern for her headache, and ask if I should bring her a cup of tea or coffee, or if there was anything else I could do for her. My offer, however, was not accepted.

"All I want is to be left quiet," she said, rather impatiently; "if I want you I will ring."

I withdrew accordingly. She stayed in her room by herself during the remainder of the evening, saying that her headache was still bad. At bedtime she summoned me to assist her as usual, and I thought she looked perfectly wretched. She meant, however, to keep up appearances, for when her aunt came in to inquire how she was, and say good night, she exerted herself to seem as lively as usual. She declared that her headache was all the fault of those stays Jarrot had wanted her to have. The mere idea of such an enormity of tininess had so shocked her nerves, liver, lungs, brain, and organs in general, that they had felt bound to make some forcible demonstration of disgust; and the demonstration had taken the shape of a headache. A night's rest would put her all right, she said, if she did not dream about those horrid stays; but if she were to have a nightmare about wearing them, she really could not say what might be the consequences to her health. This nonsense was uttered with enough of her customary vivacity to deceive Mrs. Rollin, who went away, quite satisfied that there was nothing the matter except an ordinary headache. But I thought differently. I had seen Kitty's lips quivering while she spoke, and had seen unmistakable traces of tears in her eyes; I had felt that her head was burning hot, and the rest of her body like ice; and these things made me believe that there was something more amiss with her than a mere commonplace headache.

When I had performed my duties for the night, and gone to my own room, my heart would keep aching for her, in spite of my efforts to restore it to its habitual condition of sensible hardness. Our recent adventures in Corsica had taught me that she would face death and danger unflinchingly; and I knew her to be exceptionally proud, strong, and brave. Yet for all her strength, courage, and pride, she seemed to be almost broken down to-night. And it naturally moves one more to see such a person as that give way than to witness the upsetting of a weaker mortal.

Anxiety about her, as I pictured to myself her solitary suffering, and longed to be able to comfort her, kept me awake and restless. What if she were to have a brain fever, or a nervous fever, or some other kind of illness such as I had heard of being brought on by a sudden mental shock? Perhaps at that very moment she was ill, and in need of assistance. So uneasy did I become, that at last I could stay away from her no longer, but determined to relieve my mind by going at once to assure myself of her well-being.

I got up accordingly, put on a dressing-gown, and stole quietly to the door of her room, where I stood listening for a minute, and wondering whether she had had the good fortune to fall asleep. No; for I heard a deep sigh, followed by an inarticulate, moaning sound, which—though so low as to be hardly audible—had something about it that seemed to me unutterably sad and forlorn. An incontrollable impulse seized me to go to her and try if I could not find some way of being of use or comfort to her. But I could not enter the room unless she choose to admit me, for she always kept her door locked at night when in a hotel. I knocked gently, and she responded, "Qui est-ce?"

"It is Jill," I replied; "may I come in? I came to see if your head is still bad? and if so, if I shall bathe it with eau de cologne, or fetch you anything, or try and read you to sleep, or do anything else for you?"

"Oh no, thanks," she answered in a weary voice; "pray go to bed and leave me, for I am better to be quite alone. You know if I want anything I can ring."

Was the reminder of the bell intended as a gentle hint that it was officious to disturb her with an offer of services which she could command if she required them? That was the light in which I regarded it, at all events; and I left her door, feeling that I had been a fool for my pains, and richly deserved the snub I had received. I asked myself scornfully what had made me try to obtain admittance into the room? what good it could have been? and what I supposed I should have done had she opened the door to me? Should I have flung my arms around her, and told her that I knew all, and was come to comfort her, or behaved in some similarly gushing manner? Most certainly not! I knew better than to imagine that an absurd demonstration of that kind would gratify her from any one, and, least of all, from a servant. Besides, when she was doing all she could to keep her trouble and its cause a profound secret, it would hardly have been a happy method of consolation to go and inform her that her efforts had failed, and that her secret was no secret at all. What, then, should I have done? I had not the remotest notion, and was forced to confess that my impulse to be with her had been simply a piece of sentimental, impractical folly, which it was very lucky I had not been able to indulge. I could not possibly have done anything to help her, and it would clearly have been wiser and kinder of me to have left her in peace; and, laughing at myself bitterly, and feeling decidedly small and ridiculous in my own eyes, I retired to bed.

CHAPTER VI.
NOTICE TO QUIT.

My fears lest Kitty's health might be affected by what had happened proved unfounded. By next morning she had got herself once more in hand, and I did not again see the expression of utter abandonment to misery which had been visible on her face the previous night at the moment when she entered her room, and before she was aware of my presence there. If ever she allowed herself to look like that again, I expect it was not until she had made quite sure first that there was no human being within reach to see what her countenance might betray.

Some change in her, however, it was impossible that there should not be, after the great and sudden mental commotion which she had experienced. I observed that she was paler than her wont, and had black marks under her eyes, which, when commented on by her aunt, she accounted for as being the results of her violent headache. I saw, too, that when she was not laughing or talking, and her features were in repose, they settled into a hard stern expression which they had not worn before; and that there was in her eyes a new look of haughty defiance, as though they were challenging the whole world to penetrate one hair's-breadth further than she chose into the locked casket of her inner self. In other respects she was outwardly unaltered, and went about and conducted herself in much the same way as usual. The first shock of the blow had made her stagger for an instant, but she had never broken down altogether, and was now prepared to stand firm, and give no sign of pain. Natures like hers, endowed with strength, pluck, and indomitable pride, are generally more likely to be embittered than crushed when trouble and disappointment comes upon them.

Just at this period my studies of Kitty's character were cut short abruptly, and my own concerns forced themselves unpleasantly into the foreground, and demanded exclusive attention.

