E-text prepared by Carlo Traverso and the Project Gutenberg Online

Distributed Proofreading Team (http://www.pgdp.net)

KATE COVENTRY

An Autobiography

Edited by

G. J. WHYTE-MELVILLE

[Illustration: Now began a battle in good earnest.]

T. Nelson and Sons 1909

CONTENTS.

Chapter I 3 Chapter II 15 Chapter III 24 Chapter IV 35 Chapter V 46 Chapter VI 58 Chapter VII 66 Chapter VIII 77 Chapter IX 89 Chapter X 103 Chapter XI 114 Chapter XII 125 Chapter XIII 138 Chapter XIV 151 Chapter XV 163 Chapter XVI 175 Chapter XVII 188 Chapter XVIII 201 Chapter XIX 214 Chapter XX 228 Chapter XXI 241 Chapter XXII 254 Chapter XXIII 267 Chapter XXIV 274

KATE COVENTRY.

AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY.

CHAPTER I.

"Kate," said Aunt Deborah to me as we sat with our feet on the fender one rainy afternoon—or, as we were in London, I should say one rainy morning—in June, "I think altogether, considering the weather and what not, it would be as well for you to give up this Ascot expedition, my dear."

I own I felt more than half inclined to cry—most girls would have cried—but Aunt Deborah says I am very unlike the generality of women; and so, although I had ordered a peach-coloured mantle, and such a bonnet as can only be seen at Ascot on the Cup Day, I kept back my tears, and swallowed that horrid choking feeling in my throat, whilst I replied, with the most careless manner I could assume, "Goodness, aunt, it won't rain for ever: not that I care; but think what a disappointment for John!"

I must here be allowed the privilege of my sex, to enter on a slightly discursive explanation as to who Aunt Deborah is and who I am, not forgetting Cousin John, who is good-nature itself, and without whom I cannot do the least bit. My earliest recollections of Aunt Deborah, then, date from a period when I was a curly-headed little thing in a white frock (not so very long ago, after all); and the first occasion on which I can recollect her personality with any distinctness was on a certain birthday, when poor grandfather said to me in his funny way, "Kate, you romp, we must get you a rocking-horse."

Aunt Deborah lifted up her hands and eyes in holy horror and deprecation. "A rocking-horse, Mr. Coventry," said she; "what an injudicious selection! (Aunt Deborah likes to round her periods, as the book-people say.) The child is a sad tomboy already, and if you are going to teach her to ride, I won't answer for the consequences in after-life, when the habits of our youth have become the second nature of our maturity."

Imagine such sentiments so expressed by a tall austere lady, with high manly features, piercing dark eyes, a front of jet-black hair coming low down on a somewhat furrowed brow. Cousin John says all dark women are inclined to be cross; and I own I think we blondes have the best of it as far as good temper is concerned. My aunt is not altered in the slightest degree from what she was then. She dresses invariably in gray silks of the most delicate shades and texture; carries spectacles low down upon her nose, where they can be of no earthly use except for inspection of the carpet; and wears lavender kid gloves at all hours of the day and night—for Aunt Deborah is vain of her hand, and preserves its whiteness as a mark of her birth and parentage. Most families have a crotchet of some sort on which they plume themselves; some will boast that their scions rejoice one and all in long noses; others esteem the attenuated frames which they bequeath to their descendants as the most precious of legacies; one would not part with his family squint for the finest pair of eyes that ever adorned an Andalusian maiden; another cherishes his hereditary gout as a priceless patent of nobility; and even insanity is prized in proportion to the tenacity with which it clings to a particular race. So the Horsinghams never cease talking of the Horsingham hand; and if I want to get anything out of Aunt Deborah, I have only to lend her a pair of my gloves, and apologize to her for their being so large that she can get both her hands into one.

Now the only thing we ever fall out about is what my aunt calls propriety. I had a French governess once who left because I pinned the tail of Cousin John's kite to her skirt, and put white mice in her work-box; and she was always lecturing me about what she called "les convenances." Aunt Deborah don't speak much French, though she says she understands it perfectly, and she never lets me alone about propriety. When I came home from church that rainy Sunday with Colonel Bingham, under his umbrella (a cotton one), Aunt Deborah lectured me on the impropriety of such a thing—though the Colonel is forty if he is a day, and told me repeatedly he was a "safe old gentleman." I didn't think him at all dangerous, I'm sure. I rode a race against Bob Dashwood the other morning, once round the inner ring, down Rotten Row, to finish in front of Apsley House, and beat him all to ribbons. Wasn't it fun? And didn't I kick the dirt in his face? He looked like a wall that's been fresh plastered when he pulled up. I don't know who told Aunt Deborah. It wasn't the coachman, for he said he wouldn't; but she heard of it somehow, and of course she said it was improper and unladylike, and even unfeminine—as if anything a woman does can be unfeminine. I know Bob didn't think so, though he got the worst of it every way.

To be sure, we women are sadly kept down in this world, whatever we shall be in the next. If they would only let us try, I think we could beat the "lords of the creation," as they call themselves, at everything they undertake. Dear me, they talk about our weakness and vanity—why, they never know their own minds for two minutes together; and as for vanity, only tell a man you think him good-looking, and he falls in love with you directly; or if that is too great a bounce—and indeed very few of them have the slightest pretensions to beauty—you need only hint that he rides gallantly, or waltzes nicely, or wears neat boots, and it will do quite as well. I recollect perfectly that Cousin Emily made her great marriage—five thousand a year and the chance of a baronetcy—by telling her partner in a quadrille, quite innocently, that "she should know his figure anywhere." The man had a hump, and one leg shorter than the other; but he thought Emily was dying for him, and proposed within a fortnight. Emily is an artless creature—"good, common-sense," Aunt Deborah calls it—and so she threw over Harry Bloomfield and married the hump and the legs that didn't match and the chance of the baronetcy forthwith; and now they say he beats her, and I think it serves her right.

But we women—gracious! if we only take the trouble we can turn the whole male sex round our little fingers. Who ever saw half a dozen of us hovering and watching and fussing round a masculine biped, thankful even to be snubbed rather than not noticed at all. Who ever saw us fetch and carry like so many retrievers, and "sit up," so to speak, for a withered rose-bud at the fag end of an over-blown bouquet. Not that we don't love flowers in their proper places, and keep them too, sometimes long after their colour has faded and their perfume gone; but we don't make a parade of such things, and have the grace to be ashamed of ourselves when we are so foolish.

But it's quite different with men. They give in to us about everything if we only insist—and it's our own fault if we don't insist; for, of course, if they find us complying and ready to oblige, why, there's no end to their audacity. "Give 'em an inch, and they take an ell." However, they do try to keep us down as much as they can. Now there's that very exercise of riding that they are so proud of. They get us a side-saddle, as they call it, of enormous weight and inconvenience, on which they plant pommels enough to impale three women; they place us in an attitude from which it is next to impossible to control a horse should he be violent, and in a dress which ensures a horrible accident should he fall; added to which, they constantly give us the worst quadruped in the stable; and yet, with all these drawbacks, such is our own innate talent and capacity, we ride many an impetuous steed in safety and comfort that a man would find a dangerous and incontrollable "mount." For my part, I only wish I had been born a man—that's to say, if I could keep my own ideas and feelings. To be sure, I should lose a good many personal adornments; not that I'm vain enough to consider myself a beauty, but still one cannot help being anxious about one's own appearance, particularly if one has a full-length glass in one's bedroom. I need not be ashamed to own that I know I've got bright eyes, and good teeth, and a fresh colour, and loads of soft brown hair, and not a bad figure—so my dressmaker tells me; though I think myself I look best in a riding-habit. Altogether you can't call that a perfect fright; but, nevertheless, I think if I might I would change places with Cousin John. He has no Aunt Deborah to be continually preaching propriety to him. He can go out when he likes without being questioned, and come in without being scolded. He can swagger about wherever he chooses without that most odious of encumbrances called a chaperon; and though I shouldn't care to smoke as many cigars as he does (much as I like the smell of them in the open air), yet I confess it must be delightfully independent to have a latchkey.

I often wonder whether other people think Cousin John good-looking. I have known him so long that I believe I can hardly be a fair judge. He is fresh-coloured, to be sure, and square and rather fat, and when he smiles and shows all his white teeth, he has a very pleasant appearance; but I think I admire a man who looks rather more of a roué—not like Colonel Bingham exactly, whose face is all wrinkles and whiskers, but a little care-worn and jaded, as if he was accustomed to difficulties, and had other things to occupy his thoughts besides his horses and his dinner. I don't like a man that stares at you; and I don't like a man that can't look you in the face. He provokes me if he is all smiles, and I've no patience with him if he's cross. I'm not sure I know exactly what does please me best, but I do know that I like Cousin John's constant good-humour, and the pains he takes to give me a day's amusement whenever he can, or what he calls "have Cousin Kate out for a lark." And this brings me back to Aunt Deborah and the expedition to Ascot, a thing of all others I fancied was so perfectly delightful.

"My dear," said Aunt Deborah as she folded her lavender-gloved hands, "if it wasn't for the weather and my rheumatism, I'd accompany you myself; but I do consider that Ascot is hardly a place for my niece to be seen at without a chaperon, and with no other protector than John Jones—John Jones," repeated the old lady reflectively—"an excellent young man, doubtless (I heard him his Catechism when he was so high), but still hardly equal to so responsible a charge as that of Miss Coventry."

I knew this was what John calls a "back-hander" at me, but I can be so good-tempered when I've anything to gain; therefore I only said,—

"Well, aunt, of course you're the best judge, and I don't care the least about going; only when John calls this afternoon, you must explain it all to him, for he's ordered the carriage and the luncheon and everything, and he'll be so disappointed."

I've long ago found out that if you want to do anything you should never seem too anxious about it.

Aunt Deborah is fonder of John than she likes to confess. I know why, because I overheard my old nurse tell the housekeeper when I was quite a little thing; and what I hear, especially if I'm not intended to hear it, I never forget. There were three Miss Horsinghams, all with white hands—poor mamma, Aunt Deborah, and Aunt Dorcas. Now Aunt Deborah wanted to marry old David Jones (John's papa). I can just remember him—a snuffy little man with a brown wig, but perhaps he wasn't always so; and David Jones, who was frightened at Aunt Deborah's black eyes, thought he would rather marry Aunt Dorcas. Why the two sisters didn't toss up for him I can't think; but he did marry Aunt Dorcas, and Aunt Deborah has been an old maid ever since. Sometimes even now she fixes her eyes on Cousin John, and then takes them off with a great sigh. It seems ridiculous in an old lady, but I don't know that it is so. That's the reason my cousin can do what he likes with Aunt Deborah; and that's the reason why, when he called on that rainy afternoon, he persuaded her to let me go down to Ascot with him all alone by our two selves the following day.

How pleasant it is to wake on the morning of a gala day, to hear the carts and cabs rumbling and clattering in the streets, and to know that you must get up early, and be off directly after breakfast, and will have the whole livelong day to amuse yourself in. What a bright sunshiny morning it was, and what fun I had going with John in a hansom cab to Paddington—I like a hansom cab, it goes so fast—and then down to Windsor by the train in a carriage full of such smart people, some of whom I knew quite well by name, though not to speak to. The slang aristocracy, as they are called, muster in great force at Ascot. Nor could anything be more delightful than the drive through Windsor Forest up to the Course—such a neat phaeton and pair, and John and I like a regular Darby and Joan sitting side by side. Somehow that drive through Windsor Forest made me think of a great many things I never think of at other times. Though I was going to the races, and fully prepared for a day of gaiety and amusement, a half-melancholy feeling stole over me as we rolled along amongst those stately old trees, and that lovely scenery, and those picturesque little places set down in that abode of beauty. I thought how charming it would be to saunter about here in the early summer mornings or the still summer nights, and listen to the thrush and the blackbird and the nightingale in the copse; and then I thought I would not care to wander here quite alone, and that a whisper might steal on my ear, sweeter than the note of the thrush and the nightingale; and that there might be a somebody without whom all that sylvan beauty would be a blank, but with whom any place would become a fairyland. And then I fell to wondering who that somebody would be; and I looked at Cousin John, and felt a little cross—which was very ungrateful; and a little disappointed—which was very unjust.

"Here we are, Kate: that's the Grand Stand, and we'll have the carriage right opposite; and the Queen's not come, and we're in heaps of time; and there's Frank Lovell," exclaimed the unconscious John as we drove on to the Course, and my daydreams were effectually dispelled by the gay scene which spread itself before my eyes.

As I took John's arm and walked into the enclosure in front of the stand, I must confess that the first impression on my mind was this—"Never in my life have I seen so many well-dressed people collected together before;" and when the Queen drove up the Course with her brilliant suite of carriages and outriders, and the mob of gentlemen and ladies cheered her to the echo, I was such a goose that I felt as if I could have cried. After a time I got a little more composed, and looked about at the different toilettes that surrounded me. I own I saw nothing much neater than my own; and I was pleased to find it so, as nothing gives one greater confidence in a crowd than the consciousness of being well dressed. But what I delighted in more than all the bonnets and gowns in the universe were those dear horses, with their little darlings of jockeys. If there is one thing I like better than another, it is a thoroughbred horse. What a gentleman he looks amongst the rest of his kind! How he walks down the Course, as if he knew his own value—self-confident, but not vain—and goes swinging along in his breathing-gallop as easily and as smoothly as if I was riding him myself, and he was proud of his burthen! When Colonist won the Cup, I felt again as if I could have cried. It was a near race, and closely contested the whole way from the distance in. I felt my blood creeping quite chill, and I could perfectly understand then the infatuation men cherish about racing, and why they ruin their wives and children at that pursuit. What a relief it was when the number was up, and I could be quite satisfied that the dear bay horse had won. As for the little jockey that rode him, I could and would have kissed him! Just then Cousin John came back to me, with his sunny, laughing face, and I naturally asked him, "Had he won his money?" John never bets; but he replied, "I'm just as pleased as if I'd won a fortune; only think, Frank Lovell has landed twelve hundred!" "Well," I replied, "I am glad of it—which is very good of me, seeing that I don't know Mr. Lovell." "Don't know Frank Lovell!" exclaimed John. "The greatest friend I have in the world." (Men's friends always are the greatest in the world.) "I'll introduce him to you; there he is—no he isn't. I saw him a moment ago." And forthwith John launched into a long biography of his friend Frank Lovell—how that gentleman was the nicest fellow and the finest rider and the best shot in the universe; how he knew more about racing than any man of his age, and had been in more difficulties, and got out of them better, and robbed the public generally with a more plausible air; how he sang a capital song, and was the pleasantest company, and had more brains than the world gave him credit for (as indeed might easily be the case); how he was very good-looking, and very agreeable, and met with great success (whatever that means) in society; how Lady Scapegrace was avowedly in love with him; and he had thrown over pretty Miss Pinnifer because he wouldn't leave the army, and six months afterwards was obliged to sell his commission, when Outsider won the "Two Thousand;" together with various other details, which lasted till it was time to have luncheon, and go back to Windsor to catch the four o'clock train. Though evidently such a hero of John's, I confess I didn't like what I heard of Frank Lovell at all.

CHAPTER II.

We've got such a sweet little house in Lowndes Street—to my mind the very best situation in London. When I say we, of course I mean Aunt Deborah and myself. We live together, as I hope we always shall do, as Aunt Deborah says, till "one of us is married." And notwithstanding the difference of our ages we get on as comfortably as any two forlorn maidens can. Though a perfect fairy palace within, our stronghold is guarded by no giant, griffin, dragon, or dwarf; nothing more frightful than a policeman, whose measured tread may be heard at the midnight hour pacing up and down beneath our windows. "It's a great comfort," says Aunt Deborah, "to know that assistance is close at hand. I am a lone woman, Kate, and I confess to feeling nervous when I lie awake." I quite agree with my aunt, though I'm not nervous, but I must say I like the idea of being watched over during the hours of sleep; and there is something romantic in hearing the regular tramp of the sentinel whilst one is curled up snug in bed. I don't much think it always is the policeman—at least I know that one night when I got up to peep if it was a constable, he was wrapped in a very loose cloak, such as is by no means the uniform of the force, and was besides, unquestionably, smoking a cigar, which I am given to understand is not permitted by the regulations when on duty. I watched the glowing light for at least ten minutes, and when I went to bed again, I could not get to sleep for wondering who the amateur policeman could be.

But the house is a perfect jewel of its kind. Such a pretty dining-room, such a lovely drawing-room, opening into a conservatory, with a fountain and gold-fish, to say nothing of flowers (I am passionately fond of flowers), and such a boudoir of my own, where nobody ever intrudes except my special favourites—Cousin John, for instance, when he is not in disgrace—and which I have fitted up and furnished quite to my own taste. There's the "Amazon" in gilt bronze, and a bas-relief from the Elgin marbles—not coloured like those flaxen-haired abominations at Sydenham, but pure and simple as the taste that created it; and an etching Landseer did for me himself of my little Scotch terrier growling; and a veritable original sketch of Horace Vernet—in which nothing is distinguishable save a phantom charger rearing straight up amongst clouds of smoke. Then I've put up a stand for my riding-whips, and a picture of my own thoroughbred favourite horse over the chimney-piece; altogether, Aunt Deborah describes the apartment exactly when she says to me, as she does about once a week, "My dear, if you were a man, I should say your room was fitted up in the most perfect taste; but as you happen to be a young lady, I won't say what I think, because I know you won't agree with me;" and I certainly do not agree with Aunt Deborah upon a great many subjects.

However, there's no situation like Lowndes Street. I'm not going to tell the number, nor at which end of the street we live; for it's very disagreeable to have people riding by and stopping to alter their stirrup-leathers, and squinting up at one's drawing-room windows where one sits working in peace, and then cantering off and trotting by again, as if something had been forgotten. No; if curiosity is so very anxious to know where I live, let it look in the Court Guide; for my part, I say nothing, except that there are always flowers in the balcony, and there's no great singularity about that. But there are two great advantages connected with a "residence in Belgravia," which I wonder are not inserted in the advertisements of all houses to let in that locality. In the first place, a lady may walk about all the forenoon quite alone, without being hampered by a maid or hunted by a footman; and in the second, she is most conveniently situated for a morning ride or walk in the Park; and those are about the two pleasantest things one does in London.

Well, the same conversation takes place nearly every morning at breakfast between Aunt Deborah and myself (we breakfast early, never after half-past nine, however late we may have been the night before). Aunt Deborah begins,—

"My dear, I hope we shall have a quiet morning together; I've directed the servants to deny me to all visitors; and if you'll get your work, I will proceed with my readings from excellent Mrs. Hannah More."

Kate.—"Thank you, aunt; Hannah More amuses me very much"—(I confess that prim moralist does make me laugh).

Aunt Deborah (reprovingly).—"Instructive, Kate, not amusing; certainly not ludicrous. If you'll shut the door we'll begin."

Kate.—"Can't we put it off for an hour? I must get my ride, you know, aunt. What's the use of horses if one don't ride?"

Aunt Deborah.—"Kate, you ride too much; I don't object to the afternoons with John Jones, but these morning scampers are really quite uncalled for; they're spoiling your figure and complexion; it's improper—more, it's unfeminine; but as you seem determined upon it, go and get your ride, and come back a little sobered;" and Kate—that's me—disappears into the boudoir, from which she emerges in about five minutes with the neatest habit and the nicest hat, and her hair done in two such killing plaits—John Jones says I never look so well as when I've got my hair dressed for riding.

I always go out for these morning excursions quite alone. Aunt Deborah fought for a long time, and insisted on my taking the coachman; but he is an old family servant, and I soon knocked him up completely. In the first place, the ride is always soft, and I hate going slow, so he used to get a dreadful stitch in his side trying to keep up with me on one of the high-actioned coach-horses; then he didn't see the fun of having two horses to clean when he got home instead of one; so when he found he couldn't get another helper, we begged him off between us, and I go out now unencumbered by that excellent and pursy old man. After all, I ought to be able to take care of myself. I have ridden ever since I was five years old; and if habit is second nature, as Aunt Deborah says, I'm sure my habit ought to be natural enough to me. I recollect as well as if it was yesterday, when poor papa put me on a shaggy Shetland pony, and telling me not to be frightened, gave it a thump, and started me off by myself. I wasn't the least bit afraid, I know that. It was a new sensation, and delightful; round and round the field we went, I shaking my reins with one hand, and holding on a great flapping straw hat with the other; the pony grunting and squeaking, with his mane and tail floating on the breeze, and papa standing in the middle, waving his hat and applauding with all his might. After that I was qualified to ride anything; and by the time I was twelve, there wasn't a hunter in the stables that I wouldn't get on at a moment's notice. I am ashamed to confess that I have even caught the loose cart-horses in a field, and ridden them without saddle or bridle. I never was beat but once, and that was at Uncle Horsingham's when I was about fifteen. He had bought a mare at Tattersall's for his daughter to ride, and brought her down to Dangerfield, thinking she would conduct herself like the rest of her species. How well I remember my governess's face when she gave me leave to go to the stable with Sir Harry and look over the new purchase. I was a great pet of Uncle Horsingham; and as Cousin Amelia was not much of an equestrian, he proposed that I should get upon the chestnut mare first, and try her paces and temper before his daughter mounted her. As we neared the stables out came one of the grooms with a sidesaddle on his head, and the longest face I ever beheld.

"O Sir 'Arry," said he—I quote his exact words—"that new mare's a wicious warmint; afore I was well into the stable, she ups and lets out at me just above the knee: I do believe as my thigh's broke."

