CORNELL 
 
 UNIVERSITY 
 
 LIBRARY 
 
 ViW.I'^'i.' ' 
 
 BOUGHT WITH THE INCOME 
 OF THE SAGE ENDOWMENT 
 BlIfND GIVEN IN 1891 BY 
 
 HENRY WILLIAMS SAGE 
 
Cornell University Library 
 PR4750.P14 1905 
 
 A pair of blue eyes. 
 
 3 1924 013 478 155 
 
Cornell University 
 Library 
 
 The original of tiiis book is in 
 tine Cornell University Library. 
 
 There are no known copyright restrictions in 
 the United States on the use of the text. 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924013478155 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
PREFACE 
 
 1 HE following chapters were written at a time when the 
 craze for indiscriminate church-restoration had just reached 
 the remotest nooks of western England, where the wild and 
 tragic features of the coast had long combined in perfect 
 harmony with the crude Gothic Art of the ecclesiastical 
 buildings scattered along it, throwing into extraordinary 
 discord all architectural attempts at newness there. To 
 restore the grey carcases of a mediasvalism whose spirit 
 had fled, seemed a not less incongruous act than to set 
 about renovating the adjoining crags themselves. 
 
 Hence it happened that an imaginary history of three 
 human hearts, whose emotions were not without corre- 
 spondence with these material circumstances, found in the 
 ordinary incidents of such church-renovations a fitting 
 frame for its presentation. 
 
 The shore and country about ' Castle Boterel ' is now 
 getting well known, and will be readily recognized. The 
 spot is, I may add, the furthest westward of all those 
 convenient corners wherein I have ventured to erect my 
 theatre for these imperfect little dramas of country life 
 and passions ; and it lies near to, or no great way be- 
 yond, the vague border of the Wessex kingdom on that 
 side, which, like the westering verge of modern American 
 settlements, was progressive and uncertain. 
 
PREFACE 
 
 This, however, is of little importance. The place is pre- 
 eminently (for one person at least) the region of dream and 
 mystery. The ghostly birds, the pall-like sea, the frothy 
 wind, the eternal soliloquy of the waters, the bloom of 
 dark purple cast, that seems to exhale from the shoreward 
 precipices, in themselves lend to the scene an atmosphere 
 like the twilight of a night vision. 
 
 One enormous sea-bord cliff in particular figures in the 
 narrative ; and for some forgotten reason or other this 
 cliff was described in the story as being without a name. 
 Accuracy would require the statement to be that a remark- 
 able cliff which resembles in many points the cliff of the 
 description bears a name that no event has made famous. 
 
 T. H. 
 
 March 1895. 
 
THE PERSONS 
 
 Elfridb Swancourt 
 Christopher Swancourt 
 Stephen Smith . 
 Henry Knight . 
 Charlotte Troyton . 
 Gertrude Jethway . 
 Spenser Hugo Luxellian 
 Lady Luxellian 
 Mary and Kate 
 William Worm . 
 John Smith 
 Jane Smith 
 Martin Cannister . 
 Unity .... 
 
 a young Lady. 
 
 a Clergyvtan. 
 
 an Architect. 
 
 a Reviewer and Essayist. 
 
 a rich Widow. 
 
 a poor Widow. 
 
 a Peer, 
 
 his Wife. 
 
 two little Girls. 
 
 a dazed Factotum. 
 
 a Master-mason. 
 
 his Wife. 
 
 a Sexton. 
 
 a Maid-servant. 
 
 Other servants, masons, labourers, grooms, nondescripts, etc., etc. 
 
 THE SCENE 
 Mostly on the outskirts of Lower Wessex. 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 •A fair vestal, throned in the west. 
 
 ElFRIDE SWANCOURT was a girl whose emotions 
 lay very near the surface. Their nature more precisely, 
 and as modified by the creeping hours of time, was 
 known only to those who watched the circumstances of 
 her history. 
 
 Personally, she was the combination of very interest- 
 ing particulars, whose rarity, however, lay in the com- 
 bination itself rather than in the individual elements 
 combined. As a matter of fact, you did not see the 
 form and substance of her features when conversing 
 with her; and this charming power of preventing a 
 material study of her lineaments by an interlocutor, 
 originated not in the cloaking effect of a well-formed 
 manner (for her manner was childish and scarcely 
 formed), but in the attractive crudeness of the remarks 
 themselves. She had lived all her life in retirement — 
 the monstrari digito of idle men had not flattered her, 
 and at the age of nineteen or twenty she was no further 
 on in social consciousness than an urban young lady 
 of fifteen. 
 
 One point in her, however, you did notice : that was 
 her eyes. In them was seen a sublimation of all of 
 
 I A 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 her ; it was not necessary to look further : there she 
 hved. 
 
 These eyes were blue; blue as autumn distance — 
 blue as the blue we see between the retreating mould- 
 ings of hills and woody slopes on a sunny September 
 morning. A misty and shady blue, that had no begin- 
 ning or surface, and was looked into rather than at. 
 
 As to her presence, it was not powerful; it was 
 weak. Some women can make their personality pervade 
 the atmosphere of a whole banqueting hall; Elfride's 
 was no more pervasive than that of a kitten. 
 
 Elfride had as her own the thoughtfulness which 
 appears in the face of the Madonna della Sedia, with- 
 out its rapture : the warmth and spirit of the type of 
 woman's feature most common to the beauties — mortal 
 and immortal — of Rubens, without their insistent fleshi- 
 ness. The characteristic expression of the feinale faces 
 of Correggio — that of the yearning human thoughts that 
 lie too deep for tears — was hers sometimes, but seldom 
 under ordinary conditions. 
 
 The point in Elfride Swancourt's life at which a 
 deeper current may be said to have permanently set in, 
 was one winter afternoon when she found herself stand- 
 ing, in the chaa;acter of hostess, face to face with a man 
 she had never seen before — moreover, looking at him 
 with a Miranda-like curiosity and interest that she had 
 never yet bestowed on a mortal. 
 
 On this particular day her father, the vicar of a 
 parish on the sea-swept outskirts of Lower Wessex, and 
 a widower, was suffering from an attack of gout. After 
 finishing her household supervisions Elfride became 
 restless, and several times left the room, ascended the 
 staircase, and knocked at her father's chamber-door. 
 
 ' Come in ! ' was always answered in a hearty out-of- 
 door voice from the inside. 
 
 ' Papa,' she said on one occasion to the fine, red- 
 faced, handsome man of forty, who, puffing and fizzing 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 like a bursting bottle, lay on the bed wrapped in a 
 dressing-gown, and every now and then enunciating, 
 in spite of himself, about one letter of some word or 
 words that were almost oaths; 'papa, will you not 
 come downstairs this evening ? ' She spoke distinctly : 
 he was rather deaf. 
 
 ' Afraid not — eh-h-h ! — very much afraid I shall not, 
 Elfride. Piph-ph-ph! I can't bear even a handker- 
 chief upon this deuced toe of mine, much less a 
 stocking or slipper — piph-ph-ph ! There 'tis again ! 
 No, I shan't get up till to-morrow.' 
 
 ' Then I hope this London man won't come ; for I 
 don't know what I should do, papa.' 
 
 ' Well, it would be awkward, certainly.' 
 
 ' I should hardly think he would come to-day.' 
 
 'Why?' 
 
 ' Because the wind blows so.' 
 
 ' Wind ! What ideas you have, Elfride ! Who ever 
 heard of wind stopping a man from doing his business ? 
 The idea of this toe of mine coming on so suddenly ! 
 ... If he should come, you must send him up to me, 
 I suppose, and then give him some food and put him 
 to bed in some way. Dear me, what a nuisance all 
 this is ! ' 
 
 - Must he have dinner ? ' 
 
 ' Too heavy for a tired man at the end of a tedious 
 journey.' 
 
 ' Tea, then ? ' 
 
 ' Not substantial enough.' 
 
 ' High tea, then ? There is cold fowl, rabbit-pie, 
 some pasties, and things of that kind.' 
 
 ' Yes, high tea.' 
 
 ' Must I pour out his tea, papa ? ' 
 
 ' Of course ; you are the mistress of the house.' 
 
 ' What ! sit there all the time with a stranger, just as 
 if I knew him, and not anybody to introduce us ? ' 
 
 ' Nonsense, child, about introducing ; you know 
 3 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 better than that. A practical professional man, tired 
 and hungry, who has been travelling ever since daylight 
 this morning, will hardly be inclined to talk and air 
 courtesies to-night. He wants food and shelter, and 
 you must see that he has it, simply because I am 
 suddenly laid up and cannot. There is nothing so 
 dreadful in that, I hope? You get all kinds of stuff 
 into your head from reading so many of those novels.' 
 
 ' Oh no ; there is nothing dreadful in it when it 
 becomes plainly a case of necessity like this. But, you 
 see, you are always there when people come to dinner, 
 even if we know them; and this is some strange 
 London man of the world, who will think it odd, 
 perhaps.' 
 
 ' Very well ; let him.' 
 
 ' Is he Mr. Hewby's partner ? ' 
 
 ' I should scarcely think so : he may be.' 
 
 ' How old is he, I wonder ? ' 
 
 ' That I cannot tell. You will find the copy of my 
 letter to Mr. Hewby, and his answer, upon the table in 
 the study. You may read them, and then you'll know 
 as much as I do about our visitor.' 
 
 ' I have read them.' 
 
 'Well, what's the use of asking questions, then? 
 They contain all I know. Ugh-h-h! . . . Od plague 
 you, you young scamp! don't put anything there! I 
 can't bear the weight of a fly.' 
 
 'Oh, I am sorry, papa. I forgot; I thought you 
 might be cold,' she said, hastily removing the rug she 
 had thrown upon the feet of the sufferer ; and waiting 
 till she saw that consciousness of her offence had passed 
 from his face, she withdrew from the room, and retired 
 again downstairs. 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 II 
 
 ' 'Twas on the evening of a winter's day.' 
 
 When two or three additional hours had merged 
 the same afternoon in evening, some moving outlines 
 might have been observed against the sky on the 
 summit of a wild lone hill in that district. They 
 circumscribed two men, having at present the aspect 
 of silhouettes, sitting in a dog-cart and pushing along 
 in the teeth of the wind. Scarcely a solitary house or 
 man had been visible along the whole dreary distance 
 of open country they were traversing ; and now that 
 night had begun to fall, the faint twilight, which still 
 gave an idea of the landscape to their observation, was 
 enlivened by the quiet appearance of the planet Jupiter, 
 momentarily gleaming in intenser brilliancy in front of 
 them, and by Sirius shedding his rays in rivalry from 
 his position over their shoulders. The only lights 
 apparent on earth were some spots of dull red, glowing 
 here and there upon the distant hills, which, as the 
 driver of the vehicle gratuitously remarked to the hirer, 
 were smouldering fires for the consumption of peat and 
 gorse-roots, where the common was being broken up for 
 agricultural purposes. The wind prevailed with but 
 little abatement from its daytime boisterousness, three 
 
 S 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 or four small clouds, delicate and pale, creeping along 
 under the sky southward to the Channel. 
 
 Fourteen of the sixteen miles intervening between 
 the railway terminus and the end of their journey had 
 been gone over, when they began to pass along the 
 brink of a valley some miles in extent, wherein the 
 wintry skeletons of a more luxuriant vegetation than 
 had hitherto surrounded them proclaimed an increased 
 richness of soil, which showed signs of far more careful 
 enclosure and management than had any slopes they 
 had yet passed. A little farther, and an opening in 
 the elms stretching up from this fertile valley revealed 
 a mansion. 
 
 'That's Endelstow House, Lord Luxellian's,' said 
 the driver. 
 
 ■ Endelstow House, Lord Luxellian's,' repeated the 
 other mechanically. He then turned himself sideways, 
 and keenly scrutinized the almost invisible house with 
 an interest which the indistinct picture itself seemed 
 far from adequate to create. ' Yes, that's Lord Luxel- 
 lian's,' he said yet again after a while, as he still looked 
 in the same direction. 
 
 ' What, be we going there ? ' 
 
 ' No ; Endelstow Vicarage, as I have told you.' 
 
 ' I thought you m't have altered your mind, sir, as 
 ye have stared that way at nothing so long.' 
 
 ' Oh no ; I am interested in the house, that's all.' 
 
 ' Most people be, as the saying is.' 
 
 ' Not in the sense that I am.' 
 
 'Oh! . . . Well, his family is no better than my 
 own, 'a b'lieve.' 
 
 ' How is that ? ' 
 
 'Hedgers and ditchers by rights. But once in 
 ancient times one of 'em, when he was at work, changed 
 clothes with King Charles the Second, and saved the 
 king's life. King Charles came up to him like a 
 common man, and said off-hand, " Man in the smock- 
 
 6 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 frock, my name is Charles the Second, and that's the 
 truth on't. Will you lend me your clothes ? " "I 
 don't mind if I do," said Hedger Luxellian ; and they 
 changed there and then. " Now mind ye," King 
 Charles the Second said, like a common man, as he 
 rode away, "if ever I come to the crown, you come to 
 court, knock at the door, and say out bold, ' Is King 
 Charles the Second at home ? ' Tell your name, and 
 they shall let you in, and you shall be made a lord." 
 Now, that was very nice of Master Charley ? ' 
 
 ' Very nice indeed.' 
 
 ' Well, as the story is, the king came to the throne ; 
 and some years after that, away went Hedger Luxellian, 
 knocked at the king's door, and asked if King Charles 
 the Second was in. " No, he isn't," they said. " Then, 
 is Charles the Third ? " said Hedger Luxellian. " Yes," 
 said a young feller standing by like a common man, 
 only he had a crown on, " my name is Charles the 
 Third." And ' 
 
 ' I really fancy that must be a mistake. I don't 
 recollect anything in English history about Charles the 
 Third,' said the other in a tone of mild remonstrance. 
 
 ' Oh, that's right history enough, only 'twasn't 
 prented; he was rather a queer-tempered man, if you 
 remember.' 
 
 • Very well ; go on.' 
 
 ' And, by hook or by crook, Hedger Luxellian was 
 made a lord, and everything went on well till some 
 time after, when he got into a most terrible row with 
 King Charles the Fourth ' 
 
 < I can't stand Charles the Fourth. Upon my word, 
 that's too much.' 
 
 'Why? There was a George the Fourth, wasn't 
 there ? ' 
 
 ' Certainly.' 
 
 ' Well, Charleses be as common as Georges. How- 
 ever I'll say no more about it. . . . Ah, well ! 'tis the 
 
 7 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 funniest world ever I lived in — upon my life 'tis. Ah, 
 that such should be ! ' 
 
 The dusk had thickened into darkness while they 
 thus conversed, and the outline and surface of the 
 mansion gradually disappeared. The windows, which 
 had before been as black blots on a lighter expanse 
 of wall, became illuminated, and were transfigured to 
 squares of light on the general dark body of the night 
 landscape as it absorbed the outlines of the edifice 
 into its gloomy monochrome. 
 
 Not another word was spoken for some time, and 
 they climbed a hill, then another hill piled on the 
 summit of the first. An additional mile of plateau 
 followed, from which could be discerned two light- 
 houses on the coast they were nearing, reposing on the 
 horizon with a calm lustre of benignity. Another oasis 
 was reached; a little dell lay like a nest at their feet, 
 towards which the driver pulled the horse at a sharp 
 angle, and descended a steep slope which dived under 
 the trees like a rabbit's burrow. They sank lower and 
 lower. 
 
 ' Endelstow Vicarage is inside here,' continued the 
 man with the reins. 'This part about here is West 
 Endelstow; Lord Luxellian's is East Endelstow, and 
 has a church to itself. Pa'son Swancourt is the pa'son 
 of both, and bobs backward and forward. Ah, well ! 
 'tis a funny world. 'A b'lieve there was once a quarry 
 where this house stands. The man who built it in past 
 time scraped all the glebe for earth to put round the 
 vicarage, and laid out a little paradise of flowers and 
 trees in the soil he had got together in this way, whilst 
 the fields he scraped have been good for nothing ever 
 since.' 
 
 ' How long has the present incumbent been here ? ' 
 
 ' Maybe about a year, or a year and half : 'tisn't two 
 years ; for they don't scandalize him yet ; and, as a rule, 
 a parish begins to scandalize the pa'son at the end of 
 
 8 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 two years among 'em familiar. But he's a very nice 
 party. Ay, Pa'son Swancourt knows me pretty well 
 from often driving over; and I know Pa'son Swan- 
 court.' 
 
 They emerged from the bower, swept round in a 
 curve, and the chimneys and gables of the vicarage 
 became darkly visible. Not a light showed anjrwhere. 
 They alighted; the man felt his way into the porch, 
 and rang the bell. 
 
 At the end of three or four minutes, spent in patient 
 waiting without hearing any sounds of a response, the 
 stranger advanced and repeated the call in a more 
 decided manner. He then fancied he heard footsteps 
 in the hall, and sundry movements of the door-knob, 
 but nobody appeared. 
 
 ' Perhaps they beant at home,' sighed the driver. 
 'And I promised myself a bit of supper in Pa'son 
 Swancourt's kitchen. Sich lovely mate-pize and figged 
 keakes, and cider, and drops o' cordial that they do 
 keep here ! ' 
 
 ' All right, naibours ! Be ye rich men or be ye poor 
 men, that ye must needs come to the world's end at 
 this time o' night ? ' exclaimed a voice at this instant ; 
 and, turning their heads, they saw a rickety individual 
 shambUng round from the back door with a horn lantern 
 dangling from his hand. 
 
 ' Time o' night, 'a b'lieve ! and the clock only gone 
 seven of 'em. Show a light, and let us in, William 
 Worm.' 
 
 ' Oh, that you, Robert Lickpan ? ' 
 
 ' Nobody else, William Worm.' 
 
 ' And is the visiting man a-come ? ' 
 
 'Yes,' said the stranger. 'Is Mr. Swancourt at 
 home ? ' 
 
 ' That 'a is, sir. And would ye mind coming round 
 by the back way ? The front door is got stuck wi' the 
 wet, as he will do sometimes ; and the Turk can't open 
 
 9 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 en. I know I am only a poor wambling man that 'ill 
 never pay the Lord for my making, sir ; but I can show 
 the way in, sir.' 
 
 The new arrival followed his guide through a little 
 door in a wall, and then promenaded a scullery and a 
 kitchen, along which he passed with eyes rigidly fixed 
 in advance, an inbred horror of prying forbidding him 
 to gaze around apartments that formed the back side 
 of the household tapestry. Entering the hall, he was 
 about to be shown to his room, when from the inner 
 lobby of the front entrance, whither she had gone to 
 learn the cause of the delay, sailed forth the form of 
 Elfride. Her start of amazement at the sight of the 
 visitor coming forth from under the stairs proved that 
 she had not been expecting this surprising flank move- 
 ment, which had been originated entirely by the in- 
 genuity of William Worm. 
 
 She appeared in the prettiest of all feminine guises, 
 that is to say, in demi-toilette, with plenty of loose 
 curly hair tumbling down about her shoulders. An ex- 
 pression of uneasiness pervaded her countenance ; and 
 altogether she scarcely appeared woman enough for the 
 situation. The visitor removed his hat, and the first 
 words were spoken ; Elfride prelusively looking with 
 a deal of interest, not unmixed with surprise, at the 
 person towards whom she was to do the duties of 
 hospitality. 
 
 ' I am Mr. Smith,' said the stranger in a musical 
 voice. 
 
 ' I am Miss Swancourt,' said Elfride. 
 
 Her constraint was over. The great contrast be- 
 tween the reality she beheld before her, and the dark, 
 taciturn, sharp, elderly man of business who had lurked 
 in her imagination — a man with clothes smelling of city 
 smoke, skin sallow from want of sun, and talk flavoured 
 with epigram — ^was such a relief to her that Elfride 
 smiled, almost laughed, in the new-comer's face. 
 
 lO 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 Stephen Smith, who has hitherto been hidden from 
 us by the darkness, was at this time of his life but 
 a youth in appearance, and barely a man in years. 
 Judging from his look, London was the last place in 
 the world that one would have imagined to be the 
 scene of his activities : such a face surely could not 
 be nourished amid smoke and mud and fog and dust; 
 such an open countenance could never even have seen 
 anything of ' the weariness, the fever, and the fret ' of 
 Babylon the Second. 
 
 His complexion was as fine as Elfride's own ; the 
 pink of his cheeks as delicate. His mouth as perfect as 
 Cupid's bow in form, and as cherry-red in colour as hers. 
 Bright curly hair; bright sparkling blue-gray eyes; a 
 boy's blush and manner ; neither whisker nor moustache, 
 unless a little light-brown fur on his upper lip deserved 
 the latter title : this composed the London professional 
 man, the prospect of whose advent had so troubled 
 Elfride. 
 
 Elfride hastened to say she was sorry to tell him 
 that Mr. Swancourt was not able to receive him that 
 evening, and gave the reason why. Mr. Smith replied, 
 in a voice boyish by nature and manly by art, that he 
 was very sorry to hear this news ; but that as far as his 
 reception was concerned, it did not matter in the least. 
 
 Stephen was shown up to his room. In his absence 
 Elfride stealthily glided into her father's. 
 
 ' He's come, papa. Such a young man for a business 
 man ! ' 
 
 • Oh, indeed ! ' 
 
 ' His face is — well — -prefty ; just like mine.' 
 
 ' H'm ! what next ? ' 
 
 ' Nothing ; that's all I know of him yet. It is rather 
 nice, is it not ? ' 
 
 ' Well, we shall see that when we know him better. 
 Go down and give the poor fellow something to eat 
 and drink, for Heaven's sake. And ^yheji he has done 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 eating, say I should like to have a few words with him, 
 if he doesn't mind coming up here.' 
 
 The young lady glided downstairs again, and whilst 
 she awaits young Smith's entry, the letters referring to 
 his visit had better be given. 
 
 I. — Mr. Swancourt to Mr. Hewby. 
 
 ' Endelstow Vicarage, Feb. i8, i8 — . 
 
 'Sir, — We are thinking of restoring the tower and 
 aisle of the church in this parish ; and Lord Luxellian, 
 the patron of the living, has mentioned your name as 
 that of a trustworthy architect whom it would be desir- 
 able to ask to superintend the work. 
 
 ' I am exceedingly ignorant of the necessary pre- 
 liminary steps. Probably, however, the first is that 
 (should you be, as Lord Luxellian says you are, disposed 
 to assist us) yourself or some member of your staff 
 come and see the building, and report thereupon for 
 the satisfaction of parishioners and others. 
 
 ' The spot is a very remote one : we have no railway 
 within fourteen miles ; and the nearest place for putting 
 up at — called a town, though merely a large village — is 
 Castle Boterel, two miles further on; so that it would 
 be most convenient for you to stay at the vicarage — 
 which I am glad to place at your disposal — instead of 
 pushing on to the hotel at Castle Boterel, and coming 
 back again in the morning. 
 
 ' Any day of the next week that you like to name for 
 the visit will find us quite ready to receive you. — ^Yours 
 very truly, Christopher Swancourt.' 
 
 2. — Mr. Hewby to Mr. Swancourt. 
 
 " Percy Place, Charing Cross, Feb. 20, 18 — . 
 'Dear Sir, — Agreeably to your request of the i8th 
 instant, I have arranged to survey and make drawings 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 of the aisle and tower of your parish church, and of the 
 dilapidations which have been suffered to accrue thereto, 
 with a view to its restoration. 
 
 ' My assistant, Mr. Stephen Smith, will leave London 
 by the early train to-morrow morning for the purpose. 
 Many thanks for your proposal to accommodate him. 
 He will take advantage of your offer, and will probably 
 reach your house at some hour of the evening. You 
 may put every confidence in him, and may rely upon 
 his discernment in the matter of church architecture. 
 
 ' Trusting that the plans for the restoration, which I 
 shall prepare from the details of his survey, will prove 
 satisfactory to yourself and Lord Luxellian, I am, dear 
 sir, yours faithfully, Walter Hewby.' 
 
Ill 
 
 ' Melodious birds sing madrigals.' 
 
 That first repast in Endelstow Vicarage was a very 
 agreeable one to young Stephen Smith. The table was 
 spread, as Elfride had suggested to her father, with the 
 materials for the heterogeneous meal called high tea — a 
 class of refection welcome to all when away from men 
 and towns, and particularly attractive to youthful palates. 
 The table was prettily decked with winter flowers and 
 leaves, amid which the eye was greeted by chops, chicken, 
 pie, &c., and two huge pasties overhanging the sides of 
 the dish with a cheerful aspect of abundance. 
 
 At the end, towards the fireplace, appeared the tea- 
 service, of old-fashioned Worcester porcelain, and behind 
 this arose the slight form of Elfride, attempting to add 
 matronly dignity to the movement of pouring out tea, 
 and to have a weighty and concerned look in matters 
 of marmalade, honey, and clotted cream. Having 
 made her own meal before he arrived, she found to 
 her embarrassment that there was nothing left for her 
 to do but talk when not assisting him. She asked him 
 if he would excuse her finishing a letter she had been 
 writing at a side-table, and, after sitting down to it, 
 tingled with a sense of being grossly rude. However, 
 14 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 seeing that he noticed nothing personally wrong in her, 
 and that he too was embarrassed when she attentively 
 watched his cup to refill it, Elfride became better at 
 ease ; and when furthermore he accidentally kicked the 
 leg of the table, and then nearly upset his tea-cup, 
 just as schoolboys did, she felt herself mistress of the 
 situation, and could talk very well. In a few minutes 
 ingenuousness and a common term of years obliter- 
 ated all recollection that they were strangers just met. 
 Stephen began to wax eloquent on extremely slight 
 experiences connected with his professional pursuits ; 
 and she, having no experiences to fall back upon, 
 recounted with much animation stories that had been 
 related to her by her father, which would have astonished 
 him had he heard with what fidelity of action and tone 
 they were rendered. Upon the whole, a very interesting 
 picture of Sweet-and-Twenty was on view that evening 
 in Mr. Swancourt's house. 
 
 Ultimately Stephen had to go upstairs and talk loud 
 to the vicar, receiving from him between his puffs a great 
 many apologies for calling him so unceremoniously to 
 a stranger's bedroom. ' But,' continued Mr. Swancourt, 
 ' I felt that I wanted to say a few words to you before 
 the morning, on the business of your visit. One's 
 patience gets exhausted by staying a prisoner in bed 
 all day through a sudden freak of one's enemy — new 
 to me, though — for I have known very little of gout as 
 yet. However, he's gone to my other toe in a very 
 mild manner, and I expect he'll slink off altogether by 
 the morning. I hope you have been well attended to 
 downstairs ? ' 
 
 ' Perfectly. And though it is unfortunate, and I am 
 sorry to see you laid up, I beg you will not take the 
 slightest notice of my being in the house the while.' 
 
 ' I will not. But I shall be down to-morrow. My 
 daughter is an excellent doctor. A dose or two of her 
 mild mixtures will fetch me round quicker than all the 
 
 IS 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 drug stuff in the world. Well, now about the church 
 business. Take a seat, do. We can't afford to stand 
 upon ceremony in these parts as you see, and for this 
 reason, that a civilized human being seldom stays long 
 with us ; and so we cannot waste time in approaching 
 him, or he will be gone before we have had the plea- 
 sure of close acquaintance. This tower of ours is, as 
 you will notice, entirely gone beyond the possibility of 
 restoration ; but the church itself is well enough. You 
 should see some of the churches in this county. Floors 
 rotten : ivy lining the walls.' 
 
 ' Dear me ! ' 
 
 ' Oh, that's nothing. The congregation of a neigh- 
 bour of mine, whenever a storm of rain comes on 
 during service, open their umbrellas and hold them up 
 till the dripping ceases from the roof. Now, if you will 
 kindly bring me those papers and letters you see l)dng 
 on the table, I will show you how far we have got.' 
 
 Stephen crossed the room to fetch them, and the 
 vicar seemed to notice more particularly the slim figure 
 of his visitor. 
 
 ' I suppose you are quite competent ? ' he said. 
 
 ' Quite,' said the young man, colouring slightly. 
 
 'You are very young, I fancy — I should say you 
 are not more than nineteen ? ' 
 
 ' I am nearly twenty-one.' 
 
 ' Exactly half my age ; I am forty-two.' 
 
 ' By the way,' said Mr. Swancourt, after some con- 
 versation, ' you said your whole name was Stephen 
 Fitzmaurice, and that your grandfather came originally 
 from Caxbury. Since I have been speaking, it has 
 occurred to me that I know something of you. You 
 belong to a well-known ancient county family — not 
 ordinary Smiths in the least.' 
 
 ' I don't think we have any of their blood in our 
 veins.' 
 
 ' Nonsense ! you must. Hand me the " Landed 
 i6 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 Gentry." Now, let me see. There, Stephen Fitz- 
 maurice Smith — he lies in St. Mary's Church, doesn't 
 he? Well, out of that family sprang the Leaseworthy 
 Smiths, and collaterally came General Sir Stephen 
 Fitzmaurice Smith of Caxbury ' 
 
 ' Yes ; I have seen his monument there,' shouted 
 Stephen. ' But there is no connection between his 
 family and mine : there cannot be.' 
 
 ' There is none, possibly, to your knowledge. But 
 look at this, my dear sir,' said the vicar, striking 
 his fist upon the bedpost for emphasis. ' Here are 
 you, Stephen Fitzmaurice Smith, living in London, 
 but springing from Caxbury. Here in this book is a 
 genealogical tree of the Stephen Fitzmaurice Smiths 
 of Caxbury Manor. You may be only a family of pro- 
 fessional men now — I am not inquisitive : I don't 
 ask questions of that kind ; it is not in me to do so 
 — but it is as plain as the nose in your face that 
 there's your origin ! And, Mr. Smith, I congratulate 
 you upon your blood ; blue blood, sir ; and, upon my 
 life, a very desirable colour, as the world goes.' 
 
 ' I wish you could congratulate me upon some more 
 tangible quality,' said the younger man, sadly no less 
 than modestly. 
 
 ' Nonsense ! that will come with time. You are 
 young : all your life is before you. Now look — see 
 how far back in the mists of antiquity my own family 
 of Swancourt have a root. Here, you see,' he con- 
 tinued, turning to the page, 'is Geoffrey, the one 
 among my ancestors who lost a barony because he 
 would cut his joke. Ah, it's the sort of us ! But 
 the story is too long to tell now. Ay, I'm a poor 
 man — a poor gentleman, in fact : those I would be 
 friends with, won't be friends with me; those who 
 are willing to be friends with me, I am above being 
 friends with. Beyond dining with a neighbouring 
 incumbent or two, and an occasional chat — sometimes 
 
 17 B 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 dinner — with Lord Luxellian, a connection of mine, I 
 am in absolute solitude — absolute.' 
 
 'You have your studies, your books, and your — • 
 daughter.' 
 
 ' Oh yes, yes ; and I don't complain of poverty. 
 Canto coram latrone. Well, Mr. Smith, don't let me 
 detain you any longer in a sick room. Ha ! that 
 reminds me of a story I once heard in my younger 
 days.' Here the vicar began a series of small private 
 laughs, and Stephen looked inquiry. ' Oh, no, no ! 
 it is too bad — too bad to tell ! ' continued Mr. Swan- 
 court in undertones of grim mirth. ' Well, go down- 
 stairs ; my daughter must do the best she can with 
 you this evening. Ask her to sing to you — she plays 
 and sings very nicely. Good-night ; I feel as if I had 
 known you for five or six years. I'll ring for some- 
 body to show you down.' 
 
 ' Never mind,' said Stephen, ' I can find the way.' 
 And he went downstairs, thinking of the delightful 
 freedom of manner in the remoter counties in com- 
 parison with the reserve of London. 
 
 ' I forgot to tell you that my father was rather deaf,' 
 said Elfride anxiously, when Stephen entered the little 
 drawing-room. 
 
 ' Never mind j I know all about it, and we are great 
 friends,' the man of business replied enthusiastically. 
 ' And, Miss Swancourt, will you kindly sing to me? ' 
 
 To Miss Swancourt this request seemed, what in 
 fact it was, exceptionally point-blank ; though she guessed 
 that her father had some hand in framing it, knowing, 
 rather to her cost, of his unceremonious way of utilizing 
 her for the benefit of dull sojourners. At the same 
 time, as Mr. Smith's manner was too frank to provoke 
 criticism, and his age too little to inspire fear, she was 
 ready — not to say pleased — to accede. Selecting from 
 the canterbury some old family ditties, that in years gone 
 
 i8 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 by had been played and sung by her mother, Elfride 
 sat down to the pianoforte, and began ' 'Twas on the 
 evening of a winter's day,' in a pretty contralto voice. 
 
 ' Do you like that old thing, Mr. Smith ? ' she said 
 at the end. 
 
 'Yes, I do much,' said Stephen — words he would 
 have uttered, and sincerely, to anything on earth, from 
 glee to requiem, that she might have chosen. 
 
 ' You shall have a little one by De Leyre, that was 
 given me by a young French lady who was staying at 
 Endelstow House : 
 
 '"Je I'ai plants, je I'ai vu naJtre, 
 Ce beau rosier ou les oiseaux," &c. ; 
 
 and then I shall want to give you my own favourite for 
 the very last, Shelley's " When the lamp is shattered," as 
 set to music by my poor mother. I so much like singing 
 to anybody who really cares to hear me.' 
 
 Every woman who makes a permanent impression 
 on a man is usually recalled to his mind's eye as she 
 appeared in one particular scene, which seems ordained 
 to be her special form of manifestation throughout the 
 pages of his memory. As the patron Saint has her 
 attitude and accessories in mediaeval illumination, so 
 the sweetheart may be said to have hers upon the table 
 of her true Love's fancy, without which she is rarely 
 introduced there except by effort; and this though she 
 may, on further acquaintance, have been observed in 
 many other phases which one would imagine to be far 
 more appropriate to love's young dream. 
 
 Miss Elfride's image chose the form in which she 
 was beheld during these minutes of singing, for her per- 
 manent attitude of visitation to Stephen's eyes during his 
 sleeping and waking hours in after days. The profile 
 is seen of a young woman in a pale gray silk dress with 
 trimmings of swan's-down, and opening up from a point 
 in front, Uke a waistcoat without a shirt ; the cool colour 
 
 19 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 contrasting admirably with the warm bloom of her neck 
 and face. The furthermost candle on the piano comes 
 immediately in a line with her head, and half invisible 
 itself, forms the accidentally frizzled hair into a nebulous 
 haze of light, surrounding her crown like an aureola. 
 Her hands are in their place on the keys, her lips 
 parted, and trilling forth, in a tender diminuendo, the 
 closing words of the sad apostrophe : 
 
 ' O Love, who bewailest 
 
 The frailty of all things here, 
 Why choose you the frailest 
 
 For your cradle, your home, and your bier ! ' 
 
 Her head is forward a little, and her eyes directed 
 keenly upward to the top of the page of music con- 
 , fronting her. Then comes a rapid look into Stephen's 
 face, and a still more rapid look back again to her 
 business, her face having dropped its sadness, and 
 acquired a certain expression of mischievous archness 
 the while ; which lingered there for some time, but was 
 never developed into a positive smile of flirtation. 
 
 Stephen suddenly shifted his position from her right 
 hand to her left, where there was just room enough for 
 a small ottoman to stand between the piano and the 
 corner of the room. Into this nook he squeezed him- 
 self, and gazed wistfully up into Elfride's face. So long 
 and so earnestly gazed he, that her cheek deepened to a 
 more and more crimson tint as each line was added to 
 her song. Concluding, and pausing motionless after 
 the last word for a minute or two, she ventured to look 
 at him again. His features wore an expression of 
 unutterable heaviness. 
 
 •You don't hear many songs, do you, Mr. Smith, 
 to take so much notice of these of mine ? ' 
 
 ' Perhaps it was the means and vehicle of the song 
 that I was noticing: I mean yourself,' he answered gently. 
 
 ' Now, Mr. Smith ! ' 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 ' It is perfectly true ; I don't hear much singing. 
 You mistake what I am, I fancy. Because I come as 
 a stranger to a secluded spot, you think I must needs 
 come from a life of bustle, and know the latest move- 
 ments of the day. But I don't. My life is as quiet 
 as yours, and more solitary ; solitary as death.' 
 
 ' The death which comes from a plethora of life ? 
 But seriously, I can quite see that you are not the 
 least what I thought you would be before I saw you. 
 You are not critical, or experienced, or — much to 
 mind. That's why I don't mind singing airs to you 
 that I only half know.' Finding' that by this confession 
 she had vexed him in a way she did not intend, she 
 added naively, ' I mean, Mr. Smith, that you are better, 
 not worse, for being only young and not very experi- 
 enced. You don't think my Ufa here so very tame and 
 dull, I know.' 
 
 ' I do not, indeed,' he said with fervour. ' It must 
 be delightfully poetical, and sparkling, and fresh, 
 and ' 
 
 ' There you go, Mr. Smith ! Well, men of another 
 kind, when I get them to be honest enough to own 
 the truth, think just the reverse : that my life must be 
 a dreadful bore in its normal state, though pleasant 
 for the exceptional few days they pass here.' 
 
 ' I could live here always ! ' he said, and with such 
 a tone and look of unconscious revelation that Elfride 
 was startled to find that her harmonies had fired a small 
 Troy, in the shape of Stephen's heart. She said quickly : 
 
 ' But you can't live here always.' 
 
 ' Oh no.' And he drew himself in with the sensi- 
 tiveness of a snail. 
 
 Elfride's emotions were sudden as his in kindling, but 
 the least of woman's lesser infirmities — love of admira- 
 tion — caused an inflammable disposition on his part, so 
 exactly similar to her own, to appear as meritorious in 
 him as modesty made her own seem culpable in her. 
 
 21 
 
TV 
 
 • Where heaves the turf in many a moidd'ring heap.' 
 
 For reasons of his own, Stephen Smith was stirring 
 a short time after dawn the next morning. From the 
 window of his room he could see, first, two bold 
 escarpments sloping down together like the letter V. 
 Towards the bottom, like liquid in a funnel, appeared 
 the sea, gray and small. On the brow of one hill, of 
 rather greater altitude than its neighbour, stood the 
 church which was to be the scene of his operations. 
 The lonely edifice was black and bare, cutting up into 
 the sky from the very tip of the hill. It had a 
 square mouldering tower, owning neither battlement 
 nor pinnacle, and seemed a monolithic termination, of 
 one substance with the ridge, rather than a structure 
 raised thereon. Round the church ran a low wall; 
 over-topping the wall in general level was the grave- 
 yard ; not as a graveyard usually is, a fragment of 
 landscape with its due variety of chiaro-oscuro, but a 
 mere profile against the sky, serrated with the outlines 
 of graves and a very few memorial stones. Not a tree 
 could exist up there : nothing but the monotonous 
 gray-green grass. 
 
 riv3 minutes after this casual survey was made his 
 
■A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 bedroom was empty, and its occupant had vanished 
 quietly from the house. 
 
 At the end of two hours he was again in the room, 
 looking warm and glowing. He now pursued the 
 artistic details of dressing, which on his first rising 
 had been entirely omitted. And a very blooming 
 boy he looked, after that mysterious morning scamper. 
 His mouth was a triumph of its class. It was the 
 cleanly-cut, piquantly pursed-up mouth of William 
 Pitt, as represented in the well or little known bust 
 by NoUekens — a mouth which is in itself a young 
 man's fortune, if properly exercised. His round chin, 
 where its upper part turned inward, still continued its 
 perfect and full curve, seeming to press in to a point 
 the bottom of his nether lip at their place of junction. 
 
 Once he murmured the name of Elfride. Ah, there 
 she was ! On the lawn in a plain dress, without hat or 
 bonnet, running with a boy's velocity, superadded to a 
 girl's lightness, after a tame rabbit she was endeavouring 
 to capture, her strategic intonations of coaxing words 
 alternating with desperate rushes so much out of keeping 
 with them, that the hollowness of such expressions was 
 but too evident to her pet, who darted and dodged in 
 carefully timed counterpart. 
 
 The scene down there was altogether different from 
 that of the hills. A thicket of shrubs and trees enclosed 
 the favoured spot from the wilderness without ; even at 
 this time of the year the grass was luxuriant there. No 
 wind blew inside the protecting belt of evergreens, 
 wasting its force upon the higher and stronger trees 
 forming the outer margin of the grove. 
 
 Then he heard a heavy person shuffling about in 
 slippers, and calling ' Mr. Smith ! ' Smith proceeded 
 to the study, and found Mr. Swancourt. The young 
 man expressed his gladness to see his host downstairs. 
 
 ' Oh yes ; I knew I should soon be right again. I 
 have not made the acquaintance of gout for more than 
 
 23 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 two years, and it generally goes off the second night. 
 Well, where have you been this morning ? I saw you 
 come in just now, I think ! ' 
 
 ' Yes ; I have been for a walk.' 
 
 ' Start early ? ' 
 
 ' Yes.' 
 
 ' Very early, I think ? ' 
 
 ' Yes, it was rather early.' 
 
 ' Which way did you go ? To the sea, I suppose. 
 Everybody goes seaward.' 
 
 ' No ; I followed up the river as far as the park wall.' 
 
 ' You are different from your kind. Well, I suppose 
 such a wild place is a novelty, and so tempted you out 
 of bed ? ' 
 
 ' Not altogether a novelty. I like it.' 
 
 The youth seemed averse to explanation. 
 
 'You must, you must; to go cock-watching the 
 morning after a journey of fourteen or sixteen hours. 
 But there's no accounting for tastes, and I am glad to 
 see that yours are no meaner. After breakfast, but not 
 before, I shall be good for a ten miles' walk. Master 
 Smith.' 
 
 Certainly there seemed nothing exaggerated in that 
 assertion. Mr. Swancourt by daylight showed himself 
 to be a man who, in common with the other two people 
 under his roof, had really strong claims to be considered 
 handsome, — handsome, that is, in the sense in which 
 the moon is bright : the ravines and valleys which, on a 
 close inspection, are seen to diversify its surface being 
 left out of the argument. His face was of a tint that 
 never deepened upon his cheeks nor lightened upon his 
 forehead, but remained uniform throughout; the usual 
 neutral salmon-colour of a man who feeds well — not to 
 say too well — and does not think hard; every pore 
 being in visible working order. His tout ensemble was 
 that of a highly improved class of farmer, dressed up 
 in the wrong clothes ; that of a firm-standing perpen- 
 
 24 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 dicular man, whose fall would have been backwards in 
 direction if he had ever lost his balance. 
 
 The vicar's background was at present what a vicar's 
 background should be, his study. Here the consistency 
 ends. All along the chimneypiece were ranged bottles 
 of horse, pig, and cow medicines, and against the wall 
 was a high table, made up of the fragments of an old 
 oak lych-gate. Upon this stood stuffed specimens of 
 owls, divers, and gulls, and over them bunches of wheat 
 and barley ears, labelled with the date of the year that 
 produced them. Some cases and shelves, more or less 
 laden with books, the prominent titles of which were 
 Dr. Brown's ' Notes on the Romans,' Dr. Smith's 
 ' Notes on the Corinthians,' and Dr. Robinson's ' Notes 
 on the Galatians, Ephesians, and Philippians,' just saved 
 the character of the place, in spite of a girl's doU's- 
 house standing above them, a marine aquarium in the 
 window, and Elfride's hat hanging on its corner. 
 
 ' Business, business ! ' said Mr. Swancourt after 
 breakfast. He began to find it necessary to act the 
 part of a fly-wheel towards the somewhat irregular 
 forces of his visitor. 
 
 They prepared to go to the church; the vicar, on 
 second thoughts, mounting his coal-black mare to avoid 
 exerting his foot too much at starting. Stephen said 
 he should want a man to assist him. ' Worm ! ' the 
 vicar shouted. 
 
 A minute or two after a voice was heard round the 
 corner of the building, mumbling, 'Ah, I used to be 
 strong enough, but 'tis altered now ! Well, there, I'm 
 as independent as one here and there, even if they do 
 write 'squire after their names.' 
 
 'What's the matter?' said the vicar, as William 
 Worm appeared ; when the remarks were repeated to 
 him. 
 
 ' Worm says some very true things sometimes,' Mr. 
 Swancourt said, turning to Stephen. ' Now, as regards 
 c 25 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 that word "esquire." Why, Mr. Smith, that word 
 " esquire " is gone to the dogs, — used on the letters of 
 every jackanapes who has a black coat. Anything else, 
 Worm?' 
 
 ' Ay, the folk have begun frying again ! ' 
 
 ' Dear me ! I'm sorry to hear that.' 
 
 ' Yes,' Worm said groaningly to Stephen, ' I've got 
 such a noise in my head that there's no living night 
 nor day. 'Tis just for all the world like people frying 
 fish : fry, fry, fry, all day long in my poor head, till I 
 don't know whe'r I'm here or yonder. There, God 
 A'mighty will find it out sooner or later, I hope, and 
 relieve me.' 
 
 ' Now, my deafness,' said Mr. Swancourt impres- 
 sively, 'is a dead silence; but William Worm's is that 
 of people frying fish in his head. Very remarkable, 
 isn't it ? ' 
 
 ' I can hear the frying-pan a-fizzing as naterel as life,' 
 said Worm corroboratively. 
 
 ' Yes, it is remarkable,' said Mr. Smith. 
 
 ' Very peculiar, very peculiar,' echoed the vicar ; and 
 they all then followed the path up the hill, bounded on 
 each side by a little stone wall, from which gleamed 
 fragments of quartz and blood-red marbles, apparently 
 of inestimable value, in their setting of brown alluvium. 
 Stephen walked with the dignity of a man close to the 
 horse's head. Worm stumbled along a stone's throw in 
 the rear, and Elfride was nowhere in particular, yet 
 everywhere; sometimes in front, sometimes behind, 
 sometimes at the sides, hovering about the procession 
 like a butterfly; not definitely engaged in travelling, 
 yet somehow chiming in at points with the general 
 progress. 
 
 The vicar explained things as he went on: 'The 
 fact is, Mr. Smith, I didn't want this bother of church 
 restoration at all, but it was necessary to do something 
 
 in self-defence, on account of those d dissenters : 
 
 26 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 I use the word in its scriptural meaning, of course, not 
 as an expletive.' 
 
 ' How very odd ! ' said Stephen, with the concern 
 demanded of serious friendliness. 
 
 ' Odd ? That's nothing to how it is in the parish of 
 
 Twinkley. Both the churchwardens are ; there, I 
 
 won't say what they are ; and the clerk and the sexton 
 as well.' 
 
 ' How very strange ! ' said Stephen. 
 
 ' Strange ? My dear sir, that's nothing to how it is 
 in the parish of Sinnerton. However, as to our own 
 parish, I hope we shall make some progress soon.' 
 
 ' You must trust to circumstances.' 
 
 'There are no circumstances to trust to. We may 
 as well trust in Providence if we trust at all. But here 
 we are. A wild place, isn't it ? But I like it on such 
 days as these.' 
 
 The churchyard was entered on this side by a stone 
 stile, over which having clambered, you remained still 
 on the wild hill, the within not being so divided from 
 the without as to obliterate the sense of open freedom. 
 A delightful place to be buried in, postulating that 
 delight can accompany a man to his tomb under any 
 circumstances. There was nothing horrible in this 
 churchyard, in the shape of tight mounds bonded with 
 sticks, which shout imprisonment in the ears rather 
 than whisper rest; or trim garden-flowers, which only 
 raise images of people in new black crape and white 
 handkerchiefs coming to tend them ; or wheel-marks, 
 which remind us of hearses and mourning coaches ; or 
 cypress-bushes, which make a parade of sorrow; or 
 coffin-boards and bones lying behind trees, showing 
 that we are only leaseholders of our graves. No ; 
 nothing but long, wild, untutored grass, diversifying the 
 forms of the mounds it covered, — themselves irregularly 
 shaped, with no eye to effect ; the impressive presence 
 of the old mountain that all this was a part of being 
 
 27 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 nowhere excluded by disguising art. Outside were 
 similar slopes and similar grass; and then the serene 
 impassive sea, visible to a width of half the horizon, 
 and meeting the eye with the effect of a vast con- 
 cave, like the interior of a blue vessel. Detached 
 rocks stood upright afar, a collar of foam girding their 
 bases, and repeating in its whiteness the plumage of 
 a countless multitude of gulls that restlessly hovered 
 about. 
 
 ' Now, Worm ! ' said Mr. Swancourt sharply ; and 
 Worm started into an attitude of attention at once to 
 receive orders. Stephen and himself were then left in 
 possession, and the work went on till early in the 
 afternoon, when dinner was announced by Unity of 
 the vicarage kitchen running up the hill without a 
 bonnet. 
 
 Elfride did not make her appearance inside the 
 building till late in the afternoon, and came then by 
 special invitation from Stephen during dinner. She 
 looked so intensely living and full of movement as she 
 came into the old silent place, that young Smith's world 
 began to be lit by ' the purple light ' in all its definite- 
 ness. Worm was got rid of by sending him to measure 
 the height of the tower. 
 
 What could she do but come close — so close that a 
 minute arc of her skirt touched his foot — and asked 
 him how he was getting on with his sketches, and set 
 herself to learn the principles of practical mensuration as 
 applied to irregular buildings ? Then she must ascend 
 the pulpit to re-imagine for the hundredth time how it 
 would seem to be a preacher. 
 
 Presently she leant over the front of the pulpit. 
 
 ' Don't you tell papa, will you, Mr. Smith, if I tell 
 you something?' she said with a sudden impulse to 
 make a confidence. 
 
 ' Oh no, that I won't,' said he, staring up. 
 28 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 ' Well, I write papa's sermons for him very often, and 
 he preaches them better than he does his own ; and then 
 afterwards he talks to people and to me about what he 
 said in his sermon to-day, and forgets that I wrote it 
 for him. Isn't it absurd ? ' 
 
 ' How clever you must be ! ' said Stephen. ' I 
 couldn't write a sermon for the world.' 
 
 ' Oh, it's easy enough,' she said, descending from 
 the pulpit and coming close to him to explain more 
 vividly. ' You do it like this. ' Did you ever play a 
 game of forfeits called " When is it ? where is it ? what 
 is it ? " ' 
 
 ' No, never.' 
 
 ' Ah, that's a pity, because writing a sermon is very 
 much like playing that game. You take the text. You 
 think, why is it ? what is it ? and so on. You put that 
 down under " Generally." Then you proceed to the 
 First, Secondly, and Thirdly. Papa won't have Fourthlys 
 — says they are all my eye. Then you have a final 
 Collectively, several pages of this being put in great 
 black brackets, writing opposite, " Leave this out if the 
 farmers are falling asleep." Then comes your In Con- 
 clusion, then A Few Words And I Have Done. Well, 
 all this time you have put on the back of each page, 
 " Keep your voice down " — I mean,' she added, correcting 
 herself, ' that's how I do in papa's sermon-book, because 
 otherwise he gets louder and louder, till at last he shouts 
 like a farmer up a-field. Oh, papa is so funny in some 
 things ! ' 
 
 Then, after this childish burst of confidence, she 
 was frightened, as if warned by womanly instinct, which 
 for the moment her ardour had outrun, that she had 
 been too forward to a comparative stranger. 
 
 Elfride saw her father then, and went away into the 
 wind, being caught by a gust as she ascended the 
 churchyard slope, in which gust she had the motions, 
 without the motives, of a hoiden ; the grace, without the 
 
 29 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 self-consciousness, of a pirouetter. She conversed for 
 a minute or two with her father, and proceeded home- 
 ward, Mr. Swancourt coming on to the church to 
 Stephen. The wind had freshened his warm complexion 
 as it freshens the glow of a brand. He was in a mood 
 of jollity, and watched Elfride down the hill with a 
 smile. 
 
 ' You little flyaway ! you look wild enough now,' he 
 said, and turned to Stephen. ' But she's not a wild 
 child at all, Mr. Smith. As steady as you; and that 
 you are steady I see from your diligence here.' 
 
 ' I think Miss Swancourt very clever,' Stephen 
 observed. 
 
 ' Yes, she is ; certainly, she is,' said papa, turning 
 his voice as much as possible to the neutral tone of 
 disinterested criticism. ' Now, Smith, I'll tell you some- 
 thing ; but she mustn't know it for the world — not for 
 the world, mind, for she insists upon keeping it a dead 
 secret. Why, she writes my sermons for me often, and a 
 very good job she makes of them ! ' 
 
 ' She can do anything.' 
 
 ' She can do that. The little rascal has the very 
 trick of the trade. But, mind you. Smith, not a word 
 about it to her, not a single word ! ' 
 
 • Not a word,' said Smith. 
 
 ' Look there,' said Mr. Swancourt. ' What do you 
 think of my roofing?' He pointed with his walking- 
 stick at the chancel roof. 
 
 ' Did you do that, sir ? ' 
 
 ' Yes, I worked in shirt-sleeves all the time that was 
 going on. I pulled down the old rafters, fixed the new 
 ones, put on the battens, slated the roof, all with my 
 own hands, Worm being my assistant. We worked like 
 slaves, didn't we. Worm ? ' 
 
 ' Ay, sure, we did ; harder than some here and there 
 — hee, hee ! ' said William Worm, cropping up from 
 somewhere. ' Like slaves, 'a b'lieve— hee, hee ! And 
 3° 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 weren't ye foaming mad, sir, when the nails wouldn't 
 go straight ? Mighty I ! There, 'tisn't so bad to cuss 
 and keep it in as to cuss and let it out, is it, sir ? ' 
 
 ' Well— why ? ' 
 
 'Because you, sir, when ye were a-putting on the 
 roof, only used to cuss in your mind, which is, I 
 suppose, no harm at all.' 
 
 ' I don't think you know what goes on in my mind. 
 Worm.' 
 
 'Oh, doan't I, sir — ^hee, hee ! Maybe I'm but a 
 poor wambling thing, sir, and can't read much ; but I 
 can spell as well as some here and there. Doan't ye 
 mind, sir, that blustrous night when ye asked me to 
 hold the candle to ye in yer workshop, when you were 
 making a new chair for the chancel ? ' 
 
 ' Yes ; what of that ? ' 
 
 'I stood with the candle, and you said you liked 
 company, if 'twas only a dog or cat — maning me ; and 
 the chair wouldn't do nohow.' 
 
 * Ah, I remember.' 
 
 ' No ; the chair wouldn't do nohow. 'A was very 
 well to look at ; but. Lord ! ' 
 
 ' Worm, how often have I corrected you for irreverent 
 speaking ? ' 
 
 ' — 'A was very well to look at, but you couldn't sit 
 in the chair nohow. 'Twas all a-twist wi' the chair, 
 like the letter Z, directly you sat down upon the chair. 
 " Get up. Worm," says you, when you seed the chair go 
 all a-sway wi' me. Up you took the chair, and flung en 
 like fire and brimstone to t'other end of your shop — all 
 in a passion. " Damn the chair ! " says I. " Just what 
 I was thinking," says you, sir. " I could see it in your 
 face, sir," says I, " and I hope you and God will forgi'e 
 me for saying what you wouldn't.'' To save your life 
 you couldn't help laughing, sir, at a poor wambler 
 reading your thoughts so plain. Ay, I'm as wise as one 
 here and there.' 
 
 31 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 ' I thought you had better have a practical man to 
 go over the church and tower with you,' Mr. Swancourt 
 said to Stephen the following morning, ' so I got Lord 
 Luxellian's permission to send for a man when you 
 came. I told him to be there at ten o'clock. He's a 
 very intelligent man, and he will tell you all you want 
 to know about the state of the walls. His name is 
 John Smith.' 
 
 Elfride did not like to be seen again at the church 
 with Stephen. ' I will watch here for your appearance 
 at the top of the tower,' she said laughingly. ' I shall 
 see your figure against the sky.' 
 
 • And when I am up there I'll wave my handkerchief 
 to you. Miss Swancourt,' said Stephen. ' In twelve 
 minutes from this present moment,' he added, looking 
 at his watch, ' I'll be at the summit and look out for 
 you.' 
 
 She went round to the corner of the shrubbery, 
 whence she could watch him down the slope leading 
 to the foot of the hill on which the church stood. 
 There she saw waiting for him a white spot — a mason 
 in his working clothes. Stephen met this man and 
 stopped. 
 
 To her surprise, instead of their moving on to the 
 churchyard, they both leisurely sat down upon a stone 
 close by their meeting-place, and remained as if in 
 deep conversation. Elfride looked at the time; nine 
 of the twelve minutes had passed, and Stephen showed 
 no signs of moving. More minutes passed — she grew 
 cold with waiting, and shivered. It was not till the 
 end of a quarter of an hour that they began to slowly 
 wend up the hill at a snail's pace. 
 
 'Rude and unmannerly!' she said to herself, 
 colouring with pique. ' Anybody would think he was 
 in love with that horrid mason instead of with ' 
 
 The sentence remained unspoken, though not un- 
 thought. 
 
 32 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 She returned to the porch. 
 
 ' Is the man you sent for a lazy, sit-still, do-nothing 
 kind of man ? ' she inquired of her father. 
 
 ' No,' he said surprised ; ' quite the reverse. He 
 is Lord Luxellian's master-mason, John Smith.' 
 
 ' Oh,' said Elfride indiiferently, and returned towards 
 her bleak station, and waited and shivered again. It 
 was a trifle, after all — a childish thing — looking out 
 from a tower and waving a handkerchief. But her new 
 friend had promised, and why should he tease her so ? 
 The eifect of a blow is as proportionate to the texture 
 of the object struck as to its own momentum ; and she 
 had such a superlative capacity for being wounded that 
 little hits struck her hard. 
 
 It was not till the end of half an hour that two 
 figures were seen above the parapet of the dreary old 
 pile, motionless as bitterns on a ruined mosque. Even 
 then Stephen was not true enough to perform what he 
 was so courteous to promise, and he vanished without 
 making a sign. 
 
 He returned at midday. Elfride looked vexed when 
 unconscious that his eyes were upon her; when con- 
 scious, severe. However, her attitude of coldness had 
 long outlived the coldness itself, and she could no 
 longer utter feigned words of indifference. 
 
 ' Ah, you weren't kind to keep me waiting in the cold, 
 and break your promise,' she said at last reproachfully, 
 in tones too low for her father's powers of hearing. 
 
 ' Forgive, forgive me ! ' said Stephen with dismay. 
 • I had forgotten — quite forgotten ! Something pre- 
 vented my remembering.' 
 
 ' Any further explanation ? ' said Miss Capricious, 
 pouting. 
 
 He was silent for a few minutes, and looked 
 askance. 
 
 ' None,' he said, with the accent of one who con- 
 cealed a sin. 
 
 33 C 
 
'Bosom'd high in tufted trees.' 
 
 1 
 
 T was breakfast time. 
 
 As seen from the vicarage dining-room, which took 
 a warm tone of light from the fire, the weather and 
 scene outside seemed to have stereotyped themselves 
 in unrelieved shades of gray. The long-armed trees 
 and shrubs of juniper, cedar, and pine varieties, were 
 grayish-black; those of the broad-leaved sort, together 
 with the herbage, were grajrish-green ; the eternal hills 
 and tower behind them were grayish-brown ; the sky, 
 dropping behind all, gray of the purest melancholy. 
 
 Yet in spite of this sombre artistic effect, the morn- 
 ing was not one which tended to lower the spirits. It 
 was even cheering. For it did not rain, nor was rain 
 likely to fall for many days to come. 
 
 Elfride had turned from the table towards the fire 
 and was idly elevating a hand-screen before her face, 
 when she heard the cUck of a Uttle gate outside. 
 
 ' Ah, here's the postman ! ' she said, as a shufHing, 
 active man came through an opening in the shrubbery 
 and across the lawn. She vanished, and met him in the 
 porch, afterwards coming in with her hands behind her 
 back. 
 
 34 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 ' How many are there ? Three for papa, one for 
 Mr. Smith, none for Miss Swancourt. And, papa, 
 look here, one of yours is from — whom do you think ? 
 — Lord Luxellian. And it has something hard in it 
 — a lump of something. I've been feeUng it through 
 the envelope, and can't think what it is.' 
 
 ' What does Luxellian write for, I wonder ? ' Mr. 
 Swancourt had said simultaneously with her words. 
 He handed Stephen his letter, and took his own, 
 putting on his countenance a higher class of look than 
 was customary, as became a poor gentleman who was 
 going to read a letter from a peer. 
 
 Stephen read his missive with a countenance quite 
 the reverse of the vicar's. 
 
 ' Percy Place, T%ursday Evening. 
 
 'Dear Smith, — Old H. is in a towering rage with 
 
 you for being so long about the church sketches. 
 
 Swears you are more trouble than you are worth. He 
 
 says I am to write and say you are to stay no longer 
 
 on any consideration — that he would have done it all 
 
 in three hours very easily. I told him that you were 
 
 not like an experienced hand, which he seemed to 
 
 forget, but it did not make much difference. However, 
 
 between you and me privately, if I were you I would not 
 
 alarm myself for a day or so, if I were not inclined to 
 
 return. I would make out the week and finish my spree. 
 
 He will blow up just as much if you appear here on 
 
 Saturday as if you keep away till Monday morning. — 
 
 Yours very truly, 
 
 ' SiMPKiNS Jenkins.' 
 
 ' Dear me — very awkward ! ' said Stephen, rather 
 en fair, and confused with the kind of confusion that 
 assails an understrapper when he has been enlarged 
 by accident to the dimensions of a superior, and is 
 somewhat rudely pared down to his original size. 
 
 35 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 ' What is awkward ? ' said Miss Swancourt. 
 
 Smith by this time recovered his equanimity, and 
 with it the professional dignity of an experienced 
 architect. 
 
 ' Important business demands my immediate pre- 
 sence in London, I regret to say,' he repjied. 
 
 ' What ! Must you go at once ? ' said Mr. Swan- 
 court, looking over the edge of his letter. ' Important 
 business? A young fellow like you to have important 
 business ! ' 
 
 'The truth is,' said Stephen blushing, and rather 
 ashamed of having pretended even so slightly to a con- 
 sequence which did not belong to him, — ' the truth 
 is, Mr. Hewby has sent to say I am to come home ; 
 and I must obey him.' 
 
 ' I see ; I see. It is politic to do so, you mean. 
 Now I can see more than you think. You are to be 
 his partner. I booked you for that directly I read 
 his letter to me the other day, and the way he spoke 
 of you. He thinks a great deal of you, Mr. Smith, or 
 he wouldn't be so anxious for your return.' 
 
 Unpleasant to Stephen such remarks as these could 
 not sound; to have the expectancy of partnership 
 with one of the largest-practising architects in London 
 thrust upon him was cheering, however untenable he 
 felt the idea to be. He saw that, whatever Mr. Hewby 
 might think, Mr. Swancourt certainly thought much 
 of him to entertain such an idea on such slender 
 ground as to be absolutely no ground at all. And 
 then, unaccountably, his speaking face exhibited a 
 cloud of sadness, which a reflection on the remote- 
 ness of any such contingency could hardly have sufficed 
 to cause. 
 
 Elfride was struck with that look of his ; even Mr. 
 Swancourt noticed it. 
 
 'Well,' he said cheerfully, 'never mind that now. 
 You must come again on your own account ; not on 
 36 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 business. Come to see me as a visitor, you know — 
 say, in your holidays — all you town men have holidays 
 like schoolboys. When are they ? ' 
 
 ' In August, I believe.' 
 
 'Very well; come in August; and then you need 
 not hurry away so. I am glad to get somebody decent 
 to talk to, or at, in this outlandish ultima Thule. But, 
 by the bye, I have something to say — you won't go 
 to-day ? ' 
 
 ' No ; I need not,' said Stephen hesitatingly. ' I 
 am not obliged to get back before Monday morning.' 
 