Whilst I had been abroad my mind had been fully occupied with the various incidents of our travels, and I had forgotten all about my quondam-admirer Perkins, Lord Mervyn's valet. Unluckily, however, he had not been equally oblivious of me; for, in rejecting his attentions and causing the loss of his cherished whiskers, I had inflicted an injury that he could neither forgive nor forget, and for which he had vowed vengeance. When, therefore, chance unkindly enabled him to discover an opportunity for doing me a bad turn, he lost no time in profiting by it; and the effect which his malice had upon my fortunes I was now to experience.

The day before we were to leave Paris and return to England, I was up in my room, beginning to pack my box, when a housemaid came to tell me to go to Kitty, who was in her bedroom, and wished to see me. I obeyed the summons immediately, without a suspicion of impending trouble; but my tranquillity vanished as soon as I reached her room, and caught sight of her face. She was sitting by the writing-table, and looked up at me, on my entrance, with an air of cold dignified displeasure, which showed me plainly there was something wrong, and that I was in her black books for some cause or other. What the dickens is the matter? I thought. I began hastily considering what recent actions of mine to which she was likely to object could have come to her ears; but I could not recollect any misdemeanour important enough to make her look so displeased. I wished I could guess what sort of accusation was going to be brought against me, so that I might know whether to prepare denial, excuse, or frank confession. For which of these three would be the best defence for me to offer must obviously depend upon what likelihood there was that the real truth would be ascertained.

"I have to speak to you, Jill," she said, "about a most disagreeable matter. A letter which I have just received from my mother tells me that she has seen Sir Bartholomew Brown, who has lately returned to London, and that when she questioned him about you he denied all knowledge of any one of your name, or answering to your description; declared that no such person had ever been in his service; and that the character, purporting to have been written by him, which you produced in applying for our situation, was a forgery. What have you to say to this?"

That was just what I did not know myself; for I was completely dumbfoundered by this sudden attack from a quarter where I had anticipated no danger. Why on earth could not Sir Bartholomew have stayed in the East, as he had been supposed to be going to do? In vain did I rack my brains for some way of extricating myself from this dilemma. Not a single idea would occur to me, so I simply remained silent—a course which had, at all events, the recommendation of not committing me one way or other.

Kitty waited for a little while; and then, perceiving that I did not intend to answer, she said:

"Am I to understand by your silence that you are unable to contradict the truth of what Sir Bartholomew said?"

"Oh, if you choose to understand it so, m'm, of course I can't help that," replied I, shrugging my shoulders, and still evading a direct admission of the charge which it was evidently useless for me to dispute.

"I do not choose it at all," she returned quickly; "on the contrary, I should greatly prefer to find that you are able to clear yourself. But I wish to have a definite answer from you, either yes or no, when I ask—Is the thing true?"

I hesitated for a moment. Then, seeing that I could gain nothing by denying, and that to tell a lie about it would only sink me yet lower in her eyes without doing me the least good, I replied desperately, "Well—yes."

For a few minutes she did not speak, and sat with her head resting on her hand, and apparently reflecting about something. At last she said:

"I have been considering what to do. My mother thinks that you should at once be given in charge of the police; but that I do not feel inclined to do, after what we went through together in Corsica the other day, and the way in which you behaved then. Besides, I have had no cause of complaint since you have been with me, and I think you have served me well—whatever you may have done elsewhere. Therefore, though of course I dismiss you, yet I wish to treat you with no needless harshness. I propose, then, that you should continue to be my maid for a day longer, so as not to leave me till we arrive in London. Thus you will not be turned adrift in a foreign country, as would be the case if I discharged you here, on the spot; you will also have been brought back to whence you came, and be left in no worse position than you were before entering our service. As for your wages, I shall, of course, pay them to you fully. If you like this arrangement—which is, I think, as favourable a one as you can expect—I am quite willing to make it. I daresay some people would say I ought not to let you stay an hour longer in my service; and that all the thanks I shall get is to be laughed at, and perhaps robbed, by a person who has already shown herself to be a forger. But I would rather take my chance of that than have to reproach myself with having wronged you."

I did not like her to think worse of me than I deserved, and for a moment I felt very much inclined to tell her who I was, in order that she might see that circumstances had really compelled me to act as I had done. For if I had not forged a character to start with, how could I ever have obtained a chance of earning one honestly? I think I should inevitably have yielded to the inclination, and imparted my history to her there and then, if there had been anything in her manner to make me believe that I had won a footing, however low down, in her affection—that she cared about me just one little bit. But there was no such indication. She would not defraud me of one atom that might be due for the services I had rendered, because it would have wounded her own self-respect to do that. But I saw (or imagined myself to see) that the consideration she showed for me was dictated solely by a sense of justice, and not by any softer feeling; and the rising impulse to confide in her was frozen back by the cold, haughty severity of her demeanour towards one whom she regarded as a mere common cheat and forger. Consequently I only replied stiffly that I was much obliged for her offer, which I should be glad to accept; and that she might depend upon it I would not give her cause to repent of her kindness.

"Very well," she returned, "then we will consider the matter settled so, and you will leave me when we get to Charing Cross. By the by, I may as well let you know that I have not told my aunt of what I heard to-day, and that I shall not do so till after you have left. It would only fuss her needlessly."