"Nonsense, man," said my uncle; "put the saddle on and bring her out." Presently the chestnut mare appeared; and I saw at once that she was not in the best of humours. But I was young, full of spirits, and fresh from lessons; so, fearing if one of the men should venture to mount her she might show temper, and I should lose my ride, I made a sign to the head-groom to give me a hand; and before my uncle had time to exclaim, "For goodness sake, Kate!" I was seated, muslin dress and all, on the back of the chestnut mare. What she did I never could quite make out; it seemed to me that she crouched as if she was going to lie down, and then bounded into the air, with all four legs off the ground. I was as near gone as possible; but for the only time in my life I caught hold of the pommel with my right hand, and that saved me. In another instant she had broke from the groom's hold, and was careering along the approach like a mad thing. If I had pulled at her the least she would have run away with me.

Luckily, the park was roomy, and the old trees far apart; so when we got upon the grass I knew who would be mistress. I gave her a rousing good gallop, shook my reins and patted her, to show her how confident I was, and brought her back to my uncle as quiet as a lamb. Unfortunately, however, the mare had taken a dislike to certain stone pillars which supported the stable gates, and nothing would induce her to pass them. Flushed with success, I borrowed my uncle's riding-whip to punish her; and now began a battle in good earnest. She reared and plunged, and wheeled round and round, and did all she knew to get rid of me; whilst I flogged and jerked, and screamed at her (I didn't swear, because I didn't know how), and vowed in my wicked little heart I would be killed rather than give in. During the tussle we got nearer and nearer to a certain large pond about a hundred yards from the stable gates, at which the cattle used to water in the quiet summer afternoons. I knew it wasn't very deep, for I had seen them standing in it often. By the time we were close on the brink the whole household had turned out to see "Miss Kate killed;" and just as I hit the mare a finishing cut over the ears, I caught a glimpse of my governess in an attitude of combined shame, horror, and disgust that I shall never forget. The next moment we were overhead in the pond, the mare having dashed blindly in, caught her fore-feet in the bridle, and rolled completely over. What a ducking I got to be sure! But it was nothing to the scolding I had to endure afterwards from all the females of the family, including my governess; only Uncle Horsingham stuck up for me, and from that time till the day of his death vowed he had "never known but one plucky fellow in the world, and that was his little niece Kate."

No wonder I feel at home on Brilliant, who never did wrong in his life, who will eat out of my hand, put his foot in my apron-pocket, follow me about like a dog, and is, I am firmly persuaded, the very best horse in England. He is quite thoroughbred, though he has never been in training—and is as beautiful as he is good. Bright bay, with such black legs, and such a silky mane and tail! I know lots of ladies whose hair is coarser than Brilliant's. Fifteen hands three inches, and Cousin John says well up to his weight—an honest fourteen stone. With the smallest nose, and the leanest head, and the fullest dark eye, and the widest, reddest nostril—his expression of countenance, when a little blown, is the most beautiful I ever beheld; and not a white mark about him except a tiny star in the very middle of his forehead; I know it well, for I have kissed it often and often. The picture over my chimney-piece does not half do him justice; but then, to be sure, its pendant, painted by the same artist, and representing my other horse, White Stockings, flatters that very plain and excellent animal most unblushingly.

Of all delights in the world give me my morning canter up the park on Brilliant. Away we go, understanding each other perfectly; and I am quite sure that he enjoys as much as I do the bright sunshine and the morning breeze and the gleaming Serpentine, with its solitary swan, and its hungry ducks, and its amphibious dogs continually swimming for the inciting stick, only rescued to produce fresh exertions; and the rosy children taking their morning walk; and, above all, the liberty of London before two o'clock in the day, when the real London begins. I pat Brilliant's smooth, hard neck, and he shakes his head, and strikes an imaginary butterfly with one black fore-leg, and I draw my rein a thought tighter, and away we go, much to the admiration of that good-looking man with moustachios who is leaning on his umbrella close to the rails, and smoking the cigar of meditation as if the park was his own.

I often wondered who that man was. Morning after morning have I seen him at the same place, always with an umbrella, and always with a cigar. I quite missed him on the Derby day, when of course he was gone to Epsom (by-the-bye, why don't we go to the Derby just as much as to Ascot?); and yet it was rather a relief, too, for I had got almost shy about passing him. It seemed so absurd to see the man every day and never to speak; besides, I fancied, though of course it could only be fancy, that he looked as if he was expecting me. At last I couldn't help blushing, and I thought he saw it; for I'm sure he smiled, and then I was so provoked with myself that I sent Brilliant up the ride at a pace nothing short of a racehorse could have caught.

CHAPTER III.

I wonder whether any lady in England has a maid who, to use that domestic's own expression, is capable of "giving satisfaction." If any lady does rejoice in such an Abigail, I shall be too happy to "swap" with her, and give anything else I possess except Brilliant into the bargain. Mine is the greatest goose that ever stood upon two legs, and how she can chatter as she does with her mouth full of pins is to me a perfect miracle. Once or twice in the week I have to endure a certain ordeal which, although a positive pleasure to some women, is to my disposition intense martyrdom, termed dressing to go out; and I think I never hated it more than the night of Lady Horsingham's ball. Lady Horsingham is my poor uncle's widow; and as Aunt Deborah is extremely punctilious on all matters relating to family connections, we invariably attend these solemnities with a gravity befitting the occasion.

Now, I may be singular in my ideas; but I confess that it does appear to me a strange way of enjoying oneself in the dog-days, to make one's toilette at eleven p.m., for the purpose of sitting in a carriage till twelve, and struggling on a staircase amongst a mob of one's fellow-creatures till half-past. After fighting one's way literally step by step, and gaining a landing by assault, one looks round and takes breath, and what does one see? Panting girls looking in vain for the right partner, who is probably not ten yards from them, but wedged in between substantial dowagers, whom he is cursing in his heart, but from whom there is no escape; or perhaps philosophically and perfidiously making the best of his unavoidable situation, and flirting shamefully with the one he likes next best to the imprisoned maiden on the staircase; or, the tables turned, young fledglings pining madly for their respective enslavers, and picturing to themselves how she may be even now whirling round to that pealing waltz in the arms of some former adorer or delightfully new acquaintance, little heeding him who is languishing in his white neckcloth, actually within speaking distance, but separated as effectually as if he were in another country. By-the-bye, it's fatal when people begin to think of each other as hes and shes; the softest proper name that ever was whispered is not half so dangerous as those demonstrative pronouns. In one corner is a stout old gentleman, wedged against the wall, wiping the drops from his bald head, and wondering what Jane and Julia can see in these gatherings to make them wild about going to every ball for which they can get an invitation. Deluded father! both Jane and Julia have the best of reasons in this very house. You grudge not to spend a broiling September day in the pursuit of your game; each of your fair daughters, sir, flatters herself that she, too, has winged her bird.

Swaying backwards and forwards in the mass, like some goodly merchantman at anchor, pitching and rolling to a ground-swell, behold the chaperon fulfilling her destiny, and skilfully playing that game which to her is the business of life. Flushed and hot in person, she is cool and composed in mind. Practice makes perfect; and the chaperon is as much at home here as the stockbroker on 'Change, or the betting-man in the ring, or the fisherman amidst the roar and turmoil of the waves. With lynx eyes she notes how Lady Carmine's eldest girl is "carrying on" with young Thriftless, and how Lord Looby's eyeglass is fixed on her own youngest daughter; yet for all this she is not absent or preoccupied, but can whisper to stupid Lady Dulwich the very latest intelligence of a marriage, or listen, all attention, to the freshest bit of scandal from Mrs. General Gabbler. But perhaps by this time you have floated with the tide into the doorway, and received from your hostess the cordial shake of the hand or formal bow which makes you free of the place. So, with patience and perseverance you work your way at last into the dancing-room, and you now see what people come here for—dancing, of course. Each performer has about eighteen inches of standing room, and on that space must be enacted in hopeless pantomime the intricate evolutions of the quadrille, or the rotatory struggles of the waltz. Sliding and smiling, and edging and crushing, the conscientious dancers try to fulfil their duties, and much confusion and begging of pardons are the natural results.

However, it's a rare place for love-making. What with the music and the crowd and the confusion, the difficulty is more to make out what one's partner does say than to prevent his being overheard by other people; but, I must confess, if anybody had anything very particular to say to me, I had rather hear it in the quiet country by moonlight, or even coming home from Greenwich by water—or anywhere, in short, rather than in the turmoil of a London ball. But that's all nonsense; and I hope I have too much pride to allow any man to address me in such a strain. Trust me for setting him down!

It's no wonder, then, that I was cross when I was dressing for Lady Horsingham's ball; and that silly Gertrude (that's my maid's name, and what a name it is for a person in that class of life!) put me more and more out of patience with her idiotic conversation, which she tries to adapt to my tastes, and of which the following is a specimen:——

"Master John will be at her ladyship's ball, miss, I make no doubt;" brushing away the while at my back hair, and pulling it unnecessarily hard; no maid ever yet had a "light hand."

No answer. What business is it of hers, and why should she call him Master John? Gertrude tries again: "You look pale to-night, miss; you that generally has such a colour. I'm afraid you're tired with your ride."

"Not a bit of it—only sleepy. Why, it's time one was in bed."

"Lor, miss, I shouldn't want to go to bed, not if I was going to a ball. But I think you like 'orse exercise best; and to be sure, your 'orse is a real beauty, Miss Kate."

The very name of Brilliant always puts me in good humour, so, of course, I can but answer, "That he is, Gertrude, and as good as he's handsome;" on which my voluble handmaid goes off again at score.

"That's what I say, miss, when I see him coming round to the door, with his long black tail and his elegant shape and his thin legs." Thin legs!—I can't stand that; to hear my beautiful Brilliant's great strong legs called thin, as if he were made of paper. I feel I am getting savage again, so I cut Gertrude short, and bid her "finish my hair," and hasten my dressing, for Aunt Deborah don't take long, and we shall be late for the ball. At the mention of the word "ball," off goes Gertrude again.

"What a grand ball it'll be, miss, as all her ladyship's is; and I know there'll be no young lady there as will be better dressed than my young lady, nor better looking neither; and I'm sure, to see you and Master John stand up together, as you did last Christmas when we was all at Dangerfield! and I says to the steward, 'Mr. Musty,' says I, 'a handsomer couple than them two I never clapped eyes on. Master John, he looks so fresh, and so healthy and portly, as becomes a gentleman.' And he says, 'No doubt,' says he; 'and Miss Kate, she steps away like a real good one, with her merry eyes and her trim waist, as blooming,' says he, 'as a beanfield, and as saucy as——'"

"There, that will do, Gertrude; now my pocket-handkerchief and some scent, and my gloves and my fan. Good-night, Gertrude."

"Good-night, miss; I do humbly hope you'll enjoy your ball."

Enjoy my ball, indeed! How little does the girl know what I enjoy, and what I don't enjoy! Lady Horsingham will be as stiff as the poker, and about as communicative. Cousin Amelia will look at everything I've got on, and say the most disagreeable things she can think of, because she never can forgive me for being born two years later than herself. I shall know very few people, and those I do know I shall not like. I shall have a headache before I have been half an hour in the room. If I dance I shall be hot, and if I don't dance I shall be bored. Enjoy my ball, indeed! I'd much rather be going hay-making.

Up went the steps, bang went the door, and ere long we were safely consigned to the "string" of carriages bound for the same destination as ourselves. After much "cutting-in," and shaving of wheels, and lashing of coach-horses, with not a little blasphemy, "Miss Horsingham" and "Miss Coventry" were announced in a stentorian voice, and we were struggling in a mass of silks and satins, blonde and broadcloth, up the swarming staircase. Everything happened exactly as I had predicted; Lady Horsingham accosted Aunt Deborah with the most affectionate cordiality, and lent me two fingers of her left hand, to be returned without delay. Cousin Amelia looked me well over from head to foot, and asked after my own health and Brilliant's with a supercilious smile. How that girl hates me! And I honestly confess to returning the feeling with some cordiality. As far as appearance goes, I think without vanity I may say I have the best of it, Cousin Amelia being very short and pale, with a "turn-up" nose and long ringlets. Why does a little woman with a turn-up nose always wear her hair in ringlets? Is it that she wishes to resemble a King Charles's spaniel? And why are our sex so apt to cherish feelings of animosity towards those who are younger and better-looking than themselves? While I ask myself these questions I was suddenly accosted by a lady who had been some time in conversation with my chaperon, and from whom, I saw by Aunt Deborah's countenance, she was anxious to make her escape. Poor old soul! What could she do? A double rank of dowagers hemmed her in in front; on one side of her was her unwelcome acquaintance and the banisters—on the other, myself and three demure young ladies (sisters), who looked frightened and uncomfortable—whilst her rear was guarded by a tall cavalry officer with enormous moustachios, heading an impervious column of dandies worse than himself. Aunt Deborah was like a needle in a bottle of hay. Taking advantage of her position, the lady before mentioned seized me by both hands, and vowed she should have known me anywhere by my likeness to my poor mamma. "I must make your acquaintance, my dear Miss Coventry—your uncle, Sir Harry, was one of my oldest friends. I see you so often in the park, and you ride the nicest horse in London, a bay with a white star." Of course I bowed an affirmative, and shook my new friend by the hand with a cordiality equal to her own. A conversation begun in so promising a manner as by a reference to my favourite was sure to go on swimmingly; besides, we could not have got away from each other if we would; and ere long I found Mrs. Lumley—for that was the lady's name—a most amusing and satirical personage, with a variety of anecdotes about all her friends and acquaintances, and a sort of flippant charm of manner that was quite irresistible.

Besides all this, she was doubtless a very pretty woman—less striking perhaps than winning. At the first glance you hardly remarked her—at the second you observed she was very well dressed—at the third it occurred to you all of a sudden that she was far better-looking than half the regular red-and-white beauties of the season; and after five minutes' conversation all the men were over head and ears in love with her. She was neither dark nor fair, neither pale nor ruddy, neither short nor tall. I never could succeed in making out the colour of her eyes, but she had wonderfully long thick eyelashes with a curl in them (I wish mine had been cut when I was a baby), and a beautiful healthy-looking skin, and such good teeth. After all, I think her great attraction was her nose. It had more expression in its straight, well-cut bridge and little, sharp point than all the rest of her features put together. I believe it was her nose that conquered everything, and that her small feet and pretty figure and white hands, and dashing ways and piquante conversation had much less to answer for than one saucy little feature. How she rattled on: "You don't know Lady Scapegrace, Miss Coventry, do you? There, that bold-looking woman in yellow. Beautiful black hair, hasn't she?—false, every bit of it! She'll bow to me to-night, because she sees me with your good aunt; there, I told you so! Since she and Sir Guy are living together again she sets up for being respectable—such stories, my dear! but I don't believe half of 'em. However, I've seen her with my own eyes do the oddest things—at best, I'm afraid she's a shocking flirt! There's your cousin, Mr. Jones—you see I know everybody. How black he looks—he don't like me—a great many people don't—but I return good for evil—I like everybody—it's never worth while to be cross;" and as she said so she smiled with such a sunny, merry expression that I liked her better and better.

Cousin John certainly did look very cross. "Who introduced you to that horrid woman, Kate?" said he as soon as a fresh convulsion in the crowd had stranded us a few steps higher up, and we were separated from Mrs. Lumley and her attractions.

"My aunt, sir," I replied demurely, telling a "white one" for the sake of teasing him. "Why? Have you any objections?"

"Oh, of course, if my aunt did, it's all right," replied he. "I don't know a great deal of her, and what I do know I don't much like. But, Kate, there's a friend of mine wishes to be presented to you. You've often heard me mention Frank Lovell—well, there he is; do you see him?—turning round now to speak to Lady Scapegrace."

Good heavens! it was the man I had seen in the park so often, if possible better-looking with his hat off than I had thought him in his morning costume, with the eternal cigar in his mouth. I have a sort of dim recollection of his making his bow to my aunt, who received him, as she does all good-looking young men, with a patronizing smile, and a vision of John "doing the polite," and laughing as he ceremoniously introduced "Captain Lovell" and "Miss Coventry," and something said about "the honour of the next waltz;" and although I am not easily discomposed, I confess I felt a little shy and uncomfortable till I found myself hanging on Captain Lovell's arm, and elbowing our way to a place amongst the dancers.

I must say he wasn't the least what I expected—not at all forward, and never alluded to our previous meeting, or to Brilliant, till we went to have an ice in the tea-room, when Captain Lovell began to enlarge upon the charm of those morning rides, and the fresh air, and the beautiful scenery of Hyde Park; and though I never told him exactly, he managed to find out that I rode every day at the same early hour, "even after a ball!" and that I was as likely to be there to-morrow as any day in the week; and so we had another turn at "the Colombetta" waltz, and he took me back to my aunt, half-inclined to be pleased with him, and more than half-inclined to be angry with myself. I am afraid I couldn't help watching him as he loitered about amongst the crowd, now deep in conversation with Lady Scapegrace, now laughing with my new friend, Mrs. Lumley. He looked so like a gentleman, even amongst all the high-bred men there; and though so handsome, he didn't appear the least conceited. I began to wonder whether all could be true that I had heard of him, and to think that a man who liked such early walks could not possibly be the roué and "good-for-nothing" they made him out. I was roused out of a brown study by Cousin John's voice in my ear, "Now then, Kate, for our waltz. The room's a little clearer, so we can go the 'pace' if you like." And away we went to "the Odalisque" faster than any other couple in the room. Somehow it wasn't half such a pretty air as the Colombetta, and John, though he has a very good ear, didn't seem to waltz quite so well as usual; perhaps I was getting a little tired. I know I wasn't at all sorry when my aunt ordered the carriage; and I thought the dawn never looked so beautiful as it did when we emerged from those hot, lighted rooms into the pure, fragrant summer air. I confess I do love the dawn, even in London. I like to see the "gates of morning" open with that clear, light-green tinge that art has never yet been able to imitate; and if I could do as I liked, which none of us can, I should always be up and dressed by sunrise.

As we drove down Grosvenor Place I saw Captain Lovell walking home, smoking a cigar. I think he caught a glimpse of my face at the carriage-window, for I am almost sure he bowed, but I shrunk back into the corner, and pretended to go to sleep; and when we arrived in Lowndes Street I was not at all sorry to wish Aunt Deborah good-night, and go upstairs to bed.

CHAPTER IV.

"Now then, Kate, late as usual; my phaeton's at the door, and we've only an hour and five minutes to do the twelve miles," said Cousin John's cheery voice as he accosted me on the following morning, running upstairs to change my dress after my early ride. Yes, notwithstanding the ball the night before, I was not going to disappoint Brilliant of his gallop; besides, these things are all habit; if you once get accustomed to early hours nothing is so easy as to keep to them. Why, even Captain Lovell was in the park as usual with his cigar—he seems regular enough about that, at all events—and he took his hat off so gracefully when he spied me cantering up the Ride that I hadn't the heart to pass without stopping just to say, "How d'ye do?" but of course I didn't shake hands with him.

"Come, Kate, bustle, bustle," exclaimed that fidget John; and in less time than my lady-readers would believe, I had put on my pink bonnet and my white dress, and was bowling down to Richmond by the side of my cousin, behind a roan and a chestnut that stepped away in a style that it did one good to see.

"What a clipper that off-horse is, John," said I as we cleared London, and got to the level road by Kew Gardens; "let me take the reins for five minutes—they're going so pleasantly." But John don't like me to drive anything more sporting than a pony-carriage, and he refused point blank, which, to say the least of it, was brutal on his part. If I hadn't thought it would make me sick, I should have liked to smoke, on purpose to provoke him. We did the distance with three minutes to spare, and as we pulled up in front of the Castle Hotel, I was proud to hear the admiration our tout ensemble elicited from a knot of idlers lounging round the door. "'Ere's a spicy set-out, Bill," said one. "Crickey! vot a pretty gal!" said another. "Vouldn't I like to be Vilikins with she for a Dinah!" exclaimed the dirtiest of the conclave; and although I appreciated the compliment, I was forced to turn my back on my unwashed admirer, and reply to the greetings of the picnic party we had come down to join.

There was Mrs. Molasses and her two daughters to begin with, people of unheard-of wealth, of which they seemed to carry a large portion on their persons. The mamma, ample, black-eyed, fresh-coloured, and brocaded, with an extremely natural wig. The eldest daughter, Mary, with whom I had afterwards reason to be better acquainted, pale, languid, very quiet, and low-toned, with fine eyes, and soft dark hair, and what people call an interesting look. She took the sentimental line—was all feeling and poetry, and milk and water, and as easily frightened as she was reassured again. The younger girl, Jane, was the very reverse of her sister—short and dark and energetic, rather blue, and I thought a little impudent; however, I liked her the best of the two. Then came Sir Guy and Lady Scapegrace. The Baronet, a stout, square, elderly man, with enormous dyed whiskers and hair to match, combining as much as possible the manners of the coachman with the morals of the roué. A tremendous dandy of the Four-in-hand Club school—high neckcloth, huge pins, gorgeous patterns, enormous buttons, and a flower in his mouth. His lady as handsome as a star, though a little hollow-eyed and passée. She looked like a tragedy queen, with her magnificent figure, and long black hair, and fierce flashing eyes, and woe-begone expression, and the black velvet ribbon with its diamond cross, which she always wore round her neck. Ah me! what stories that diamond-cross could tell, if all be true that we hear of Lady Scapegrace! A girl sold for money, to become a rebellious wife to an unfeeling husband. A handsome young cousin, who cut his own throat in despair—they brought it in temporary insanity, of course. An elopement with a gallant Major to the south of France, and a duel there, in which the Major was shot, but not by Sir Guy; an English lady of rank travelling on the Continent, independent and alone, breaking banks in all directions with her luck and hearts with her beauty; a reconciliation, entirely for money considerations, which drove another far less erring woman into a madhouse (but that was Sir Guy's fault); and a darker tale still of a certain potion prepared by her hand, which the Baronet was prevented from swallowing only by his invariable habit of contradicting his wife on all points, and which the lady herself had the effrontery to boast "would have settled all accounts." Not a word of truth in any of these stories probably; but still, such is the character the world's good nature affixes to that dark handsome woman at whom Cousin John seems so very much alarmed.