 'Very well, then, that brings me to what I am 
 going to propose. This is a letter from Lord Luxellian. 
 I think you heard me speak of him as the resident 
 landowner in this district, and patron of this living ? ' 
 
 ' I — know of him.' 
 
 ' He is in London now. It seems that he has 
 run up on business for a day or two, and taken Lady 
 Ltixellian with him. He has written to ask me to go 
 to his house, and search for a paper among his private 
 memoranda, which he forgot to take with him.' 
 
 ' What did he send in the letter ? ' inquired' 
 Elfride. 
 
 ' The key of a private desk in which the papers 
 are. He doesn't like to trust such a matter to any- 
 body else. I have done such things for him before. 
 And what I propose is, that we make an afternoon of 
 it — all three of us. Go for a drive to Targan Bay, 
 come home by way of Endelstow House j and whilst 
 I am looking over the documents you can ramble 
 about the rooms where you like. I have the run of 
 the house at any time, you know. The building, 
 though nothing but a mass of gables outside, has a 
 splendid hall, staircase, and gallery within; and there 
 are a few good pictures.' 
 
 ' Yes, there are,' said Stephen. 
 ' Have you seen the place, then ? ' 
 37 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 ' I saw it as I came by,' he said hastily. 
 
 ' Oh yes ; but I was alluding to the interior. And 
 the church — St. Eval's — is much older than our St. 
 Agnes' here. I do duty in that and this alternately, 
 you know. The fact is, I ought to have some help ; 
 riding across that park for two miles on a wet morning 
 is not at all the thing. If my constitution were not 
 well seasoned, as thank God it is,' — here Mr. Swan- 
 court looked down his front, as if his constitution 
 were visible there, — ' I should be coughing and barking 
 all the year round. And when the family goes away, 
 there are only about three servants to preach to when 
 I get there. Well, that shall be the arrangement, then. 
 Elfride, you will like to go ? ' 
 
 Elfride assented ; and the little breakfast-party sepa- 
 rated. Stephen rose to go and take a few final mea- 
 surements at the church, the vicar following him to 
 the door with a mysterious expression of inquiry on 
 his face. 
 
 'You'll put up with our not having family prayer 
 this morning, I hope ? ' he whispered. 
 
 ' Yes ; quite so,' said Stephen. 
 
 ' To tell you the truth,' he continued in the same 
 undertone, ' we don't make a regular thing of it ; but 
 when we have strangers visiting us, I am strongly of 
 opinion that it is the proper thing to do, and I always 
 do it. I am very strict on that point. But you. 
 Smith, there is something in your face which makes 
 me feel quite at home; no nonsense about you, in 
 short. Ah, it reminds me of a splendid story I used 
 to hear when I was a helter-skelter young fellow — 
 such a story! But' — here the vicar shook his head 
 self-forbiddingly, and grimly laughed. 
 
 'Was it a good story?' said young Smith, smiling 
 too. 
 
 ' Oh yes ; but 'tis too bad— too bad ! Couldn't tell 
 it to you for the world ! ' 
 
 38 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 Stephen went across the lawn, hearing the vicar 
 chuckling privately at the recollection as he withdrew. 
 
 They started at three o'clock. The gray morning 
 had resolved itself into an afternoon bright with a 
 pale pervasive sunlight, without the sun itself being 
 visible. Lightly they trotted along — the wheels nearly 
 silent, the horse's hoofs clapping, almost ringing, upon 
 the hard, white, turnpike road as it followed the level 
 ridge in a perfectly straight line, seeming to be absorbed 
 ultimately by the white of the sky. 
 
 Targan Bay — which had the merit of being easily 
 got at — was duly visited. They then swept round by 
 innumerable Janes, in which not twenty consecutive 
 yards were either straight or level, to the domain of 
 Lord Luxellian. A woman with a double chin and 
 thick neck, like Queen Anne by Dahl, threw open the 
 lodge gate, a little boy standing behind her. 
 
 ' I'll give him something, poor little fellow,' said 
 Elfride, pulling out her purse and hastily opening it. 
 From the interior of her purse a host of bits of paper, 
 like a flock of white birds, floated into the air, and were 
 blown about in all directions. i 
 
 ' Well, to be sure ! ' said Stephen with a slight 
 laugh. 
 
 ' What the dickens is all that ? ' said Mr. Swancourt. 
 ' Not halves of bank-notes, Elfride ? ' 
 
 Elfride looked annoyed and guilty. ' They are only 
 something of mine, papa,' she faltered, whilst Stephen 
 leapt out, and, assisted by the lodge-keeper's little boy, 
 crept about round the wheels and horse's hoofs till the 
 papers were all gathered together again. He handed 
 them back to her, and remounted. 
 
 ' I suppose you are wondering what those scraps 
 were ? ' she said, as they bowled along up the sycamore 
 avenue. ' And so I may as well tell you. They are 
 notes for a romance I am writing.' 
 
 39 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 She could not help colouring at the confession, much 
 as she tried to avoid it. 
 
 ' A story, do you mean ? ' said Stephen, Mr. Swan- 
 court half listening, and catching a word of the con- 
 versation now and then. 
 
 'Yesj The Court of Kelly on Castle; a romance of 
 the fifteenth century. Such writing is out of date now, 
 I know ; but I like doing it.' 
 
 ' A romance carried in a purse ! If a highwayman 
 were to rob you, he would be taken in.' 
 
 'Yes; that's my way of carrying manuscript. The 
 real reason is, that I mostly write bits of it on scraps of 
 paper when I am on horseback ; and I put them there 
 for convenience.' 
 
 ' What are you going to do with your romance when 
 you have written it ? ' said Stephen. 
 
 ' I don't know,' she replied, and turned her head to 
 look at the prospect. 
 
 For by this time they had reached the precincts of 
 Endelstow House. Driving through an ancient gate- 
 way of dun - coloured stone, spanned by the high- 
 shouldered Tudor arch, they found themselves in a 
 spacious court, closed by a fagade on each of its 
 three sides. The substantial portions of the existing 
 building dated from the reign of Henry VIII. ; but 
 the picturesque and sheltered spot had been the 
 site of an erection of a much earlier date. A 
 licence to crenellate mansum infra manerium suum 
 was granted by Edward II. to ' Hugo Luxellen 
 chivaler ; ' but though the faint outline of the ditch 
 and mound was visible at points, no sign of the 
 original building remained. 
 
 The windows on all sides were long and many- 
 muUioned ; the roof lines broken up by dormer lights 
 of the same pattern. The apex stones of these dormers, 
 together with those of the gables, were surmounted by 
 grotesque figures in rampant, passant, and couchant 
 40 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 variety. Tall octagonal and twisted chimneys thrust 
 themselves high up into the sky, surpassed in height, 
 however, by some poplars and sycamores at the back, 
 which showed their gently rocking summits over ridge 
 and parapet. In the corners of the court polygonal 
 bays, whose surfaces were entirely occupied by buttresses 
 and windows, broke into the squareness of the enclosure ; 
 and a far-projecting oriel, springing from a fantastic 
 series of mouldings, overhung the archway of the chief 
 entrance to the house. 
 
 As Mr. Swancourt had remarked, he had the freedom 
 of the mansion in the absence of its owner. Upon a 
 statement of his errand they were all admitted to the 
 library, and left entirely to themselves. Mr. Swan- 
 court was soon up to his eyes in the examination 
 of a heap of papers he had taken from the cabinet 
 described by his correspondent. Stephen and Elfride 
 had nothing to do but to wander about till her father 
 was ready. 
 
 Elfride entered the gallery, and Stephen followed her 
 without seeming to do so. It was a long sombre 
 apartment, enriched with fittings a century or so later 
 in style than the walls of the mansion. Pilasters of 
 Renaissance workmanship supported a cornice from 
 which sprang a curved ceiling, panelled in the awkward 
 twists and curls of the period. The old Gothic quarries 
 still remained in the upper portion of the large window 
 at the end, though they had made way for a more 
 modern form of glazing elsewhere. 
 
 Stephen was at one end of the gallery looking towards 
 Elfride, who stood in the midst, beginning to feel some- 
 what depressed by the society of Luxellian shades of 
 cadaverous complexion fixed by Holbein, Kneller, and 
 Lely, and seeming to gaze at and through her in a 
 moralizing mood. The silence, which cast almost a 
 spell upon them, was broken by the sudden opening of 
 a door at the far end. 
 
 D 41 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 Out bounded a pair of little girls, lightly yet warmly 
 dressed. Their eyes were sparkling; their hair swing- 
 ing about and around ; their red mouths laughing with 
 unalloyed gladness. 
 
 ' Ah, Miss Swancourt : dearest Elfie ! we heard you. 
 Are you going to stay here ? You are our little mamma, 
 are you not — our big mamma is gone to London,' said 
 one. 
 
 ' Let me tiss you,' said the other, in appearance very 
 much like the first, but to a smaller pattern. 
 
 Their pink cheeks and yellow hair were speedily 
 intermingled with the folds of Elfride's dress ; she then 
 stooped and tenderly embraced them both. 
 
 ' Such an odd thing,' said Elfride, smiling, and turn 
 ing to Stephen. ' They have taken it into their heads 
 lately to call me " little mamma," because I am very 
 fond of them, and wore a dress the other day something 
 like one of Lady Luxellian's.' 
 
 These two young creatures were the Honourable 
 Mary and the Honourable Kate — scarcely appearing 
 large enough as yet to bear the weight of such pon- 
 derous prefixes. They were the only two children of 
 Lord and Lady Luxellian, and, as it proved, had 
 been left at home during their parents' temporary 
 absence, in the custody of nurse and governess. Lord 
 Luxellian was dotingly fond of the children; rather 
 indifferent towards his wife, since she had begun 
 to show an inclination not to please him by giving 
 him a boy. 
 
 All children instinctively ran after Elfride, looking 
 upon her more as an unusually nice large specimen of 
 their own tribe than as a grown-up elder. It had now 
 become an established rule, that whenever she met 
 them — indoors or out-of-doors, weekdays or Sundays — 
 they were to be severally pressed against her face and 
 bosom for the space of a quarter of a minute, and other- 
 wise made much of on the delightful system of cumu- 
 42 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 lative epithet and caress to -which unpractised girls will 
 occasionally abandon themselves. 
 
 A look of misgiving by the youngsters towards the 
 door by which they had entered directed attention to 
 a maid-servant appearing from the same quarter, to put 
 an end to this sweet freedom of the poor Honourables 
 Mary and Kate. 
 
 ' I wish you lived here, Miss Swancourt,' piped one 
 like a melancholy bullfinch. 
 
 ' So do I,' piped the other like a rather more 
 melancholy bullfinch. ' Mamma can't play with us 
 so nicely as you do. I don't think she ever learnt 
 playing when she was little. When shall we come to 
 see you ? ' 
 
 ' As soon as you like, dears.' 
 
 ' And sleep at your house all night ? That's what I 
 mean by coming to see you. I don't care to see people 
 with hats and bonnets on, and all standing up and 
 walking about.' 
 
 ' As soon as we can get mamma's permission you 
 shall come and stay as long as ever you like. Good- 
 bye ! ' 
 
 The prisoners were then led off, Elfride again turning 
 her attention to her guest, whom she had left standing 
 at the remote end of the gallery. On looking around 
 for him he was nowhere to be seen. Elfride stepped 
 down to the library, thinking he might have rejoined 
 her father there. But Mr. Swancourt, now cheerfully 
 illuminated by a pair of candles, was still alone, un- 
 tying packets of letters and papers, and tying them 
 up again. 
 
 As Elfride did not stand on a sufficiently intimate 
 footing with the object of her interest to justify her, as 
 a proper young lady, to commence the active search 
 for him that youthful impulsiveness prompted, and as, 
 nevertheless, for a nascent reason connected with those 
 divinely cut lips of his, she did not like him to be absent 
 
 43 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 from her side, she wandered desultorily back to the oak 
 staircase, pouting and casting her eyes about in hope of 
 discerning his boyish figure. 
 
 Though daylight still prevailed in the rooms, the 
 corridors were in a depth of shadow — chill, sad, and 
 silent ; and it was only by looking along them towards 
 light spaces beyond that anything or anybody could be 
 discerned therein. One of these light spots she found 
 to be caused by a side-door with glass panels in the 
 upper part. Elfride opened it, and found herself con- 
 fronting a secondary or inner lawn, separated from the 
 principal lawn front by a shrubbery. 
 
 'And now she saw a perplexing sight. At right 
 angles to the face of the wing she had emerged from, 
 and within a few feet of the door, jutted out another 
 wing of the mansion, lower and with less architectural 
 character. Immediately opposite to her, in the wall 
 of this wing, was a large broad window, having its 
 blind drawn down, and illuminated by a light in the 
 room it screened. 
 
 On the blind was a shadow from somebody close 
 inside it — a person in profile. The profile was un- 
 mistakably that of Stephen. It was just possible to 
 see that his arms were uplifted, and that his hands 
 held an article of some kind. Then another shadow 
 appeared — also in profile — and came close to him. 
 This was the shadow of a woman. She turned 
 her back towards Stephen : he lifted and held out 
 what now proved to be a shawl or mantle — placed 
 it carefully — so carefully — round the lady ; disap- 
 peared ; reappeared in her front — fastened the 
 mantle. Did he then kiss her? Surely not. Yet 
 the motion might have been a kiss. Then both 
 shadows swelled to colossal dimensions — grew dis- 
 torted — vanished. 
 
 Two minutes elapsed. 
 
 ' Ah, Miss Swancourt ! I am so glad' to find 
 44 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 you. I was looking for you,' said a voice at her 
 elbow — Stephen's voice. She stepped into the 
 passage. 
 
 ' Do you know any of the members of this establish- 
 ment ? ' said she. 
 
 ' Not a single one : how should I ? ' he replied. 
 
VI 
 
 ' Fare thee weel awhile ! ' 
 
 Simultaneously with the conclusion of 
 
 Stephen's remark, the sound of the closing of 
 an external door in their immediate neighbourhood 
 reached Elfride's ears. It came from the further side 
 of the wing containing the illuminated room. She 
 then discerned, by the aid of the dusky departing 
 light, a figure, whose sex was undistinguishable, walk- 
 ing down the gravelled path by the parterre towards 
 the river. The figure grew fainter, and vanished 
 under the trees. 
 
 Mr. Swancourt's voice was heard calUng out their 
 names from a distant corridor in the body of the 
 building. They retraced their steps, and found him 
 with his coat buttoned up and his hat on, awaiting 
 their advent in a mood of self-satisfaction at having 
 brought his search to a successful close. The carriage 
 was brought round, and without further delay the trio 
 drove away from the mansion, under the echoing 
 gateway arch, and along by the leafless sycamores, as 
 the stars began to kindle their trembling lights behind 
 the maze of branches and twigs. 
 
 No words were spoken either by youth or maiden. 
 46 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 Her unpractised mind was completely occupied in 
 fathoming its recent acquisition. The young man 
 who had inspired her with such novelty of feeling, who 
 had come directly from London on business to her 
 father, having been brought by chance to Endelstow 
 House had, by some means or other, acquired the 
 privilege of approaching some lady he had found 
 therein, and of honouring her by petits soins of a 
 marked kind, — all in the space of half an hour. 
 
 What room were they standing in ? thought Elfride. 
 As nearly as she could guess, it was Lord Luxellian's 
 business-room, or ofiSce. ^Vhat people were in the 
 house ? None but the governess and servants, as far 
 as she knew, and of these he had professed a total 
 ignorance. Had the person she had indistinctly seen 
 leaving the house anything to do with the performance ? 
 It was impossible to say without appealing to the 
 culprit himself, and that she would never do. The 
 more Elfride reflected, the more certain did it appear 
 that the meeting was a chance rencounter, and not 
 an appointment. On the ultimate inquiry as to the 
 individuality of the woman, Elfride at once assumed 
 that she could not be an inferior. Stephen Smith 
 was not the man to care about passages-at-love with 
 women beneath him. Though gentle, ambition was 
 visible in his kindling eyes ; he evidently hoped for 
 much; hoped indefinitely, but extensively. Elfride 
 was puzzled, and be'ing puzzled, was, by a natural 
 sequence of girlish sensations, vexed with him. No 
 more pleasure came in recognizing that from liking to 
 attract him she was getting on to love him, boyish as 
 he was and innocent as he had seemed. 
 
 They reached the bridge which formed a link between 
 the eastern and western halves of the parish. Situated 
 in a valley that was bounded outwardly by the sea, it 
 formed a point of depression from which the road 
 ascended with great steepness to West Endelstpw and 
 47 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 the Vicarage. There was no absolute necessity for 
 either of them to alight, but as it was the vicar's custom 
 after a long journey to humour the horse in making 
 this winding ascent, Elfride, moved by an imitative 
 instinct, suddenly jumped out when Pleasant had just 
 begun to adopt the deliberate stalk he associated with 
 this portion of the road. 
 
 The young man seemed glad of any excuse for break- 
 ing the silence. 'Why, Miss Swancourt, what a risky 
 thing to do ! ' he exclaimed, immediately following her 
 example by jumping down on the other side. 
 
 ' Oh no, not at all,' replied she coldly ; the shadow 
 phenomenon at Endelstow House still paramount 
 within her. 
 
 Stephen walked along by himself for two or three 
 minutes, wrapped in the rigid reserve dictated by her 
 tone. Then apparently thinking that it was only for 
 girls to pout, he came serenely round to her side, and 
 offered his arm with Castilian gallantry, to assist her in 
 ascending the remaining three-quarters of the steep. 
 
 Here was a temptation : it was the first time in her 
 life that Elfride had been treated as a grown-up woman 
 in tliis way — offered an arm in a manner implying that 
 she had a right to refuse it. Till to-night she had 
 never received masculine attentions beyond those which 
 might be contained in such homely remarks as ' Elfride, 
 give me your hand ; ' ' Elfride, take hold of my arm,' 
 from her father. Her callow heart made an epoch of 
 the incident; she considered her array of feelings, for 
 and against. Collectively they were for taking this 
 offered arm; the single one of pique determined her 
 to punish Stephen by refusing. 
 
 ' No, thank you, Mr. Smith ; I can get along better 
 by myself 
 
 It was Elfride's first fragile attempt at browbeating 
 a lover. Fearing more the issue of such an undertaking 
 than what a gentle young man might think of her 
 48 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 wajfwardness, she immediately afterwards determined to 
 please herself by reversing her statement. 
 
 ' On second thoughts, I will take it,' she said. 
 
 They slowly went their way up the hill, a few yards 
 behind the carriage. 
 
 ' How silent you are, Miss Swancourt ! ' Stephen 
 observed. 
 
 ' Perhaps I think you silent too,' she returned. 
 
 ' I may have reason to be.' 
 
 ' Scarcely ; it is sadness that makes people silent, 
 and you can have none.' 
 
 ' You don't know : I have a trouble ; though some 
 might think it less a trouble than a dilemma.' 
 
 ' What is it ? ' she asked impulsively. 
 
 Stephen hesitated. ' I might tell,' he said ; ' at the 
 same time, perhaps, it is as well ' 
 
 She let go his arm and imperatively pushed it from 
 her, tossing her head. She had just learnt that a good 
 deal of dignity is lost by asking a question to which 
 an answer is refused, even ever so politely ; for though 
 politeness does good service in cases of requisition and 
 compromise, it but little helps a direct refusal. ' I 
 don't wish to know anything of it; I don't wish it,' 
 she went on. ' The carriage is waiting for us at the 
 top of the hill ; we must get in ; ' and Elfride flitted to 
 the front. ' Papa, here is your Elfride ! ' she exclaimed 
 to the dusky figure of the old gentleman, as she sprang 
 up and sank by his side without deigning to accept aid 
 from Stephen. 
 
 ' Ah, yes ! ' uttered the vicar in artificially alert tones, 
 awaking from a most profound sleep, and suddenly 
 preparing to alight. 
 
 ' Why, what are you doing, papa ? We are not home 
 yet.' 
 
 ' Oh no, no ; of course not ; we are not at home 
 yet,' Mr. Swancourt said very hastily, endeavouring to 
 dodge back to his original position with the air of a 
 
 49 D 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 man who had not moved at all. ' The fact is I was so 
 lost in deep meditation that I forgot whereabouts we 
 were.' And in a minute the vicar was snoring again. 
 
 That evening, being the last, seemed to throw an 
 exceptional shade of sadness over Stephen Smith, and 
 the repeated injunctions of the vicar, that he was to 
 come and revisit them in the summer, apparently tended 
 less to raise his spirits than to unearth some misgiving. 
 
 He left them in the gray light of dawn, whilst the 
 colours of earth were sombre, and the sun was yet 
 hidden in the east. Elfride had fidgeted all night in 
 her little bed lest none of the household should be 
 awake soon enough to start him, and also lest she 
 might miss seeing again the bright eyes and curly hair, 
 to which their owner's possession of a hidden mystery 
 added a deeper tinge of romance. To some extent — 
 so soon does womanly interest take a solicitous turn — 
 she felt herself responsible for his safe conduct. They 
 breakfasted before daylight ; Mr. Swancourt, being more 
 and more taken with his guest's ingenuous appearance, 
 having determined to rise early and bid him a friendly 
 farewell. It was, however, rather to the vicar's asto- 
 nishment, that he saw Elfride walk in to the breakfast- 
 table, candle in hand. 
 
 Whilst William Worm performed his toilet (during 
 which performance the inmates of the vicarage were 
 always in the habit of waiting with exemplary patience), 
 Elfride wandered desultorily to the summer house. 
 Stephen followed her thither. The copse-covered valley 
 was visible from this position, a mist now lying all along 
 its length, hiding the stream which trickled through it, 
 though the observers themselves were in clear air. 
 
 They stood close together, leaning over the rustic 
 
 balustrading which bounded the arbour on the outward 
 
 side, and formed the crest of a steep slope beneath. 
 
 Elfride constrainedly pointed out some features of the 
 
 5° 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EVES 
 
 distant uplands rising irregularly opposite. But the 
 artistic eye was, either from nature or circumstance, 
 very faint in Stephen now, and he only half attended to 
 her description, as if he spared time from some other 
 thought going on within him. 
 
 ' Well, good-bye,' he said suddenly ; ' I must never 
 see you again, I. suppose, Miss Swancourt, in spite of 
 invitations.' 
 
 His genuine tribulation played directly upon the 
 delicate chords of her nature. She could afford to 
 forgive him for a concealment or two. Moreover, the 
 shyness which would not allow him to look her in the 
 face lent bravery to her own eyes and tongue. 
 
 ' Oh, do come again, Mr. Smith ! ' she said prettily. 
 
 ' I should delight in it ; but it will be better if I do 
 not.' 
 
 'Why?' 
 
 ' Certain circumstances in connection with me make 
 it undesirable. Not on my account ; on yours.' 
 
 ' Goodness ! As if anything in connection with you 
 could hurt me,' she said with serene supremacy; but 
 seeing that this plan of treatment was inappropriate, 
 she tuned a smaller note. 'Ah, I know why you will 
 not come. You don't want to. You'll go home to 
 London and to all the stirring people there, and will 
 never want to see us any more ! ' 
 
 ' You know I have no such reason.' 
 
 ' And go on writing letters to the lady you are 
 engaged to, just as before.' 
 
 ' What does that mean ? I am not engaged.' 
 
 ' You' wrote a letter to a Miss Somebody ; I saw it 
 in the letter-rack.' 
 
 ' Pooh ! an elderly woman who keeps a stationer's 
 shop ; and it was to tell her to keep my newspapers till 
 I get ba:ck.' 
 
 ' You needn't have explained : it was not my business 
 at all.' Miss Elfride was rather relieved to hear that 
 
 SI 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 statement, nevertheless. 'And you won't come again 
 to see my father ? ' she insisted. 
 
 ' I should like to — and to see you again, but ' 
 
 ' Will you reveal to me that matter you hide ? ' she 
 interrupted petulantly. 
 
 ' No ; not now.' 
 
 She could not but go on, graceless as it might 
 seem. 
 
 'Tell me this,' she importuned with a trembling 
 mouth. ' Does any meeting of yours with a lady at 
 Endelstow Vicarage clash with — any interest you may 
 take in me ? ' 
 
 He started a little. ' It does not,' he said emphati- 
 cally ; and looked into the pupils of her eyes with the 
 confidence that only honesty can give, and even that 
 to youth alone. 
 
 The explanation had not come, but a gloom left her. 
 She could not but believe that utterance. Whatever 
 enigma might lie in the shadow on the blind, it was 
 not an enigma of underhand passion. 
 
 She turned towards the house, entering it through 
 the conservatory. Stephen went round to the front 
 door. Mr. Swancourt was standing on the step in his 
 slippers. Worm was adjusting a buckle in the harness, 
 and murmuring about his poor head; and everything 
 was ready for Stephen's departure. 
 
 ' You named August for your visit. August it shall 
 be; that is, if you care for the society of such a 
 fossilized Tory,' said Mr. Swancourt. 
 
 Mr. Smith only responded hesitatingly, that he 
 should like to come again. 
 
 'You said you would, and you must,' insisted 
 Elfride, coming to the door and speaking under her 
 father's arm. 
 
 Whatever reason the youth may have had for not 
 wishing to enter the house as a guest, it no longer 
 predominated. He promised, and bade them adieu, 
 52 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 and got into the pony-carriage, which crept up the 
 slope, and bore him out of their sight. 
 
 ' I never was so much taken with anybody in my 
 life as I am with that young fellow — never ! I cannot 
 understand it — can't understand it anyhow,' said Mr. 
 Swancourt quite energetically to himself; and went 
 indoors. 
 
VII 
 
 " No more of me you knew, my love ! ' 
 
 Stephen smith revisited Endelstow Vicarage, 
 agreeably to his promise. He had a genuine artistic 
 reason for coming, though no such reason seemed to 
 be required. Six-and-thirty old seat ends, of exquisite 
 fifteenth-century workmanship, were rapidly decaying in 
 an aisle of the church ; and it became politic to make 
 drawings of their worm-eaten contours ere they were 
 battered past recognition in the turmoil of the so-called 
 restoration. 
 
 He entered the house at sunset, and the world was 
 pleasant again to the two fair-haired ones. A momen- 
 tary pang of disappointment had, nevertheless, passed 
 through Elfride when she casually discovered that he 
 had not come that minute post-haste from London, but 
 had reached the neighbourhood the previous evening. 
 Surprise would have accompanied the feeling, had she 
 not remembered that several tourists were haunting 
 the coast at this season, and that Stephen might have 
 chosen to do likewise. 
 
 They did little besides chat that evening, Mr. 
 Swancourt beginning to question his visitor, closely yet 
 paternally, and in good part, on his hopes and pros- 
 54 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 pects from the profession he had embraced. Stephen 
 gave vague answers. The next day it rained. In the 
 evening, when twenty-four hours of Elfride had com- 
 pletely rekindled her admirer's ardour, a game of chess 
 was proposed between them. 
 
 The game had its value in helping on the develop- 
 ments of their future. 
 
 Elfride soon perceived that her opponent was but 
 a learner. She next noticed that he had a very odd 
 way of handling the pieces when castling or taking a 
 man. Antecedently she would have supposed that 
 the same performance must be gone through by all 
 players in the same manner; she was taught by his 
 differing action that all ordinary players, who learn the 
 game by sight, unconsciously touch the men in a 
 stereotyped way. This impression of indescribable 
 oddness in Stephen's touch culminated in speech when 
 she saw him, at the taking of one of her bishops, push 
 it aside with the taking man instead of lifting it as a 
 preliminary to the move. 
 
 ' How strangely you handle the men, Mr. Smith ! ' 
 
 ' Do I ? I am sorry for that.' 
 
 ' Oh no — don't be sorry ; it is not a matter great 
 enough for sorrow. But who taught you to play ? ' 
 
 ' Nobody, Miss Swancourt,' he said. ' I learnt from 
 a book lent me by my friend Mr. Knight, the noblest 
 man in the world.' 
 
 ' But you have seen people play ? ' 
 
 ' I have never seen the playing of a single game. 
 This is the first time I ever had the opportunity of 
 playing with a living opponent. I have worked out 
 many games from books, and studied the reasons of the 
 different moves, but that is all.' 
 
 This was a full explanation of his mannerism ; but 
 the fact that a man with the desire for chess should 
 have grown up without being able to see or engage in a 
 game astonished her not a little. She pondered on the 
 
 SS 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 circumstance for some time, looking into vacancy and 
 hindering the play. 
 
 Mr. Swancourt was sitting with his eyes fixed on the 
 board, but apparently thinking of other things. Half to 
 himself he said, pending the move of Elfride : 
 
 ' " Quae finis aut quod me manet stipendium ? " ' 
 
 Stephen replied instantly : 
 
 ' " Effare : jussas cum fide poenas luam." ' 
 
 ' Excellent — prompt — gratifying ! ' said Mr. Swan- 
 court with feeling, bringing down his hand upon the 
 table, and making three pawns and a knight dance over 
 their borders by the shaking. ' I was musing on those 
 words as applicable to a strange course I am steering — 
 but enough of that. I am delighted with you, Mr. 
 Smith, for it is so seldom in this desert that I meet 
 with a man who is gentleman and scholar enough to 
 continue a quotation, however trite it may be.' 
 
 ' I also apply the words to myself,' said Stephen 
 quietly. 
 
 'You? The last man in the world to do that, I 
 should have thought.' 
 
 ' Come,' murmured Elfride poutingly, and insinuating 
 herself between them, ' tell me all about it. Come, 
 construe, construe ! ' 
 
 Stephen looked steadfastly into her face, and said 
 slowly, and in a voice full of a far-off meaning that 
 seemed quaintly premature in one so young : 
 
 ' Quse finis What will be the end, aut or, quod stipen- 
 dium what fine, manet me awaits me? Effare Speak 
 out ; luam I will pay, cum fide with faith, jusssls poenas 
 the penalty required.^ 
 
 The vicar, who had listened with a critical com- 
 pression of the lips to this school-boy recitation, and by 
 reason of his imperfect hearing had missed the marked 
 realism of Stephen's tone in the English words, now 
 said hesitatingly : ' By the bye, Mr. Smith (I know you'll 
 excuse my curiosity), though your translation was un- 
 S6 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 exceptionably correct and close, you have a way of pro- 
 nouncing your Latin which to me seems most peculiar. 
 Not that the pronunciation of a dead language is of 
 much importance ; yet your accents and quantities have 
 a grotesque sound to my ears. I thought first that you 
 had acquired your way of breathing the vowels from 
 some of the northern colleges ; but it cannot be so with 
 the quantities. What I was going to ask was, if your 
 instructor in the classics could possibly have been an 
 Oxford or Cambridge man ? ' 
 
 ' Yes; he was an Oxford man — Fellow of St. Cyprian's.' 
 
 •Really?' 
 
 ' Oh yes ; there's no doubt about it. 
 
 ' The oddest thing ever I heard of ! ' said Mr. Swan- 
 court, starting with astonishment. ' That the pupil of 
 such a man ' 
 
 ' The best and cleverest man in England ! ' cried 
 Stephen enthusiastically. 
 
 ' That the pupil of such a man should pro- 
 nounce Latin in the way you prono6nce it beats all I 
 ever heard. How long did he instruct you ? ' 
 
 ' Four years.' 
 
 ' Four years ! ' 
 
 ' It is not so strange when I explain,' Stephen 
 hastened to say. ' It was done in this way — by letter. 
 I sent him exercises and construing twice a week, and 
 twice a week he sent them back to me corrected, with 
 marginal notes of instruction. That is how I learnt my 
 Latin and Greek, such as it is. He is not responsible 
 for my scanning. He has never heard me scan a Hne.' 
 
 ' A novel case, and a singular instance of patience ! ' 
 cried the vicar. 
 
 ' On his part, not on mine. Ah, Henry Knight is 
 one in a thousand ! I remember his speaking to me 
 on this very subject of pronunciation. He says that, 
 much to his regret, he sees a time coming when every 
 man will pronounce even the common words of his 
 ^ 57 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 own tongue as seems right in his own ears, and be 
 thought none the worse for it; that the speaking age 
 is passing away, to make room for the writing age.' 
 
 Both Elfride and her father had waited attentively 
 to hear Stephen go on to what would have been the 
 most interesting part of the story, namely, what cir- 
 cumstances could have necessitated such an unusual 
 method of education. But no further explanation was 
 volunteered ; and they saw, by the young man's manner 
 of concentrating himself upon the chess-board, that he 
 was anxious to drop the subject. 
 
 The game proceeded. Elfride played by rote; 
 Stephen by thought. It was the cruellest thing to 
 checkmate him after so much labour, she considered. 
 What was she dishonest enough to do in her com- 
 passion ? To let him checkmate her. A second game 
 followed ; and being herself absolutely indifferent as to 
 the result (her playing was above the average among 
 women, and she knew it), she allowed him to give 
 checkmate again. A final game, in which she adopted 
 the Muzio gambit as her opening, was terminated by 
 Elfride's victory at the twelfth move. 
 
 Stephen looked up suspiciously. His heart was 
 throbbing even more excitedly than was hers, which 
 itself had quickened when she seriously set to work 
 on this last occasion. Mr. Swancourt had left the 
 room. 
 
 ' You have been trifling with me till now ! ' he 
 exclaimed, his face flushing. ' You did not play your 
 best in the first two games ? ' 
 
 Elfride's guilt showed in her face. Stephen became 
 the picture of vexation and sadness, which, relishable 
 for a moment, caused her the next instant to regret the 
 mistake she had made. 
 
 ' Mr. Smith, forgive me ! ' she said sweetly. ' I see 
 now, though I did not at first, that what I have done 
 seems like contempt for your skill. But, indeed, I 
 58 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 did not mean it in that sense. I could not, upon 
 my conscience, win a victory in those first and second 
 games over one who fought at such a disadvantage 
 and so manfully.' 
 
 He drew a long breath, and murmured bitterly, 
 ' Ah, you are cleverer than I. You can do everything 
 — I can do nothing ! O Miss Swancourt ! ' he burst 
 out wildly, his heart swelling in his throat, ' I must 
 tell you how I love you! All these months of my 
 absence I have worshipped you.' 
 
 He leapt from his seat like the impulsive lad that 
 he was, slid round to her side, and almost before she 
 suspected it his arm was round her waist, and the 
 two sets of curls intermingled. 
 
 So entirely new was full-blown love to Elfride, that 
 she trembled as much from the novelty of the emotion 
 as from the emotion itself Then she suddenly with- 
 drew herself and stood upright, vexed that she had 
 submitted unresistingly even to his momentary pres- 
 sure. She resolved to consider this demonstration as 
 premature. 
 
 ' You must not begin such things as those,' she 
 said with coquettish hauteur of a very transparent 
 nature. ' And — you must not do so again — and papa 
 is coming.' 
 
 ' Let me kiss you — only a little one,' he said with 
 his usual delicacy, and without reading the factitious- 
 ness of her manner. 
 
 ' No ; not one.' 
 
 ' Only on your cheek ? ' 
 
 'No.' 
 
 ' Forehead ? ' 
 
 ' Certainly not.' 
 
 ' You care for somebody else, then ? Ah, I thought 
 so!' 
 
 ' I am sure 1 do not.' 
 
 ' Nor for me either ? ' 
 
 .--,■-«■- ■' 
 
 5? 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 ' How can I tell ? ' she said simply, the simplicity 
 lying merely in the broad outlines of her manner and 
 speech. There were the semitone of voice and half- 
 hidden expression of eyes which tell the initiated how 
 very fragile is the ice of reserve at these times. 
 
 Footsteps were heard. Mr. Swancourt then entered 
 the room, and their private colloquy ended. 
 
 The day after this partial revelation, Mr. Swancourt 
 proposed a drive to the cliffs beyond Targan Bay, a 
 distance of three or four miles. 
 
 Half an hour before the time of departure a crash 
 was heard in the back yard, and presently Worm came 
 in, saying partly to the world in general, partly to him- 
 self, and slightly to his auditors : 
 
 ' Ay, ay, sure ! That fr)dng of fish will be the end 
 of William Worm. They be at it again this morning — 
 same as ever — fizz, fizz, fizz ! ' 
 
 ' Your head bad again. Worm ? ' said Mr. Swancourt. 
 ' What was that noise we heard in the yard ? ' 
 
 ' Ay, sir, a weak wambling man am I ; and the frying 
 have been going on in my poor head all through the 
 long night and this morning as usual; and I was so 
 dazed wi' it that down fell a piece of leg-wood across 
 the shaft of the pony-shay, and splintered it off. " Ay," 
 says I, " I feel it as if 'twas my own shay ; and though 
 I've done it, and parish pay is my lot if I go from 
 here, perhaps I am as independent as one here and 
 there." ' 
 
 ' Dear me, the shaft of the carriage broken ! ' cried 
 Elfride. She was disappointed: Stephen doubly so. 
 The vicar showed more warmth of temper than the 
 accident seemed to demand, much to Stephen's uneasi- 
 ness and rather to his surprise. He had not supposed 
 so much latent sternness could co-exist with Mr. Swan- 
 court's frankness and good-nature. 
 
 •You shall not be disappointed,' said the vicar at 
 length. ' It is almost too long a distance for you to 
 60 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 walk. Elfride can trot down on her pony, and you 
 shall have my old nag, Smith.' 
 
 Elfride exclaimed triumphantly, 'You have never 
 seen me on horseback — Oh, you must ! ' She looked 
 at Stephen and read his thoughts immediately. ' Ah, 
 you don't ride, Mr. Smith ? ' 
 
 ' I am sorry to say I don't.' 
 
 ' Fancy a man not able to ride ! ' said she rather 
 pertly. 
 
 The vicar came to his rescue. 'That's common 
 enough; he has had other lessons to learn. Now, I 
 recommend this plan : let Elfride ride on horseback, 
 and you, Mr. Smith, walk beside her.' 
 
 The arrangement was welcomed with secret delight 
 by Stephen. It seemed to combine in itself all the 
 advantages of a long slow ramble with Elfride, without 
 the contingent possibility of the enjoyment being spoilt 
 by her becoming weary. The pony was saddled and 
 brought round. 
 
 ' Now, Mr. Smith,' said the lady imperatively, coming 
 downstairs, and appearing in her riding-habit, as she 
 always did in a change of dress, like a new edition of 
 a delightful volume, ' you have a task to perform to-day. 
 These earrings are my very favourite darling ones ; but 
 the worst of it is that they have such short hooks 
 that they are liable to be dropped if I toss my head 
 about much, and when I am riding I can't give my 
 mind to them. It would be doing me knight service 
 if you keep your eyes fixed upon them, and remember 
 them every minute of the day, and tell me directly I 
 drop one. They have had such hairbreadth escapes, 
 haven't they, Unity ? ' she continued to the parlour-maid 
 who was standing at the door. 
 
 ' Yes, miss, that they have ! ' said Unity with round- 
 eyed commiseration. 
 
 ' Once 'twas in the lane that I found one of them,' 
 pursued Elfride reflectively. 
 
 6i 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 'And then 'twas by the gate into Eighteen Acres,' 
 Unity chimed in. 
 
 ' And then 'twas on the carpet in my own room,' 
 rejoined Elfride merrily. 
 
 ' And then 'twas dangling on the embroidery of your 
 petticoat, miss ; and then 'twas down your back, miss, 
 wasn't it ? And oh, what a way you was in, miss, wasn't 
 you ? my ! until you found it ! ' 
 
 Stephen took Elfride's slight foot upon his hand : 
 ' One, two, three, and up ! ' she said. 
 
 Unfortunately not so. He staggered and lifted, and 
 the horse edged round; and Elfride was ultimately 
 deposited upon the ground rather more forcibly than 
 was pleasant. Smith looked all contrition. 
 
 ' Never mind,' said the vicar encouragingly ; ' try 
 again ! 'Tis a little accomplishment that requires some 
 practice, although it looks so easy. Stand closer to the- 
 horse's head, Mr. Smith.' 
 
 ' Indeed, I shan't let him try again,' said she with a 
 microscopic look of indignation. ' Worm, come here, 
 and help me to mount.' Worm stepped forward, and 
 she was in the saddle in a trice. 
 
 Then they moved on, going for some distance in 
 silence, the hot air of the valley being occasionally 
 brushed from their faces by a cool breeze, which wound 
 its way along ravines leading up from the sea. 
 
 ' I suppose,' said Stephen, ' that a man who can 
 neither sit in a saddle himself nor help another person 
 into one seems a useless incumbrance; but, Miss 
 Swancourt, I'll learn to do it all for your sake; I 
 will, indeed.' 
 
 'What is so unusual in you,' she said, in a didac- 
 tic tone justifiable in a horsewoman's address to a be- 
 nighted walker, ' is that your knowledge of certain things 
 should be combined with your ignorance of certain 
 other things.' 
 
 Stephen lifted his eyes earnestly to hers. 
 62 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 ' You know,' he said, ' it is simply because there 
 are so many other things to be learnt in this wide world 
 that I didn't trouble about that particular bit of know- 
 ledge. I thought it would be useless to me; but I 
 don't think so now. I will learn riding, and all con- 
 nected with it, because then you would like me better. 
 Do you like me much less for this ? ' 
 
 She looked sideways at him with critical meditation 
 tenderly rendered. 
 
 'Do I seem like La Belle Dame sans merciV she 
 began suddenly, without replying to his question. 
 ' Fancy yourself saying, Mr. Smith : 
 
 " I sat her on my pacing steed, 
 
 And nothing else saw all day long, 
 For sidelong would she bend, and sing 
 A fairy's song, 
 She found me roots of relish sweet, 
 
 And honey wild, and manna dew ; " 
 
 and that's all she did.' 
 
 ' No, no,' said the young man stilly, and with a 
 rising colour. 
 
 ' " And sure in language strange she said, 
 I love thee true." ' 
 
 ' Not at all,' she rejoined quickly. ■ See how I can 
 gallop. Now, Pansy, off ! ' And Elfride started ; and 
 Stephen beheld her light figure contracting to the 
 dimensions of a bird as she sank into the distance — her 
 hair flowing. 
 
 He walked on in the same direction, and for a con- 
 siderable time could see no signs of her returning. 
 Dull as a flower without the sun he sat down upon a 
 stone, and not for fifteen minutes was any sound of 
 horse or rider to be heard. Then Elfride and Pansy 
 appeared on the hill in a round trot. 
 
 ' Such a delightful scamper as we have had ! ' she 
 (>2, 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 said, her face flushed and her eyes sparkling. She 
 turned the horse's head, Stephen arose, and they went 
 on again. 
 
 ' Well, what have you to say to me, Mr. Smith, after 
 my long absence ? ' 
 
 ' Do you remember a question you could not exactly 
 answer last night — whether I was more to you than 
 anybody else ? ' said he. 
 
 ' I cannot exactly answer now, either.' 
 
 ' Why can't you ? ' 
 
 ' Because I don't know if T am more to you than 
 any one else.' 
 
 ' Yes, indeed, )^ou are ! ' he exclaimed in a voice of 
 intensest appreciation, at the same time gliding round 
 and looking into her face. 
 
 ' Eyes in eyes,' he murmured playfully ; and she 
 blushingly obeyed, looking back into his. 
 
 ' And why not lips on lips ? ' continued Stephen 
 daringly. 
 
 ' No, certainly not. Anybody might look ; and it 
 would be the death of me. You may kiss my hand if 
 you like.' 
 
 He expressed by a look that to kiss a hand through 
 a glove, and that a riding-glove, was not a great treat 
 under the circumstances. 
 
 ' There, then ; I'll take my glove ofT. Isn't it a 
 pretty white hand ? Ah, you don't want to kiss it, and 
 you shall not now ! ' 
 
 ' If I do not, may I never kiss again, you severe 
 Elfride! You know I think more of you than I can 
 tell; that you are my queen. I would die for you, 
 Elfride ! ' 
 
 A rapid red again filled her cheeks, and she looked 
 at him meditatively. What a proud moment it was for 
 Elfride then ! She was ruling a heart with absolute 
 despotism for the first time in her life. 
 
 Stephen stealthily pounced upon her hand. 
 64 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 ' No ; I won't, I won't ! ' she said intractably ; ' and 
 you shouldn't take me by surprise.' 
 
 There ensued a mild form of tussle for absolute 
 possession of the much-coveted hand, in which the 
 boisterousness of boy and girl was far more prominent 
 than the dignity of man and woman. Then Pansy 
 became restless. Elfride recovered her position and 
 remembered herself. 
 
 ' You make me behave in not a nice way at all ! ' 
 she exclaimed, in a tone neither of pleasure nor anger, 
 but partaking of both. ' I ought not to have allowed 
 such a romp ! We are too old now for that sort of 
 thing.' 
 
 ' I hope you don't think me too — too much of a 
 creeping-round sort of man,' said he in a penitent tone, 
 conscious that he too had lost a little dignity by the 
 proceeding. 
 
 ' You are too familiar ; and I can't have it ! Con- 
 sidering the shortness of the time we have known each 
 other, Mr. Smith, you take too much upon you. You 
 think I am a country girl, and it doesn't matter how 
 you behave to me ! ' 
 
 • I assure you. Miss Swancourt, that I had no idea 
 of freak in my mind. I wanted to imprint a sweet 
 serious kiss upon your hand ; and that's all.' 
 
 ' Now, that's creeping round again ! And you 
 mustn't look into my eyes so,' she said, shaking her 
 head at him, and trotting on a few paces in advance. 
 Thus she led the way out of the lane and across some 
 fields in the direction of the cliffs. At the boundary 
 of the fields nearest the sea she expressed a wish to 
 dismount. The horse was tied to a post^ and they both 
 followed an irregular path, which ultimately terminated 
 upon a flat ledge passing round the face of the huge 
 blue-black rock at a height about midway between the 
 sea and the topmost verge. There, far beneath and 
 before them, lay the everlasting stretch of ocean ; there, 
 
 65 E 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 upon detached rocks, were the white screaming gulls, 
 seeming ever intending to settle, and yet always passing 
 on. Right and left ranked the toothed and zigzag Una 
 of storm-torn heights, forming the series which culmi- 
 nated in the one beneath their feet. 
 
 Behind the youth and maiden was a tempting alcove 
 and seat, formed naturally in the beetling mass, and 
 wide enough to admit two or three persons. Elfride 
 sat down, and Stephen sat beside her. 
 
 ' I am afraid it is hardly proper of us to be here, 
 either,' she said half inquiringly. ' We have not 
 known each other long enough for this kind of thing, 
 have we ! ' 
 
 ' Oh yes,' he replied judicially ; ' quite long enough.' 
 
 ' How do you know ? ' 
 
 ' It is not length of time, but the manner in which 
 our minutes beat, that makes enough or not enough in 
 our acquaintanceship.' 
 
 ' Yes, I see that. But I wish papa suspected or 
 knew what a very new thing I am doing. He does 
 not think of it at all.' 
 
 ' Darling Elfie, I wish we could be married ! It is 
 wrong for me to say it — I know it is — before you know 
 more ; but I wish we might be, all the same. Do you 
 love me deeply, deeply ? ' 
 
 ' No ! ' she said in a fluster. 
 
 At this point-blank denial, Stephen turned his face 
 away decisively, and preserved an ominous silence; 
 the only objects of interest on earth for him being 
 apparently the three or four-score sea-birds circling in 
 the air afar off. 
 
 ' I didn't mean to stop you quite,' she faltered with 
 some alarm ; and seeing that he still remained silent, 
 she added more anxiously, ' If you say that again, 
 perhaps, I will not be quite — quite so obstinate — if — 
 if you don't like me to be.' 
 
 ' Oh, my Elfride ! ' he exclaimed, and kissed her. 
 66 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 It was Elfride's first kiss. And so awkward and 
 unused was she ; full of striving — no relenting. There 
 was none of those apparent struggles to get out of the 
 trap which only results in getting further in : no final 
 attitude • of receptivity : no easy close of shoulder to 
 shoulder, hand upon hand, face upon face, and, in spite 
 of coyness, the lips in the right place at the supreme 
 moment. That graceful though apparently accidental 
 falling into position, which many have noticed as pre- 
 cipitating the end and making sweethearts the sweeter, 
 was not here. Why ? Because experience was absent. 
 A woman must have had many kisses before she 
 kisses well. 
 
 In fact, the art of tendering the lips for these amatory 
 salutes follows the principles laid down in treatises on 
 legerdemain for performing the trick called Forcing a 
 Card. The card is to be shifted nimbly, withdrawn, 
 edged under, and withal not to be offered till the 
 moment the unsuspecting person's hand reaches the 
 pack ; this forcing to be done so modestly and yet so 
 coaxingly, that the person trifled with imagines he is 
 really choosing what is in fact thrust into his hand. 
 
 Well, there were no such facilities now ; and Stephen 
 was conscious of it — first with a momentary regret that 
 his kiss should be spoilt by her confused receipt of it, 
 and then with the pleasant perception that her awkward- 
 ness was her charm. 
 
 ' And you do care for me and love me ? ' said he. 
 
 ' Yes.' 
 
 ' Very much ? ' 
 
 ' Yes.' 
 
 ' And I mustn't ask you if you'll wait for me, and be 
 my wife some day ? ' 
 
 ' Why not ? ' she said naively. 
 
 ' There is a reason why, my Elfride.' 
 
 ' Not any one that I know of.' 
 
 ' Suppose there is something connected with me which 
 6/ 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 makes it almost impossible for you to agree to be my 
 wife, or for your father to countenance such an idea ? ' 
 
 ' Nothing shall make me cease to love you : no 
 blemish can be found upon your personal nature. That 
 is pure and generous, I know; and having that, how 
 can I be cold to you ? ' 
 
 'And shall nothing else affect us — shall nothing 
 beyond my nature be a part of my quality in your eyes, 
 Elfie ? ' 
 
 ' Nothing whatever,' she said with a breath of relief 
 ' Is that all ? Some outside circumstance ? What do 
 I care?' 
 
 ' You can hardly judge, dear, till you know what has 
 to be judged. For that, we will stop till we get home. 
 I believe in you, but I cannot feel bright.' 
 
 ' Love is new, and fresh to us as the dew ; and we 
 are together. As the lover's world goes, this is a great 
 deal. Stephen, I fancy I see the difference between me 
 and you — between men and women generally, perhaps. 
 I am content to build happiness on any accidental basis 
 that may lie near at hand ; you are for making a world 
 to suit your happiness.' 
 
 ' Elfride, you sometimes say things which make you 
 seem suddenly to become five years older than you are, 
 or than I am; and that remark is one. I couldn't 
 think so old as that, try how I might. . . . And no 
 lover has ever kissed you before ? ' 
 
 ' Never.' 
 
 ' I knew that ; you were so unused. You ride well, 
 but you don't kiss nicely at all ; and I was told once, 
 by my friend Knight, that that is an excellent fault in 
 woman.' 
 
 ' Now, come ; I must mount again, or we shall not 
 be home by dinner-time.' And they returned to where 
 Pansy stood tethered. ' Instead of entrusting my weight 
 to a young man's unstable palm,' she continued gaily, 
 ' I prefer a surer " upping-stock " (as the villagers call 
 68 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 it), in the form of a gate. There — now I am myself 
 again.' 
 
 They proceeded homeward at the same walking pace. 
 
 Her blitheness won Stephen out of his thoughtful- 
 ness, and each forgot everything but the tone of the 
 moment. 
 
 ' What did you love me for ? ' she said, after a long 
 musing look at a flying bird. 
 
 ' I don't know,' he replied idly. 
 
 ' Oh yes, you do,' insisted Elfride. 
 
 ' Perhaps, for your eyes. 
 
 ' What of them ? — now, don't vex me by a light 
 answer. What of my eyes ? ' 
 
 ' Oh, nothing to be mentioned. They are indiffer- 
 ently good.' 
 
 ' Come, Stephen, I won't have that. What did you 
 love me for ? ' 
 
 ' It might have been for your mouth ? ' 
 
 ' Well, what about my mouth ? ' 
 
 ' I thought it was a passable mouth enough ' 
 
 'That's not very comforting.' 
 
 ' With a pretty pout and sweet lips ; but actually, 
 nothing more than what everybody has.' 
 
 ' Don't make up things out of your head as you 
 go on, there's a dear Stephen. Now — what — did — 
 you — love — me — for ? ' 
 
 ' Perhaps, 'twas for your neck and hair ; though I 
 am not sure : or for your idle blood, that did nothing 
 but wander away from your cheeks and back again ; 
 but I am not sure. Or your hands and arms, that 
 they eclipsed all other hands and arms ; or your feet, 
 that they played about under your dress like little 
 mice; or your tongue, that it was of a dear delicate 
 tone. But I am not altogether sure.' 
 
 ' Ah, that's pretty to say ; but I don't care for your 
 love, if it made a mere flat picture of me in that way, 
 and not being sure, and such cold reasoning; but 
 
 69 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 what you felt I was, you know, Stephen ' (at this a 
 stealthy laugh and frisky look into his face), 'when 
 you said to yourself, "I'll certainly love that young 
 lady." ' 
 
 ' I never said it.' 
 
 ' When you said to yourself, then, " I never will 
 love that young lady." ' 
 
 ' I didn't say that, either.' 
 
 ' Then was it, " I suppose I must love that young 
 lady?"' 
 
 'No.' 
 
 ' What, then ? ' 
 
 ' 'Twas much more fluctuating — not so definite.' 
 
 ' Tell me ; do, do.' 
 
 ' It was that I ought not to think about you if I 
 loved you truly.' 
 
 'Ah, that I don't understand. There's no getting 
 it out of you. And I'll not ask you ever any more — 
 never more — to say out of the deep reality of your 
 heart what you loved me for.' 
 
 ' Sweet tantalizer, what's the use ? It comes to 
 this sole simple thing : That at one time I had never 
 seen you, and I didn't love you ; that then I saw you, 
 and I did love you. Is that enough ? ' 
 
 ' Yes ; I will make it do. ... I know, I think, 
 what I love you for. You are nice-looking, of course ; 
 but I didn't mean for that. It is because you are so 
 docile and gentle.' 
 
 ' Those are not quite the correct qualities for a man 
 to be loved for,' said Stephen, in rather a dissatisfied 
 tone of self-criticism. ' Well, never mind. I must ask 
 your father to allow us to be engaged directly we get 
 indoors. It will be for a long time.' 
 
 'I like it the better. . . . Stephen, don't mention 
 it till to-morrow.' 
 
 'Why?' 
 
 ' Pecause, if he should object — I don't think h? 
 70 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 will ; but if he should — we shall have a day longer of 
 happiness from our ignorance. . . . Well, what are 
 you thinking of so deeply ? ' 
 
 ' I was thinking how my dear friend Knight would 
 enjoy this scene. I wish he could come here.' 
 
 'You seem very much engrossed with him,' she 
 answered, with a jealous little toss. ' He must be an 
 interesting man to take up so much of your attention.' 
 
 ' Interesting ! ' said Stephen, his face glowing with 
 his fervour ; ' noble, you ought to say.' 
 
 'Oh yes, yes; I forgot,' she said half satirically. 
 'The noblest man in England, as you told us last 
 night.' 
 
 ' He is a fine fellow, laugh as you will, Miss Elfie.' 
 
 ' I know he is your hero. But what does he do ? 
 anything ? ' 
 
 ' He writes.' 
 
 ' What does he write ? I have never heard of his 
 name.' 
 
 ' Because his personality, and that of several others 
 like him, is absorbed into a huge WE, namely, the 
 impalpable entity called the Present — a social and 
 literary Review.' 
 
 ■ Is he only a reviewer ? ' 
 
 ' Only, Elfie ! Why, I can tell you it is a fine thing 
 to be on the staff of the Present. Finer than bejng a 
 novelist considerably.' 
 
 ' That's a hit at me, and my poor Court of Kellyon 
 Castle.' 
 
 ' No, Elfride,' he whispered ; ' I didn't mean that. 
 I mean that he is really a literary man of some eminence, 
 and not altogether a reviewer. He writes things of a 
 higher class than reviews, though he reviews a book 
 occasionally. His ordinary productions are social and 
 ethical essays — all that the Present contains which is 
 not literary reviewing.' 
 
 ' I admit he must be talented if he writes for the 
 71 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 Present. We have it sent to us irregularly. I want 
 papa to be a subscriber, but he's so conservative. Now 
 the next point in this Mr. Knight — I suppose he is a 
 very good man.' 
 
 'An excellent man. I shall try to be his intimate 
 friend some day.' 
 
 ' But aren't you now ? ' 
 
 ' No ; not so much as that,' replied Stephen, as if 
 such a supposition were extravagant. ' You see, it was 
 in this way — he came originally from the same place as 
 I, and taught me things; but I am not intimate with 
 him. Shan't I be glad when I get richer and better 
 known, and hob and nob with him ! ' Stephen's eyes 
 sparkled. 
 
 A pout began to shape itself upon Elfride's soft lips. 
 ' You think always of him, and like him better than you 
 do me ! ' 
 
 'No, indeed, Elfride. The feeling is different quite. 
 But I do like him, and he deserves even more affection 
 from me than I give.' 
 
 ' You are not nice now, and you make me as jealous 
 as possible ! ' she exclaimed perversely. ' I know you 
 will never speak to any third person of me so warmly as 
 you do to me of him.' 
 
 ' But you don't understand, Elfride,' he said with an 
 anxious movement. 'You shall know him some day. 
 He is so brilliant — no, it isn't exactly brilliant; so 
 thoughtful — nor does thoughtful express him — that it 
 would charm you to talk to him. He's a most desirable 
 friend, and that isn't half I could say.' 
 
 ' I don't care how good he is ; I don't want to know 
 him, because he comes between me and you. You think 
 of him night and day, ever so much more than of any- 
 body else; and when you are thinking of him, I am 
 shut out of your mind.' 
 
 ' No, dear Elfride ; I love you dearly.' 
 
 ' And I don't like you to tell me so warriily about 
 72 
 
A Pair of. blue eyes 
 
 iiim when you are in the middle of loving me. Stephen, 
 suppose that I and this man Knight of yours were both 
 drowning, and you could only save one of us ' 
 
 'Yes — the stupid old proposition — ^which would I 
 save ? ' 
 
 ' Well, which ? Not me.' 
 
 ' Both of you,' he said, pressing her pendent hand. 
 
 ' No, that won't do ; only one of us.' 
 
 ' I cannot say ; I don't know. It is disagreeable — 
 quite a horrid idea to have to handle.' 
 
 ' A-ha, I know. You would save him, and let me 
 drown, drown, drown ; and I don't care about your love ! ' 
 
 She had endeavoured to give a playful tone to her 
 words, but the latter speech was rather forced in its 
 gaiety. 
 
 At this point in the discussion she trotted off to turn 
 a corner which was avoided by the footpath, the road and 
 the path reuniting at a point a little further on. On 
 again making her appearance she continually managed 
 to look in a direction away from him, and left him in 
 the cool shade of her displeasure. Stephen was soon 
 beaten at this game of indifference. He went round and 
 entered the range of her vision. 
 
 ' Are you offended, Elfie ? Why don't you talk ? ' 
 
 ' Save me, then, and let that Mr. Clever of yours 
 drown. I hate him. Now, which would you ? ' 
 
 ' Really, Elfride, you should not press such a hard 
 question. It is ridiculous.' 
 
 ' Then I won't be alone with you any more. Unkind, 
 to wound me so ! ' She laughed at her own absurdity, 
 but persisted. 
 
 ' Come, Elfie, let's make it up and be friends.' 
 
 ' Say you would save me, then, and let him drown.' 
 
 ' I would save you — and him too.' 
 
 ' And let him drown. Come, or you don't love me ! ' 
 she teasingly went on. 
 
 ' And let him drown,' he ejaculated despairingly. 
 ' 73 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 ' There ; now I am yours ! ' she said, and a woman's 
 flush of triumph Ut her eyes. 
 
 ' Only one earring, miss, as I'm alive,' said Unity on 
 their entering the hall. 
 
 With a face expressive of wretched misgiving, Elfride's 
 hand flew hke an arrow to her ear. 
 
 ' There ! ' she exclaimed to Stephen, looking at him 
 with eyes full of reproach. 
 
 ' I quite forgot, indeed. If I had only remembered ! ' 
 he answered, with a conscience-stricken face. 
 
 She wheeled herself round, and turned into the 
 shrubbery. Stephen followed. 
 
 • If you had told me to watch anything, Stephen, I 
 should have religiously done it,' she capriciously went 
 on, as soon as she heard him behind her. 
 
 ' Forgetting is forgivable.' 
 
 ' Well, you will find it, if you want me to respect 
 you and be engaged to you when we have asked papa.' 
 She considered a moment, and added more seriously, 
 ' I know now where I dropped it, Stephen. It was on 
 the cliff. I remember a faint sensation of some change 
 about me, but I was too absent to think of it then. 
 And that's where it is now, and you must go and look 
 there.' 
 
 ' I'll go at once.' 
 
 And he strode away up the valley, under a broiling 
 sun and amid the deathlike silence of early afternoon. 
 He ascended, with giddy-paced haste, the windy range 
 of rocks to where they had sat, felt and peered about 
 the stones and crannies, but Elfride's stray jewel was 
 nowhere to be seen. Next Stephen slowly retraced his 
 steps, and, pausing at a cross-road to reflect a while, he 
 left the plateau and struck downwards across some 
 fields, in the direction of Endelstow House. 
 
 He walked along the path by the river without the 
 slightest hesitation as to its bearing, apparently quite 
 74 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 familiar with every inch of the ground. As the shadows 
 began to lengthen and the sunlight to mellow, he passed 
 through two wicket-gates, and drew near the outskirts 
 of Endelstow Park. The river now ran along under 
 the park fence, previous to entering the grove itself, a 
 little further on. 
 
 Here stood a cottage, between the fence and the 
 stream, on a slightly elevated spot of ground, round 
 which thp river took a turn. The characteristic feature 
 of this snug habitation was its one chimney in the gable 
 end, its squareness of form disguised by a huge cloak 
 of ivy, which had grown so luxuriantly and extended so 
 far from its base, as to increase the apparent bulk of 
 the chimney to the dimensions of a tower. Some little 
 distance from the back of the house rose the park 
 boundary, and over this were to be seen the sycamores 
 of the grove, making slow inclinations to the just- 
 awakening air. 
 
 Stephen crossed the little wood bridge in front, went 
 up to the cottage door, and opened it without knock or 
 signal of any kind. 
 
 Exclamations of welcome burst from some person 
 or persons when the door was thrust ajar, followed 
 by the scrape of chairs on a stone floor, as if pushed 
 back by their occupiers in rising from a table. The 
 door was closed again, and nothing could now be 
 heard from within, save a lively chatter and the rattle 
 of plates. 
 
VIII 
 
 ' Allen-a-Dale is no baron or lord.' 
 
 1 HE mists were creeping out of pools and swamps 
 for their pilgrimages of the night when Stephen came 
 up to the front door of the vicarage. Elfride was stand- 
 ing on the step illuminated by a lemon-hued expanse - 
 of western sky. 
 
 ' You never have been all this time looking for that 
 earring ? ' she said anxiously. 
 
 ' Oh no ; and I have not found it.' 
 
 ' Never mind. Though I am much vexed ; they 
 are my prettiest. But, Stephen, what ever have you 
 been doing — where have you been? I have been so 
 uneasy. I feared for you, knowing not an inch of 
 the country. I thought, suppose he has fallen over 
 the cliff! But now I am inclined to scold you for 
 frightening me so.' 
 
 ' I must speak to your father now,' he said rather 
 abruptly ; ' I have so much to say to him — and to you, 
 Elfride.' 
 