Then I withdrew, feeling extremely provoked at the turn affairs had taken, and heartily anathematising Sir Bartholomew for having come back to England so inopportunely, instead of staying in the East, as he had been expected to do. How unlucky, too, that Lady Mervyn should have happened to meet him, and to have had nothing better to talk about than me! The more I thought about it, the more extraordinary did it seem that she should have ever troubled herself to mention me to him: for, from what I knew of her ladyship, I should have thought that a lady's-maid was far too insignificant to be honoured by being made a topic of her conversation with a stranger—that is to say, unless there had been some special reason for it; and I did not think any such reason was likely to have existed in this instance. Very likely the letter she had written to Kitty about me would contain some enlightenment on this point. If only I could get hold of that document, I would see; but the chances were that I should not be able to lay hands on it, as Kitty rarely left correspondence about—a carefulness which deprived her maids of a good deal of the amusement they might otherwise have had. On this occasion, however, fortune favoured my desires. When Kitty changed her dress that evening, in taking her handkerchief, purse, and other et-ceteras out of her pocket, she dropped a letter on the floor without noticing its fall; I, who was standing close by and helping her, instantly covered it with my dress, in hopes it might be the epistle I wanted to see; I managed to keep it under my feet and dress till she was looking in another direction, and then shoved it under the skirts of the toilette-table, where it was safely out of sight. She finished dressing, and went down to dinner, without having perceived the loss; and as soon as the coast was clear, I rushed to the table, and extracted the letter, which I had hidden there. On opening it, I found, to my delight, that it was the one from Lady Mervyn about me; the contents sufficiently explained why she should have condescended to discuss so humble an individual as myself with Sir Bartholomew, showing that it was all owing to the interference of Perkins, and that I had only him to thank for the misfortune by which I was now overtaken. After relating what I already had heard from Kitty, Lady Mervyn went on to say:

"It was only by the merest accident that we came to hear anything about the matter. Your father's valet, Perkins, is member of some club or other (fancy one's servants having clubs, like gentlemen! I can't think why parliament doesn't make them illegal), to which a man who used to be with Sir Bartholomew belongs also. With this man Perkins happened to make acquaintance, and, on hearing where he had been in service, asked him if he knew Lady Brown's last maid, Jill, who was now abroad with you."

Ah, thought I, when I had read so far, I can quite believe that that spiteful wretch Perkins, directly he thought he had met an old fellow-servant of mine, lost no time in going spying and sniffing about, and trying to rake up some ill-natured story against me! I know his tricks and his manners, as the doll's dressmaker in Our Mutual Friend used to say.

"When Perkins said that, however," continued the letter, "the man stared at him, and declared he was talking nonsense. Lady Brown's last maid, the man asserted, had been called Smith; had married a man named Roberts soon after her mistress's death; and had then gone with her husband to live at Liverpool, where she had been ever since, to his positive knowledge. This seemed very odd to Perkins, and made him suspect there was something amiss, so he, very properly, told me of what he had heard. As it happened that Sir Bartholomew had returned to England, I had no difficulty in learning the truth from the fountainhead; and now that I have just had an interview with him, I write at once to tell you the result. Of course you will not lose a moment about handing the odious woman over to the police as a forger and impostor. I shan't be a bit surprised to find that they want her already, and know lots of other things against her; goodness only knows what she is—thief, coiner, swindler, incendiary, or anything! It is so lucky that we should have found her out in time. Mind that you see all your things are quite right, and if they are not, have her boxes searched. Don't pay her anything, by the by. I should not think a person who gets a situation as she has done can claim wages—it would be getting money under false pretences, I fancy. At any rate, there's no need to hurry about paying until we find out whether we are legally bound to or not."

Having perused the letter I folded it up, and replaced it where Kitty had let it fall on the floor, so that she might find it there whenever she missed it, and went to search for it.

One thing, at all events, the letter proved clearly, and that was that Lady Mervyn's servants had spoken with perfect truth when they said she was mean; for how contemptibly mean and petty was her suggestion about withholding my wages! It seemed to me that as I had earned them honestly I was unquestionably entitled to them, whatever my character might be. And I might conclude that Kitty, who was not so little-minded as her mother, and whose pride made her incapable of an ignoble action, took the same view of the matter that I did; for I knew that if she had intended obeying her mother's instructions about dismissing me unpaid, she would certainly not have mentioned, as she had done, that I was to receive the full amount due to me. Honour and truth were integral parts of her character, and apparent in all her dealings; and though I was not myself sensitively particular about those things, yet I could not help admiring them in her all the same.

Well, I had not deserved badly of her, I thought; and in reviewing my past conduct it seemed to me that, on the whole, she had not much reason to complain of me. No doubt, my acquisition of her purse at the railway station had been somewhat questionable; but, after all, it had only been picked up—not stolen; and my subsequent retention of it had been caused chiefly by pique, because my feelings had been hurt for the moment, when I found that she had forgotten me. Since I had been her maid I had, I considered, served her faithfully enough; and so I would continue to do during the short remaining period of being in her service. This resolution, be it said, was prompted by no ulterior views of self-interest, as I was quite aware of the impossibility of my ever referring to her for a character. But she had declined to rob me of my wages and send me to prison, as her mother would have had her do, and had also troubled herself to soften the dismissal in some way, and I wished to show that I appreciated the consideration with which she had treated me, and was not ungrateful for it. Consequently I omitted nothing that it was in my power to do for her comfort on the journey back to England, and performed my duties as her maid up to the last moment of quitting her every bit as zealously as though I had hoped to gain some advantage by my attentions.

At Charing Cross Station we separated, to the intense astonishment of her aunt, who as yet knew nothing of what had taken place. They went one way and I went another; and thus I was cut off from the first person I had ever come across who possessed the gift of arousing the sluggish capacity for affection which lay dormant in my cold-blooded nature. Our being parted was entirely the doing of that abominable Perkins; and, as I looked after her with a sigh, I relegated him to the same place as my stepmother amongst my enemies, and regarded him with sentiments of similar detestation.

CHAPTER VII.
A DOGGY PLACE.