Then there was an elderly Miss Minnows, who was horribly afraid of catching cold, but in whose character I could perceive no other very salient point; and a fair-haired young gentleman, whose name I did not distinctly catch, and who looked as if he ought to have been at school, where, indeed, I think he would have been much happier; and sundry regular stereotyped London men and women, well bred and well dressed, and cool and composed, and altogether thoroughly respectable and stupid; and a famous author, who drank a great deal of wine, and never opened his lips to speak; and I think that was all—no, by-the-bye, there was Captain Lovell, who came very late, and we went soberly into Richmond Park, and dined under a tree.

I do not think I quite like a picnic. It is all very well, like most other arrangements, if everything goes right; but I sat between Sir Guy Scapegrace and the light-haired young gentleman, and although I could hear lots of fun going on at the other end of the tablecloth, where Cousin John and Mary Molasses and Captain Lovell had got together, I was too far off to partake of it, and my vis-à-vis, Lady Scapegrace, scowled at me so from under her black eyebrows, though I believe utterly unconsciously, that she made me feel quite nervous. Then it was not reassuring to have that odious Sir Guy pressing me to eat everything, and looking right under my bonnet, and asking me to drink champagne at least four times; and if I turned to my other neighbour, and ventured to address him on the most commonplace subject, he blushed so painfully that I began to think he was quite as much afraid of me as I was of Sir Guy. Altogether I was rather glad when the things were cleared away and put back into the hampers, and the gentlemen asked leave to light their cigars, and we broke up our circle, and lounged about and enjoyed ourselves in the shade of those fine trees on that dry velvet sward. We were rather put to it though for amusement, and had to propose games of forfeits and other pastimes; and Cousin John, quite unwittingly, got me into a sad scrape by boasting about his horses. "Not such another pair out of London to-day," expatiated John to the company in general. "We came down in seven minutes under the hour from my aunt's door in Lowndes Street; didn't we, Kate? And never turned a hair; did we, Kate? Why, they went so smooth Kate couldn't keep her hands off the reins; could you, Kate? And there are few better judges, let me tell you, than Miss Coventry." I saw the ladies look at me, and then at each other; and I knew by that indescribable glance, which none but a woman can thoroughly appreciate, how from that moment they had vowed, one and all, to hate me eternally in their hearts. The offence had been committed; the sentence had gone forth. I had been tried for being fast, and found guilty nem. com., from sneering Lady Scapegrace to unmeaning Miss Minnows; each stared at me for about two seconds, and so made up her mind. I cannot think why it is that this should be so great a crime in the eyes of my own sex. Next to being attractive to the other half of creation—and that I can easily understand is totally unpardonable—there is nothing makes a woman so angry with her sister as high spirits, natural courage, and above all a love for a horse. It is very hard upon us that we should be debarred from all out-of-door exercises and amusements by the prejudices of those very individuals who ought to back us up in our efforts to enlarge the circle of our amusements. I cannot see why it follows that because I do not mind "weather," I must, therefore, be utterly regardless of morality; nor how my knack of breaking in a horse should imply an infraction of all the commandments. Are men the only bipeds that can be at the same time brave and virtuous? Must pluck and piety be for ever divorced in the female character? Shall I never be able to keep the straight path in life because I can turn an awkward corner with four horses at a trot? Female voices answer volubly in the negative, and I give in.

But odious Sir Guy thinks none the worse of me for my coaching predilections. "Fond of driving, Miss Coventry?" says he, leering at me from over his great choking neckcloth. "Seen my team—three greys and a piebald? If you like going fast I can accommodate you. Proud to take you back on my drag. What? Go on the box. Drive, if you like. Hey!"

I confess for one instant, much as I hated the old reprobate, I should have liked to go, if it was only to make all the women so angry; but just then I caught Captain Lovell's eye fixed upon me with a strange, earnest expression, and all at once I felt that nothing should induce me to trust myself with Sir Guy. I couldn't help blushing though as I declined, more particularly when my would-be charioteer swore he considered it "an engagement, hey?—only put off to another time—get the coach new painted—begad, Miss Coventry's favourite colour!" And the old monster grinned in my face till I could have boxed his ears.

The author by this time was fast asleep, with a handkerchief over his face, Miss Minnows searching in vain for a fabulous pair of clogs, as she imagined the dew must be falling—it was about six p.m., and hot June weather. Sir Guy was off to the hampers in search of "brandy and soda," and the rest of the party lounging about in twos and threes, when Captain Lovell proposed we should stroll down to the river and have a row in the cool of the evening. Mary Molasses voted it "charming;" Lady Scapegrace was willing to go anywhere away from Sir Guy; John, of course, all alive for a lark; and though Mrs. Molasses preferred remaining on dry land, she had no objection to trusting her girls with us. So we mustered a strong party for embarkation on Father Thames. Our two cavaliers ran forward to get the boat ready, Captain Lovell bounding over the fences and stiles almost as actively as Brilliant could have done; and John, who is no mean proficient at such exercises, following him; whilst we ladies paced along soberly in the rear.

"Can you row, Miss Coventry?" asked Lady Scapegrace, who seemed to have taken rather a fancy to me, probably out of contradiction to the other women. "I can. I rowed four miles once on the Lake of Geneva," she added in her deep, melancholy voice, "and we were caught in one of those squalls and nearly lost. If it hadn't been for poor Alphonse, not one of us could have escaped. I wonder if drowning's a painful death, Miss Coventry; the water always looks so inviting."

"Goodness, Lady Scapegrace!" exclaimed I; "don't take this opportunity of finding out. None of us can swim but John; and if he saves anybody, he's solemnly engaged to save me."

"I quite agree with you, Lady Scapegrace," said the romantic Miss
Molasses. "It looks so peaceful, and gives one such an idea of repose.
I for one have not the slightest fear of death, or indeed of any mere
bodily changes——Gracious goodness! the bull! the bull!"

What a rout it was! The courageous young lady who thus gave us the first intimation of danger leading the flight with a speed and activity of which I should have thought her languid frame totally incapable; Lady Scapegrace making use of her long legs with an utter forgetfulness of her usually grave and tragic demeanour; and the rest of the party seeking safety helter-skelter.

It was indeed a situation of some peril. Our course to the riverside had led us through a long narrow strip of meadow-land, bounded by high impervious thorn fences, such as I knew would be bullfinches in the winter, and which now, in all the luxuriance of summer foliage, presented a mass of thorns and fragrance that no mortal could expect to get through. At either end of the field was a high hog-backed stile, such as ladies usually make considerable difficulties about surmounting, but which are by no means so impossible of transit when an infuriated bull is bringing up the rear. We were already a quarter of the way across the field, when Miss Mary's exclamation made us aware of our enemy, who had been quietly cropping the grass in a corner behind us, but who now, roused by our gaudy dresses and the piercing screams of some of our party, was lashing himself into a rage, and looking sufficiently mischievous to be a very unpleasant acquaintance. It was impossible to turn round and make for the stile we had just left, as the bull now occupied a position exactly between us and that place of safety; it was hopeless, particularly in our light muslin gowns, to attempt the hedge on either side; there was nothing for it but a fair run to the other end of the meadow, about a quarter of a mile, and sauve qui peut was now the order of the day.

I will not allow that I am deficient in courage; on the contrary, as Cousin John says, "I am rather proud of my pluck;" but there is nothing so contagious as a panic, and I too ran for my very life. The bull came galloping after us, tossing his head and rolling his great body about as if he quite enjoyed the fun; nor do I know how the adventure would have ended, for he must have overtaken some of us before we could reach our haven, had not Lady Scapegrace caught her foot in the long grass, and, falling prostrate, buried her face in her hands, and giving herself up, as she afterwards assured me, to the prospect of a horrible and violent death. I could not leave her in such a situation. By an impulse for which I cannot account I stopped short, turned round, got between the pursuer and his fallen foe, and with a beating heart and my knees knocking together, faced the great mischievous brute with no other weapon, offensive or defensive, than a laced pocket handkerchief. I believe he was a well-meaning bull after all; for instead of crashing in upon me, as I half expected he would, and immolating me on the spot, he too stopped short, stared, bellowed, and began sniffing the grass, and pawing up the turf, and whisking his tail about, just as Brilliant does when he is going to lie down. I don't think he had ever seen a young lady, certainly not a French bonnet before, and he didn't seem to know what to make of the combination; so there we stood, he and I staring each other out of countenance, but without proceeding to any further extremities. I know I have plenty of courage, for after the first minute I wasn't the least bit afraid; I felt just as I do when I ride at a large fence—as I get nearer and nearer I feel something rising and rising within me that enables me to face anything; and so when I had confronted the bull for a little time I felt inclined to carry the war into the enemy's country, and advance upon him. But of course all this is very indelicate and unfeminine; and it would have been far more virtuous and lady-like to have run shrieking away like Miss Molasses, or laid down and given in at once like poor Lady Scapegrace, who was quite resigned to being tossed and trampled upon, and only gave vent every now and then to a stifled moan.

Well, at last I did advance a few steps, and the bull gave ground in the same proportion. I began to think I should beat him after all, when to my great relief, I must allow, I heard a voice behind me exclaim, "By Jove, what a plucky girl!" and I thought I heard something muttered that sounded very like "darling," but of course that couldn't be meant for me; and Captain Lovell, hot, handsome, and breathless, made his appearance, and soon drove our enemy into the farthest corner of the field. As soon as the coast was clear we raised poor Lady Scapegrace, who kissed me with tears in her eyes as she thanked me for what she called "saving her life." I had no idea the woman had so much feeling. Captain Lovell gave each of us an arm as we walked on to join our party, and he explained how the screams of Miss Molasses had reached him even at the riverside, and how he had turned and hastened back immediately, "Fortunately in time to be of some use. But I never saw a finer thing done, Miss Coventry; if I live to a hundred I shall never forget it;" and he looked as if he would have added, "or you either."

Many were the exclamations, and much the conversation created by our adventure. The ladies who had run away so gallantly were of course too much agitated for the proposed boating excursion; so after sundry restoratives at the hotel we ordered the carriages to return to town. Cousin John gave "Frank" (as he calls him) a place in the back seat of his phaeton, and he leaned over and talked to me the whole way home. What a pleasant drive it was in the moonlight, and how happy I felt! I was really sorry when we got back to London. Frank seemed quite anxious to make Aunt Deborah's acquaintance; and I thought I shouldn't wonder if he was to call in Lowndes Street very soon.

CHAPTER V.

When Aunt Deborah is laid up with one of her colds she always has a wonderful accession of "propriety" accompanying the disorder; and that which would appear to her at the worst a harmless escapade when in her usual health and spirits becomes a crime of the blackest dye when seen through the medium of barley-broth and water-gruel—these being Aunt Deborah's infallible remedies for a catarrh. Now, the cold in question had lasted its victim over the Ascot meeting, over our picnic to Richmond, and bade fair to give her employment during the greater part of the summer, so obstinate was the enemy when he had once possessed himself of the citadel; and under these circumstances I confess it appeared to me quite hopeless to ask her permission to accompany Cousin John on a long-promised expedition to Hampton Races. I did not dare make the request myself; and I own I had great misgivings, even when I overheard from my boudoir the all-powerful John preferring his petition, which he did with a sort of abrupt good humour peculiarly his own.

"Going to take Kate out for another lark, aunt, if you have no objection," says John, plumping down into an armchair, and forthwith proceeding to entangle Aunt Deborah's knitting into the most hopeless confusion. "Only some quiet races near town; all amongst ourselves, you know—gentlemen riders, and that sort of thing."

Aunt Deborah, who is a good deal behindhand in all matters connected with the turf, and who has set her face into a determined refusal when she hears the word "racing," rather relaxes at the mention of "gentlemen riders," and replies gravely, "John, I want to talk to you about Kate. The girl's wild after horses and hounds and all such unfeminine pursuits. I wonder you like to see it yourself, my dear. Now, don't you think it would be far better to encourage her in domestic tastes and amusements? I give you my word, she hasn't done a bit of worsted-work for a fortnight."

John's face must have been good at this piece of intelligence; if there is one thing he hates more than another it is "cross-stitch." But he replied with exemplary gravity that "Cousin Kate never was strong, you know, aunt, and she is ordered to be a good deal in the open air, with plenty of horse exercise; and this is delightful weather for riding."

"Well, John," says Aunt Deborah, "of course, if you don't mind it, I needn't; you'll be the sufferer, my dear, not I" (I wonder what she meant by that?); "and I must let her go if you choose to take her, John. How like your father you're growing, my handsome boy!" and Aunt Deborah kissed Cousin John on the forehead, with tears in her eyes; and they called to me to get ready, and the horses came round, and in less than ten minutes we were up and away.

It was very gratifying to overhear the complimentary remarks made upon the general appearance of White Stockings, whom I had ridden down to save Brilliant, and who, despite his ugliness, is a very hunting-looking horse.

"Looks a game 'un, don't he, squire?" remarked a jolly-looking Surrey farmer in top-boots to a dilapidated friend in a white neckcloth. "Shouldn't wonder if he couldn't kick the dirt in some of their faces, with that tight lass to keep his head straight." The friend was a melancholy man, and nodded his silent affirmative with a sigh. I think, early as it was, they had both been drinking.

"Look at that chestnut horse!" exclaimed a good-looking boy of some twenty summers, who had coached his own drag down, like a second Phaethon, only as yet with better luck, and was now smoking a huge cigar on its roof. "Isn't he the image of old Paleface? Who's the woman, eh? Does nobody know her? I'll ask her to come and sit up here. She looks like a lady, too," he added, checking himself. "Never mind, here goes!" And he was jumping off the coach, to tender me, I presume, his polite invitation in person, when his arm was caught by the man next him, who was no other than John's friend, Captain Lovell.

"Charley, stop!" exclaimed Frank, flushing all over his handsome face and temples. "I know her, I tell you. Have a care; it's Miss Coventry." And in another instant he had bounded to the earth, accosted my chaperon with a hearty "Jack, how goes it?" and was deep in conversation with my humble self, with his hand on my horse's neck—Frank always wears such good gloves—and his pleasant countenance beaming with delight at our chance interview. I liked the races better after this, and should have spent a happier day, perhaps, without the society of Mrs. Lumley, who appeared likewise on horseback, quite unexpectedly, and was riding the most beautiful brown mare I ever saw in my life. I quite wished I had brought down Brilliant, if only to have met her on more equal terms. As we were the only two ladies on horseback, of course we were obliged to fraternize (if the weaker sex may use such an expression), as, indeed, we must have done had we been the bitterest foes on earth, instead of merely hating each other with common civility. Mrs. Lumley seemed on particularly good terms with Frank Lovell—I do not know that I liked her any the better for that—and expressed her sentiments and opinions to the world in general with a vivacity and freedom peculiarly her own.

"I am out on 'the sly,' you know," she observed with an arch smile. "I have a good, quiet aunt who lives down at Richmond, and I do penance there for a time, whenever I have been more than usually wicked; but to-day I could not resist the fine weather and the crowd and the fun, and above all the bad company, which amuses me more than all the rest put together, though I do not include you, Miss Coventry, nor yet Mr. Jones, but I am afraid I must Captain Lovell. Come, let's ride amongst the carriages and see the ninnies."

So Mrs. Lumley and I plunged into the crowd, leaving Frank to return to his drag and his betting-book, and Cousin John somewhat discontentedly to bring up the rear.

"After all, I don't see much harm in Hampton," said my lively guide as we threaded our way between the carriages, "though, to be sure, there are some very queer-looking people on the course. I could tell you strange stories of most of them, Miss Coventry, only you wouldn't believe me. Do you see that old, plainish woman, with such black hair and eyebrows—something like Lady Scapegrace, only not so handsome as my favourite enemy? Would you believe it, she might marry three coronets at this moment if she chose, and she won't have any one of them. She is not good-looking, you can see; she can scarcely write her own name. She has no conversation, I happen to know, for I met her once at dinner, and she cannot by any chance put an 'H' into its right place. Yet men see something in her that is totally inexplicable to us, and she seems to have a mysterious influence over all ages and all sorts. One of these infatuated noblemen is decrepit and twaddling; the other a stern, reserved man that up to forty years of age was supposed to be the very impersonation of common sense; and the third, young, clever, and handsome, a man that might marry half the nicest women in England if he liked. And why, do you think, she won't pick and choose from such a trio? Why, forsooth, because she has set her stupid heart on a drunken stockbroker, who won't have a word to say to her, and would have been here to-day, I have no doubt, if he hadn't been afraid of meeting her. Well, there's a stranger story than that about the girl with long fair hair in the next carriage. You can see her now, in a pink bonnet, drinking sherry and soda water. It is supposed that she is old Goldfinch's daughter, and that he won't give her a farthing; but I know somebody who knows his lawyer, and that girl will have half a million, if she don't drink herself to death before old Goldfinch takes his departure from this wicked world. She is beautiful and clever and accomplished, and all the young men are in love with her; but she cannot keep sober, and in three years' time she will have lost her youth and her health and her faculties, and in all probability will finish in a madhouse. There's Frank Lovell making fierce love to her now."

And as Mrs. Lumley concluded with this amiable remark, I looked round for Cousin John, and rode away from her in disgust at her flippancy, and sick at heart to think of such a man as Captain Lovell wasting his smiles on such a creature. To be sure, he only said three words to her, for when I looked round again at the carriage he was gone. There is something very amusing to me in the bustle of a racecourse; and yet, after talking to Mrs. Lumley, the gloss seemed to be only on the surface. She had told me enough of the company to make me fancy there must be some strange history belonging to each. Like the man that saw through the roofs of the houses in Madrid, thanks to the agency of his familiar, I thought that my demon on a side-saddle had taught me to see into the very hearts and secrets of the motley assemblage.

There was a handsome girl, with beautiful teeth and neatly-braided hair and such a brilliant smile, attracting a crowd round her as she sang piquant songs in a sweet, deep-toned voice that ought to have made her fortune on the stage if it had been properly cultivated—sang them, too, with a look and manner that I have seen seldom rivalled by the cleverest actresses; and I thought what a face and form were wasted here to make profit for one knave and sport for some fifty fools. As she accompanied herself on the harp, and touched its strings with a grace and expression which made amends for a certain want of tuition, I could not help fancying her in a drawing-room, surrounded by admirers, making many a heart ache with her arch smile and winning ways. Without being positively beautiful, she had the knack so few women possess of looking charming in every attitude and with every expression of countenance; and although her songs were of a somewhat florid school, yet I could not help thinking that, with those natural gifts and a plaintive old ballad, English or Scotch, such as "Annie Laurie" or "The Nut-brown Maid" to bring them out, in a pretty drawing-room, with the assistance of a good dressmaker—dear! she might marry a duke if she liked.

And yet all this belonged to a dark, close-shaved ruffian, with silver rings and a yellow handkerchief, who scowled and prowled about her, and looked as if he was likely enough to beat her when they got home. But she hands up an ivory bowl for contributions amongst the young dandies on the roof of a neighbouring coach, who have been listening open-mouthed to the siren, and shillings and half-crowns, and a bit of gold from the one last out of the Bench, pour into it; and she moves off, to make way for three French glee-maidens with a monkey and a tambourine, and the swells return to their cigars and their betting, and we are all attention for the next event on the card, because it is a gentlemen-riders' race; and the performances will consequently be as different as possible from what we have just seen.

"We'll secure a good place for this, Kate," says Cousin John, edging his horse in as near the judges' stand as he can get. "Frank Lovell has a mare to run, and I have backed her for a sovereign."

"Dear, I hope she'll win!" is my ardent rejoinder.

"Thank you, Kate," says kind Cousin John, who concludes I take an unusual interest in his speculations; and forthwith we proceed to criticize the three animals brought to the post, and to agree that Captain Lovell's Parachute is far the best-looking of the lot; or, as Sir Guy Scapegrace says to the well-pleased owner, "If make and shape go for anything, Frank, she ought to beat them, as far as they can see."

Sir Guy is chaperoning a strange-looking party of men and women, who have been very noisy since luncheon-time. He is attired in a close-shaved hat (which he had the effrontery to take off to me, but I looked the other way), a white coat, and a red neckcloth, the usual flower in his mouth being replaced for the occasion by a large cigar. Captain Lovell hopes "I admire his mare—she has a look of Brilliant from here, Miss Coventry. 'Baby Larkins' of the Lancers is to ride; and The Baby will do her justice if any one can. He's far the best of the young ones now."