 ' Will what you have to say endanger this nice time 
 of ours, and is it that same shadowy secret you allude 
 to so frequently, and will it make me unhappy ? ' 
 
 ' Possibly.' 
 
 76 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 She breathed heavily, and looked around as if for a 
 prompter. 
 
 ' Put it off till to-morrow,' she said. 
 
 He involuntarily sighed too. 
 
 ' No j it must come to-night. Where is your father, 
 Elfride ? ' 
 
 ' Somewhere in the kitchen garden, I think,' she 
 replied. ' That is his favourite evening retreat. I will 
 leave you now. Say all that's to be said — do all there 
 is to be done. Think of me waiting anxiously for the 
 end.' And she re-entered the house. 
 
 She waited in the drawing-room, watching the lights 
 sink to shadows, the shadows sink to darkness, until 
 her impatience to know what had occurred in the garden 
 could no longer be controlled. She passed round the 
 shrubbery, unlatched the garden door, and skimmed 
 with her keen eyes the whole twilighted space that the 
 four walls enclosed and sheltered : they were not there. 
 She mounted a little ladder, which had been used for 
 gathering fruit, and looked over the wall into the field. 
 This field extended to the limits of the glebe, which 
 was enclosed on that side by a privet-hedge. Under 
 the hedge was Mr. Swancourt, walking up and down, 
 and talking aloud — to himself, as it sounded at first. 
 No : another voice shouted occasional replies ; and 
 this interlocutor seemed to be on the other side of 
 the hedge. The voice, though soft in quality, was not 
 Stephen's. 
 
 The second speaker must have been in the long- 
 neglected garden of an old manor-house hard by, which, 
 together with a small estate attached, had lately been 
 purchased by a person named Troyton, whom Elfride 
 had never seen. Her father might have struck up an 
 acquaintanceship with some member of that family 
 through the privet-hedge, or a stranger to the neighbour- 
 hood might have wandered thither. 
 
 Well, there was no necessity for disturbing him. 
 77 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 And it seemed that, after all, Stephen had not yet 
 made his desired communication to her father. Again 
 she went indoors, wondering where Stephen could be. 
 For want of something better to do, she went upstairs 
 to her own little room. Here she sat down at the open 
 window, and, leaning with her elbow on the table and 
 her cheek upon her hand, she fell into meditation. 
 
 It was a hot and still August night. Every disturb- 
 ance of the silence which rose to the dignity of a noise 
 could be heard for miles, and the merest sound for a 
 long distance. So she remained, thinking of Stephen, 
 and wishing he had not deprived her of his company 
 to no purpose, as it appeared. How delicate and 
 sensitive he was, she reflected; and yet he was man 
 enough to have a private mystery, which considerably 
 elevated him in her eyes. Thus, looking at things with 
 an inward vision, she lost consciousness of the flight 
 of time. 
 
 Strange conjunctions of circumstances, particularly 
 those of a trivial everyday kind, are so frequent in an 
 ordinary life, that we grow used to their unaccountable- 
 ness, and forget the question whether the very long 
 odds against such juxtaposition is not almost a disproof 
 of it being a matter of chance at all. What occurred 
 to Elfride at this moment was a case in point. She 
 was vividly imagining, for the twentieth time, the kiss 
 of the morning, and putting her lips together in the 
 position another such a one would demand, when she 
 heard the identical operation performed on the lawn, 
 immediately beneath her window. 
 
 A kiss — not of the quiet and stealthy kind, but 
 decisive, loud, and smart. 
 
 Her face flushed and she looked out, but to no 
 purpose. The dark rim of the upland drew a keen 
 sad hne against the pale glow of the sky, unbroken 
 except where a young cedar on the lawn, that had 
 outgrown its fellow trees, shot its pointed head across 
 78 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 the horizon, piercing the firmamental lustre like a 
 sting. 
 
 It was just possible that, had any persons been 
 standing on the grassy portions of the lawn, Elfride 
 might have seen their dusky forms. But the shrubs, 
 which once had" merely dotted the glade, had now 
 grown bushy and large, till they hid at least half the 
 enclosure containing them. The kissing pair might 
 have been behind some of these; at any rate, nobody 
 was in sight. 
 
 Had no enigma ever been connected with her lover 
 by his hints and absences, Elfride would never have 
 thought of admitting into her mind a suspicion that he 
 might be concerned in the foregoing enactment. But 
 the reservations he at present insisted on, while they 
 added to the mystery without which perhaps she would 
 never have seriously loved him at all, were calculated 
 to nourish doubts of all kinds, and with a slow flush 
 of jealousy she asked herself, might he not be the 
 culprit ? 
 
 Elfride glided downstairs on tiptoe, and out to the 
 precise spot on which she had parted from Stephen 
 to enable him to speak privately to her father. Thence 
 she wandered into all the nooks around the place from 
 which the sound seemed to proceed — among the huge 
 laurestines, about the tufts of pampas grasses, amid 
 the variegated hollies, under the weeping wych-elm — 
 nobody was there. Returning indoors she called 
 • Unity ! ' 
 
 ' She is gone to her aunt's, to spend the evening,' 
 said Mr. Swancourt, thrusting his head out of his study 
 door, and letting the light of his candles stream upon 
 Elfride's face — less revealing than, as it seemed to 
 herself, creating the blush of uneasy perplexity that was 
 burning upon her cheek. 
 
 ' I didn't know you were indoors, papa,' she said 
 with surprise. ' Surely no light was shining from the 
 
 79 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 window when I was on the lawn ? ' and she looked and 
 saw that the shutters were still open. 
 
 ' Oh yes, I am in,' he said indifferently. ' What did 
 you want Unity for? I think she laid supper before 
 she went out.' 
 
 ' Did she ? — I have not been to see — I didn't want 
 her for that.' 
 
 Elfride scarcely knew, now that a definite reason 
 was required, what that reason was. Her mind for a 
 moment strayed to another subject, unimportant as it 
 seemed. The red ember of a match was lying inside 
 the fender, which explained that why she had seen no 
 rays from the window was because the candles had only 
 just been lighted. 
 
 ' I'll come directly,' said the vicar. ' I thought you 
 were out somewhere with Mr. Smith.' 
 
 Even the inexperienced Elfride could not help think- 
 ing that her father must be wonderfully blind if he failed 
 to perceive what was the nascent consequence of herself 
 and Stephen being so unceremoniously left together; 
 wonderfully careless, if he saw it and did not think 
 about it ; wonderfully good, if, as seemed to her by far 
 the most probable supposition, he saw it and thought 
 about it and approved of it. These reflections were 
 cut short by the appearance of Stephen just outside 
 the porch, silvered about the head and shoulders with 
 touches of moonlight, that had begun to creep through 
 the trees. 
 
 ' Has your trouble anything to do with a kiss on the 
 lawn ? ' she asked abruptly, almost passionately. 
 
 ' Kiss on the lawn ? ' 
 
 ' Yes ! ' she said, imperiously now. 
 
 ' I didn't comprehend your meaning, nor do I now 
 exactly. I certainly have kissed nobody on the lawn, 
 if that is really what you want to know, Elfride.' 
 
 ' You know nothing about such a performance ? ' 
 
 ' Nothing whatever. What makes you ask ? ' 
 80 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 ' Don't press me to tell ; it is nothing of importance. 
 And, Stephen, you have not yet spoken to papa about 
 our engagement ? ' 
 
 ' No,' he said regretfully, ' I could not find him 
 directly; and then I went on thinking so much of 
 what you said about objections, refusals — bitter words 
 possibly — ending our happiness, that I resolved to put 
 it off till to-morrow; that gives us one more day of 
 delight — delight of a tremulous kind.' 
 
 'Yes; but it would be improper to be silent too 
 long, I think,' she said in a delicate voice, which im- 
 plied that her face had grown warm. ' I want him to 
 know we love, Stephen. Why did you adopt as your 
 own my thought of delay ? ' 
 
 ' I will explain ; but I want to tell you of my secret 
 first — to tell you now. It is two or three hours yet to 
 bedtime. Let us walk up the hill to the church.' 
 
 Elfride passively assented, and they went from the 
 lawn by a side wicket, and ascended into the open 
 expanse of moonlight which streamed around the lonely 
 edifice on the summit of the hill. 
 
 The door was locked. They turned from the porch, 
 and walked hand in hand to find a resting-place in the 
 churchyard. Stephen chose a flat tomb, showing itself 
 to be newer and whiter than those around it, and sitting 
 down himself, gently drew her hand towards him. 
 
 ' No, not there,' she said. 
 
 ' Why not here ? ' 
 
 ' A mere fancy ; but never mind.' And she sat 
 down. 
 
 ' Elfie, will you love me, in spite of everything that 
 may be said against me ? ' 
 
 ' O Stephen, what makes you repeat that so con- 
 tinually and so sadly ? You know I will. Yes, indeed,' 
 she said, drawing closer, ' whatever may be said of you 
 — and nothing bad can be — I will cling to you just the 
 same. Your ways shall be my ways until I die.' 
 
 8i F 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 ' Did you ever think what my parents might be, or 
 what society I originally moved in ? ' 
 
 ' No, not particularly. I have observed one or two 
 little points in your manners which are rather quaint — 
 no more. I suppose you have moved in the ordinary 
 society of professional people.' 
 
 ' Supposing I ha,ve not — that none of my family 
 have a profession except me ? ' 
 
 ' I don't mind. What you are only concerns me.' 
 
 ' Where do you think I went to school — I mean, to 
 what kind of school ? ' 
 
 ' Dr. Somebody's academy,' she said simply. 
 
 ' No. To a dame school originally, then to a national 
 school.' 
 
 ' Only to those ! Well, I love you just as much, 
 Stephen, dear Stephen,' she murmured tenderly, ' I do 
 indeed. And why should you tell me these things so 
 impressively ? What do they matter to me ? ' 
 
 He held her closer and proceeded : 
 
 ' What do you think my father is — does for his living, 
 that is to say? " 
 
 ' He practises some profession or calling, I suppose.' 
 
 ' No ; he is a mason.' 
 
 ' A Freemason ? ' 
 
 ' No ; a cottager and journeyman mason.' 
 
 Elfride said nothing at first. After a while she 
 whispered : 
 
 ' That is a strange idea to me. But never mind ; 
 what does it matter ? ' 
 
 ' But aren't you ajigry with me for not telling you 
 before ? ' 
 
 ' No, not at all. Is your mother alive ? ' 
 
 'Yes.' 
 
 ' Is she a nice lady ? ' 
 
 ' Very — the best mother in the world. Her people 
 had been well-to-do yeomen for centuries, but she was 
 only a dairymaid.' 
 
 83 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 ' O Stephen ! ' came from her in whispered excla- 
 mation. 
 
 ' She continued to attend to a dairy long after my 
 father married her,' pursued Stephen, without further 
 hesitation. ' And I remember very well how, when I 
 was very young, I used to go to the milking, look on at 
 the skimming, sleep through the churning, and make 
 believe I helped her. Ah, that was a happy time 
 enough ! ' 
 
 ' No, never — not happy.' 
 ' Yes, it was.' 
 
 ' I don't see how happiness could be where the 
 drudgery of dairy-work had to be done for a living — 
 the hands red and chapped, and the shoes clogged. . . . 
 Stephen, I do own that it seems odd to regard you in 
 the light of — of — having been so rough in your youth, 
 and done menial things of that kind.' (Stephen with- 
 drew an inch or two from her side.) ' But I do love you 
 just the same,' she continued, getting closer under his 
 shoulder again, ' and I don't care anything about the 
 past ; and I see that you are all the worthier for having 
 pushed on in the world in such a way.' 
 
 ' It is not my worthiness j it is Knight's, who pushed 
 me.' 
 
 ' Ah, always he — always he ! ' 
 
 ' Yes, and properly so. Now, Elfride, you see the 
 reason of his teaching me by letter. I knew him years 
 before he went to Oxford, but I had not got far enough 
 in my reading for him to entertain the idea of helping 
 me in classics till he left home. Then I was sent away 
 from the village, and we very seldom met ; but he kept 
 up this system of tuition by correspondence with the 
 greatest regularity. I will tell you all the story, but not 
 now. There is nothing more to say now, beyond giving 
 places, persons, and dates.' His voice became timidly 
 slow at this point. 
 
 'No; don't take trouble to say more. You are 
 83 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 a dear honest fellow to say so much as you have; 
 and it is not so dreadful either. It has become a 
 normal thing that millionaires commence by going up 
 to London with their tools at their back, and half-a- 
 crown in their pockets. That sort of origin is getting 
 so respected,' she continued cheerfully, ' that it is 
 acquiring some of the odour of Norman ancestry.' 
 
 ' Ah, if I had made my fortune, I shouldn't mind. 
 But I am only a possible maker of it as yet.' 
 
 ' It is quite enough. And so this is what your 
 trouble was ? ' 
 
 ' I thought I was doing wrong in letting you love 
 me without telling you my story; and yet I feared to 
 do so, Elfie. I dreaded to lose you, and I was 
 cowardly on that account.' 
 
 ' How plain everything about you seems after this 
 explanation ! Your peculiarities in chess-playing, the 
 pronunciation papa noticed in your Latin, your odd 
 mixture of book-knowledge with ignorance of ordinary 
 social accomplishments, are accounted for in a moment. 
 And has this anything to do with what I saw at Lord 
 Luxellian's ? ' 
 
 ' What did you see ? ' 
 
 ' I saw the shadow of yourself putting a cloak round 
 a lady. I was at the side door; you two were in a 
 room with the window towards me. You came to me 
 a moment later.' 
 
 ' She was my mother.' 
 
 'Your mother there T She withdrew herself to 
 look at him silently in her interest. 
 
 'Elfride,' said Stephen, 'I was going to tell you 
 the remainder to-morrow — I have been keeping it back 
 — I must tell it now, after all. The remainder of my 
 revelation refers to where my parents are. Where do 
 you think they live? You know them — by sight at 
 any rate.' 
 
 ' / know them ! ' she said in suspended amazement. 
 84 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 ' Yes. My father is John Smith, Lord Luxellian's 
 master-mason, who lives under the park wall by the 
 river.' 
 
 ' O Stephen ! can it be ? ' 
 
 ' He built — or assisted at the building of the house 
 you live in, years ago. He put up those stone gate 
 piers at the lodge entrance to Lord Luxellian's park. 
 My grandfather planted the trees that belt in your 
 lawn ; my grandmother — who worked in the fields with 
 him — held each tree upright whilst he filled in the earth : 
 they told me so when I was a child. He was the 
 sexton, too, and dug many of the graves around us.' 
 
 ' And was your unaccountable vanishing on the first 
 morning of your arrival, and again this afternoon, a 
 run to see your father and mother ? . . . I understand 
 now ; no wonder you seemed to know your way about 
 the village ! ' 
 
 ' No wonder. But remember, I have not lived here 
 since I was nine years old. I then went to live with 
 my uncle, a blacksmith, near Exonbury, in order to 
 be able to attend a national school as a day scholar ; 
 there was none on this remote coast then. It was 
 there I met with my friend Knight. And when I 
 was fifteen and had been fairly educated by the school- 
 master — and more particularly by Knight — I was put 
 as a pupil in an architect's office in that town, because 
 I was skilful in the use of the pencil. A full premium 
 was paid by the efforts of my mother and father, rather 
 against the wishes of Lord Luxellian, who likes my 
 father, however, and thinks a great deal of him. There 
 I stayed till six months ago, when I obtained a situa- 
 tion as improver, as it is called, in a London office. 
 That's all of me.' 
 
 ' To think you, the London visitor, the town man, 
 should have been born here, and have known this 
 village so many years before I did. How strange — ■ 
 how very strange it seems to me ! ' she murmured. 
 
 8S 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 ' My mother curtseyed to you and your father last 
 Sunday,' said Stephen, with a pained smile at the 
 thought of the incongruity. ' And your papa said to 
 her, " I am glad to see you so regular at church, 
 fane:" 
 
 ' I remember it, but I have never spoken to her. 
 We have only been here eighteen months, and the 
 parish is so large.' 
 
 ' Contrast with this,' said Stephen, with a miserable 
 laugh, ' your father's beUef in my " blue blood," which 
 is still prevalent in his mind. The first night I came, 
 he insisted upon proving my descent from one of the 
 most ancient west-county families, on account of my 
 second Christian name ; when the truth is, it was given 
 me because my grandfather was assistant gardener in the 
 Fitzmaurice-Smith family for thirty years. Having seen 
 your face, my darling, I had not heart to contradict him, 
 and tell him what would have cut me off from a friendly 
 knowledge of you.' 
 
 She sighed deeply. ' Yes, I see now how this in- 
 equality may be made to trouble us,' she murmured, 
 and continued in a low, sad whisper, ' I wouldn't have 
 minded if they had lived far away. Papa might have 
 consented to an engagement between us if your con- 
 nection had been with villagers a hundred miles off; 
 remoteness softens family contrasts. But he will not 
 like — O Stephen, Stephen ! what can I do ? ' 
 
 ' Do ? ' he said tentatively, yet with heaviness. ' Give 
 me up ; let me go back to Lond on, and think no more 
 of me.' 
 
 ' No, no ; I cannot give you up ! This hop elessness 
 in our aflfairs makes me care more for you. ... I see 
 what did not strike me at first. Stephen, why do we 
 trouble? Why should papa object? An architect in 
 London is an architect in London. Who inquires 
 there? Nobody. We shall live there, shall we not? 
 Why nq§d we be so alarmed ? ' 
 
 55 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 ' And Elfie,' said Stephen, his hopes kindling with 
 hers, ' Knight thinks nothing of my being only a cottager's 
 son ; he says I am as worthy of his friendship as if I 
 were a lord's ; and if I am worthy of his friendship, I 
 am worthy of you, am I not, Elfride ? ' 
 
 ' I not only have never loved anybody but you,' she 
 said, instead of giving an answer, ' but I have not even 
 formed a strong friendship, such as you have for Knight. 
 I wish you hadn't. It diminishes me.' 
 
 ' Now, Elfride, you know better,' he said wooingly. 
 ' And had you really never any sweetheart at all ? ' 
 
 ' None that was ever recognized by me as such.' 
 
 ' But did nobody ever love you ? ' 
 
 ' Yes — a man did once ; very much, he said.' 
 
 ' How long ago ? ' 
 
 ' Oh, a long time.' 
 
 ' How long, dearest ? 
 
 ' A twelvemonth.' 
 
 ' That's not very long ' (rather disappointedly). 
 
 ' I said long, not very long.' 
 
 ' And did he want to marry you ? ' 
 
 ' I believe he did. But I didn't see anything in him. 
 He was not good enough, even if I had loved him.' 
 
 ' May I ask what he was ? ' 
 
 ' A farmer.' 
 
 ' A farmer not good enough — how much better than 
 my family ! ' Stephen murmured. 
 
 ' Where is he now ? ' he continued to Elfride. 
 
 ' Bere.' 
 
 ' Here ! what do you mean by that ? ' 
 
 ' I mean that he is here.' 
 
 ' Where here ? ' 
 
 ' Under, us. He is under this tomb. He is dead, 
 and we are sitting on his grave.' 
 
 ' Elfie,' said the young man, standing up and looking 
 at the tomb, ' how odd and sad that revelation seems ! 
 It quite depresses me for the moment.' 
 
 87 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 ' Stephen, I didn't wish to sit here ; but you would 
 do so.' 
 
 ' You never encouraged him ? ' 
 
 ' Never by look, word, or sign,' she said solemnly. 
 ' He died of consumption, and was buried the day you 
 first came.' 
 
 ' Let us go away. I don't like standing by him, even 
 if you never loved him. He was before me.' 
 
 ' Worries make you unreasonable,' she half pouted, 
 following Stephen at the distance of a few steps. ' Per- 
 haps I ought to have told you before we sat down. Yes ; 
 let us go.' 
 
IX 
 
 ' Her father did fume.' 
 
 Oppressed, in spite of themselves, by a foresight 
 of impending complications, Elfride and Stephen re- 
 turned down the hill hand in hand. At the door they 
 paused wistfully, like children late at school. 
 
 Women accept their destiny more readily than men. 
 Elfride had now resigned herself to the overwhelming 
 idea of her lover's sorry antecedents ; Stephen had not 
 forgotten the trifling grievance that Elfride had known 
 earlier admiration than his own. 
 
 ' What was that young man's name ? ' he inquired. 
 
 ' Felix Jethway ; a widow's only son.' 
 
 ' I remember the family.' 
 
 ' She hates me now. She says I killed him.' 
 
 Stephen mused, and they entered the porch. 
 
 ' Stephen, I love only you,' she tremulously whispered. 
 
 He pressed her fingers, and the trifling shadow 
 passed away, to admit again the mutual and more 
 tangible trouble. 
 
 The study appeared to be the only room lighted 
 up. They entered, each with a demeanour intended to 
 conceal the inconcealable fact that reciprocal love was 
 their dominant chord. Elfride perceived a man, sitting 
 
 o 89 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 with his back towards herself, talking to her father. 
 She would have retired, but Mr. Swancourt had seen 
 her. 
 
 'Come in,' he said; 'it is only Martin Cannister, 
 come for a copy of the register for poor Mrs. Jethway.' 
 
 Martin Cannister, the sexton, was rather a favourite 
 with Elfride. He used to absorb her attention by 
 telling her of his strange experiences in digging up 
 after long years the bodies of persons he had known, 
 and recognizing them by some little sign (though in 
 reality he had never recognized any). He had shrewd 
 small eyes and a great wealth of double chin, which 
 compensated in some measure for considerable poverty 
 of nose. 
 
 The appearance of a slip of paper in Cannister's 
 hand, and a few shillings lying on the table in front 
 of him, denoted that the business had been transacted, 
 and the tenor of their conversation went to show that 
 a summary of village news was now engaging the atten- 
 tion of parishioner and parson. 
 
 Mr. Cannister stood up and touched his forehead 
 over his eye with his finger, in respectful salutation of 
 Elfride, gave half as much salute to Stephen (whom he, 
 in common with other villagers, had never for a moment 
 recognized), then sat down again and resumed his 
 discourse. 
 
 ' Where had I got on to, sir ? ' 
 
 ' To driving the pile,' said Mr. Swancourt. 
 
 'The pile 'twas. So, as I was saying, Nat was 
 driving the pile in this manner, as I might say.' Here 
 Mr. Cannister held his walking-stick scrupulously verti- 
 cal with his left hand, and struck a blow with great 
 force on the knob of the stick with his right. 'John 
 was steadying the pile so, as I might say.' Here he 
 gave the stick a slight shake, and looked firmly in the 
 various eyes around to see that before proceeding 
 further his listeners well grasped the subject at that 
 90 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 Stage. ' Well, when Nat had struck some half-dozen 
 blows nnore upon the pile, 'a stopped for a second or 
 two. John, thinking he had done striking, put his 
 hand upon the top o' the pile to gie en a pull, and see if 
 'a were firm in the ground.' Mr. Cannister spread his 
 hand over the top of the stick, completely covering it 
 with his palm. ' Well, so to speak, Nat hadn't maned 
 to stop striking, and when John had put his hand upon 
 the pile, the beetle ' 
 
 ' Oh dreadful ! ' said Elfride. 
 
 ' The beetle was already coming down, you see, sir. 
 Nat just caught sight of his hand, but couldn't stop 
 the blow in time. Down came the beetle upon poor 
 John Smith's hand, and squashed en to a pummy.' 
 
 ' Dear me, dear me ! poor fellow ! ' said the vicar, 
 with an intonation like the groans of the wounded in a 
 pianoforte performance of the ' Battle of Prague.' 
 
 ' John Smith, the master - mason ? ' cried Stephen 
 hurriedly. 
 
 ' Ay, no other ; and a better-hearted man God 
 A'mighty never made.' 
 
 ' Is he so much hurt ? ' 
 
 ' I have heard,' said Mr. Swancourt, not noticing 
 Stephen, ' that he has a son in London, a very pro- 
 mising young fellow.' 
 
 ' Oh, how he must be hurt ! ' repeated Stephen. 
 
 ' A beetle couldn't hurt very little. Well, sir, good- 
 night t'ye J and ye, sir ; and you, miss, I'm sure.' 
 
 Mr. Cannister had been making unnoticeable motions 
 of withdrawal, and by the time this farewell remark came 
 from his lips he was just outside the door of the room. 
 He tramped along the hall, stayed more than a minute 
 endeavouring to close the door properly, and then was 
 lost to their hearing. 
 
 Stephen had meanwhile turned and said to the vicar : 
 
 ' Please excuse me this evening ! I must leave. 
 John Smith is my father.' 
 
 91 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 The vicar did not comprehend at first. 
 
 ' What did you say ? ' he inquired. 
 
 ' John Smith is my father,' said Stephen deliberately. 
 
 A surplus tinge of redness rose from Mr. Swancourt's 
 neck, and came round over his face, the lines of his 
 features became more firmly defined, and his lips seemed 
 to get thinner. It was evident that a series of little 
 circumstances, hitherto unheeded, were now fitting 
 themselves together, and forming a lucid picture in 
 Mr. Swancourt's mind in such a manner as to render 
 useless further explanation on Stephen's part. 
 
 ' Indeed,' the vicar said, in a voice dry and without 
 inflection. 
 
 This being a word which depends entirely upon its 
 tone for its meaning, Mr. Swancourt's enunciation was 
 equivalent to no expression at all. 
 
 ' I have to go now,' said Stephen, with an agitated 
 bearing, and a movement as if he scarcely knew whether 
 he ought to run off or stay longer. ' On my return, 
 sir, will you kindly grant me a few minutes' private 
 conversation ? ' 
 
 ' Certainly. Though antecedently it does not seem 
 possible that there can be anything of the nature of 
 private business between us.' 
 
 Mr. Swancourt put on his straw hat, crossed the 
 drawing-room, into which the moonlight was shining, 
 and stepped out of the French window into the 
 verandah. It required no further effort to perceive 
 what, indeed, reasoning might have foretold as the 
 natural colour of a mind whose pleasures were taken 
 amid genealogies, good dinners, and patrician reminis- 
 cences, that Mr. Swancourt's prejudices were too strong 
 for his generosity, and that Stephen's moments as his 
 friend and equal were numbered, or had even now 
 ceased. 
 
 Stephen moved forward as if he would follow the 
 vicar, then as if he would not, and in absolute per- 
 92 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 plexity whither to turn himself, went awkwardly to the 
 door. Elfride followed lingeringly behind him. Before 
 he had receded two yards from the doorstep, Unity and 
 Ann the housemaid came home from their visit to the 
 village. 
 
 ' Have you heard anything about John Smith ? The 
 accident is not so bad as was reported, is it ? ' said 
 Elfride intuitively. 
 
 ' Oh no ; the doctor says it is only a bad bruise.' 
 
 ' I thought so ! ' cried Elfride gladly. 
 
 ' He says that, although Nat believes he did not 
 check the beetle as it came down, he must have done 
 so without knowing it — checked it very considerably 
 too ; for the full blow would have knocked his hand 
 abroad, and in reality it is only made black-and- 
 blue like.' 
 
 ' How thankful I am ! ' said Stephen. 
 
 The perplexed Unity looked at him with her mouth 
 rather than with her eyes. 
 
 ' That will do, Unity,' said Elfride magisterially ; and 
 the two maids passed on. 
 
 ' Elfride, do you forgive me ? ' said Stephen with a 
 faint smile. ' No man is fair in love ; ' and he took her 
 fingers Ughtly in his own. 
 
 With her head thrown sideways in the Greuze 
 attitude, she looked a tender reproach at his doubt 
 and pressed his hand. Stephen returned the pressure 
 threefold, then hastily went off to his father's cottage 
 by the wall of Endelstow Park. 
 
 ' Elfride, what have you to say to this ? ' inquired 
 her father, coming up immediately Stephen had retired. 
 
 With feminine quickness she grasped at any straw 
 that would enable her to plead his cause. ' He had told 
 me of it,' she faltered ; ' so that it is not a discovery in 
 spite of him. He was just coming in to tell you.' 
 
 ' Coming to tell ! Why hadn't he already told ? I 
 object as much, if not more, to his underhand conceal- 
 
 93 
 
A PAIR OP BLUE EYES 
 
 ment of this, than I do to the fact itself. It looks very 
 much like his making a fool of me, and of you too. You 
 and he have been about together, and corresponding 
 together, in a way I don't at all approve of — in a most 
 unseemly way. You should have known how improper 
 such conduct is. A woman can't be too careful not to 
 be seen alone with I-don't-know-whom.' 
 
 ' You saw us, papa, and have never said a word.' 
 
 ' My fault, of course ; my fault. What the deuce 
 could I be thinking of ! He, a villager's son ; and we, 
 Swancourts, connections of the Luxellians. We have 
 been coming to nothing for centuries, and now I believe 
 we have got there. What shall I next invite here, I 
 wonder ! ' 
 
 Elfride began to cry at this very unpropitious aspect 
 of affairs. ' O papa, papa, forgive me and him ! We 
 care so much for one another, papa — O, so much ! 
 And what he was going to ask you is, if you will allow 
 of an engagement between us till he is a gentleman as 
 good as you. We are not in a hurry, dear papa; we 
 don't want in the least to marry now ; not until he is 
 richer. Only will you let us be engaged, because I love 
 him so, and he loves me ? ' 
 
 Mr. Swancourt's feelings were a little touched by 
 this appeal, and he was annoyed that such should be 
 the case. ' Certainly not ! ' he replied. He pronounced 
 the inliibition lengthily and sonorously, so that the ' not ' 
 sounded like ' n-o-o-o-t ! ' 
 
 ' No, no, no ; don't say it ! ' 
 
 ' Foh ! A fine story. It is not enough that I have 
 been deluded and disgraced by having him here, — the 
 son of one of my village peasants, — ^but now I am to 
 make him my son-in-law ! Heavens above us, are you 
 mad, Elfride ? ' 
 
 ' You have seen his letters come to me ever since his 
 first visit, papa, and you knew they were a sort of — love- 
 letters ; and since he has been here you have let him be 
 94 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 alone with me almost entirely; and you guessed, you 
 must have guessed, what we were thinking of, and doing, 
 and you didn't stop him. Next to love-making comes 
 love-winning, and you knew it would come to that, papa.' 
 
 The vicar parried this common-sense thrust. ' I know 
 — since you press me so — I know I did guess some 
 childish attachment might arise between you ; I own I 
 did not take much trouble to prevent it ; but I have not 
 particularly countenanced it ; and, Elfride, how can you 
 expect that I should now ? It is impossible ; no father 
 in England would hear of such a thing.' 
 
 ' But he is the same man, papa ; the same in every 
 particular ; and how can he be less fit for me than he 
 was before ? ' 
 
 ' He appeared a young rrian with well-to-do friends, and 
 a little property ; but having neither, he is another man.' 
 
 ' You inquired nothing about him ? ' 
 
 ' I went by Hewby's introduction. He should have 
 told me. So should the young man himself; of course 
 he should. I consider it a most dishonourable thing to 
 come into a man's house like a treacherous I-don't-know- 
 what.' 
 
 ' But he was afraid to tell you, and so should I have 
 been. He loved me too well to like to run the risk. 
 And as to speaking of his friends on his first visit, I 
 don't see why he should have done so at all. He came 
 here on business : it was no affair of ours who his 
 parents were. And then he knew that if he told you he 
 would never be asked here, and would perhaps never see 
 me again. And he wanted to see me. Who can blame 
 him for trying, by any means, to stay near me — the girl 
 he loves ? All is fair in love. I have heard you say so 
 yourself, papa ; and you yourself would have done just 
 as he has — so would any man.' 
 
 ' And any man, on discovering what I have dis- 
 covered, would also do as I do, and mend my mistake ; 
 that is, get shot of him again, as soon as the laws of 
 
 95 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 hospitality will allow.' But Mr. Swancourt then re- 
 membered that he was a Christian. ' I would not, for 
 the world, seem to turn him out of doors,' he added; 
 ' but I think he will have the tact to see that he cannot 
 stay long after this, with good taste.' 
 
 ' He will, because he's a gentleman. See how grace- 
 ful his manners are,' Elfride went on ; though perhaps 
 Stephen's manners, like the feats of Euryalus, owed their 
 attractiveness in her eyes rather to the attractiveness of 
 his person than to their own excellence. 
 
 ' Ay ; anybody can be what you call graceful, if he 
 lives a little time in a city, and keeps his eyes open. 
 And he might have picked up his gentlemanliness by 
 going to the galleries of theatres, and watching stage 
 drawing-room manners. He reminds me of one of the 
 worst stories I ever heard in my life.' 
 
 ' What story was that ? ' 
 
 ' Oh no, thank you ! I wouldn't tell you such an 
 improper matter for the world ! ' 
 
 ' If his father and mother had lived in the north or 
 east of England,' gallantly persisted Elfride, though her 
 sobs began to interrupt her articulation, • anywhere but 
 here — you — would have — only regarded — him, and not 
 them I His station — would have — been what — his pro- 
 fession makes it, — and not fixed by — his father's humble 
 position — at all ; whom he never lives with — now. 
 Though John Smith has saved lots of money, and is 
 better off than we are, they say, or he couldn't have 
 put his son to such an expensive profession. And it 
 is clever and — honourable — of Stephen, to be the best 
 of his family.' 
 
 ' Yes. " Let a beast be lord of beasts, and his crib 
 shall stand at the king's mess." ' 
 
 « You insult me, papa ! ' she burst out. ' You do, 
 you do ! He is my own Stephen, he is ! ' 
 
 'That may or may not be true, Elfride,' returned 
 her father, again uncomfortably agitated in spite of 
 96 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 himself. • You confuse future probabilities with present 
 facts, — what the young man may be with what he is. 
 We must look at what he is, not what an improbable 
 degree of success in his profession may make him. 
 The case is this : the son of a working-man in my 
 parish who may or may not be able to buy me up — . 
 a youth who has not yet advanced so far into life as 
 to have any income of his own deserving the name, and 
 therefore of his father's degree as regards station — wants 
 to be engaged to you. His family are living in precisely 
 the same spot in England as yours, so throughout this 
 county — which is the world to us — you would always 
 be known as the wife of Jack Smith the mason's son, 
 and not under any circumstances as the wife of a 
 London professional man. It is the drawback, not the 
 compensating fact, that is talked of always. There, say 
 no more. You may argue all night, and prove what 
 you will ; I'll stick to my words.' 
 
 Elfride looked silently and hopelessly out of the 
 window with large heavy eyes and wet cheeks. 
 
 ' I call it great temerity — and long to call it audacity 
 — in Hewby,' resumed her father. ' I never heard such 
 a thing — giving such a hobbledehoy native of this place 
 such an introduction to me as he did. Naturally you 
 were deceived as well as I was. I don't blame you at 
 all, so far.' He went and searched for Mr. Hewby's 
 original letter. ' Here's what he said to me : " Dear 
 Sir, — Agreeably to your request of the i8th instant, 
 I have arranged to survey and make drawings," et cmtera. 
 " My assistant, Mr. Stephen Smith " — assistant, you see 
 he called him, and naturally I understood him to mean 
 a sort of partner. Why didn't he say " clerk " ? ' 
 
 'They never call them clerks in that profession, 
 because they do not write. Stephen — Mr. Smith — told 
 me so. So that Mr. Hewby simply used the accepted 
 word.' 
 
 ' Let me speak, please, Elfride ! " My assistant, Mr. 
 
 97 e 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 Stephen Smith, will leave London by the early train 
 to-morrow morning . . . many thanks for your proposal 
 to accommodate him . . . you may put every confidence in 
 him, and may rely upon his discernment in the matter 
 of church architecture." Well, I repeat that Hewby 
 ought to be ashamed of himself for making so much 
 of a poor lad of that sort.' 
 
 ' Professional men in London,' Elfride argued, ' don't 
 know anything about their clerks' fathers and mothers. 
 They have assistants who come to their offices and 
 shops for years, and hardly even know where they live. 
 What they can do — what profits they can bring the firm 
 — that's all London men care about. And that is helped 
 in him by his faculty of being uniformly pleasant.' 
 
 ' Uniform pleasantness is rather a defect than a 
 faculty. It shows that a man hasn't sense enough to 
 know whom to despise.' 
 
 ' It shows that he acts by faith and not by sight, as 
 those you claim succession from directed.' 
 
 ' That's some more of what he's been telling you, 
 I suppose ! Yes, I was inclined to suspect him, 
 because he didn't care about sauces of any kind. I 
 always did doubt a man's being a gentleman if his 
 palate had no acquired tastes. An unedified palate is 
 the irrepressible cloven foot of the upstart. The idea 
 of my bringing out a bottle of my '40 Martinez — only 
 eleven of them left now — to a man who didn't know it 
 from eighteenpenny ! Then the Latin line he gave to 
 my quotation; it was very cut-and- dried, very; or I, 
 who haven't looked into a classical author for the last 
 eighteen years, shouldn't have remembered it. Well, 
 Elfride, you had better go to your room; you'll get 
 over this bit of tomfoolery in time.' 
 
 ' No, no, no, papa,' she moaned. For of all the 
 miseries attaching to miserable love, the worst is the 
 misery of thinking that the passion which is the cause 
 of them all may cease. 
 
 98 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 ' Elfride,' said her father with rough friendliness, ' I 
 have an excellent scheme on hand, which I cannot 
 tell you of now. A scheme to benefit you and me. 
 It has been thrust upon me for some little time — 
 yes, thrust upon me — but I didn't dream of its value 
 till this afternoon, when the revelation came. I should 
 be most unwise to refuse to entertain it.' 
 
 ' I don't like that word,' she returned wearily. 
 ' You have lost so much already by schemes. Is it 
 those wretched mines again ? ' 
 
 ' No ; not a mining scheme.' 
 
 ' Railways ? ' 
 
 ' Nor railways. It is like those mysterious offers 
 we see advertised, by which any gentleman with no 
 brains at all may make so much a week without risk, 
 trouble, or soiling his fingers. However, I am in- 
 tending to say nothing till it is settled, though I will 
 just say this much, that you soon may have other fish 
 to fry than to think of Stephen Smith. Remember, 
 I wish, not to be angry, but friendly, to the young 
 man ; for your sake I'll regard him as a friend in a 
 certain sense. But this is enough ; in a few days 
 you will be quite my way of thinking. There, now, 
 go to your bedroom. Unity shall bring you up some 
 supper. I wish you not to be here when he comes 
 back.' 
 
•Beneath the shelter of an aged tree.' 
 
 Stephen retraced his steps towards the cottage he 
 had visited only two or three hours previously. .He 
 drew near and under the rich foliage growing about 
 the outskirts of Endelstow Park, the spotty lights and 
 shades from the shining moon maintaining a race over 
 his head and down his back in an endless gambol. 
 When he crossed the plank bridge and entered the 
 garden-gate, he saw an illuminated figure coming from 
 the enclosed plot towards the house on the other side. 
 It was his father, with his hand in a sling, taking a 
 general moonlight view of the garden, and particularly 
 of a plot of the youngest of young turnips, previous 
 to closing the cottage for the night. 
 
 He saluted his son with customary force. ■ Hallo, 
 Stephen ! We should ha' been in bed in another ten 
 minutes. Come to see what's the matter wi' me, I 
 suppose, my lad ? ' 
 
 The doctor had come and gone, and the hand had 
 been pronounced as injured but slightly, though ic 
 might possibly have been considered a far more serious 
 case if Mr. Smith had been a more important man. 
 Stephen's anxious inquiry drew from his father words 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 of regret at the inconvenience to the world of his 
 doing nothing for the next two days, rather than of 
 concern for the pain of the accident. Together they 
 entered the house. 
 
 John Smith — brown as autumn as to skin, white 
 as winter as to clothes — was a satisfactory specimen 
 of the village artificer in stone. In common with 
 most rural mechanics, he had too much individuality 
 to be a typical 'working-man' — a resultant of that 
 beach-pebble attrition with his kind only to be ex- 
 perienced in large towns, which metamorphoses the 
 unit Self into a fraction of the unit Class. 
 
 There was not the speciality in his labour which 
 distinguishes the handicraftsmen of towns. Though 
 only a mason, strictly speaking, he was not above 
 handling a brick, if bricks were the order of the day ; 
 or a slate or tile, if a roof had to be covered before 
 the wet weather set in, and nobody was near who 
 could do it better. Indeed, on one or two occasions 
 in the depth of winter, when frost peremptorily forbids 
 all use of the trowel, making foundations to settle, 
 stones to fly, and mortar to crumble, he had taken 
 to felling and sawing trees. Moreover, he had prac- 
 tised gardening in his own plot for so many years 
 that, on an emergency, he might have made a living 
 by that calling. 
 
 Probably our countryman was not such an accom- 
 plished artificer in a particular direction as his town 
 brethren in the trades. But he was, in truth, like that 
 clumsy pin-maker who made the whole pin, and who 
 was despised by Adam Smith on that account and 
 respected by Macaulay, much more the artist never- 
 theless. 
 
 Appearing now, indoors, by the light of the candle, 
 his stalwart healthiness was a sight to see. His beard 
 was close and knotted as that of a chiselled Hercules ; 
 his shirt sleeves were partly rolled up, his waistcoat 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 unbuttoned; the difference in hue between the snowy 
 linen and the ruddy arms and face contrasting like the 
 white of an egg and its yolk. Mrs. Smith, on hearing 
 them enter, advanced from the pantry. 
 
 Mrs. Smith was a matron whose countenance ad- 
 dressed itself to the mind rather than to the eye, though 
 not exclusively. She retained her personal freshness 
 even now, in the prosy afternoon-time of her life ; but 
 what her features were primarily indicative of was a 
 sound common sense behind them ; as a whole, appear- 
 ing to carry with them a sort of argumentative commen- 
 tary on the world in general. 
 
 The details of the accident were then rehearsed by 
 Stephen's father, in the dramatic manner also common 
 to Martin Cannister, other individuals of the neighbour- 
 hood, and the rural world generally. Mrs. Smith threw 
 in her sentiments between the acts, as Coryphaeus of 
 the tragedy, to make the description complete. The 
 story at last came to an end, as the longest will, and 
 Stephen directed the conversation into another channel. 
 
 ' Well, mother, they know everything about me now,' 
 he said quietly. 
 
 ' Well done ! ' replied his father ; ' now my mind's 
 at peace.' 
 
 ' I blame myself — I never shall forgive myself — for 
 not telling them before,' continued the young man. 
 
 Mrs. Smith at this point abstracted her mind from 
 the former subject. ' I don't see what you have to 
 grieve about, Stephen,' she said. ' People who acci- 
 dentally get friends don't, as a first stroke, tell the 
 history of their families.' 
 
 ' Ye've done no wrong, certainly,' said his father. 
 
 ' No ; but I should have spoken sooner. There's 
 more in this visit of mine than you think — a good deal 
 more.' 
 
 ' Not more than / think,' Mrs. Smith replied, look- 
 ing contemplatively at him. Stepheu blysh^d j and his 
 
 102 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 father looked from one to the other in a state of utter 
 incomprehension. 
 
 ' She's a pretty piece enough,' Mrs. Smith continued, 
 'and very lady-like and clever too. But though she's 
 very well fit for you as far as that is, why, mercy 'pon 
 me, what ever do you want any woman at all for yet ? ' 
 
 John made his naturally short mouth a long one, 
 and wrinkled his forehead, ' That's the way the wind 
 d'blow, is it ? ' he said. 
 
 ' Mother,' exclaimed Stephen, ' how absurdly you 
 speak ! Criticizing whether she's fit for me or no, as 
 if there were room for doubt on the matter ! Why, to 
 marry her would be the great blessing of my life — socially 
 and practically, as well as in other respects. No such 
 good fortune as that, I'm afraid ; she's too far above 
 me. Her family doesn't want such country lads as I 
 in it.' 
 
 ' Then if they don't want you, I'd see them dead 
 corpses before I'd want them, and go to better families 
 who do want you.' 
 
 ' Ah, yes ; but I could never put up with the distaste 
 of being welcomed among such people as you mean, 
 whilst I could get indifference among such people as 
 hers.' 
 
 'What crazy twist o' thinking will enter your head 
 next ? ' said his mother. ' And come to that, she's not 
 a bit too high for you, or you too low for her. See 
 how careful I be to keep myself up. I'm sure I never 
 stop for more than a minute together to talk to any 
 journe)niien people; and I never invite anybody to our 
 party o' Christmases who are not in business for them- 
 selves. And I talk to several toppermost carriage people 
 that come to my lord's without saying ma'am or sir to 
 'em, and they take it as quiet as lambs.' 
 
 ' You curtseyed to the vicar, mother ; and I wish 
 you hadn't.' 
 
 ' But it was before he called me by my Christian 
 103 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 name, or he would have got very little curtseying from 
 me ! ' said Mrs. Smith, bridling and sparkling with 
 vexation. ' You go on at me, Stephen, as if I were 
 your worst enemy ! What else could I do with the man 
 to get rid of him, banging it into me and your father 
 by side and by seam, about his greatness, and what 
 happened when he was a young fellow at college, and I 
 don't know what-all ; the tongue o' en flopping round 
 his mouth like a mop-rag round a dairy. That 'a did, 
 didn't he, John ? ' 
 
 ' That's about the size o't,' replied her husband. 
 
 ' Every woman now-a-days,' resumed Mrs. Smith, 
 ' if she marry at all, must expect a father-in-law of a 
 rank lower than her father. The men have gone up so, 
 and the women have stood still. Every man you meet 
 is more the dand than his father ; and you are just level 
 wi' her.' 
 
 ' That's what she thinks herself 
 
 ' It only shows her sense. I knew she was after 'ee, 
 Stephen — I knew it.' 
 
 ' After me ! Good Lord, what next ! ' 
 
 ' And I really must say again that you ought not 
 to be in such a hurry, and wait for a few years. You 
 might go higher than a bankrupt pa'son's girl then.' 
 
 ' The fact is, mother,' said Stephen impatiently, ' you 
 don't know anything about it. I shall never go higher, 
 because I don't want to, nor should I if I lived to be 
 a hundred. As to you saying that she's after me, I 
 don't like such a remark about her, for it implies a 
 scheming woman, and a man worth scheming for, both 
 of which are not only untrue, but ludicrously untrue, 
 of this case. Isn't it so, father ? ' 
 
 'I'm afraid I don't understand the matter well 
 enough to gie my opinion,' said his father, in the tone 
 of the fox who had a cold and could not smell. 
 
 ' She couldn't have been very backward anyhow, 
 considering the short time you have known her,' said 
 104 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 his mother. ' Well I think that five years hence you'll 
 be plenty young enough to think of such things. And 
 really she can very well afford to wait, and will too, take 
 my word. Living down in an out-step place like this, 
 I am sure she ought to be very thankful that you took 
 notice of her. She'd most likely have died an old maid 
 if you hadn't turned up.' 
 
 ' All nonsense,' said Stephen, but not aloud. 
 
 ' A nice httle thing she is,' Mrs. Smith went on in 
 a more complacent tone now that Stephen had been 
 talked down ; ' there's not a word to say against her, 
 I'll own. I see her sometimes decked out like a horse 
 going to fair, and I admire her for't. A perfect little 
 lady. But people can't help their thoughts, and if she'd 
 learnt to make figures instead of letters when she was 
 at school 'twould have been better for her pocket ; for 
 as I said, there never were worse times for such as she 
 than now.' 
 
 ' Now, now, mother ! ' said Stephen with smiling 
 deprecation. 
 
 ' But I will ! ' said his mother with asperity. ' I 
 don't read the papers for nothing, and I know men all 
 move up a stage by marriage. Men of her class, that 
 is, parsons, marry squires' daughters ; squires marry 
 lords' daughters ; lords marry dukes' daughters ; dukes 
 marry queens' daughters. All stages of gentlemen 
 mate a stage higher; and the lowest stage of gentle- 
 women are left single, or marry out of their class.' 
 
 ' But you said just now, dear mother ' retorted 
 
 Stephen, unable to resist the temptation of showing 
 his mother her inconsistency. Then he paused. 
 
 ' Well, what did I say ? ' And Mrs. Smith prepared 
 her lips for a new campaign. 
 
 Stephen, regretting that he had begun, since a 
 volcano might be the consequence, was obliged to 
 go on. 
 
 'You said I wasn't out of her class just before.' 
 
 H 105 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 ' Yes, there, there ! That's you ; that's my own 
 flesh and blood. I'll warrant that you'll pick holes in 
 everything your mother says, if you can, Stephen. You 
 are just like your father for that ; take anybody's part 
 but mine. 'Whilst I am speaking and talking and 
 trying and slaving away for your good, you are waiting 
 to catch me out in that way. So you are in her class, 
 but 'tis what her people would call marrying out of her 
 class. Don't be so quarrelsome, Stephen ! ' 
 
 Stephen preserved a discreet silence, in which he was 
 imitated by his father, and for several minutes nothing 
 was heard but the ticking of the green-faced case-clock 
 against the wall. 
 
 ' I'm sure,' added Mrs. Smith in a more philosophic 
 tone, and as a terminative speech, ' if there'd been so 
 much trouble to get a husband in my time as there is in 
 these days — when you must make a god-almighty of a 
 man to get en to hae ye — I'd have trod clay for bricks 
 before I'd ever have lowered my dignity to marry, or 
 there's no bread in nine loaves.' 
 
 The discussion now dropped, and as it was getting 
 late, Stephen bade his parents farewell for the evening, 
 his mother none the less warmly for their sparring ; for 
 although Mrs. Smith and Stephen were always contend- 
 ing, they were never at enmity. 
 
 'And possibly,' said Stephen, 'I may leave here 
 altogether to-morrow; I don't know. So that if I 
 shouldn't call again before returning to London, don't 
 be alarmed, will you ? ' 
 
 'But didn't you come for a fortnight?' said his 
 mother. 'And haven't you a month's holiday alto- 
 gether ? They are going to turn you out, then ? ' 
 
 ' Not at all. I may stay longer ; I may go. If I go, 
 you had better say nothing about my having been here, 
 for her sake. At what time of the morning does the 
 carrier pass Endelstow lane ? ' 
 
 ' Seven o'clock.' 
 
 io6 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 And then he left them. His thoughts were, that 
 should the vicar permit him to become engaged, to hope 
 for an engagement, or in any way to think of his beloved 
 Elfride, he might stay longer. Should he be forbidden 
 to think of any such thing, he resolved to go at once. 
 And the latter, even to young hopefulness, seemed the 
 more probable alternative. 
 
 Stephen walked back to the vicarage through the 
 meadows, as he had come, surrounded by the soft 
 musical purl of the water through little weirs, the modest 
 light of the moon, the freshening smell of the dews out- 
 spread around. It was a time when mere seeing is 
 meditation, and meditation peace. Stephen was hardly 
 philosopher enough to avail himself of Nature's offer. 
 His constitution was made up of very simple particulars ; 
 was one which, rare in the spring-time of civilizations, 
 seems to grow abundant as a nation gets older, individu- 
 ality fades, and education spreads ; that is, his brain had 
 extraordinary receptive powers, and no great creativeness. 
 Quickly acquiring any kind of knowledge he saw around 
 him, and having a plastic adaptability more common in 
 woman than in man, he changed colour like a chameleon 
 as the society he found himself in assumed a higher and 
 more artificial tone. He had not many original ideas, 
 and yet there was scarcely an idea to which, under 
 proper training, he could not have added a respectable 
 co-ordinate. 
 
 He saw nothing outside himself to-night ; and what 
 he saw within was a weariness to his flesh. Yet to a 
 dispassionate observer, his pretensions to Elfride, though 
 rather premature, were far from absurd as marriages go, 
 unless the accidental proximity of simple but honest 
 parents could be said to make them so. 
 
 The clock struck eleven when he entered the house. 
 
 Elfride had been waiting with scarcely a movement since 
 
 he departed. Before he had spoken to her she caught 
 
 sight of him passing into the study with her father. She 
 
 107 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 saw that he had by some means obtained the private 
 interview he desired. 
 
 A nervous headache had been growing on the ex- 
 citable girl during the absence of Stephen, and now she 
 could do nothing beyond going up again to her room as 
 she had done before. Instead of lying down she sat 
 again in the darkness without closing the door, and 
 listened with a beating heart to every sound from down- 
 stairs. The servants had gone to bed. She ultimately 
 heard the two men come from the study and cross to 
 the dining-room, where supper had been lingering for 
 more than an hour. The door was left open, and she 
 found that the meal, such as it was, passed oif between 
 her father and her lover without any remark, save 
 commonplaces as to cucumbers and melons, their whole- 
 someness and culture, uttered in a stiif and formal way. 
 It seemed to prefigure failure. 
 
 Shortly afterwards Stephen came upstairs to his bed- 
 room, and was almost immediately followed by her father, 
 who also retired for the night. Not inclined to get a 
 light, she partly undressed and sat on the bed, where she 
 remained in pained thought for some time, possibly an 
 hour. Then rising to close her door previously to fully 
 unrobing, she saw a streak of light shining across the 
 landing. Her father's door was shut, and he could be 
 heard snoring regularly. The light came from Stephen's 
 room, and the slight sounds also coming thence em- 
 phatically denoted what he was doing. In the perfect 
 silence she could hear the closing of a lid and the click- 
 ing of a lock, — he was fastening his hat-box. Then 
 the buckling of straps and the click of another key, 
 — he was securing his portmanteau. With trebled 
 foreboding she opened her door softly, and went to- 
 wards his. One sensation pervaded her to distrac- 
 tion. Stephen, her handsome youth and darling, was 
 going away, and she might never see him again except 
 in secret and in sadness — perhaps never more. At 
 io8 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 any rate, she could no longer wait till the morning to 
 hear the result of the interview, as she had intended. 
 She flung her dressing-gown round her, tapped lightly 
 at his door, and whispered ' Stephen ! ' He came 
 instantly, opened the door, and stepped out. 
 
 ' Tell me ; are we to hope ? ' 
 
 He replied in a disturbed whisper, and a tear ap- 
 proached its outlet, though none fell. 
 
 ' I am not to think of such a preposterous thing — 
 that's what he said. And I am going to-morrow. I 
 should have called you up to bid you good-bye.' 
 
 ' But he didn't say you were to go — O Stephen, he 
 didn't say that ? ' 
 
 ' No ; not in words. But I cannot stay.' 
 
 ' Oh, don't, don't go ! Do come and let us talk. 
 Let us come down to the drawing-room for a few 
 minutes ; he will hear us here.' 
 
 She preceded him down the staircase with the taper 
 light in her hand, looking unnaturally tall and thin in 
 the long dove-coloured dressing-gown she wore. She 
 did not stop to think of the propriety or otherwise of 
 this midnight interview under such circumstances. She 
 thought that the tragedy of her life was beginning, and, 
 for the first time almost, felt that her existence might 
 have a grave side, the shade of which enveloped and 
 rendered invisible the delicate gradations of custom and 
 punctilio. Elfride softly opened the drawing-room door 
 and they both went in. When she had placed the 
 candle on the table, he enclosed her with his arms, 
 dried her eyes with his handkerchief, and kissed their 
 lids. 
 
 ' Stephen, it is over — happy love is over ; and there 
 is no more sunshine now ! ' 
 
 ' I wiU make a fortune, and come to you, and have 
 you. Yes, I will ! ' 
 
 ' Papa will never hear of it — never — never ! You 
 don't know him. I do. He is either biassed in favour 
 109 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 of a thing, or prejudiced against it. Argument is power- 
 less against either feeling.' 
 
 ' No ; I won't think of him so,' said Stephen. ' If I 
 appear before him some time hence as a man of estab- 
 lished name, he will accept me — I know he will. He 
 is not a wicked man.' 
 
 ' No, he is not wicked. But you say " some time 
 hence," as if it were no time. To you, among bustle 
 and excitement, it will be comparatively a short time, 
 perhaps; oh, to me, it will be its real length trebled! 
 Every summer will be a year — autumn a year — winter 
 a year ! O Stephen ! and you may forget me ! ' 
 
 Forget : that was, and is, the real sting of waiting to 
 fond-hearted woman. The remark awoke in Stephen 
 the converse fear. ' You, too, may be persuaded to 
 give me up, when time has made me fainter in your 
 memory. For, remember, your love for me must be 
 nourished in secret; there will be no long visits from 
 me to support you. Circumstances will always tend to 
 obliterate me.' 
 
 ' Stephen,' she said, filled with her own misgivings, 
 and unheeding his last words, ' there are beautiful 
 women where you live — of course I know there are — 
 and they may \yin you away from me.' Her tears came 
 visibly as she drew a mental picture of his faithlessness. 
 'And it won't be your fault,' she continued, looking 
 into the candle with doleful eyes. ' No ! You will 
 think that our family don't want you, and get to include 
 me with them. And there will be a vacancy in your 
 heart, and some others will be let in.' 
 
 'I could not, I would not. Elfie, do not be so 
 full of forebodings.' 
 
 'Oh yes, they will,' she replied. 'And you will 
 look at them, not caring at first, and then you will 
 look and be interested, and after a while you will think, 
 " Ah, they know all about city life, and assemblies, 
 and coteries, and the manners of the titled, and poor 
 no 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 little Elfie, with all the fuss that's made about her 
 having me, doesn't know about anything but a little 
 house and a few cliffs and a space of sea, far away." 
 And then you'll be more interested in them, and they'll 
 make you have them instead of me, on purpose to be 
 cruel to me because I am silly, and they are clever 
 and hate me. And I hate them, too ; yes, I do ! ' 
 
 Her impulsive words had power to impress him 
 at any rate with the recognition of the uncertainty of 
 all that is not accomplished. And, worse than that 
 general feeling, there of course remained the sadness 
 which arose from the special features of his own case. 
 However remote a desired issue may be, the mere 
 fact of having entered the groove which leads to it, 
 cheers to some extent with a sense of accomplishment. 
 Had Mr. Swancourt consented to an engagement of 
 no less length than ten years, Stephen would have 
 been comparatively cheerful in waiting ; they would 
 have felt that they were somewhere on the road to 
 Cupid's garden. But, with a possibility of a shorter 
 probation, they had not as yet any prospect of the 
 beginning ; the zero of hope had yet to be reached. 
 Mr. Swancourt would have to revoke his formidable 
 words before the waiting for marriage could even set 
 in. And this was despair. 
 
 ' I wish we could marry now,' murmured Stephen, 
 as an impossible fancy. 
 
 'So do I,' said she also, as if regarding an idle 
 dream. "Tis the only thing that ever does sweet- 
 hearts good ! ' 
 
 ' Secretly would do, would it not, Elfie ? ' 
 
 ' Yes, secretly would do ; secretly would indeed be 
 best,' she said, and went on ireflectively : ' All we want 
 is to render it absolutely impossible for any future 
 circumstance to upset our future intention of being 
 happy together ; not to begin being happy now.' 
 
 ' Exactly,' he murmured in a voice and manner the 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 counterpart of hers. ' To marry and part secretly, and 
 live on as we are living now ; merely to put it out of 
 anybody's power to force you away from me, dearest.' 
 
 ' Or you away from me, Stephen.' 
 
 ' Or me from you. It is possible to conceive a force 
 of circumstance strong enough to make any woman 
 in the world marry against her will : no conceivable 
 pressure, up to torture or starvation, can make a woman 
 once married to her lover anybody else's wife.' 
 
 Now up to this point the idea of an immediate 
 secret marriage had been held by both as an untenable 
 hypothesis, wherewith simply to beguile a miserable 
 moment. During a pause which followed Stephen's 
 last remark, a fascinating perception, then an alluring 
 conviction, flashed along the brain of both. The 
 perception was that an immediate marriage could be 
 contrived; the conviction that such an act, in spite 
 of its daring, its fathomless results, its deceptiveness, 
 would be preferred by each to the life they must lead 
 under any other conditions. 
 
 The youth spoke first, and his voice trembled with 
 the magnitude of the conception he was cherishing. 
 ' How strong we should feel, Elfride ! going on our 
 separate courses as before, without the fear of ultimate 
 separation ! O Elfride ! think of it ; think of it ! ' 
 
 It is certain that the young girl's love for Stephen 
 received a fanning from her father's opposition which 
 made it blaze with a dozen times the intensity it would 
 have exhibited if left alone. Never were conditions 
 more favourable for developing a girl's first passing 
 fancy for a handsome boyish face — a fancy rooted in 
 inexperience and nourished by seclusion — ^into a wild 
 unreflecting passion fervid enough for anything. All 
 the elements of such a development were there, the 
 chief one being hopelessness — a necessary ingredient 
 always to perfect the mixture of feelings united under 
 the name of loving to distraction. 
 II? 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 ' We would tell papa soon, would we not ? ' she 
 inquired timidly. ' Nobody else need know. He 
 would then be convinced that hearts cannot be played 
 with ; love encouraged be ready to grow, love dis- 
 couraged be ready to die, at a naoment's notice. 
 Stephen, do you not think that if marriages against 
 a parent's consent are ever justifiable, they are when 
 young people have been favoured up to a point, as 
 we have, and then have had that favour suddenly 
 withdrawn ? ' 
 
 ' Yes. It is not as if we had from the beginning 
 acted in opposition to your papa's wishes. Only think, 
 Elfie, how pleasant he was towards me but six hours 
 ago ! He liked me, praised me, never objected to my 
 being alone with you.' 
 
 ' I believe he must like you now,' she cried. ' And 
 if he found that you irremediably belonged to me, he 
 would own it and help you. ' O Stephen, Stephen,' 
 she burst out again, as the remembrance of his packing 
 came afresh to her mind, ' I cannot bear your going 
 away like this ! It is too dreadful. All I have been 
 expecting miserably killed within me like this ! ' 
 
 Stephen flushed hot with impulse. ' I will not be a 
 doubt to you — thought of you shall not be a misery to 
 me ! ' he said. ' We will be wife and husband before 
 we part for long ! ' 
 
 She hid her face on his shoulder. ' Anything to 
 make sure 1 ' she whispered. 
 
 ' I did not like to propose it immediately,' continued 
 Stephen. ' It seemed to me — it seems to me now — 
 like trying to catch you — a girl better in the world 
 than I.' 
 
 'Not that, indeed! And am I better in worldly 
 station? What's the use of have beens? We may 
 have been something once ; we are nothing now.' 
 
 Then they whispered long and earnestly together; 
 Stephen hesitatingly proposing this and that plan, 
 113 H 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 Elfride modifying them, with quick breathings, and 
 hectic flush, and unnaturally bright eyes. It was two 
 o'clock before an arrangement was finally concluded. 
 
 She then told him to leave her, giving him his light 
 to go up to his own room. They parted with an agree- 
 ment not to meet again in the morning. After his door 
 had been some time closed he heard her softly gliding 
 into her chamber. 
 
XI 
 
 •Journeys end in lovers meeting.' 
 
 Stephen lay watching the Great Bear ; Elfride was 
 regarding a monotonous parallelogram of window blind. 
 Neither slept that night. 
 
 Early the next morning — that is to say, four hours 
 after their stolen interview, and just as the earliest 
 servant was heard moving about — Stephen Smith went 
 downstairs, portmanteau in hand. Throughout the 
 night he had intended to see Mr. Swancourt again, 
 but the sharp rebuff of the previous evening rendered 
 such an interview particularly distasteful. Perhaps 
 there was another and less honest reason. He decided 
 to put it off. Whatever of moral timidity or obliquity 
 may have lain in such a decision, no perception of it 
 was strong enough to detain him. He wrote a note in 
 his room, which stated simply that he did not feel 
 happy in the house after Mr. Swancourt's sudden veto 
 on what he had favoured a few hours before ; but that 
 he hoped a time would come, and that soon, when his 
 original feelings of pleasure as Mr. Swancourt's guest 
 might be recovered. 
 