When first cut adrift from Kitty, I felt disgusted with service and had a great mind not to be a maid again, because I knew I should hate waiting on any other mistress. But people who have to earn their own living cannot afford to be fanciful, and reflection soon showed me the unwisdom of throwing up in a pet a profession in which I had now acquired some little experience; so, within a couple of days after my return to London, I was once more advertising for a place as travelling-maid.

The next consideration was how I was to get myself a character, as I certainly could not apply to my late employers for one. Of course it was open to me to supply myself with it in the same way I had done before; but though I had then thought it a good joke and laughed at the deception I practised, yet somehow I did not find myself taking to the idea nearly as kindly now. I had been in the habit of making fools of people for the mere fun of the thing, and had regarded a falsehood much as the historian Green says that Queen Elizabeth did, i.e. as an intellectual means of meeting a difficulty. But my views seemed to have undergone an alteration of late, and I was conscious of a certain amount of repugnance for what was untrue, which perhaps showed that my intercourse with Kitty had had some effect in educating my conscience, and that I had imbibed something of her contempt for lies. Therefore I hesitated about writing a false character; and no doubt my scruples were all the more lively in consequence of my recent detection and narrow escape of prosecution for forgery; for I had a horror of going to prison.

Consider as I might, however, I could see no honest way out of the difficulty. A character I must have, as without one I had no chance of a situation, and without a situation I should starve. And as I had no one to give me a character, I was bound to give it myself. So—with a sigh for my own roguery—I took a pen and indited an epistle, highly recommending Caroline Jill, from a lady with whom she had lived two years and eight months, and who, before departing for the Cape (where she did not want to be accompanied by a maid) had written this character for the aforesaid Jill. I flatter myself it was an artistic composition, decidedly complimentary, and yet not ascribing to me such perfection as might arouse suspicion by its incompatibility with the frailty of human nature.

After waiting for two or three weeks without receiving a single answer to my advertisement, and searching the papers diligently during that time without discovering any place advertised of the kind that I wanted, I came to the conclusion that travelling-maids were at a discount just at present. Living in lodgings and earning nothing was too expensive a process to be continued long, so it seemed to me that I had better alter my plans, and try and be something which was not at a discount. Should I go in for being a shopwoman? But that was a monotonous existence, I thought, with not enough chance of variety and amusement to suit me. And then it struck me that I might let my talents as courier-maid lie idle for a while, and try for an ordinary lady's-maid's situation. I knew that my lack of dressmaking knowledge was much against that scheme; but still I might have the luck to meet with one of those ladies who always have their dresses made out. At any rate I determined to make the attempt.

As soon as possible next morning I procured one or two newspapers, copied the addresses of as many advertisers for ladies-maids as I should be able to go and see in the day, and set off to call upon these ladies. At every place, however, I found that dressmaking was an indispensable qualification, and I returned to my lodgings weary and unsuccessful. Next day I repeated the process with no better result; and on the third day also it was just the same story over again. Wherever I went there was a universal demand for dressmaking on the part of the maid; and I began to wonder if, in all England, there existed such a person as a struggling dressmaker; and if so, why she did not instantly take to lady's-maiding.

Though discouraged by these repeated failures, I thought I would still persevere a little longer before giving up, and accordingly started on a fourth day's round as before. In the course of them I came to the house of a Mrs. Torwood, who lived in Chester Square. My ring at her bell was not answered for several minutes, and I was thinking of repeating it when a noise something like a miniature steam-engine approaching from within the house made me pause to see what was coming. Directly afterwards the door was opened, and I perceived that the pulling and blowing I had heard proceeded from a fat, apoplectic-looking man-servant, to whom stairs were evidently antipathetic, and who was panting tremendously after his ascent from the inferior regions to the front-door. Being too much out of breath to waste words, he only nodded affirmatively when I inquired whether his mistress was at home and disengaged.

"Then please will you go and tell her," I said, "that I have called about the maid's place, and ask if she can see me now?"

By this time he had recovered sufficiently to be able to speak.

"Why it's hanother of 'em! Is this hever going to hend?" he groaned in a melancholy voice, when he heard what my errand was. Then, some happy thought seemed to occur to him, for his face brightened, and he muttered to himself, "But why shouldn't she and me settle it? I'll soon see if it's hany good her going further." And without stirring from the spot, or giving the slightest indication of any intention of taking my message, he addressed me thus:

"'Scuse me hasking, miss, but was your father, or hany near relative of yours, a 'untsman?"

"No," I answered, whereupon his countenance fell a little, and he resumed:

"Or a gamekeeper, p'raps?"

I repeated the negative, and he looked still more disappointed, but continued:

"No hoffence, miss, if I hasks one more question, and that is, 'ave you hever, in hany way, bin abitooally brought in contack with kennels, or packs of 'ounds?"

I shook my head; feeling not a little astonished at all this questioning.

"Hah, then there's not a ghost of a chance as you'll take the place," he exclaimed regretfully, "and you may as well say good day, for I can't in conshence hadvise you to go a wasting of your valuable time with seeing the missis! I'm sorry—very; for I'm quite sick of a hopening this old door to maids come about the sitooation, and I did 'ope as you might 'ave done, and put a bend to it. But its no use; from what you've told me, I can see plainly as you won't do."

That the man was a character was evident; but as I was getting tired of standing talking to him, and did not at all wish to receive his confidences about his employers, I politely reiterated my former request that he would go and find out if his mistress would see me.

"Well; but 'aven't I just told you as it's no good?" he returned, looking at me with an air of aggrieved surprise. "When I tells you as I knows as you hain't the individooal for the place, can't you go hoff agin quietly, without a giving no more trouble? If you 'aven't no considerashin for yourself, you might 'ave some for me, and not give me all the wear and tear of toiling hup a lot of steps just for nothing."