"Do you mean his name is 'Baby'?" said I, much amused, "or that you call him so because he is such a child? He looks as if he ought to be with mamma still." "We always call him 'Baby' in the Lancers," explained Frank, "because he joined us so very young. He is nineteen, though you would guess him about twelve; but he's got the brains of a man of sixty and the nerves of a giant. Ah! Parachute, you may kick, old girl, but you won't get rid of that child!"

And sure enough "The Baby" sat like a rock, with a grim smile, and preserving throughout a silence and sang froid which nothing seemed able to overcome. Two more seedy-looking animals made up the entry. The lamer one of the two was ridden by a stout major with a redundancy of moustaches, the other by a lanky cornet of Heavy Dragoons, who seemed not to know where on earth to dispose of his arms and legs, besides finding his cap somewhat in his way, and being much embarrassed with his whip. They gallop up and down before starting, till I wonder how any galloping can be left for the race; and after a futile attempt or two they get away, The Baby making strong running, the stout Major waiting closely upon his infantine antagonist, while the long cornet, looming like a windmill in the distance, brings up the rear.

"Parachute still making running," says John, standing erect in his stirrups, his honest face beaming with excitement. "Woa, horse!—Stand still, White-Stockings—now they reach the turn, and The Baby takes a pull—Gad, old Ganymede's coming up. Well done, Major—no, the old one's flogging. Parachute wins. Now, Baby!—now Major—the horse!—the mare!—Best race I ever saw in my life—a dead heat—Ha! ha! ha!" The latter explosion of mirth is due to the procrastinated arrival of the long cornet, who flogs and works as religiously home as if he had a hundred more behind him, and who reaches the weighing enclosure in time to ascertain with his own eyes that Ganymede has won, the lame plater who rejoices in that classical appellation having struggled home first by a head, "notwithstanding," as the sporting papers afterwards expressed themselves, "the judicious riding and beautiful finish of that promising young jockey, Mr. B. Larkins." The Baby himself, however, is unmoved as usual, nodding to Parachute's disappointed owner without moving a muscle of his countenance. He merely remarks, "Short of work, Frank. Told you so afore I got up," and putting on a tiny white overcoat like a plaything, disappears, and is seen no more.

What a confusion there is in getting away! Sir Guy Scapegrace has a yearly bet with young Phaethon, who wanted to invite me on his box, as to which shall get first to Kensington on their way back to town. You would suppose Sir Guy was very happy at home by his anxiety to be off. The two drags are soon bumping and rolling and rattling along the sward. The narrow lane through which they must make their way is completely blocked up with spring-vans, and tax-carts, and open carriages, and shut carriages, and broughams, and landaus, and every description of vehicle that ever came out of Long Acre; whilst more four-horse coaches, with fast teams and still faster loads, are thundering in the rear. Slang reigns supreme; and John Gilpin's friend, who had a "ready wit," would here meet with his match. Nor are jest and repartee (what John calls "chaff") the only missiles bandied about. Toys, knocked off "the sticks" for the purpose, darken the air as they fly from one vehicle to another, and the broadside from a well-supplied coach is like that of a seventy-four. Fun and good-humour abound, but confusion gets worse confounded. Young Phaethon's wheel is locked with a market-gardener's, who is accompanied by two sisters-in-law and the suitors of those nowise disconcerted damsels, all more or less intoxicated. Thriftless has his near leader in the back-seat of a pony-carriage, and Sir Guy's off-wheeler is over the pole. John and I agree to make a detour, have a pleasant ride in the country, never mind about dinner, and so get back to London by moonlight. As we reach a quiet, sequestered lane, and inhale the pleasant fragrance of the hawthorn—always sweetest towards nightfall—we hear a horse's tramp behind us, and are joined by Frank Lovell, who explains with unnecessary distinctness that "he always makes a practice of riding back from Hampton to avoid the crowd, and always comes that way." If so, he must be in the habit of taking a considerable detour. But he joins our party, and we ride home together.

How beautifully the moon shone upon the river as we crossed Kew Bridge that calm, silent, summer night! How it flickered through their branches and silvered over the old trees, and what a peaceful, lovely landscape it was! I thought Frank's low, sweet voice quite in keeping with the time and the scene. As we rode together, John lagging a good deal behind (that bay horse of John's never could walk with White Stockings), I could not help thinking how much I had misunderstood Captain Lovell's character. What a deal of feeling—almost of romance—there was under that conventional exterior which he wore before the world! I liked him so much more now I came to know him better. I was quite sorry when we had to wish him "good-night" and John and I rode thoughtfully home through the quiet streets. I thought my cousin's manner was altered too, though I scarce knew how. His farewell sounded more constrained, more polite than usual, when he left me at Aunt Deborah's door. And whilst I was undressing I reflected on all the proceedings of the day, and tried to remember what I had done that could possibly have displeased good-natured John. The more I went over it, backwards and forwards, the less could I make of it. "Can it be possible," I thought at last; "can it be possible that Cousin John——" And here I popped out my candle and jumped into bed.

CHAPTER VI.

I really had not courage to take my usual canter the morning after Hampton Races. I did not feel as if I could face the umbrella and the cigar at the rails in "the Ride," and yet I rang the bell once for my maid to help me on with my habit, and had my hand on it more than once to order my horse; but I thought better of it. Poor Aunt Deborah's cold was still bad, though she was downstairs; so I determined to take care of her, in common gratitude, and give her the advantage of my agreeable society. I am very fond of Aunt Deborah in my own way, and I know there is nothing she likes so much as a "quiet morning with Kate."

The hours passed off rather slowly till luncheon-time. I did forty-two stitches of worsted-work—I never do more than fifty at a time, unless it's "grounding"—and I got off Hannah More because Aunt Deborah was too hoarse to read to me, and I really cannot read that excellent work to her without laughing; but I thought luncheon never would be ready, and when it did come I couldn't eat any. However, I went upstairs afterwards, and smoothed my hair and set my collar straight, and was glad to hear Aunt Deborah give her usual order that she was "at home" with her usual solemnity. I had not been ten minutes in the drawing-room before a knock at the door brought my heart into my mouth, and our tragic footman announced "Captain Lovell" in his most tragic voice. In marched Frank, who had never set eyes on my aunt in his life, and shook hands with me, and made her a very low bow, with a degree of effrontery that nothing but a man could ever have been capable of assuming. Aunt Deborah drew herself up—and she really is very formidable when she gets on her high horse—and looked first at me, and then at Frank, and then at me again; and I blushed like a fool, and hesitated, and introduced "Captain Lovell" to "My aunt, Miss Horsingham!" and I didn't the least know what to do next, and had a great mind to make a bolt for it and run upstairs. But our visitor seemed to have no misgivings whatever, and smoothed his hat and talked about the weather as if he had known us all from childhood. I have often remarked that if you only deprive a man of the free use of his hands there is no difficulty which he is unable to face. Give him something to handle and keep fidgeting at, and he seems immediately to be in his element, never mind what it is—a paper-knife and a book to open, or a flower to pull in pieces, or a pair of scissors and a bit of thread to snip, or even the end of a stick to suck—and he draws inspiration, and what is more to the purpose, conversation, from any and all of these sources.

But let him have his hands entirely to himself, give him nothing to "lay hold of," and he is completely dumbfoundered on the spot. Here was Frank brushing and smoothing away at his hat till it shone like black satin, and facing my aunt with a gallantry and steadiness beyond all praise; but I believe if I could have snatched it away from him and hid it under the sofa, he would have been routed at once, and must have fled in utter bewilderment and dismay. After my aunt had replied courteously enough to a few commonplace observations, she gave one of her ominous coughs, and I trembled for the result.

"Captain Beville," said my aunt. "I think I once knew a family of your name in Hampshire—the New Forest, if I remember rightly."

"Excuse me," said Frank, nowise disconcerted, and with a sly glance at me, "my name is Lovell."

"Oh," replied my aunt, with a considerable assumption of stateliness, "then—ahem!—Captain Greville, I don't think I have ever had the pleasure of meeting you before."

And my aunt looked as if she didn't care whether she ever met him again. This would have been a "poser" to most people; but Frank applied himself diligently to his hat, and opened the trenches in his own way.

"The fact is, Miss Horsingham," said he, "that I have taken advantage of my intimacy with your nephew to call upon you without a previous introduction, in hopes of ascertaining what has become of an old brother officer of mine, a namesake of yours, and consequently, I should conclude, a relative. There is, I believe, only one family in England of your name. Excuse me, Miss Horsingham, for so personal a remark, but I am convinced he must have been a near connection from a peculiarity which every one who knows anything about our old English families is aware belongs to yours: my poor friend Charlie had a beautiful 'hand.' You, madame, I perceive, own the same advantage; therefore I am convinced you must be a near connection of my old comrade. You may think me impertinent, but there is no mistaking 'the Horsingham hand.'"

Aunt Deborah gave in at once.

"I cannot call to mind at this moment any relative of mine who is likely to have served with you" (nor was this to be wondered at, the warrior aux blanches mains being a fabulous creation of wicked Frank); "but I have no doubt, Captain Lovell, that you are correct. I have great pleasure in making your acquaintance, particularly as you seem well acquainted with our belongings. Do you stay any length of time in town?"

"I seldom remain till the end of the season; but this year I think I shall. By the way, Miss Horsingham, I saw a curious old picture the other day in the West of England, purporting to be a portrait of the celebrated 'Ysonde of Brittany, with the White Hand,' in which I traced a strong resemblance to some of the Horsinghams, with whom I am acquainted. Yours is, I believe, an old Norman family; and as I am a bit of an antiquary" (O Frank, Frank!), "I consulted my friend Sir J. Burke on the subject, who assures me that the 'Le Montants'—Godfrey le Montant, if you remember, distinguished himself highly in the second crusade—that the Le Montants claimed direct descent from the old Dukes of Brittany, and consequently from the very lady of whom we are speaking. Roger le Montant came over with the Conqueror, and although strangely omitted from the Roll of Battle Abbey, doubtless received large grants of land in Hampshire from William; and two generations later we can trace his descendant, Hugo, in the same locality, under the Anglicized name of Horsengem, now corrupted to Horsingham, of which illustrious family you are, of course, aware yours is a younger branch. It is curious that the distinguishing mark of the race should have been preserved in all its shapely beauty," added Frank, with the gravest face possible, and glancing at the lavender kids, "through so many changes and so many successive generations."

Aunt Deborah was delighted. "Such a clever young man, my dear!" she said to me afterwards. "Such manners! such a voice! quite one of the old school—evidently well-bred, and with that respect for good blood which in these days, I regret to say, is fast becoming obsolete. Kate, I like him vastly!"

In the meantime she entered freely into conversation with our visitor; and before he went away—by which time his hat looked as if it had been ironed—"she hoped he would call again; she was always at home till two o'clock, and trusted to have the pleasure of his company at dinner as soon as she was well enough to get anybody to meet him."

So Frank went off to ride in the Park on the neatest possible brown hack; for I saw him quite plainly trot round the corner as I went into the balcony to water my poor geraniums.

Well, I waited and waited, and John never came for me, as was his usual habit; and I began to think I must lose my ride, for I am not allowed to go by myself in the afternoons; and at last I was obliged to coax Aunt Deborah to take me out in the open carriage, for it was a beautiful day, and it would be just the thing for her cold. So we went dowagering about, and shopped in Bond Street, and looked at some lace in Regent Street, and left cards for Lady Horsingham, as in duty bound, after helping her to "make a good ball;" and then we went into the Ring, and I looked and looked everywhere, but I could not see anything like Frank or his brown hack. To be sure the Ride was as crowded as a fair. But I did see Cousin John, and I must say it was too bad of him to keep me waiting and watching all the afternoon, and then never to take the trouble of sending a note or a message, but to start off by himself and escort Miss Molasses, as if he was her brother at least, if not a nearer relation. Miss Molasses, forsooth, with her lackadaisical ways and her sentimental nonsense; and that goose John taking it all in open-mouthed, as if she was an angel upon earth. Well, at all events she don't ride like me. Such a figure I never saw on a horse!—all on one side, like the handle of a teapot, bumping when she trots and wobbling when she canters, with braiding all over her habit, and a white feather in her hat, and gauntlet gloves (of course one may wear gauntlet gloves for hunting, but that's not London), and her sallow face. People call her interesting, but I call her bilious. And a wretched long-legged Rosinante, with round reins and tassels, and a netting over its ears, and a head like a fiddle-case, and no more action than a camp-stool. Such a couple I never beheld. I wonder John wasn't ashamed to be seen with her, instead of leaning his hand upon her horse's neck, and looking up in her face with his broad, honest smile, and taking no more notice of her sister Jane, who is a clever girl, with something in her, than if she had been the groom. I was provoked with him beyond all patience. Had it been Mrs. Lumley, for instance, I could have understood it; for she certainly is a chatty, amusing woman, though dreadfully bold, and it is a pleasure to see her canter up the Park in her close-fitting habit and her neat hat, with her beautiful round figure swaying gracefully to every motion of her horse, yet so imperceptibly that you could fancy she might balance a glassful of water on her head without spilling a drop. To say nothing of the brown mare, the only animal in London I covet, who is herself a picture. Such action! such a mouth! and such a shape! I coaxed Aunt Deborah to wait near Apsley House, on purpose that we might see her before we left the Park. And sure enough we did see her, as usual surrounded by a swarm of admirers; and next to her—positively next to her—Frank Lovell, on the very brown hack that had been standing an hour at our door. He saw me too, and took his hat off; and she said something to him, and they both laughed!

I asked Aunt Deborah to go home, for it was getting late, and the evening air was not very good for her poor cold. I did not feel well myself somehow; and when dear aunty told me I looked pale, I was forced to confess to a slight headache. I am not subject to low spirits generally—I have no patience with a woman that is—but of course one is sometimes a "little out of sorts;" and I confess I did not feel quite up to the mark that evening, I cannot tell why. If John flatters himself it was because he behaved so brutally in disappointing me, he is very much mistaken; and as for Captain Lovell, I am sure he may ride with anybody he likes for what I care. I wonder, with all his cleverness, he can't see how that woman is only laughing at him. However, it's no business of mine. So I went into my boudoir, drank some tea, and then locked myself in and had a "good cry."

CHAPTER VII.

It is wonderful how soon the London season comes to an end; and, in fact, it is difficult to say when its tide is really at the flood. Single men—and they are necessary ingredients for gaiety wherever there are young ladies—single men seldom go to town much before the Derby. Then comes Ascot, for which meeting they leave the metropolis, and enjoy some quiet retreat in the neighbourhood of Windsor, taking with them many potables and what they call a "dog cook." After Ascot people begin to think about going away, and before you know where you are three more weeks have elapsed, and it is July. Dear, what a scatter there is then!—some off to Norway, some to Cowes, some to Caithness, and some to Galway. Those that remain for Goodwood are sure to go to Newmarket; and the man who sticks religiously to the pavement, and resists the allurements of all the above-mentioned resorts, only does so because he is meditating a trip to California, Kamtschatka, or the Rocky Mountains, and is so preoccupied with portable soup, patent saddle-bags, bowie-knives, and revolvers that he might just as well be at his ultimate destination in person for all the benefit one gets from his society. I confess I don't like the end of the season. You keep on trying to be gay, whilst your friends are dropping off and disappearing one by one. Like the survivor in some horrid pestilence, you know your time must come too; but you shut your eyes to the certainty, and greet every fresh departure with a gaiety more forced and a smile more and more hopeless.

Well, my London season too was drawing to its close, and I confess I had enjoyed it very much. What with my morning gallops and afternoon saunters (for John had returned to his allegiance, and came to take me out regularly, although he always joined Miss Molasses' party when he got into the Park); what with Aunt Deborah's tiresome cold, which obliged me to go about a good deal by myself, and the agreeable society of Frank Lovell, who never missed an opportunity of being with us, I had been very happy, and I was quite sorry to think it was all so soon to come to an end. John was already talking of a fishing excursion to Norway, and actually proposed that I should accompany him; an arrangement which Aunt Deborah declared "was totally impracticable," and which I confess I do not myself think would have been a very good plan. I had made several pleasant acquaintances, amongst whom I may number Lady Scapegrace—that much-maligned dame having taken a great fancy to me ever after the affair of the bull, and proving, when I came to know her better, a very different person from what the world gave her credit for being. With all her faults—the chief of which were an uncontrollable temper and much too strong feelings for the nineteenth century—she had a warm, affectionate heart, and was altogether an energetic, straightforward woman, very much in earnest, whether for good or evil. But there was one thing that vexed me considerably amongst all my regrets for past pleasures and castles in the air for the future, and this was the conduct of Captain Lovell. What did he mean? I couldn't make him out at all. One day calling on my aunt at eleven in the morning, and staying to luncheon, and making himself so agreeable to her, and bringing bouquets of the loveliest flowers (which I know came from Harding's or else direct from Covent Garden) to me; and then going away as if he had fifty more things to say, and lingering over his farewell as if he was on the eve of departure for China instead of Mayfair, and joining me again in the Park, and asking me if I was going to the Opera, and finding out all my engagements and intentions, as if he couldn't possibly live five minutes out of my sight; and then, perhaps, never coming near us for days together, till even my aunt "wondered what had become of that pleasant Captain Lovell;" and when he met me in the Park, taking off his hat with a civil bow, as if he had only been introduced the night before. All this I couldn't make out, and I didn't half like, as I told Lady Scapegrace one hot morning, sitting with her in her boudoir. I was a good deal at Lady Scapegrace's now, and the more so because that was the place of all others at which I was least likely to meet Sir Guy. "Men are so uncertain, my dear," said her ladyship, sitting in a morning deshabille, with her long black hair combed straight out over her shoulders and reaching nearly to her knees. "If you ask me candidly whether he means anything, I tell you I think Frank Lovell a shocking flirt." "Flirt!" I replied, half crying with vexation. "It's time enough for him to flirt with me when I give him any encouragement. But I don't, Lady Scapegrace, and I never will. I hope I'm too proud for that. Only when a man is always in one's pocket wherever one goes; when he sends one bouquets, and rides out in the rain to get one's bracelet mended, and watches one from a corner of the room if one happens to be dancing with anybody else, and looks pleased when one is dull and cross when one laughs—why, he either does prefer, or ought to prefer, one's society to that of Miss Molasses and Mrs. Lumley, and that is why I tell you I can't quite make out Captain Lovell."

"Don't talk of that odious woman," exclaimed Lady Scapegrace, between whom and Mrs. Lumley there was a polite feud of some years' standing. "She is ready and willing to jump down Frank Lovell's throat, or any one else's for the matter of that, so bold as she is, and so utterly regardless—such stories, my dear. But take my advice, Kate: play that cheerful cousin of yours against Master Frank. I never knew it fail yet if you only go the right way to work. Men are not only very vain, but very jealous. Don't let him think you are going to marry your cousin, or he may consider it a capital arrangement and a sort of matter-of-course affair, which is all in his favour. Men like Frank always prefer other people's property, and I have no doubt he would be over head and ears in love with you if you were not single. So don't be going to marry Mr. Jones, but just appeal to him about every earthly thing you do or say, look after him when he leaves the room, as if you couldn't bear him out of your sight. Get Frank to abuse him if you can, and then fight his battles fiercely; and directly the latter thinks there is a rival in the field he will be down on his knees, you mark my words, in two days' time at the furthest. I think I ought to know what men are, my dear" (and to do Lady Scapegrace justice, she had studied that variety of the creation to some purpose, or she was much maligned). "I know that they can't, any of them, see three yards before their noses, and that you can turn and twist them which way you will if you only go upon this principle—that they are full of vanity and self-conceit, and totally deficient in brains."

"But I'm sure Captain Lovell's a clever man," said I, not disposed to come to quite such sweeping conclusions as those of my monitress; "and—and—I don't mean to say that I care about him, Lady Scapegrace, but still it mightn't answer with him, and—and—I shouldn't like to lose him altogether."

"Pooh! Lose him! Fiddlestick!" rejoined her ladyship. "You'll see. He is to join our party at Greenwich this afternoon. By the way, when Sir Guy heard you were coming, he proposed to drive us all down on that horrid coach. But I told him we should be taken for the people that usually occupy it, and nothing should induce me to go; so that plan was given up. But you and I will go down in the barouche, and I'll call for you, and we'll take Mr. Jones with us. And mind you're very civil to him, and only notice the other in a quiet, good-humoured way—for he mustn't think you do it out of pique—and before the whitebait is on the table you'll see he'll be a different man. But now you must go—there's a dear. I'll call for you at five. It's too bad to turn you out; but I'm never at home to any one between three and half-past four. Good-bye, dear, good-bye."

And Lady Scapegrace kissed me most affectionately, and promised to call for me punctually at five, till which hour I cannot make out why her time was always engaged.

As I tripped downstairs, hoping to make my escape without being attended by the whole establishment to open the house-door, whom should I come across but odious Sir Guy, in a sort of scarlet fancy dress, which I concluded was his morning "demi-toilette." He actually had the effrontery to propose that I should accompany him to the stable, and that he should then "show me his boudoir—hey? You look like a rose this morning, Miss Coventry. Should like to transplant you. What?" And whilst he stood dodging and grinning on the stairs, I managed to slip by him and get safe into the street. I wonder when men think they are beginning to grow old! I am sure Sir Guy fancies he is still in the flower of his youth, and so charming that nobody can resist him.