 He expected to find the downstairs rooms wearing 
 the gray and cheerless aspect that early morning gives 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 to everything out of the sun. He found in the dining, 
 room a breakfast laid, of which somebody had just 
 partaken. 
 
 Stephen gave the maid-servant his note of adieu. 
 She stated that Mr. Swancourt had risen early that 
 morning, and made an early breakfast. He was not 
 going away that she knew of. 
 
 Stephen took a cup of coffee, left the house of his 
 love, and turned into the lane. It was so early that 
 the shaded places still smelt like night time, and the 
 sunny spots had hardly felt the sun. The horizontal 
 rays made every shallow dip in the ground to show as 
 a well-marked hollow. Even the channel of the path 
 was enough to throw shade, and the very stones of the 
 road cast tapering dashes of darkness westward, as long 
 as Jael's tent-nail. 
 
 At a spot not more than a hundred yards from the 
 vicar's residence the lane leading thence crossed the high 
 road. Stephen reached the point of intersection, stood 
 still and listened. Nothing could be heard save the 
 lengthy, murmuring line of the sea upon the adjacent 
 shore. He looked at his watch, and then mounted a 
 gate upon which he seated himself, to await the arrival 
 of the carrier. Whilst he sat he heard wheels coming 
 in two directions. 
 
 The vehicle approaching on his right he soon recog- 
 nized as the carrier's. There were the accompanying 
 sounds of the owner's voice and the smack of his whip, 
 distinct in the still morning air, by which he encouraged 
 his horses up the hill. 
 
 The other set of wheels sounded from the lane 
 Stephen had just traversed. On closer observation, he 
 perceived that they were moving from the precincts of 
 the ancient manor-house adjoining the vicarage grounds. 
 A carriage then left the entrance gates of the house, and 
 wheeling round came fully in sight. It was a plain 
 travelling carriage, with a small quantity of luggage, 
 ii6 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 apparently a lady's. The vehicle came to the junction 
 of the four ways half-a-minute before the carrier reached 
 the same spot, and crossed directly in his front, pro- 
 ceeding by the lane on the other side. 
 
 Inside the carriage Stephen could just discern an 
 elderly lady tvith a younger woman, who seemed to be 
 her maid. The road they had taken led to Stratleigh, 
 a small watering-place sixteen miles north. 
 
 He heard the manor-house gates swing again, and 
 looking up saw another person leaving them, and walking 
 off in the direction of the parsonage. ' Ah, how much 
 I wish I were moving that way ! ' felt he parenthetically. 
 The gentleman was tall, and resembled Mr. Swancourt 
 in outline and attire. He opened the vicarage gate and 
 went in. Mr. Swancourt, then, it certainly was. Instead 
 of remaining in bed that morning Mr. Swancourt must 
 have taken it into his head to see his new neighbour off 
 on a journey. He must have been greatly interested in 
 that neighbour to do such an unusual thing. 
 
 The carrier's conveyance had pulled up, and Stephen 
 now handed in his portmanteau and mounted the shafts. 
 ' Who is that lady in the carriage ? ' he inquired in- 
 differently of Lickpan the carrier. 
 
 ' That, sir, is Mrs. Troyton, a widder wi' a mint o' 
 money. She's the owner of all that part of Endelstow 
 that is not Lord Luxellian's. Only been here a short 
 time; she came into it by law. The owner formerly 
 was a terrible mysterious party — never lived here — 
 hardly ever was seen here except in the month of 
 September, as I might say.' 
 
 The horses were started again, and noise rendered 
 further discourse a matter of too great exertion. Stephen 
 crept inside under the tilt, and was soon lost in reverie. 
 
 Three hours and a half of straining up hills and 
 
 jogging down brought them to St. Launce's, the market 
 
 town and railway station nearest to Endelstow, and the 
 
 place from which Stephen Smith had journeyed over the 
 
 117 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 downs on the, to him, memorable winter evening at the 
 beginning of the same year. The carrier's van was so 
 timed as to meet a starting up-train, which Stephen 
 entered. Two or three hours' railway travel through 
 vertical cuttings in metamorphic rock, through oak 
 copses rich and green, stretching over slopes and down 
 delightful valleys, glens, and ravines, sparkling with 
 water like many-rilled Ida, and he plunged amid the 
 hundred and fifty thousand people composing the town 
 of Plymouth. 
 
 There being some time upon his hands he left his 
 luggage at the cloak-room, and went on foot along 
 Bedford Street to the nearest church. Here Stephen 
 wandered among the multifarious tombstones and looked 
 in at the chancel window, dreaming of something that 
 was likely to happen by the altar there in the course of 
 the coming month. He turned away and ascended the 
 Hoe, viewed the magnificent stretch of sea and massive 
 promontories of land, but without particularly discerning 
 one feature of the varied perspective. He still saw that 
 inner prospect — the event he hoped for in yonder 
 church. The wide Sound, the Breakwater, the light- 
 house on far-off Eddystone, the dark steam vessels, 
 brigs, barques, and schooners, either floating stilly, or 
 gliding with tiniest motion, were as the dream, then; 
 the dreamed-of event was as the reality. 
 
 Soon Stephen went down from the Hoe, and returned 
 to the railway station. He took his ticket, and entered 
 the London train. 
 
 That day was an irksome time at Endelstow vicarage. 
 Neither father nor daughter alluded to the departure of 
 Stephen. Mr. Swancourt's manner towards her partook 
 of the compunctious kindness that arises from a misgiving 
 as to the justice of some previous act. 
 
 Either from lack of the capacity to grasp the whole 
 coup d'xil, or from a natural endowment for certain kinds 
 ii8 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 of stoicism, women are cooler than men in critical situa- 
 tions of the passive form. Probably, in Elfride's case at 
 least, it was blindness to the greater contingencies of the 
 future she was preparing for herself, which enabled her 
 to ask her father in a quiet voice if he could give her 
 a holiday soon, to ride to St. Launce's and go on to 
 Plymouth. 
 
 Now, she had only once before gone alone to Ply- 
 mouth, and that was in consequence of some unavoid- 
 able difficulty. Being a country girl, and a good, not 
 to say a wild, horsewoman, it had been her delight to 
 canter, without the ghost of an attendant, over the four- 
 teen or sixteen miles of hard road intervening between 
 their home and the station at St. Launce's, put up the 
 horse, and go on the remainder of the distance by train, 
 returning in the same manner in the evening It was 
 then resolved that, though she had successfully accom- 
 plished this journey once, it was not to be repeated 
 without some attendance. 
 
 But Elfride must not be confounded with ordinary 
 young feminine equestrians. The circumstances of her 
 lonely and narrow life made it imperative that in trotting 
 about the neighbourhood she must trot alone or else 
 not at all. Usage soon rendered this perfectly natural 
 to herself. Her father, who had had other experiences, 
 did not much like the idea of a Swancourt, whose pedigree 
 could be as distinctly traced as a thread in a skein of 
 silk, scampering over the hills like a farmer's daughter, 
 even though he could habitually neglect her. But what 
 with his not being able to afford her a regular attendant, 
 and his inveterate habit of letting anything be to save 
 himself trouble, the circumstance grew customary. And 
 so there arose a chronic notion in the villagers' minds 
 that all ladies rode without an attendant, like Miss 
 Swancourt, except a few who were sometimes visiting at 
 Lord Luxellian's. 
 
 ' I don't like your going to Plymouth alone, particu- 
 119 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 larly going to St. Launce's on horseback. Why not 
 drive, and take the man ? ' 
 
 ' It is not nice to be so overlooked.' Worm's company 
 would not seriously have interfered with her plans, but 
 it was her humour to go without him. 
 
 ' When do you want to go ? ' said her father 
 
 She only answered, ' Soon.' 
 
 ' I will cqpsider,' he said. 
 
 Only a few days elapsed before she asked again. A 
 letter had reached her from Stephen. It had been timed 
 to come on that day by special arrangement between 
 them. In it he named the earliest morning on which he 
 could meet her at Plymouth. Her father had been on a 
 journey to Stratleigh, and returned in unusual buoyancy 
 of spirit. It was a good opportunity; and since the 
 dismissal of Stephen her father had been generally in a 
 mood to make small concessions, that he might steer 
 clear of large ones connected with that outcast lover 
 of hers. 
 
 ' Next Thursday week I am going from home in a 
 different direction,' said her father. ' In fact, I shall 
 leave home the night before. You might choose the 
 same day, for they wish to take up the carpets, or some 
 such thing, I think. As I said, I don't Uke you to be 
 seen in a town on horseback alone ; but go if you will.' 
 
 Thursday week. Her father had named the very 
 day that Stephen also had named that morning as the 
 earliest on which it would be of any use to meet her ; 
 that was, about fifteen days from the day on which he 
 had left Endelstow. Fifteen days — that fragment of dura- 
 tion which has acquired such an interesting individuality 
 from its connection with the English marriage law. 
 
 She involuntarily looked at her father so strangely, 
 that on becoming conscious of the look she paled with 
 embarrassment. Her father, too, looked confused. What 
 was he thinking of? 
 
 There seemed to be a special facility offered her by a 
 
 120 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 power external to herself in the circumstance that Mr. 
 Swancourt had proposed to leave home the night pre- 
 vious to her wished-for day. Her father seldom took 
 long journeys ; seldom slept from home except perhaps 
 on the night following a remote Visitation. Well, she 
 would not inquire too curiously into the reason of the 
 opportunity, nor did he, as would have been natural, 
 proceed to explain it of his own accord. In matters of 
 fact there had hitherto been no reserve between them, 
 though they were not usually confidential in its full 
 sense. But the divergence of their emotions on 
 Stephen's account had produced an estrangement which 
 just at present went even to the extent of reticence on 
 the most ordinary household topics. 
 
 Elfride was almost unconsciously relieved, persuad- 
 ing herself that her father's reserve on his business 
 justified her in secrecy as regarded her own — a secrecy 
 which was necessarily a foregone decision with her. 
 So anxious is a young conscience to discover a pallia- 
 tive, that the ex post facto nature of a reason is of no 
 account in excluding it. 
 
 The intervening fortnight was spent by her mostly 
 in walking by herself among the shrubs and trees, 
 indulging sometimes in sanguine anticipations ; more, 
 far more frequently, in misgivings. All her flowers 
 seemed dull of hue ; her pets seemed to look wistfully 
 into her eyes, as if they no longer stood in the same 
 friendly relation to her as formerly. She wore melan- 
 choly jewellery, gazed at sunsets, and talked to old men 
 and women. It was the first time that she had had 
 an inner and private world apart from the visible one 
 about her. She wished that her father, instead of 
 neglecting her even more than usual, would make some 
 advance — just one word; she would then tell all, and 
 risk Stephen's displeasure. Thus brought round to 
 the youth again, she saw him in her fancy, standing, 
 touching her, his eyes full of sad affection, hopelessly 
 
 I 121 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 renouncing his attempt because she had renounced 
 hers ; and she could not recede. 
 
 On the Wednesday she was to receive another letter. 
 She had resolved to let her father see the arrival of 
 this one, be the consequences what they might : the 
 dread of losing her lover by this deed of honesty pre- 
 vented her acting upon the resolve. Five minutes 
 before the postman's expected arrival she slipped out, 
 and down the lane to meet him. She met him immedi- 
 ately upon turning a sharp angle, which hid her from 
 view in the direction of the vicarage. The man smil- 
 ingly handed one missive, and was going on to hand 
 another, a circular from some tradesman. 
 
 ' No,' she said ; ' take that on to the house.' 
 
 ' Why, miss, you are doing what your father has 
 done for the last fortnight.' 
 
 She did not comprehend. 
 
 ' Why, come to this corner, and take a letter of me 
 every morning, all writ in the same handwriting, and 
 letting any others for him go on to the house.' And 
 on the postman went. 
 
 No sooner had he turned the corner behind her 
 back than she heard her father meet and address the 
 man. She had saved her letter by two minutes. Her 
 father audibly went through precisely the same perform- 
 ance as she had just been guilty of herself. 
 
 This stealthy conduct of his was, to say the least, 
 peculiar. 
 
 Given an impulsive inconsequent girl, neglected as 
 to her inner life by her only parent, and the following 
 forces alive within her ; to determine a resultant : 
 
 First love acted upon by a deadly fear of separation 
 from its object : inexperience, guiding onward a frantic 
 wish to prevent the above-named issue : misgivings as 
 to propriety, met by hope of ultimate exoneration: 
 indignation at parental inconsistency in first encour- 
 
 122 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 aging, then forbidding : a chilling sense of disobedience, 
 overpowered by a conscientious inability to brbok a 
 breaking of plighted faith with a man who, in essentials, 
 had remained unaltered from the beginning : a blessed 
 hope that opposition would turn an erroneous judg- 
 ment : a bright faith that things would mend thereby, 
 and wind up well. 
 
 Probably the result would, after all, have been nil, 
 had not the following few remarks been made one day 
 at breakfast. 
 
 Her father was in his old hearty spirits. He smiled 
 to himself at stories too bad to tell, and called Elfride 
 a little scamp for surreptitiously preserving some blind 
 kittens that ought to have been drowned. After this 
 expression, she said to him suddenly : 
 
 ' If Mr. Smith had been already in the family, you 
 would not have been made wretched by discovering 
 he had poor relations ? ' 
 
 ' Do you mean in the family by marriage ? ' he 
 replied inattentively, and continuing to peel his egg. 
 
 The accumulating scarlet told that was her meaning, 
 as much as the affirmative reply. 
 
 ' I should have put up with it, no doubt,' Mr. 
 Swancourt observed. 
 
 ' So that you would not have been driven into hope- 
 less melancholy, but have made the best of him ? ' 
 
 Elfride's erratic mind had from her youth upwards 
 been constantly in the habit of perplexing her father 
 by hypothetical questions, based on absurd conditions. 
 The present seemed to be cast so precisely in the 
 mould of previous ones that, not being given to syn- 
 theses of circumstances, he answered it with customary 
 complacency. 
 
 ' If he were allied to us irretrievably, of course I, 
 
 or any sensible man, should accept conditions that 
 
 could not be altered ; certainly not be hopelessly 
 
 melancholy about it, I don't believe anything in the 
 
 123 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 world would make me hopelessly melancholy. And 
 don't -let anything make you so, either.' 
 
 ' I won't, papa,' she cried, with a serene brightness 
 that pleased him. 
 
 Certainly Mr. Swancourt must have been far from 
 thinking that the brightness came from an exhilarating 
 intention to hold back no longer from the mad action 
 she had planned. 
 
 In the evening he drove away towards Stratleigh, 
 quite alone. It was an unusual course for him. At 
 the door Elfride had been again almost impelled by 
 her feelings to pour out all. 
 
 ' Why are you going to Stratleigh, papa ? ' she said, 
 and looked at him longingly. 
 
 ' I will tell you to-morrow when I come back,' he 
 said cheerily ; ' not before then, Elfride. Thou wilt 
 not utter what thou dost not know, and so far will 
 I trust thee, gentle Elfride.' 
 
 She was repressed and hurt. 
 
 ' I will tell you my errand to Plymouth, too, when 
 I come back,' she murmured. 
 
 He went away. His jocularity made her intention 
 seem the lighter, as his indiiference made her more 
 resolved to do as she liked. 
 
 It was a familiar September sunset, dark-blue frag- 
 ments of cloud upon an orange-yellow sky. These 
 sunsets used to tempt her to walk towards them, as 
 any beautiful thing tempts a near approach. She went 
 through the field to the privet hedge, clambered into 
 the middle of it, and reclined upon the thick boughs. 
 After looking westward for a considerable time, she, 
 blamed herself for not looking eastward to where 
 Stephen was, and turned round. Ultimately her eyes 
 fell upon the ground. 
 
 A peculiarity was observable beneath her. A green 
 field spread itself on each side of the hedge, one be- 
 longing to the glebe, the other being a part of the land 
 124 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 attached to the manor-house adjoining. On the vicar- 
 age side she saw a Httle footpath, the distinctive and 
 altogether exceptional feature of which consisted in 
 its being only about ten yards long; it terminated 
 abruptly at each end. 
 
 A footpath, suddenly beginning and suddenly end- 
 ing, coming from nowhere and leading nowhere, she 
 had never seen before. 
 
 Yes, she had, on second thoughts. She had seen 
 exactly such a path trodden in the front of barracks 
 by the sentry. 
 
 And this recollection explained the origin of the 
 path here. Her father had trodden it by pacing up 
 and down, as she had once Seen him doing. 
 
 Sitting on the hedge as she sat now, her eyes 
 commanded a view of both sides of it. And a few 
 minutes later, Elfride looked over to the manor side. 
 
 Here was another sentry path. It was like the 
 first in length, and it began and ended exactly opposite 
 the beginning and ending of its neighbour, but it was 
 thinner, and less distinct. 
 
 Two reasons existed for the difference. This one 
 might have been trodden by a similar weight of tread to 
 the other, exercised a less number of times ; or it might 
 have been walked just as frequently, but by lighter feet. 
 
 Probably a gentleman from Scotland-yard, had he 
 been passing at the time, might have considered the 
 latter alternative as the more probable. Elfride thought 
 otherwise, so far as she thought at all. But her own 
 great To-Morrow was now imminent; all thoughts in- 
 spired by casual sights of the eye were only allowed to 
 exercise themselves in inferior corners of her brain, 
 previously to being banished altogether. 
 
 Elfride was at length compelled to reason practically 
 upon her undertaking. All her definite perceptions 
 thereon, when the emotion accompanying them was 
 abstracted, amounted to no more than these : 
 
 125 
 
A PAIR OF BLtTE Eyes 
 
 ' Say an hour and three-quarters to ride to St 
 Launce's. 
 
 'Say half an hour at the Falcon to change my 
 dress. 
 
 ' Say two hours waiting for some train and getting to 
 Pljrmouth. 
 
 ' Say an hour to spare before twelve o'clock. 
 
 ' Total time from leaving Endelstow till twelve o'clock, 
 five hours. 
 
 ' Therefore I shall have to start at seven.' 
 
 No surprise or sense of unwontedness entered the 
 minds of the servants at her early ride. The monotony 
 of life we associate with people of small incomes in 
 districts out of the sound of the railway whistle, has 
 one exception, which puts into shade the experience of 
 dwellers about the great centres of population — that is, 
 in travelling. Every journey there is more or less an 
 adventure ; adventurous hours are necessarily chosen 
 for the most commonplace outing. Miss Elfride had 
 to leave early — that was all. 
 
 Elfride never went out on horseback but she brought 
 home something — something found, or something 
 bought. If she trotted to town or village, her burden 
 was books. If to hills, woods, or the seashore, it was 
 wonderful mosses, abnormal twigs, a handkerchief of 
 wet shells or seaweed. 
 
 Once, in muddy weather, when Pansy was walking 
 with her down the street of Castle Boterel, on a fair- 
 day, a packet in front of her and a packet under her 
 arm, an accident befell the packets, and they slipped 
 down. On one side of her, three volumes of fiction lay 
 kissing the mud ; on the other numerous skeins of poly- 
 chromatic wools lay absorbing it. Unpleasant women 
 smiled through windows at the mishap, the men all 
 looked round, and a boy, who was minding a ginger- 
 bread stall whilst the owner had gone to get drunk, 
 126 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 laughed loudly. The blue eyes turned to sapphires, 
 and the cheeks crimsoned with vexation. 
 
 After that misadventure she set her wits to work, 
 and was ingenious enough to invent an arrangement of 
 small straps about the saddle, by which a great deal 
 could be safely carried thereon, in a small compass. 
 Here she now spread out and fastened a plain dark 
 walking-dress and a few other trifles of apparel. Worm 
 opened the gate for her, and she vanished away. 
 
 One of the brightest mornings of late summer shone 
 upon her. The heather was at its purplest, the furze 
 at its yellowest, the grasshoppers chirped loud enough 
 for birds, the snakes hissed like little engines, and 
 Elfride at first felt lively. Sitting at ease upon Pansy, 
 in her orthodox riding-habit and nondescript hat, she 
 looked what she felt. But the mercury of those days 
 had a trick of falling unexpectedly. First, only for one 
 minute in ten had she a sense of depression. Then a 
 large cloud, that had been hanging in the north like a 
 black fleece, came and placed itself between her and 
 the sun. It helped on what was already inevitable, and 
 she sank into a uniformity of sadness. 
 
 She turned in the saddle and looked back. They 
 were now on an open table-land, whose altitude still 
 gave her a view of the sea by Endelstow. She looked 
 longingly at that spot. 
 
 During this little revulsion of feeling Pansy had 
 been still advancing, and Elfride felt it would be absurd 
 to turn her little mare's head the other way. 'Still,' 
 she thought, 'if I had a mamma at home I would go 
 back ! ' 
 
 And making one of those stealthy movements by 
 which women let their hearts juggle with their brains, 
 she did put the horse's head about, as if unconsciously, 
 and went at a hand-gallop towards home for more than 
 a mile. By this time, from the inveterate habit of 
 valuing what we have renounced directly the alternative 
 
 137 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 is chosen, the thought of her forsaken Stephen recalled 
 her, and she turned about, and cantered on to St. 
 Launce's again. 
 
 This miserable strife of thought now began to rage 
 in all its wildness. Overwrought and trembling, she 
 dropped the rein upon Pansy's shoulders, and vowed 
 she would be led whither the horse would take her. 
 
 Pansy slackened her pace to a walk, and walked on 
 with her agitated burden for three or four minutes. 
 At the expiration of this time they had come to a 
 little by-way on the right, leading down a slope to a 
 pool of water. The pony stopped, looked towards the 
 pool, and then advanced and stooped to drink. 
 
 Elfride looked at her watch and discovered that if 
 she were going to reach St. Launce's early enough to 
 change her dress at the Falcon, and get a chance of 
 some early train to Plymouth — there were only two 
 available — it was necessary to proceed at once. 
 
 She was impatient. It seemed as if Pansy would 
 never stop drinking; and the repose of the pool, the 
 idle motions of the insects and flies upon it, the placid 
 waving of the flags, the leaf-skeletons, like Genoese fili- 
 gree, placidly sleeping at the bottom, by their contrast 
 with her own turmoil made her impatience greater. 
 
 Pansy did turn at last, and went up the slope again to 
 the high-road. The pony came upon it, and stood cross- 
 wise, looking up and down. Elfride's heart throbbed 
 erratically, and she thought, ' Horses, if left to them- 
 selves, make for where they are best fed. Pansy will 
 go home.' 
 
 Pansy turned and walked on towards St. Launce's 
 
 Pansy at home, during summer, had little but grass 
 to live on. After a run to St. Launce's she always had 
 a feed of corn to support her on the return journey. 
 Therefore, being now more than half way, she preferred 
 St. Launce's. 
 
 But Elfride did not remember this now. AH she 
 128 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 cared to recognize was a dreamy fancy that to-day's rash 
 action was not her own. She was disabled by her 
 moods, and it seemed indispensable to adhere to the 
 programme. So strangely involved are motives that, 
 more than by her promise to Stephen, more even 
 than by her love, she was forced on by a sense of the 
 necessity of keeping faith with herself, as promised in 
 the inane vow of ten minutes ago. 
 
 She hesitated no longer. Pansy went, like the steed 
 of Adonis, as if she told the steps. Presently the quaint 
 gables and jumbled roofs of St. Launce's were spread 
 beneath her, and going down the hill she entered the 
 courtyard of the Falcon. Mrs. Buckle, the landlady, 
 came to the door to meet her. 
 
 The Swancourts were well known here. The transi- 
 tion from equestrian to the ordinary guise of railway 
 travellers had been more than once performed by father 
 and daughter in this establishment. 
 
 In less than a quarter of an hour Elfride emerged 
 from the door in her walking dress, and went to the 
 railway. She had not told Mrs. Buckle anything as to 
 her intentions, and was supposed to have gone out 
 shopping. 
 
 An hour and forty minutes later, and she was in 
 Stephen's arms at the Plymouth station. Not upon 
 the platform — in the secret retreat of a deserted 
 waiting-room. 
 
 Stephen's face boded ill. He was pale and de- 
 spondent. 
 
 ' What is the matter ? ' she asked. 
 
 'We cannot be married here to-day, my Elfie ! I 
 ought to have known it and stayed here. In my 
 ignorance I did not. I have the licence, but it can 
 only be used in my parish in London. I only came 
 down last night, as you know.' 
 
 ' What shall we do ? ' she said blankly. 
 
 « There's only one thing we can do, darling.' 
 129 I 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 What's that ? ' 
 
 ' Go on to London by a train just starting, and be 
 married there to-morrow.' " 
 
 ' Passengers for the 1 1.5 up-train toke their seats ! ' 
 said a guard's voice on the platform 
 
 'Will you go, Elfride?' 
 
 ' I will.' 
 
 In three minutes the train had moved off, bearing 
 away with it Stephen and Elfride. 
 
XII 
 
 'Adieu! she cries, and waved her lily hand.' 
 
 1 HE few tattered clouds of the morning enlarged and 
 united, the sun withdrew behind them to emerge no 
 more that day, and the evening drew to a close in drifts 
 of rain. The water-drops beat like duck shot against 
 the window of the railway-carriage containing Stephen 
 and Elfride. 
 
 The journey from Plymouth to Paddington, by even 
 the most headlong express, allows quite enough leisure 
 for passion of any sort to cool. Elfride's excitement 
 had passed off, and she sat in a kind of stupor during 
 the latter half of the journey. She was aroused by the 
 clanging of the maze of rails over which they traced 
 their way at the entrance to the station. 
 
 ' Is this London ? ' she said. 
 
 ' Yes, darling,' said Stephen in a tone of assurance 
 he was far from feeling. To him, no less than to her, 
 the reality so greatly differed from the prefiguring. 
 
 She peered out as well as the window, beaded with 
 drops, would allow her, and saw only the lamps, which 
 had just been lit, blinking in the wet atmosphere, and 
 rows of hideous zinc chimney-pipes in dim relief against 
 the sky. She writhed uneasily, as when a thought is 
 131 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 swelling in the mind which must cause much pain at 
 its deliverance in words. Elfride had known no more 
 about the stings of evil report than the native wild-fowl 
 knew of the effects of Crusoe's first shot. Now she 
 saw a little further, and a little further still. 
 
 The train stopped. Stephen relinquished the soft 
 hand he had held all the day, and proceeded to assist 
 her on to the platform. 
 
 This act of alighting upon strange ground seemed 
 all that was wanted to complete a resolution within 
 her. 
 
 She looked at her betrothed with despairing eyes. 
 
 ' O Stephen,' she exclaimed, ' I am so miserable ! I 
 must go home again — I must — I must ! Forgive my 
 wretched vacillation. I don't like it here — nor myself 
 — nor you ! ' 
 
 Stephen looked bewildered, and did not speak. 
 
 ' Will you allow me to go home ? ' she implored. 
 ' I won't trouble you to go with me. I will not be any 
 weight upon you; only say you will agree to my re- 
 turning ; that you will not hate me for it, Stephen ! 
 It is better that I should return again ; indeed it is, 
 Stephen.' 
 
 ' But we can't return now,' he said in a deprecatory 
 tone. 
 
 ' I must ! I will ! ' 
 
 ' How ? When do you want to go ? ' 
 
 ' Now. Can we go at once ? ' 
 
 The lad looked hopelessly along the platform. 
 
 ' If you must go, and think it wrong to remain, 
 dearest,' said he sadly, ' you shall. You shall do what- 
 ever you like, my Elfride. But would you in reahty 
 rather go now than stay till to-morrow, and go as my 
 wife ? ' 
 
 ' Yes, yes — much — anything to go now. I must ; I 
 must ! ' she cried. 
 
 'We ought to have done one of two things,' he 
 132 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 answered gloomily. ' Never to have started, or not to 
 have returned without being married. I don't like to 
 say it, Elfride — indeed I don't ; but you must be told 
 this, that going back unmarried may compromise your 
 good name in the eyes of people who may hear of it.' 
 
 ' They will not ; and I must go.' 
 
 ' O Elfride ! I am to blame for bringing you away.' 
 
 ' Not at all. I am the elder.' 
 
 ' By a month ; and what's that ? But never mind 
 that now.' He looked around. ' Is there a train for 
 Plymouth to-night?' he inquired of a guard. The 
 guard passed on and did not speak. 
 
 ' Is there a train for Plymouth to-night ? ' said Elfride 
 to another. 
 
 'Yes, miss; the 8.10 — leaves in ten minutes. You 
 have come to the wrong platform ; it is the other side. 
 Change at Bristol into the night mail. Down that stairx 
 case, and under the line.' 
 
 They ran down the staircase — Elfride first — to the 
 booking-office, and into a carriage with an official standi 
 ing beside the door. ' Show your tickets, please.' They 
 are locked in- — men about the platform accelerate their 
 velocities till they fly up and down like shuttles in a 
 loom — a whistle — the waving of a flag — a human cry — 
 a steam groan — and away they go to Plymouth again, 
 just catching these words as they glide off: 
 
 ' Those two youngsters had a near run for it, and no 
 mistake ! ' 
 
 Elfride found her breath. 
 
 ' And have you come too, Stephen ? Why did you ? ' 
 
 ' I shall not leave you till I see you safe at St. 
 Launce's. Do not think worse of me than I am, 
 Elfride.' 
 
 And then they rattled along through the night, back 
 
 again by the way they had come. The weather cleared, 
 
 and the stars shone in upon them. Their two or three 
 
 fellow-passengers sat for most of the time with close4 
 
 133 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 eyes. Stephen sometimes slept; Elfride alone was 
 wakeful and palpitating hour after hour. 
 
 The day began to break, and revealed that they were 
 by the sea. Red rocks overhung them, and, receding 
 into distance, grew livid in the blue grey atmosphere. 
 The sun rose, and sent penetrating shafts of light in 
 upon their weary faces. Another hour, and the world 
 began to be busy. They waited yet a little, and the 
 train slackened its speed in view of the platform at 
 St. Launce's. 
 
 She shivered, and mused sadly. 
 
 ' I did not see all the consequences,' she said. 
 ' Appearances are wofully against me. If anybody finds 
 me out, I am, I suppose, disgraced.' 
 
 ' Then appearances will speak falsely ; and how can 
 that matter, even if they do ? I shall be your husband 
 sooner or later, for certain, and so prove your purity.' 
 
 ' Stephen, once in London I ought to have married 
 you,' she said firmly. ' It was my only safe defence. I 
 see more things now than I did yesterday. My only 
 remaining chance is not to be discovered ; and that we 
 must fight for most desperately.' 
 
 They stepped out. Elfride pulled a thick veil over 
 her face. 
 
 A woman with red and scaly eyelids and glistening 
 eyes was sitting on a bench just inside the oflSce-door. 
 She fixed her eyes upon Elfride with an expression 
 whose force it was impossible to doubt, but the meaning 
 of which was not clear ; then upon the carriage they had 
 left. She seemed to read a sinister story in the scene. 
 
 Elfride shrank back, and turned the other way. 
 
 ' Who is that woman ? ' said Stephen. ' She looked 
 hard at you.' 
 
 ' Mrs. Jethway — a widow, and mother of that young 
 man whose tomb we sat on the other night. Stephen, 
 she is my enemy. Would that God had had mercy 
 §nough upon me to have hidden this from her ! ' 
 134 
 
A PAIR OP BLUE EYES 
 
 ' Do not talk so hopelessly,' he remonstrated. ' 1 
 don't think she recognized us.' 
 
 ' I pray that she did not.' 
 
 He put on a more vigorous mood. 
 
 ' Now, we will go and get some breakfast.' 
 
 ' No, no ! ' she begged. ' I cannot eat. I must get 
 back to Endelstow.' 
 
 Elfride was as if she had grown years older than 
 Stephen now. 
 
 ' But you have had nothing since last night but that 
 cup of tea at Bristol.' 
 
 ' I can't eat, Stephen.' 
 
 ' Wine and biscuit ? ' 
 
 'No.' 
 
 ' Nor tea, nor coffee ? ' 
 
 'No.' 
 
 ' A glass of water ? ' 
 
 ' No. I want something that makes people strong 
 and energetic for the present, that borrows the strength 
 of to-morrow for use to-day — leaving to-morrow without 
 any at all for that matter ; or even that would take all 
 life away to-morrow, so long as it enabled me to get 
 home again now. Brandy, that's what I want. That 
 woman's eyes have eaten my heart away ! ' 
 
 ' You are wild ; and you grieve me, darling. Must 
 it be brandy ? ' 
 
 ' Yes, if you please.' 
 
 ' How much ? ' 
 
 ' I don't know. I have never drunk more than a 
 teaspoonful at once. All I know is that I want it. 
 Don't get it at the Falcon.' 
 
 He left her in the fields, and went to the nearest 
 inn in that direction. Presently he returned with a 
 small flask nearly full, and some slices of bread-and- 
 butter, thin as wafers, in a paper-bag. Elfride took a 
 sip or two. 
 
 ' It goes into my eyes,' she said wearily. ' I can't 
 135 
 
A PAIR OF BLtJE EYES 
 
 take any more. Yes, I will; I will close my eyes. 
 Ah, it goes to them by an inside route. I don't want 
 it ; throw it away.' 
 
 However, she could eat, and did eat. Her chief 
 attention was concentrated upon how to get the horse 
 from the Falcon stables without suspicion. Stephen 
 was not allowed to accompany her into the town. 
 She acted now upon conclusions reached without any 
 aid from him : his power over her seemed to have 
 departed. 
 
 ' You had better not be seen with me, even here 
 where I am so little known. We have begun stealthily 
 as thieves, and we must end stealthily as thieves, at 
 all hazards. Until papa has been told by me myself, 
 a discovery would be terrible.' 
 
 Walking and gloomily talking thus they waited till 
 nearly nine o'clock, at which time Elfride thought 
 she might call at the Falcon without creating much 
 surprise. Behind the railway-station was the river, 
 spanned by an old Tudor bridge, whence the road 
 diverged in two directions, one skirting the suburbs 
 of the town, and winding round again into the high- 
 road to Endelstow. Beside this road Stephen sat, and 
 awaited her return from the Falcon. 
 
 He sat as one sitting for a portrait, motionless, 
 watching the chequered lights and shades on the tree- 
 trunks, the children pla3dng opposite the school pre- 
 vious to entering for the morning lesson, the reapers 
 in a field afar off. The certainty of possession had not 
 come, and there was nothing to mitigate the youth's 
 gloom, that increased with the thought of the parting 
 now so near. 
 
 At length she came trotting round to him, in 
 appearance much as on the romantic morning of their 
 visit to the cliff, but shorn of the radiance which 
 glistened about her then. However, her compara- 
 tive immunity from further risk and trouble had con- 
 136 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 siderably composed her. Elfride's capacity for being 
 wounded was only surpassed by her capacity for heal- 
 ing, which rightly or wrongly is by some considered 
 an index of transientness of feeling in general. 
 
 ' Elfride, what did they say at the Falcon ? ' 
 
 ' Nothing. Nobody seemed curious about me. 
 They knew I went to Plymouth, and I have stayed 
 there a night now and then with Miss Bicknell. I 
 rather calculated upon that.' 
 
 And now parting arose like a death to these chil- 
 dren, for it was imperative that she should start at 
 once. Stephen walked beside her for nearly a mile. 
 During the walk he said sadly : 
 
 ' Elfride, four-and-twenty hours have passed, and 
 the thing is not done.' 
 
 ' But you have insured that it shall be done.' 
 
 ' How have I ? ' 
 
 ' O Stephen, you ask how ! Do you think I could 
 marry another man on earth after having gone thus 
 far with you ? Have I not shown beyond possibility 
 of doubt that I can be nobody else's ? Have I not 
 irretrievably committed myself? — pride has stood for 
 nothing in the face of my great love. You misunder- 
 stood my turning back, and I cannot explain it. It 
 was wrong to go with you at all ; and though it would 
 have been worse to go further, it would have been 
 better policy, perhaps. Be assured of this, that when- 
 ever you have a home for me — however poor and 
 humble — and come and claim me, I am ready.' She 
 added bitterly, ' When my father knows of this day's 
 work, he may be only too glad to let me go.' 
 
 ' Perhaps he may, then, insist upon our marriage 
 at once ! ' Stephen answered, seeing a ray of hope in 
 the very focus of her remorse. ' I hope he may, even 
 if we had still to part till I am ready for you, as we 
 intended.' 
 
 Elfride did not reply. 
 K 137 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 'You don't seem the same woman, Elfie, that you 
 were yesterday.' 
 
 ' Nor am I. But good-bye. Go back now.' And 
 she reined the horse for parting. ' O Stephen,' she 
 cried, ' I feel so weak ! I don't know how to meet 
 him. Cannot you, after all, come back with me ? ' 
 
 ' Shall I come ? ' 
 
 Elfride paused to think. 
 
 ' No ; it will not do. It is my utter foolishness 
 that makes me say such words. But he will send 
 for you.' 
 
 ' Say to him,' continued Stephen, ' that we did this 
 in the absolute despair of our minds. Tell him we 
 don't wish him to favour us — only to deal justly with 
 us. If he says, marry now, so much the better. If 
 not, say that all may be put right by his promise to 
 allow me to have you when I am good enough for 
 you — which may be soon. Say I have nothing to 
 offer him in exchange for his treasure — the more sorry 
 I ; but all the love, and all the life, and all the labour 
 of an honest man shall be yours. As to when this 
 had better be told, I leave you to judge.' 
 
 His words made her cheerful enough to toy with her 
 position. 
 
 ' And if ill report should come, Stephen,' she said 
 smiling, ' why, the orange-tree must save me, as it saved 
 virgins in St. George's time from the poisonous breath 
 of the dragon. There, forgive me for forwardness : I 
 am going.' 
 
 Then the boy and girl beguiled themselves with 
 words of half-parting only. 
 
 ' Own wifie, God bless you till we meet again ! ' 
 
 ' Till we meet again, good-bye ! ' 
 
 And the pony went on, and she spoke to him no 
 more. He saw her figure diminish , and her blue veil 
 grow gray — saw it with the agonizing sensations of a 
 slow death. 
 
 138 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 After thus parting from a man than whom she had 
 known none greater as yet, Elfride rode rapidly onwards, 
 a tear being occasionally shaken from her eyes into the 
 road. What yesterday had seemed so desirable, so 
 promising, even trifling, had now acquired the com- 
 plexion of a tragedy. 
 
 She saw the rocks and sea in the neighbourhood of 
 Endelstow, and heaved a sigh of relief. 
 
 When she passed a field behind the vicarage she 
 heard the voices of Unity and William Worm. They 
 were hanging a carpet upon a line. Unity was uttering a 
 sentence that concluded with ' when Miss Elfride comes.' 
 
 ' When d'ye expect her ? ' 
 
 ' Not till evening now. She's safe enough at Miss 
 Bicknell's, bless ye.' 
 
 Elfride went round to the door. She did not knock 
 or ring ; and seeing nobody to take the horse, Elfride 
 led her round to the yard, slipped off the bridle and 
 saddle, drove her towards the paddock, and turned her 
 in. Then Elfride crept indoors, and looked into all the 
 ground-floor rooms. Her father was not there. 
 
 On the mantelpiece of the drawing-room stood a 
 letter addressed to her in his handwriting. She took it 
 and read it as she went upstairs to change her habit. 
 
 'Stratleigh, Thursday. 
 ' Dear Elfride, — On second thoughts I will not 
 return to-day, but only come as far as Wadcorabe. 
 I shall be at home by to-morrow afternoon, and bring 
 a friend with me. — Yours, in haste, C. S.' 
 
 After making a quick toilet she felt more revived, 
 though still suffering from a headache. On going out 
 of the door she met Unity at the top of the stair. 
 
 ' O Miss Elfride ! I said to myself 'tis her sperrit ! 
 We didn't dream o' you not coming home last night. 
 Ypu didn't say anything about staying,' 
 139 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 ' I intended to come home the same evening, but 
 altered my plan. I wished I hadn't afterwards. Papa 
 will be angry, I suppose ? ' 
 
 ' Better not tell him, miss,' said Unity. 
 
 ' I do fear to,' she murmured. ' Unity, would you 
 just begin telling him when he comes home ? ' 
 
 ' What ! and get you into trouble ? ' 
 
 ' I deserve it.' 
 
 ' No, indeed, I won't,' said Unity. ' It is not such 
 a mighty matter, Miss Elfride. I says to myself, 
 master's taking a hoUerday, and because he's not been 
 kind lately to Miss Elfride, she ' 
 
 ' Is imitating him. Well, do as you like. And will 
 you now bring me some luncheon ? ' 
 
 After satisfying an appetite which the fresh marine 
 air had given her in its victory over an agitated mind, 
 she put on her hat and went to the garden and summer- 
 house. She sat down, and leant with her head in a 
 corner. Here she fell asleep. 
 
 Half-awake, she hurriedly looked at the time. She 
 had been there three hours. At the same moment she 
 heard the outer gate swing together, and wheels sweep 
 round the entrance; some prior noise from the same 
 source having probably been the cause of her awaking. 
 Next her father's voice was heard calling to Worm. 
 
 Elfride passed along a walk towards the house 
 behind a belt of shrubs. She heard a tongue holding 
 converse with her father, which was not that of either 
 of the servants. Her father and the stranger were 
 laughing together. Then there was a rustling of silk, 
 and Mr. Swancourt and his companion, or companions, 
 to all seeming entered the door of the house, for 
 nothing more of them was audible. Elfride had turned 
 back to meditate on what friends these could be, when 
 she heard footsteps, and her father exclaiming behind 
 her: 
 
 ' P Elfride, here you are ! I hope you got on well ? ' 
 140 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 Elfride's heart smote her, and she did not speak. 
 
 ' Come back to the summer-house a minute,' con- 
 tinued Mr. Swancourt ; ' I have to tell you of that I 
 promised to.' 
 
 They entered the summer-house, and stood leaning 
 over the knotty woodwork of the balustrade. 
 
 ' Now,' said her father radiantly, ' guess what I have 
 to say.' He seemed to be regarding his own existence 
 so intently, that he took no interest in nor even saw 
 the complexion of hers. 
 
 ' I cannot, papa,' she said sadly. 
 
 ' Try, dear.' 
 
 ' I would rather not, indeed.' 
 
 ' You are tired. You look worn. The ride was too 
 much for you. Well, this is what I went away for. 
 I went to be married ! ' 
 
 ' Married ! ' she faltered, and could hardly check an 
 involuntary ' So did I.' A moment after and her re- 
 solve to confess perished like a bubble. 
 
 ' Yes ; to whom do you think ? Mrs. Troyton, the 
 new owner of the estate over the hedge, and of the old 
 manor-house. It was only finally settled between us 
 when I went to Stratleigh a few days ago.' He lowered 
 his voice to a sly tone of merriment. ' Now, as to 
 your stepmother, you'll find she is not much to look 
 at,~ though a good deal to listen to. She is twenty 
 years older than myself, for one thing.' 
 
 'You forget that I know her. She called here 
 once, after we had been, and found her away from 
 home.' 
 
 ' Of course, of course. Well, whatever her looks 
 are, she's as excellent a woman as ever breathed. She 
 has had lately left her as absolute property three thou- 
 sand five hundred a year, besides the devise of this 
 estate — and, by the way, a large legacy came to her in 
 satisfaction of dower, as it is called.' 
 
 ' Three thousand five hundred a year ! ' 
 141 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 ' And a large — well, a fair-sized — mansion in town, 
 and a pedigree as long as my walking-stick ; though 
 that bears evidence of being rather a raked-up affair — 
 done since the family got rich — people do those things 
 now as they build ruins on maiden estates and cast 
 antiques at Birmingham.' 
 
 Elfride merely listened and said nothing. 
 
 He continued more quietly and impressively. ' Yes, 
 Elfride, she is wealthy in comparison with us, though 
 with few connections. However, she will introduce 
 you to the world a little. We are going to exchange 
 her house in Baker Street for one at Kensington, for 
 your sake. Everybody is going thesre now, she says. 
 At Easters we shall fly to town for the usual three 
 months — I shall have a curate of course by that time. 
 Elfride, I am past love, you know, and I honestly con- 
 fess that I married her for your sake. Why a woman 
 of her standing should have thrown herself away upon 
 me, God knows. But I suppose her age and plainness 
 were too pronounced for a town man. With your good 
 looks, if you now play your cards well, you may marry 
 anybody. Of course, a little contrivance will be neces- 
 sary; but there's nothing to stand between you and a 
 husband with a title, that I can see. Lady Luxellian 
 was only a squire's daughter. Now, don't you see how 
 foolish the old fancy was ? But come, she is indoors 
 waiting to see you. It is as good as a play, too,' con- 
 tinued the vicar, as they walked towards the house. 
 ' I courted her through the privet hedge yonder : not 
 entirely, you know, but we used to walk there of an 
 evening — nearly every evening at last. But I needn't 
 tell you details now; everything was terribly matter-of- 
 fact, I assure you. At last, that day I saw her at 
 Stratleigh, we determined to settle it off-hand.' 
 
 ' And you never said a word to me,' replied Elfride, 
 not reproachfully either in tone or thought. Indeed, 
 her feeling was the very reverse of reproachful. She 
 142 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 felt relieved and even thankful. Where confidence had 
 not been given, how could confidence be expected ? 
 
 Her father mistook her dispassionateness for a veil 
 of politeness over a sense of ill-usage. ' I am not 
 altogether to blame,' he said. 'There were two or 
 three reasons for secrecy. One was the recent death 
 of her relative the testator, though that did not apply to 
 you. But remember, Elfride,' he continued in a stiffer 
 tone, 'you had mixed yourself up so foolishly with 
 those low people, the Smiths — and it was just, too, 
 when Mrs. Troyton and myself were beginning to 
 understand each other — that I resolved to say nothing 
 even to you. How did I know how far you had gone 
 with them and their son ? You might have made a 
 point of taking tea with them every day, for all that 
 I knew.' 
 
 Elfride swallowed her feelings as she best could, and 
 languidly though flatly asked a question. 
 
 ' Did you kiss Mrs. Troyton on the lawn about three 
 weeks ago ? That evening I came into the study and 
 found you had just had candles in ? ' 
 
 Mr. Swancourt looked rather red and abashed, as 
 middle-aged lovers are apt to do when caught in the 
 tricks of younger ones. 
 
 ' Well, yes ; I think I did,' he stammered ; ' just to 
 please her, you know.' And then recovering himself 
 he laughed heartily. 
 
 ' And was this what your Horatian quotation referred 
 to?' 
 
 ' It was, Elfride.' 
 
 They stepped into the drawing-room from the ver- 
 andah. At that moment Mrs. Swancourt came down- 
 stairs, and entered the same room by the door. 
 
 'Here, Charlotte, is my little Elfride,' said Mr. 
 Swancourt, with the increased affection of tone often 
 adopted towards relations when newly produced. 
 
 Poor Elfride, not knowing what to do, did nothing 
 143 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 at all ; but stood receptive of all that came to her by 
 sight, hearing, and touch. 
 
 Mrs. Swancourt moved forward, took her step- 
 daughter's hand, then kissed her. 
 
 ' Ah, darling ! ' she exclaimed good-humouredly, ■ you 
 didn't think when you showed a strange old woman over 
 the conservatory a month or two ago, and explained the 
 flowers to her so prettily, that she would so soon be 
 here in new colours. Nor did she, I am sure.' 
 
 The new mother had been truthfully enough described 
 by Mr. Swancourt. She was not physically attractive. 
 She was dark — very dark — in complexion, portly in 
 figure, and with a plentiful residuum of hair in the 
 proportion of half a dozen white ones to half a dozen 
 black ones, though the latter were black indeed. No 
 further observed, she was not a woman to like. But 
 there was more to see. To the most superficial critic 
 it was apparent that she made no attempt to disguise 
 her age. She looked sixty at the first glance, and close 
 acquaintanceship never proved her older. 
 
 Another and still more winning trait was one attach- 
 ing to the corners of her mouth. Before she made a 
 remark these often twitched gently : not backwards and 
 forwards, the index of nervousness ; not down upon the 
 jaw, the sign of determination j but palpably upwards, 
 in precisely the curve adopted to represent mirth in the 
 broad caricatures of schoolboys. Only this element in 
 her face was expressive of anything within the woman, 
 but it was unmistakable. It expressed humour subjective 
 as well as objective — which could survey the peculiarities 
 of self in as whimsical a light as those of other people. 
 
 This is not all of Mrs. Swancourt. She had held 
 out to Elfride hands whose fingers were literally stiff 
 with rings, sigm's auroque rigentes, like Helen's robe. 
 These rows of rings were not worn in vanity apparently. 
 They were mostly antique and dull, though a few were 
 the reverse. 
 
 144 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 RIGHT HAND. 
 
 I St. Plainly set oval onyx, representing a devil's 
 head. 2nd. Green jasper intaglio, with red veins. 3rd. 
 Entirely gold, bearing figure of a hideous griffin. 4th. 
 A sea-green monster diamond, with small diamonds 
 round it. Sth. Antique cornelian intaglio of dancing 
 figure of a satyr. 6th. An angular band chased with 
 dragons' heads. 7th. A facetted carbuncle accompanied 
 by ten little twinkling emeralds ; &c. &c. 
 
 LEFT HAND. 
 
 1st. A reddish-yellow toadstone. and. A heavy ring 
 enamelled in colours, and bearing a jacynth. 3rd. An 
 amethystine sapphire. 4th. A polished ruby, sur- 
 rounded by diamonds. 5th. The engraved ring of an 
 abbess. 6th. A gloomy intaglio ; &c. &c. 
 
 Beyond this rather quaint array of stone and metal 
 Mrs. Swancourt wore no ornament whatever. 
 
 Elfride had been favourably impressed with Mrs. 
 Troyton at their meeting about two months earlier; 
 but to be pleased with a woman as a momentary ac- 
 quaintance was different from being taken with her as 
 a stepmother. However, the suspension of feeling was 
 but for a moment. Elfride decided to like her still. 
 
 Mrs. Swancourt was a woman of the world as to 
 knowledge, the reverse as to action, as her marriage 
 suggested. Elfride and the lady were soon inextricably 
 involved in conversation, and Mr. Swancourt left them 
 to themselves. 
 
 ' And what do you find to do with yourself here ? ' 
 Mrs. Swancourt said, after a few remarks about the 
 wedding. ' You ride, I know.' 
 
 ' Yes, I ride. But not much, because papa doesn't 
 like my going alone.' 
 
 ' You must have somebody to look after you.' 
 14s K 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 ' And I read, and write a little.' 
 
 ' You should write a novel. The regular resource 
 of people who don't go enough into the world to live 
 a novel is to write one.' 
 
 ' I have done it,' said Elfride, looking dubiously at 
 Mrs. Swancourt, as if in doubt whether she would meet 
 with ridicule there. 
 
 ' That's right. Now, then, what is it about, dear ? ' 
 
 ' About — well, it is a romance of the Middle Ages.' 
 
 ' Knowing nothing of the present age, which every- 
 body knows about, for safety you chose an age known 
 neither to you nor other people. That's it, eh ? No, 
 no ; I don't mean it, dear.' 
 
 ' Well, I have had some opportunities of stud)?ing 
 mediaeval art and manners in the library and private 
 museum at Endelstow House, and I thought I should 
 like to try my hand upon a fiction. I know the time 
 for these tales is past; but I was interested in it, very 
 much interested.' 
 
 ' When is it to appear ? ' 
 
 ' Oh, never, I suppose.' 
 
 ' Nonsense, my dear girl. Publish it, by all means. 
 All ladies do that sort of thing now ; not for profit, you 
 know, but as a guarantee of mental respectability to 
 their future husbands.' 
 
 ' An excellent idea of us ladies.' 
 
 ' Though I am afraid it rather resembles the melan- 
 choly ruse of throwing loaves over castle-walls at be- 
 siegers, and suggests desperation rather than plenty 
 inside.' 
 
 ' Did you ever try it ? ' 
 
 ' No ; I was too far gone even for that.' 
 
 ' Papa says no publisher will take my book.' 
 
 ' That remains to be proved. I'll give my word, 
 my dear, that by this time next year it shall be printed.' 
 
 ' Will you, indeed ? ' said Elfride, partially brighten- 
 ing with pleasure, though she was sad enough in her 
 146 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 depths. ' I thought brains were the indispensable, even 
 if the only, qualification for admission to the republic 
 of letters. A mere commonplace creature like me will 
 soon be turned out again.' 
 
 ' Oh no ; once you are there you'll be like a drop 
 of water in a piece of rock-crystal — your medium will 
 dignify your commonness.' 
 
 ' It will be a great satisfaction,' Elfride murmured, 
 and thought of Stephen, and wished she could make a 
 great fortune by writing romances, and marry him and 
 live happily. 
 
 ' And then we'll go to London, and then to Paris,' 
 said Mrs. Swancourt. ' I have been talking to your 
 father about it. But we have first to move into the 
 manor-house, and we think of staying at Torquay 
 whilst that is going on. Meanwhile, instead of going 
 on a honeymoon scamper by ourselves, we have come 
 home to fetch you, and go all together to Bath for two 
 or three weeks.' 
 
 Elfride assented pleasantly, even gladly ; but she 
 saw that, by this marriage, her father and herself had 
 ceased for ever to be the close relations they had been 
 up to a few weeks ago. It was impossible now to 
 tell him the tale of her wild elopement with Stephen 
 Smith. 
 
 He was still snugly housed in her heart. His 
 absence had regained for him much of that aureola of 
 saintship which had been nearly abstracted during her 
 reproachful mood on that miserable journey from 
 London. Rapture is often cooled by contact with its 
 cause, especially if under awkward conditions. And 
 that last experience with Stephen had done anything 
 but make him shine in her eyes. His very kindness 
 in letting her return was his offence. Elfride had her 
 sex's love of sheer force in a man, however ill-directed ; 
 and at that critical juncture in London Stephen's only 
 chance of retaining the ascendancy over her that his 
 M7 
 
A PAIR OP BLUE EYES 
 
 face and not his parts had acquired for him, would 
 have been by doing what, for one thing, he was too 
 youthful to undertake — that was, dragging her by the 
 wrist to the rails of some altar, and peremptorily 
 marrying her. Decisive action is seen by appreciative 
 minds to be frequently objectless, and sometimes fatal ; 
 but decision, however suicidal, has more charm for a 
 woman than the most unequivocal Fabian success. 
 
 However, some of the unpleasant accessories of that 
 occasion were now out of sight again, and Stephen had 
 resumed not a few of his fancy colours. 
 
XIII 
 
 'He set in order many proverbs.' 
 
 IT is London in October — two months further on in 
 the story. 
 
 Bede's Inn has this peculiarity, that it faces, receives 
 from, and discharges into a bustling thoroughfare speak- 
 ing only of wealth and respectability, whilst its postern 
 abuts on as crowded and poverty-stricken a network of 
 alleys as are to be found anywhere in the metropolis. 
 The moral consequences are, first, that those who occupy 
 chambers in the Inn may see a great deal of shirt- 
 less humanity's habits and enjoyments without doing 
 more than look down from a back window ; and second 
 they may hear wholesome though unpleasant social re- 
 minders through the medium of a harsh voice, an 
 unequal footstep, the echo of a blow or a fall, which 
 originates in the person of some drunkard or wife- 
 beater, as he crosses and interferes with the quiet of 
 the square. Characters of this kind frequently pass 
 through the Inn from a little foxhole of an alley at the 
 back, but they never loiter there. 
 
 It is hardly necessary to state that all the sights and 
 movements proper to the Inn are most orderly. On 
 the fine October evening on which V^ (qUqiv Stephen 
 149 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 Smith to this place, a placid porter is sitting on a stool 
 under a sycamore-tree in the midst, with a little cane 
 in his hand. We notice the thick coat of soot upon 
 the branches, hanging underneath them in flakes, as in 
 a chimney. The blackness of these boughs does not at 
 present improve the tree — nearly forsaken by its leaves 
 as it is — but in the spring their green fresh beauty is 
 made doubly beautiful by the contrast. Within the 
 railings is a flower-garden of respectable dahlias and 
 chrysanthemums, where a man is sweeping the leaves 
 from the grass. 
 
 Stephen selects a doorway, and ascends an old 
 though wide wooden staircase, with moulded balusters 
 and handrail, which in a country manor-house would 
 be considered a noteworthy specimen of Renaissance 
 workmanship. He reaches a door on the first floor, 
 over which is painted, in black letters, ' Mr. Henry 
 Knight ' — ' Barrister-at-law ' being understood but not 
 expressed. The wall is thick, and there is a door at 
 its outer and inner face. The outer one happens to be 
 ajar : Stephen goes to the other, and taps. 
 
 ' Come in ! ' from distant penetralia. 
 
 First was a small anteroom, divided from the inner 
 apartment by a wainscoted archway two or three yards 
 wide. Across this archway hung a pair of dark-green 
 curtains, making a mystery of all within the arch except 
 the spasmodic scratching of a quill pen. Here was 
 grouped a chaotic assemblage of articles — mainly old 
 framed prints and paintings — leaning edgewise against 
 the wall, like roofing slates in a builder's yard. All the 
 books visible here were folios too big to be stolen — some 
 lying on a heavy oak table in one corner, some on the 
 floor among the pictures, the whole intermingled with 
 old coats, hats, umbrellas, and walking-sticks. 
 
 Stephen pushed aside the curtain, and before him sat 
 a man writing away as if his life depended upon it — 
 which it did. 
 
 150 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 A man of thirty in a speckled coat, with dark brown 
 hair, curly beard, and crisp moustache : the latter 
 running into the beard on each side of the mouth, and, 
 as usual, hiding the real expression of that organ under 
 a chronic aspect of impassivity. 
 
 ' Ah, my dear fellow, I knew 'twas you,' said Knight, 
 looking up with a smile, and holding out his hand. 
 
 Knight's mouth and eyes came to view now. Both 
 features were good, and had the peculiarity of appearing 
 younger and fresher than the brow and face they belonged 
 to, which were getting sicklied o'er by the unmistakable 
 pale cast. The mouth had not quite relinquished rotun- 
 dity of curve for the firm angularities of middle life ; and 
 the eyes, though keen, permeated rather than penetrated : 
 what they had lost of their boy-time brightness by a 
 dozen years of hard reading lending a quietness to their 
 gaze which suited them well. 
 
 A lady would have said there was a smell of tobacco 
 in the room : a man that there was not. 
 
 Knight did not rise. He looked at a timepiece on 
 the mantelshelf, then turned again to his letters, point- 
 ing to a chair. 
 
 ' Well, I am glad you have come. I only returned 
 to town yesterday; now, don't speak, Stephen, for ten 
 minutes ; I have just that time to the late post. At the 
 eleventh minute, I'm your man.' 
 
 Stephen sat down as if this kind of reception was by 
 no means new, and away went Knight's pen, beating up 
 and down like a ship in a storm. 
 
 Cicero called the library the soul of the house ; here 
 the house was all soul. Portions of the floor, and half 
 the wall-space, were taken up by book-shelves ordinary 
 and extraordinary; the remaining parts, together with 
 brackets, side - tables, 5z:c., being occupied by casts, 
 statuettes, medaUions, and plaques of various descrip- 
 tions, picked up by the owner in his wanderings through 
 France and Italy. 
 
 151 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 One stream only of evening sunlight came into the 
 room from a window quite in the corner, overlooking a 
 court. An aquarium stood in the window. It was a 
 dull parallelopipedon enough for living creatures at 
 most hours of the day ; but for a few minutes in the 
 evening, as now, an errant, kindly ray lighted up and 
 warmed the little world therein, when the many-coloured 
 zoophytes opened and put forth their arms, the weeds 
 acquired a rich transparency, the shells gleamed of a 
 more golden yellow, and the timid community expressed 
 gladness more plainly than in words. 
 
 Within the prescribed ten minutes Knight flung 
 down his pen, rang for the boy to take the letters to the 
 post, and at the closing of the door exclaimed, ' There ; 
 thank God, that's done. Now, Stephen, pull your chair 
 round, and tell me what you have been doing all this 
 time. Have you kept up your Greek ? ' 
 
 'No.' 
 
 ' How's that ? ' 
 
 ' I haven't enough spare time.' 
 
 ' That's nonsense.' 
 
 ' Well, I have done a great many things, if not that. 
 And I have done one extraordinary thing.' 
 
 Knight turned full upon Stephen. ' Ah-ha ! Now, 
 then, let me look into your face, put two and two to- 
 gether, and make a shrewd guess.' 
 
 Stephen changed to a redder colour. 
 
 'Why, Smith,' said Knight, after holding him 
 rigidly by the shoulders, and keenly scrutinising his 
 countenance for a minute in silence, 'you have fallen 
 in love.' 
 
 ' Well— the fact is 
 
 ' Now, out with it.' But seeing that Stephen looked 
 rather distressed, he changed to a kindly tone. ' Now 
 Smith, my lad, you know me well enough by this time, 
 or you ought to ; and you know very well that if you 
 choose to give me a detailed account of the phenomenon 
 152 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 vsrithin you, I shall listen ; if you don't, I am the last 
 man in the world to care to hear it.' 
 
 ' I'll tell this much : I have fallen in love, and I want 
 to be married.' 
 
 Knight looked ominous as this passed Stephen's 
 lips. 
 
 ' Don't judge me before you have heard more,' 
 cried Stephen anxiously, seeing the change in his 
 friend's countenance. 
 
 ' I don't judge. Does your mother know about it ? ' 
 
 ' Nothing definite.' 
 
 ' Father ? ' 
 
 ' No. But I'll tell you. The young person ' 
 
 ' Come, that's dreadfully ungallant. But perhaps 
 I understand the frame of mind a little, so go on. 
 Your sweetheart ' 
 
 ' She is rather higher in the world than I am.' 
 
 ' As it should be.' 
 
 ' And her father won't hear of it, as I now stand. 
 
 ' Not an uncommon case.' 
 
 'And now comes what I want your advice upon. 
 Something has happened at her house which makes it 
 out of the question for us to ask her father again now. 
 So we are keeping silent. In the meantime an architect 
 in India has just written to Mr. Hewby to ask whether 
 he can find for him a young assistant willing to go 
 over to Bombay to prepare drawings for work formerly 
 done by the engineers. The salary he offers is 350 
 rupees a month, or about £,2)^. Hewby has mentioned 
 it to me, and I have been to Dr. Wray, who says I 
 shall acclimatise without much illness. Now, would 
 you go ? ' 
 
 ' You mean to say, because it is a possible road to 
 the young lady.' 
 
 ' Yes ; I was thinking I could go over and make a 
 little money, and then come back and ask for her. I 
 have the option of practising for myself after a year.' 
 ^ 153 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 ' Would she be staunch ? ' 
 
 ' Oh yes ! For ever — to the end of her life ! ' 
 
 ' How do you know ? ' 
 
 ' Why, how do people know ? Of course, she will.' 
 
 Knight leant back in his chair. 'Now, though I 
 know her thoroughly as she exists in your heart, 
 Stephen, I don't know her in the flesh. All I want 
 to ask is, is this idea of going to India based entirely 
 upon a belief in her fidelity ? ' 
 
 ' Yes ; I should not go if it were not for her.' 
 
 'Well, Stephen, you have put me in rather an 
 awkward position. If I give my true sentiments, I 
 shall hurt your feelings; if I don't, I shall hurt my 
 own judgment. And remember, I don't know much 
 about women.' 
 
 ' But you have had attachments, although you tell 
 me very little about them.' 
 
 ' And I only hope you'll continue to prosper till I 
 tell you more.' 
 