The seriousness with which he seemed to expect that I should accept his opinion, and be satisfied to go away without having seen the lady of the house, was intensely ludicrous, and I had some difficulty in keeping my countenance.

"I am quite grieved to be so troublesome," I said, "but I have a strange fancy for always making sure for myself whether a place will suit me or not, and I'm afraid I really must ask you to be so good as to let the lady know I am here."

He did not at all resent this (to him, probably, incomprehensible) pertinacity on my part, but only put on a sort of resigned-martyr air, saying:

"Come halong then, since you hinsists hupon it. But you'll soon find as I was right, and p'raps that'll make you less hinkredulous of my words hanother time. If you honly knowed what a lot of maids I've a took hup these 'ere blessid stairs and down hagain, all for nothing! Putting a hunfair strain hupon a man's lungs, I considers it; but there!—people are so thoughtless."

He took care to reduce the strain upon his lungs to a minimum by making me accompany him as far as the first landing on the stairs, and wait there whilst he proceeded to the drawing-room. Thus, when he had ascertained that his mistress would see me, it was only necessary for him to lean over the banisters and beckon, whereby he avoided having to descend any steps to fetch me, and could wait placidly till I joined him on the first floor to be ushered into Mrs. Torwood's presence.

There were dogs dispersed about the room in all directions, and my entrance was the signal for a sudden chorus of sharp barks, which gave me some clue to a comprehension of the butler's enigmatical allusions to a kennel. It would have been impossible to hear oneself speak had the clamour continued; but it subsided as quickly as it had arisen, and, with two exceptions, the dogs took no more notice of me. One exception was a terrier, who uttered subdued yaps at intervals, as if half-ashamed of it; and the other was a collie, who thought he would like my umbrella (which I held in my hand), and who kept sidling up with an innocent air, and giving unobtrusive tugs at the coveted object from time to time, apparently in hopes of getting possession of it at some unguarded moment when I might be too much engrossed in talking to his mistress to notice his proceedings. The rest of the dogs, however, evidently thought that they had done their duty conscientiously when they had proclaimed my advent, and that there was no need to pursue the subject further. Very possibly they considered barking to be the proper canine equivalent to the human practice of announcing a visitor's name, which is only done on the visitor's entrance, and not repeated afterwards.

Mrs. Torwood looked to me pretty, elegantly dressed, and silly, and I guessed her age to be about thirty. She began by asking me my name; after I had told her that, I expected the usual queries as to qualifications would follow, and waited with dread for the mention of that abominable dressmaking which had so often been my rock ahead. But her next remark was quite unlike anything I had anticipated. She hesitated a moment, and then said:

"You see these dogs of mine? Well, I can assure you that they are the nicest, best-behaved darlings possible, and not a bit of trouble. Why any one should mind doing anything for them, I can't conceive; but so many maids do object to it, for some unaccountable reason or other, that I had better tell you at once that I expect my maid to brush and comb these dogs every morning and take them out walking, besides washing them once a week. So if you would dislike that, of course it is no use my thinking of engaging you."

Certainly this was rather a variety on the ordinary ideas of what a lady's-maid's duties would be; but as I had always been fond of animals, I did not feel averse to the notion. Still, as Mrs. Torwood evidently thought it likely that I should make difficulties about undertaking the dogs, I would not be in too great a hurry to consent, and would appear to make rather a favour of it. So I paused to consider, and then asked: "How many dogs are there to look after, m-m?"

"There are six at present," she replied; "but of course, if I were to get any new ones, you would have them also."

It flashed upon me that here was an excellent opportunity for escaping the demand for dressmaking which had hitherto been my stumbling-block at every place for which I had applied.

"I have never been expected to take care of any lower animals before," I said, speaking as like a dignified lady's-maid as I could; "still, I would not object to oblige you by doing so, provided no dressmaking is required."

"Why not?" she inquired, looking surprised.

"Because I know I should not have time for it," I answered.

"Oh, but the dogs won't take you the whole day," she returned. "I don't say you would have time for a great deal of dressmaking. But surely you might manage just a little—especially if you weren't hurried about it?"

"There will be you to wait upon, and your clothes to keep in order, m-m," said I, "and that, with washing, combing, and taking out six dogs, is quite as much as I could think of undertaking to get through in the day; because if I undertook anything more, I know I should only fail to give you satisfaction."

She hesitated. She had, however, met with so many maids who had from the first moment flatly refused to have to do with her pets, that one like me, who had no objection to them, seemed to her a rara avis. Besides, her present maid was just going away, and she was in a hurry to secure another. And therefore, after a little more opposition, my firmness carried the day, and the obnoxious dressmaking was conceded. Then we discussed other details, and I had to produce the character with which I was provided. This, and the account of myself which I gave, being deemed satisfactory, the interview terminated in my engagement as her maid—upon which office I was to enter in another three days.

She rang the bell when I left the room, and in the hall I found the fat butler waiting to see that I left the premises without committing any depredations on the plate or other portable property.

"Well; so now you knows as I was right, I s'pose, and that you might as well 'ave gone away at once when I told you," he observed.

"Not exactly," I returned, "seeing that I have taken the situation."

"You don't say so!" he cried joyfully, elevating his eyebrows in extreme surprise. "Thank goodness for that; and I honly 'opes as you'll keep it, so as I shan't 'ave no more worrit with maids coming about the place! What haggeravated me, you see, was knowing all the time as they was sure not to take it, and that I was just a trotting hup and down them beastly old stairs, all for nothing. A man doesn't like to think as he's being sackerificed in vain; and that there's no hobjeck in heggsershuns sitch as may land him in a consumpshun or a hastma."