What a pleasant day we had! Only we four—Lady Scapegrace, Cousin John, Captain Lovell, and I. We went down in Lady Scapegrace's barouche, and walked in Greenwich Park, and adjourned to a nice room with a bay window, and such a lookout over the river, blushing rose colour in the evening sun. And the whitebait was so good, and the champagne-cup so nice; and we were all in such spirits, and Frank was so kind and attentive and agreeable I couldn't find it in my heart to be cross to him. So it ended in our making up any little imaginary differences we may have had and becoming better friends than ever. As we sat in the balcony over the river—the two gentlemen smoking their after-dinner cigars, and we ladies sipping our coffee—I thought I had never enjoyed an evening so much; and even John, who was generally dreadfully afraid of Lady Scapegrace, became quite lively and gallant (for him), and they laughed and talked and joked about all sorts of things; while Frank leant over my shoulder and conversed more gravely than was his habit; and I listened, and thought him pleasanter even than usual. By the way, that lilac bonnet never quite lost the odour of tobacco afterwards.

"How quick the time passes!" said Frank, with almost a sigh. "Can't we do anything to put off horrid London and home and bed? Let's all go to Vauxhall."

"What do you say, Mr. Jones?" inquired Lady Scapegrace, who was always ready for a lark; "you're our chaperon, you know. Do you think you can be responsible?"

"Oh yes, John!" I exclaimed. "You promised to take me once before the end of the season. We shall never have such another chance."

"This is a capital night to go," remarked Frank, "because there is a new riding-woman; and you can take a lesson, Miss Coventry, in case you should wish to perform in public." Cousin John could not possibly hold out against all three; and although I think in his heart he did not entirely approve, the carriage was ordered, the bill paid, and we were rolling along through the cool summer night en route for Vauxhall.

"My dear," said Lady Scapegrace to me as we sidled through the entrance of that place of amusement, and the gentlemen remained behind to pay, "you are doing anything but what I told you; scarcely three words have you spoken to your cousin, who, by the way, is very pleasant. I think I shall take him up and improve him on my own account; but as for you, my dear, I can see plainly it's all over with you."

"And you really leave town to-morrow?" said Frank as we walked arm in arm up one of those shaded alleys which lead to the "Hermit," or the "Gipsy," or some other excuse for a tête-à-tête not too much under the lamps. By the way, why is it that a party never can keep together at Vauxhall? Lady Scapegrace and I had particularly stipulated that we were not to separate under any circumstances. "Whatever happens, do let us keep together," we mutually implored at least ten times during the first five minutes, and yet no sooner did we pair off arm in arm than the distance began gradually to increase, till we found ourselves in "couples," totally independent of each other's proceedings. In this manner we saw the horsemanship, and the acrobats, and the man with the globe, and all the other eccentricities of the circus. I really think I could have ridden quite as nicely as Madame Rose d'Amour had I been mounted on an equally well-broken animal with the one which curvetted and caracoled under that much-rouged and widely-smiling dame. They do look pretty too at a little distance those histrionic horsewomen, with their trappings and their spangles and their costume of Francis I. I often wonder whether people really rode out hawking, got up so entirely regardless of expense, in the days of the Field of the Cloth of Gold. From the horsemanship we went to see the people dance, which they did with a degree of vigour and hilarity such as might be introduced in a modified form with great advantage into good society; and here we came across Cousin John and Lady Scapegrace just in time to witness a short and abrupt interview between the latter and Sir Guy. Yes, there was Sir Guy, with the flower in his mouth and all, dancing, actually dancing—and he can't be much less than sixty—with a little smart lady, wearing the most brilliant colour and the blackest eyelashes and the reddest lips and the lightest eyes I ever saw upon a human being. The little lady, whose hair, moreover, was dressed à l'Impératrice, thereby imparting additional boldness to a countenance not remarkable for modesty, frisked and whisked round Sir Guy with a vivacity that must have been of Parisian growth; whilst the Baronet laboured ponderously along with true British determination, like a man who habitually wears very thick shoes and is used to take his own time. In the course of his evolutions he brought his foot down heavily on the skirt of a lady's dress, and turning round to apologize found himself face to face with his wife! To do him justice he was not the least taken aback—anger rather than confusion seemed to be his dominant feeling; and although he tried to smother a rising oath in a laugh, or rather a grin, it was such a muscular contraction of the mouth as does not give me the idea of a smile.

"Come out for a lark too, my lady, hey?" said the Baronet, studiously interposing his large person between "my lady" and his partner. "Reminds one of Paris; dance with anybody, whether one knows them or not." And Sir Guy tried to look as if he was telling the truth with indifferent success. But Lady Scapegrace's face was a perfect study; I never saw a countenance so expressive of scorn—intense scorn—and yet, as it seemed to me, not so much of him as of herself.

"I am glad you amuse yourself, Sir Guy," she said very quietly; but her lip was as white as ashes while she spoke. "I should think this place must suit you exactly. Mr. Jones, we shall be late for the fireworks." And she swept on, taking no further notice of the discomfited Sir Guy, whilst Frank and I followed in her wake, feeling rather awkward even at witnessing this ill-timed rencontre.

"And so you leave town to-morrow, Miss Coventry?" said Frank; and I thought his voice shook a little whilst he spoke. "I shall ride down Lowndes Street every day, and think how deserted it looks. No more walks in the morning for me, no more pleasant rides in the afternoons; I shall send my hacks home and sulk by myself, for I shall be miserable when my friends are gone. Do you know, Miss Coventry"—I listened, all attention; how could I tell what he might not be going to say?—"do you know that I have never had courage to ask you something till to-night?" (Goodness! I thought, now it's coming, and my heart beat as it does when I'm going out hunting.) "I want you to give me" (a lock of my hair, thinks I. Well, I don't know; perhaps I may)—"I want you to give me—Miss Horsingham's receipt for making barley-water; but I know it's a long business to write out, and I'm afraid of being troublesome." So that was all, was it? I felt half inclined to laugh, and more than half inclined to cry; but turning round I was somewhat consoled to find Lady Scapegrace and her cavalier close behind us; and I do confess I rather attributed Frank's extremely moderate request to their immediate vicinity; there was no opportunity, however, of renewing the subject. John had said all he had to say to his companion. John soon gets high and dry with these smart ladies, and they seem mutually tired of each other; so we got the carriage and took our departure, Frank pressing my hand as he bade me farewell, and whispering, "Au revoir, Miss Coventry; something tells me it won't be very long before we meet again." What could he mean?

CHAPTER VIII.

It was a melancholy work to glide out of London by the last train, and to think that one's gaieties were over for that summer, and that there was nothing to look forward to till the hunting season but Dangerfield and Lady Horsingham, and the wearisome monotony of a regular country-house life. Aunt Deborah and I settled ourselves comfortably in a roomy first-class carriage, she with her knitting and I with the last Punch—in which, by the way, was the portrait of a dandy, the very image of Frank Lovell—and prepared for our journey, as ladies generally do, by arranging multifarious outworks of smelling-bottles, shawls, reticules, parasols, etc., without which paraphernalia no well-bred woman can possibly travel a hundred yards. I confess I dreaded the trip. I was too well aware by experience that a railway always makes Aunt Deborah rather cross and me very sleepy; so I knew what was coming, and I was not disappointed. Before we had fairly left the outskirts of London I saw by the way in which my aunt laid down her knitting and the ominous cough or two in which she indulged that I was in for a lecture; and sure enough, just as we emerged on the open fields and began to smell the fresh country air, it began.

"Kate," said my aunt, "as we are going to a very regular and well-conducted establishment, I think it is a good opportunity for me to say a few words to you as regards your past conduct."

"Good gracious, aunt!" I replied, quite frightened, "what have I done?"

"My dear," said my aunt, "I have seen a great deal going on lately that I have taken no notice of; but it don't follow that I should approve of it any more than John."

"And what has John got to do with it, I should like to know?" I rejoined, firing up on the instant, for such a chance of carrying the war into the enemy's country was not to be neglected. "John, indeed! I'm sure, aunt, John encourages me in all my unfeminine pursuits, as you call them; and if he has been telling tales or setting you against me, I'll soon let him know what I think of such conduct. I'll soon tell him that I'm not going to be accountable to him; indeed, that I'm not going to——"

"Hush, my dear," said Aunt Deborah; "there is no occasion for all this animosity against John. After all, it is very natural, poor fellow, that he should feel aggrieved and annoyed. There's that Captain Lovell: I don't mean to say that he's not an agreeable, well-informed young man, but there he is coming to see you at all hours, riding with you in the Park, whispering to you at the Opera, bringing you new music and old china and fresh flowers, and conducting himself altogether as if he was either your accepted suitor or mine—and I don't think the latter very likely, Kate—whereas, you know, John——" My aunt stopped short. The ringing of the bell and loud exclamations of "Trotter's Heath! Trotter's Heath! All out for Sheepshanks, Fleecyfold, and Market Muddlebury!" announced that we had arrived at the Muddlebury Junction; and the opportune entrance into the carriage of a stranger, who seemed extremely anxious concerning the safety of a brace of pointers that accompanied him, effectually prevented my aunt from proceeding with her discourse; while the dead silence which followed the renewed puffing of the engine, and the vibration of the train, gave me an opportunity of studying attentively the person and features of our new fellow-traveller.

I don't think I ever saw a man so freckled in my life. Even the backs of his hands (for he wore no gloves—I should think didn't even know his number!) were studded with spots till you could have hardly put a pin's point on a place free from this horrid disfigurement. His face, too, was like a plum-pudding on which the fruit had been showered with a most liberal hand; but the features were good, and had it not been for his red hair, a little grizzled, and his stiff red whiskers, the bright-blue eyes and white teeth would almost have entitled him to be considered "handsome." He had a strong, stiff-built figure, about the middle size, well made for everything but dancing, and large, useful feet encased in the stoutest double-soled shooting shoes. The latter articles of costume proved him at once to be a country gentleman. Every one must have remarked this peculiarity in that enviable class. Their attire, particularly as regards the lower man, is invariably of a nature to defy the utmost inclemency of the weather, and is worn totally irrespective of the season or the pursuit in which the owner may chance to be engaged at the time. But even independent of these tell-tales the stranger's social position was easily enough discerned by the deference with which he was treated "along the line," and the title of "Squire," which greeted him from guards, porters, and book-keepers at every station we passed.

So humane a master of dumb animals, or one so fidgety as to their welfare, I never came across; and this, I confess, prepossessed me in his favour. Every time the train stopped out jumped our fellow-traveller, and off he went to a certain van containing his treasures, from which he emerged with a very red face and a constantly-repeated apology for disturbing me on his return to his seat. Despite of his thick shoes and his freckles, I could see the man was a gentleman; but, dear me, what a contrast to the smart gentlemen I had lately been accustomed to meet! Beyond a "Beg your pardon; I fear I'm very much in your way," accompanied by such a vivid blush as can be performed only by a red-haired man, the Squire did not venture on any communication either with me or my aunt; and with the latter's lecture fresh in my mind I did not, as may be supposed, dare to take the initiative by dropping my gloves, or pretending I couldn't pull up the window, or any other little lady-like manoeuvre which lays the foundation of a temporary intimacy, and often furnishes one with an agreeable hour's conversation. I can not see why one should sit "mum" opposite the same person for miles, merely because one has never been introduced.

When we arrived at length at the Dangerfield Station, where Lady Horsingham's emblazoned coach and fat horses were in waiting for us, "the Squire," who was here treated with a deference bordering on idolatry, got out too. He made an involuntary motion with his hand, as though he would have taken his hat off, and wished us "good-morning;" but his shyness got the better of him, and he disappeared from the platform, entangled amongst his dumb favourites, with a blush that was visible even at the back of his head, where the tips of his ears met the rim of his white hat. As we toiled up the sandy lane leading from Dangerfield Station to Dangerfield Park, we were overtaken by a smart, high dogcart, drawn by a clever, raking-looking bay mare, and driven by the owner of the freckles, the pointers, and the white hat.

"Bachelor, my dear," said Aunt Deborah as he whisked by, "and not at all a bad-looking man either."

"How do you know he's a bachelor, aunt?" I naturally inquired.

"Common-sense, my dear," replied Aunt Deborah sententiously. "I judge of people by their belongings. No lady could get into that dogcart without dirtying her dress against the wheel; and if he had a wife, that handsome bay horse would go with another in her carriage instead of his. Besides, he wouldn't be so fond of his pointers if he had anything else to care for; and above all, Kate," added my aunt conclusively, "his silk handkerchief wasn't hemmed, and he'd a button wanting in the front of his shirt."

All my life I have had a sinking at my heart when I have heard the ring at that great Dangerfield front door bell. It was better in my poor uncle's time, for he would have made any place lively; but since his death the Park has relapsed into its natural solemnity, and I am quite sure that if ever I do go into a convent my sensations will be exactly like those which I have always experienced when visiting Aunt Horsingham. The moat alone is enough to give one the "blues;" but in addition to that, the thick horse-chestnuts grow up to the very windows, and dark Scotch firs shed a gloom all over the Park. Dangerfield is one of those places that seem always to be in the shade. How the strawberries ever ripen, or the flowers ever bloom, or the birds ever sing there is to me a mystery. Outside there are dark walls and yew hedges and cypresses, and here and there a copper beech, with lawns that are never mown and copses that are never thinned, to say nothing of that stagnant moat, with its sombre and prolific vegetation; whilst within, black oak wainscoting, and heavy tapestry, and winding staircases, and small, deep-set windows, and oddly-shaped rooms, with steps at the door like going down into a bath, and doors considerably up and down hill, and queer recesses that frighten one out of one's wits to go into, form altogether a domicile that would tame the wildest Merry-Andrew in a fortnight into as staid and sober and stupid a personage as the veriest Lady Superior could desire. Aunt Horsingham received us as usual with a freezing smile.

"How do you do, Kate?" said she, putting two of her cold bony fingers into my hand. "I'm afraid you will find it rather dull here after London; but it is wholesome for young people to be occasionally sobered a little."

Aunt Horsingham is tall and thin, with a turn-up nose, rather red at the point, a back that never stoops, and a grim smile that never varies. She dresses in bright colours, affecting strange and startling contrasts, both of hues and material. Her hands are always cold and seldom clean; and she has sundry uncomfortable notions about damping the spirits of youth and checking the exuberance of its gaiety which render her a perfect terror and bugbear to the rising generation. When I was a little thing, laughing, prattling, and giggling, as children will, an admonishing look from my aunt, with a gaunt finger held aloft, and a cold "Kate, don't be silly, my dear," was always sufficient to make me dull and gloomy for the rest of the day.

I should like to know indeed why children are not to be "silly." Are grown-up people always so rational in their amusements or irreproachable in their demeanour? "Let the child alone," poor Uncle Harry used to say; and once I overheard him mutter, "I've more patience with a young fool than an old one." Such training has not had a good effect on Cousin Amelia. She has been so constantly tutored to conceal her emotions and to adopt the carriage and manners of an automaton that the girl is now a complete hypocrite. It is quite impossible to make her out. If you tickled her, I don't believe you could get her to laugh; and if you struck her, I very much doubt whether she would cry. My aunt calls it "self-command;" I call it "imbecility." She shook hands with me in her provokingly patronizing manner—"hoped I had brought my horses with me" (as if I was coming to spend months at Dangerfield without Brilliant!); "supposed I had my side-saddle in the cap-box;" and showed me my room without so much as a single kind word of welcome or a cousinly caress. It was quite a relief to help dear Aunt Deborah to unpack her dressing-case, and kiss her pleasant face, and give her the warm cup of tea without which Aunt Deborah never dreams of dressing for dinner.

Oh, those solemn, heavy, silent, stupid dinners, with the massive plate and the dark oak wainscoting, and the servants gliding about like ghosts at a festival in Acheron! What a relief it would have been even to have had a clownish footman spill soup over one's dress, or ice-cream down one's back, or anything to break the monotony of the entertainment! But, no; there we sat, Aunt Horsingham remarking that the "weather was dull" and the "crops looking very unpromising;" Aunt Deborah with her eyes fixed on a portrait of the late Mr. David Jones as a boy, opposite which she invariably took her place, and on which, though representing an insignificant urchin in a high frill and blue jacket, she gazed intently during the whole repast; Cousin Amelia looking at herself in the silver dish-covers, and when those were removed relapsing into a state of irritable torpor; and as for poor me, all I could do was to think over the pleasures of the past season, and dwell rather more than I should otherwise have done on the image of Frank Lovell, and the very agreeable acquisition he would have been to such a party. And then the evenings were, if possible, worse than the dinners—work, work, work—mum, mum, mum—till tea. And after tea Aunt Horsingham would read to us, in her dry harsh voice, long passages from the Spectator, very excellent articles from the Rambler, highly interesting in their day no doubt, but which lose some of their point after an interval of nearly a century; or, worse than all, Pope's "Homer" or Cowper's "Task," running the lines into each other, so as to avoid what she called "the sing-song of the rhymes," till the poet's effusions sounded like the most extraordinary prose, cut into lengths, as we ladies should say, for no earthly purpose but to make nonsense of the whole thing. Her ladyship never went to bed till eleven; so there, having dined at half-past six to a minute, we were forced to sit three mortal hours and a half, swallowing yawns and repressing that inexplicable disorder termed the "fidgets" till the welcome bed-candles arrived. No wonder men drink and smoke and commit all sort of enormities to fill up those dreadful hours after dinner. I think if ever I take to tobacco it will be at Dangerfield.

Then of course the Hall was haunted; and of course my passage was the one which the ghost particularly affected. It was a sad story that of "the Dangerfield ghost." I have got it all out of Aunt Deborah at different times; and though I don't exactly believe in the spectre, I can't help sometimes crying over the incidents. The fact is, the Horsinghams were quite as proud of their ghost as they were of their hand; and although not a very creditable tale to any of the family, Aunt Deborah would never forgive me if I were not to relate the tragedy which conferred on Dangerfield the honour of being a haunted house.

In the reign of George II, the head of the house, Sir Hugh Horsingham, married a young wife, and brought her home to Dangerfield with the usual demonstrations and rejoicings peculiar to such an event. Sir Hugh was a dark, morose man, considerably older than his bride; stern and forbidding in his manners, but possessing deep feelings under a reserved exterior, and a courage and determination not to be daunted or subdued. Such a man was capable of great things for good or for evil; and such was the very nature on which a woman's influence might have produced the most beneficial results. But, unfortunately, young Lady Horsingham had but one feeling for her lord, and that was intense terror of his anger. She never sought to win his confidence; she never entered into his political schemes, his deeper studies, or even his country amusements and pursuits. All she thought of was how to avoid offending Sir Hugh; and ere long this one idea grew to such a pitch that she quite trembled in his presence, could scarcely answer distinctly when he spoke to her, and seemed hardly to draw breath in freedom save when out of his sight. Such a state of things could have but one ending—distrust and suspicion on one side, unqualified aversion on the other. A marriage, never of inclination, as indeed in those days amongst great families few marriages were, became an insupportable slavery ere the first year of wedded life had elapsed; and by the time an heir was born to the house of Horsingham, probably there was no unhappier couple within fifty miles of Dangerfield than dark Sir Hugh and his pretty, fair-haired, gentle wife. No; she ought never to have married him at all. It was but the night before her wedding that she walked in the garden of her father's old manor-house with a bright, open-hearted, handsome youth, whose brow wore that expression of acute agony which it is so pitiable to witness on a young countenance—that look almost of physical pain, which betokens how the iron has indeed "entered the sufferer's soul." "Ah, you may plead, 'Cousin Edward;' but we women are of a strange mixture, and the weakest of us may possess obstinacy such as no earthly consideration can overcome." "Lucy! Lucy! for the last time, think of it; for the love of Heaven, do not drive me mad; think of it once more; it is the last, last chance!" The speaker was white as a sheet, and his hollow voice came in hoarse, inarticulate whispers as he looked almost fiercely into that dear face to read his doom. Too well he knew the set, fixed expression of her delicate profile. She did not dare turn towards him; she could not have looked him in the face and persevered; but she kept her eyes fastened on the horizon, as though she saw her future in the fading sunset; and whilst her heart seemed turning to very stone she kept her lips firmly closed; she repressed the tears that would have choked her, and so for that time she conquered.

Lucy had a great idea of duty; hers was no high-principled love of duty from the noblest motives, but a morbid dread of self-reproach. She had not character enough to do anything out of her own notions of the beaten track. She had promised her father she would marry Sir Hugh Horsingham—not that he had the slightest right to exact such a promise—and she felt bound to fulfil it. She never remembered the injury she was doing "Cousin Edward," the right which such devotion as his ought to have given him. She knew she loved him better than any one in the world; she knew she was about to commit an act of the greatest injustice towards Sir Hugh; but she had "promised papa," and though she would have given worlds to avoid fulfilling her compact, she had not strength of mind to break the chain and be free.

Cousin Edward! Cousin Edward! you should have carried her off then and there; she would have been truly grateful for the rest of her life, but she would have died sooner than open her lips. He was hurt—reckless—almost savage. He thought her sullen. "Once more, Lucy," he said, and his eye glared fiercely in the waning light—"once more, will you give me one word, or never set eyes on me again?" Her lip never moved. "I give you till we pass that tree"—he looked dangerous now—"and then"—he swore a great oath—"I leave you for ever!" Lucy thought the tree looked strange and ghastly in the rising moon, she even remarked a knot upon its smooth white stem; but she held out whilst one might have counted ten; and when she turned round, poor girl, Cousin Edward was gone!

CHAPTER IX.