 Stephen winced at this rap. ' I have never formed 
 a deep attachment,' continued Knight. ' I never have 
 found a woman worth it. Nor have I been once 
 engaged to be married.' 
 
 ' You write as if you had been engaged a hundred 
 times, if I may be allowed to say so,' said Stephen in 
 an injured tone. 
 
 ' Yes, that may be. But, my dear Stephen, it is only 
 those who half know a thing that write about it. Those 
 who know it thoroughly don't take the trouble. All I 
 know about women, or men either, is a mass of generali- 
 ties. I plod along, and occasionally lift my eyes and 
 skim the weltering surface of mankind lying between me 
 and the horizon, as a crow might ; no more.' 
 
 Knight stopped as if he had fallen into a train of 
 thought, and Stephen looked with affectionate awe at a 
 master whose mind, he believed, could swallow up at 
 one meal all that his own head contained. 
 IS4 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 There was affective sympathy, but no great intel- 
 lectual fellowship, between Knight and Stephen Smith. 
 Knight had seen his young friend when the latter was 
 a cherry-cheeked happy boy, had been interested in 
 him, had kept his eye upon him, and generously helped 
 the lad to books, till the mere connection of patronage 
 grew to acquaintance, and that ripened to friendship. 
 And so, though Smith was not at all the man Knight 
 would have deliberately chosen as a friend — or even for 
 one of a group of a dozen friends — he somehow was 
 his friend. Circumstance, as usual, did it all. How 
 many of us can say of our most intimate alter ego, 
 leaving alone friends of the outer circle, that he is the 
 man we should have chosen, as embodying the net 
 result after adding up all the points in human nature 
 that we love, and principles we hold, and subtracting 
 all that we hate ? The man is really somebody we got 
 to know by mere physical juxtaposition long maintained, 
 and was taken into our confidence, and even heart, as 
 a makeshift. 
 
 ' And what do you think of her ? ' Stephen ventured 
 to say, after a silence. 
 
 ' Taking her merits on trust from you,' said Knight, 
 ' as we do those of the Roman poets of whom we 
 know nothing but that they lived, I still think she 
 will not stick to you through, say, three years of 
 absence in India.' 
 
 ' But she will ! ' cried Stephen desperately. ' She 
 is a girl all delicacy and honour. And no woman of 
 that kind, who has committed herself so into a man's 
 hands as she has into mine, could possibly marry 
 another.' 
 
 'How has she committed herself?' asked Knight 
 curiously. 
 
 Stephen did not answer. Knight had looked on 
 his love so sceptically that it would not do to say all 
 that he had intended to say by any means. 
 155 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 'Well, don't tell,' said Knight. 'But you are 
 begging the question, which is, I suppose, inevitable 
 in love.' 
 
 ' And I'll tell you another thing,' the younger man 
 pleaded. 'You remember what you said to me once 
 about women receiving a kiss. Don't you ? Why, 
 that instead of our being charmed by the fascination 
 of their bearing at such a time, we should immediately 
 doubt them if their confusion has any grace in it — 
 that awkward bungling was the true charm of the occa- 
 sion, implying that we are the first who has played 
 such a part with them.' 
 
 ' It is true, quite,' said Knight musingly. 
 
 It often happened that the disciple thus remem- 
 bered the lessons of the master long after the master 
 himself had forgotten them. 
 
 ■ Well, that was like her ! ' cried Stephen triumph- 
 antly. ' She was in such a flurry that she didn't know 
 what she was doing.' 
 
 ' Splendid, splendid ! ' said Knight soothingly. ' So 
 that all I have to say is, that if you see a good open- 
 ing in Bombay there's no reason why you should not 
 go without troubling to draw fine distinctions as to 
 reasons. No man fully realizes what opinions he acts 
 upon, or what his actions mean.' 
 
 'Yes; I go to Bombay. I'll write a note here, if 
 you don't mind.' 
 
 ' Sleep over it — it is the best plan — and write 
 to-morrow. Meantime, go there to that window and 
 sit down, and look at my Humanity Show. I am 
 going to dine out this evening, and have to dress here 
 out of my portmanteau. I bring up my things like 
 this to save the trouble of going down to my place at 
 Richmond and back again.' 
 
 Knight then went to the middle of the room and 
 flung open his portmanteau, and Stephen drew near 
 the window. The streak of sunlight had crept upward, 
 iS6 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 edged away, and vanished ; the zoophytes slept : a 
 dusky gloom pervaded the room. And now another 
 volume of light shone over the window. 
 
 ' There ! ' said Knight, ' where is there in England 
 a spectacle to equal that ? I sit there and watch 
 them every night before I go home. Softly open the 
 sash.' 
 
 Beneath them was an alley running up to the wall, 
 and thence turning sideways and passing under an 
 arch, so that Knight's back window was immediately 
 over the angle, and commanded a view of the alley 
 lengthwise. Crowds — mostly of women — were surging, 
 bustling, and pacing up and down. Gaslights glared 
 from butchers' stalls, illuminating the lumps of flesh 
 to splotches of orange and vermilion, like the wild 
 colouring of Turner's later pictures, whilst the purl 
 and babble of tongues of every pitch and mood was 
 to this human wild-wood what the ripple of a brook 
 is to the natural forest. 
 
 Nearly ten minutes passed. Then Knight also 
 came to the window. 
 
 ' Well, now, I call a cab and vanish down the street 
 in the direction of Berkeley Square,' he said, buttoning 
 his waistcoat and kicking his morning suit into a 
 corner. Stephen rose to leave. 
 
 'What a heap of literature!' remarked the young 
 man, taking a final longing survey round the room, as 
 if to abide there for ever would be the great pleasure 
 of his life, yet feeling that he had almost outstayed his 
 welcome-while. His eyes rested upon an arm-chair 
 piled full of newspapers, magazines, and bright new 
 volumes in green and red. 
 
 ' Yes,' said Knight, also looking at them and breath- 
 ing a sigh of weariness ; ' something must be done with 
 several of them soon, I suppose. Stephen, you needn't 
 hurry away for a few minutes, you know, if you want 
 to stay ; I am not quite ready. Overhaul those volumes 
 157 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 whilst I put on my coat, and I'll walk a little way 
 with you.' 
 
 Stephen sat down beside the arm-chair and began 
 to tumble the books about. Among the rest he found a 
 novelette in one volume, The Court of Kellyon Castle. 
 By Ernest Field. 
 
 ' Are you going to review this ? ' inquired Stephen 
 with apparent unconcern, and holding up Elfride's 
 eifusion. 
 
 'Which? Oh, that! I may — though I don't do 
 much light reviewing now. But it is reviewable.' 
 
 ' How do you mean ? ' 
 
 Knight never liked to be asked what he meant. 
 ' Mean ! I mean that the majority of books published 
 are neither good enough nor bad enough to provoke 
 criticism, and that that book does provoke it.' 
 
 ' By its goodness or its badness ? ' Stephen said 
 with some anxiety on poor little Elfride's score. 
 
 ' Its badness. It seems to be written by some girl 
 in her teens.' 
 
 Stephen said not another word. He did not care 
 to speak plainly of Elfride after that unfortunate slip 
 his tongue had made in respect of her having com- 
 mitted herself; and, apart from that. Knight's severe — 
 almost dogged and self-willed — honesty in criticizing 
 was unassailable by the humble wish of a youthful 
 friend like Stephen. 
 
 Knight was now ready. Turning off the gas, and 
 slamming together the door, they went downstairs and 
 into the street. 
 
XIV 
 
 'We frolic while 'tis May." 
 
 It has now to be realized that nearly three-quarters of 
 a year have passed away. In place of the autumnal 
 scenery which formed a setting to the previous enact- 
 ments, we have the culminating blooms of summer in 
 the year following. 
 
 Stephen is in India, slaving away at an office in 
 Bombay; occasionally going up the country on pro- 
 fessional errands, and wondering why people who had 
 been there longer than he complained so much of the 
 effect of the climate upon their constitutions. Never 
 had a young man a finer start than seemed now to 
 present itself to Stephen. It was just in that excep- 
 tional heyday of prosperity which shone over Bombay 
 some few years ago, that he arrived on the scene. 
 Building and engineering partook of the general im- 
 petus. Speculation moved with an accelerated velocity 
 every successive day, the only disagreeable contingency 
 connected with it being the possibility of a collapse. 
 
 Elfride had never told her father of the four-and- 
 
 twenty-hours' escapade with Stephen, nor had it, to 
 
 her knowledge, come to his ears by any other route. 
 
 It was a secret trouble and grief to the girl for a short 
 
 159 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 time, and Stephen's departure was another ingredient 
 in her sorrow. But Elfride possessed special facilities 
 for getting rid of trouble after a decent interval. Whilst 
 a slow nature was imbibing a misfortune little by little, 
 she had swallowed the whole agony of it at a draught 
 and was brightening again. She could slough off a sad- 
 ness and replace it by a hope as easily as a lizard renews 
 a diseased limb. 
 
 And two such excellent distractions had presented 
 themselves. One was bringing out the romance and 
 looking for notices in the papers, which, though they 
 had been significantly short so far, had served to divert 
 her thoughts. The other was migrating from the vicar- 
 age to the more commodious old house of Mrs. Swan- 
 court's, overlooking the same valley. Mr. Swancourt 
 at first disliked the idea of being transplanted to 
 feminine soil, but the obvious advantages of such an 
 accession of dignity reconciled him to the change. So 
 there was a radical ' move ; ' the two ladies stajdng at 
 Torquay as had been arranged, the vicar going to and 
 fro. 
 
 Mrs. Swancourt considerably enlarged Elfride's ideas 
 in an aristocratic direction, and she began to forgive her 
 father for his politic marriage. Certainly, in a worldly 
 sense, a handsome face at three-and-forty had never 
 served a man in better stead. 
 
 The new house at Kensington was ready, and they 
 were all in town. 
 
 The Hyde Park shrubs had been transplanted as 
 usual, the chairs ranked in line, the grass edgings 
 trimmed, the roads made to look as if they were suffer- 
 ing from a heavy thunderstorm ; carriages had been 
 called for by the easeful, horses by the brisk, and the 
 Drive and Row were again the groove of gaiety for an 
 hour. We gaze upon the spectacle, at six o'clock on 
 this midsummer afternoon, in a melon-frame atmosphere 
 
 i6o 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 and beneath a violet sky. The Swancourt equipage 
 formed one in the stream. 
 
 Mrs. Swancourt was a talker of talk of the incisive 
 kind, which her low musical voice — the only beautiful 
 point in the old woman — prevented from being weari- 
 some. 
 
 ' Now,' she said to Elfride, who, like ^neas at 
 Carthage, was full of admiration for the brilHant scene, 
 ' you will find that our companionless state will give us, 
 as it does everybody, an extraordinary power in reading 
 the features of our fellow-creatures here. I always am 
 a listener in such places as these — not to the narratives 
 told by my neighbours' tongues, but by their faces — the 
 advantage of which is, that whether I am in Row, 
 Boulevard, Rialto, or Prado, they all speak the same 
 language. I may have acquired some skill in this 
 practice through having been an ugly lonely woman for 
 so many years, with nobody to give me information ; a 
 thing you will not consider strange when the parallel 
 case is borne in mind, — how truly people who have no 
 clocks will tell the time of day.' 
 
 ' Ay, that they will,' said Mr. Swancourt corrobora- 
 tively. ' I have known labouring men at Endelstow 
 and other farms who had framed complete systems of 
 observation for that purpose. By means of shadows, 
 winds, clouds, the movements of sheep and oxen, the 
 singing of birds, the crowing of cocks, and a hundred 
 other sights and sounds which people with watches in 
 their pockets never know the existence of, they are 
 able to pronounce within ten minutes of the hour 
 almost at any required instant. That reminds me of 
 an old story which I'm afraid is too bad — too bad to 
 repeat.' Here the vicar shook his head and laughed 
 inwardly. 
 
 ' Tell it — do ! ' said the ladies. 
 
 ' I mustn't quite tell it.' 
 
 ' That's absurd,' said Mrs. Swancourt. 
 
 j6i h 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 ' It was only about a man who, by the same careful 
 system of observation, was known to deceive persons for 
 more than two years into the belief that he kept a baro- 
 meter by stealth, so exactly did he foretell all changes 
 in the weather by the braying of his ass and the temper 
 of his wife.' 
 
 Elfride laughed. 
 
 'Exactly,' said Mrs. Swancourt. 'And in just the 
 way that those learnt the signs of nature, I have learnt 
 the language of her illegitimate si iter — artificiality ; and 
 the fibbing of eyes, the contempt of nose-tips, the 
 indignation of back hair, the laughter of clothes, the 
 cynicism of footsteps, and the various emotions lying 
 in walking-stick twirls, hat-liftings, the elevation of 
 parasols, the carriage of umbrellas, become as A B C 
 to me. 
 
 ' Just look at that daughter's sister class of mamma 
 in the carriage across there,' she continued to Elfride, 
 pointing with merely a turn of her eye. ' The absorbing 
 self-consciousness of her position that is shown by her 
 countenance is most humiliating to a lover of one's 
 country. You would hardly believe, would you, that 
 members of a Fashionable World, whose professed 
 zero is far above the highest degree of the humble, 
 could be so ignorant of the elementary instincts of 
 reticence.' 
 
 'How?' 
 
 ' Why, to bear on their faces, as plainly as on a 
 phylactery, the inscription, " Do, pray, look at the 
 coronet on my panels." ' 
 
 ' Really, Charlotte,' said the vicar, ' you see as much 
 in faces as Mr. Puff saw in Lord Burleigh's nod.' 
 
 Elfride could not but admire the beauty of her fellow 
 countr)rwomen, especially since herself and her own few 
 acquaintances had always been slightly sunburnt or 
 marked on the back of the hands by a bramble-scratch 
 at this time of the year. 
 
 162 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 'And what lovely flowers and leaves they wear in 
 their bonnets ! ' she exclaimed. 
 
 ' Oh yes,' returned Mrs. Swancourt. ' Some of them 
 are even more striking in colour than any real ones. 
 Look at that beautiful rose worn by the lady inside the 
 rails. Elegant vine-tendrils introduced upon the stem 
 as an improvement upon prickles, and all growing so 
 naturally just over her ear — I say growing advisedly, 
 for the pink of the petals and the pink of her handsome 
 cheeks are equally from Nature's hand to the eyes of 
 the most casual observer.' 
 
 ' But praise them a little, they do deserve it ! ' said 
 generous Elfride. 
 
 ' Well, I do. See how the Duchess of waves to 
 
 and fro in her seat, utilizing the sway of her landau 
 by looking around only when her head is swung forward, 
 with a pussive pride which forbids a resistance to the 
 force of circumstance. Look at the pretty pout on the 
 mouths of that family there, retaining no traces of being 
 arranged beforehand, so well is it done. Look at the 
 demure close of the little fists holding the parasols ; the 
 tiny alert thumb, sticking up erect against the ivory 
 stem as knowing as can be, the satin of the parasol 
 invariably matching the complexion of the face beneath 
 it, yet seemingly by an accident, which makes the thing 
 so attractive. There's the red book Ijfing on the 
 opposite seat, bespeaking the vast numbers of their 
 acquaintance. And I particularly admire the aspect of 
 that abundantly daughtered woman on the other side 
 — I mean her look of unconsciousness that the girls 
 are stared at by the walkers, and above all the look of 
 the girls themselves — losing their gaze in the depths 
 of handsome men's eyes without appearing to notice 
 whether they are observing masculine eyes or the leaves 
 of the trees. There's praise for you. But I am only 
 jesting, child — you know that.' 
 
 ' Piph-ph-ph — how warm it is, to be sure ! ' said Mr. 
 163 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 Swancourt, as if his mind were a long distance from all 
 he saw. ' I declare that my watch is so hot that I can 
 scarcely bear to touch it to see what the time is, and all 
 the world smells like the inside of a hat.' 
 
 ' How the men stare at you, Elfride ! ' said the elder 
 lady. ' You will kill me quite, I am afraid.' 
 
 'Kill you?' 
 
 ' As a diamond kills an opal in the same setting.' 
 
 ' I have noticed several ladies and gentlemen looking 
 at me,' said Elfride artlessly, showing her pleasure at 
 being observed. 
 
 ' My dear, you mustn't say " gentlemen " nowadays,' 
 her stepmother answered in the tones of arch concern 
 that so well became her ugliness. ' We have handed over 
 " gentlemen " to the lower middle class, where the word 
 is still to be heard at tradesmen's balls and provincial 
 tea-parties, I believe. It is done with here.' 
 
 ' What must I say, then ? ' 
 
 ' " Ladies and men " always.' 
 
 At this moment appeared in the stream of vehicles 
 moving in the contrary direction a chariot presenting in 
 its general surface the rich indigo hue of a midnight 
 sky, the wheels and margins being picked out in delicate 
 lines of ultramarine ; the servants' liveries were dark- 
 blue coats and silver lace, and breeches of neutral Indian 
 red. The whole concern formed an organic whole, and 
 moved along behind a pair of dark chestnut geldings, 
 who advanced in an indifferently zealous trot, very 
 daintily performed, and occasionally shrugged divers 
 points of their veiny surface as if they were rather above 
 the business. 
 
 In this sat a gentleman with no decided characteristics 
 more than that he somewhat resembled a good-natured 
 commercial traveller of the superior class. Beside him 
 was a lady with skim-milky eyes and complexion, be- 
 longing to the "interesting'' class of women, where 
 that class merges in the sickly, her greatest pleasure 
 164 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 being apparently to enjoy nothing. Opposite this pair 
 sat two little girls in white hats and blue feathers. 
 
 The lady saw Elfride, smiled and bowed, and touched 
 her husband's elbow, who turned and received Elfride's 
 movement of recognition with a gallant elevation of his 
 hat. Then the two children held up their arms to 
 Elfride, and laughed gleefully. 
 
 ' Who is that ? ' 
 
 'Why, Lord Luxellian, isn't it?' said Mrs. Swan- 
 court, who with the vicar had been seated with her 
 back towards them. 
 
 ' Yes,' replied Elfride. ' He is the one man of those 
 I have seen here whom I consider handsomer than papa.' 
 
 ' Thank you, dear,' said Mr. Swancourt. 
 
 'Yes; but your father is so much older. When 
 Lord Luxellian gets a little further on in life, he won't 
 be half so good-looking as our man.' 
 
 ' Thank you, dear, likewise,' said Mr. Swancourt. 
 
 ' See,' exclaimed Elfride, still looking towards them, 
 ' how those little dears want me ! Actually one of them 
 is crying for me to come.' 
 
 ' We were talking of bracelets just now. Look at 
 Lady Luxellian's,' said Mrs. Swancourt, as that baroness 
 lifted up her arm to support one of the children. ' It 
 is slipping up her arm — too large by half I hate to 
 see daylight between a bracelet and a wrist ; I wonder 
 women haven't better taste.' 
 
 ' It is not on that account, indeed,' Elfride expostu- 
 lated. ' It is that her arm has got thin, poor thing. 
 You cannot think how much she has altered in this 
 last twelvemonth.' 
 
 The carriages were now nearer together, and there 
 was an exchange of more familiar greetings between 
 the two families. Then the Luxellians crossed over 
 and drew up under the plane-trees, just in the rear of 
 the Swancourts. Lord Luxellian alighted, and came 
 forward with a musical laugh. 
 165 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 It was his attraction as a man. People liked him 
 for those tones, and forgot that he had no talents. 
 Acquaintances remembered Mr. Swancourt by his 
 manner ; they remembered Stephen Smith by his face, 
 Lord Luxellian by his laugh. 
 
 Mr. Swancourt made some friendly remarks — among 
 others things upon the heat. 
 
 ' Yes,' said Lord Luxellian, • we were driving by a 
 furrier's window this afternoon, and the sight filled us 
 all with such a sense of suffocation that we were glad 
 to get away. Ha-ha ! ' He turned to Elfride. ' Miss 
 Swancourt, I have hardly seen or spoken to you since 
 your literary feat was made public. I had no idea a 
 chiel was taking notes down at quiet Endelstow, or I 
 should certainly have put myself and friends upon our 
 best behaviour. Swancourt, why didn't you give me a 
 hint'! ' 
 
 Elfride fluttered, blushed, laughed, said it was nothing 
 to speak of, &c. &c. 
 
 ' Well, I think you were rather unfairly treated by 
 the Present ; I certainly do. Writing a heavy review 
 like that upon an elegant trifle like the Court of Kelly on 
 Castle was absurd.' 
 
 'What?' said Elfride, opening her eyes. 'Was I 
 reviewed in the Present t ' 
 
 ' Oh yes ; didn't you see it ? Why, it was four or 
 five months ago ! ' 
 
 ' No, I never saw it. How sorry I am ! What a 
 shame of my publishers ! They promised to send me 
 every notice that appeared.' 
 
 ' Ah, then, I am almost afraid I have been giving 
 you disagreeable information, intentionally withheld out 
 of courtesy. Depend upon it they thought no good 
 would come of sending it, and so would not pain you 
 unnecessarily.' 
 
 ' Oh no ; I am indeed glad you have told me. Lord 
 Luxellian. It is quite a mistaken kindness on their 
 i66 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 part. Is the review so much against me ? ' she inquired 
 tremulously. 
 
 ' No, no ; not that exactly — though I almost forget 
 its exact purport now. It was merely — merely sharp, 
 you know — ungenerous, I might say. But really my 
 memory does not enable me to speak decidedly.' 
 
 'We'll drive to the Present office, and get one 
 directly ; shall we, papa ? ' 
 
 ' If you are so anxious, dear, we will, or send. But 
 to-morrow will do.' 
 
 ' And do oblige me in a little matter now, Elfride,' 
 said Lord Luxellian warmly, and looking as if he were 
 sorry he had brought news that disturbed her. ' I am 
 in reality sent here as a special messenger by my 
 little Polly and Katie to ask you to come into our 
 carriage with them for a short time. I am just going 
 to walk across into Piccadilly, and my wife is left 
 alone with them. I am afraid they are rather spoilt 
 children ; but I have half promised them you shall 
 come.' 
 
 The steps were let down, and Elfride was transferred 
 — to the intense delight of the little girls, and to the 
 mild interest of loungers with red skins and long 
 necks, who cursorily eyed the performance with their 
 walking-sticks to their lips, occasionally laughing from 
 far down their throats and with their eyes, their mouths 
 not being concerned in the operation at all. Lord 
 Luxellian then told the coachman to drive on, lifted his 
 hat, smiled a smile that missed its mark and alighted 
 on a total stranger, who bowed in bewilderment. Lord 
 Luxellian looked long at Elfride. 
 
 The look was a manly, open, and genuine look of 
 admiration ; a momentary tribute of a kind which any 
 honest Englishman might have paid to fairness without 
 being ashamed of the feeling, or permitting it to encroach 
 in the slightest degree upon his emotional obligations as 
 a husband and head of a family. Then Lord Luxellian 
 167 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 turned away, and walked musingly to the upper end oi 
 the promenade. 
 
 Mr. Swancourt had alighted at the same time with 
 Elfride, crossing over to the Row for a few minutes to 
 speak to a friend he recognized there ; and his wife was 
 thus left sole tenant of the carriage. 
 
 Now, whilst this little act had been in course of 
 performance, there stood among the promenading spec- 
 tators a man of somewhat different description from 
 the rest. Behind the general throng, in the rear of the 
 chairs, and leaning against the trunk of a tree, he looked 
 at Elfride with quiet and critical interest. 
 
 Three points about this unobtrusive person showed 
 promptly to the exercised eye that he was not a Row 
 man pur sang. First, an irrepressible wrinkle or two 
 in the waist of his frock-coat — denoting that he had not 
 damned his tailor sufficiently to drive that tradesman up 
 to the orthodox high pressure of cunning workmanship. 
 Second, a slight slovenliness of umbrella, occasioned by 
 its owner's habit of resting heavily upon it, and using 
 it as a veritable walking-stick, instead of letting its point 
 touch the ground in the most coquettish of kisses, as 
 is the proper Row manner to do. Third, and chief 
 reason, that try how you might, you could scarcely help 
 supposing, on looking at his face, that your eyes were 
 not far from a well-hnished mind, instead of the well- 
 finished skin et prceterea nihil, which is by rights the 
 Mark of the Row. 
 
 The probability is that, had not Mrs. Swancourt been 
 left alone in her carriage under the tree, this man would 
 have remained in his unobserved seclusion. But seeing 
 her thus, he came round to the front, stooped under the 
 rail, and stood beside the carriage-door. 
 
 Mrs. Swancourt looked reflectively at him for a 
 quarter of a minute, then held out her hand laugh- 
 ingly : 
 
 ' Why, Henry Knight — of course it is ! My — second 
 168 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 — third — fourth cousin — what shall I say? At any 
 rate, my kinsman.' 
 
 ' Yes, one of a remnant not yet cut off. I scarcely 
 was certain of you, either, from where I was standing.' 
 
 ' I have not seen you since you first went to Oxford ; 
 consider the number of years ! You know, I suppose, 
 of my marriage ? ' 
 
 And there sprang up a dialogue concerning family 
 matters of birth, death, and marriage, which it is not 
 necessary to detail. Knight presently inquired : 
 
 ' The young lady who changed into the other carriage 
 is, then, your stepdaughter ? ' 
 
 ' Yes, Elfride. You must know her.' 
 
 ' And who was the lady in the carriage Elfride 
 entered ; who had an ill-defined and watery look, as if 
 she were only the reflection of herself in a pool ? ' 
 
 ' Lady Luxellian ; very weakly, Elfride says. My 
 husband is remotely connected with them ; but there 
 
 is not much intimacy on account of . However, 
 
 Henry, you'll come and see us, of course. 24 Chevron 
 Square. Come this week. We shall only be in town 
 a week or two longer.' 
 
 ' Let me see. I've got to run up to Oxford to- 
 morrow, where I shall be for several days ; so that I 
 must, I fear, lose the pleasure of seeing you in London 
 this year.' 
 
 ' Then come to Endelstow ; why not return with 
 us?' 
 
 ' I am afraid if I were to come before August I 
 should have to leave again in a day or two. I should 
 be delighted to be with you at the beginning of that 
 month; and I could stay a nice long time. I have 
 thought of going westward all the summer.' 
 
 ' Very well. Now remember that's a compact. And 
 won't you wait now and see Mr. Swancourt ? He will 
 not be away ten minutes longer.' 
 
 ' No ; I'll beg to be excused ; for I must get to my 
 
 « 169 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 chambers again this evening before I go home ; indeed, 
 I ought to have been there now — I have such a press of 
 matters to attend to just at present. You will explain 
 to him, please. Good-bye.' 
 
 'And let us know the day of your appearance as 
 soon as you can.' 
 
 ' I wiU.' 
 
XV 
 
 'A wandering voice." 
 
 1 HOUGH sheer and intelligible griefs are not charmed 
 away by being confided to mere acquaintances, the pro- 
 cess is a palliative to certain ill - humours. Among 
 these, perplexed vexation is one — a species of trouble 
 which, like a stream, gets shallower by the simple 
 operation of widening it in any quarter. 
 
 On the evening of the day succeeding that of the 
 meeting in the Park, Elfride and Mrs. Swancourt were 
 engaged in conversation in the dressing-room of the 
 latter. Such a treatment of such a case was in course 
 of adoption here. 
 
 Elfride had just before received an affectionate letter 
 from Stephen Smith in Bombay, which had been for- 
 warded to her from Endelstow. But since this is not 
 the case referred to, it is not worth while to pry further 
 into the contents of the letter than to discover that, 
 with rash though pardonable confidence in coming 
 times, he addressed her in high spirits as his darling 
 future wife. 
 
 Probably there cannot be instanced a briefer and 
 surer rule-of-thumb test of a man's temperament- 
 sanguine or cautious — than this : did he or does he 
 171 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 ante-date the word wife in corresponding with a sweet- 
 heart he honestly loves ? 
 
 She had taken this epistle into her own room, read a 
 Uttle of it, then saved the rest for to-morrow, not wish- 
 ing to be so extravagant as to consume the pleasure all 
 at once. Nevertheless, she could not resist the wish 
 to enjoy yet a little more, so out came the letter again, 
 and in spite of misgivings as to prodigality the whole 
 was devoured. The letter was finally reperused and 
 placed in her pocket. 
 
 What was this ? Also a newspaper for Elfride, 
 which she had overlooked in her hurry to open the 
 letter. It was the old number of the Present, contain- 
 ing the article upon her book, forwarded as had been 
 requested. 
 
 Elfride had hastily read it through, shrunk percep- 
 tibly smaller, and had then gone with the paper in her 
 hand to Mrs. Swancourt's dressing-room, to lighten or 
 at least modify her vexation by a discriminating estimate 
 from her stepmother. 
 
 She was now looking disconsolately out of the 
 window. 
 
 ' Never mind, my child,' said Mrs. Swancourt after 
 a careful perusal of the matter indicated. ' I don't see 
 that the review is such a terrible one, after all. Besides, 
 everybody has forgotten about it by this time. I'm 
 sure the opening is good enough for any book ever 
 written. Just listen — it sounds better read aloud than 
 when you pore over it silently : " The Court of Kellyon 
 Castle. A Romance of the Middle Ages. By Ernest 
 Field. In the belief that we were for a while escaping 
 the monotonous repetition ofwearisome details in modern 
 social scenery, analyses of uninteresting character, or 
 the unnatural unfoldings of a sensation plot, we took 
 this volume into our hands with a feeling of pleasure. 
 We were disposed' to beguile ourselves with the fancy 
 that some new change might possibly be rung upon 
 172 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 donjon keeps, chain and plate armour, deeply scarred 
 cheeks, tender maidens disguised as pages, to which 
 we had not listened long ago." Now, that's a very 
 good beginning, in my opinion, and one to be proud of 
 having brought out of a man who has never seen you.' 
 
 'Ah, yes,' murmured Elfride wofuUy. 'But, then, 
 see further on ! ' 
 
 ' Well the next bit is rather unkind, I must own,' 
 said Mrs. Swancourt, and read on. ' " Instead of this 
 we found ourselves in the hands of some young lady, 
 hardly arrived at years of discretion, to judge by the 
 silly device it has been thought worth while to adopt on 
 the title-page, with the idea of disguising her sex." ' 
 
 ' I am not " silly " ! ' said Elfride indignantly. ' He 
 might have called me anything but that.' 
 
 ' You are not, indeed. Well : — " Hands of a young 
 lady . . . whose chapters are simply devoted to im- 
 possible tournaments, towers, and escapades, which 
 read like flat copies of like scenes in the stories of 
 Mr. G. P. R. James, and the most unreal portions of 
 Ivanhoe. The bait is so palpably artificial that the 
 most credulous gudgeon turns away.'' Now, my dear, 
 I don't see overmuch to complain of in that. It 
 proves that you were clever enough to make him think 
 of Sir Walter Scott, which is a great deal.' 
 
 ' Oh yes ; though I cannot romance myself, I am 
 able to remind him of those who can ! ' Elfride in- 
 tended to hurl these words sarcastically at her invisible 
 enemy, but as she had no more satirical power than 
 a wood-pigeon, they m.erely fell in a pretty murmur 
 from lips shaped to a pout. 
 
 ' Certainly : and that's something. Your book is 
 good enough to be bad in an ordinary literary manner, 
 and doesn't stand by itself in a melancholy position 
 altogether worse than assailable. — " That interest in an 
 historical romance may nowadays have any chance of 
 being sustained, it is indispensable that the reader find 
 173 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 himself under the guidance of some nearly extinct 
 species of legendary, who, in addition to an impulse 
 towards antiquarian research and an unweakened faith 
 in the mediaeval halo, shall possess an inventive faculty 
 in which delicacy of sentiment is far overtopped by a 
 power of welding to stirring incident a spirited variety 
 of the elementary human passions." Well, that long- 
 winded effusion doesn't refer to you at all, Elfride, 
 merely something put in to fill up. Let me see, 
 when does he come to you again; . . . not till the 
 very end, actually. Here you are finally polished oif : 
 
 ' " But to return to the little work we have used 
 as the text of this article. We are far from altogether 
 disparaging the author's powers. She has a certain 
 versatility that enables her to use with effect a style 
 of narration peculiar to herself, which may be called a 
 murmuring of delicate emotional trifles, the particular 
 gift of those to whom the social sympathies of a 
 peaceful time are as daily food. Hence, where matters 
 of domestic experience, and the natural touches which 
 make people real, can be introduced without anachro- 
 nisms too striking, she is occasionally felicitous ; and 
 upon the whole we feel justified in saying that the 
 book will bear looking into for the sake of those 
 portions which have nothing whatever to do with the 
 story." 
 
 ' Well, I suppose it is intended for satire ; but don't 
 think anything more of it now, my dear. It is seven 
 o'clock.' And Mrs. Swancourt rang for her maid. 
 
 Attack is more piquant than concord. Stephen's 
 letter was concerning nothing but oneness with her: 
 the review was the very reverse. And a stranger with 
 neither name nor shape, age nor appearance, but a 
 mighty voice, is naturally rather an interesting novelty 
 to a lady he chooses to address. When Elfride fell 
 asleep that night she was loving the writer of the 
 letter, but thinking of the writer of that article. 
 174 
 
XVI 
 
 'Then fancy shapes — as fancy can." 
 
 VJN a day about three weeks later, the Swancourt trio 
 were sitting quietly in the drawing-room of The Crags, 
 Mrs. Swancourt's house at Endelstow, chatting, and 
 taking easeful survey of their previous month or two 
 of town — a tangible weariness even to people whose 
 acquaintances there might be counted on the fingers. 
 
 A mere season in London with her practised step- 
 mother had so advanced Elfride's perceptions, that her 
 courtship by Stephen seemed emotionally meagre, and 
 to have drifted back several years into a childish past. 
 In regarding our mental experiences, as in visual obser- 
 vation, our own progress reads like a dwindling of that 
 we progress from. 
 
 She was seated on a low chair, looking over her 
 romance with melancholy interest for the first time 
 since she had become acquainted with the remarks of 
 the Present thereupon. 
 
 ' Still thinking of that reviewer, Elfie ? ' 
 
 ' Not of him personally ; but I am thinking of his 
 opinion. Really, on looking into the volume after this 
 long time has elapsed, he seems to b^ve estimated one 
 part of it fairly enough.' 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 ' No, no ; I wouldn't show the white feather now ! 
 Fancy that of all people in the world the writer herself 
 should go over to the enemy. How shall Monmouth's 
 men fight when Monmouth runs away ? ' 
 
 ' I don't do that. But I think he is right in some 
 of his arguments, though wrong in others. And because 
 he has some claim to my respect I regret all the more 
 that he should think so mistakenly of my motives in 
 one or two instances. It is more vexing to be mis- 
 understood than to be misrepresented ; and he mis- 
 understands me. I cannot be easy whilst a person 
 goes to rest night after night attributing to me intentions 
 I never had.' 
 
 ' He doesn't know your name, or anything about 
 you. And he has doubtless forgotten there is such a 
 book in existence by this time.' 
 
 ' I myself should certainly like him to be put right 
 upon one or two matters,' said the vicar, who had 
 hitherto been silent. ' You see, critics go on writing, 
 and are never corrected or argued with, and therefore 
 are never improved.' 
 
 ' Papa,' said Elfride brightening, ' write to him ! ' 
 
 ' I would as soon write to him as look at him, for 
 the matter of that,' said Mr. Swancourt. 
 
 ' Do ! And say, the young person who wrote the 
 book did not adopt a masculine pseudonym in vanity or 
 conceit, but because she was afraid it would be thought 
 presumptuous to publish her name, and that she did 
 not mean the story for such as he, but as a sweetener 
 of history for young people, who might thereby acquire 
 a taste for what went on in their own country hundreds 
 of years ago, and be tempted to dive deeper into the 
 subject. Oh, there is so much to explain; I wish I 
 might write myself ! ' 
 
 ' Now, Elfie, I'll tell you what we will do,' answered 
 Mr. Swancourt, tickled with a sort of bucolic humour at 
 the idea of criticizing the critic. ' You shall write a clear 
 176 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 account of what he is wrong in, and I will copy it and 
 send it as mine.' 
 
 ' Yes, now, directly ! ' said Elfride, jumping up. 
 ' When will you send it, papa ? ' 
 
 ' Oh, in a day or two, I suppose,' he returned. Then 
 the vicar paused and slightly yawned, and in the manner 
 of elderly people began to cool from his ardour for the 
 undertaking now that it came to the point. ' But, really, 
 it is hardly worth while,' he said. 
 
 ' O papa ! ' said Elfride, with much disappointment. 
 ' You said you would, and now you won't. That is not 
 fair ! ' 
 
 ' But how can we send it if we don't know whom to 
 send it to ? ' 
 
 ' If you really want to send such a thing it can easily 
 be done,' said Mrs. Swancourt, coming to her step- 
 daughter's rescue. ' An envelope addressed, " To the 
 Critic of The Court of Kelly on Castle, care of the Editor 
 of the Present," would find him.' 
 
 ' Yes, I suppose it would.' 
 
 ' Why not write your answer yourself, Elfride ? ' Mrs. 
 Swancourt inquired. 
 
 ' I might,' she said hesitatingly ; ' and send it anony- 
 mously : that would be treating him as he has treated 
 me.' 
 
 ' No use in the world ! ' 
 
 ' But I don't like to let him know my exact name. 
 Suppose I put my initials only? The less you are 
 known the more you are thought of.' 
 
 ' Yes J you might do that.' 
 
 Elfride set to work there and then. Her one desire 
 for the last fortnight seemed likely to be realized. As 
 happens with sensitive and secluded minds, a continual 
 dwelling upon the subject had magnified to colossal 
 proportions the space she assumed herself to occupy 
 or to have occupied in the occult critic's mind. At 
 noon and at night she had been pestering herself with 
 
 177 M 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 endeavours to perceive more distinctly his conception 
 of her as a woman apart from an author : whether he 
 really despised her ; whether he thought more or less of 
 her than of ordinary young women who never ventured 
 into the fire of criticism at all. Now she would have the 
 satisfaction of feeling that at any rate he knew her true 
 intent in crossing his path, and annoying him so by 
 her performance, and be taught perhaps to despise it a 
 little less. 
 
 Four days later an envelope, directed to Miss Swan- 
 court in a strange hand, made its appearance from the 
 post-bag. 
 
 ' Oh,' said Elfride, her heart sinking within her. 
 ' Can it be from that man — a lecture for impertinence ? 
 And actually one for Mrs. Swancourt in the same hand- 
 writing ! ' She feared to open hers. ' Yet how can he 
 know my name ? No ; it is somebody else.' 
 
 ' Nonsense ! ' said her father grimly. ' You sent 
 your initials, and the Directory was available. Though 
 he wouldn't have taken the trouble to look there unless 
 he had been thoroughly savage with you. I thought you 
 wrote with rather more asperity than simple literary 
 discussion required.' This timely clause was introduced 
 to save the character of the vicar's judgment under any 
 issue of affairs. 
 
 ' Well, here I go,' said Elfride, desperately tearing 
 open the seal. 
 
 ' To be siire, of course,' exclaimed Mrs. Swancourt ; 
 and looking up from her own letter. 'Christopher, I 
 quite forgot to tell you, when I mentioned that I had 
 seen my distant relative, Harry Knight, that I invited 
 him here for whatever length of time he could spare. 
 And now he says he can come any day in August.' 
 
 ' Write, and say the first of the month,' repUed the 
 indiscriminate vicar. 
 
 She read on. 'Goodness me — and that isn't all. 
 He is actually the reviewer of Elfride's book. How 
 178 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 absurd, to be sure ! I had no idea he reviewed novels 
 or had anything to do with the Present. He is a 
 barrister — and I thought he only wrote in the Quar- 
 terlies. Why, Elfride, you have brought about an odd 
 entanglement ! What does he say to you ? ' 
 
 Elfride had put down her letter with a dissatisfied 
 flush on her face. 'I don't know. The idea of his 
 knowing my name and all about me ! . . . Why, he 
 says nothing particular, only this — 
 
 ' " My DEAR Madam, — Though I am sorry that my 
 remarks should have seemed harsh to you, it is a 
 pleasure to find that they have been the means of 
 bringing forth such an ingeniously argued reply. Un- 
 fortunately, it is so long since I wrote my review, that 
 my memory does not serve me sufficiently to say a 
 single word in my defence, even supposing there remains 
 one to be said, which is doubtful. You will find from a 
 letter I have written to Mrs. Swancourt, that we are not 
 such strangers to each other as we have been imagining. 
 Possibly, I may have the pleasure of seeing you soon, 
 when any argument you choose to advance shall receive 
 all the attention it deserves." 
 
 ' That is dim sarcasm — I know it is.' 
 
 ' Oh no, Elfride.' 
 
 ' And then, his remarks didn't seem harsh — I mean 
 I did not say so.' 
 
 ' He thinks you are in a frightful temper,' said Mr. 
 Swancourt, chuckling in undertones. 
 
 • And he will come and see me, and find the 
 a thoress as contemptible in speech as she has been 
 impertinent in manner. I do heartily wish I had never 
 written a word to him ! ' 
 
 'Never mind,' said Mrs. Swancourt, also laughing 
 in low quiet jerks ; ' it will make the meeting such a 
 comical affair, and afford splendid by-play for your 
 179 
 
A PAIR OP BLUE EYES 
 
 father and myself. The idea of our running our heads 
 against Harry Knight all the time ! I cannot get 
 over that.' 
 
 The vicar had immediately remembered the name to 
 be that of Stephen Smith's preceptor and friend; but 
 having ceased to concern himself in the matter he 
 made no remark to that effect, consistently forbearing 
 to allude to anything which could restore recollection 
 of the (to him) disagreeable mistake with regard to poor 
 Stephen's lineage and position. Elfride had of course 
 perceived the same thing, which added to the compli- 
 cation of relationship a mesh that her stepmother knew 
 nothing of. 
 
 The identification scarcely heightened Knight's at- 
 tractions now, though a twelvemonth ago she would 
 only have cared to see him for the interest he pos- 
 sessed as Stephen's friend. Fortunately for Knight's 
 advent, such a reason for welcome had only begun to 
 be awkward to her at a time when the interest he 
 had acquired on his own account made it no longer 
 necessary. 
 
 These coincidences, in common with all relating to 
 him, tended to keep Elfride's mind upon the stretch 
 concerning Knight. As was her custom when upon 
 the horns of a dilemma, she walked off by herself among 
 the laurel bushes, and there, standing still and splitting 
 up a leaf without removing it from its stalk, fetched 
 back recollections of Stephen's frequent words in praise 
 of his friend, and wished she had listened more atten- 
 tively. Then, still pulling the leaf, she would blush 
 at some fancied mortification that would accrue to her 
 from his words when they met, in consequence of 
 her intrusiveness, as she now considered it, in writing 
 to him. 
 
 The next development of her meditations was the 
 subject of what this man's personal appearance might 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 be — was he tall or short, dark or fair, gay or grim? 
 She would have asked Mrs. Swancourt but for the 
 risk she might thereby incur of some teasing remark 
 being returned. Ultimately Elfride would say, ' Oh, 
 what a plague that reviewer is to me ! ' and turn her 
 face to where she imagined India lay, and murmur to 
 herself, 'Ah, my little husband, what are you doing 
 now ? Let me see, where are you — south, east, where ? 
 Behind that hill, ever so far behind ! ' 
 
XVII 
 
 'Her welcome, spoke in faltering phrase.' 
 
 There is Henry Knight, I declare!' said Mrs. 
 Swancourt one day. 
 
 They were gazing from the jutting angle ol a wild 
 enclosure not far from The Crags, which almost over- 
 hung the valley already described as leading up from 
 the sea and little port of Castle Boterel. The stony 
 escarpment upon which they stood had the contour of 
 a man's face, and it was covered with furze as with a 
 beard. People in the field above were preserved from 
 an accidental roll down these prominences and hollows 
 by a hedge on the very crest, which was doing that 
 kindly service for Elfride and her mother now. 
 
 Scrambling higher into the hedge and stretching her 
 neck further over the furze, Elfride beheld the individual 
 signified. He was walking leisurely along the little 
 green path at the bottom, beside the stream, a satchel 
 slung upon his left hip, a stout walking-stick in his 
 hand, and a brown-hoUand sun-hat upon his head. 
 The satchel was worn and old, and the outer polished 
 surface of the leather was cracked and peeling off. 
 
 Knight having arrived over the hills to Castle 
 Boterel upon the top of a crazy omnibus, preferrt^d to 
 
 l83 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 walk the remaining two miles up the valley, leaving 
 his luggage to be brought on. 
 
 Behind him wandered, helter-skelter, a boy of whom 
 Knight had briefly inquired the way to Endelstow ; 
 and by that natural law of physics which causes lesser 
 bodies to gravitate towards the greater, this boy had 
 kept near to Knight, and trotted like a little dog close 
 at his heels, whistling as he went, with his eyes fixed 
 upon Knight's boots as they rose and fell. 
 
 When they had reached a point precisely opposite 
 that in which Mrs. and Miss Swancourt lay in ambush. 
 Knight stopped and turned round. 
 
 ' Look here, my boy,' he said. 
 
 The boy parted his lips, opened his eyes, and 
 answered nothing. 
 
 ' Here's sixpence for you, on condition that you 
 don't again come within twenty yards of my heels, all 
 the way up the valley.' 
 
 The boy, who apparently had not known he had 
 been looking at Knight's heels at all, took the sixpence 
 mechanically, and Knight went on again, wrapt in 
 meditation. 
 
 ' A nice voice,' Elfride thought ; ' but what a singular 
 temper ! ' 
 
 ' Now we must get indoors before he ascends the 
 slope,' said Mrs. Swancourt softly. And they went 
 across by a short cut over a stile, entering the lawn 
 by a side door, and so on to the house. 
 
 Mr. Swancourt had gone into the village with the 
 curate, and Elfride felt too nervous to await their 
 visitor's arrival in the drawing-room with Mrs. Swan- 
 court. So that when the elder lady entered, Elfride 
 made some pretence of perceiving a new variety of 
 crimson geranium, and lingered behind among the 
 flower beds. 
 
 There was nothing gained by this, after all, she 
 thought; and a few minutes after boldly came into 
 183 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 the house by the glass side-door. She walked along 
 the corridor, and entered the drawing-room. Nobody 
 was there. 
 
 A window at the angle of the room opened directly 
 into an octagonal conservatory, enclosing the corner of 
 the building. From the conservatory came voices in 
 conversation — Mrs. Swancourt's and the stranger's. 
 
 She had expected him to talk brilUantly. To her 
 surprise he was asking questions in quite a learner's 
 manner, on subjects connected with the flowers and 
 shrubs that she had known for years. When after 
 the lapse of a few minutes he spoke at some length, 
 she considered there was a hard square decisiveness 
 in the shape of his sentences, as if, unlike her own 
 and Stephen's, they were not there and then newly 
 constructed, but were drawn forth from a large store 
 ready-made. They were now approaching the window 
 to come in again. 
 
 ' That is a flesh-coloured variety,' said Mrs. Swan- 
 court. ' But oleanders, though they are such bulky 
 shrubs, are so very easily wounded as to be unprunable 
 — giants with the sensitiveness of young ladies. Oh, 
 here is Elfride ! ' 
 
 Elfride looked as guilty and crestfallen as Lady 
 Teazle at the dropping of the screen. Mrs. Swancourt 
 presented him half comically, and Knight in a minute 
 or two placed himself beside the young lady. 
 
 A complexity of instincts checked Elfride's conven- 
 tional smiles of complaisance and hospitality; and, to 
 make her still less comfortable, Mrs. Swancourt im- 
 mediately afterwards left them together to seek her 
 husband. Mr. Knight, however, did not seem at all 
 incommoded by his feelings, and he said with light 
 easefulness : 
 
 ' So, Miss Swancourt, I have met you at last. You 
 escaped me by a few minutes only when we were in 
 London.' 
 
 184 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 ' Yes. I found that you had seen Mrs. Swancourt.' 
 
 ' And now reviewer and reviewed are face to face,' 
 he added unconcernedly. 
 
 ' Yes : though the fact of your being a relation of 
 Mrs. Swancourt's takes off the edge of it. It was 
 strange that you should be one of her family all the 
 time.' Elfride began to recover herself now, and to 
 look into Knight's face. ' I was merely anxious to 
 let you know my real meaning in writing the book — 
 extremely anxious.' 
 
 ' I can quite understand the wish ; and I was 
 gratified that my remarks should have reached home. 
 They very seldom do, I am afraid.' 
 
 Elfride drew herself in. Here he was, sticking to 
 his opinions as firmly as if friendship and politeness 
 did not in the least require an immediate renunciation 
 of them. 
 
 'You made me very uneasy and sorry by writing 
 such things ! ' she murmured, suddenly dropping the 
 mere caqueterie of a fashionable first introduction, and 
 speaking with some of the dudgeon of a child towards 
 a severe schoolmaster. 
 
 ' That is rather the object of honest critics in such a 
 case. Not to cause unnecessary sorrow, but : " To make 
 you sorry after a proper manner, that ye may receive 
 damage by us in nothing," as a powerful pen once wrote to 
 the Gentiles. Are you going to write another romance?' 
 
 'Write another?' she said. 'That somebody may 
 pen a condemnation and " nail't wi' Scripture " again, 
 as you do now, Mr. Knight ? ' 
 
 ' You may do better next time,' he said placidly : 
 ' I think you will. But I would advise you to confine 
 yourself to domestic scenes.' 
 
 ' Thank you. But never again ! ' 
 
 ' Well, you may be right. That a young woman has 
 taken to writing is not by any means the best thing to 
 hear about her.' 
 
 N 185 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 ' What is the best ? ' 
 
 ' I prefer not to say.' 
 
 ' Do you know ? Then, do tell me, please.' 
 
 ' Well ' — (^Knight was evidently changing his mean- 
 ing) — ' I suppose to hear that she has married.' 
 
 Elfride hesitated. 'And what when she has been 
 married ? ' she said at last, partly in order to withdraw 
 her own person from the argument. 
 
 ' Then to hear no more about her. It is as Smeaton 
 said of his lighthouse : her greatest real praise, when 
 the novelty of her inauguration has worn off, is that 
 nothing happens to keep the talk of her alive.' 
 
 ' Yes, I see,' said Elfride softly and thoughtfully. 
 ' But of course it is different quite with men. Why 
 don't you write novels, Mr. Knight ? ' 
 
 ' Because I couldn't write one that would interest 
 anybody.' 
 
 'Why?' 
 
 ' For several reasons. It requires a judicious omis- 
 sion of your real thoughts to make a novel popular, for 
 one thing.' 
 
 ' Is that really necessary ? Well, I am sure you could 
 learn to do that with practice,' said Elfride with an 
 ex-cathedrd air, as became a person who spoke from 
 experience in the art. ' You would make a great name 
 for certain,' she continued. 
 
 ' So many people make a name nowadays, that it is 
 more distinguished to remain in obscurity.' 
 
 ' Tell me seriously — apart from the subject — ^why 
 don't you write a volume instead of loose articles ? ' she 
 insisted. 
 
 ' Since you are pleased to make me talk of myself, 
 I will tell you seriously,' said Knight, not less amused 
 at this catechism by his young friend than he was 
 interested in her appearance. 'As I have implied, I 
 have not the wish. And if I had the wish, I could not 
 now concentrate sufficiently. We all have only our one 
 i86 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 cruse of energy given us to make the best of. And 
 where that energy has been leaked away week by week, 
 quarter by quarter, as mine has for the last nine or ten 
 years, there is not enough dammed back behind the mill 
 at any given period to supply the force a complete book 
 on any subject requires. Then there is the self-con- 
 fidence and waiting power. Where quick results have 
 grown customary, they are fatal to a lively faith in the 
 future.' 
 
 ' Yes, I comprehend ; and so you choose to write in 
 fragments ? ' 
 
 ' No, I don't choose to do it in the sense you mean ; 
 choosing from a whole world of professions, all possible. 
 It was by the constraint of accident merely. Not that 
 I object to the accident.' 
 
 ' Why don't you object — I mean, why do you feel 
 so quiet about things ? ' Elfride was half afraid to 
 question him so, but her intense curiosity to see what 
 the inside of literary Mr. Knight was like, kept her 
 going on. 
 
 Knight certainly did not mind being frank with her. 
 Instances of this trait in men who are not without feel- 
 ing, but are reticent from habit, may be recalled by all of 
 us. When they find a listener who can by no possi- 
 bility make use of them, rival them, or condemn them, 
 reserved and even suspicious men of the world become 
 frank, keenly enjo5dng the inner side of their frankness. 
 
 ' Why I don't mind the accidental constraint,' he 
 replied, 'is because, in making beginnings, a chance 
 limitation of direction is often better than absolute 
 freedom.' 
 
 ' I see — that is, I should if I quite understood what 
 all those generalities mean.' 
 
 ' Why, this : That an arbitrary foundation for one's 
 work, which no length of thought can alter, leaves the 
 attention free to fix itself on the work itself, and make 
 
 the best of it,' 
 
 187 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 ' Lateral compression forcing altitude, as would be 
 said in that tongue,' she said mischievously. ' And I 
 suppose where no limit exists, as in the case of a rich 
 man with a wide taste who wants to do something, it 
 will be better to choose a limit capriciously than to 
 have none.' 
 
 ' Yes,' he said meditatively. ' I can go as far as 
 that.' 
 
 'Well,' resumed Elfride, 'I think it better for a 
 man's nature if he does nothing in particular.' 
 
 ' There is such a case as being obliged to.' 
 
 ' Yes, yes ; I was speaking of when you are not 
 obliged for any other reason than delight in the prospect 
 of fame. I have thought many times lately that a thin 
 widespread happiness, commencing now, and of a piece 
 with the days of your life, is preferable to an anticipated 
 heap far away in the future, and none now.' 
 
 ' Why, that's the very thing I said just now as being 
 the principle of all ephemeral doers like myself.' 
 
 ' Oh, I am sorry to have parodied you,' she said with 
 some confusion. 'Yes, of course. That is what you 
 meant about not trying to be famous.' And she added, 
 with the quickness of conviction characteristic of her 
 mind : ' There is much littleness in trying to be great. 
 A man must think a good deal of himself, and be 
 conceited enough to believe in himself, before he tries 
 at all.' 
 
 ' But it is soon enough to say there is harm in a 
 man's thinking a good deal of himself when it is proved 
 he has been thinking wrong, and too soon then some- 
 times. Besides, we should not conclude that a man 
 who strives earnestly for success does so with a strong 
 sense of his own merit. He may see how little success 
 has to do with merit, and his motive may be his very 
 humility.' 
 
 This manner of treating her rather provoked Elfride. 
 No sooner did she agree with him than he ceased to 
 i88 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 seem to wish it, and took the other side. 'Ah,' she 
 thought inwardly, ' I shall have nothing to do with a 
 man of this kind, though he is our visitor.' 
 
 ' I think you will find,' resumed Knight, pursuing 
 the conversation more for the sake of finishing off his 
 thoughts on the subject than for engaging her attention, 
 ' that in actual life it is merely a matter of instinct with 
 men — this trying to push on. They awake to a recog- 
 nition that they have, without premeditation, begun to 
 try a little, and they say to themselves, " Since I have 
 tried thus much, I will try a little more." They go on 
 because they have begun.' 
 
 Elfride, in her turn, was not particularly attending 
 to his words at this moment. She had, unconsciously 
 to herself, a way of seizing any point in the remarks of 
 an interlocutor which interested her, and dwelling upon 
 it, and thinking thoughts of her own thereupon, totally 
 oblivious of all that he might say in continuation. On 
 such occasions she artlessly surveyed the person speak- 
 ing; and then there was a time for a painter. Her 
 eyes seemed to look at you, and past you, as you were 
 then, into your future ; and past your future into your 
 eternity — not reading it, but gazing in an unused, un- 
 conscious way — her mind still clinging to its original 
 thought. 
 
 This is how she was looking at Knight. 
 
 Suddenly Elfride became conscious of what she was 
 doing, and was painfully confused. 
 
 ' What were you so intent upon in me ? ' he in- 
 quired. 
 
 ' As far as I was thinking of you at all, I was think- 
 ing how clever you are,' she said, with a want of 
 premeditation that was startling in its honesty and 
 simplicity. 
 
 Feeling restless now that she had so unwittingly 
 spoken, she arose and stepped to the window, having 
 heard the voices of her father and Mrs. Swancourt 
 189 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 coming up below the terrace. ' Here they are,' she said, 
 going out. Knight walked out upon the lawn behind 
 her. She stood upon the edge of the terrace, close to 
 the stone balustrade, and looked towards the sun, 
 hanging over a glade just now fair as Tempe's vale, up 
 which her father was walking. 
 
 Knight could not help looking at her. The sun 
 was within ten degrees of the horizon, and its warm 
 light flooded her face and heightened the bright rose 
 colour of her cheeks to a vermilion red, their moderate 
 pink hue being only seen in its natural tone where the 
 cheek curved round into shadow. The ends of her 
 hanging hair softly dragged themselves backwards and 
 forwards upon her shoulder as each faint breeze thrust 
 against or relinquished it. Fringes and ribbons of her 
 dress, moved by the same breeze, licked like tongues 
 upon the parts around them, and fluttering forward 
 from shady folds caught likewise their share of the 
 lustrous orange glow. 
 
 Mr. Swancourt shouted out a welcome to Knight 
 from a distance of about thirty yards, and after a few 
 preliminary words proceeded to a conversation of deep 
 earnestness on Knight's fine old family name, and 
 theories as to lineage and intermarriage connected 
 therewith. Knight's portmanteau having in the mean- 
 time arrived, they soon retired to prepare for dinner, 
 which had been postponed two hours later than the 
 usual. time of that meal. 
 
 An arrival was an event in the life of Elfride, now 
 that they were again in the country, and that of Knight 
 necessarily an engrossing one. And that evening she 
 went to bed for the first time without thinking of 
 Stephen at all. 
 
 190 
 
XVIII 
 
 ' He heard her musical pants." 
 
 i HE old tower of West Endelstow Church had 
 reached the last weeks of its existence. It was to 
 be replaced by a new one from the designs of Mr. 
 Hewby, the architect who had sent down Stephen. 
 Planks and poles had arrived in the churchyard, iron 
 bars had been thrust into the venerable crack ex- 
 tending down the belfry wall to the foundation, the 
 bells had been taken down, the owls had forsaken this 
 home of their forefathers, and six iconoclasts in white 
 fustian, to whom a cracked edifice was a species of 
 Mumbo Jumbo, had taken lodgings in the village pre- 
 vious to beginning the actual removal of the stones. 
 
 This was the day after Knight's arrival. To enjoy 
 for the last time the prospect seaward from the summit, 
 the vicar, Mrs. Swancourt, Knight, and Elfride, all 
 ascended the winding turret — Mr. Swancourt stepping 
 forward with many loud breaths, his wife struggling 
 along silently, but suffering none the less. They 
 had hardly reached the top when a large lurid cloud, 
 palpably a reservoir of rain, thunder, and lightning, 
 was seen to be advancing overhead from the north. 
 
 The two cautious elders suggested an immediate 
 191 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 return, and proceeded to put it in practice as regarded 
 themselves. 
 
 'Dear me, I wish I had not come up,' exclaimed 
 Mrs. Swancourt. 
 
 ' We shall be slower than you two in going down,' 
 the vicar said over his shoulder, ' and so, don't you 
 start till we are nearly at the bottom, or you will run 
 over us and break our necks somewhere in the darkness 
 of the turret.' 
 
 Accordingly Elfride and Knight waited on the leads 
 till the staircase should be clear. Knight was not in 
 a talkative mood that morning. Elfride was rather 
 wilful, by reason of his inattention, which she privately 
 set down to his thinking her not worth talking to. 
 Whilst Knight stood watching the rise of the cloud, 
 she sauntered to the other side of the tower, and there 
 remembered a giddy feat she had performed the year 
 before. It was to walk round upon the parapet of 
 the tower — which was quite without battlement or 
 pinnacle, and presented a smooth flat surface about 
 two feet wide, forming a pathway on all the four 
 sides. Without reflecting in the least upon what she 
 was doing she now stepped upon the parapet in the 
 old way, and began walking along. 
 
 'We are down, cousin Henry,' cried Mrs. Swan- 
 court up the turret. ' Follow us when you like.' 
 
 Knight turned and saw Elfride beginning her ele- 
 vated promenade. His face flushed with mingled 
 concern and anger at her rashness. 
 
 ' I certainly gave you credit for more common 
 sense,' he said. 
 
 She reddened a little and walked on. 
 
 ' Miss Swancourt, I insist upon your coming down,' 
 he exclaimed. 
 
 ' I will in a minute. I am safe enough. I have 
 done it often.' 
 
 At that moment, by reason of a slight perturbation 
 192 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 his words had caused in her, Elfride's foot caught itself 
 in a httle tuft of grass growing in a joint' of the stone- 
 work, and she almost lost her balance. Knight sprang 
 forward with a face of horror. By what seemed the 
 special interposition of a considerate Providence she 
 tottered to the inner edge of the parapet instead of to 
 the outer, and reeled over upon the lead roof two or 
 three feet below the wall. 
 
 Knight seized her as in a vice, and he said, panting, 
 ' That ever I should have tnet a woman fool enough to 
 do a thing of that kind ! Good God, you ought to be 
 ashamed of yourself ! ' 
 
 The close proximity of the Shadow of Death had 
 made her sick and pale as a corpse before he spoke. 
 Already lowered to that state, his words completely over- 
 powered her, and she swooned away as he held her. 
 
 Elfride's eyes were not closed for more than forty 
 seconds. She opened them, and remembered the posi- 
 tion instantly. His face had altered its expression from 
 stern anger to pity. But his severe remarks had rather 
 frightened her, and she struggled to be free. 
 
 ' If you can stand, of course you may,' he said, and 
 loosened his arms. ' I hardly know whether most to 
 laugh at your freak or to chide you for its folly.' 
 
 She immediately sank upon the lead-work. Knight 
 lifted her again. ' Are you hurt ? ' he said. 
 
 She murmured an incoherent expression, and tried 
 to smile ; saying, with a fitful aversion of her face, ' I 
 am only frightened. Put me down, do put me down ! ' 
 
 ' But you can't walk,' said Knight. 
 
 ' You don't know that ; how can you ? I am only 
 frightened, I tell you,' she answered petulantly, and 
 raised her hand to her forehead. Knight then saw that 
 she was bleeding from a severe cut in her wrist, appa- 
 rently where it had descended upon a salient corner of 
 the lead-work. Elfride, too, seemed to perceive and 
 feel this now for the first time, and for a minute nearly 
 193 N 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 lost consciousness again. Knight rapidly bound his 
 handkerchief round the place, and to add to the com- 
 plication, the thundercloud he had been watching 
 began to shed some heavy drops of rain. Knight 
 looked up and saw the vicar striding towards the 
 house, and Mrs. Swancourt waddling beside him like a 
 hard-driven duck. 
 
 ' As you are so faint, it will be much better to let 
 me carry you down,' said Knight ; ' or at any rate 
 inside out of the rain.' But her objection to be lifted 
 made it impossible for him to support her for more 
 than five steps. 
 
 ' This is folly, great folly,' he exclaimed, setting her 
 down. 
 
 ' Indeed ! ' she murmured, with tears in her eyes. 
 ' I say I will not be carried, and you say this is folly ! ' 
 
 ' So it is.' 
 
 ' No, it isn't ! ' 
 
 ' It is folly, I think. At any rate, the origin of it 
 all is.' 
 
 ' I don't agree to it. And you needn't get so angry 
 with me ; I am not worth it.' 
 