"But you made sure once too often," I said, laughing; "you declared that it was no use showing me upstairs, and yet you were wrong, you see."

"Not a bit of it," he retorted severely; "no young 'ooman need think as she'll make me out wrong so heasy as all that. Did you never 'ear tell of the eggsepshun as proves the rule? Because that's what you are, let me tell you; and I doesn't form my judgment by eggsepshuns but by rules! Precious slow those eggsepshuns are in showing theirselves, too, sometimes. I've known one keep a man waiting till he's just wore out, instead of 'urrying to the fore sharp when 'twas wanted, as it might 'a done."

Having thus refuted the charge of error, and given me a pretty broad hint that I—by not making my appearance on the scene sooner—had incurred the responsibility of his numerous needless journeys up and downstairs on behalf of aspirant maids, he relaxed his severity, and bid me good-bye with a graciousness which showed he bore no malice for the injuries I had done him.

I returned his farewell civilly, little dreaming that this man would ever give me a means of annoying my hated step-mother; then I went straight to buy a dog-whistle, which seemed to me a most essential article for Mrs. Torwood's maid to possess.

It was on that same day, I remember, that the papers announced the engagement of the Hon. K. Mervyn to Lord Clement. I had not expected it to come quite so soon, but otherwise was not at all surprised; for I had never doubted that the Earl's chance of winning her would go up as soon as Captain Norroy was out of the question.

CHAPTER VIII.
A DISCOVERY.

Mrs. Torwood was lady-like, good-natured, indolent, rather foolish, easily-influenced, not difficult to get on with, and thinking more of her clothes, her appearance, and her dogs, than anything else. She spoilt these last terribly, and let them do whatever they pleased. But I liked them for all that; indeed, if it had not been for them, I doubt whether I should not have found myself too much bored in the situation to stay there, for their mistress was very uninteresting in my eyes, and did not move about enough to please me. Her pets, however, had considerably more individuality than she had, and afforded me sufficient amusement and occupation to keep me contented. As my ignorance of dressmaking had prevented me from getting other places that I had tried for, and as it was through the dogs that I had at last surmounted that obstacle, mere gratitude would have prompted me to do well by them, even if the work of looking after them had been distasteful to me. But this was not the case, thanks to my fondness for animals; and it was not long before they and I were on the best of terms together.

In some respects, however, they caused me a good deal of anxiety. The chief of these causes was the daily airing which it was my duty to give them; and I was always thankful to find myself safely at home again without either of my charges being lost or stolen, or having got into any mischief. I used to take them out singly and in a chain just at first; and as soon as our acquaintance was sufficiently advanced for me to discard the chain, I took them two at a time. But I did not venture to go beyond that number when in town, as all the dear creatures had some little characteristic peculiarity or other, which made it necessary to keep a sharp look-out upon each individual during the whole walk, if one did not want to lose them or get into a scrape. If I enumerate these little peculiarities, I think it will be evident that my precaution of not taking more than two together was not uncalled-for.

I will begin with Dart, a terrier whose mouth always watered after the calves of children's legs, though he only wanted to enjoy the feel of the flesh between his teeth, and had not the least wish to do any real harm. As soon as he saw a pair of these tempting objects anywhere near, he would go and join the owner, wagging his tail, smoothing back his ears, smiling, wriggling his body, and altogether looking sweet enough to inspire confidence in the breast of the most distrustful infant. Then, turning his head insidiously as he walked along, he would seize the nearest calf, give it a good squeeze, and depart hastily, leaving the victim more frightened than hurt, howling dismally, kicking, and struggling. Of course it was easy to prevent the catastrophe by recalling him the instant he assumed an expression of extra-amiability, and set off in the direction of a barelegged child; but, as barelegged children are plentiful in London, it was obviously well for whoever had charge of Dart to keep an eye upon him constantly.

Yarrow, again, was a collie who had a rooted conviction that his constitution required carriage exercise, and who never failed to do his best to give effect to that idea by trying to get into any carriage, cab, or 'bus whose door he saw open. This habit of his sometimes gave rise to laughable scenes, as, for instance, one day when he skipped up the steps of an extremely grand barouche, just as the gorgeously-apparelled footman was holding the door open for his mistress to get in, whilst a dignified butler, and a couple more men in gorgeous liveries were respectfully attending her to the door of the house she was leaving. The flunkey at the carriage nearly fell backwards with horror, but did not venture to interfere with the audacious intruder, so Yarrow settled himself in triumph on the front seat, and sat there at ease with his tongue hanging out, and shedding drops on the smart cushions which he was profaning. He looked blandly at the dismayed servants—not one of whom dared lay a finger on him—and at the lady standing laughing on the doorstep of the house; and how the scene would have terminated if I had not arrived to the rescue and dislodged him, I cannot imagine. He was complete master of the situation as far as the servants were concerned; but I suppose one of them would eventually have called a policeman if I had not intervened.

A third member of my pack was Royal, a fat King Charles, who always made me wish I had eyes in the back of my head. He was the veriest dawdle that ever existed, and was possessed with the idea that whoever took him out was walking too fast, and that it was his duty to protest against such haste; therefore, no matter how slowly one went, he was sure to lag far behind. His dilatoriness was especially provoking, because of his being so handsome and well-bred as to be unusually attractive to dog-stealers; and many a collision have I had with other street passengers in consequence of walking backwards so as not to lose sight of that precious animal.