So the bells rung merrily at Dangerfield, and the rustics huzzaed for their landlord and the comely village maidens envied the bride; and Lucy was Lady Horsingham now, with new duties and a high position, and a large, fine, gloomy house, and jewels in her hair, and an aching heart in her bosom. Nevertheless, she determined to do her duty as a wife; and every hour of the day she resolved not to think of Cousin Edward.

Years elapsed, and pretty Lucy became a gentle, handsome woman—kindly, courteous, and beloved by all, timid, and shrinking only with Sir Hugh. Her husband, wearied and discontented, mixed himself fiercely in all the intrigues of the day—became a staunch partisan of the House of Stuart, and sought for excitement abroad in proportion as he missed congeniality of feeling at home. It was an unhappy household. Their one child was the mother's sole consolation; she scarcely ever let it out of her presence. They were a pretty sight, that loving couple, as they basked in the sun of a fine summer's morning on the terrace in front of the manor-house. The boy, with his mother's blue eyes and his own golden curls and the arch, merry smile that he never got from stern Sir Hugh; and the fair, graceful woman, with her low, white brow and her soft brown hair and her quiet gestures and gentle sorrowing face—that face that haunts poor Cousin Edward still.

"Mamma!" says the urchin, pouting his rosy lips, "why don't you play with me?—what are you thinking of?" and a shade passes over that kind face, and she blushes, though there is no one with her but the child, and catches him up and smothers him in kisses, and says "You, my darling;" but, nevertheless, I do not think at that moment she was thinking either of her boy or Sir Hugh.

And where was Cousin Edward all the time? Why, at that particular instant, sword-point to sword-point with Colonel Bludyer of the Dragoons, slightly wounded in two places—cool and wary, and seeming to enjoy, with a sort of fierce pleasure, such a safety-valve for excitement as a duel with one of the best fencers in Europe.

Cousin Edward was an altered man since he stood with the future Lady Horsingham in the moonlight. "An evil counsellor is despair;" and he had hugged that grim adviser to his heart. He had grown handsomer, indeed, than ever; but the wild eye, the haggard brow, and the deep lines about his mouth spoke of days spent in fierce excitement—nights passed in reckless dissipation. He had never forgotten Lucy through it all, but even her image only goaded him to fresh extravagances—anything to deaden the sting of remembrance—anything to efface the maddening past. So Cousin Edward too became a Jacobite; and was there a daring scheme to be executed, a foolhardy exploit to be performed—life and limb to be risked without a question—who so ready and so reckless as "handsome Ned Meredith"?

In the course of their secret meetings and cabals he became slightly acquainted with Sir Hugh Horsingham; and, with the inexplicable infatuation peculiar to a man in love, he look a pleasure in being near one so closely connected with Lucy, although that one was the very person who had deprived him of all he valued on earth. So it fell out that Sir Hugh Horsingham and Ned Meredith were supping at the Rose and Thistle in close alliance, the table adjoining them being occupied by those staunch Hanoverians, Colonel Bludyer and Mr. Thornton.

"Here's 'The Blackbird,'"* said Cousin Edward, tossing off a huge goblet of Bordeaux, and looking round the room with an air of defiance as he proposed so well-known a toast. Sir Hugh was a man of a certain grim humour, and as he drained his goblet and nodded to his companion, he added, "May the rats dance to his whistle, and the devil—that's you, Ned—take the hindmost!"

* One of the many passwords by which the adherents of the Chevalier distinguished that ill-fated Prince.

Colonel Bludyer rose from his chair, placed his cocked hat on his head, and turned the buckle of his sword-belt in front. "The King!" he shouted, raising his hat with one hand and filling a bumper with the other. "The King!" he repeated, scowling fiercely at his two neighbours.

"Over the water!" roared Ned Meredith; and the Colonel, turning rapidly round and mistaking his man, flung his cocked hat right in Sir Hugh Horsingham's face.

Swords were out in a second—thrust, parry, and return passed like lightning, but the bystanders separated the combatants; and Meredith, determining for the sake of Lucy that Sir Hugh should encounter no unnecessary danger, took the whole quarrel on himself, and arranged a meeting for the following morning with the redoubtable Colonel Bludyer. Thus it was that while Lucy and her boy were basking in the summer sunshine, Cousin Edward was exhausting all his knowledge of swordsmanship in vain endeavours to get within that iron Colonel's guard. The duel was fought on the ground now occupied by Leicester Square, Sir Hugh and Mr. Thornton officiating as seconds, though, the latter being disabled from the effects of a recent encounter, they did not, as was usual in those days, fight to the death, merely "pour se désennuyer." Stripped to their shirts—in breeches and silk stockings, with no shoes—the antagonists lunged and glared and panted, and twice paused for breath by mutual consent, with no further damage than two slight wounds in Ned's sword-arm.

"Very pretty practice," said Mr. Thornton, coolly taking a pinch of snuff, and offering his box to Sir Hugh. "I'm in despair at not being able to oblige you this fine morning."

"Some other time," replied Sir Hugh with a grim smile; "d——ation," he added, "Ned's down!"

Sure enough Cousin Edward was on the grass, striving in vain to raise himself, and gasping out that he "wasn't the least hurt." He had got it just between the ribs, and was trying to stanch the blood with a delicate laced handkerchief, in a corner of which, had he examined it closely, Sir Hugh would have found embroidered the well-known name of "Lucy." Poor Cousin Edward! it was all he had belonging to his lost love, and he would have been unwilling to die without that fragment of lace in his hand.

"A very promising fencer," remarked Colonel Bludyer, as he wiped his rapier on the grass. "If he ever gets over it, he won't forget that "plongeant" thrust in tierce. I never knew it fail, Thornton—never, with a man under thirty." So the Colonel put his coat on, and drove off to breakfast; while Sir Hugh took charge of Ned Meredith, and as soon as he was recovered—for his wound was not mortal—carried him down with him to get thoroughly well at Dangerfield Hall.

It is an old, old story. Love, outraged and set at defiance, bides his time, and takes his revenge. Dangerfield looked like a different place now, so thought Lucy; and her spirits rose, and the colour came back to her cheek, and she even summoned courage to speak without hesitating to Sir Hugh. When Cousin Edward was strong enough to limp about the house, it seemed that glimpses of sunshine brightened those dark oak rooms; and ere he was able to take the air, once more leaning on Lucy's arm, alas! alas! he had become even dearer to the impassioned, thoughtful woman than he ever was to the timid, vacillating girl. There was an addition now to the party on the terrace in the bright autumn mornings, but the little boy needed no longer to ask mamma "what she was thinking of;" and the three would have seemed to a careless observer a happy family party—husband, wife, and child. Oh that it could but have been so!

In the meantime Sir Hugh was again as usual busied with his state intrigues and party politics, and absented himself for weeks together from the Hall; riding post to London night and day, returning at all sorts of unexpected hours, leaving again at a moment's notice, and otherwise comporting himself in his usual mysterious reserved manner. Yet those who knew him best opined there was something wrong about Sir Hugh. He was restless and preoccupied; his temper less easily excited about trifles than was his wont, but perfectly ungovernable when once he gave way to it. No man dared to question him. He had not a friend in the world who would have ventured to offer him a word of advice or consolation; but it was evident to his servants and his intimates that Sir Hugh was ill at ease. Who can tell the struggles that rent that strong, proud heart? Who could see beneath that cold surface, and read the intense feelings of love, hatred, jealousy, or revenge that smouldered below, stifled and kept down by the iron will, the stubborn, indomitable pride? There is a deep meaning in the legend of that Spartan boy who suffered the stolen fox to gnaw his very vitals, the while he covered him with his tunic and preserved on his brave face a smile of unconcern. Most of us have a stolen fox somewhere; but the weak nature writhes and moans, and is delivered from its torment, while the bold, unflinching spirit preserves a gallant bearing before the world, and scorns to be relieved from the fangs that are draining its very life away.

Whatever Sir Hugh saw or suspected, he said not a word to Lucy, nor was it until surmise had become certainty that he forbade "Cousin Edward" the house. To him he would not condescend to explain his motives; he simply wrote to him to say that on his return he should expect to find that his guest had departed, and that he had sufficient reasons for requesting his visits might not be repeated. With his wife he was, if possible, more austere and morose than ever; so once more the Hall resumed its old aspect of cheerlessness and desolation, and its mistress went moping about, more than ever miserable and broken-hearted. Such a state of things could not long go on; the visits forbidden openly took place by stealth; and the climax rapidly approached which was to result in the celebrated Dangerfield tragedy.

At this period there was set on foot another of those determined plots which during the first two reigns of the house of Hanover so constantly harassed that dynasty. Sir Hugh of course was a prime mover of the conspiracy, and was much in London and elsewhere gathering intelligence, raising funds, and making converts to his opinions. Ned Meredith, having, it is to be presumed, all his energies occupied in his own private intrigues, had somewhat withdrawn of late from the Jacobite party; and Sir Hugh heard, with his grim, unmoved smile, many a jest and innuendo levelled at the absentee.

One stormy winter's evening the baronet, well armed, cloaked, and booted, left his own house for the metropolis, accompanied by one trusty servant. He was bearing papers of importance, and was hurrying on to lay them with the greatest dispatch before his fellow-conspirators. As night was drawing on, Sir Hugh's horse shied away from a wild figure, looming like some spectre in the fading light; and ere he had forced the animal back into the path, his bridle was caught by a half-naked lad, whom the rider at once recognized as an emissary he had often before employed to be the bearer of secret intelligence, and who, under an affectation of being half-witted, concealed much shrewdness of observation and unimpeachable fidelity to the cause.

"Whip and spur, Sir Hugh—whip and spur," said the lad, who seemed flustered and confused with drink; "you may burst your best horse betwixt this and London, and all to get there before you're wanted. A dollar to drink, Sir Hugh, like handsome Ned gave me this morning—a dollar to drink, and I'll save you a journey for the sake of the 'Bonny White Rose' and the 'Bird with the Yellow Bill.'"

Sir Hugh scrutinized the lad with a piercing eye, flung him a crown from his purse, and bid him "out with what he had to say, for that he himself was hurried, and must push on to further the good cause." The lad was sobered in an instant.

"Look ye here, Sir Hugh," he said eagerly; "handsome Ned went down the road at a gallop this morning. There's something brewing in London, you may trust me, Sir Hugh, and I tried to stop him to learn his errand; but he tossed me a crown and galloped on. He took the Hill road, Sir Hugh, and you came up the Vale; but he's bound for Dangerfield, I know, and mayhap he's got papers that will save your journey to London. No offence, Sir Hugh," added the lad, for the baronet's face was black as midnight.

"None, my good boy," was the reply in a hoarse, thick voice. "Hold, there's another crown for you—drink it every farthing, you villain! or I never give you a sixpence again;" and Sir Hugh rode on as though bound for London, but stopped a mile farther forward, at a place where two roads met; and entrusting his papers to his servant, bade him hasten on with them, whilst he galloped back through the darkness in the direction of his home.

Home, indeed! Had it ever been home to Sir Hugh? Would it be home to-night? When he got back there, and skulked into his own house like a midnight thief—what would he do?—why was he galloping so fast? Sir Hugh set his teeth tight, and holding his powerful horse hard by the head urged him on faster than before. The lights are all out in the little village of which he is sole master, and his horse's hoofs clattering through the street rouse the sleepy inmates for an instant ere they return to their peaceful rest. Sir Hugh is not sleepy; he feels as if he never should want to sleep again.

How dark it is in the Park under those huge old trees! He fastens his horse to one of the drooping branches, and after removing his pistols from their holsters spreads his cloak over the heaving flanks of the heated animal. Habit is second nature, and he does not forget the good horse. He strides through the shrubberies and across Lucy's garden, crushing with his heavy boot-heel the last flower that had lingered on into the winter. There is a light streaming from one of the windows in the gallery. Ha!—he may be right—he may not have returned in vain. For an instant a feeling of sickness comes over him, and he learns for the first time that he had cherished a hope he might be deceived.

He can let himself in by the garden-gate with his own pass-key. Ere he is aware, he is tramping up the corridor in his heavy horseman's boots—his hand is on the door—there is a woman's shriek—and Sir Hugh's tall, dark figure fills the doorway of Lucy's sitting-room, where, alas! she is not alone, for the stern, angry husband is confronted by Ned Meredith!

Lucy cowers down in a corner of the room with her face buried in her hands. Cousin Edward draws himself up to his full height, and looks his antagonist steadily in the face, but with an expression of calm despair that seems to say fate has now done her worst. Sir Hugh is cool, collected, and polite; nay, he can even smile, but he speaks strangely, almost in a whisper, and hisses through his set teeth. He has double-locked the door behind him, and turns to Cousin Edward with a grave, courteous bow.

"You have done me the honour of an unexpected visit, Mr. Meredith," he says. "I trust Lady Horsingham has entertained you hospitably! Pray do not stir, madam. Mr. Meredith, we are now quits; you saved my life when you encountered Colonel Bludyer; I forbore from taking yours when I had proofs that it was my right. We have now entered on a fresh account, but the game shall be fairly played. Mr. Meredith, you are a man of honour—yes, it shall be fairly played." Ned's lip quivered, but he bowed and stood perfectly still. "Lady Horsingham," continued Sir Hugh, "be good enough to hand me those tables; they contain a dice-box.—Nay, Mr. Meredith," seeing Ned about to assist the helpless, frightened woman; "when present, at least, I expect my wife to obey me." Lucy was forced to rise, and, trembling in every limb, to present the tables to her lord. Sir Hugh placed the dice-box on the table, laid his pistols beside it, and, taking a seat, motioned to Cousin Edward to do the same. "You are a man of honour, Mr. Meredith," he repeated; "we will throw three times, and the highest caster shall blow the other's brains out." Lucy shrieked and rushed to the door; it was fast, and her husband forced her to sit down and watch the ghastly game.

"Good God, Sir Hugh!" exclaimed Cousin Edward, "this is too horrible—for your wife's sake—any reparation I can make, I will; but this is murder, deliberate murder!"

"You are a man of honour, Mr. Meredith," reiterated Sir Hugh. "I ask for no reparation but this—the chances are equal if the stakes are high. You are my guest, or rather, I should say, Lady Horsingham's guest. Begin." Cousin Edward's face turned ghastly pale. He took the box, shook it, hesitated; but the immovable eye was fixed on him, the stern lips repeated once more, "You are a man of honour," and he threw—"Four." It was now Sir Hugh's turn. With a courteous bow he received the box, and threw—"Seven." Again the adversaries cast, the one a six, the other a three; and now they were even in the ghastly match. Once more Cousin Edward shook the box, and the leaping dice turned up—"Eleven." Lucy's white face stood out in the lamplight, as she watched with stony eyes that seemed to have lost the very power of sight.

"For God's sake, forego this frightful determination, Sir Hugh," pleaded Cousin Edward; "take my life in a fair field. I will offer no resistance; but you can hardly expect to outdo my throw, and nothing shall induce me to take advantage of it. Think better of it, Sir Hugh, I entreat you."

"You are a man of honour, Mr. Meredith, and so am I," was the only reply, as Sir Hugh brandished the box aloft, and thundered it down on the table—"Sixes!" "Good casting," he remarked; and at the same instant cocking the pistol nearest to him, discharged it full into his antagonist's bosom. The bullet sped through a delicate lace handkerchief, which he always wore there, straight and true into Cousin Edward's heart. As he fell forward across the table, a dark stream flowed slowly along the carpet, till it dyed the border of Lucy's white dress with a crimson stain. She was on her knees, apparently insensible; but one small hand felt the cold, wet contact, and she looked at it, and saw that it was blood. Once more she uttered a shriek that rang through those vast buildings, and rushed again to the door to find it locked. In sheer despair she made for the window, threw open the casement, and ere Sir Hugh could seize or stop her flung herself headlong into the court below. When the horrified husband looked down into the darkness, a wisp of white garments, a bruised and lifeless body, was all that remained of Lady Horsingham.

That night one half of Dangerfield Hall was consumed by fire. Its mistress was said to have perished in the flames. The good neighbours, the honest country people, pitied poor Sir Hugh, galloping back from London, to find his house in ruins and his wife a corpse. His gay companions missed "Ned Meredith" from his usual haunts; but it was generally supposed he had obtained a mission to the court of St. Germains, and there was a rumour that he had perished in a duel with a French marquis. A certain half-witted lad, who had followed Sir Hugh back to Dangerfield on that fearful night, might have elucidated the mystery; but he had been kidnapped, and sent to the plantations. After many years he returned to England, and on his deathbed left a written statement, implicating Sir Hugh in the double crime of arson and murder. But long ere this the culprit had appeared before a tribunal which admits of no prevarication, and the pretty boy with the golden curls had become lord of Dangerfield Hall. The long corridor had been but partially destroyed. It was repaired and refurnished by successive generations; but guests and servants alike refused to sleep again in that dreary wing after the first trial. Every night, so surely as the clock tolled out the hour of twelve, a rush of feet was heard along the passage—a window looking into the court was thrown open—a piercing scream from a woman's voice rang through the building—and those who were bold enough to look out averred that they beheld a white figure leap wildly into the air and disappear. Some even went so far as to affirm that drops of blood, freshly sprinkled, were found every morning on the pavement of the court. But no one ever doubted the Dangerfield ghost to be the nightly apparition of Lucy, Lady Horsingham. At length, in my grandfather's time, certain boards being lifted to admit of fresh repairs in the accursed corridor, the silver-mounted guard of a rapier, the stock and barrel of a pistol, with a shred of lace, on which the letter "L" was yet visible, were discovered by the workmen. They are in existence still. Whatever other remains accompanied them turned to dust immediately on exposure to the air. That dust was, however, religiously collected and buried in a mausoleum appropriated to the Horsinghams. Since then the ghost has been less troublesome; but most of the family have seen or heard it at least once in their lives. I confess that if ever I lie awake at Dangerfield till the clock strikes twelve I invariably stop my ears and bury my head under the bedclothes for at least a quarter of an hour. By these means I have hitherto avoided any personal acquaintance with the spectre; but nothing on earth would induce me to walk down that corridor at midnight and risk a private interview with the Dangerfield ghost!

CHAPTER X.

As for spending a whole morning in the drawing-room with the ladies it is what I cannot and will not submit to. Working and scandal, scandal and working, from half-past ten till two is more than I can stand, so the very first morning I was at Dangerfield I resolved to break the chain at once, and do as I always meant to do for the future. Accordingly, immediately after breakfast I popped my bonnet on—the lavender one, that had done a good deal of London work, but was still quite good enough for the country—and started off for a walk by myself, confiding my intentions to no one; as I well knew if I did I should have Aunt Deborah's "Kate, pray don't overheat yourself, my dear. Do wrap yourself up, and take care not to catch cold;" and Lady Horsingham's sarcastic smile, and "In my time, Miss Coventry, young ladies were not in the habit of trailing all over the country by themselves; but I expect soon to hear of their farming and fishing and shooting, I shouldn't wonder—not worse than hunting, at any rate. However, I say nothing;" and Cousin Amelia with her lackadaisical sneer, and her avowal that "she was not equal to walking," and her offer to "go as far as the garden with me in the afternoon." So I tripped down the back staircase and away to the stables with a bit of sugar for Brilliant, who had arrived safely by the train in company with White Stockings, and on through the kitchen-garden and the home-farm up to the free, fresh, breezy down.

I do enjoy a walk by myself, and it was the last chance I should have of one; for Cousin John was expected that very day, and when Cousin John and I are anywhere, of course we are inseparable. But I am sure an occasional stroll quite by oneself does one more good than anything. I think of such quantities of things that never occur to me at other times—fairies, brigands, knights, and damsels, and all sorts of wild adventures; and I feel so brave and determined, as if I could face anything in a right cause, and so good, and I make such excellent resolutions, and walk faster and faster, and get more and more romantic, like a goose, as I know I am.

Well, it was a beautiful morning, early in autumn—blue sky, light fleecy clouds, a sharp, clear air from the north, the low country studded with corn-ricks, and alive with reapers and cart-teams and cattle. A green valley below me, rich in fine old timber, and clothed with high, thick hedgerows, concealing the sluggish river that stole softly away, and only gleamed out here and there to light up the distance; whilst above and around me stretched far and wide the vast expanse of down, cutting sharply against the sky, and dwarfing to mere shrubs the clumps of old fir trees that relieved its magnificent monotony. I was deep in a daydream and an imaginary conversation with Frank Lovell—in which I was running over with much mental eloquence what I should say, and what he would say, and what I should reply to that—when a shrill whistle caused me to start and turn suddenly round; whilst at the same instant a great black retriever bounced up against my legs, and two handsome pointers raced by me as if just emancipated from the kennel. The consequence of all this was that I stepped hastily on a loose stone, turned my foot the wrong way under me, and came down with a slightly-sprained ankle, and the black retriever, an animal of exceedingly noisome breath, affectionately licking my face.

"Down, Juno!—I beg your pardon a million times; get down, you bitch! How shall I ever apologize? Confound you, get down," said an agitated voice above me; and looking up I espied the red-haired stranger of the railway, dressed in a most conspicuous shooting-costume, white hat and all, whose dogs had been the means of bringing me thus suddenly to the earth, and on whom I was now dependent for succour and support till I should be able to reach home.

In such an emergency my new friend was not half so confused and shy as I should have expected. He seemed to summon all his energies to consider what was best to be done; and as my foot pained me considerably when I tried to walk (particularly down hill), he made no more ado, but lifted me carefully in his arms, and proceeded incontinently to carry me off in the direction of Dangerfield Hall, where he seemed intuitively to know I was at present residing.