 ' Indeed you are. You are worth the enmity of 
 princes, as was said of such another. Now, then, will 
 you clasp your hands behind my neck, that I may carry 
 you down without hurting you ? ' 
 
 ' No, no.' 
 
 ' You had better, or I shall foreclose.' 
 
 ' What's that ! ' 
 
 'Deprive you of your chance.' 
 
 Elfride gave a little toss. 
 
 ' Now, don't writhe so when I attempt to carry you.' 
 
 ' I can't help it.' 
 
 ' Then submit quietly.' 
 
 ' I don't care, I don't care,' she murmured in languid 
 tones and with closed eyes. 
 
 He took her into his arms, entered the turret, and 
 194 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 with slow and cautious steps descended round and 
 round. Then, with the gentleness of a nursing mother, 
 he attended to the cut on her arm. During his pro- 
 gress through the operations of wiping it and binding 
 it up anew, her face changed its aspect from pained 
 indifference to something like bashful interest, inter- 
 spersed with small tremors and shudders of a trifling 
 kind. 
 
 In the centre of each pale cheek a small red spot 
 the size of a wafer had now made its appearance, and 
 continued to grow larger. Elfride momentarily ex- 
 pected a recurrence to the lecture on her foolishness, 
 but Knight said no more than this — 
 
 ' Promise me never to walk on that parapet again.' 
 
 ' It will be pulled down soon : so I do.' In a few 
 minutes she continued in a lower tone, and seriously, 
 ' You are familiar of course, as everybody is, with those 
 strange sensations we sometimes have, that our life for 
 the moment exists in duplicate.' 
 
 ■* That we have lived through that moment before ? ' 
 
 ' Or shall again. Well, I felt on the tower that 
 something similar to that scene is again to be common 
 to us both.' 
 
 ' God forbid ! ' said Knight. ' Promise me that you 
 will never again walk on any such place on any con- 
 sideration.' 
 
 ' I do.' 
 
 ' That such a thing has not been before, we know. 
 That it shall not be again, you vow. Therefore think 
 no more of such a foolish fancy.' 
 
 There had fallen a great deal of rain, but unaccom- 
 panied by lightning. A few minutes longer, and the 
 storm had ceased. 
 
 ' Now, take my arm, please.' 
 
 ' Oh no, it is not necessary.' This relapse into 
 wilfulness was because he had again connected the 
 epithet foolish with her. 
 
 195 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 ' Nonsense : it is quite necessary ; it will rain again 
 directly, and you are not half recovered.' And without 
 more ado Knight took her hand, drew it under his arm, 
 and held it there so firmly that she could not have 
 removed it without a struggle. Feeling like a colt in 
 a halter for the first time, at thus being led along, yet 
 afraid to be angry, it was to her great relief that she saw 
 the carriage coming round the corner to fetch them. 
 
 Her fall upon the roof was necessarily explained to 
 some extent upon their entering the house ; but both 
 forbore to mention a word of what she had been doing 
 to cause such an accident. During the remainder of 
 the afternoon Elfride was invisible ; but at dinner-time 
 she appeared as bright as ever. 
 
 In the drawing-room, after having been exclusively 
 engaged with Mr. and Mrs. Swancourt through the 
 intervening hour. Knight again found himself thrown 
 with Elfride. She had been looking over a chess 
 problem in one of the illustrated periodicals. 
 
 ' You like chess. Miss Swancourt ? ' 
 
 ' Yes. It is my favourite scientific game ; indeed, 
 excludes every other. Do you play ? ' 
 
 ' I have played ; though not lately.' 
 
 ' Challenge him, Elfride,' said the vicar heartily. 
 ' She plays very well for a lady, Mr. Knight.' 
 
 ' Shall we play ? ' asked Elfride tentatively. 
 
 ' Oh, certainly. I shall be delighted.' 
 
 The game began. Mr. Swancourt had forgotten a 
 similar performance with Stephen Smith the year before. 
 Elfride had not; but she had begun to take for her 
 maxim the undoubted truth that the necessity of con- 
 tinuing faithful to Stephen, without suspicion, dictated a 
 fickle behaviour almost as imperatively as fickleness itself; 
 a fact, however, which would give a startling advantage to 
 the latter quality should it ever appear. 
 
 Knight, by one of those inexcusable oversights which 
 will sometimes afflict the best of players, placed his rook 
 196 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 in the arms of one of her pawns. It was her first 
 advantage. She looked triumphant — even ruthless. 
 
 'By George! what was I thinking of?' said Knight 
 quietly; and then dismissed all concern at his accident. 
 
 ' Club laws we'll have, won't we, Mr. Knight ? ' said 
 Elfride suasively. 
 
 ' Oh yes, certainly,' said Mr. Knight, a thought, 
 however, just occurring to his mind, that he had two 
 or three times allowed her to replace a man on her 
 religiously assuring him that such a move was an 
 absolute blunder. 
 
 She immediately took up the unfortunate rook and 
 the contest proceeded, Elfride having now rather the 
 better of the game. Then he won the exchange, re- 
 gained his position, and began to press her hard. Elfride 
 grew flurried, and placed her queen on his remaining 
 rook's file. 
 
 ' There — how stupid ! Upon my word, I did not 
 see your rook. Of course nobody but a fool would have 
 put a queen there knowiijgly ! ' 
 
 She spoke excitedly, half expecting her antagonist to 
 give her back the move. 
 
 ' Nobody, of course,' said Knight serenely, and 
 stretched out his hand towards his royal victim. 
 
 ' It is not very pleasant to have it taken advantage 
 of, then,' she said with some vexation. 
 
 ' Club laws, I think you said ? ' returned Knight 
 blandly, and mercilessly appropriating the queen. 
 
 She was on the brink of pouting, but was ashamed 
 to show it; tears almost stood in her eyes. She had 
 been trying so hard^ — so very hard — thinking and 
 thinking till her brain was in a whirl; and it seemed 
 so heartless of him to treat her so, after all. 
 
 ' I think it is ' she began. 
 
 ' What ? ' 
 
 — ' Unkind to take advantage of a pure mistake X 
 make in that way.' 
 
 197 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 ' I lost my rook by even a purer mistake,' said 
 the enemy in an inexorable tone, without lifting his 
 eyes. 
 
 'Yes, but ' However, as his logic was abso- 
 lutely unanswerable, she merely registered a protest. 
 ' I cannot endure those cold-blooded ways of clubs and 
 professional players, like Staunton and Morphy. Just 
 as if it really mattered whether you have raised your 
 fingers from a man or no ! ' 
 
 Knight smiled as pitilessly as before, and they 
 went on in silence. 
 
 ' Checkmate,' said Knight. 
 
 ' Another game,' said Elfride peremptorily, and look- 
 ing very warm. 
 
 ' With all my heart,' said Knight. 
 
 ' Checkmate,' said Knight again at the end of forty 
 minutes. 
 
 ' Another game,' she returned resolutely. 
 
 ' I'll give you the odds of a bishop,' Knight said to 
 her kindly. 
 
 ' No, thank you,' Elfride replied in a tone intended 
 for courteous indifference ; but, as a fact, very cavalier 
 indeed. 
 
 ' Checkmate,' said her opponent without the least 
 emotion. 
 
 Oh, the difference between Elfride's condition of 
 mind now, and when she purposely made blunders 
 that Stephen Smith might win ! 
 
 It was bedtime. Her mind as distracted as if it 
 would throb itself out of her head, she went off to her 
 chamber, full of mortification at being beaten time after 
 time when she herself was the aggressor. Having for 
 two or three years enjoyed the reputation throughout 
 the globe of her father's brain — which almost con- 
 stituted her entire world — of being an excellent player, 
 this fiasco was intolerable ; for unfortunately the person 
 most dogged in the belief in a false reputation is always 
 198 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 that one, the possessor, who has the best tneans of 
 knowing that it is not true. 
 
 In bed no sleep came to soothe her ; that gentle thing 
 being the very middle-of-summer friend in this respect 
 of flying away at the merest troublous cloud. After 
 lying awake till two o'clock an idea seemed to strike 
 her. She softly arose, got a light, and fetched a Chess 
 Praxis from the library. Returning and sitting up in 
 bed, she diligently studied the volume till the clock 
 struck five, and her eyelids felt thick and heavy. She 
 then extinguished the light and lay down again. 
 
 'You look pale, Elfride,' said Mrs. Swancourt the 
 next morning at breakfast. ' Isn't she, cousin Harry? ' 
 
 A young girl who is scarcely ill at all can hardly help 
 becoming so when regarded as such by all eyes turning 
 upon her at the table in obedience to some remark. 
 Everybody looked at Elfride. She certainly was pale. 
 
 ' Am I pale ? ' she said with a faint smile. ' I did 
 not sleep much. I could not get rid of armies of 
 bishops and knights, try how I would.' 
 
 ' Chess is a bad thing just before bedtime ; especially 
 for excitable people like yourself, dear. Don't ever 
 play late again.' 
 
 ' I'll play early instead. Cousin Knight,' she said 
 in imitation of Mrs. Swancourt, ' will you oblige me in 
 something ? ' 
 
 ' Even to half my kingdom.' 
 
 ' Well, it is to play one game more. 
 
 ' When ? ' 
 
 ' Now, instantly ; the moment we have breakfasted. 
 
 ' Nonsense, Elfride,' said her father. ' Making your- 
 self a slave to the game like that.' 
 
 ' But I want to, papa ! Honestly, I am restless at 
 having been so ignominiously overcome. And Mr. 
 Knight doesn't mind. So what harm can there be ? ' 
 
 ' Let us play, by all means, if you wish it,' said 
 Knight. 
 
 199 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 So, when breakfast was over, the combatants with- 
 drew to the quiet of the library, and the door was 
 closed. Elfride seemed to have an idea that her con- 
 duct was rather ill-regulated and startlingly free from 
 conventional restraint. And worse, she fancied upon 
 Knight's face a slightly amused look at her proceedings. 
 
 'You think me foolish, I suppose,' she said reck- 
 lessly ; ' but I want to do my very best just once, and 
 see whether I can overcome you.' 
 
 • Certainly : nothing more natural. Though I am 
 afraid it is not the plan adopted by women of the 
 world after a defeat.' 
 
 ' Why, pray ? ' 
 
 ' Because they know that as good as overcoming is 
 skill in effacing recollection of being overcome, and 
 turn their attention to that entirely.' 
 
 ' I am wrong again, of course.' 
 
 ' Perhaps your wrong is more pleasing than their 
 right.' 
 
 ' I don't quite know whether you mean that, or 
 whether you are laughing at me,' she said, looking 
 doubtingly at him, yet inclining to accept the more 
 flattering interpretation. ' I am almost sure you think 
 it vanity in me to think I am a match for you. Well, 
 if you do, I say that vanity is no crime in such a case.' 
 
 ' Well, perhaps not. Though it is hardly a virtue.' 
 
 ' Oh yes, in battle ! Nelson's bravery lay in his 
 vanity.' 
 
 ' Indeed ! Then so did his death.' 
 Oh no, no ! For it is written in the book of the 
 prophet Shakespeare — 
 
 " Fear and be slain? no worse can come to fight ; 
 And fight and die, is death destroying death ! " ' 
 
 And down they sat, and the contest began, Elfride 
 having the first move. The game progressed. Elfride's 
 heart beat so violently that she could not sit still. Her 
 
A PAIR OP BLUE EYES 
 
 dread was lest he should hear it. And he did discovei' 
 it at last — some flowers upon the table being set throb- 
 bing by its pulsations. 
 
 ' I think we had better give over,' said Knight, 
 looking at her gently. ' It is too much for you, I know. 
 Let us write down the position, and finish another 
 time.' 
 
 ' No, please not,' she implored. ' I should not rest 
 if I did not know the result at once. It is your move.' 
 
 Ten minutes passed. 
 
 She started up suddenly. ' I know what you are 
 doing ? ' she cried, an angry colour upon her cheeks, 
 and her eyes indignant. ' You were thinking of letting 
 me win to please me ! ' 
 
 ' I don't mind owning that I was,' Knight responded 
 phlegmatically, and appearing all the more so by contrast 
 with her own turmoil. 
 
 ' But you must not ! I won't have it.' 
 
 ' Very well.' 
 
 ' No, that will not do ; I insist that you promise not 
 to do any such absurd thing. It is insulting me ! ' 
 
 ' Very well, madam. I won't do any such absurd 
 thing. You shall not win.' 
 
 ' That is to be proved ! ' she returned proudly ; and 
 the play went on. 
 
 Nothing is now heard but the ticking of a quaint old 
 timepiece on the summit of a bookcase. Ten minutes 
 pass ; he captures her knight ; she takes his knight, and 
 looks a very Rhadamanthus. 
 
 More minutes tick away; she takes his pawn and 
 has the advantage, showing her sense of it rather 
 prominently. 
 
 Five minutes more : he takes her bishop : she brings 
 things even by taking his knight. 
 
 Three minutes : she looks bold, and takes his queen : 
 he looks placid, and takes hers. 
 
 Eight or ten minutes pass : he takes a pawn ; she 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 Utters a little pooh ! but not the ghost of a pawn can 
 she take in retaliation. 
 
 Ten minutes pass : he takes another pawn and says, 
 ' Check ! ' She flushes, extricates herself by capturing 
 his bishop, and looks triumphant. He immediately 
 takes her bishop : she looks surprised. 
 
 Five minutes longer : she makes a dash and takes 
 his only remaining bishop; he replies by taking her 
 only remaining knight. 
 
 Two minutes : he gives check ; her mind is now in 
 a painful state of tension, and she shades her face with 
 her hand. 
 
 Yet a few minutes more : he takes her rook and 
 checks again. She literally trembles now lest an artful 
 surprise she has in store for him shall be anticipated 
 by the artful surprise he evidently has in store for her. 
 
 Five minutes : ' Checkmate in two moves ! ' exclaims 
 Elfride. 
 
 ' If you can,' says Knight. 
 
 ' Oh, I have miscalculated ; that is cruel ! ' 
 
 ' Checkmate,' says Knight ; and the victory is won. 
 
 Elfride arose and turned away without letting him see 
 her face. Once in the hall she ran upstairs and into 
 her room, and flung herself down upon her bed, weeping 
 bitterly. 
 
 ' Where is Elfride ? ' said her father at luncheon. 
 
 Knight listened anxiously for the answer. He had 
 been hoping to see her again before this time. 
 
 ' She isn't well, sir,' was the reply. 
 
 Mrs. Swancourt rose and left the room, going 
 upstairs to Elfride's apartment. 
 
 At the door was Unity, who occupied in the new 
 establishment a position between young lady's maid 
 and middle-housemaid. 
 
 ' She is sound asleep, ma'am,' Unity whispered. 
 
 Mrs. Swancourt opened the door. Elfride was lying 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 full-dressed on the bed, her face hot and red, her arms 
 thrown abroad. At intervals of a minute she tossed 
 restlessly from side to side, and indistinctly moaned 
 words used in the game of chess. 
 
 Mrs. Swancourt had a turn for doctoring, and felt 
 her pulse. It was twanging like a harp-string, at the 
 rate of nearly a hundred and fifty a minute. Softly 
 moving the sleeping girl to a little less cramped posi- 
 tion, she went downstairs again. 
 
 ' She is asleep now,' said Mrs. Swancourt. ' She 
 does not seem very well. Cousin Knight, what were 
 you thinking of ? her tender brain won't bear cudgelling 
 like your great head. You should have strictly for- 
 bidden her to play again.' 
 
 In truth, the essajdst's experience of the nature of 
 young women was far less extensive than his abstract 
 knowledge of them led himself and others to believe. 
 He could pack them into sentences like a workman, but 
 practically was nowhere. 
 
 ' I am indeed sorry,' said Knight, feeling even more 
 than he expressed. ' But surely, the young lady knows 
 best what is good for her ! ' 
 
 ' Bless you, that's just what she doesn't know. She 
 never thinks of such things, does she, Christopher? 
 Her father and I have to command her and keep her 
 in order, as you would a child. She will say things 
 worthy of a French epigrammatist, and act like a robin 
 in a greenhouse. But I think we will send for Dr. 
 Granson — there can be no harm.' 
 
 A man was straightway despatched on horseback 
 to Castle Boterel, and the gentleman known as Dr. 
 Granson came in the course of the afternoon. He 
 pronounced her nervous system to be in a decided 
 state of disorder; forwarded some soothing draught, 
 arid gave orders that on no account whatever was she 
 to play chess again. 
 
 The next paprping Knight, much vexed with himself, 
 
 ,203 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 waited witli a curiously compounded feeling for her 
 entry to breakfast. The women servants came in to 
 prayers at irregular intervals, and as each entered, he 
 could not, to save his life, avoid turning his head with 
 the hope that she might be Elfride. Mr. Swancourt 
 began reading without waiting for her. Then some- 
 body glided in noiselessly ; Knight softly glanced up : 
 it was only the little kitchen-maid. Knight thought 
 reading prayers a bore. 
 
 He went out alone, and for almost the first time failed 
 to recognize that holding converse with Nature's charms 
 was not solitude. On nearing the house again he per- 
 ceived his young friend crossing a slope by a path which 
 ran into the one he was following in the angle of the 
 field. Here they met. Elfride was at once exultant 
 and abashed : coming into his presence had upon her 
 the effect of entering a cathedral. 
 
 Knight had his note-book in his hand, and had, in 
 fact, been in the very act of writing therein when they 
 came in view of each other. He left off in the midst 
 of a sentence, and proceeded to inquire warmly con- 
 cerning her state of health. She said she was perfectly 
 well, and indeed had never looked better. Her health 
 was as inconsequent as her actions. Her lips were red, 
 without the polish that cherries have, and their redness 
 margined with the white skin in a clearly defined line, 
 which had nothing of jagged confusion in it. Altogether 
 she stood as the last person in the world to be knocked 
 over by a game of chess, because too ephemeral-looking 
 to play one. 
 
 ' Are you taking notes ? ' she inquired with an 
 alacrity plainly arising less from interest in the subject 
 than from a wish to divert his thoughts from herself 
 
 'Yes; I was making an entry. And with your 
 permission I will complete it.' Knight then stood still 
 and wrote. Elfride remained beside him a moment, 
 and afterwards walked on. 
 
 204 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 ' I should like to see all the secrets that are in that 
 book,' she gaily flung back to him over her shoulder. 
 
 ' I don't think you would find much to interest you.' 
 
 ' I know I should.' 
 
 ' Then of course I have no more to say.' 
 
 ' But I would ask this question first. Is it a book 
 of mere facts concerning journeys and expenditure, and 
 so on, or a book of thoughts ? ' 
 
 ' Well, to tell the truth, it is not exactly either. 
 It consists for the most part of jottings for articles 
 and essays, disjointed and disconnected, of no possible 
 interest to anybody but myself.' 
 
 ' It contains, I suppose, your developed thoughts in 
 embryo ? ' 
 
 ' Yes.' 
 
 ' If they are interesting when enlarged to the size 
 of an article, what must they be in their concentrated 
 form? Pure rectified spirit, above proof; before it is 
 lowered to be fit for human consumption : " words 
 that burn " indeed.' 
 
 ' Rather like a balloon before it is inflated : flabby, 
 shapeless, dead. You could hardly read them.' 
 
 ' May I try ? ' she said coaxingly. ' I wrote my poor 
 romance in that way — I mean in bits, out of doors — 
 and I should like to see whether your way of entering 
 things is the same as mine.' 
 
 ' Really, that's rather an awkward request. I sup- 
 pose I can hardly refuse now you have asked so 
 directly; but ' 
 
 ' You think me ill-mannered in asking. But does 
 not this justify me — your writing in my presence, 
 Mr. Knight? If I had lighted upon your book by 
 chance, it would have been different ; but you stand 
 before me, and say, "Excuse me," without caring 
 whether I do or not, and write on, and then tell me 
 they are not private facts but public ideas.' 
 
 ' Very well, Miss Swancourt. If you really must see, 
 205 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 the consequences be upon your own head. Remember, 
 my advice to you is to leave my book alone.' 
 
 ' But with that caution I have your permission ? ' 
 ' Yes.' 
 
 She hesitated a moment, looked at his hand contain- 
 ing the book, then laughed, and saying, 'I must see 
 it,' withdrew it from his fingers. 
 
 Knight rambled on towards the house, leaving her 
 standing in the path turning over the leaves. By the 
 time he had reached the wicket-gate he saw that she 
 had moved, and waited till she came up. 
 
 Elfride had closed the note-book, and was carrying 
 it disdainfully by the corner between her finger and 
 thumb; her face wore a nettled look. She silently 
 extended the volume towards him, raising her eyes no 
 higher than her hand was lifted. 
 
 'Take it,' said Elfride quickly. 'I don't want to 
 read it.' 
 
 ' Could you understand it ? ' said Knight. 
 'As far as I looked; But I didn't care to read 
 much.' 
 
 ' Why, Miss Swancourt ? ' 
 ' Only because I didn't wish to — that's all.' 
 ' I warned you that you might not.' 
 ' Yes, but I never supposed you would have put me 
 there.' 
 
 ' Your name is not mentioned once within the four 
 corners.' 
 
 ' Not my name — I know that.' 
 
 ' Nor your description, nor anything by which any- 
 body would recognize you.' 
 
 ' Except myself. For what is this ? ' she exclaimed, 
 taking it from him and opening a page. ' August 7. 
 That's the day before yesterday. But I won't read it,' 
 Elfride said, closing the book again with pretty hauteuri 
 ' Why should I ? I had no business to ask to see your 
 book, and it serves me right.' 
 206 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 Knight hardly recollected what he had written, and 
 turned over the book to see. He came to this : 
 
 'Aug. 7. Girl gets into her teens, and her self- 
 consciousness is born. After a certain interval passed 
 in infantine helplessness, it begins to act. Simple, 
 young, and inexperienced at first. Persons of observa- 
 tion can tell to a nicety how old this consciousness is 
 by the skill it has acquired in the art necessary to its 
 success — the art of hiding itself. Generally begins 
 career by actions which are popularly termed showing- 
 off. Method adopted depends in each case upon the 
 disposition, rank, residence, of the young lady attempt- 
 ing it. Town-bred girl will utter some moral paradox 
 on fast men, or love. Country miss adopts the more 
 material media of taking a ghastly fence, whistling, or 
 making your blood run cold by appearing to risk her 
 neck. {Mem. On Endelstow Tower.) 
 
 ' An innocent vanity is of course the origin of these 
 displays. " Look at me," say these youthful beginners 
 in womanly artifice, without reflecting whether or not it 
 be to their advantage to show so very much of them- 
 selves. (Amplify and correct for paper on Artless 
 Arts.) ' 
 
 'Yes, I remember now,' said Knight. 'The notes 
 were certainly suggested by your manoeuvre on the 
 church tower. But you must not think too much of 
 such random observations,' he continued encouragingly, 
 as he noticed her injured looks. ' A mere fancy passing 
 through my head assumes a factitious importance to you, 
 because it has been made permanent by being written 
 down. All mankind think thoughts as bad as those 
 of people they most love on earth, but such thoughts 
 never getting embodied on paper, it becomes assumed 
 that they never existed. I daresay that you yourself 
 have thought some disagreeable thing or other of me, 
 which would seem just as bad as this if written. I 
 challenge you, now, to tell me.' 
 207 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 ' The worst thing I have thought of you ? ' 
 
 ' Yes.' 
 
 ' I must not.' 
 
 ' Oh yes.' 
 
 ' I thought you were rather round-shouldered.' 
 
 Knight looked slightly redder. 
 
 ' And that there was a little bald spot on the top of 
 your head.' 
 
 ' Heh-heh ! Two ineradicable defects,' said Knight, 
 there being a faint ghastliness discernible in his laugh. 
 'They are much worse in a lady's eye than being 
 thought self-conscious, I suppose.' 
 
 ' Ah, that's very fine,' she said, too inexperienced to 
 perceive her hit, and hence not quite disposed to for- 
 give his notes. 'You alluded to me in that entry as 
 if I were such a child, too. Everybody does that. I 
 cannot understand it. I am quite a woman, you know. 
 How old do you think I am ? ' 
 
 ' How old ? Why, seventeen, I should say. All 
 girls are seventeen.' 
 
 'You are wrong. I am nearly nineteen. Which 
 class of women do you like best, those who seem 
 younger, or those who seem older than they are ? ' 
 
 ' Off-hand I should be inclined to say those who 
 seem older.' 
 
 So it was not Elfride's class. 
 
 ' But it is well known,' she said eagerly, and there 
 was something touching in the artless anxiety to be 
 thought much of which she revealed by her words, ' that 
 the slower a nature is to develop, the richer the nature. 
 Youths and girls who are men and women before they 
 come of age are nobodies by the time that backward 
 people have shown their full compass.' 
 
 'Yes,' said Knight thoughtfully. 'There is really 
 
 something in that remark. But at the risk of offence I 
 
 must remind you that you there take it for granted that 
 
 the woman behind her time at a given age has not 
 
 2oa 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 reached the end of her tether. Her backwardness may 
 be not because she is slow to develop, but because she 
 soon exhausted her capacity for developing.' 
 
 Elfride looked disappointed. By this time they 
 were indoors. Mrs. Swancourt, to whom match-making 
 by any honest means was meat and drink, had now a 
 little scheme of that nature concerning this pair. The 
 morning-room, in which they both expected to find her, 
 was empty; the old lady having, for the above reason, 
 vacated it by the second door as they entered by the 
 first. 
 
 Knight went to the chimney-piece, and carelessly 
 surveyed two portraits on ivory. 
 
 ' Though these pink ladies had very rudimentary 
 features, judging by what I see here,' he observed, ' they 
 had unquestionably beautiful heads of hair.' 
 
 ' Yes ; and that is everything,' said Elfride, possibly 
 conscious of her own, possibly not. 
 
 ' Not everything ; though a great deal, certainly.' 
 
 ' Which colour do you like best ? ' she ventured 
 to ask. 
 
 ' More depends on its abundance than on its colour.' 
 
 'Abundances being equal, may I inquire your 
 favourite colour ? ' 
 
 ' Dark.' 
 
 ' I mean for women,' she said, with the minutest fall 
 of countenance, and a hope that she had been mis- 
 understood. 
 
 ' So do I,' Knight replied. 
 
 It was impossible for any man not to know the 
 colour of Elfride's hair. In women who wear it plainly 
 such a feature may be overlooked by men not given to 
 ocular intentness. But hers was always in the way. 
 You saw her hair as far as you could see her sex, and 
 knew that it was the palest brown. She knew instantly 
 that Knight, being perfectly aware of this, had an inde- 
 pendent standard of admiration in the matter. 
 
 209 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 Elfride was thoroughly vexed. She could not but be 
 struck with the honesty of his opinions, and the worst of 
 it was, that the more they went against her, the more she 
 respected them. And now, like a reckless gambler, she 
 hazarded her last and best treasure. Her eyes : they 
 were her all now. 
 
 ' What coloured eyes do you Uke best, Mr. Knight ? ' 
 she said slowly. 
 
 ' Honestly, or as a compliment ? ' 
 
 ' Of course honestly ; I don't want anybody's com- 
 pliment ! ' 
 
 And yet Elfride knew otherwise : that a compliment 
 or word of approval from that man then would have 
 been like a well to a famished Arab. 
 
 ' I prefer hazel,' he said serenely. 
 
 She had played and lost again. 
 
XIX 
 
 'Love was in the next degree.' 
 
 jv NIGHT had none of those light familiarities of 
 speech which, by judicious touches of epigrammatic 
 flattery, obliterate a woman's recollection of the speaker's 
 abstract opinions. So no more was said by either on 
 the subject of hair, eyes, or development. Elfride's 
 mind had been impregnated with sentiments of her 
 own smallness to an uncomfortable degree of distinct- 
 ness, and her discomfort was visible in her face. The 
 whole tendency of the conversation latterly had been 
 to quietly but surely disparage her ; and she was fain to 
 take Stephen into favour in self-defence. He would 
 not have been so unloving, she said, as to admire an 
 idiosyncrasy and features different from her own. 
 True, Stephen had declared he loved her : Mr. Knight 
 had never done anything of the sort. Somehow this 
 did not mend matters, and the sensation of her small- 
 ness in Knight's eyes still remained. Had the posi- 
 tion been reversed — had Stephen loved her in spite 
 of a differing taste, and had Knight been indifferent 
 in spite of her resemblance to his ideal^ it would 
 have engendered far happier thoughts. As matters 
 stood, Stephen's admiration might have its root in a 
 
 211 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 blindness the result of passion. Perhaps any keen 
 man's judgment was condemnatory of her. 
 
 During the remainder of Saturday they were more 
 or less thrown with their seniors, and no conversation 
 arose which was exclusively their own. When Elfride 
 was in bed that night her thoughts recurred to the 
 same subject. At one moment she insisted that it 
 was ill-natured of him to speak so decisively as he had 
 done ; the next, that it was sterling honesty. 
 
 ' Ah, what a poor nobody I am ! ' she said, sighing. 
 ' People like him, who go alDout the great world, don't 
 care in the least what I am like either in mood or 
 feature.' 
 
 Perhaps a man who has got thoroughly into a 
 woman's mind in this manner, is half way to her heart ; 
 the distance between those two stations is proverbially 
 short. 
 
 ' And are you really going away this week ? ' said 
 Mrs. Swancourt to Knight on the following evening, 
 which was Sunday. 
 
 They were all leisurely climbing the hill to the church, 
 where a last service was now to be held at the rather 
 exceptional time of evening instead of in the afternoon, 
 previous to the demolition of the ruinous portions. 
 
 ' I am intending to cross to Cork from Bristol,' re- 
 turned Knight ; ' and then I go on to Dublin.' 
 
 ' Return this way, and stay a little longer with us,' 
 said the vicar. ' A week is nothing. We have hardly 
 been able to realize your presence yet. I remember a 
 story which ' 
 
 The vicar suddenly stopped. He had forgotten it 
 was Sunday, and would probably have gone on in 
 his week-day mode of thought had not a turn in the 
 breeze blown the skirt of his college gown within the 
 range of his vision, and so reminded him. He at 
 once diverted the current of his narrative with the 
 dexterity the occasion demanded. 
 
 212 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 ' The story of the Levite who journeyed to Bethlehem- 
 judah, from which I took my text the Sunday before last, 
 is quite to the point,' he continued, with the pronun- 
 ciation of a man who, far from having intended to tell a 
 week-day story a moment earlier, had thought of nothing 
 but Sabbath matters for several weeks. ' What did he 
 gain after all by his restlessness ? Fad he remained in 
 the city of the Jebusites, and not been so anxious for 
 Gibeah, none of his troubles would have arisen.' 
 
 ' But he had wasted five days already,' said Knight, 
 closing his eyes to the vicar's commendable diversion. 
 ' His fault lay in beginning the tarrying system ori- 
 ginally.' 
 
 ' True, true ; my illustration fails.' 
 
 ' But not the hospitality which prompted the story.' 
 
 ' So you are to come just the same,' urged Mrs. 
 Swancourt, for she had seen an almost imperceptible 
 fall of countenance in her stepdaughter at Knight's 
 announcement. 
 
 Knight half promised to call on his return journey ; 
 but the uncertainty with which he spoke was quite 
 enough to fill Elfride with a regretful interest in all he 
 did during the few remaining hours. The curate having 
 already ofiSciated twice that day in the two churches, 
 Mr. Swancourt had undertaken the whole of the even- 
 ing service, and Knight read the lessons for him. The 
 sun streamed across from the dilapidated west window, 
 and lighted all the assembled worshippers with a golden 
 glow, Knight as he read being illuminated by the same 
 mellow lustre. Elfride at the organ regarded him with 
 a throbbing sadness of mood which was fed by a sense 
 of being far removed from his sphere. As he went delibe- 
 rately through the chapter appointed — a portion of the 
 history of Elijah — and ascended that magnificent climax 
 of the wind, the earthquake, the fire, and the still small 
 voice, his deep tones echoed past with such apparent 
 disregard of her existence, that his presence inspired her 
 213 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 with a forlorn sense of unapproachableness, which his 
 absence would hardly.have been able to cause. 
 
 At the same time, turning her face for a moment to 
 catch the glory of the dying sun as it fell on his form, her 
 eyes were arrested by the shape and aspect of a woman in 
 the west gallery. It was the bleak barren countenance 
 of the widow Jethway, whom Elfride had not seen much 
 of since the morning of her return with Stephen Smith. 
 Possessing the smallest of competencies, this unhappy 
 woman appeared to spend her life in journeyings be- 
 tween Endelstow Churchyard and that of a village near 
 Southampton, where her father and mother were laid. 
 
 She had not attended the service here for a consider- 
 able time, and she now seemed to have a reason for 
 her choice of seat. From the gallery window the tomb 
 of her son was plainly visible — standing as the nearest 
 object in a prospect which was closed outwardly by the 
 changeless horizon of the sea. 
 
 The streaming rays, too, flooded her face, now bent 
 towards Elfride with a hard and bitter expression that 
 the solemnity of the place raised to a tragic dignity it did 
 not intrinsically possess. The girl resumed her normal 
 attitude with an added disquiet. 
 
 Elfride's emotion was cumulative, and after a while 
 would assert itself on a sudden. A slight touch was 
 enough to set it free — a poem, a sunset, a cunningly 
 contrived chord of music, a vague imagining, being the 
 usual accidents of its exhibition. The longing for 
 Knight's respect, which was leading up to an incipient 
 yearning for his love, made the present conjuncture a 
 sufficient one. Whilst kneeling down previous to 
 leaving, when the sunny streaks had gone upward to 
 the roof, and the lower part of the church was in 
 soft shadow, she could not help thinking of Coleridge's 
 morbid poem ' The Three Graves,' and shuddering as 
 she wondered if Mrs. Jethway were cursing her, she 
 wept as if her heart would break. 
 214 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 They came out of church just as the sun went down, 
 leaving the landscape like a platform from which an 
 eloquent speaker has retired, and nothing remains for 
 the audience to do but to rise and go home. Mr. and 
 Mrs. Swancourt went off in the carriage. Knight and 
 Elfride preferring to walk, as the skilful old matchmaker 
 had imagined. They descended the hill together. 
 
 ' I liked your reading, Mr. Knight,' Elfride presently 
 found herself saying. ' You read better than papa.' 
 
 ' I will praise anybody that will praise me. You played 
 excellently, Miss Swancourt, and very correctly.' 
 
 ' Correctly — ^yes.' 
 
 ' It must be a great pleasure to you to take an active 
 part in the service.' 
 
 ' I want to be able to play with more feeling. But I 
 have not a good selection of music, sacred or secular. 
 I wish I had a nice little music-library — well chosen, 
 and that the only new pieces sent me were those of 
 genuine merit.' 
 
 ' I am glad to hear such a wish from you. It is 
 extraordinary how many women have no honest love of 
 music as an end and not as a means, even leaving out 
 those who have nothing in them. They mostly like it 
 for its accessories. I have never met a woman who 
 loves music as do ten or a dozen men I know.' 
 
 ' How would you draw the line between women with 
 something and women with nothing in them ? ' 
 
 ' Well,' said Knight, reflecting a moment, ' I mean 
 by nothing in them those who don't care about any- 
 thing solid. This is an instance : I knew a man who 
 had a young friend in whom he was much interested ; 
 in fact, they were going to be married. She was seem- 
 ingly poetical, and he offered her a choice of two 
 editions of the British poets, which she pretended to 
 want badly. He said, " Which of them would you like 
 best for me to send ? " She said, " A pair of the prettiest 
 earrings in Bond Street, if you don't mind, would be 
 
 21K 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 nicer than either." Now I call her a girl with not 
 much in her but vanity ; and so do you, I daresay.' 
 
 ' Oh yes,' replied Elfride with an effort. 
 
 Happening to catch a glimpse of her face as she was 
 speaking, and noticing that her attempt at heartiness was 
 a miserable failure, he appeared to have misgivings. 
 
 'You, Miss Swancourt, would not, under such cir- 
 cumstances, have preferred the nicknacks ? ' 
 
 ' No, I don't think I should, indeed,' she stam- 
 mered. 
 
 ' I'll put it to you,' said the inflexible Knight. 
 ■Which will you have of these two things of about 
 equal value — the well-chosen little library of the best 
 music you spoke of — bound in morocco, walnut case, 
 lock and key — or a pair of the very prettiest earrings in 
 Bond Street windows ? ' 
 
 ' Of course the music,' Elfride repUed with forced 
 earnestness. 
 
 ' You are quite certain ? ' he said emphatically. 
 
 ' Quite,' she faltered ; ' if I could for certain buy the 
 earrings afterwards.' 
 
 Knight, somewhat blamably, keenly enjoyed sparring 
 with the palpitating mobile creature, whose excitable 
 nature made any such thing a species of cruelty. 
 
 He looked at her rathei: oddly, and said, ' Fie ! ' 
 
 'Forgive me,' she said, laughing a Uttle, a little 
 frightened, and blushing very deeply. 
 
 ' Ah, Miss Elfie, why didn't you say at first, as any 
 firm woman would have said, I am as bad as she, and 
 shall choose the same ? ' 
 
 'I don't know,' said Elfride wofully, and with a 
 distressful smile. 
 
 ' I thought you were exceptionally musical ? ' 
 
 ' So I am, I think. But the test is so severe — quite 
 painful.' 
 
 ' I don't understand.' 
 
 ' Music doesn't do any real good, or rather ' 
 
 216 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 'That is a thing to say, Miss Swancourt! Why, 
 what ' 
 
 ' You don't understand ! you don't understand ! ' 
 
 ' Why, what conceivable use is there in jimcrack 
 jewellery ? ' 
 
 ' No, no, no, no ! ' she cried petulantly ; ' I didn't 
 mean what you think. I like the music best, only I 
 like ' 
 
 ' Earrings better — own it ! ' he said in a teasing 
 tone. 'Well, I think I should have had the moral 
 courage to own it at once, without pretending to an 
 elevation I could not reach.' 
 
 Like the French soldiery, Elfride was not brave 
 when on the defensive. So it was almost with tears in 
 her eyes that she answered desperately : 
 
 ' My meaning is, that I like earrings best just now, 
 because I lost one of my prettiest pair last year, and 
 papa said he would not buy any more, or allow me to 
 myself, because I was careless ; and now I wish I had 
 some like them — that's what my meaning is — indeed it 
 is, Mr. Knight.' 
 
 ' I am afraid I have been very harsh and rude,' said 
 Knight, with a look of regret at seeing how disturbed 
 she was. ' But seriously, if women only knew how they 
 ruin their good looks by such appurtenances, I am sure 
 they would never want them.' 
 
 ' They were lovely, and became me so ! ' 
 
 ' Not if they were like the ordinary hideous things 
 women stuff their ears with nowadays — like the governor 
 of a steam-engine, or a pair of scales, or gold gibbets 
 and chains, and artists' palettes, and compensation pen- 
 dulums, and Heaven knows what besides.' 
 
 ' No ; they were not one of those things. So pretty 
 — like this,' she said with eager animation. And she 
 drew with the point of her parasol an enlarged view of 
 one of the lamented darlings, to a scale that would have 
 suited a giantess half-a-mile high. 
 •" 317 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 ' Yes, very pretty — very,' said Knight dryly. ' How 
 did you come to lose such a precious pair of articles ? ' 
 
 ' I only lost one — nobody ever loses both at the 
 same time.' 
 
 She made this remark with embarrassment, and a 
 nervous movement of the fingers. Seeing that the loss 
 occurred whilst Stephen Smith was attempting to kiss 
 her for the first time on the cliff, her confusion was 
 hardly to be wondered at. The question had been 
 awkward, and received no direct answer. 
 
 Knight seemed not to notice her manner. 
 
 • Oh, nobody ever loses both — I see. And certainly 
 the fact that it was a case of loss takes away all odour 
 of vanity from your choice.' 
 
 'As I never know whether you are in earnest, I 
 don't now,' she said, looking up inquiringly at the hairy 
 face of the oracle. And coming gallantly to her own 
 rescue, ' If I really seem vain, it is that I am only vain 
 in my ways — not in my heart. The worst women are 
 those vain in their hearts, and not in their ways.' 
 
 ' An adroit distinction. Well, they are certainly the 
 more objectionable of the two,' said Knight. 
 
 ' Is vanity a mortal or a venial sin ? You know 
 what life is : tell me.' 
 
 ' I am very far from knowing what life is. A just con- 
 ception of life is too large a thing to grasp during the 
 short interval of passing through it.' 
 
 ' Will the fact of a woman being fond of jewellery be 
 likely to make her life, in its higher sense, a failure ? ' 
 
 ' Nobody's life is altogether a failure.' 
 
 'Well, you know what I mean, even though my 
 words are badly selected and commonplace,' she said 
 impatiently. 'Because I utter commonplace words, 
 you must not suppose I think only commonplace 
 thoughts. My poor stock of words are like a, limited 
 number of rough moulds I have to cast all my materials 
 in, good and bad ; and the novelty or delicacy of the 
 
 2l8 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 substance is often lost in the coarse triteness of the 
 form.' 
 
 'Very wellj I'll believe that ingenious representa- 
 tion. As to the subject in hand — lives which are 
 failures — you need not trouble yourself. Anybody's 
 life may be just as romantic and strange and interest- 
 ing if he or she fails as if he or she succeed. All the 
 difference is, that the last chapter is wanting in the 
 story. If a man of power tries to do a great deed, and 
 just falls short of it by an accident not his fault, up to 
 that time his history had as much in it as that of a 
 great man who has done his great deed. It is whim- 
 sical of the world to hold that particulars of how a lad 
 went to school and so on should be as an interesting 
 romance or as nothing to them, precisely in proportion 
 to his after renown.' 
 
 They were walking between the sunset and the moon- 
 rise. With the dropping of the sun a nearly full moon 
 had begun to raise itself. Their shadows, as cast by the 
 western glare, showed signs of becoming obliterated 
 in the interest of a rival pair in the opposite direction 
 which the moon was bringing to distinctness. 
 
 < I consider my life to some extent a failure,' said 
 Knight again after a pause, during which he had noticed 
 the antagonistic shadows. 
 
 'You! How?' 
 
 ' I don't precisely know. But in some way I have 
 missed the mark.' 
 
 ' Really ? To have done it is not much to be sad 
 about, but to feel that you have done it must be a 
 cause of sorrow. Am I right ? ' 
 
 ' Partly, though not quite. For a sensation of being 
 profoundly experienced serves as a sort of consolation 
 to people who are conscious of having taken wrong 
 turnings. Contradictory as it seems, there is nothing 
 truer than that people who have always gone right don't 
 know half as much about the nature and ways of going 
 219 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 right as those do who have gone wrong. However, it is 
 not desirable for me to chill your summer-time by going 
 into this.' 
 
 'You have not told me even now if I am really 
 vain.' 
 
 ' If I say Yes, I shall offend you ; if I say No, you'll 
 think I don't mean it,' he replied, looking curiously 
 into her face. 
 
 ' Ah, well,' she replied, with a little breath of distress, 
 ' " That which is exceeding deep, who will find it out ? " 
 I suppose I must take you as I do the Bible — find out 
 and understand all I can ; and on the strength of that, 
 swallow the rest in a lump, by simple faith. Think me 
 vain, if you will. Worldly greatness requires so much 
 littleness to grow up in, that an infirmity more or less 
 is not a matter for regret.' 
 
 ' As regards women, I can't say,' answered Knight 
 carelessly ; ' but it is without doubt a misfortune for 
 a man who has a living to get, to be born of a truly 
 noble nature. A high soul will bring a man to the 
 workhouse; so you may be right in sticking up for 
 vanity.' 
 
 'No, no, I don't do that,' she said regretfully. 
 ■ Mr. Knight, when you are gone, will you send me 
 something you have written ? I think I should like to 
 see whether you write as you have lately spoken, or in 
 your better mood. Which is your true self — the cynic 
 you have been this evening, or the nice philosopher you 
 were up to to-night ? ' 
 
 ' Ah, which ? You know as well as I.' 
 
 Their conversation detained them on the lawn and 
 in the portico till the stars blinked out. Elfride flung 
 back her head, and said idly — 
 
 ' There's a bright star exactly over me.' 
 
 ' Each bright star is overhead somewhere.' 
 
 ■ Is it ? Oh yes, of course. Where is that one ? ' 
 and she pointed with her finger. 
 220 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 ' That is poised like a white hawk over one of the 
 Cape Verde Islands.' 
 
 ' And that ? ' 
 
 ' Looking down upon the source of the Nile.' 
 
 ' And that lonely quiet-looking one ? ' 
 
 ' He watches the North Pole, and has no less than 
 the whole equator for his horizon. And that idle one 
 low down upon the ground, that we have almost rolled 
 away from, is in India — over the head of a young friend 
 of mine, who very possibly looks at the star in our 
 zenith, as it hangs low upon his horizon, and thinks of 
 it as marking where his true love dwells.' 
 
 Elfride glanced at Knight with misgiving. Did he 
 mean her? She could not see his features; but his 
 attitude seemed to show unconsciousness. 
 
 'The star is over my head,' she said with hesita- 
 tion. 
 
 ' Or anybody else's in England.' 
 
 ' Oh yes, I see : ' she breathed her relief. 
 
 ' His parents, I believe, are natives of this county. 
 I don't know them, though I have been in correspond- 
 ence with him for many years till lately. Fortunately 
 or unfortunately for him he fell in love, and then went 
 to Bombay. Since that time I have heard very little of 
 him.' 
 
 Knight went no further in his volunteered statement, 
 and though Elfride at one moment was inclined to 
 profit by the lessons in honesty he had just been giving 
 her, the flesh was weak, and the intention dispersed 
 into silence. There seemed a reproach in Knight's 
 blind words, and yet she was not able to clearly define 
 any disloyalty that she had been guilty of. 
 
XX 
 
 'A distant dearness in the hill.' 
 
 Knight turned Ws back upon the parish of 
 Endelstow, and crossed over to Cork. 
 
 One day of absence superimposed itself on another, 
 and proportionately weighted his heart. He pushed on 
 to the Lakes of Killarney, rambled amid their luxuriant 
 woods, surveyed the infinite variety of island, hill, and 
 dale there to be found, listened to the marvellous 
 echoes of that romantic spot; but altogether missed 
 the glory and the dream he formerly found in such 
 favoured regions. 
 
 Whilst in the company of Elfride, her girlish pre- 
 sence had not perceptibly affected him to any depth. 
 He had not been conscious that her entry into his 
 sphere had added anything to himself; but now that 
 she was taken away he was very conscious of a great 
 deal being abstracted. The superfluity had become a 
 necessity, and Knight was in love. 
 
 Stephen fell in love with Elfride by looking at her : 
 Knight by ceasing to do so. When or how the spirit 
 entered into him he knew not : certain he was that 
 when on the point of leaving Endelstow he had felt 
 none of that exquisite nicety of poignant sadness 
 
 222 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 natural to such severances, seeing how delightful a 
 subject of contemplation Elfride had been ever since. 
 Had he begun to love her when she met his eye after 
 her mishap on the tower? He had simply thought 
 her weak. Had he grown to love her whilst standing 
 on the lawn brightened all .over by the evening sun? 
 He had thought her complexion good : no more. Was 
 it her conversation that had sown the seed ? He had 
 thought her words ingenious, and very creditable to a 
 young woman, but not noteworthy. Had the chess- 
 playing anything to do vrith it ? Certainly not : he had 
 thought her at that time a rather conceited child. 
 
 Knight's experience was a complete disproof of the 
 assumption that love always comes by glances of the 
 eye and sympathetic touches of the fingers : that, like 
 flame, it makes itself palpable at the moment of genera- 
 tion. Not till they were parted, and she had become 
 sublimated in his memory, could he be said to have 
 even attentively regarded her. 
 
 Thus, having passively gathered up images of her 
 which his mind did not act upon till the cause of them 
 was no longer before him, he appeared to himself to 
 have fallen in love with her soul, which had tempor- 
 arily assumed its disembodiment to accompany him 
 on his way. 
 
 She began to rule him so imperiously now that, 
 accustomed to analysis, he almost trembled at the 
 possible result of the introduction of this new force 
 among the nicely adjusted ones of his ordinary life. 
 He became restless : then he forgot all collateral sub- 
 jects in the pleasure of thinking about her. 
 
 Yet it must be said that Knight loved philosophi- 
 cally rather than with romance. 
 
 He thought of her manner towards him. Simplicity 
 verges on coquetry. Was she flirting ? he said to him- 
 self. No forcible translation of favour into suspicion 
 was, able to uphold such a theory. The performance 
 2.23 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 had been too well done to be anything but real. It 
 had the defects without which nothing is genuine. No 
 actress of twenty years' standing, no bald-necked lady 
 whose earliest season ' out ' was lost in the discreet 
 mist of evasive talk, could have played before him the 
 part of ingenuous girl as Elfride lived it. She had the 
 little artful ways which partly make up ingenuousness. 
 
 There are bachelors by nature and bachelors by 
 circumstance : spinsters there doubtless are also of 
 both kinds, though some think only those of the latter. 
 However, Knight had been looked upon as a bachelor 
 by nature. What was he coming to ? It was very 
 odd to himself to look at his theories on the subject 
 of love, and reading them now by the full light of a 
 new experience, to see how much more his sentences 
 meant than he had felt them to mean when they were 
 written. People often discover the real force of a trite 
 old maxim only when it is thrust upon them by a 
 chance adventure ; but Knight had never before known 
 the case of a man who learnt the fuU compass of his 
 own epigrams by such means. 
 
 He was intensely satisfied with one aspect of the 
 affair. Inbred in him was an invincible objection to 
 be any but the first comer in a woman's heart. He 
 had discovered within himself the condition that if 
 ever he did make up his mind to marry, it must be 
 on the certainty that no cropping out of inconvenient 
 old letters, no bow and blush to a mysterious stranger 
 casually met, should be a possible source of discom- 
 posure. Knight's sentiments were only the ordinary 
 ones of a man of his age who loves genuinely, perhaps 
 exaggerated a little by his pursuits. When men first 
 love as lads, it is with the very centre of their hearts, 
 nothing else being concerned in the operation. With 
 added years, more of the faculties attempt a partner- 
 ship in the passion, till at Knight's age the under- 
 Standing is fain to have a hand in it. It may as well 
 
 ?24 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 be left out. A man in love setting up his brains as 
 a gauge of his position is as one determinitig a ship's 
 longitude from a light at the mast-head. 
 
 Knight argued from Elfride's unwontedness of man- 
 ner, which was matter of fact, to an unwontedness in 
 love, which was matter of inference only. Incridules 
 les plus credules. ' Elfride,' he said, ' had hardly looked 
 upon a man. till she saw me.' 
 
 He had never forgotten his severity to her because 
 she preferred ornament to edification, and had since 
 excused her a hundred times by thinking how natural 
 to womankind was a love of adornment, and how 
 necessary became a mild infusion of personal vanity 
 to complete the delicate and fascinating dye of the 
 feminine mind. So at the end of the week's absence, 
 which had brought him as far as Dublin, he resolved 
 to curtail his tour, return to Endelstow, and commit 
 himself by making a reality of the hypothetical offer 
 of that Sunday evening. 
 
 Notwithstanding that he had concocted a great deal 
 of paper theory on social amenities and modern manners 
 generally, the special ounce of practice was wanting, 
 and now for his life Knight could not recollect whether 
 it was considered correct to give a young lady personal 
 ornaments before a regular engagement to marry had 
 been initiated. But the day, before leaving Dublin he 
 looked around anxiously for a high-class jewellery estab- 
 lishment, in which he purchased what he considered 
 would suit her best. 
 
 It was with a most awkward and unwonted feeling 
 that after entering and closing the door of his room 
 he sat down, opened the morocco case, and held up 
 each of the fragile bits of gold-work before his eyes. 
 Many things had become old to the solitary man of 
 letters, but these were new, and he handled like a child 
 an outcome of civilization which had never before been 
 touched by his fingers. A sudden fastidious decision 
 225 P 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 that the pattern chosen would not suit her after all 
 caused him to rise in a flurry and tear down the street 
 to change them for others. After a great deal of 
 trouble in reselecting, during which his mind became 
 so bewildered that the critical faculty on objects of art 
 seemed to have vacated his person altogether, Knight 
 carried off another pair of ear-rings. These remained 
 in his possession till the afternoon, when, after con- 
 templating them fifty times with a growing misgiving 
 that the last choice was worse than the first, he felt 
 that no sleep would visit his pillow till he had im- 
 proved upon his previous purchases yet again. In a 
 perfect heat of vexation with himself for such tergiver- 
 sation, he went anew to the shop-door, was absolutely 
 ashamed to enter and give further trouble, went to 
 another shop, bought a pair at an enormously increased 
 price, because they seemed the very thing, asked the 
 goldsmiths if they would take the other pair in exchange, 
 was told that they could not exchange articles bought 
 of another maker, paid down the money, and went off 
 with the two pairs in his possession, wondering what 
 on earth to do with the superfluous pair. He almost 
 wished he could lose them, or that somebody would 
 steal them, and was burdened with an interposing sense 
 that, as a capable man, with true ideas of economy, he 
 must necessarily sell them somewhere, which he did 
 at last for a mere song. Mingled with a blank feeling 
 of a whole day being lost to him in running about the 
 city on this new and extraordinary class of errand, and 
 of several pounds being lost through his bungling, was 
 a slight sense of satisfaction that he had emerged for 
 ever from his antediluvian ignorance on the subject of 
 ladies' jewellery, as well as secured a truly artistic pro- 
 duction at last. During the remainder of that day he 
 scanned the ornaments of every lady he met with the 
 profoundly experienced eye of an appraiser. 
 
 Next morning Knight was again crossing St. George's 
 226 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 Channel — not returning to London by the Holyhead 
 route as he had originally intended, but towards Bristol 
 — availing himself of Mr. and Mrs. Swancourt's invita- 
 tion to revisit them on his homeward journey. 
 
 We flit forward to Elfride. 
 
 Woman's ruling passion — to fascinate and influence 
 those more powerful than she — though operant in 
 Elfride, was decidedly purposeless. She had wanted 
 her friend Knight's good opinion from the first : how 
 much more than that elementary ingredient of friend- 
 ship she now desired, her fears would hardly allow her 
 to think. In originally wishing to please the highest 
 class of man she had ever intimately known, there was 
 no disloyalty to Stephen Smith. She could not — and 
 few women can — realize the possible vastness of an issue 
 which has only an insignificant begetting. 
 
 Her letters from Stephen were necessarily few, and 
 her sense of fidelity clung to the last she had received 
 as a wrecked mariner clings to flotsam. The young 
 girl persuaded herself that she was glad Stephen had 
 such a right to her hand as he had acquired (in her 
 eyes) by the elopement. She beguiled herself by sapng, 
 ' Perhaps if I had not so committed myself I might 
 fall in love with Mr. Knight.' 
 
 All this made the week of Knight's absence very 
 gloomy and distasteful to her. She retained Stephen 
 in her prayers, and his old letters were re-jead — as a 
 medicine in reality, though she deceived herself into 
 the belief that it was as a pleasure. 
 
 These letters had grown more and more hopeful. 
 He told her that he finished his work every day with a 
 pleasant consciousness of having removed one more 
 stone from the barrier which divided them. Then he 
 drew images of what a fine figure they two would cut 
 some day. People would turn their heads and say, 
 • What a prize he has won ! ' She was not to be sad 
 about that wild runaway attempt of theirs (Elfride had 
 227 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 repeatedly said that it grieved her). Whatever any 
 other person who knew of it might think, he knew well 
 enough the modesty of her nature. The only reproach 
 was a gentle one for not having written quite so de- 
 votedly during her visit to London. Her letter had 
 seemed to have a liveliness derived from other thoughts 
 than thoughts of him. 
 
 Knight's intention of an early return to Endelstow 
 having originally been faint, his promise to do so had 
 been fainter. He was a man who kept his words well 
 to the rear of his possible actions. The vicar was 
 rather surprised to see him again so soon : Mrs. Swan- 
 court was not. Knight found, on meeting them all, 
 after his arrival had been announced, that they had 
 formed an intention to go to St. Leonards for a few 
 days at the end of the month. 
 
 No satisfactory conjuncture offered itself on this 
 first evening of his return for presenting Elfride with 
 what he had been at such pains to procure. He was 
 fastidious in his reading of opportunities for such an 
 intended act. The next morning chancing to break 
 fine after a week of cloudy weather, it was proposed 
 and decided that they should all drive to Barwith 
 Strand, a local lion which neither Mrs. Swancourt nor 
 Knight had seen. Knight scented romantic occa- 
 sions from afar, and foresaw that such a one might be 
 expected before the coming night. 
 
 The journey was along a road by neutral green hills, 
 upon which hedgerows lay trailing like ropes on a quay. 
 Gaps in these uplands revealed the blue sea, flecked 
 with a few dashes of white and a solitary white sail, 
 the whole brimming up to a keen horizon which lay 
 like a line ruled from hillside to hillside. Then they 
 rolled down a pass, the chocolate-toned rocks forming 
 a wall on both sides, from one of which fell a heavy 
 jagged shade over half the roadway. A spout of fresh 
 228 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 water burst from an occasional crevice, and pattering 
 down upon broad green leaves, ran along as a rivulet 
 at the bottom. Unkempt locks of heather overhung 
 the brow of each steep, whence at divers points a 
 bramble swung forth into mid-air, snatching at their 
 head-dresses like a claw. 
 
 They mounted the last crest, and the bay which was 
 to be the end of their pilgrimage burst upon them. The 
 ocean blueness deepened its colour as it stretched to 
 the foot of the crags, where it terminated in a fringe 
 of white — silent at this distance, though moving and 
 heaving like a counterpane upon a restless sleeper. 
 The shadowed hollows of the purple and brown rocks 
 would have been called blue had not that tint been so 
 entirely appropriated by the water beside them. 
 
 The carriage was put up at a little cottage with a 
 shed attached, and an ostler and the coachman carried 
 the hamper of provisions down to the shore. 
 
 Knight found his opportunity. ' I did not forget 
 your wish,' he began, when they were apart from their 
 friends. 
 
 Elfride looked as if she did not understand. 
 
 'And I have brought you these,' he continued, 
 awkwardly pulling out the case, and opening it while 
 holding it towards her. 
 
 ' O Mr. Knight ! ' said Elfride confusedly, and turn- 
 ing to a lively red ; ' I didn't know you had any inten- 
 tion or meaning in what you said. I thought it a mere 
 supposition. I don't want them.' 
 
 A thought which had flashed into her mind gave the 
 reply a greater decisiveness than it might otherwise have 
 possessed. To-morrow was the day for Stephen's 
 letter. 
 
 ' But will you not accept them ? ' Knight returned, 
 feeling less her master than heretofore. 
 
 'I would rather not. They are beautiful — more 
 beautiful than any I have ever seen,' she answered 
 229 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 earnestly, looking half-wishfuUy at the temptation, as 
 Eve may have looked at the apple. ' But I don't want 
 to have them, if you will kindly forgive me, Mr. 
 Knight.' 
 
 ' No kindness at all,' said Mr. Knight, brought to 
 a full stop at this unexpected turn of events. 
 
 A silence followed. Knight held the open case, 
 looking rather wofuUy at the glittering forms he had 
 forsaken his orbit to procure; turning it about and 
 holding it up as if, feeling his gift to be slighted by 
 her, he were endeavouring to admire it very much 
 himself. 
 
 ' Shut them up, and don't let me see them any 
 longer — do ! ' she said laughingly, and with a quaint 
 mixture of reluctance and entreaty. 
 
 ' Why, Elfie ? \ 
 
 'Not Elfie to you, Mr. Knight. Oh, because I 
 shall want them. There, I am silly, I know, to say 
 that ! But I have a reason for not taking them — now.' 
 She kept in the last word for a moment, intending to 
 imply that her refusal was finite, but somehow the word 
 slipped out, and undid all the rest. 
 
 ' You will take them some day ? ' 
 
 ' I don't want to.' 
 
 ' Why don't you want to, Elfride Swancourt ? ' 
 
 ' Because I don't. I don't like to take them.' 
 
 ' I have read a fact of distressing significance in 
 that,' said Knight. ' Since you like them, your dislike 
 to having them must be towards me ? ' 
 
 ' No, it isn't.' 
 
 • What, then ? Do you like me ? ' 
 
 Elfride deepened in tint, and looked into the 
 distance with features shaped to an expression of the 
 nicest criticism as regarded her answer. 
 
 ' I like you pretty well,' she at length murmured 
 mildly. 
 
 ' Not very much ? ' 
 
 230 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 'You are so sharp with me, and say hard things, 
 and so how can I ? ' she replied evasively. 
 
 ' You think me a fogey, I suppose ? ' 
 
 ' No, I don't — I mean I do — I don't know what I 
 think you, I mean. Let us go to papa,' responded 
 Elfride, with somewhat of a flurried delivery. 
 
 ' Well, I'll tell you my object in getting the present,' 
 said Knight, with a composure intended to remove 
 from her mind any possible impression of his being 
 what he was — her lover. 'You see it was the very 
 least I could do in common civility.' 
 
 Elfride felt rather blank at this lucid statement. 
 
 Knight continued, putting away the case : ' I felt as 
 anybody naturally would have, you know, that my words 
 on your choice the other day were invidious and unfair, 
 and thought an apology should take a practical shape.' 
 
 ' Oh yes.' 
 
 Elfride was sorry — she could not tell why — that he 
 gave such a legitimate reason. It was a disappointment 
 that he had all the time a cool motive, which might 
 be stated to anybody without raising a smile. Had 
 she known they were offered in that spirit, she would 
 certainly have accepted the seductive gift. And the 
 tantalizing feature was that perhaps he suspected her 
 to imagine them offered as a lover's token, which was 
 mortifying enough if they were not. 
 
 Mrs. Swancourt came now to where they were sitting, 
 to select a flat boulder for spreading their table-cloth 
 upon, and, amid the discussion on that subject, the 
 matter pending between Knight and Elfride was shelved 
 for a while. He read her refusal so certainly as the 
 bashfulness of a girl in a novel position, that, upon 
 the whole, he could tolerate such a beginning. Could 
 Knight have been told that it was a sense of fidelity 
 struggling against new love, whilst no less assuring 
 as to his ultimate victory, it might have entirely ab- 
 stracted the wish to secure it. 
 231 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 At the same time a slight constraint of manner was 
 visible between them for the remainder of the afternoon. 
 The tide turned, and they were obliged to ascend to 
 higher ground. The day gUded on to its end with the 
 usual quiet dreamy passivity of such occasions — when 
 every deed done and thing thought is in endeavouring 
 to avoid doing and thinking more. Looking idly over 
 the verge of a crag, they beheld their stone dining-table 
 gradually being splashed upon and their crumbs and 
 fragments all washed away by the incoming sea. The 
 vicar drew a moral lesson from the scene; Knight 
 replied in the same satisfied strain. And then the 
 waves rolled in furiously — the neutral green-and-blue 
 tongues of water slid up the slopes, and were metamor- 
 phosed into foam by a careless blow, falling back white 
 and faint, and leaving trailing followers behind. 
 
 The passing of a heavy shower was the next scene — 
 driving them to shelter in a shallow cave — after which 
 the horses were put in, and they started to return 
 homeward. By the time they reached the higher levels 
 the sky had again cleared, and the sunset rays glanced 
 directly upon the wet uphill road they had climbed. 
 The ruts formed by their carriage-wheels on the ascent 
 — a pair of Liliputian canals — were as shining bars of 
 gold, tapering to nothing in the distance. Upon this also 
 they turned their backs, and night spread over the sea. 
 