I come next to Sue, a spaniel of inordinate appetite, who, like Royal, kept me in a continual state of alarm during her walks lest she should be stolen. As she never thought she had had enough to eat, she was sure to follow any one who carried food, and would also constantly stop to sniff about in the gutter in search of something to satisfy her cravings; for she was not in the least dainty, and devoured everything edible with relish. She was a shocking thief, too; and now and then, before I could stop her, she would manage to whip a beef-steak or mutton-chop off some butcher's tray that had been left unguarded by the area-rails whilst the butcher was below enjoying a gossip with the cook. On these occasions I felt a little puzzled how to act. To let Sue carry off her prize quietly would be robbing the butcher, and I did not want to be dishonest if I could help it. Yet, if the man knew what had happened, he would probably make a bother and claim damages, and I did not want that either. So I adopted the middle course of running after Sue, taking the meat from her and restoring it to the tray, and getting clear off from the spot as quickly as possible before the return of the owner. This arrangement seemed to me fair to all parties, as it saved me from unpleasantness, and, at the same time, did no wrong to the butcher. No doubt his customers would not buy the meat if they knew it had been in the dog's mouth, and would declare it to be disgusting and uneatable; but then the idea is everything in matters of taste; and as the little accident with Sue would be unknown, the meat would be eaten without a qualm, and was therefore undeteriorated in value, I argued; for I was sure it was not really any the worse. Sue often aggravated me also in respect of poor working men eating an al fresco breakfast or dinner. As soon as ever she saw one of these men, off she would go, and sit up on her hind-legs in front of him, begging with glistening eyes, slobbering mouth, and an eagerness that might have made one think she was starving, if her sleek sides had not told a different tale. Her beseeching face and manner generally produced an effect, and I have seen many a man, who looked ill able to afford a morsel out of his scanty meal, throw her a scrap. I always interfered with this little game of hers, and prevented her from being given anything if I could get to the spot in time; for I felt quite ashamed to be in charge of an evidently well-fed dog like her, who went sponging upon poor people who probably had not enough for themselves—I almost wondered she had not too much self-respect to do it.

Chose was a light-hearted French poodle, with a strong taste for sport, which had, unluckily, never been developed in the right direction. Sheep appeared to him to be quite legitimate game, and he never could see them without trying to sneak off in their direction, with a drooping tail and general air of depression, which may have been caused by a consciousness of wrongdoing, or else by fear of being recalled before he was out of reach, and thus deprived of the chasse on which his heart was set. As for birds, he considered all to be fair game alike, and rushed madly after any feathered creature that was sitting or running on the ground, or flying low anywhere near him. Repeated failure did not discourage him; he evidently believed it to be his mission to catch birds, and dashed off accordingly in frantic pursuit of rooks, swallows, chaffinches, sparrows, and other birds on the wing, though he had no more chance of catching them than he had of jumping over the moon. This was all very well when he hunted wild birds that could fly away; but it was a more serious matter when poultry were concerned, and the scrapes he got into with ducks and chickens in the course of his career would require a chapter to enumerate.

Finally, I come to Jumbo, a diminutive terrier, with a mania for digging, who was the abomination of all the gardeners in his neighbourhood. Soft, freshly-turned earth was an irresistible temptation to him; and if not watched carefully, he was sure to slip off to the nearest flower-bed in park, square, or garden, and there dig gigantic graves in a surprisingly short space of time. I expect he thought that, considering what a lot of moles, rabbits, rats, and mice had holes underground, he must infallibly light upon some one of these creatures at last, if he persevered in his researches long enough. He had also a weakness for flowers, and liked to pick them for himself; so, altogether, I don't wonder he was not loved by gardeners, one of whom once remarked to me indignantly:

"That 'ere dawg o' yourn is the werry wusstest little beast I ever see! I'd just like to take and give 'im to one o' them 'ere willysectin doctors, that I would!"

Well, those six dogs gave me a good bit of trouble in one way or other, no doubt; and all the more because their mistress spoilt them, and did not try to get them out of their bad ways, and they were not with me long enough for me to be able to undo the effect of her spoiling. But they amused me and I liked them, notwithstanding their troublesomeness; and when I went near them it pleased me to hear the thump thump of tails against the ground, which showed that I was welcome.

The Torwoods kept no indoor man-servant except the butler already mentioned, who rejoiced in the name of Eliezer Scroggins; and as he was a respectable, steady-going married man, I found, to my great satisfaction, that I was in no danger of suffering from persecutions like those of the detestable Perkins. I got on very well with Scroggins, and was often amused by his peculiarities; for he was (as I had guessed at first) somewhat of a character, though a very good sort of fellow, for all that. His prejudices were very strong, and he was sure to cling with pigheaded obstinacy to whatever idea he had taken into his head. I soon discovered that amongst his pet aversions were people who, in his opinion, gave themselves airs, and presumed to push their way up to a station above that in which they had been born. Such people he hated as he hated stairs—perhaps more; and no matter whether they moved in his mistress's sphere of life or his own, they irritated him as the proverbial red rag does the bull. Indeed, I rather suspect that he sometimes had premeditated accidents when any of these objects of his dislike were dining at the Torwoods, and that any visitor of theirs who was considered by him to be what he called a "parvenyoo" was not at all unlikely to receive a bath of soup, sauce, tea, coffee, or wine, or to suffer from some similar misadventure, caused by the intentional clumsiness of the butler.

His bitterness on the subject of people who had risen above their natural position was so great that I had little doubt of there being some particular reason for it; and idle curiosity moved me to try and find out what that reason was, though I never for an instant supposed that the history could be one in any way specially concerning me. However, he did not choose to confide his private family affairs to a complete stranger; and so, though he dropped occasional dark hints, whence I concluded that he had a step-sister whom he detested, yet it was not till I had been nearly a year in Mrs. Torwood's service that I at last was permitted to know the cause of his inveterate spite against the whole race of parvenus.