It was, to say the least of it, an unusual situation. A man I had never seen but once before in my life—and here was I lying in his arms (precious weight he must have found me!) and looking up in his face like a child in its nurse's, and the usages of society making it incumbent on us both to attempt a sort of indifferent conversation about the weather and the country and the beauty of the scenery, which the juxtaposition of our respective faces rendered ludicrous in the extreme.

"A tempting day for a walk, Miss—ah—ah" (he didn't know my name—how should he?—and was now beginning to get very red, partly from the return of his constitutional shyness and partly from the severity of his exertions). "I hope your foot does not pain you quite so much; be good enough to lean a little more this way." Poor man, how his arms must have ached! Whilst I replied somewhat in this fashion, "Thank you, I'm better; I shall soon be able to walk, I think; this is indeed a lovely country. Don't you find me very heavy?" "I think I could carry you a good many miles," he said quietly; and then seemed so shocked at such an avowal that he hardly opened his lips again, and put me down the very first time I asked him, and offered me his arm with an accession of confusion that made me feel quite awkward myself. Truth to tell, my ankle was not sprained, only twisted; and when the immediate pain wore off I was pretty sound again, and managed, with the assistance of my new acquaintance's arm, to make a very good walk of it. So we plodded on quite sociably towards the Hall, and my friend took leave of me at the farm with a polite bow and a sort of hesitating manner that most shy men possess, and which would lead one to infer they have always got something more to say that never is said. I knew I should be well scolded if I avowed my accident to any of the family; besides, I did not quite fancy facing all the inquiries as to how I got home, and Cousin Amelia's sneers about errant damsels and wandering knights; so I stole quietly up to my room, bathed my foot in eau-de-Cologne, and remained perdue till dinner-time, in despite of repeated messages from my aunts and the arrival of Cousin John.

People may talk about country pleasures and country duties and all the charms of country life; but it appears to me that a good many things are done under the titles of pleasure and duty which belong in reality to neither; and that those who live entirely in the country inflict on themselves a great variety of unnecessary disagreeables, as they lose a great many of its chief delights. Of all receipts for weariness commend me to a dinner-party of country neighbours by daylight—people who know each other just well enough to have opposite interests and secret jealousies—who arrive ill at ease in their smart dresses, to sit through a protracted meal with hot servants and forced conversation, till one young lady on her promotion being victimized at the pianoforte enables them to yawn unobserved; and welcome ten o'clock brings round the carriage and tipsy coachman, in order that they may enter on their long, dark, dreary drive home through lanes and by-ways, which is only endurable from the consideration that the annual ordeal has been accomplished, and that they need not do it again till this time next year.

There was a dinner-party at Dangerfield regularly once a month, and this was the day. Aunt Horsingham was great on these occasions, astonishing the neighbours as much with her London dresses as did Cousin Amelia with her London manners. We all assembled a few minutes earlier than usual in the drawing-room, so as to be ready to receive our guests, and great was the infliction on poor Aunt Deborah and my humble self. How they trooped in, one after another! Sir Brian and Lady Banneret and Master Banneret and two Misses Banneret; these were the great cards of the party; so Lady Horsingham kissed Lady Banneret and the young ladies, and opined Master Banneret was grown, much to the indignation of that young gentleman, who, being an Oxonian, of course considered himself a man. Sir Brian was a good-humoured jolly old boy, with a loud laugh, and stood with his coat-tails lifted and his back to the empty fireplace in perfect ease and contentment. Not so his lady; first she scrutinized everything Lady Horsingham had got on, then she took a review of the furniture, and specially marked one faded place in the carpet. Lastly, she turned a curious and disappointed glance on myself. I accounted for the latter mark of displeasure by the becoming shade of my gown; I knew it was a pretty one, and would meet with feminine censure accordingly. The Bannerets were soon followed by Mr. and Mrs. Plumridge, a newly-married couple, who were fêted accordingly. Mr. Plumridge was a light-haired, unmeaning-looking individual, partially bald, with a blue coat and white satin neckcloth; his bride a lively, sarcastic, black-eyed little woman, who must have married him for her own convenience—they said afterwards she was once a governess; but at all events she held her own handsomely when alone with the ladies after dinner, and partly from good-humour, partly from an exceedingly off-hand natural manner, forced even Lady Banneret to be civil to her. Then came the Marmadukes and the Marygolds, and old Miss Finch in a sedan-chair from the adjoining village, and a goodish-looking man whose name I never made out, and Mr. Sprigges the curate; and lastly, in a white heat and a state of utter confusion, my shy acquaintance of the railway and the pointers, who was ushered in by Lady Horsingham's pompous butler under the style and title of Mr. Haycock. He appeared to be a great friend of the family; and, much to his own discomfiture, was immediately laid violent hands on by my aunt and cousin—the former not thinking it necessary to present him to me, till he offered me his arm to take me in to dinner, when her face of reproval, on his stammering out he "had met Miss Coventry before," was worth anything, expressive as it was of shocked propriety and puzzled astonishment.

When you have a secret only known to your two selves, even with a shy man, it is wonderful how it brings him on. Before the soup was off the table Squire Haycock and I had become wonderfully good friends. He had hoped "my ankle did not pain me," and I had trusted "his arms did not ache." He had even gone the length of "vowing" that he would have shot his clumsy retriever for being the cause of the accident, only he let him off because "if it hadn't been for the dog——" and here, seeing Cousin Amelia's eye fixed upon us, my companion stopped dead short, and concealed his blushes in a glass of champagne. Taking courage from that well-iced stimulant, he reverted to our railway journey in company.

"I knew you again this morning, Miss Coventry, I assure you, a long way off; in fact, I was going the other way, only, seeing you walking in that lonely part of the down, I feared you might be frightened" (he was getting bright scarlet again), "and I determined to watch you at a little distance, and be ready to assist you if you were alarmed by tramps or sheep-dogs or——"

I thought he was getting on too fast, so I stopped him at once by replying,—

"I am well able to take care of myself, Mr. Haycock, I assure you, and I like best walking quite alone;" after which I turned my shoulder a little towards him, and completely discomfited him for the rest of dinner. One great advantage of diffidence in a man is that one can so easily reduce him to the lowest depths of despondency; but then, on the other hand, he is apt to think one means to be more cruel than one does, and one is obliged to be kind in proportion to previous coldness, or the stupid creature breaks away altogether. When the ladies got up to leave the dining-room, I dropped my handkerchief well under the table, and when it was returned to me by the Squire, I gave him such a look of gratitude as I knew would bring him back to me in the evening. Nobody hates flirting so much as myself, but what is one to do shut up in a country-house, with no earthly thing to occupy or amuse one?

Tea and coffee served but little to produce cordiality amongst the female portion of the guests after their flight to the drawing-room. Lady Horsingham and Lady Banneret talked apart on a sofa; they were deep in the merits of their respective preachers and the failings of their respective maids. Mrs. Marmaduke and Mrs. Marygold, having had a "Book-Club" feud, did not speak to each other, but communicated through the medium of Miss Finch, whose deafness rendered this a somewhat unsatisfactory process. Aunt Deborah went to sleep as usual; and I tried the two Miss Bannerets consecutively, but ascertained that neither would open her lips, at least in the presence of mamma. At last I found a vacant place by the side of Mrs. Plumridge, and discovered immediately, with the peculiar freemasonry which I believe men do not possess, that she was one of my sort. She liked walking, riding, driving, dancing—all that I liked, in short; and she hated scandal-gossiping, sensible women, morning visits, and worsted-work, for all of which I confess to an unqualified aversion. We were getting fast friends when the gentlemen came in from their wine, honest Sir Brian's voice sounding long before he entered the room, and the worthy gentleman himself rolling in with an unsteady step, partly from incipient gout, and partly, I fancy, from a good deal of port wine. He took a vacant seat by me almost immediately, chiefly, I think, because it was the nearest seat; and avowing openly his great regard and admiration for my neighbour, Mrs. Plumridge, proceeded to make himself agreeable to both of us in his own way—though I am concerned to state that he trod heavily on my sprained foot, and spilt the greater part of a cup of coffee over her satin gown. The Squire, whose nerves for the present were strung above blushing pitch, soon joined our little party; and whilst the two Miss Bannerets performed an endless duet on Aunt Horsingham's luckless pianoforte, and their brother, choking in his stiff white neckcloth, turned over the leaves, Sir Brian bantered Mr. Haycock gracefully on his abstemiousness after dinner, an effort of self-denial of which no one could accuse him, and vowed, with much laughter, that "Haycock must be in love! in love, Miss Coventry, don't you think so? A man that always used to take his two bottles as regularly as myself—I am a foe to excess, ladies, but Haycock's an anchorite, d—— me—a monk! Haycock! monks mustn't marry, you know!—wouldn't he look well with his feet shaved, Miss Coventry, and his head bare and a rope round his neck?" Sir Brian was getting confused, and had slightly transposed the clerical costume to which he alluded; but was quite satisfied that his little badinage was witty and amusing in the extreme. Indeed, Mrs. Plumridge and I couldn't help laughing; but poor Squire Haycock's embarrassment was so intense that he ordered his carriage immediately, and took leave, venturing, however, at the very last, to shake me by the hand, and braving once again the banter of the inebriated Baronet.

"Stole away," said Sir Brian; "a shy man, Miss Coventry—a shy, diffident man, my friend Haycock, but true as steel—not a better landlord in the county—excellent neighbour—useful magistrate—good house—beautiful garden—lots of poultry, and a glass beehive—wants nothing but a wife—order the carriage, my lady.—Mrs. Plumridge, you must come and see us at Slopperly, and don't forget to bring Plumridge.—Miss Coventry, you're a charming young lady; mind you come too." So jolly Sir Brian wished us both a most affectionate good-night, and, shaking Aunt Horsingham violently by both hands, packed himself into his carriage in a state of high good-humour and confusion. I have since heard that on his arrival at Slopperly he stoutly refused to get out, declaring that he preferred to "sit in the carriage whilst they changed horses," and avowing, much to his old butler's astonishment, his resolution to go "at least one more stage that night."

CHAPTER XI.

I must despair of being able in simple narrative to convey the remotest idea of the dullness of Dangerfield Hall; but as during my residence there I beguiled the weary hours by keeping a diary (bound in blue velvet, with brass clasps and a Bramah lock), I have it in my power, by transcribing a few of its pages, to present to my readers my own impressions of life in that well-regulated establishment. I put things down just as they happened, with my own reflections, more or less philosophical, on the events of each day. My literary labours were invariably carried on after the family had retired for the night; and I may observe that a loose white dressing-gown, trimmed with Mechlin lace and pink ribbons—one's hair, of course, being "taken down"—is a costume extremely well adapted to the efforts of composition. I take a day from the diary at random.

Thursday.—Up at half-past seven; peeped in the glass the instant I was out of bed, and wondered how Cousin Amelia looks when she wakes. Yellowish, I should think, and by no means captivating, particularly if she wears a nightcap. I don't care how ugly a woman is, she has no right to look anything but fresh in the morning; and yet how few possess this advantage! Nothing like open air and plenty of exercise; saving one's complexion is undoubtedly the very way to spoil it. Saw Brilliant and White Stockings going to exercise in the Park. What coddles they look on these fine autumn mornings, covered with clothing! Felt very keen about hunting; the same feeling always comes on at the fall of the leaf; shouldn't wonder if I could jump a gate, with my present nerves. Should like once in my life to plant a field of horsemen, and show these gentlemen how a woman can ride. Interrupted in my daydreams by Lady Horsingham's bell, and huddled on my things in a tremendous hurry; forced to wash my hands in cold water, which made the tips of my fingers as red as radishes for the rest of the day. Got down to prayers by half-past eight, and took Aunt Deborah her tea and toast from the breakfast-table at nine.

Breakfast dull, and most of the party cross: Aunt Horsingham is generally out of humour at breakfast-time, particularly on Sundays. Cousin Amelia suggested my towels were too coarse: "they had rubbed a colour into my cheeks like a dairymaid's." John said I looked like a rose—a tea-rose, he added, as I handed him his cup. Cousin John is getting quite poetical, and decidedly improved since he left London. I wonder whom he got that letter from that was lying on his plate when he came down. I am not curious, but I just glanced at the direction, and I am certain it was in a lady's hand. Not that it's any business of mine; only I should think Miss Molasses would hardly have the face to write to him. I wonder whether there is anything between John and Miss Molasses. I asked him, half spitefully, the other day how he could bear to be parted from her now the season was over; and he seemed so pleased at my taking an interest in the thing at all that I had no patience to go on with my cross-questioning. I don't think she's good enough for John, I must confess; but he is easily imposed on by young ladies—as indeed, for that matter, are the rest of his great thick-headed sex. When breakfast was over and Cousin Amelia went off as usual to practise her music for an hour or two, I thought I might steal away for a visit to my favourites in the stable; indeed I saw John at the front door in a hideous wide-awake, with a long cigar in his mouth. But I was waylaid by Aunt Horsingham; and as these visits to the stable are strictly forbidden, I was obliged to follow her into the drawing-room, and resign myself for the whole morning to that dreadful worsted-work, more especially as it was coming on a drizzling mist, and there was no pretext for my usual walk.

"I am glad to see you getting more sociable, Kate," said Lady Horsingham, in her dry, harsh voice, as I took a seat beside her and opened my work-basket. "It is never advisable for any young lady to affect singularity, and I have observed with some concern that your demeanour on many occasions is very unlike that of the rest of your sex."

I never give in to Aunt Horsingham—after all she's not my own aunt—so I answered as pertly as ever I could:

"No: you mean I don't spend the morning in looking in the glass and talking evil of my neighbours; I don't scream when I see a beetle, or go into convulsions because there's a mouse in the room. I've got two legs, very good legs, Aunt Horsingham—shall I show you them?—and I like to use them, and to be out of doors amongst the trees and the grass and the daisies, instead of counting stitches for work that nobody wants or writing letters that nobody reads. I had rather give Brilliant a good 'bucketing' (Aunt Horsingham shuddered; I knew she would, and used the word on purpose) over an open heath or a line of grass than go bodkin in a chariot, seven miles an hour, and both windows up. Thank you, Aunt Horsingham; you would like to make a fine lady of me—a useless, sickly, lackadaisical being instead of a healthy, active, light-hearted woman. Much obliged to you; I had rather stay as I am."

"Miss Coventry," said my aunt, who was completely posed by my volubility, and apparently shocked beyond the power of expression at my opinions—"Miss Coventry," she repeated, "if these are indeed your sentiments, I must beg—nay, I must insist—on your keeping them to yourself whilst under this roof.—Amelia, my dear" (to my cousin, who was gliding quietly into the room)—"Amelia, go back to your music for ten minutes.—I must insist, Miss Coventry, that you do not inoculate my daughter with these pernicious doctrines—this mistaken view of the whole duties and essentials of your sex. Do you think men appreciate a woman who, if she had but a beard, would be exactly like one of themselves? Do you think they like to see their ideal hot and dishevelled, plastered with mud, and draggled with wet? Do you think they wish her to be strong and independent of them, and perhaps their superior at those very sports and exercises on which they plume themselves? Do you think they are to be taken by storm, and, so to speak, bullied into admiration? You're wrong, Kate, you're wrong; and I believe I am equally wrong to talk to you in this strain, inasmuch as the admiration of the other sex ought to be the last thing coveted or thought of by a young person of yours."

"I'm sure, aunt, I don't want the men to admire me," I replied; "but I would not give much for the admiration of one who could be jealous of me for so paltry a cause as my riding better than himself; and as for ideals, I don't know much about such things, but I think a man's ideal may do pretty well what she likes, and he is sure to think everything she does do is perfect. Besides, I don't see why I should bully him into liking me because I'm fond of the beautiful 'out of doors' instead of the fireside. And courageous women, like courageous men, are generally a deal more gentle than the timid ones. I've known ladies who would not venture into a carriage or a boat who could wage a war of words bitterer than the veriest trooper would have at his command; and I've heard Cousin John say that there is scarcely an instance of a veritable heroine in history, from Joan of Arc downwards, who was not in her private life as sweet, as gentle, and as womanly as she was high-couraged and undaunted when the moment came that summoned her energies to the encounter. Unselfishness is the cause in both cases, you may depend. People that are always so dreadfully afraid something is going to happen to them think a great deal more of self than anything else; and the same cause which makes them tremble at imaginary danger for their own sakes will make them forgetful of real sufferings in which they themselves have no share. I had rather be a hoyden, Aunt Horsingham, and go on in my own way. I have much more enjoyment; and, upon my word, I don't think I'm one bit a worse member of society than if I was the most delicate fine lady that ever fainted away at the overpowering smell of a rose leaf or the merry peal of a noisy child's laugh."

My aunt lifted up her hands and gave in, for the return of Cousin Amelia from the music-room effectually prevented further discussion; and we beguiled the time till luncheon by alternate fits of scandal and work, running through the characters of most of the neighbours within twenty miles, and completely demolishing the reputation of my friend, as they called her—lively, sarcastic little Mrs. Plumridge. John was off rabbit-shooting, so of course he did not appear at that meal so essential to ladies; and after Cousin Amelia, by way of being delicate, had got through two cutlets, the best part of a chicken, a plateful of rice-pudding, and a large glass of sherry, I ventured to propose to her that if the afternoon held up we should have a walk.

"I'm not equal to much fatigue," said she, with a languid air and a heavy look about her eyes which I attributed to the luncheon; "but if you like we'll go to the garden and the hothouses, and be back in time for a cup of tea at five o'clock."

"Anything to get out of the house," was my reply, and forthwith I rushed upstairs, two steps at a time, to put on my things; whilst my aunt whispered to her daughter, loud enough for me to hear, "She really ought to have been a man, Emmy; did you ever see such a hoyden in your life?"

It was pleasant to get out even into that formal garden. The day was soft and misty, such as one often finds it towards the close of autumn—dark without being chill—and the withered leaves strewed the earth in all the beauty of wholesome natural decay. Autumn makes some people miserable; I confess it is the time of year that I like best. Spring makes me cross if it's bad weather, and melancholy if it's fine. Summer is very enjoyable certainly, but it has a luxuriance of splendour that weighs down my spirits; and in those glorious hot, dreamy haymaking days I seem unable to identify myself sufficiently with all the beauty around me, and to pine for I don't exactly know what. Winter is charming when it don't freeze, with its early candle-light and long evenings; but autumn combines everything that to me is most delightful—the joys of reality and the pleasures of anticipation. Cousin Amelia don't think so at all.

"A nasty raw day, Kate," she remarked as we emerged from the hothouse into the moist, heavy air. "How I hate the country! except whilst the strawberries are ripe. Let's go back to the house, and read with our feet on the fender till tea-time."

"Not yet, Emmy," I pleaded, for I really pined for a good walk; "let's go on the highroad as far as the milestone—it's market day at Muddlebury, and we shall see the tipsy farmers riding home and the carriers' carts with their queer-looking loads; besides, think what a colour you'll have for dinner. Come on, there's a dear!"

The last argument was unanswerable; and Cousin Amelia putting her best foot foremost, we soon cleared the garden and the approach, and emerged on the highroad three miles from Muddlebury, and well out of the sight of the windows of Dangerfield Hall. As we rose the hill, on the top of which is perched the well-known milestone, and my cousin began already to complain of fatigue, the sound of hoofs behind us caused us both to stop and look round.

"It's cavalry," said Amelia, who jumps rather rapidly to conclusions, and is no judge of a horse.

"It's a stud," was my reply; "somebody coming to hunt with 'the Heavy-top.' Let's stand in this gateway and see them pass." We took up a position accordingly; and if I felt keen about the commencement of the season previously, how much more so did I become to watch the string of gallant well-bred horses now jogging quietly towards us with all the paraphernalia and accessories of the chase!

Two, four, six, and a hack, all clothed and hooded, and packed for travelling. Such a chestnut in the van, with a minute boy on him, who cannot have weighed four stone; strong, flat, sinewy legs (the chestnut's, not the boy's), hocks and thighs clean, full, and muscular as Brilliant's, only twice the size; a long, square tail, and a wicked eye. How I should like to ride that chestnut! Then a brown and two bays, one of the latter scarcely big enough for a hunter, to my fancy, but apparently as thoroughbred as Eclipse; then a gray, who seemed to have a strong objection to being led, and who held back and dragged at his rein in a most provoking manner; and lastly, by the side of a brown hack that I fancied I had seen before, a beautiful black horse, the very impersonation of strength, symmetry, courage, speed, and all that a horse should be.

"Ask the groom whose they are," whispered Amelia as he went by. "I don't quite like to speak to him; he looks an impudent fellow with those dark whiskers."

I should like to see the whiskers that would frighten me; so I stepped boldly out into the road, and accosted him at once.

"Whose horses are those, my man?" I asked, with my most commanding air.

"Captain Lovell's, miss," was the reply. My heart jumped into my mouth, and you might have knocked me down with a feather.

"Captain Lovell's!" exclaimed Amelia; "why, that's your old flirt,
Kate. I see it all now." But I hardly heard her, and when I looked up
the horses were a mile off, and we were retracing our steps towards
Dangerfield Hall.