 The evening was chUly, and there was no moon. 
 Knight sat close to Elfride, and, when the darkness 
 rendered the position of a person a matter of uncer- 
 tainty, particularly close. Elfride edged away. 
 
 ' I hope you allow me my place ungrudgingly ? ' he 
 whispered. 
 
 ' Oh yes ; 'tis the least I can do in common civility,' 
 she said, accenting the words so that he might recognize 
 them as his own returned. 
 
 Both of them felt delicately balanced between two 
 possibilities. Thus they reached home. 
 232 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 To Knight this mild experience was delightful. It 
 was to him a gentle innocent time — a time which, 
 though there may not be much in it, seldom repeats 
 itself in a man's life, and has a peculiar dearness when 
 glanced at retrospectively. He is not inconveniently 
 deep in love, and is lulled by a peaceful sense of being 
 able to enjoy the most trivial thing with a childlike 
 enjoyment. The movement of a wave, the colour of 
 a stone, anything, was enough for Knight's drowsy 
 thoughts of that day to precipitate themselves upon. 
 Even the sermonizing platitudes the vicar had delivered 
 himself of — chiefly because something seemed to be 
 professionally required of him in the presence of a man 
 of Knight's proclivities — were swallowed whole. The 
 presence of Elfride led him not merely to tolerate that 
 kind of talk from the necessities of ordinary courtesy ; 
 but he listened to it — took in the ideas with an enjoy- 
 able make-believe that they were proper and necessary, 
 and indulged in a conservative feeling that the face of 
 things was complete. 
 
 Entering her room that evening Elfride found a 
 packet for herself on the dressing-table. How it came 
 there she did not know. She tremblingly undid the 
 folds of white paper that covered it. Yes ; it was the 
 treasure of a morocco case, containing those treasures 
 of ornament she had refused in the daytime. 
 
 Elfride dressed herself in them for a moment, looked 
 at herself in the glass, blushed red, and put them away. 
 They filled her dreams all that night. Never had she 
 seen anything so lovely, and never was it more clear 
 that as an honest woman she was in duty bound to 
 refuse them. Why it was not equally clear to her that 
 duty required more vigorous co-ordinate conduct as 
 well, let those who dissect her say. 
 
 The next morning glared in like a spectre upon 
 her. It was Stephen's letter-day, and she was bound 
 to meet the postman — to stealthily do a deed she 
 233 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 had never liked, to secure an end she now had ceased 
 to desire. 
 
 But she went. 
 
 There were two letters. 
 
 One was from the bank at St. Launce's, in which she 
 had a small private deposit — probably something about 
 interest. She put that in her pocket for a moment, and 
 going indoors and upstairs to be safer from observation, 
 tremblingly opened Stephen's. 
 
 What was this he said to her ? 
 
 She was to go to the St. Launce's Bank and take 
 a sum of money which they had received private advices 
 to pay her. 
 
 The sum was two hundred pounds. 
 
 There was no check, order, or anything of the 
 nature of guarantee. In fact the information amounted 
 to this : the money was now in the St. Launce's Bank, 
 standing in her name. 
 
 She instantly opened the other letter. It contained 
 a deposit-note from the bank for the sum of two 
 hundred pounds which had that day been added to 
 her account. Stephen's information, then, was correct, 
 and the transfer made. 
 
 ' I have saved this in one year,' Stephen's letter 
 went on to say, ' and what so proper as well as pleasant 
 for me to do as to hand it over to you to keep for 
 your use ? I have plenty for myself, independently 
 of this. Should you not be disposed to let it lie idle 
 in the bank, get your father to invest it in your name 
 on good security. It is a little present to you from 
 your more than betrothed. He will, I think, Elfride, 
 feel now that my pretensions to your hand are any- 
 thing but the dream of a silly boy not worth rational 
 consideration.' 
 
 With a natural delicacy, Elfride, in mentioning her 
 father's marriage, had refrained from all allusion to the 
 pecuniary resources of the lady. 
 234 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 Leaving this matter-of-fact subject, he went on, 
 somewhat after his boyish manner : 
 
 • Do you remember, darling, that first morning of my 
 arrival at your house, when your father read at prayers 
 the miracle of healing the sick of the palsy — where he 
 is told to take up his bed and walk ? I do, and I can 
 now so well realize the force of that passage. The 
 smallest piece of mat is the bed of the Oriental, and 
 yesterday I saw a native perform the very action, which 
 reminded me to mention it. But you are better read 
 than I, and perhaps you knew all this long ago. . . . 
 One day I bought some small native idols to send home 
 to you as curiosities, but afterwards finding they had 
 been cast in England, made to look old, and shipped 
 over, I threw them away in disgust. 
 
 ' Speaking of this reminds me that we are obliged to 
 import all our house-building ironwork from England. 
 Never was such foresight required to be exercised in 
 building houses as here. Before we begin, we have 
 to order every column, lock, hinge, and screw that will 
 be required. We cannot go into the next street, as 
 in London, and get them cast at a minute's notice. 
 Mr. L. says somebody will have to go to England very 
 soon and superintend the selection of a large order of 
 this kind. I only wish I may be the man.' 
 
 There before her lay the deposit-receipt for the two 
 hundred pounds, and beside it the elegant present of 
 Knight. Elfride grew cold — then her cheeks felt 
 heated by beating blood. If by destroying the piece 
 of paper the whole transaction could have been with- 
 drawn from her experience, she would willingly have 
 sacrificed the money it represented. She did not know 
 what to do in either case. She almost feared to let 
 the two articles lie in juxtaposition : so antagonistic 
 were the interests they represented that a miraculous 
 repulsion of one by the other was almost to be expected. 
 
 That day she was seen little of. By the evening 
 235 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 she had come to a resolution, and acted upon it. 
 The packet was sealed up — with a tear of regret as 
 she closed the case upon the pretty forms it con- 
 tained — directed, and placed upon the writing-table in 
 Knight's room. And a letter was written to Stephen, 
 stating that as yet she hardly understood her position 
 with regard to the money sent ; but declaring that she 
 was ready to fulfil her promise to marry him. After 
 this letter had been written she delayed posting it — 
 although never ceasing to feel strenuously that the 
 deed must be done. 
 
 Several days passed. There was another Indian 
 letter for Elfride. Coming unexpectedly, her father 
 saw it, but made no remark — why, she could not tell. 
 The news this time was absolutely overwhelming. 
 Stephen, as he had wished, had been actually chosen 
 as the most fitting to execute the iron-work commission 
 he had alluded to as impending. This duty completed 
 he would have three months' leave. His letter con- 
 tinued that he should follow it in a week, and should 
 take the opportunity to plainly ask her father to per- 
 mit the engagement. Then came a page expressive of 
 his delight and hers at the reunion; and finally, the 
 information that he would write to the shipping agents, 
 asking them to telegraph and tell her when the ship 
 bringing him home should be in sight — knowing how 
 acceptable such information would be. 
 
 Elfride lived and moved now as in a dream. Knight 
 had at first become almost angry at her persistent 
 refusal of his offering — and no less with the manner 
 than the fact of it. But he saw that she began to 
 look worn and ill — and his vexation lessened to simple 
 perplexity. 
 
 He ceased now to remain in the house for long 
 hours together as before, but made it a mere centre for 
 antiquarian and geological excursions in the neighbour- 
 hood. Throw up his cards and go away he fain would 
 236 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 have done, but could not. And, thus, availing himself 
 of the privileges of a relative, he went in and out the 
 premises as fancy led him — but still lingered on. 
 
 ' I don't wish to stay here another day if my presence 
 is distasteful,' he said one afternoon. ' At first you 
 used to imply that I was severe with you ; and when I 
 am kind you treat me unfairly.' 
 
 ' No, no. Don't say so.' 
 
 The origin of their acquaintanceship had been such 
 as to render their manner towards each other peculiar 
 and uncommon. It was of a kind to cause them to 
 speak out their minds on any feelings of objection and 
 difference : to be reticent on gentler matters. 
 
 ' I have a good mind to go away and never trouble 
 you again,' continued Knight. 
 
 She said nothing, but the eloquent expression of 
 her eyes and wan face was enough to reproach him 
 for harshness. 
 
 ' Do you like me to be here, then ? ' inquired Knight 
 gently. 
 
 ' Yes,' she said. Fidelity to the old love and truth 
 to the new were ranged on opposite sides, and truth 
 virtuelessly prevailed. 
 
 ' Then I'll stay a little longer,' said Knight. 
 
 ' Don't be vexed if I keep by myself a good deal, 
 will you? Perhaps something may happen, and I may 
 tell you something.' 
 
 ' Mere coyness,' said Knight to himself; and went 
 away with a lighter heart. The trick of reading truly 
 the enigmatical forces at work in women at given times, 
 which with some men is an unerring instinct, is peculiar 
 to minds less direct and honest than Knight's. 
 
 The next evening, about five o'clock, before Knight 
 had returned from a pilgrimage along the shore, a man 
 walked up to the house. He was a messenger from 
 Camelton, a town a few miles off, to which place the 
 railway had been advanced during the summer. 
 237' 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 'A telegram for Miss Swancourt, and three and 
 sixpence to pay for the special messenger.' 
 
 Miss Swancourt sent out the money, signed the paper, 
 and opened her letter with a trembling hand. She read : 
 
 'Johnson, Liverpool, to Miss Swancourt, Endelstow, 
 near Castle Boterel. 
 
 'Amaryllis telegraphed off Holyhead, four d clock. 
 Expect will dock and land passengers at Cannings Basin 
 ten o'clock to-morrow morning.' 
 
 Her father called her into the study. 
 ' Elfride, who sent you that message ? ' he asked 
 suspiciously. 
 ' Johnson.' 
 
 ' Who is Johnson, for Heaven's sake ? ' 
 ' I don't know.' 
 
 ' The deuce you don't ! Who is to know, then ? ' 
 ' I have never heard of him till now.' 
 ' That's a singular story, isn't it.' 
 ' I don't know.' 
 
 ' Come, come, miss ! What was the telegram ? ' 
 ' Do you really wish to know, papa ? ' 
 
 • Well, I do.' 
 
 ' Remember, I am a full-grown woman now.' 
 
 ' Well, what then ? ' 
 
 ' Being a woman, and not a child, I may, I think, 
 have a secret or two.' 
 
 ' You will, it seems.' 
 
 ' Women have, as a rule.' 
 
 ' But don't keep them. So speak out.' 
 
 ' If you will not press me now, I give my word to 
 tell you the meaning of all this before the week is past.' 
 
 ' On your honour ? * 
 
 • On my honour.' 
 
 'Very well. I have had a certain suspicion, you 
 238 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 know ; and I shall be glad to find it false. I don't 
 like your manner lately.' 
 
 ' At the end of the week, I said, papa.' 
 
 Her father did not reply, and Elfride left the room. 
 
 She began to look out for the postman again. 
 Three mornings later he brought an inland letter from 
 Stephen. It contained very little matter, having been 
 written in haste; but the meaning was bulky enough. 
 Stephen said that, having executed a commission in 
 Liverpool, he should arrive at his father's house. East 
 Endelstow, at five or six o'clock that same evening; 
 that he would after dusk walk on to the next village, 
 and meet her, if she would, in the church porch, as in 
 the old time. He proposed this plan because he 
 thought it unadvisable to call formally at her house so 
 late in the evening; yet he could not sleep without 
 having seen her. The minutes would seem hours till 
 he clasped her in his arms. 
 
 Elfride was still steadfast in her opinion that honour 
 compelled her to meet him. Probably the very longing to 
 avoid him lent additional weight to the conviction ; for she 
 was markedly one of those who sigh for the unattainable 
 — to whom, superlatively, a hope is pleasing because not 
 a possession. And she knew it so well that her intel- 
 lect was inclined to exaggerate this defect in herself. 
 
 So during the day she looked her duty steadfastly in 
 the face ; read Wordsworth's astringent yet depressing 
 ode to that Deity ; committed herself to her guidance ; 
 and still felt the weight of chance desires. 
 
 But she began to take a melancholy pleasure in 
 contemplating the sacrifice of herself to the man whom 
 a maidenly sense of propriety compelled her to regard 
 as her only possible husband. She would meet him, 
 and do all that lay in her power to marry him. To 
 guard against a relapse, a note was at once despatched 
 to his father's cottage for Stephen on his arrival, fixing 
 an hour for the interview. 
 
 239 
 
XXI 
 
 ' On thy cold grey stones, O sea ! ' 
 
 OTEPHEN had said that he should come by way of 
 Bristol, and thence by a steamer to Castle Boterel, in 
 order to avoid the long journey over the hills from St. 
 Launce's. He did not know of the extension of the 
 railway to Camelton. 
 
 During the afternoon a thought occurred to Elfride, 
 that from any cliff along the shore it would be possible 
 to see the steamer some hours before its arrival. 
 
 She had accumulated religious force enough to do 
 an act of supererogation. The act was this — to go to 
 some point of land and watch for the ship that brought 
 her future husband home. 
 
 It was a cloudy afternoon. Elfride was often 
 diverted from a purpose by a dull sky; and though 
 she used to persuade herself that the weather was as 
 fine as possible on the other side of the clouds, she 
 could not bring about any practical result from this 
 fancy. Now, her mood was such that the humid sky 
 harmonized with it. 
 
 Having ascended and passed over a hill behind the 
 house, Elfride came to a small stream. She used it 
 as a guide to the coast. It was smaller than that in 
 240 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 her own valley, and flowed altogether at a higher level. 
 Bushes lined the slopes of its shallow trough^ but at 
 the bottom, where the water ran, was a soft green 
 carpet, in a strip two or three yards wide. 
 
 In winter, the water flowed over the grass ; in 
 summer, as now, it trickled along a channel in the 
 midst. 
 
 Elfride had a sensation of eyes regarding her from 
 somewhere. She turned, and there was Mr. Knight. 
 He had dropped into the valley from the side of the 
 hill. She felt a thrill of pleasure, and rebelliously 
 allowed it to exist. 
 
 ' What utter loneliness to find you in ! ' 
 
 ' I am going to the shore by tracking the stream. 
 I believe it empties itself not far off", in a silver thread 
 of water, over a cascade of great height.' 
 
 ' Why do you load yourself with that heavy tele- 
 scope ? ' 
 
 ' To look over the sea with it,' she said faintly. 
 
 ' I'll carry it for you to your journey's end.' And 
 he took the glass from her unresisting hands. ' It 
 cannot be half a mile further. See, there is the water.' 
 He pointed to a short fragment of level muddy-gray 
 colour, cutting against the sky. 
 
 Elfride had already scanned the small surface of 
 ocean visible, and had seen no ship. 
 
 They walked along in company, sometimes with the 
 brook between them — for it was no wider than a man's 
 stride — sometimes close together. The green carpet 
 grew swampy, and they kept higher up. 
 
 One of the two ridges between which they walked 
 dwindled lower and became insignificant. That on 
 the right hand rose with their advance, and terminated 
 in a clearly defined edge against the light, as if it were 
 abruptly sawn off. A little further, and the bed of 
 the rivulet ended in the same fashion. 
 
 They had come to a bank breast-high, and over it 
 241 Q 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 the valley was no longer to be seen. It was withdrawn 
 cleanly and completely. In its place was sky and 
 boundless atmosphere; and perpendicularly down be- 
 neath them — small and far off — lay the corrugated 
 surface of the Atlantic. 
 
 The small stream here found its death. Running 
 over the precipice it was dispersed in spray before it 
 was half-way down, and falling like rain upon project- 
 ing ledges, made minute grassy meadows of them. At 
 the bottom the water-drops soaked away amid the 
 ddbris of the cliff. This was the inglorious end of 
 the river. 
 
 ' What are you looking for ? ' said Knight, following 
 the direction of her eyes. 
 
 She was gazing hard at a black object — nearer to 
 the shore than to the horizon — from the summit of 
 which came a nebulous haze, stretching like gauze 
 over the sea. 
 
 ' The Puffin, a little summer steamboat — from Bristol 
 to Castle Boterel,' she said. ' I think that is it — look. 
 Will you give me the glass ? ' 
 
 Knight pulled open the old-fashioned but powerful 
 telescope, and handed it to Elfride, who had looked 
 on with heavy eyes. 
 
 ' I can't keep it up now,' she said. 
 
 ' Rest it on my shoulder.' 
 
 ' It is too high.' 
 
 ' Under my arm.' 
 
 'Too low. You may look instead,' she murmured 
 weakly. 
 
 Knight raised the glass to his eye, and swept the 
 sea till the Puffin entered its field. 
 
 ' Yes, it is tlie Puffin — a tiny craft. I can see her 
 figure-head distinctly — a bird with a beak as big as its 
 head.' 
 
 ' Can you see the deck ? ' 
 
 'Wait a minute; yes, pretty clearly. And I can 
 242 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 see the black forms of the passengers against its white 
 surface. One of them has taken something from 
 another — a glass, I think — yes, it is — and he is level- 
 ling it in this direction. Depend upon it we are con- 
 spicuous objects against the sky to them. Now, it 
 seems to rain upon them, and they put on overcoats 
 and open umbrellas. They vanish and go below — all 
 but that one who has borrowed the glass. He is a 
 slim young fellow, and still watches us.' 
 
 Elfride grew pale, and shifted her little feet uneasily. 
 
 Knight lowered the glass. 
 
 ' I think we had better return,' he said. ' That 
 cloud which is raining on them may soon reach us. 
 Why, you look ill. How is that ? ' 
 
 ' Something in the air affects my face.' 
 
 ' Those fair cheeks are very fastidious, I fear,' re- 
 turned Knight tenderly. 'This air would make those 
 rosy that were never so before, one would think — eh, 
 Nature's spoilt child ? ' 
 
 Elfride's colour returned again. 
 
 'There is more to see behind us, after all,' said 
 Knight. 
 
 She turned her back upon the boat and Stephen 
 Smith, and saw, towering still higher than themselves, 
 the vertical face of the hill on the right, which did not 
 project seaward so far as the bed of the valley, but 
 formed the back of a small cove, and so was visible 
 like a concave wall, bending round from their position 
 towards the left. 
 
 The composition of the huge hill was revealed to its 
 backbone and marrow here at its rent extremity. It 
 consisted of a vast stratification of blackish-gray slate, 
 unvaried in its whole height by a single change of 
 shade. 
 
 It is with cliffs and mountains as with persons; 
 they have what is called a presence, which is not 
 necessarily proportionate to their actual bulk.' A little 
 243 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 cliff will impress you powerfully; a great one not at 
 all. It depends, as with man, upon the countenance of 
 the cliff. 
 
 ' I cannot bear to look at that cliff,' said Elfride. 
 ' It has a horrid personality, and makes me shudder. 
 We will go.' 
 
 ' Can you climb ? ' said Knight. ' If so, we will 
 ascend by that path over the grim old fellow's brow.' 
 
 ' Try me,' said Elfride disdainfully. ' I have 
 ascended steeper slopes than that.' 
 
 From where they had been loitering, a grassy path 
 wound along inside a bank, placed as a safeguard for 
 unwary pedestrians, to the top of the precipice, and 
 over it along the hill in an inland direction. 
 
 ■ Take my arm, Miss Swancourt,' said Knight. 
 ' I can get on better without it, thank you.' 
 
 When they were one quarter of the way up, Elfride 
 stopped to take breath. Knight stretched out his hand. 
 
 She took it, and they ascended the remaining slope 
 together. Reaching the very top, they sat down to 
 rest by mutual consent. 
 
 ■ Heavens, what an altitude ! ' said Knight between 
 his pants, and looking far over the sea. The cascade 
 at the bottom of the slope appeared a mere span in 
 height from where they were now. 
 
 Elfride was looking to the left. The steamboat was 
 in full view again, and by reason of the vast sur- 
 face of sea their higher position uncovered it seemed 
 almost close to the shore. 
 
 ' Over that edge,' said Knight, ' where nothing but 
 vacancy appears, is a moving compact mass. The wind 
 strikes the face of the rock, runs up it, rises like a 
 fountain to a height far above our heads, curls over us 
 in an arch, and disperses behind us. In fact, an in- 
 verted cascade is there — as perfect as the Niagara Falls 
 — but rising instead of falling, and air instead of water. 
 Now look here.' 
 
 244 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 Knight threw a stone over the bank, aiming it as if 
 to go onward over the cliff. Reaching the verge, it 
 towered into the air like a bird, turned back, and 
 alighted on the ground behind them. They themselves 
 were in a dead calm. 
 
 'A boat crosses Niagara immediately at the foot of 
 the falls, where the water is quite still, the fallen mass 
 curving under it. We are in precisely the same posi- 
 tion with regard to our atmospheric cataract here. If 
 you run back from the cliff fifty yards, you will be in a 
 brisk wind. Now I daresay over the bank is a little 
 backward current.' 
 
 Knight rose and leant over the bank. No sooner 
 was his head above it than his hat appeared to be 
 sucked from his head — slipping over his forehead in 
 a seaward direction. 
 
 ' That's the backward eddy, as I told you,' he cried, 
 and vanished over the little bank after his hat. 
 
 Elfride waited one minute ; he did not return. She 
 waited another, and there was no sign of him. 
 
 A few drops of rain fell, then a sudden shower. 
 
 She arose, and looked over the bank. On the 
 other side were two or three yards of level ground — 
 then a short steep preparatory slope — then the verge 
 of the precipice. 
 
 On the slope was Knight, his hat on his head. He 
 was on his hands and knees, trpng to climb back to 
 the level ground. The rain had wetted the shaly sur- 
 face of the incline. A slight superficial wetting of the 
 soil hereabout made it far more slippery to stand on 
 than the same soil thoroughly drenched. The inner 
 substance was still hard, and was lubricated by the moist- 
 ened film. 
 
 ' I find a difficulty in getting back,' said Knight. 
 
 Elfride's heart fell like lead. 
 
 ' But you can get back ? ' she wildly inquired. 
 
 Knight strove with all his might for two or three 
 245 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 minutes, and the drops of perspiration began to bead 
 his brow. 
 
 ' No, I am unable to do it,' he answered. 
 
 Elfride, by a wrench of thought, forced away from 
 her mind the sensation that Knight was in bodily 
 danger. But attempt to help him she must. She 
 ventured upon the treacherous incline, propped her- 
 self with the closed telescope, and gave him her hand 
 before he saw her movements. 
 
 ' O Elfride ! why did you ? ' said he. ' I am afraid 
 you have only endangered yourself.' 
 
 And as if to prove his statement, in making an 
 endeavour by her assistance they both slipped lower, 
 and then he was again stayed. His foot was propped 
 by a bracket of quartz rock, balanced on the verge of 
 the precipice. Fixed by this, he steadied her, her 
 head being about a foot below the beginning of the 
 slope. Elfride had dropped the glass ; it rolled to the 
 edge and vanished over it into a nether sky. 
 
 ' Hold tightly to me,' he said. 
 
 She flung her arms round his neck with such a 
 firm grasp that whilst he remained it was impossible 
 for her to fall. 
 
 ' Don't be flurried,' Knight continued. ' So long as 
 we stay above this block we are perfectly safe. Wait a 
 moment whilst I consider what we had better do.' 
 
 He turned bis eyes to the dizzy depths beneath them, 
 and surveyed the position of affairs. 
 
 Two glances told him a tale with ghastly distinctness. 
 It was that, unless they performed their feat of getting 
 up the slope with the precision of machines, they were 
 over the edge and whirling in mid-air. 
 
 For this purpose it was necessary that he should 
 recover the breath and strength which his previous 
 efforts had cost him. So he still waited, and looked 
 in the face of the enemy. 
 
 The crest of this terrible natural fafade passe^ 
 246 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 among the neighbouring inhabitants as being seven 
 hundred feet above the water it overhung. It had 
 been proved by actual measurement to be not a foot 
 less than six hundred and fifty. 
 
 That is to say, it is nearly three times the height of 
 Flamborough, half as high again as the South Foreland, 
 a hundred feet higher than Beachy Head — the loftiest 
 promontory on the east or south side of this island — 
 twice the height of St. Aldhelm's, thrice as high as 
 the Lizard, and just double the height of St. Bee's. 
 One sea-bord point on the western coast is known 
 to surpass it in altitude, but only by a few feet. This 
 is Great Orme's Head, in Caernarvonshire. 
 
 And it must be remembered that the cliff exhibits 
 an intensifying feature which some of those are without 
 — sheer perpendicularity from the half-tide level. 
 
 Yet this remarkable rampart forms no headland : 
 it rather walls in an inlet — the promontory on each 
 side being much lower. Thus, far from being salient, 
 its horizontal section is concave. The sea, rolling 
 direct from the shores of North America, has in fact 
 eaten a chasm into the middle of a hill, and the giant, 
 embayed and unobtrusive, stands in the rear of pigmy 
 supporters. Not least singularly, neither hill, chasm, 
 nor precipice has a name. On this account I will call 
 the precipice the Cliff without a Name.* 
 
 What gave an added terror to its height was its 
 blackness. And upon this dark face the beating of 
 ten thousand west winds had formed a kind of bloom, 
 which had a visual effect not unlike that of a Hambro' 
 grape. Moreover it seemed to float off into the atmo- 
 sphere, and inspire terror through the lungs. 
 
 • This piece of quartz, supporting my feet, is on the 
 very nose of the cliff,' said Knight, breaking the silence 
 after his rigid stoical meditation. ' Now what you are 
 
 * See Preface. 
 247 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 to do is this. Clamber up my body till your feet are 
 on my shoulders : when you are there you will, I think, 
 be able to climb on to level ground.' 
 
 ' What will you do ? ' 
 
 ' Wait whilst you run for assistance.' 
 
 ' I ought to have done that in the first place, ought 
 I not ? ' 
 
 ' I was in the act of slipping, and should have 
 reached no stand-point without your weight, in all 
 probability. But don't let us talk. Be brave, Elfride, 
 and climb.' 
 
 She prepared to ascend, saying, ' This is the moment 
 I anticipated when on the tower. I thought it would 
 come ! ' 
 
 'This is not a time for superstition,' said Knight. 
 ' Dismiss all that.' 
 
 ' I will,' she said humbly. 
 
 ' Now put your foot into my hand : next the other. 
 That's good — well done. Hold to my shoulder.' 
 
 She placed her feet upon the stirrup he made of his 
 hand, and was high enough to get a view of the natural 
 surface of the hill over the bank. 
 
 ' Can you now climb on to level ground ? ' 
 
 ' I am afraid not. I will try.' 
 
 ' What can you see ? ' 
 
 ' The sloping common.' 
 
 ' What upon it ? ' 
 
 ' Purple heather and some grass.' 
 
 ' Nothing more — no man or human being of any 
 kind ? ' 
 
 ' Nobody.' 
 
 ' Now try to get higher in this way. You see that 
 tuft of sea-pink above you. Get that well into your 
 hand, but don't trust to it entirely. Then step upon 
 my shoulder, and I think you will reach the top.' 
 
 With trembling limbs she did exactly as he told her. 
 The preternatural quiet and solemnity of his manner 
 248 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 overspread upon herself, and gave her a courage not 
 her own. She made a spring from the top of his 
 shoulder, and was up. 
 
 Then she turned to look at him. 
 
 By an ill fate, the force downwards of her bound, 
 added to his own weight, had been too much for the 
 block of quartz upon which his feet depended. It was, 
 indeed, originally an igneous protrusion into the enor- 
 mous masses of black strata, which had since been worn 
 away from the sides of the alien fragment by cen- 
 turies of frost and rain, and now left it without much 
 support. 
 
 It moved. Knight seized a tuft of sea-pink with 
 each hand. 
 
 The quartz rock which had been his salvation was 
 worse than useless now. It rolled over, out of sight, 
 and away into the same nether sky that had engulfed 
 the telescope. 
 
 One of the tufts by which he held came out at the 
 root, and Knight began to follow the quartz. It was 
 a terrible moment. Elfride uttered a low wild wail 
 of agony, bowed her head, and covered her face with 
 her hands. 
 
 Between the turf-covered slope and the gigantic 
 perpendicular rock intervened a weather-worn series of 
 jagged edges, forming a face yet steeper than the former 
 slope. As he slowly slid inch by inch upon these. 
 Knight made a last desperate dash at the lowest tuft of 
 vegetation — the last outlying knot of starved herbage 
 ere the rock appeared in all its bareness. It arrested 
 his further descent. Knight was now literally sus- 
 pended by his arms ; but the incline of the brow being 
 what engineers would call about a quarter in one, it 
 was sufficient to relieve his arms of a portion of his 
 weight, but was very far from offering an adequately flat 
 face to support him. 
 
 In spite of this dreadful tension of body and mind, 
 R 249 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 Knight found time for a moment of thankfulness. 
 Elfride was safe. 
 
 She lay on her side above him — her fingers clasped. 
 Seeing him again steady, she jumped upon her feet. 
 
 ' Now, if I can only save you by running for help ! ' 
 she cried. ' Oh, I would have died instead ! Why did 
 you try so hard to deliver me ? ' And she turned away 
 wildly to run for assistance. 
 
 ' Elfride, how long will it take you to run to Endel- 
 stow and back ? ' 
 
 ' Three-quarters of an hour.' 
 
 ' That won't do ; my hands will not hold out ten 
 minutes. And is there nobody nearer ? ' 
 
 ' No ; unless a chance passer may happen to be.' 
 
 ' He would have nothing with him that could save 
 me. Is there a pole or stick of any kind on the 
 common ? ' 
 
 She gazed around. The common was bare of every- 
 thing but heather and grass. 
 
 A minute — perhaps more time — was passed in mute 
 thought by both. On a sudden the blank and helpless 
 agony left her face. She vanished over the bank from 
 his sight. 
 
 Knight felt himself in the presence of a personalized 
 loneliness. 
 
XXII 
 
 " A woman's way.* 
 
 rxAGGARD cliffs, of every ugly altitude, are as 
 common as sea-fowl along the line of coast between 
 Exmoor and Land's End; but this outflanked and 
 encompassed specimen was the ugliest of them all. 
 Their summits are not safe places for scientific experi- 
 ment on the principles of air-currents, as Knight had 
 now found, to his dismay. 
 
 He still clutched the face of the escarpment — not 
 with the frenzied hold of despair, but with a dogged 
 determination to make the most of his every jot of 
 endurance, and so give the longest possible scope to 
 Elfride's intentions, whatever they might be. 
 
 He reclined hand in hand with the world in its 
 infancy. Not a blade, not an insect, which spoke of 
 the present, was between him and the past. The 
 inveterate antagonism of these black precipices to all 
 strugglers for hfe is in no way more forcibly suggested 
 than by the paucity of tufts of grass, lichens, or confervae 
 on their outermost ledges. 
 
 Knight pondered on the meaning of Elfride's hasty 
 disappearance, but could not avoid an instinctive con- 
 clusion that there existed but a (Jpubtful hope for him. 
 251 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES" 
 
 As far as he could judge, his sole chance of deliverance 
 lay in the possibility of a rope or pole being brought ; 
 and this possibility was remote indeed. The soil upon 
 these high downs was left so untended that they were 
 unenclosed for miles, except by a casual bank or dry 
 wall, and were rarely visited but for the purpose of 
 collecting or counting the flock which found a scanty 
 means of subsistence thereon. 
 
 At first, when death appeared improbable, because 
 it had never visited him before. Knight could think of 
 no future, nor of anything connected with his past. 
 He could only look , sternly at Nature's treacherous 
 attempt to put an end to him, and strive to thwart her. 
 
 From the fact that the cliff formed the inner face 
 of the segment of a huge cylinder, having the sky for a 
 top and the sea for a bottom, which enclosed the cove 
 to the extent of more than a semicircle, he could see 
 the vertical face curving round on each side of him. 
 He looked far down the facade, and realized more 
 thoroughly how it threatened him. Grimness was in 
 every feature, and to its very bowels the inimical shape 
 was desolation. 
 
 By one of those familiar conjunctions of things 
 wherewith the inanimate world baits the mind of man 
 when he pauses in moments of suspense, opposite 
 Knight's eyes was an imbedded fossil, standing forth 
 in low relief from the rock. It was a creature with 
 eyes. The eyes, dead and turned to stone, were even 
 now regarding him. It was one of the early crustaceans 
 called Trilobites. Separated by millions of years in 
 their lives. Knight and this underling seemed to have 
 met in their death. It was the single instance within 
 reach of his vision of anything that had ever been alive 
 and had had a body to save, as he himself had now. 
 
 The creature represented but a low type of animal 
 existence, for never in their vernal years had the plains 
 indicated by those numberless slaty layers been tra- 
 252 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 versed by an intelligence worthy of the name. Zoo- 
 phytes, moUusca, shell-fish, were the highest develop- 
 ments of those ancient dates. The immense lapses of 
 time each formation represented had known nothing of 
 the dignity of man. They were grand times, but they 
 were mean times too, and mean were their relics. He 
 was to be with the small in his death. 
 
 Knight was a geologist ; and such is the supremacy 
 of habit over occasion, as a pioneer of the thoughts of 
 men, that at this dreadful juncture his mind found time 
 to take in, by a momentary sweep, the varied scenes 
 that had had their day between this creature's epoch 
 and his own. There is no place like a cleft landscape 
 for bringing home such imaginings as these. 
 
 Time closed up like a fan before him. He saw him- 
 self at one extremity of the years, face to face with the 
 beginning and all the intermediate centuries simulta- 
 neously. Fierce men, clothed in the hides of beasts, and 
 carrying, for defence and attack, huge clubs and pointed 
 spears, rose from the rock, like the phantoms before the 
 doomed Macbeth. They lived in hollows, woods, and 
 mud huts — perhaps in caves of the neighbouring rocks. 
 Behind them stood an earlier band. No man was there. 
 Huge elephantine forms, the mastodon, the hippopo- 
 tamus, the tapir, antelopes of monstrous size, the mega- 
 therium, and the myledon — all, for the moment, in 
 juxtaposition. Further back, and overlapped by these, 
 were perched huge-billed birds and swinish creatures as 
 large as horses. Still more shadowy were the sinister 
 crocodilian outlines — alligators and other uncouth 
 shapes, culminating in the colossal lizard, the iguanodon. 
 Folded behind were dragon forms and clouds of flying 
 reptiles : still underneath were fishy beings of lower 
 development ; and so on, till the lifetime scenes of the 
 fossil confronting him were a present and modern con- 
 dition of things. These images passed before Knight's 
 inner eye in less than half a minute, and he was again 
 253 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 considering the actual present. Was he to die? The 
 mental picture of Elfride in the world, without himself 
 to cherish her, smote his heart like a whip. He had 
 hoped for deliverance, but what could a girl do ? He 
 dared not move an inch. Was Death really stretching 
 out his hand ? The previous sensation, that it was im- 
 probable he would die, was fainter now. 
 
 However, Knight still clung to the cliff. 
 
 To those musing weather-beaten West-country folk 
 who pass the greater part of their days and nights out 
 of doors. Nature seems to have moods in other than a 
 poetical sense : predilections for certain deeds at certain 
 times, without any apparent law to govern or season 
 to account for them. She is read as a person with a 
 curious temper; as one who does not scatter kind- 
 nesses and cruelties alternately, impartially, and in 
 order, but heartless severities or overwhelming gene- 
 rosities in lawless caprice. Man's case is always that 
 of the prodigal's favourite or the miser's pensioner. 
 In her unfriendly moments there seems a feline fun 
 in her tricks, begotten by a foretaste of her pleasure 
 in swallowing the victim. 
 
 Such a way of thinking had been absurd to Knight, 
 but he began to adopt it now. He was first spitted 
 on to a rock. New tortures followed. The rain in- 
 creased, and persecuted him with an exceptional persis- 
 tency which he was moved to believe owed its cause to 
 the fact that he was in such a wretched state already. 
 An entirely new order of things could be observed in 
 this introduction of rain upon the scene. It rained 
 upwards instead of down. The strong ascending air 
 carried the rain-drops with it in its race up the escarp- 
 ment, coming to him with such velocity that they stuck 
 into his flesh like cold needles. Each drop was virtually 
 a shaft, and it pierced him to his skin. The water- 
 shafts seemed to lift him on their points : no downward 
 rain ever had such a torturing effect. In a brief space 
 
 254 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 he was drenched, except in two places. These were on 
 the top of his shoulders and on the crown of his hat. 
 
 The wind, though not intense in other situations, 
 was strong here. It tugged at his coat and lifted it. 
 We are mostly accustomed to look upon all opposition 
 which is not animate, as that of the stolid, inexorable 
 hand of indifference, which wears out the patience more 
 than the strength. Here, at any rate, hostility did not 
 assume that slow and sickening form. It was a cosmic 
 agency, active, lashing, eager for conquest : determina- 
 tion ; not an insensate standing in the way. 
 
 Knight had over-estimated the strength of his hands. 
 They were getting weak already. ' She will never come 
 again ; she has been gone ten minutes,' he said to 
 himself. 
 
 This mistake arose from the unusual compression 
 of his experiences just now : she had really been gone 
 but three. 
 
 ' As many more minutes will be my end,' he 
 thought. 
 
 Next came another instance of the incapacity of the 
 mind to make comparisons at such times. 
 
 ' This is a summer afternoon,' he said, ' and there 
 can never have been such a heavy and cold rain on 
 a summer day in my life before.' 
 
 He was again mistaken. The rain was quite ordi- 
 nary in quantity ; the air in temperature. It was, as 
 is usual, the menacing attitude in which they approached 
 him that magnified their powers. 
 
 He again looked straight downwards, the wind and 
 the water-dashes lifting his moustache, scudding up his 
 cheeks, under his eyelids, and into his eyes. This is 
 what he saw down there : the surface of the sea — 
 visually just past his toes, and under his feet ; actually 
 one-eighth of a mile, or more than two hundred yards, 
 below them. We colour according to our moods the 
 objects we survey. The sea would have been a deep 
 255 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 neutral blue, had happier auspices attended the gazer : 
 it was now no otherwise than distinctly black to his 
 vision. That narrow white border was foam, he knew 
 well ; but its boisterous tosses were so distant as to 
 appear a pulsation only, and its plashing was barely 
 audible. A white border to a black sea — his funeral 
 pall and its edging. 
 
 The world was to some extent turned upside down for 
 him. Rain descended from below. Beneath his feet was 
 aerial space and the unknown ; above him was the firm, 
 familiar ground, and upon it all that he loved best. 
 
 Pitiless nature had then two voices, and two only. 
 The nearer was the voice of the wind in his ears rising 
 and falling as it mauled and thrust him hard or softly. 
 The second and distant one was the moan of that un- 
 plummetted ocean below and afar— rubbing its restless 
 flank against the Cliff without a Name. 
 
 Knight perseveringly held fast. Had he any faith 
 in Elfride ? Perhaps. Love is faith, and faith, like a 
 gathered flower, will rootlessly live on. 
 
 Nobody would have expected the sun to shine on 
 such an evening as this. Yet it appeared, low down 
 upon the sea. Not with its natural golden fringe, 
 sweeping the furthest ends of the landscape, not with 
 the strange glare of whiteness which it sometimes puts 
 on as an alternative to colour, but as a splotch of ver- 
 milion red upon a leaden ground — a red face looking 
 on with a drunken leer. 
 
 Most men who have brains know it, and few are so 
 foolish as to disguise this fact from themselves or others, 
 even though an ostentatious display may be called self- 
 conceit. Knight, without showing it much, knew that 
 his intellect was above the average. And he thought — 
 he could not help thinking— that his death would be a 
 deliberate loss to earth of good material ; that such an 
 experiment in killing might have been practised upon 
 some less developed life. 
 
 256 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 A fancy some people hold, when in a bitter mood, 
 is that inexorable circumstance only tries to prevent 
 what intelligence attempts. Renounce a desire for a 
 long-contested position, and go on another tack, and 
 after a while the prize is thrown at you, seemingly in 
 disappointment that no more tantalizing is possible. 
 
 Knight gave up thoughts of life utterly and entirely, 
 and turned to contemplate the Dark Valley and the un- 
 known future beyond. Into the shadowy depths of these 
 speculations we will not follow him. Let it suffice to 
 state what ensued. 
 
 At that moment of taking no more thought for this 
 life, something disturbed the outline of the bank above 
 him. A spot appeared. It was the head of Elfride. 
 
 Knight immediately prepared to welcome life again. 
 
 The expression of a face consigned to utter loneli- 
 ness, when a friend first looks in upon it, is moving 
 in the extreme. In rowing seaward to a light-ship or 
 sea-girt lighthouse, where, without any immediate terror 
 of death, the inmates experience the gloom of mono- 
 tonous seclusion, the grateful eloquence of their counte- 
 nances at the greeting, expressive of thankfulness for 
 the visit, is enough to stir the emotions of the most 
 careless observer. 
 
 Knight's upward look at Elfride was of a nature with, 
 but far* transcending, such an instance as this. The 
 lines of his face had deepened to furrows, and every 
 one of them thanked her visibly. His lips moved to 
 the word ' Elfride,' though the emotion evolved no 
 sound. His eyes passed all description in their com- 
 bination of the whole diapason of eloquence, from 
 lover's deep love to fellow-man's gratitude for a token 
 of remembrance from one of his kind. 
 
 Elfride had come back. What she had come to do 
 he did not know. She could only look on at his death, 
 perhaps. Still, she had come back, and not deserted 
 him utterly, and it was much. 
 
 257 R 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 It was a novelty in the extreme to see Henry Knight, 
 to whom Elfride was but a child, who had swayed her 
 as a tree sways a bird's nest, who mastered her and 
 made her weep most bitterly at her own insignificance, 
 thus thankful for a sight of her face. She looked down 
 upon him, her face glistening with rain and tears. He 
 smiled faintly. 
 
 ' How calm he is ! ' she thought. ' How great and 
 noble he is to be so calm ! ' She would have died ten 
 times for him then. 
 
 The gliding form of the steamboat caught her eye : 
 she heeded it no longer. 
 
 ' How much longer can you wait ? ' came from her 
 pale lips and along the wind to his position. 
 
 ' Four minutes,' said Knight in a weaker voice than 
 her own. 
 
 ' But with a good hope of being saved ? ' 
 
 ' Seven or eight.' 
 
 He now noticed that in her arms she bore a bundle 
 of white linen, and that her form was singularly attenu- 
 ated. So preternaturally thin and flexible was Elfride 
 at this moment, that she appeared to bend under the 
 light blows of the rain-shafts, as they struck into her 
 sides and bosom, and splintered into spray on her 
 face. There is nothing like a thorough drenching for 
 reducing the protuberances of clothes, but Elfride's 
 seemed to cling to her like a glove. 
 
 Without heeding the attack of the clouds further 
 than by raising her hand and wiping away the spirts 
 of rain when they went more particularly into her eyes, 
 she sat down and hurriedly began rending the linen 
 into strips. These she knotted end to end, and after- 
 wards twisted them like the strands of a cord. In a 
 short space of time she had formed a perfect rope by 
 this means, six or seven yards long. 
 
 ' Can you wait while I bind it ? ' she said, anxiously 
 extending her gaze down to him. 
 258 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 'Yes, if not very long. Hope has given me a 
 wonderful instalment of strength.' 
 
 Elfride dropped her eyes again, tore the remaining 
 material into narrow tape-like ligaments, knotted each 
 to each as before, but on a smaller scale, and wound 
 the lengthy string she had thus formed round and 
 round the linen rope, which, without this binding, had 
 a tendency to spread abroad. 
 
 ' Now,' said Knight, who, watching the proceedings 
 intently, had by this time not only grasped her scheme, 
 but reasoned further on, 'I can hold three minutes 
 longer yet. And do you use the time in testing the 
 strength of the knots, one by one.' 
 
 She at once obeyed, tested each singly by putting 
 her foot on the rope between each knot, and pulling 
 with her hands. One of the knots slipped. 
 
 ' Oh, think ! It would have broken but for your 
 forethought,' Elfride exclaimed apprehensively. 
 
 She retied the two ends. The rope was now firm in 
 every part. 
 
 ' When you have let it down,' said Knight, already 
 resuming his position of ruling power, ' go back from 
 the edge of the slope, and over the bank as far as the 
 rope will allow you. Then lean down, and hold the 
 end with both hands.' 
 
 He had first thought of a safer plan for his own 
 deliverance, but it involved the disadvantage of possibly 
 endangering her life. 
 
 ' I have tied it round my waist,' she cried, ' and I 
 will lean directly upon the bank, holding with my 
 hands as well.' 
 
 It was the arrangement he had thought of, but 
 would not suggest. 
 
 ' I will raise and drop it three times when I am 
 behind the bank,' she continued, ' to signify that I am 
 ready. Take care, oh, take the greatest care, I beg 
 you!' 
 
 2S9 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 She dropped the rope over him, to learn how much 
 of its length it would be necessary to expend on that 
 side of the bank, went back, and disappeared as she 
 had done before. 
 
 The rope was trailing by Knight's shoulders. In a 
 few moments it twitched three times. 
 
 He waited yet a second or two, then laid hold. 
 
 The incline of this upper portion of the precipice, 
 to the length only of a few feet, useless to a climber 
 empty-handed, was invaluable now. Not more than 
 half his weight depended entirely on the linen rope. 
 Half a dozen extensions of the arms, alternating with 
 half a dozen seizures of the rope with his feet, brought 
 him up to the level of the soil. 
 
 He was saved, and by Elfride. 
 
 He extended his cramped limbs like an awakened 
 sleeper, and sprang over the bank. 
 
 At sight of him she leapt to her feet with almost 
 a shriek of joy. Knight's eyes met hers, and with 
 supreme eloquence the glance of each told a long- 
 concealed tale of emotion in that short half-moment. 
 Moved by an impulse neither could resist, they ran 
 together and into each other's arms. 
 
 At the moment of embracing, Elfride's eyes invol- 
 untarily flashed towards the Puffin steamboat. It had 
 doubled the point, and was no longer to be seen. 
 
 An overwhelming rush of exultation at having de- 
 livered the man she revered from one of the most 
 terrible forms of death, shook the gentle girl to the 
 centre of her soul. It merged in a defiance of duty to 
 Stephen, and a total recklessness as to plighted faith. 
 Every nerve of her will was now in entire subjection to 
 her feeling — volition as a guiding power had forsaken 
 her. To remain passive, as she remained now, en- 
 circled by his arms, was a sufficiently complete result — 
 a glorious crown to all the years of her life. Perhaps 
 he was only grateful, and did not love her. No matter : 
 260 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 it was infinitely more to be even the slave of the 
 greater than the queen of the less. Some such sensa- 
 tion as this, though it was not recognized as a finished 
 thought, raced along the impressionable soul of Elfride. 
 
 Regarding their attitude, it was impossible for two 
 persons to go nearer to a kiss than went Knight and 
 Elfride during those minutes of impulsive embrace in 
 the pelting rain. Yet they did not kiss. Knight's 
 peculiarity of nature was such that it would not allow 
 him to take advantage of the unguarded and passionate 
 avowal she had tacitly made. 
 
 Elfride recovered herself, and gently struggled to 
 be free. 
 
 He reluctantly relinquished her, and then surveyed 
 her from crown to toe. She seemed as small as an 
 infant. He perceived whence she had obtained the 
 rope. 
 
 ' Elfride, my Elfride ! ' he exclaimed in gratified 
 amazement. 
 
 ' I must leave you now,' she said, her face doubling 
 its red, with an expression between gladness and shame 
 ' You follow me, but at some distance.' 
 
 ' The rain and wind pierce you through ; the chill 
 will kill you. God bless you for such devotion ! Take 
 my coat and put it on.' 
 
 ' No ; I shall get warm running.' 
 
 Elfride had absolutely nothing between her and the 
 weather but her exterior robe or ' costume.' The door 
 had been made upon a woman's wit, and it had found 
 its way out. Behind the bank, whilst Knight reclined 
 upon the dizzy slope waiting for death, she had taken 
 off her whole clothing, and replaced only her outer 
 bodice and skirt. Every thread of the remainder lay 
 upon the ground in the form of a woollen and cotton 
 rope. 
 
 ' I am used to being wet through,' she added. ' I 
 have been drenched on Pansy dozens of times. Gogd- 
 261 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 bye till we meet, clothed and in our right minds, by the 
 fireside at home ! ' 
 
 She then ran ofT from him through the pelting rain 
 like a hare ; or more like a pheasant when, scampering 
 away with a lowered tail, it has a mind to fly, but does 
 not. Elfride was soon out of sight. 
 
 Knight felt uncomfortably wet and chilled, but 
 glowing with fervour nevertheless. He fully appreci- 
 ated Elfride's girlish delicacy in refusing his escort in 
 the meagre habiliments she wore, yet felt that necessary 
 abstraction of herself for a short half-hour as a most 
 grievous loss to him. 
 
 He gathered up her knotted and twisted plumage of 
 linen, lace, and embroidery work, and laid it across his 
 arm. He noticed on the ground an envelope, limp 
 and wet. In endeavouring to restore this to its proper 
 shape, he loosened from the envelope a piece of paper 
 it had contained, which was seized by the wind in 
 falling from Knight's hand. It was blown to the right, 
 blown to the left — it floated to the edge of the cliff" and 
 over the sea, where it was hurled aloft. It twirled in 
 the air, and then flew back over his head. 
 
 Knight followed the paper, and secured it. Having 
 done so, he looked to discover if it had been worth 
 securing. 
 
 The troublesome sheet was a banker's receipt for 
 two hundred pounds, placed to the credit of Miss 
 Swancourt, which the impractical girl had totally for- 
 gotten she carried with her. 
 
 Knight folded it as carefully as its moist condition 
 would allow, put it in his pocket, and followed Elfride, 
 
XXIII 
 
 'Should auld acquaintance be forgot?' 
 
 JjY this time Stephen Smith had stepped out upon 
 the quay at Castle Boterel, and breathed his native air. 
 
 A darker skin, a more pronounced moustache, and 
 an incipient beard, were the chief additions and changes 
 noticeable in his appearance. 
 
 In spite of the falUng rain, which had somewhat 
 lessened, he took a small valise in his hand, and, leav- 
 ing the remainder of his luggage at the inn, ascended 
 the hills towards East Endelstow. This place lay in a 
 vale of its own, further inland than the west village, 
 and though so near it, had little of physical feature in 
 common with the latter. East Endelstow was more 
 wooded and fertile : it boasted of Lord Luxellian's 
 mansion and park, and was free from those bleak open 
 uplands which lent such an air of desolation to the 
 vicinage of the coast — always excepting the small valley 
 in which stood the vicarage and Mrs. Swancourt's old 
 house, The Crags. 
 
 Stephen had arrived nearly at the summit of the 
 
 ridge when the rain again increased its volume, and, 
 
 looking about for temporary shelter, he ascended a 
 
 steep path which penetrated dense hazel bushes in the 
 
 263 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 lower part of its course. Further up it emerged upon a 
 ledge immediately over the turnpike-road, and sheltered 
 by an overhanging face of rubble rock, with bushes 
 above. For a reason of his own he made this spot his 
 refuge from the storm, and turning his face to the left, 
 conned the landscape as a book. 
 
 He was overlooking the valley containing Elfride's 
 residence. 
 
 From this point of observation the prospect exhibited 
 the peculiarity of being either brilliant foreground or the 
 subdued tone of distance, a sudden dip in the surface of 
 the country lowering out of sight all the intermediate 
 prospect. In apparent contact with the trees and 
 bushes growing close beside him appeared the distant 
 tract, terminated suddenly by the brink of the series of 
 cliffs which culminated in the tall giant without a name 
 — small and unimportant as here beheld. A leaf on a 
 bough at Stephen's elbow blotted out a whole hill in the 
 contrasting district far away; a green bunch of nuts 
 covered a complete upland there, and the great cliff 
 itself was outvied by a pigmy crag in the bank hard by 
 him. Stephen had looked upon these things hundreds 
 of times before to-day, but he had never viewed them 
 with such tenderness as now. 
 
 Stepping forward in this direction yet a little further, 
 he could see the tower of West Endelstow Church, be- 
 neath which he was to meet his Elfride that night. And 
 at the same time he noticed, coming over the hill from 
 the cliffs, a white speck in motion. It seemed first to 
 be a sea-gull flying low, but ultimately proved to be a 
 human figure, running with great rapidity. The form 
 flitted on, heedless of the rain which had caused 
 Stephen's halt in this place, dropped down the heathery 
 hill, entered the vale, and was out of sight. 
 
 Whilst he meditated upon the meaning of this pheno- 
 menon, he was surprised to see swim into his ken from 
 the same point of departure another moving speck, as 
 264 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 different from the first as well could be, insomuch that 
 it was perceptible only by its blackness. Slowly and 
 regularly it took the same course, and there was not 
 much doubt that this was the form of a man. He, too, 
 gradually descended from the upper levels, and was lost 
 in the valley below. 
 
 The rain had by this time again abated, and Stephen 
 returned to the road. Looking ahead, he saw two men 
 and a cart. They were soon obscured by the interven- 
 tion of a high hedge. Just before they emerged again 
 he heard voices in conversation. 
 
 ' 'A must soon be in the naibourhood, too, if so be 
 he's a-coming,' said a tenor tongue, which Stephen in- 
 stantly recognized as Martin Cannister's. 
 
 ' 'A must 'a b'lieve,' said another voice — that of 
 Stephen's father. 
 
 Stephen stepped forward, and came before them face 
 to face. His father and Martin were walking, dressed 
 in their second best suits, and beside them rambled 
 along a grizzel horse and brightly painted spring-cart. 
 
 • All right, Mr. Cannister ; here's the lost man ! ' ex- 
 claimed young Smith, entering at once upon the old 
 style of greeting. ' Father, here I am.' 
 
 ' All right, my sonny ; and glad I be for't ! ' returned 
 John Smith, overjoyed to see the young man. ' How 
 be ye? Well, come along home, and don't let's bide 
 out here in the damp. Such weather must be terrible 
 bad for a young chap just come from a fiery nation like 
 Indy ; hey, naibour Cannister ? ' 
 
 ' Trew, trew. And about getting home his traps ? 
 Boxes, monstrous bales, and noble packages of foreign 
 description, I make no doubt ? ' 
 
 ' Hardly all that,' said Stephen laughing. 
 
 • 'We brought the cart, maning to go right on to 
 
 Castle Boterel afore ye landed,' said his father. ' " Put 
 
 in the horse," says Martin. " Ay," says I, " so we will j " 
 
 and did it straightway. Now, maybe, Martin had better 
 
 s- 265 
 
A fAIft Of BLUE EYES 
 
 go on wi' the cart for the things, and you and I walk 
 home-along.' 
 
 ' And I shall be back a'most as soon as you. Peggy 
 is a pretty step still, though time d' begin to tell upon 
 her as upon the rest o' us.' 
 
 Stephen told Martin where to find his baggage, and 
 then continued his journey homeward in the company 
 of his father. 
 
 ' Owing to your coming a day sooner than we first 
 expected,' said John, ' you'll find us in a turk of a mess, 
 sir — " sir," says I to my own son ! but ye've gone up 
 so, Stephen. We've killed the pig this morning for ye, 
 thinking ye'd be hungry, and glad of a morsel of fresh 
 mate. And 'a won't be cut up till to-night. However, 
 we can make ye a good supper of fry, which will chaw 
 up well wi' a dab o' mustard and a few nice new taters, 
 and a drop of shilling ale to wash it down. Your 
 mother have scrubbed the house through because ye 
 were coming, and dusted all the chimmer furniture, and 
 bought a new basin and jug of a travelling crockery- 
 woman that came to our door, and scoured the cannel- 
 sticks, and claned the winders ! Ay, I don't know what 
 'a ha'n't a done. Never were such a steer, 'a b'lieve.' 
 
 Conversation of this kind and inquiries of Stephen 
 for his mother's wellbeing occupied them for the 
 remainder of the journey. When they drew near the 
 river, and the cottage behind it, they could hear the 
 master-mason's clock striking off the bygone hours of 
 the day at intervals of a quarter of a minute, during 
 which intervals Stephen's imagination readily pictured 
 his mother's forefinger wandering round the dial in 
 company with the minute-hand. 
 
 ' The clock stopped this morning, and your mother 
 in putting en right seemingly,' said his father in an 
 explanatory tone; and they went up the garden to 
 the door. 
 
 When they had entered, and Stephen had dutifully 
 266 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 and warmly greeted his mother — who appeared in a 
 cotton dress of a dark-blue ground, covered broadcast 
 with a multitude of new and full moons, stars, and 
 planets, with an occasional dash of a comet-like aspect 
 to diversify the scene— the crackle of cart-wheels was 
 heard outside, and Martin Cannister stamped in at the 
 doorway, in the form of a pair of legs beneath a great 
 box, his body being nowhere visible. When the luggage 
 had been all taken down, and Stephen had gone upstairs 
 to change his clothes, Mrs. Smith's mind seemed to 
 recover a lost thread. 
 
 ' Really our clock is not worth a penny,' she said, 
 turning to it and attempting to start the pendulum. 
 
 ' Stopped again ? ' inquired Martin with commisera- 
 tion. 
 
 • Yes, sure,' replied Mrs. Smith ; and continued 
 after the manner of certain matrons, to whose tongues 
 the harmony of a subject with a casual mood is a 
 greater recommendation than its pertinence to the 
 occasion, ' John would spend pounds a year upon the 
 jimcrack old thing, if he might, in having it claned, 
 when at the same time you may doctor it yourself as 
 well. " The clock's stopped again, John," I say to him. 
 " Better have en claned," says he. There's five shillings. 
 " That clock grinds again," I say to en. " Better have 
 en claned," 'a says again. " That clock strikes wrong, 
 John," says I. "Better have en claned," he goes on. 
 The wheels would have been polished to skeletons by 
 this time if I had listened to en, and I assure you we 
 could have bought a chainey-faced beauty wi' the good 
 money we've flung away these last ten years upon this 
 old green-faced mortal. And, Martin, you must be 
 wet. My son is gone up to change. John is damper 
 than I should like to be, but 'a calls it nothing. Some 
 of Mrs. Swancourt's servants have been here — they ran 
 in out of th^ rain when going for a walk — and I assure 
 you the state of their bonnets was frightful,' 
 267 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 'How's the folks? We've been over to Castle 
 Boterel, and what wi' running and stopping out of the 
 storms, my poor head is beyond everything ! fizz, fizz, 
 fizz ; 'tis frying o' fish from morning to night,' said a 
 cracked voice in the doorway at this instant. 
 
 ' Lord so's, who's that ? ' said Mrs. Smith, in a 
 private exclamation, and turning round saw William 
 Worm, endeavouring to make himself look passing 
 civil and friendly by overspreading his face with a 
 large smile that seemed to have no connection with 
 the humour he was in. Behind him stood a woman 
 about twice his size, with a large umbrella over her 
 head. This was Mrs. Worm, William's wife. 
 
 ' Come in, William,' said John Smith. ' We don't 
 kill a pig every day. And you, likewise, Mrs. Worm. 
 I make ye welcome. Since ye left Parson Swancourt, 
 William, I don't see much of 'ee.' 
 
 ' No, for to tell the truth, since I took to the turn- 
 pike-gate line, I've been out but little, coming to church 
 o' Sundays not being my duty now, as 'twas in a par- 
 son's family, you see. However, our boy is able to 
 mind the gate now, and I said, says I, " Barbara, let's 
 call and see John Smith." ' 
 
 ' I am sorry to hear yer pore head is so bad still.' 
 
 ' Ay, I assure you that frjang o' fish is going on for 
 nights and days. And, you know, sometimes 'tisn't 
 only fish, but rashers o' bacon and inions. Ay, I can 
 hear the fat pop and fizz as nateral as life ; can't I, 
 Barbara ? ' 
 
 Mrs. Worm, who had been all this time engaged in 
 closing her umbrella, corroborated this statement, and 
 now, coming indoors, showed herself to be a wide-faced, 
 comfortable-looking woman, with a wart upon her cheek, 
 bearing a small tuft of hair in its centre. 
 
 'Have ye ever tried anything to cure yer noise, 
 Maister Worm ? ' inquired Martin Cannister. 
 
 ' Qh ay ; bless ye, I've tried everything. Ay, Provi- 
 ?<5§ 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 dence is a merciful man, and I have hoped He'd have 
 found it out by this time, living so many years in a 
 parson's family, too, as I have, but 'a don't seem to 
 relieve me. Ay, I be a poor wambling man, and life's 
 a mint o' trouble ! ' 
 
 'True, mournful true, William Worm. 'Tis so. 
 The world wants looking to, or 'tis all sixes and 
 sevens wi' us.' 
 
 ' Take your things off, Mrs. Worm,' said Mrs. Smith. 
 ' We be rather in a muddle, to tell the truth, for my 
 son is just dropped in from Indy a day sooner than 
 we expected, and the pig-killer is coming presently to 
 cut up.' 
 
 Mrs. Barbara Worm, not wishing to take any mean 
 advantage of persons in a muddle by observing them, 
 removed her bonnet and mantle with eyes fixed upon 
 the flowers in the plot outside the door. 
 
 ' What beautiful tiger-lilies ! ' said Mrs. Worm. 
 
 ' Yes, they be very well, but such a trouble to me on 
 account of the children that come here. They will go 
 eating the berries on the stem, and call 'em currants. 
 Taste wi' junivals is quite fancy, really.' 
 
 ' And your snapdragons look as fierce as ever.' 
 
 ' Well, really,' answered Mrs. Smith, entering didacti- 
 cally into the subject, ' they are more like Christians 
 than flowers. But they make up well enough wi' the 
 rest, and don't require much tending. And the same 
 can be said o' these miller's wheels. 'Tis a flower I 
 like very much, though so simple. John says he never 
 cares about the flowers o' 'em, but men have no eye for 
 anything neat. He says his favourite flower is a cauli- 
 flower. And I assure you I tremble in the springtime, 
 for 'tis perfect murder.' 
 
 ' You don't say so, Mrs. Smith ! ' 
 
 'John digs round the roots, you know. In goes his 
 blundering spade, through roots, bulbs, everything that 
 hasn't got a good show above ground, turning 'em up 
 269 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 cut all to slices. Only the very last fall I went to move 
 some tulips, when I found every bulb upside down, 
 and the stems crooked round. He had turned 'em 
 over in the spring, and the cunning creatures had soon 
 found that heaven was not where it used to be.' 
 
 ' What's that long-favoured flower under the hedge ? ' 
 'They? O Lord, they are the horrid Jacob's 
 ladders ! Instead of praising 'em, I be mad wi' 'em 
 for being so ready to bide where they are not wanted. 
 They be very well in their way, but I do not care for 
 things that neglect won't kill. Do what I will, dig, 
 drag, scrap, pull, I get too many of 'em. I chop the 
 roots : up they'll come, treble strong. Throw 'em over 
 hedge; there they'll grow, staring me in the face like 
 a hungry dog driven away, and creep back again in ar 
 week or two the same as before. 'Tis Jacob's ladder 
 here, Jacob's ladder there, and plant 'em where nothing 
 in the world will grow, you get crowds of 'em in a 
 month or two. John made a new manure mixen last 
 summer, and he said, " Maria, now if you've got any 
 flowers or such like, that you don't want, you may plant 
 'em round my mixen so as to hide it a bit, though 'tis 
 not likely anything of much value will grow there." I 
 thought, " There's them Jacob's ladders ; I'll put them 
 there, since they can't do harm in such a place ; '' and 
 I planted the Jacob's ladders sure enough. They 
 growed, and they growed, in the mixen and out of the 
 mixen, all over the litter, covering it quite up. When 
 John wanted to use it about the garden, 'a said, 
 " Nation seize them Jacob's ladders of yours, Maria ! 
 They've eat the goodness out of every morsel of my 
 manure, so that 'tis no better than sand itself ! " Sure 
 enough the hungry mortals had. 'Tis my belief that in 
 the secret souls o' 'em, Jacob's ladders be weeds, and 
 not flowers at all, if the truth was known.' 
 