His mother, it appeared, had been twice married, and he was her child by the second marriage. Her first husband was a clerk named Brown, who had died before he was thirty, leaving only one child, a daughter named Mary. He had had rather exalted ideas about education, and had no opinion of home teaching, and consequently had sent his daughter to a cheap boarding-school as soon as ever she was old enough to leave home.

After Brown's death his young widow had married into a social position a shade below that of the clerk, and become the spouse of a grocer in the East End, named Joshua Scroggins, to whom in due time she presented my friend Eliezer, and sundry other children.

On the second marriage the grocer, a good-hearted conscientious man, had declared that it would be a shame for her daughter Mary not to have the same education as her own father would have given her, so he generously went on paying for her at the school where she had been already placed. Here the girl picked up a fair education, and also many ridiculous and fine ideas. She took to spell her name with an "e" at the end; would sooner have died than let her school-fellows know that she was connected with a small retail shopkeeper bearing a name so odiously vulgar as Scroggins; and brooded over the grievance of having so unpresentable a step-father, until she became convinced he had done her a mortal injury by marrying her mother, and got into the habit of disliking and despising him in spite of the kindness and liberality with which he always treated her. Now Scroggins was an honest hard-working man, who minded his shop in person, with the assistance of his wife and children; though he had managed to defray Mary's schooling, yet the expense had now and then pressed on him a little heavily, and he had not the least intention of keeping her as an idle fine lady when she left school for good and came to live at home, but expected her to take her turn in the shop, as the rest of the household did. Her disgust at this was intense, and she showed it by doing her work as badly as she dared, scolding and flouncing about the house, and losing no opportunity of making herself generally disagreeable.

The Scroggins family—consisting of father and mother, and four children, of whom my friend Eliezer was the eldest—had hitherto lived in unbroken peace and harmony, and now groaned sorely under the infliction of the new-comer, with her airs and graces and tantrums. The recollection of her being fatherless kept them from resenting her nonsense as it deserved, and made them more gentle and patient with her than they would perhaps have been otherwise; but it was felt by all to be a blessed relief when the disturbing element was removed by marriage to a city gent. He was in business, but did not keep a shop, and so she graciously condescended to accept him as a means of escape from the intolerable humiliation of serving behind her step-father's counter. The city gent proved a good speculation. A few lucky ventures gave him a rise in the world; and when, in the course of years, he left her a widow, her social position was very considerably better than it had been when she first became his wife. By the time he died, all intercourse between her and the Scrogginses had long been at an end. Though she had not hesitated to receive a dowry from her step-father, yet she had never evinced the smallest gratitude for that, or any of the numerous other benefits he had bestowed upon her. On the contrary, she took no trouble to conceal her aversion to him; declared that vulgarity was necessarily attached to such a name as Scroggins; and, after her marriage, saw less and less of the family, and rudely checked all friendly advances on their part, till at last she succeeded in altogether cutting the connection. Mrs. Scroggins—a peace-loving, kindly soul, who could not bear to be mixed up in any kind of dissension—was grieved by this, and by the separation from her daughter, though it was no fault of hers, and she could not possibly help it. But she bore no malice, and when the news came of her son-in-law's death, she thought only of her daughter's present distress, and forgot the many slights and insults that had been cast upon her and hers. Full of unaffected hearty sorrow and sympathy, she set off immediately to visit the bereaved Mary, hoping to be able to comfort her and be of use to her. What took place on the occasion of this visit Eliezer never exactly knew. But he knew well that the reception of his good-hearted and forgiving mother must have been both unseemly and unpleasant, when he saw her return home in tears, thoroughly upset, and saying that she could not have believed any woman would have behaved so rudely to her own mother; and that, unless she was sent for, she would never again try to see Mary. This had made a deep impression on Eliezer, who adored his mother; and the bitter enmity he had ever since cherished against the person who had treated her so badly, and whom he regarded as an upstart, had extended to the whole race of "parvenyoos."

"Do you know what has become of your step-sister?" I asked carelessly; "and do you ever see her?"

"See 'er!" he ejaculated wrathfully; "not if I knows it. I'm none so fond of raising my corruption by looking at what I 'ates! But I 'ears tell on 'er now and agin; she married some swell with a 'andle to 'is name some years back. Mary Grove's clever enough—you may trust 'er to do well for 'erself wherehever she is."

In telling his tale he had not before mentioned the name of his step-sister's husband; but when he spoke of Mary Grove, I pricked up my ears with a sudden recollection that that had been the name of my step-mother. "Was Grove the name of the city gent?" I enquired eagerly.

Scroggins nodded.

"Had they any children?" I continued.

"A couple o' gals named Jane and Margret there was," he returned; "I don't know what they be like now, for I ain't seen 'em—not since they was little mites o' things."

Jane and Margaret! these had been the names of my step-sisters, and I felt almost sure that his step-sister and my step-mother must be one and the same person. One more question would make the matter absolutely certain, so I said: "What was the name of Mary Grove's second husband—do you know it?"

"Oh yes, I knows it; but I can't lay tongue to it at this moment. What hever is it now? Sir Hanthony something or other—I should know it if I was to 'ear it."

"Was it anything like——" I began, and then paused. Never once had my own name passed my lips since I left home, and somehow now, when I tried to say it, it seemed to stick in my throat. Overcoming this feeling, however, I completed my sentence—"like Trecastle?" It was strange how, in spite of my first hesitation about uttering the word, yet when once it was out, my tongue clung lovingly to it, and I should have liked to repeat it over and over again. I thought it sounded better than any other name I had ever heard, and felt a thrill of pride to think that it was mine by right.

"That's the very thing!" he exclaimed triumphantly; "Sir Hanthony Trecassel, and I wishes 'im joy of 'is bargain! 'Ow hever did you come to think of 'im?"