What a happy day this has been, and how unpromising was its beginning! And yet I don't know why I should have been so happy. After all, there is nothing extraordinary in Captain Lovell's sending down a stud of horses to hunt with so favourite a pack as "the Heavy-top" hounds. I wish I had summoned courage to ask the man when his master was coming and where he was going to stay; but I really couldn't do it—no, not if my life depended on it. All the way home Cousin Amelia laughed and sneered and chattered, and once she acknowledged I was "the best-tempered girl in the world;" but I am sure I have not an idea why I deserve this character. Her words fell perfectly unheeded on my ear. I was glad to get to the solitude of my own room, when it was time to dress for dinner, that I might have the luxury, if it was only for five minutes, of thinking undisturbed. But there was Aunt Deborah to be attended to; for poor Aunt Deborah, I am sorry to say, is by no means well. And Gertrude came in "to do my hair;" and then the dinner-bell rang, and the wearisome meal, and the long evening dragged on in their accustomed monotony. But I did not find it as dull as usual, though I was more rejoiced than ever when the hand-candles came and we were dismissed to go to bed.

And now they are all fast asleep, and I can sit at my open window and think, think, think as much as I like. What a lovely night it is! The mist has cleared off, and the moat is glistening in the moonlight, and the old trees are silvered over and blackened alternately by its beams; the church tower stands out massively against the sky. How dark the old belfry looks on such a night as this, contrasting with the white tombstones in the churchyard, and the slated roof shimmering above the aisle! There is a faint breeze sighing amongst the few remaining leaves, now rising into a pleading whisper, now dying away with a sad, unearthly moan. The deer are moving restlessly about the Park, now standing out in bold relief on some open space brightened by the moonlight, now flitting like spectres athwart the shade. Everything breathes of romance and illusion; and I do believe it is very bad for one to be watching here, dreaming wide awake, instead of snoring healthily in bed. I wonder what he is about at this moment. Perhaps smoking a cigar out of doors, and enjoying this beautiful night. I wonder what he is thinking of. Perhaps, after all, he's stewed up in some lamplit drawing-room talking nonsense to Lady Scapegrace and Mrs. Lumley, or playing that odious whist at his club. Well, I suppose I may as well go to bed. One more look into the night, and then—hark! what is it? how beautiful, how charming! Distant music from the wood at the low end of the Park. The deer are all listening, and now they troop down towards the noise in scores. How softly it dies away and rises again! 'Tis a cornet-à-piston, I think, and though not very skilfully played it sounds heavenly by moonlight. I never thought that old air of "You'll Remember Me" half so beautiful before. Who can it be? I have never heard it since I came here. It can't be Captain Lovell's groom; it's not quite impossible it might be Captain Lovell himself. Ah, if I thought that! Well, it has ceased now. I may as well go to bed. What a happy day this has been, and what dreams I shall have!

CHAPTER XII.

Friday.—This has been an eventful day. I thought somehow it would be so; at all events, the first day's hunting is always an era to me—so when I came down to breakfast in my riding-habit, and braved the cold glances of my aunt and the sarcasms of my cousin, I was prepared for a certain amount of excitement, although, I confess, I did not bargain for quite so much as I got.

"You'll enjoy yourself to-day, I trust, Miss Coventry," said Aunt
Horsingham, looking as black as thunder.

"Mind you don't get a fall," observed Cousin Amelia with a sneer; but I cared little for their remarks and remonstrances. White Stockings was at the door, Cousin John ready to lift me into my saddle, and I envied no mortal woman on earth, no not our gracious Queen upon the throne, when I found myself fairly mounted, and jogging gently down the park in all the delightful anticipation of a good day's sport. I think I would rather have ridden Brilliant of the two, but John suggested that the country was cramped and sticky, with small fields and blind fences. Now, White Stockings is an animal of great circumspection, and allows no earthly consideration to hurry him. He is, moreover, as strong as a dray-horse, and as handy, so John declares, "as a fiddle." To him, therefore, was entrusted the honour of carrying me on my first appearance with the Heavy-top hounds. The meet was at no great distance from Dangerfield Hall, and being the beginning of the season, and a favourite place, there was a considerable muster of the élite of the county, and a goodly show of very respectable horses to grace the covert side. As we rode up to the mounted assemblage, I perceived, by the glance of curiosity, not to say admiration, directed at myself and White Stockings, that ladies were unusual visitors in that field, and that the Heavy-top gentlemen were not prepared to be cut down, at all events by a woman. Cousin John seems to know them all and to be a universal favourite.

"Who's the lady, John, my boy?" whispered a fat squire in a purple garment, with a face to match; "good seat on a horse, eh? rides like a bird, I'll warrant her." I did not catch John's answer; but the corpulent sportsman nodded, and smiled, and winked, and wheezed out, "Lucky dog—pretty cousin—double harness."

I don't know what he meant; but that it was something intensely ludicrous I gather from his nearly choking with laughter at his own concluding observation, though John blushed and looked rather like a fool.

"Who's that girl on the chestnut?" I again heard asked by a slang-looking man with red whiskers meeting under his chin; "looks like a larker—I must get introduced to her," added the conceited brute. How I hated him! If he had ventured to speak to me, I really think I could have struck him over the face with my riding-whip.

"I told you it would not be long before we met, Miss Coventry," said a well-known voice beside me; and turning round, I shook hands with Captain Lovell; and I am ashamed to confess, shook all over into the bargain. I am always a little nervous the first day of the season. How well he looked in his red coat and neat appointments, with his graceful seat upon a horse, and so high-bred, amongst all the country squires and jolly yeomen that surrounded us! He had more colour too than when in London, and altogether I thought I had never seen him looking so handsome. The chestnut with the wicked eye, showing off his fine shape, now divested of clothing, curvetted and bent to his rider's hand as if he thoroughly enjoyed that light restraining touch: the pair looked what the gentlemen call "all over like going," and I am sure one of them thought so too.

"I saw your horses on their way to Muddlebury yesterday," I at length found courage to say. "Are you going to hunt all the season with the Heavy-top?"

"How long do you stay at Dangerfield?" was the counter question from Frank; "you see I know the name of the place already; I believe I could find my way now about the Park; very picturesque it is too by night, Miss Coventry. Do you like music by moonlight?"

"Not if it's played out of tune," I answered with a laugh and a blush; but just then Squire Haycock, whom I scarcely knew in his hunting costume, rode up to us, and begged as a personal favour to himself that we would accompany him to a particular point, from which he could ensure us a good start if the fox went away—his face becoming scarlet as he expressed a hope "Miss Coventry would not allow her fondness for the chase to lead her into unnecessary danger;" whilst Frank looked at him with a half-amused, half-puzzled expression that seemed to say, "What a queer creature you are; and what the deuce can that matter to you?"

I wonder why people always want to oblige you when you don't want to be obliged; "too civil by half" is much more in the way than "not half civil enough." So we rode on with Squire Haycock, and took up a position at the end of the wood that commanded a view of the whole proceedings, and, as Frank whispered to me, was "the likeliest place in the world if we wanted to head the fox."

The Heavy-top hounds are an establishment such as, I am given to understand, is not usually kept in Leicestershire, Northamptonshire, and other so-called "flying counties." I like to gain all the information I can—Cousin John calls this thirst for knowledge, "female curiosity"—and gather from him that the Heavy-top consists of twenty-two couples of hunting hounds, and that the whole twenty-two come out three times a week during the season. I don't see why they shouldn't, I'm sure; they look very fat, and remind me of the otter hounds poor Uncle Horace used to keep when I was a child. He (that's my oracle, Cousin John) further adds that they are remarkably "steady"—which is more than can be said of their huntsman, who is constantly drunk—and that they consume a vast quantity of "flesh," which, far from being a meritorious, appears to me a disgusting tendency. They are capital "line-hunters," so says John; a "line-hunter," I imagine, is a hound that keeps snuffing about under the horses' feet, and must be a most useful auxiliary, when, as is often the case, the sportsmen are standing on the identical spot where the fox has crossed. He considers them a very "killing" pack, not in manners or appearance certainly, but in perseverance and undying determination. Their huntsman is what is called "one of the old sort." If this is a correct description, I can only say that "the old sort" must have worn the brownest and shabbiest of boots, the oldest of coats, and the greasiest of caps; must have smelt of brandy on all occasions, and lived in a besotted state of general confusion, vibrating between "delirium audacious" and "delirium tremens." They have, however, a certain whip called "Will," who appears to me to do all the work, and to keep everything right. When old Tippler drinks himself to death (a casualty which must shortly happen), Will is pretty sure to succeed him—an event which I fancy will greatly add to the efficiency of the Heavy-top hounds. To crown all, Frank Lovell dubs the whole thing "slow;" but I have remarked gentlemen make use of this epithet to convey their disapproval of that which they cannot find any positive fault with—just as we ladies call a woman "bad style" when we have nothing else to say in her disparagement.

"Gone away!" exclaims Squire Haycock, lifting his cap high above his red head; "yonder he goes! Don't you see him, Miss Coventry, now whisking under the gate?"

"Forward, forward!" holloas Frank, giving vent to his excitement in one of those prolonged screams that proclaim how the astonished sportsman has actually seen the fox with his own eyes. The next instant he is through the hand-gate at the end of the ride, and rising in his stirrups, with the wicked chestnut held hard by the head, is speeding away over the adjoining pasture, alongside of the two or three couples of leading hounds that have just emerged from the covert. Ah! we are all forgotten now; women, children, everything is lost in that first delirious five minutes when the hounds are really away. Frank was gazing at me a minute ago as if his very life was at my disposal, and now he is speeding away a field ahead of me, and don't care whether I break my neck following him or not. But this is no time for such thoughts as these; the drunken huntsman is sounding his horn in our rear. Will, the whip, cap in hand, is bringing up the body of the pack. Squire Haycock holds the gate open for me to pass, Cousin John goes by me like a flash of lightning; White Stockings with a loose rein, submits to be kicked along at any pace I like to ask him. The fence at the end of the field is nothing; I shall go exactly where Frank did. My blood thrills with ecstasy in my veins: moment of moments! I have got a capital start, and we are in for a run.

As I sit here in my armchair and dressing-gown, I see the whole panorama of to-day passing once more before my eyes. I see that dark, wet, ploughed field, with the white hounds slipping noiselessly over its furrowed surface. I can almost perceive the fresh, wholesome smell of the newly-turned earth. I see the ragged, overgrown, straggling fence at the far end, glistening with morning dew, and green with formidable briers. I see Frank Lovell's chestnut rising at the weakest place, the rider sitting well back, his spurs and stirrup-irons shining in the sun; I see Squire Haycock's square scarlet back, as he diverges to a well-known corner for some friendly egress; I hear Cousin John's voice shouting, "Give him his head, Kate!" As White Stockings and I rapidly approach the leap, my horse relapses of his own accord into a trot, points his small ears, crashes into the very middle of the fence, and just as I give myself up for lost, makes a second bound that settles me once more in the saddle, and lands gallantly in the adjoining field, Frank looking back over his shoulder in evident anxiety and admiration, whilst John's cheery voice, with its "Bravo, Kate!" rings in my delighted ears. We three are now nearest the hounds, a long strip of rushy meadow-land before us, the pack streaming along the side of a high, thick hedge that bounds it on our left; the south wind fans my face and lifts my hair as I slacken my horse's rein and urge him to his speed. I am alongside of Frank. I could ride anywhere now, or do anything. I pass him with a smile and a jest. I am the foremost with the chase. What is ten years of common life, one's feet upon the fender, compared to five such golden minutes as these? The hounds stop suddenly, and after scattering and spreading themselves into the form of an open fan, look up in my face with an air of mute bewilderment. The huntsman and the field come up, the gentlemen in a high state of delight and confusion; but Mr. Tippler in the worst of humours, and muttering as he trots off to a corner of the meadow with the pack about his horse's heels,—

"Rode 'em slap off the scent—drove 'em to a check—wish she was at home and abed and asleep, and be d——d to her!"

A grim old lady who has but one eye, and answers to the name of "Jezebel," has threaded the fence, and proclaims in anything but a sweet voice to her comrades, that she has discovered the line of our fox. They join her in an instant, down go their heads in concert, and away we all speed again, through an open gate, across a wide common, into a strip of plantation, over a stile and foot-board that leads out of it, and I find myself once more following Captain Lovell with Cousin John alongside of me, and all the rest far, far behind. This is indeed glorious. I should like it to go on till dinnertime. How I hope we shan't kill the fox!

"Take hold of his head, Kate," says my cousin, whose horse has just blundered on to his nose through a gap. "Even White Stockings won't last for ever, and this is going to be something out of the common."

"Forward!" is my reply as I point with my whip towards the lessening pack, now a whole field ahead of us. "Forward!" If we hadn't been going such a pace I could have sung for joy.

There is a line of pollarded willow trees down in that hollow, and the hounds have already left these behind them; they are rising the opposite ground. Again Frank Lovell looks anxiously back at me, but makes no sign.

"We must have it, Kate!" says John; "there's your best place, under the tree; send him at it as hard as he can lay legs to the ground."

I ply my whip and loosen my reins in vain. White Stockings stops dead short, and lowers his nose to the water, as if he wanted to drink; all of a sudden the stream is behind me, and with a flounder and a struggle we are safe over the brook. Not so Cousin John; I see him on his legs on the bank, with his horse's head lying helplessly between his feet, the rest of that valuable animal being completely submerged.

"Go along, Kate!" he shouts encouragingly, and again I speed after Frank Lovell, who is by this time nearly a quarter of a mile ahead of me, and at least that distance behind the hounds. White Stockings is going very pleasantly, but the ground is now entirely on the rise, and he indulges occasionally in a trot without any hint on my part; the fences fortunately get weaker and weaker; the fields are covered with stones, and are light, good galloping enough, but the rise gets steeper every yard; round hills are closing in about us; we are now on the Downs, and the pack is still fleeting ahead, like a body of hounds in a dream, every moment increasing their distance from us, and making them more and more indistinct. Frank Lovell disappears over the brow of that hill, and I urge White Stockings to overtake my only companion. He don't seem to go much faster for all that. I strike him once or twice with my light riding-whip; I shake my reins, and he comes back into a trot; I rise in my stirrup and rouse his energies in every way I can think of. I am afraid he must be ill, the trot degenerates to a jog, a walk; he carries his head further out from him than is his wont, and treats curb and snaffle with a like disregard and callousness of mouth. Now he stops altogether, and catching a side view of his head his eye appears to me more prominent than usual, and the whole animal seems changed, till I can hardly fancy it is my own horse. I get a little frightened now, and look round for assistance. I am quite alone. Hounds, horsemen, all have disappeared; the wide, dreary, solitary Downs stretch around me, and I begin to have misgivings as to how I am to get back to Dangerfield Hall. Cousin John has explained it all to me since.

"Nothing could be simpler, Kate," said he this evening when I handed him his tea; "you stopped your horse. If ladies will go in front with a loose rein for five-and-forty minutes, 'riding jealous' of such a first-rate performer as Frank Lovell, it is not an unlikely thing to happen. If you could have lasted ten minutes longer, you would have seen them kill their fox. Frank was the only one there, but he assures me he could not have gone another hundred yards. Never mind, Kate, better luck next time!"

Well, to return to my day. After a while White Stockings began to recover himself. I'm sure I didn't know what to do with him. I got off, and loosened his girths as well as I could, and turned his head to the wind, and wiped his poor nose with my pocket-handkerchief. I hadn't any eau-de-Cologne, and if I had it might not have done him much good. At last he got better, and I got on again (all my life I've been used to mounting and dismounting without assistance). Thinking downhill must be the way home, downhill I turned him, and proceeded slowly on, now running over in my own mind the glorious hour I had just spent, now wondering whether I should be lost and have to sleep amongst the Downs; and anon coming back to the old subject, and resolving that hunting was the only thing to live for, and that for the future I would devote my whole time and energies to that pursuit. At last I got into a steep chalky lane, and at a turn a little farther on espied to my great relief a red-coated back jogging leisurely home. White Stockings pricked his ears and mended his pace, so I soon overtook the returning sportsman, who proved to be no other than Squire Haycock, thrown out like the rest of the Heavy-top gentlemen, and only too happy to take care of me, and show me the shortest way (eleven miles as the crow flies) back to Dangerfield Hall.

We jogged on amicably enough, the Squire complimenting me much on my prowess, and not half so shy as usual—very often the case with a diffident man when on horseback. We were forced to go very slow, both our horses being pretty well tired; and to make matters better, we were caught in a tremendous hailstorm about two miles from home, just as it was getting dark, and close to the spot where our respective roads diverged. I could not possibly miss mine, as it was perfectly straight. Ah! that hailstorm has a deal to answer for. We were forced to turn through a hand-gate, and take shelter in a friendly wood. What a ridiculous position, pitch dark, pelting with rain, an elderly gentleman and a young lady on horseback under a fir tree. The Squire had been getting more incoherent for some time; I couldn't think what he was driving at.

"You like our country, Miss Coventry; fine climate, excellent soil, nice and dry for ladies?"

I willingly subscribed to all these advantages.

"Good neighbourhood," added the Squire; "capital hunting, charming rides, wonderful scenery for sketching. Do you think you could live in this part of the world?"

I thought I could if I was to try.

"You expressed your approbation of my house, Miss Coventry," the Squire proceeded, with his hand on my horse's neck; "do you think—I mean—should you consider—or rather I should say, is there any alteration you would suggest—anything in my power—if you would condescend to ride over any afternoon; may I consider you will so far favour me?"

I said "I should be delighted, but that it had left off raining, and it was time for us to get home."

"One word, Miss Coventry," pleaded the Squire with a shaking voice.
"Have I your permission to call upon Lady Horsingham to-morrow?"

I said I thought my aunt would be at home, and expressed my conviction that she would be delighted to see him, and I wished him good-bye.

"Good-bye, Miss Coventry, good-bye," said the Squire, shaking hands with a squeeze that crushed my favourite ring into my prettiest finger; "you have made me the happiest of men—good-bye!"

I saw it all in an instant, just as I see it now. The Squire means to propose for me to-morrow, and he thinks I have accepted him. What shall I do? Mrs. Haycock—Kate Haycock—Catherine Haycock. No, I can't make it look well, write it how I will; and then, to vow never to think of any one else; I suppose I mightn't even speak to Frank. Never, no, never; but what a scrape I have got into, and how I wish to-morrow was over!

CHAPTER XIII.

My diary continued,—

Saturday.—Well, it is over at last; and upon my word I begin to think I am capable of anything after all I have got through to-day since breakfast. Scarcely had I finished the slice of toast and single cup of tea that constitute my morning meal, before I heard the tramp of a horse on the gravel in front of the house, followed by the ominous sound of the door-bell. I have remarked that in all country families a ring at the door-bell brings everybody's heart into everybody's mouth. Aunt Horsingham, brooding over the teapot as usual, had been in her worst of humours ever since she came down, and tried to look as if no bell that ever was cast had power to move her grim resolve.

"A message by electric telegraph," exclaimed Cousin Amelia, who is always anticipating some catastrophe; "no visitor would ever call at such a time."

"Unless he came to propose for one of us," suggested John, who was carving a ham at the side-table.

"Some one on business for me, probably," remarked Aunt Horsingham, drawing herself up and looking more stately than usual.

"Mr. Haycock!" announced the butler, throwing open the door with a flourish; and while all our untimely visitor's preparations, such as wiping his shoes, arranging his dress, etc., were distinctly audible outside, we looked at each other in mute astonishment, and I own I did feel the guilty one amongst the party.

The Squire made his entrance in a state of intense trepidation. Having been forcibly deprived of his white hat in the hall, he had nothing but natural means to resort to for concealment of his confusion. Had it not been for an enormous silk handkerchief (white spots on a yellow ground) with which he blew his nose and wiped his brow at short and startling intervals his condition would have been pitiable in the extreme. The "Squire's" dress too was of a more florid style than is usual in these days of sad-coloured attire. A bright blue neckcloth, well starched, and of great depth and volume; a buff waistcoat, with massive gilt buttons; a grass-green riding-coat of peculiar shape and somewhat scanty material; white cord trousers, York tan gaiters, and enormous double-soled shooting-shoes, pierced and strapped, and clamped and hobnailed, completing a tout ensemble that almost upset my aunt's gravity, and made me, nervous as I felt, stuff my pocket-handkerchief into my mouth that I might not laugh outright.

"Fine morning, Lady Horsingham," observed the Squire, as if he had come all that distance at this early hour on purpose to impart so valuable a piece of information—"fine morning, but cold," he repeated, rubbing his hands together though the perspiration stood on his brow. "I don't recollect a much finer morning at this time of year," he resumed, addressing Cousin John after a pause, during which he had ceremoniously shaken hands with each of us in succession.

"Will you have some breakfast?" asked Lady Horsingham, whose cold and formal demeanour contrasted strangely with the nervous excitement of her visitor.

"No, thank you—if you please," answered the Squire in a breath. "I breakfasted before I left home. Early hours, Lady Horsingham—I think your ladyship approves of early hours—but I'll ask for a cup of tea, if you please." So he sat down to a weak cup of lukewarm tea with much assumed gusto and satisfaction.

It was now time for Cousin Amelia to turn her battery on the Squire; so she presently attacked him about his poultry and his garden and his farm, the honest gentleman's absent and inconsequent replies causing my aunt and John to regard him with silent astonishment, as one who was rapidly taking leave of his senses; whilst I who knew, or at least guessed, the cause of his extraordinary behaviour began heartily to wish myself back in Lowndes Street, and to wonder how this absurd scene was going to end.

"Your dahlias must have suffered dreadfully from these early frosts," said Cousin Amelia, shaking her ringlets at the poor man in what she fancies her most bewitching style.

"Beautifully," was the bewildered reply, "particularly the shorthorns."