 Robert Lickpan, pig-killer and carrier, arrived at this 
 moment. The fatted animal hanging in the back 
 270 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 kitchen was cleft down the middle of its backbone, 
 Mrs. Smith being meanwhile engaged in cooking 
 supper. 
 
 Between the cutting and chopping, ale was handed 
 round, and Worm and the pig-killer listened to John 
 Smith's description of the meeting with Stephen, with 
 eyes blankly fixed upon the table-cloth, in order that 
 nothing in the external world should interrupt their 
 efforts to conjure up the scene correctly. 
 
 Stephen came downstairs in the middle of the story, 
 and after the little interruption occasioned by his 
 entrance and welcome, the narrative was again con- 
 tinued, precisely as if he had not been there at all, and 
 was told inclusively to him, as to somebody who knew 
 nothing about the matter. 
 
 ' " Ay," I said, as I catched sight o' en through the 
 brimbles, " that's the lad, for I d' know en by his grand- 
 father's walk ; " for 'a stapped out like poor father for 
 all the world. Still there was a touch o' the frisky that 
 set me wondering. 'A got closer, and I said, " That's 
 the lad, for I d' know en by his carrying a black case 
 like a travelling man." Still, a road is common to all 
 the world, and there be more travelling men than one. 
 But I kept my eye cocked, and I said to Martin, " 'Tis 
 the boy, now, for I d' know en by the wold twirl o' the 
 stick and the family step." Then 'a come closer, and 
 a' said, " All right." I could swear to en then.' 
 
 Stephen's personal appearance was next criticised. 
 
 ' He d' look a deal thinner in face, surely, than when 
 I seed en at the parson's, and never knowed en, if ye'U 
 believe me,' said Martin. 
 
 ' Ay, there,' said another, without removing his eyes 
 from Stephen's face, ' I should ha' knowed en anywhere. 
 'Tis his father's nose to a t.' 
 
 ' It has been often remarked,' said Stephen modestly. 
 
 • And he's certainly taller,' said Martin, letting his 
 glance run over Stephen's form from bottom to top. 
 271 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 •I was thinking 'a was exactly the same height,' 
 Worm replied. 
 
 'Bless thy soul, that's because he's bigger round 
 likewise.' And the united eyes all moved to Stephen's 
 waist. 
 
 ' I be a poor wambling man, but I can make allow- 
 ances,' said William Worm. 'Ah, sure, and how he 
 came as a stranger and pilgrim to Parson Swancourt's 
 that time, not a soul knowing en after so many years ! 
 Ay, life's a strange picter, Stephen : but I suppose I 
 must say Sir to ye ? ' 
 
 ' Oh, it is not necessary at present,' Stephen replied, 
 though mentally resolving to avoid the vicinity of that 
 familiar friend as soon as he had made pretensiorjs to 
 the hand of Elfride. 
 
 ' Ah, well,' said Worm musingly, ' some would have 
 looked for no less than a Sir. There's a sight of differ- 
 ence in people.' 
 
 ' And in pigs likewise,' observed John Smith, look- 
 ing at the halved carcass of his own. 
 
 Robert Lickpan, the pig-killer, here seemed called 
 upon to enter the lists of conversation. 
 
 'Yes, they've got their particular naters good-now,^ 
 he remarked initially. ' Many's the rum-tempered pig 
 I've knowed.' 
 
 ' I don't doubt it. Master Lickpan,' answered Martin, 
 in a tone expressing that his convictions, no less than 
 good manners, demanded the reply. 
 
 'Yes,' continued the pig-killer, as one accustomed 
 to be heard. ' One that I knowed was deaf and dumb, 
 and we couldn't make out what was the matter wi' the 
 pig. 'A would eat well enough when 'a seed the 
 trough, but when his back was turned, you might 
 a-rattled the bucket all day, the poor soul never heard 
 ye. Ye could play tricks upon en behind his back, 
 and a' wouldn't find it out no quicker than poor deaf 
 Grammer Gates. But a' fatted well, and I never seed 
 272 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 a pig open better when a' was killed, and 'a was very 
 tender eating, very ; as pretty a bit of mate as ever you 
 see ; you could suck that mate through a quill. 
 
 ' And another I knowed,' resumed the killer, after 
 quietly letting a pint of ale run down his throat of its 
 own accord, and setting down the cup with mathe- 
 matical exactness upon the spot from which he had 
 raised it — ' another went out of his mind.' 
 
 ' How very mournful ! ' murmured Mrs. Worm. 
 
 ' Ay, poor thing, 'a did ! As clean out of his mind 
 as the cleverest Christian could go. In early life 'a 
 was very melancholy, and never seemed a hopeful pig 
 by no means. 'Twas Andrew Stainer's pig — that's 
 whose pig 'twas.' 
 
 ' I can mind the pig well enough,' attested John 
 Smith. 
 
 • And a pretty little porker 'a was. And you all 
 know Farmer Buckle's sort ? Every jack o' em suffer 
 from the rheumatism to this day, owing to a damp sty 
 they lived in when they were striplings, as 'twere.' 
 
 ' Well, now we'll weigh,' said John. 
 
 ' If so be he were not so fine, we'd weigh en whole : 
 but as he is, we'll take a side at a time. John, you 
 can mind my old joke, ey ? ' 
 
 ' I do so ; though 'twas a good few years ago I first 
 heard en.' 
 
 ' Yes,' said Lickpan, ' that there old familiar joke 
 have been in our family for generations, I may say. 
 My father used that joke regular at pig-killings for 
 more than five and forty years — the time he followed 
 the calling. And 'a told me that 'a had it from his 
 father when he was quite a chiel, who made use o' en 
 just ' the same at every killing more or less ; and pig- 
 killings were pig-killings in those days.' 
 
 ' Trewly they were.' 
 
 ' I've never heard the joke,' said Mrs. Smith 
 tentatively. 
 
 273 s 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 « Nor I,' chimed in Mrs. Worm, who, being the 
 only other lady in the room, felt bound by the laws of 
 courtesy to feel like Mrs. Smith in everything. 
 
 ' Surely, surely you have,' said the killer, looking 
 sceptically at the benighted females. ' However, 'tisn't 
 much — I don't wish to say it is. It commences like 
 this : " Bob will tell the weight of your pig, 'a b'lieve," 
 says I. The congregation of neighbours think I mane 
 my son Bob, naturally; but the secret is that I mane 
 the bob o' the steelyard. Ha, ha, ha ! ' 
 
 ' Haw, haw, haw ! ' laughed Martin Cannister, who 
 had heard the explanation of this striking story for the 
 hundredth time. 
 
 ' Huh, huh, huh ! ' laughed John Smith, who had 
 heard it for the thousandth. 
 
 ' Hee, hee, hee ! ' laughed William Worm, who had 
 never heard it at all, but was afraid to say so. 
 
 ' Thy grandfather, Robert, must have been a wide- 
 awake chap to make that story,' said Martin Cannister, 
 subsiding to a placid aspect of delighted criticism. 
 
 ' He had a head, by all account. And, you see, as 
 the first-born of the Lickpans have all been Roberts, 
 they've all been Bobs, so the story was handed down 
 to the present day.' 
 
 ' Poor Joseph, your second boy, will never be able 
 to bring it out in company, which is rather unfortunate,' 
 said Mrs. Worm thoughtfully. 
 
 ''A won't. Yes, grandfer was a clever chap, as ye 
 say; but I knowed a cleverer. 'Twas my uncle Levi. 
 Uncle Levi made a snuff-box that should be a puzzle 
 to his friends to open. He used to hand en round at 
 wedding parties, christenings, funerals, and in other 
 jolly company, and let 'em try their skill. This extra- 
 ordinary snuiF-box had a spring behind that would push 
 in and out — a hinge where seemed to be the cover; a 
 slide at the end, a screw in front, and knobs and queer 
 notches everywhere. One man would try the spring, 
 274 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 another would try the screw, another would try the 
 slide; but try as they would, the box wouldn't opea 
 And they couldn't open en, and they didn't open en. 
 Now what might you think was the secret of that box ? ' 
 
 All put on an expression that their united thoughts 
 were inadequate to the occasion. 
 
 ' Why the box wouldn't open at all. 'A were made 
 not to open, and ye might have tried till the end of 
 Revelations, 'twould have been as naught, for the box 
 were glued all round.' 
 
 ■ A very deep man to have made such a box.' 
 
 ' Yes. 'Twas like uncle Levi all over.' 
 
 "Twas. I can mind the man very well. Tallest 
 man ever I seed.' 
 
 ' 'A was so. He never slept upon a bedstead after 
 he growed up a hard boy-chap — never could get one 
 long enough. When 'a lived in that little small house 
 by the pond, he used to have to leave open his chamber 
 door every night at going to his bed, and let his feet 
 poke out upon the landing.' 
 
 ' He's dead and gone now, nevertheless, poor man, 
 as we all shall,' observed Worm, to fill the pause which 
 followed the conclusion of Robert Lickpan's speech. 
 
 The weighing and cutting up was pursued amid an 
 animated discourse on Stephen's travels ; and at the 
 finish, the first-fruits of the day's slaughter, fried in 
 onions, were then turned from the pan into a dish on 
 the table, each piece steaming and hissing till it reached 
 their very mouths. 
 
 It must be owned that the gentlemanly son of the 
 house looked rather out of place in the course of this 
 operation. Nor was his mind quite philosophic enough 
 to allow him to be comfortable with these old-estabUshed 
 persons, his father's friends. He had never lived long 
 at home — scarcely at all since his childhood. The pre- 
 sence of William Worm was the most awkward feature 
 of the case, for, though Worm had left the house of Mr. 
 275 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 Swancourt, the being hand-in-glove with a d-devani 
 servitor reminded Stephen too forcibly of the vicar's 
 classification of himself before he went from England. 
 Mrs. Smith was conscious of the defect in her arrange- 
 ments which had brought about the undesired conjunc- 
 tion. She spoke to Stephen privately. 
 
 ' I am above having such people here, Stephen ; but 
 what could I do? And your father is so rough in 
 his nature that he's more mixed up with them than 
 need be.' 
 
 ' Never mind, mother,' said Stephen ; ' I'll put up 
 with it now.' 
 
 ' When we leave my lord's service, and get further 
 up the country — as I hope we shall soon — it will be 
 diiferent. We shall be among fresh people, and in a 
 larger house, and shall keep ourselves up a bit, I 
 hope.' 
 
 ' Is Miss Swancourt at home, do you know ? ' Stephen 
 inquired 
 
 ' Yes, your father saw her this morning.' 
 
 ' Do you often see her ? ' 
 
 ' Scarcely ever. Mr. Glim, the curate, calls occasiori- 
 ally, but the Swancourts don't come into the village 
 now any more than to drive through it. They dine at 
 my lord's oftener than they used. Ah, here's a note 
 was brought this morning for you by a boy.' 
 
 Stephen eagerly took the note and opened it, his 
 mother watching him. He read what Elfride had 
 written and sent before she started for the cliff that 
 afternoon : 
 
 • Yes ; I will meet you in the church at nine to- 
 night.— E. S.' 
 
 * I don't know, Stephen,' his mother said meaningly, 
 ' whe'r you still think about Miss Elfride, but if I were 
 you I wouldn't concern about her. They say that none 
 
 276 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 of old Mrs. Swancourt's money will come to her step- 
 daughter.' 
 
 ' I see the evening has turned out fine ; I am going 
 out for a little while to look round the place,' he said, 
 evading the direct query. ' Probably by the time I 
 return our visitors will be gone, and we'll have a more 
 confidential talk.' 
 
XXIV 
 
 • Breeze, bird, and flower confess the hour.' 
 
 The rain had ceased since the sunset, but it was a 
 cloudy night ; and the light of the moon, softened and 
 dispersed by its misty veil, was distributed over the 
 land in pale gray. 
 
 A dark figure stepped from the doorway of John 
 Smith's river-side cottage, and strode rapidly towards 
 West Endelstow with a light footstep. Soon ascending 
 from the lower levels he turned a corner, followed a 
 cart-track, and saw the tower of the church he was in 
 quest of distinctly shaped forth against the sky. In 
 less than half an hour from the time of starting he 
 swung himself over the churchyard stile. 
 
 The wild irregular enclosure was as much as ever 
 an integral part of the old hill. The grass was still 
 long, the graves were shaped precisely as passing years 
 chose to alter them from their orthodox form as laid 
 down by Martin Cannister, and by Stephen's own 
 grandfather before him. 
 
 A sound sped into the air from the direction in 
 
 which Castle Boterel lay. It was the striking of the 
 
 church clock, distinct in the still atmosphere as if 
 
 it had come from the tower hard by, which, wrapt 
 
 278 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 in its solitary silentness, gave out no such sounds 
 of life. 
 
 ' One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine.' 
 Stephen carefully counted the strokes, though he well 
 knew their number beforehand. Nine o'clock. It was 
 the hour Elfride had herself named as the most con- 
 venient for meeting him. 
 
 Stephen stood at the door of the porch and listened. 
 He could have heard the softest breathing of any person 
 within the porch; nobody was there. He went inside 
 the doorway, sat down upon the stone bench, and waited 
 with a beating heart. 
 
 The faint sounds heard only accentuated the silence. 
 The rising and falling of the sea, far away along the 
 coast, was the most important. A minor sound was 
 the scurr of a distant night-hawk. Among the minutest 
 where all were minute were the light settlement of 
 gossamer fragments floating in the air, a toad humbly 
 labouring along through the grass near the entrance, 
 the crackle of a dead leaf which a worm was endea- 
 vouring to pull into the earth, a waft of air, getting 
 nearer and nearer, and expiring at his feet under the 
 burden of a winged seed. 
 
 Among all these soft sounds came not the only soft 
 sound he cared to hear — the footfall of Elfride. 
 
 For a whole quarter of an hour Stephen sat thus 
 intent, without moving a muscle. At the end of that 
 time he walked to the west front of the church. Turn- 
 ing the corner of the tower, a white form stared him in 
 the face. He started back, and recovered himself. 
 It was the tomb of young farmer Jethway, looking still 
 as fresh and as new as when it was first erected, the 
 white stone in which it was hewn having a singular 
 weirdness amid the dark blue slabs from local quarries, 
 of which the whole remaining gravestones were formed. 
 
 He thought of the night when he had sat thereon 
 with Elfride as his companion, and well remembered 
 279 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 his regret that she had received, even unwillingly, 
 earlier homage than his own. But his present tangible 
 anxiety reduced such a feeling to sentimental nonsense 
 in comparison ; and he strolled on over the graves to 
 the border of the churchyard, whence in the daytime 
 could be clearly seen the vicarage and the present 
 residence of the Swancourts. No footstep was dis- 
 cernible upon the path up the hill, but a light was 
 shining from a window in the last-named house. 
 
 Stephen knew there could be no mistake about the 
 time or place, and no difficulty about keeping the 
 engagement. He waited yet longer, passing from 
 impatience into a mood which failed to take any 
 account of the lapse of time. He was awakened from 
 his reverie by Castle Boterel clock. 
 
 One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, 
 
 TEN. 
 
 One little fall of the hammer in addition to the 
 number it had been sharp pleasure to hear, and what 
 a difference to him ! 
 
 He left the churchyard on the side opposite to his 
 point of entrance, and went down the hill. Slowly he 
 drew near the gate of her house. This he softly 
 opened, and walked up the gravel drive to the door. 
 Here he paused for several minutes. 
 
 At the expiration of that time the murmured speech 
 of a manly voice came out to his ears through an open 
 window behind the corner of the house. This was 
 responded to by a clear soft laugh. It was the laugh 
 of Elfride. 
 
 Stephen was conscious of a gnawing pain at his 
 heart. He retreated as he had come. There are 
 disappointments which wring us, and there are those 
 which inflict a wound whose mark we bear to our graves. 
 Such are so keen that no future gratification of the 
 same desire can ever obliterate them: they become 
 registered as a permanent loss of happiness. Such a 
 280 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 one was Stephen's now : the crowning aureola of the 
 dream had been the meeting here by stealth; and if 
 Elfride had come to him only ten minutes after he 
 had turned away, the disappointment would have been 
 recognizable still. 
 
 When the young man reached home he found there 
 a letter which had arrived in his absence. Believing 
 it to contain some reason for her non-appearance, yet 
 unable to imagine one that could justify her, he hastily 
 tore open the envelope. 
 
 The paper contained not a word from Elfride. It 
 was the deposit-note for his two hundred pounds. 
 On the back was the form of a cheque, and this she 
 had filled up with the same sum, payable to the 
 bearer. 
 
 Stephen was confounded. He attempted to divine 
 her motive. Considering how limited was his know- 
 ledge of her later actions, he guessed rather shrewdly 
 that, between the time of her sending the note in the 
 morning and the evening's silent refusal of his gift, 
 something had occurred which had caused a total 
 change in her attitude towards him. 
 
 He knew not what to do. It seemed absurd now 
 to go to her father next morning, as he had purposed, 
 and ask for an engagement with her, a possibility im- 
 pending all the while that Elfride herself would not be 
 on his side. Only one course recommended itself as 
 wise. To wait and see what the days would bring 
 forth ; to go and execute his commissions in Birming- 
 ham; then to return, learn if anything had happened, 
 and try what a meeting might do ; perhaps her surprise 
 at his backwardness would bring her forward to show 
 latent warmth as decidedly as in old times. 
 
 This act of patience was in keeping only with the 
 nature of a man precisely of Stephen's constitution. 
 Nine men out of ten would perhaps have rushed off, 
 got into her presence, by fair means or foul, and pro- 
 
 T 281 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 voked a catastrophe of some sort. Possibly for the 
 better, probably for the worse. 
 
 He started for Birmingham the next morning. A 
 day's delay would have made no difference; but he 
 could not rest until he had begun and ended the pro- 
 gramme proposed to himself. Bodily activity will 
 sometimes take the sting out of anxiety as completely 
 as assurance itself. 
 
XXV 
 
 'Mine own familiar friend.' 
 
 UURING these days of absence Stephen lived under 
 alternate conditions. Whenever his emotions were 
 active, he was in agony. Whenever he was not in 
 agony, the business in hand had driven out of his 
 mind by sheer force all deep reflection on the subject 
 of Elfride and love. 
 
 By the time he took his return journey at the week's 
 end, Stephen had very nearly worked himself up to an 
 intention to call and see her face to face. On this 
 occasion also he adopted his favourite route — by the 
 little summer steamer from Bristol to Castle Boterel ; 
 the time saved by speed on the railway being wasted 
 at junctions, and in following a devious course. 
 
 It was a bright silent evening at the beginning of 
 September when Smith again set foot in the little town. 
 He felt inclined to linger awhile upon the quay before 
 ascending the hills, having formed a romantic inten- 
 tion to go home by way of her house, yet not wishing 
 to wander in its neighbourhood till the evening shades 
 should suflSciently screen him from observation. 
 
 And thus waiting for night's nearer approach, he 
 watched the placid scene, over which the pale luminosity 
 283 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 of the west cast a sorrowful monochrome, that became 
 slowly embrowned by the dusk. A star appeared, and 
 another, and another. They sparkled amid the yards 
 and rigging of the two coal brigs lying alongside, as if 
 they had been tiny lamps suspended in the ropes. The 
 masts rocked sleepily to the infinitesimal flux of the tide, 
 which clucked and gurgled with idle regularity in nooks 
 and holes of the harbour wall. 
 
 The twilight was now quite pronounced enough for 
 his purpose ; and as, rather sad at heart, he was about 
 to move on, a little boat containing two persons glided 
 up the middle of the harbour with the lightness of a 
 shadow. The boat came opposite him, passed on, and 
 touched the landing-steps at the further end. One of 
 its occupants was a man, as Stephen had known by the 
 easy stroke of the oars. When the pair ascended the 
 steps, and came into greater prominence, he was enabled 
 to discern that the second personage was a woman ; 
 also that she wore a white decoration — apparently a 
 feather — in her hat or bonnet, which spot of white was 
 the only distinctly visible portion of her clothing. 
 
 Stephen remained a moment in their rear, and they 
 passed on, when he pursued his way also, and soon 
 forgot the circumstance. Having crossed a bridge, 
 forsaken the high road, and entered the footpath which 
 led up the vale to West Endelstow, he heard a little 
 wicket click softly together some yards ahead. By the 
 time that Stephen had reached the wicket and passed 
 it, he heard another click of precisely the same nature 
 from another gate yet further on. Clearly some person 
 or persons were preceding him along the path, their 
 footsteps being rendered noiseless by the soft carpet 
 of turf. Stephen now walked a little quicker, and per- 
 ceived two forms. One of them bore aloft the white 
 feather he had noticed in the woman's hat on the quay : 
 they were the couple he had seen in the boat. Stephen 
 dropped a little further to the rear. 
 284 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYE^ 
 
 From the bottom of the valley, along which the path 
 had hitherto lain, beside the margin of the trickling 
 streamlet, another path now diverged, and ascended 
 the slope of the left-hand hill. This footway led only 
 to the residence of Mrs. Swancourt and a cottage or 
 two in its vicinity. No grass covered this diverging 
 path in portions of its length, and Stephen was re- 
 minded that the pair in front of him had taken this 
 route by the occasional rattle of loose stones under 
 their feet. Stephen climbed in the same direction, 
 but for some undefined reason he trod more softly than 
 did those preceding him. His mind was unconsciously 
 in exercise upon whom the woman might be — whether 
 a visitor to The Crags, a servant, or Elfride. He put 
 it to himself yet more forcibly; could the lady be 
 Elfride? A possible reason for her unaccountable 
 failure to keep the appointment with him returned 
 with painful force. 
 
 They entered the grounds of the house by the side 
 wicket, whence the path, now wide and well trimmed, 
 wound fantastically through the shrubbery to an octa- 
 gonal pavilion called the Belvedere, by reason of the 
 comprehensive view over the adjacent district that its 
 green seats afforded. The path passed this erection 
 and went on to the house as well as to the gardener's 
 cottage on the other side, straggling thence to East 
 Endelstow; so that Stephen felt no hesitation in 
 entering a promenade which could scarcely be called 
 private. 
 
 He fancied that he heard the gate open and swing 
 together again behind him. Turning, he saw nobody. 
 
 The people of the boat came to the summer-house. 
 One of them spoke. 
 
 ' I am afraid we shall get a scolding for being so 
 late." 
 
 Stephen instantly recognised the familiar voice, 
 richer and fuller now than it used to be. ' Elfride ! ' 
 28s 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 he whispered to himself, and held fast by a sapling, to 
 steady himself under the agitation her presence caused 
 him. His heart swerved from its beat; he shunned 
 receiving the meaning he sought. 
 
 ' A breeze is rising again ; how the ash tree rustles ! ' 
 said Elfride. ' Don't you hear it ? I wonder what the 
 time is.' 
 
 Stephen relinquished the sapling. 
 
 ' I will get a light and tell you. Step into the 
 summer-house ; the air is quiet there.' 
 
 The cadence of that voice — its peculiarity seemed 
 to come home to him like that of some notes of the 
 northern birds on his return to his native clime, as an 
 old natural thing renewed, yet not particularly noticed 
 as natural before that renewal. 
 
 They entered the Belvedere. In the .lower part it 
 was formed of close wood-work nailed crosswise, and 
 had openings in the upper by way of windows. 
 
 The scratch of a striking light was heard, and a bright 
 glow radiated from the interior of the building. The 
 light gave birth to dancing leaf-shadows, stem-shadows, 
 lustrous streaks, dots, sparkles, and threads of silver 
 sheen of all imaginable variety and transience. It 
 awakened gnats, which flew towards it, revealed shiny 
 gossamer threads, disturbed earthworms. Stephen gave 
 but little attention to these phenomena, and less time. 
 He saw in the summer-house a strongly illuminated 
 picture. 
 
 First, the face of his friend and preceptor Henry 
 Knight, between whom and himself an estrangement 
 had arisen, not from any definite causes beyond those 
 of absence, increasing age, and diverging sympathies. 
 
 Next, his bright particular star, Elfride. The face 
 of Elfride was more womanly than when she had called 
 herself his, but as clear and healthy as ever. Her 
 plenteous twines of beautiful hair were looking much 
 as usual, with the exception of a slight modification 
 286 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 in their arrangement in deference to the changes of 
 fashion. 
 
 Their two foreheads were close together, almost 
 touching, and both were looking down. Elfride was 
 holding her watch. Knight was holding the light with 
 one hand, his left arm being round her waist. Part of 
 the scene reached Stephen's eyes through the horizontal 
 bars of woodwork, which crossed their forms like the 
 ribs of a skeleton. 
 
 Knight's arm stole still further round the waist of 
 Elfride. 
 
 ' It is half-past eight,' she said in a low voice, which 
 had a peculiar music in it, seemingly born of a thrill of 
 pleasure at the new proof that she was beloved. 
 
 The flame dwindled down, died away, and all was 
 wrapped in a darkness to which the gloom before the 
 Ulumination bore no comparison in apparent density. 
 Stephen, shattered in spirit and sick to his heart's 
 centre, turned away. In turning, he saw a shadowy 
 outline behind the summer-house on the other side. 
 His eyes grew accustomed to the darkness. Was the 
 form a human form, or was it an opaque bush of 
 juniper ? 
 
 The lovers arose, brushed against the laurestines, 
 and pursued their way to the house. The indistinct 
 figure had moved, and now passed across Smith's front. 
 So completely enveloped was the person, that it was im- 
 possible to discern him or her any more than as a shape. 
 The shape glided noiselessly on. 
 
 Stephen stepped forward, fearing any mischief was 
 intended to the other two. ' Who are you ? ' he said. 
 
 ' Never mind who I am,' answered a weak whisper 
 from the enveloping folds. ' Wkaf I am, may she be ! 
 Perhaps I k.-.ew well — ah, so well ! — a youth whose 
 place you took, as he there now takes yours. Will you 
 let her break your heart, and bring you to an untimely 
 grave, as she did the one before you ? ' 
 287 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 ' You are Mrs. Jethway, I think. What do you do 
 here ? And why do you talk so wildly ? ' 
 
 ' Because my heart is desolate, and nobody cares 
 about it. May hers be so that brought trouble upon 
 me!' 
 
 ' Silence ! ' said Stephen, staunch .to Elfride in spite 
 of himself. ' She would harm nobody wilfully, never 
 would she ! How do you come here ? ' 
 
 ' I saw the two coming up the path, and wanted to 
 learn if she were not one of them. Can I help disliking 
 her if I think of the past ? Can I help watching her if 
 I remember my boy ? Can I help ill-wishing her if I 
 well-wish him ? ' 
 
 The bowed form went on, passed through the wicket, 
 and was enveloped by the shadows of the field. 
 
 Stephen had heard that Mrs. Jethway, since the 
 death of her son, had become a crazed, forlorn woman ; 
 and bestowing a pitying thought upon her, he dismissed 
 her fancied wrongs from his mind, but not her condem- 
 nation of Elfride's faithlessness. That entered into and 
 mingled with the sensations his new experience had 
 begotten. The tale told by the little scene he had wit- 
 nessed ran parallel with the unhappy woman's opinion, 
 which, however baseless it might have been antecedently, 
 had become true enough as regarded himself. 
 
 A slow weight of despair, as distinct from a violent 
 paroxysm as starvation from a mortal shot, filled him 
 and wrung him body and soul. The discovery had nbt 
 been altogether unexpected, for throughout his anxiety 
 of the last few days since the night in the churchyard, 
 he had been inclined to construe the uncertainty un- 
 favourably for himself. His hopes for the best had 
 been but periodic interruptions to a chronic fear of the 
 wotst. 
 
 A strange concomitant of his misery was the singu- 
 larity of its form. That his rival should be Knight. 
 whom once upon a time he had adored as a man is 
 ?88 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 very rarely adored by another in modern times, and 
 whom he loved now, added deprecation to sorrow, and 
 cynicism to both. Henry Knight, whose praises he 
 had so frequently trumpeted in her ears, of whom she 
 had actually been jealous, lest she herself should be 
 lessened in Stephen's love on account of him, had pro- 
 bably won her the more easily by reason of those very 
 praises which he had only ceased to utter by her com- 
 mand. She had ruled him like a queen in that matter, 
 as in all others. Stephen could tell by her manner, 
 brief as had been his observation of it, and by her 
 words, few as they were, that her position was far 
 different with Knight. That she looked up at and 
 adored her new lover from below his pedestal, was 
 even more perceptible than that she had smiled down 
 upon Stephen from a height above him. 
 
 The suddenness of Elfride's renunciation of himself 
 was food for more torture. To an unimpassioned out- 
 sider, it admitted of at least two interpretations — it 
 might either have proceeded from an endeavour to be 
 faithful to her first choice, till the lover seen absolutely 
 overpowered the lover remembered, or from a wish not 
 to lose his love till sure of the love of another. But 
 to Stephen Smith the motive involved in the latter 
 alternative made it untenable where Elfride was the 
 actor. 
 
 He mused on her letters to him, in which she had 
 never mentioned a syllable concerning Knight. It is 
 desirable, however, to observe that only in two letters 
 could she possibly have done so. One was written 
 about a week before Knight's arrival, when, though 
 she did not mention his promised coming to Stephen, 
 she had hardly a definite reason in her mind for- 
 neglecting to do it. In the next she did casually 
 allude to Knight. But Stephen had left Bombay long 
 before that letter arrived. 
 
 Stephen looked at the black form of the adjacent 
 289 T 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 house, where it cut a dark polygonal notch out of the 
 sky, and felt that he hated the spot. He did not know 
 many facts of the case, but could not help instinctively 
 associating Elfride's fickleness with the marriage of her 
 father, and their introduction to London society. He 
 closed the iron gate bounding the shrubbery as noise- 
 lessly as he had opened it, and w^ent into the grassy 
 field. Here he could see the old vicarage, the house 
 alone that was associated with the sweet pleasant time 
 of his incipient love for Elfride. Turning sadly from 
 the place that was no longer a nook in which his 
 thoughts might nestle when he was far away, he wan- 
 dered in the direction of the east village, to reach his 
 father's house before they retired to rest. 
 
 The nearest way to the cottage was by crossing the 
 park. He did not hurry. Happiness frequently has 
 reason for haste, but it is seldom that desolation need 
 scramble or strain. Sometimes he paused under the 
 low-hanging arms of the trees, looking vacantly on the 
 ground. 
 
 Stephen was standing thus, scarcely less crippled 
 in thought than he was blank in vision, when a clear 
 sound permeated the quiet air about him, and spread 
 on far beyond. The sound was the stroke of a bell 
 from the tower of East Endelstow Church, which stood 
 in a dell not forty yards from Lord Luxellian's mansion, 
 and within the park enclosure. Another stroke greeted 
 his ear, and gave character to both : then came a slow 
 succession of them. 
 
 ' Somebody is dead,' he said aloud. 
 
 The death - knell of an inhabitant of the eastern 
 parish was being tolled. 
 
 An unusual feature in the tolling was that it had 
 not been begun according to the custom in Endelstow 
 and other parishes in the neighbourhood. At every 
 death the sex and age of the deceased were announced 
 by a system of changes. Three times three strokes 
 290 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 signified that the departed one was a man ; three times 
 two, a woman ; twice three, a boy ; twice two, a girl. 
 The regular continuity of the tolling suggested that it 
 was the resumption rather than the beginning of a 
 knell — the opening portion of which Stephen had not 
 been near enough to hear. 
 
 The momentary anxiety he had felt with regard to 
 his parents passed away. He had left them in perfect 
 health, and had any serious illness seized either, a com- 
 munication would have reached him ere this. At the 
 same time, since his way homeward lay under the 
 churchyard yews, he resolved to look into the belfry 
 in passing by, and speak a word to Martin Cannister, 
 who would be there. 
 
 Stephen reached the brow of the hill, and felt 
 inclined to renounce his idea. His mood was such 
 that talking to any person to whom he could not 
 unburden himself would be wearisome. However, 
 before he could put any inclination into effect, the 
 young man saw from amid the trees a bright light 
 shining, the rays from which radiated like needles 
 through the sad plumy foliage of the yews. Its direc- 
 tion was from the centre of the churchyard. 
 
 Stephen mechanically went forward. Never could 
 there be a greater contrast between two places of like 
 purpose than between this graveyard and that of the 
 further village. Here the grass was carefully tended, 
 and formed virtually a part of the manor-house lawn ; 
 flowers and shrubs being planted indiscriminately over 
 both, whilst the few graves visible were mathematically 
 exact in shape and smoothness, appearing in the day- 
 time like chins newly shaven. There was no wall, the 
 division between God's Acre and Lord Luxellian's 
 being marked only by a few square stones set at 
 equidistant points. Among those persons who have 
 romantic sentiments on the subject of their last dwell- 
 ing-place, probably the greater number would have 
 291 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 chosen such a spot as this in preference to any other : a 
 few would have fancied a constraint in its trim neatness, 
 and would have preferred the wild hill-top of the neigh- 
 bouring site, with Nature in her most negligent attire. 
 
 The light in the churchyard he next discovered to 
 have its source in a point very near the ground, and 
 Stephen imagined it might come from a lantern in the 
 interior of a partly-dug grave. But a nearer approach 
 showed him that its position was immediately under the 
 wall of the aisle, and within the mouth of an archway. 
 He could now hear voices, and the truth of the whole 
 matter began to dawn upon him. Walking on towards 
 the opening. Smith discerned on his left hand a heap of 
 earth, and before him a flight of stone steps which the 
 removed earth had uncovered, leading down under the 
 edifice. It was the entrance to a large family vault, 
 extending under the north aisle. 
 
 Stephen had never before seen it open, and descend- 
 ing one or two steps stooped to look under the arch. 
 The vault appeared to be crowded with coffins, with the 
 exception of an open central space, which had been neces- 
 sarily kept free for ingress and access to the sides, round 
 three of which the coffins were stacked in stone bins 
 or niches. 
 
 The place was well lighted with candles stuck in 
 slips of wood that were fastened to the wall. On making 
 the descent of another step the living inhabitants of 
 the vault were recognizable. They were his father the 
 master-mason, an under-mason, Martin Cannister, and 
 two or three young and old labouring-men. Crowbars 
 and workmen's hammers were scattered about. The 
 whole company, sitting round on coffins which had 
 been removed from their places, apparently for some 
 alteration or enlargement of the vault, were eating 
 bread and cheese, and drinking ale from a cup with 
 two handles, passed round from each to each. 
 
 ' Who is dead ? ' Stephen inquired, stepping down. 
 292 
 
XXVI 
 
 • To that last nothing under earth,' 
 
 All eyes were turned to the entrance as Stephen 
 spoke, and the ancient-mannered conclave scrutinized 
 him inquiringly. 
 
 ' Why, 'tis our Stephen ! ' said his father, rising from 
 his seat ; and, still retaining the frothy mug in his left 
 hand, he swung forward his right for a grasp. ' Your 
 mother is expecting ye — thought you would have come 
 afore dark. But you'll wait and go home with me ? I 
 have all but done for the day, and was going directly.' 
 
 ' Yes, 'tis Master Stephy, sure enough. Glad to see 
 you so soon again. Master Smith,' said Martin Cannister, 
 chastening the gladness expressed in his words by a 
 strict neutrality of countenance, in order to harmonize 
 the feeling as much as possible with the solemnity of a 
 family vault. 
 
 ' The same to you, Martin ; and you, William,' said 
 Stephen, nodding around to the rest, who, having their 
 mouths full of bread and cheese, were of necessity com- 
 pelled to reply merely by compressing their eyes to 
 friendly lines and wrinkles. 
 
 ' And who is dead ? ' Stephen repeated. 
 
 « Lady Luxellian, poor gentlewoman, as we all shall,' 
 293 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 said the under-mason. • Ay, and we be going to enlarge 
 the vault to make room for her.' 
 
 ' When did she die ? ' 
 
 'Early this morning,' his father replied, with an 
 appearance of recurring to a chronic thought. ' Yes, 
 this morning. Martin hev been tolling ever since, 
 almost. There, 'twas expected. She was very limber.' 
 
 'Ay, poor soul, this morning,' resumed the under- 
 mason, a marvellously old man, whose skin seemed so 
 much too large for his body that it would not stay in 
 position. ' She must know by this time whether she's 
 to go up or down, poor woman.' 
 
 ' What was her age ? ' 
 
 ' Not more than seven or eight and twenty by candle- 
 light. But, Lord ! by day 'a was forty if 'a were an 
 hour.' 
 
 ' Ay, night-time or day-time makes a difference of 
 twenty years to rich feymels,' observed Martin. 
 
 ' She was one and thirty really,' said John Smith. 
 ' I had it from them that know.' 
 
 ' Not more than that ! ' 
 
 ' 'A looked very bad, poor lady. In faith, ye might 
 say she was dead for years afore 'a would own it.' 
 
 ' As my old father used to say, " dead, but wouldn't 
 drop down." ' 
 
 ' I seed her, poor soul,' said a labourer from behind 
 some removed coffins, ' only but last Valentine's-day of 
 all the world. 'A was arm in crook wi' my lord. I 
 says to myself, " You be ticketed Churchyard, my noble 
 lady, although you don't dream on't." ' 
 
 ' I suppose my lord will write to all the other lords 
 anointed in the nation, to let 'em know that she that 
 was is now no more ? ' 
 
 "Tis done and past. I see. a bundle of letters go 
 off an hour after the death. Sich wonderful black rims 
 as they letters had — half-an-inch wide, at the very least.' 
 
 'Too much,' observed Martin. 'In short, 'tis out 
 294 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 of the question that a human being can be so mournful 
 as black edges half-an-inch wide. I'm sure people don't 
 feel more than a very narrow border when they feels 
 most of all.' 
 
 ' And there are two little girls, are there not ? ' said 
 Stephen. 
 
 ' Nice clane little faces ! — left motherless now.' 
 
 ' They used to come to Parson Swancourt's to play 
 with Miss Elfride when I were there,' said William 
 Worm. ' Ah, they did so's ! ' The latter sentence was 
 introduced to add the necessary melancholy to a remark 
 which, intrinsically, could hardly be made to possess 
 enough for the occasion. 'Yes,' continued Worm, 
 'they'd run upstairs, they'd run down; flitting about 
 with her everywhere. Very fond of her, they were. 
 Ah, well ! ' 
 
 ' Fonder than ever they were of their mother, so 'tis 
 said here and there,' added a labourer. 
 
 ' Well, you see, 'tis natural. Lady Luxellian stood 
 aloof from 'em so — was so drowsy-like, that they couldn't 
 love her in the jolly-companion way children want to 
 like folks. Only last winter I seed Miss Elfride talking 
 to my lady and the two children, and Miss Elfride 
 wiped their noses for em' so careful — my lady never 
 once seeing that it wanted doing; and, naturally, 
 children take to people that's their best friend.' 
 
 ' Be as 'twill, the woman is dead and gone, and we 
 must make a place for her,' said John. ' Come, lads, 
 drink up your ale, and we'll just rid this corner, so as to 
 have all clear for beginning at the wall, as soon as 'tis 
 light to-morrow.' 
 
 Stephen then asked where Lady Luxellian was to lie. 
 
 ' Here,' said his father. ' We are going to set back 
 this wall and make a recess ; and 'tis enough for us to 
 do before the funeral. When my lord's mother died, 
 she said, "John, the place must be enlarged before 
 another can be put in." But 'a never expected 'twould 
 295 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 be wanted so soon. Better move Lord George first, I 
 suppose, Simeon ? ' 
 
 He pointed with his foot to a heavy coffin, covered 
 with what had originally been red velvet, the colour of 
 which could only just be distinguished now. 
 
 'Just as ye think best. Master John,' replied the 
 shrivelled mason. ' Ah, poor Lord George ! ' he con- 
 tinued, looking contemplatively at the huge coffin ; ' he 
 and I were as bitter enemies once as any could be 
 when one is a lord and t'other only a mortal man. 
 Poor fellow ! He'd clap his hand upon my shoulder 
 and cuss me as familiar and neighbourly as if he'd 
 been a common chap. Ay, 'a cussed me up hill and 
 'a cussed me down ; and then 'a would rave out again, 
 and the goold clamps of his fine new teeth would glisten 
 in the sun like fetters of brass, while I, being a small 
 man and poor, was fain to say nothing at all. Such a 
 strappen fine gentleman as he was too ! Yes, I rather 
 liked en sometimes. But once now and then, when I 
 looked at his towering height, I'd think in my inside, 
 "What a weight you'll be, my lord, for our arms to 
 lower under the aisle of Endelstow Church some 
 day ! " ' 
 
 ' And was he ? ' inquired a young labourer. 
 
 ' He was. He was five hundredweight if 'a were a 
 pound. What with his lead, and his oak, and his 
 handles, and his one thing and t'other' — here the 
 ancient man slapped his hand upon the cover with a 
 force that caused a rattle among the bones inside — ' he 
 half broke my back when I took his feet to lower en 
 down the steps there. " Ah," saith I to John there — 
 didn't I, John ? — " that ever one man's glory should be 
 such a weight upon another man ! " But there, I liked 
 my lord George sometimes.' 
 
 ''Tis a strange thought,' said another, 'that while 
 they be all here under one roof, a snug united family 
 o' Luxellians, they be really scattered miles away from 
 296 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 one another in the form of good sheep and wicked goats, 
 isn't it ? ' 
 
 ' True ; 'tis a thought to look at.' 
 
 'And that one, if he's gone upward, don't know 
 what his wife is doing no more than the man in the 
 moon if she's gone downward. And that some un- 
 fortunate one in the hot place is a-hollering across to 
 a lucky one up in the clouds, and quite forgetting their 
 bodies be boxed close together all the time.' 
 
 ' Ay, 'tis a thought to look at, too, that I can say 
 "Hullo!" close to fiery Lord George, and 'a can't 
 hear me.' 
 
 ' And that I be eating my onion close to dainty Lady 
 Jane's nose, and she can't smell me.' 
 
 ' What do 'em put all their heads one way for ? ' 
 inquired a young man. 
 
 ' Because 'tis churchyard law, you simple. The law 
 of the living is, that a man shall be upright and down- 
 right ; and the law of the dead is, that a man shall be 
 east and west. Every state of society have its laws.' 
 
 ' We must break the law wi' a few of the poor souls, 
 however. Come, buckle to,' said the master-mason. 
 
 And they set to work anew. 
 
 The order of interment could be distinctly traced by 
 observing the appearance of the coffins as they lay piled 
 around. On those which had been standing there but 
 a generation or two the trappings still remained. Those 
 of an earlier period showed bare wood, with a few 
 tattered rags dangling therefrom. Earlier still, the wood 
 lay in fragments on the floor of the niche, and the coffin 
 consisted of naked lead alone ; whilst in the case of the 
 very oldest, even the lead was bulging and cracking in 
 pieces, revealing to the curious eye a heap of dust within. 
 The shields upon many were quite loose, and removable 
 by the hand, their lustreless surfaces still indistinctly 
 exhibiting the name and title of the deceased. 
 
 Overhead the groins and concavities of the arches 
 
 " 297 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 curved in all directions, dropping low towards the walls, 
 where the height was no more than sufficient to enable 
 a person to stand upright. 
 
 'The body of George the fourteenth baron, together 
 with two or three others, all of more recent date than 
 the great bulk of coffins piled there, had, for want of 
 room, been placed at the end of the vault on tressels, 
 and not in niches like the others. These it was neces- 
 sary to remove, to form behind them the chamber in 
 which they were ultimately to be deposited. Stephen, 
 finding the place and proceedings in keeping with the 
 sombre colours of his mind, waited there still. 
 
 ' Simeon, I suppose you can mind poor Lady Elfride, 
 and how she ran away with the actor ? ' said John Smith, 
 after awhile. ' I think it fell upon the time my father 
 was sexton here. Let us see — where is she ? ' 
 
 ' Here somewhere,' returned Simeon, looking round 
 him. 
 
 ' Why, I've got my arms round the very gentlewoman 
 at this moment.' He lowered the end of the coffin he 
 was holding, wiped his face, and throwing a morsel of 
 rotten wood upon another as an indicator, continued : 
 ' That's her husband there. They was as fair a couple 
 as you should see anywhere round about ; and a good- 
 hearted pair likewise. Ay, I can mind it, though I was 
 but a chiel at the time. She fell in love with this young 
 man of hers, and their banns were asked in some church 
 in London ; and the old lord her father actually heard 
 'em asked the three times, and didn't notice her name, 
 being gabbled on wi' a host of others. When she had 
 married she told her father, and 'a fleed into a mon- 
 strous rage, and said she shouldn' hae a farthing. 
 Lady Elfride said she didn't think of wishing it ; if he'd 
 forgie her 'twas all she asked, and as for a living, she 
 was content to play plays with her husband. This 
 frightened the old lord, and 'a gie'd 'em a house to live 
 in, and a great garden, and a httle field or two, and a 
 298 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 carriage, and a good few guineas. Well, the poor thing 
 died at her first gossiping, and her husband — who was 
 as tender-hearted a man as ever eat meat, and would 
 have died for her — went wild in tiis mind, and broke 
 his heart (so 'twas said). Anyhow, they were buried 
 the same day — father and mother — but the baby lived. 
 Ay, my lord's family made much of that man then, and 
 put him here with his wife, and there in the corner the 
 man is now. The Sunday after there was a funeral 
 sermon : the text was, " Or ever the silver cord be loosed, 
 or the golden bowl be broken ; " and when 'twas preach- 
 ing the men drew their hands across their eyes several 
 times, and every woman cried out loud.' 
 
 ' And what became of the baby ? ' said Stephen, who 
 had frequently heard portions of the story. 
 
 ' She was brought up by her grandmother, and a 
 pretty maid she were. And she must needs run away 
 with the curate — Parson Swancourt that is now. Then 
 her grandmother died, and the title and everything went 
 away to another branch of the family altogether. Parson 
 Swancourt wasted a good deal of his wife's money, and 
 she left him Miss Elfride. That trick of running away 
 seems to be handed down in families, like craziness or 
 gout. And they two women be alike as peas.' 
 
 ' Which two ? ' 
 
 ' Lady Elfride and young Miss that's alive now. 
 The same hair and eyes : but Miss Elfride's mother was 
 darker a good deal.' 
 
 ' Life's a strangle bubble, ye see,' said William Worm 
 musingly. ' For if the Lord's anointment had de- 
 scended upon women instead of men. Miss Elfride 
 would be Lord LuxelUan — Lady, I mane. But as 
 it is, the blood is run out, and she's nothing to the 
 Luxellian family by law, whatever she may be by 
 gospel.' 
 
 ' I used to fancy,' said Simeon, ' when I seed Miss 
 Elfride hugging the little ladyships, that there was a 
 299 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 likeness ; but I suppose 'twas only my dream, for years 
 must have altered the old family shape.' 
 
 'And now we'll move these two, and home-along,' 
 interposed John Smith, reviving, as became a master, 
 the spirit of labour, which had showed unmistakable 
 signs of being nearly vanquished by the spirit of chat. 
 ' The flagon of ale we don't want we'll let bide here till 
 to-morrow; none of the poor souls will touch it 'a 
 b'lieve.' 
 
 So the evening's work was concluded, and the party 
 drew from the abode of the quiet dead, closing the old 
 iron door, and shooting the lock loudly into the huge 
 copper staple — an incongruous act of imprisonment 
 towards those who had no dreams of escape. 
 
XXVII 
 
 ' How should I greet thee?' 
 
 LOVE frequently dies of time alone — much more 
 frequently of displacement. With Elfride Swancourt, a 
 powerful reason why the displacement should be suc- 
 cessful was that the new-comer was a greater man than 
 the first. By the side of the instructive and piquant 
 snubbings she received from Knight, Stephen's general 
 agreeableness seemed watery; by the side of Knight's 
 spare love-making, Stephen's continual outflow seemed 
 lackadaisical. She had begun to sigh for somebody 
 further on in manhood. Stephen was hardly enough of 
 a man. 
 
 Perhaps there was a proneness to inconstancy in 
 her nature — a nature, to those who contemplate it from 
 a standpoint beyond the influence of that inconstancy, 
 the most exquisite of all in its plasticity and ready 
 sympathies. Partly, too, Stephen's failure to make his 
 hold on her heart a permanent one was his too timid 
 habit of dispraising himself beside her — a peculiarity 
 which, exercised towards sensible men, stirs a kindly 
 chord of attachment that a marked assertiveness would 
 leave untouched, but inevitably leads the most sensible 
 woman in the world to undervalue him who practises 
 301 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 it. Directly domineering ceases in the man, snubbing 
 begins in the woman ; the trite but no less unfortunate 
 fact being that the gentler creature rarely has the 
 capacity to appreciate fair treatment from her natural 
 complement. The abiding perception of the position 
 of Stephen's parents had, of course, a little to do with 
 Elfride's renunciation. To such girls poverty may not 
 be, as to the more worldly masses of humanity, a sin 
 in itself; but it is a sin, because graceful and dainty 
 manners seldom exist in such an atmosphere. Few 
 women of old family can be thoroughly taught that a 
 fine soul may wear a smock-frock, and an admittedly 
 common man in one is but a worm in their eyes. 
 John Smith's rough hands and clothes, his wife's 
 • dialect, the necessary narrowness of their ways, being 
 constantly under Elfride's notice, were not without their 
 deflecting influence. 
 
 On reaching home after the perilous adventure by 
 the sea-shore, Knight had felt unwell, and retired almost 
 immediately. The young lady who had so materially 
 assisted him had done the same, but she reappeared, 
 properly clothed, about five o'clock. She wandered 
 restlessly about the house, but not on account of their 
 joint narrow escape from death. The storm which had 
 torn the tree had merely bowed the reed, and with the 
 deliverance of Knight all deep thought of the accident 
 had left her. The mutual avowal which it had been 
 the means of precipitating occupied a far longer length 
 of her meditations. 
 
 Elfride's disquiet now was on account of that miser- 
 able promise to meet Stephen, which returned like a 
 spectre again and again. The perception of his littleness 
 beside Knight grew upon her alarmingly. She now 
 thought how sound had been her father's advice to her 
 to give him up, and was as passionately desirous of 
 following it as she had hitherto been averse. Perhaps 
 there is nothing more hardening to the tone of young 
 30Z 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 minds than thus to discover how their dearest and 
 strongest wishes become gradually attuned by Time the 
 Cynic to the very note of some selfish policy which in 
 earlier days they despised. 
 
 The hour of appointment came, and with it a crisis ; 
 and with the crisis a collapse. 
 
 ' God forgive me — I can't meet Stephen ! ' she 
 exclaimed to herself. ' I don't love him less, but I 
 love Mr. Knight more ! ' 
 
 Yes : she would save herself from a man not fit for 
 her — in spite of vows. She would obey her father, and 
 have no more to do with Stephen Smith. Thus the 
 fickle resolve showed signs of assuming the complexion 
 of a virtue. 
 
 The following days were passed without any definite 
 avowal from Knight's lips. Such solitary walks and 
 scenes as that witnessed by Smith in the summer-house 
 were frequent, but he courted her so intangibly that to 
 any but such a delicate perception as Elfride's it would 
 have appeared no courtship at all. The time now really 
 began to be sweet with her. She dismissed the sense 
 of sin in her past actions, and was automatic in the 
 intoxication of the moment. The fact that Knight 
 made no actual declaration was no drawback. Knowing 
 since the betrayal of his sentiments that love for her 
 really existed, she preferred it for the present in its 
 form of essence, and was willing to avoid for awhile the 
 grosser medium of words. Their feelings having been 
 forced to a rather premature demonstration, a reaction 
 was indulged in by both. 
 
 But no sooner had she got rid of her troubled 
 conscience on the matter of faithlessness than a new 
 anxiety confronted her. It was lest Knight should 
 accidentally meet Stephen in the parish, and that herself 
 should be the subject of discourse. 
 
 Elfride, learning Knight more thoroughly, perceived 
 that, far from having a notion of Stephen's precedence, 
 3°3 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 he had no idea that she had ever been wooed before 
 by anybody. Oi;i ordinary occasions she had a tongue 
 so frank as to show her whole mind, and a mind so 
 straightforward as to reveal her heart to its innermost 
 shrine. But the time for a change had come. She 
 never alluded to even a knowledge of Knight's friend. 
 When women are secret they are secret indeed ; and 
 more often than not they only begin to be secret with 
 the advent of a second lover. 
 
 The elopement was now a spectre worse than the 
 first, and, like the Spirit in Glenfinlas, it waxed taller 
 with every attempt to lay it. Her natural honesty in- 
 vited her to confide in Knight, and trust to his gener- 
 osity for forgiveness : she knew also that as mere policy 
 it would be better to tell him early if he was to be told 
 at all. The longer her concealment the more difficult 
 would be the revelation. But she put it ofT The 
 intense fear which accompanies intense love in young 
 women was too strong to allow the exercise of a moral 
 quality antagonistic to itself : 
 
 ' Where love is great, the littlest doubts are fear ; 
 Where little fears grow great, great love grows there.' 
 
 The match was looked upon as made by her father 
 and mother. The vicar remembered her promise to 
 reveal the meaning of the telegram she had received, 
 and two days after the scene in the summer-house, 
 asked her pointedly. She was frank with him now. 
 
 ' I had been corresponding with Stephen Smith ever 
 since he left England, till lately,' she calmly said. 
 
 ' What ! ' cried the vicar aghast ; ' under the eyes of 
 Mr. Knight, too ? ' 
 
 ' No ; when I found I cared most for Mr. Knight, 
 I obeyed you.' 
 
 'You were very kind, I'm sure. When did you 
 begin to like Mr. Knight ? ' 
 
 ' I don't see that that is a pertinent question, papa ; 
 304 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 the telegram was from the shipping agent, and was not 
 sent at my request. It announced the arrival of the 
 vessel bringing him home.' 
 
 ' Home ! What, is he here ? ' 
 
 ' Yes ; in the village, I believe.' 
 
 ' Has he tried to see you ? ' 
 
 ' Only by fair means. But don't, papa, question me 
 so ! It is torture.' 
 
 ' I will only say one word more,' he replied. ' Have 
 you met him ? ' 
 
 ' I have not. I can assure you that at the present 
 moment there is no more of an understanding between 
 me and the young man you so much disliked than 
 between him and you. You told me to forget him; 
 and I have forgotten him.' 
 
 ' Oh, well ; though you did not obey me in the begin- 
 ning, you are a good girl, Elfride, in obeying me at last.' 
 
 'Don't call me "good," papa,' she said bitterly; 
 ' you don't know — and the less said about some things 
 the better. Remember, Mr. Knight knows nothing 
 about the other. Oh, how wrong it all is ! I don't 
 know what I am coming to.' 
 
 ' As matters stand, I should be inclined to tell him ; 
 or, at any rate, I should not alarm myself about his 
 knowing. He found out the other day that this was 
 the parish young Smith's father lives in — what puts you 
 in such a flurry ? ' 
 
 ' I can't say ; but promise — pray don't let him 
 know ! It would be my ruin ! ' 
 
 ' Pooh, child. Knight is a good fellow and a clever 
 man ; but at the same time it does not escape my per- 
 ceptions that he is no great catch for you. Men of 
 his turn of mind are nothing so wonderful in the way 
 of husbands. If you had chosen to wait, you might 
 have mated with a much wealthier man. But remember, 
 I have not a word to say against your having him, if 
 you like him. Charlotte is delighted, as you know.' 
 3°S U 
 
^ PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 ' Well, papa,' she said, smiling hopefully through a 
 sigh, • it is nice to feel that in giving way to — to caring 
 for him, I have pleased my family. But I am not good ; 
 oh no, I am very far from that ! ' 
 
 ' None of us are good, I am sorry to say,' said her 
 father blandly ; ' but girls have a chartered right to 
 change their minds, you know. It has been recognized 
 by poets from time immemorial. Catullus says, " Mulier 
 cupido quod dicit amanti, in vento — ' What a memory 
 mine is ! However, the passage is, that a woman's 
 words to a lover are as a matter of course written only 
 on wind and water. Now don't be troubled about that, 
 Elfride.' ' 
 
 ' Ah, you don't know ! 'I 
 
 They had been standing on the lawn, and Knight 
 was now seen lingering some way down a winding walk. 
 When Elfride met him, it was with a much greater 
 lightness of heart ; things were more straightforward 
 now. The responsibility of her fickleness seemed partly 
 shifted from her own shoulders to her father's. Still, 
 there were shadows. 
 
 ' Ah, could he have known how far I went with 
 Stephen, and yet have said the same, how much happier 
 I should be ! ' That was her prevailing thought. 
 
 In the afternoon the lovers went out together on 
 horseback for an hour or two ; and though not wishing 
 to be observed, by reason of the late death of Lady 
 LuxelKan, whose funeral had taken place very privately 
 on the previous day, they yet found it necessary to pass 
 East Endelstow Church. 
 
 The steps to the vault, as has been stated, were on 
 the outside of the building, immediately under the aisle 
 wall. Being on horseback, both Knight and Elfride 
 could overlook the shrubs which screened the church- 
 yard. 
 
 • Look, the vault seems still to be open,' said Knight. 
 
 ' Yes, it is open,' she answered. 
 306 
 
A PAIR OP Slue eyes 
 
 ' Who is that man close by it ? The mason, I 
 suppose ? ' 
 
 'Yes.' 
 
 ' I wonder if it is John Smith, Stephen's father ? ' 
 
 ' I believe it is,' said Elfride, with apprehension. 
 
 ' Ah, and can it be ? I should like to inquire how 
 his son, my truant prot^g^, is going on. And from 
 your father's description of the vault, the interior must 
 be interesting. Suppose we go in.' 
 
 ' Had we better, do you think ? May not Lord 
 Luxellian be there ? ' 
 
 ' It is not at all likely.' 
 
 Elfride then assented, since she could do nothing 
 else. Her heart, which at first had quailed in con- 
 sternation, recovered itself when she considered the 
 character of John Smith. A quiet unassuming man, he 
 would be sure to act towards her as before those love 
 passages with his son, which might have given a more 
 pretentious mechanic airs. So without much alarm she 
 took Knight's arm after dismounting, and went with 
 him between and over the graves. The master-mason 
 recognized her as she approached, and, as usual, lifted 
 his hat respectfully. 
 
 ' I know you to be Mr. Smith, my former friend 
 Stephen's father,' said Knight, directly he had scanned 
 the embrowned and ruddy features of John. 
 
 ' Yes, sir, I b'heve I be.' 
 
 ' How is your son now ? I have only once heard 
 from him since he went to India. I daresay you have 
 heard him speak of me — Mr. Knight, who became 
 acquainted with him some years ago in Exonbury.' 
 
 'Ay, that I have. Stephen is very well, thank you, 
 sir, and he's in England; in fact, he's at home. In 
 short, sir, he's down in the vault there, a-looking at the 
 departed coffins.' 
 
 Elfride's heart fluttered like a butterfly. 
 
 Knight looked amazed. 'Well, that is extraordi- 
 307 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 nary.' he murmured. 'Did he know I was in the 
 
 parish ? ' 
 
 ' I really can't say, sir,' said John, wishing him- 
 self out of the entanglement he rather suspected than 
 thoroughly understood. 
 
 'Would it be considered an intrusion by the family 
 if we went into the vault ? ' 
 
 ' Oh, bless ye, no, sir ; scores of folk have been 
 stepping down. 'Tis left open a-purpose.' 
 
 ' We will go down, Elfride.' 
 
 ' I am afraid the air is close,' she said appealingly. 
 
 ' Oh no, ma'am,' said John. ' We white-limed the 
 walls and arches the day 'twas opened, as we always do, 
 and again on the morning of the funeral ; the place is 
 as sweet as a granary.' 
 
 ' Then I should like you to accompany me, Elfie ; 
 having originally sprung from the family too.' 
 
 ' I don't like going where death is so emphatically 
 present. I'll stay by the horses whilst you go in ; they 
 may get loose.' 
 
 ' What nonsense ! I had no idea your sentiments 
 were so flimsily formed as to be perturbed by a few 
 remnants of mortality ; but stay out, if you are so 
 afraid, by all means.' 
 
 ' Oh no, I am not afraid ; don't say that.' 
 
 She held miserably to his arm, thinking that, perhaps, 
 the revelation might as well come at once as ten minutes 
 later, for Stephen would be sure to accompany his friend 
 to his horse. 
 
 At first, the gloom of the vault, which was lighted 
 only by a couple of candles, was too great to admit 
 of their seeing anything distinctly ; but with a further 
 advance Knight discerned, in front of the black masses 
 hning the walls, a young man standing, and writing 
 in a pocket-book. 
 
 Knight said one word : ' Stephen ! ' 
 
 Stephen Smith, not being in such absolute ignorance 
 308 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 of Knight's whereabouts as Knight had been of Smith's, 
 instantly recognized his friend, and knew by rote the 
 outlines of the fair woman standing behind him. 
 
 Stephen came forward and shook him by the hand, 
 without speaking. 
 
 ' Why have you not written, my boy ? ' said Knight, 
 without in any way signifying Elfride's presence to 
 Stephen. To the essayist. Smith was still the country 
 lad whom he had patronized and tended ; one to whom 
 the formal presentation of a lady betrothed to himself 
 would have seemed incongruous and absurd. 
 
 ' Why haven't you written to me ? ' said Stephen. 
 
 'Ah, yes. Why haven't I? why haven't we? 
 That's always the query which we cannot clearly 
 answer without an unsatisfactory sense of our inade- 
 quacies. However, I have not forgotten you, Smith. 
 And now we have met; and we must meet again, 
 and have a longer chat than this can conveniently 
 be. I must know all you have been doing. That 
 you have thriven, I know, and you must teach me 
 the way.' 
 
 Elfride stood in the background. Stephen had read 
 the position at a glance, and immediately guessed that 
 she had never mentioned his name to Knight. His 
 tact in avoiding catastrophes was the chief quality 
 which made him intellectually respectable, in which 
 quality he far transcended Knight; and he decided 
 that a tranquil issue out of the encounter, without any 
 harrowing of the feelings of either Knight or Elfride, 
 was to be attempted if possible. His old sense of 
 indebtedness to Knight had never wholly forsaken 
 him ; his love for Elfride was generous now. 
 
 As far as he dared look at her movements he saw 
 that her bearing towards him would be dictated by his 
 own towards her; and if he acted as a stranger she 
 would do likewise as a means of deliverance. Circum- 
 stances favouring this course, it was desirable also to 
 309 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 be rather reserved towards Knight, to shorten the 
 meeting as much as possible. 
 
 ' I am afraid that my time is almost too short to 
 allow even of such a pleasure,' he said. ' I leave here 
 to-morrow. And until I start for the Continent and 
 India, which will be in a fortnight, I shall have hardly 
 a moment to spare.' 
 
 Knight's disappointment and dissatisfied looks at 
 this reply sent a pang through Stephen as great as any 
 he had felt at the sight of Elfride. The words about 
 shortness of time were literally true, but their tone was 
 far from being so. He would have been gratified to 
 talk with Knight as in past times, and saw as a dead 
 loss to himself that, to save the woman who cared 
 nothing for him, he was deliberately throwing away his 
 friend. 
 
 ' Oh, I am sorry to hear that,' said Knight, in a 
 changed tone. ' But of course, if you have weighty 
 concerns to attend to, they must not be neglected. 
 And if this is to be our first and last meeting, let 
 me say that I wish you success with . all my heart ! ' 
 Knight's warmth revived towards the end; the solemn 
 impressions he was beginning to receive from the scene 
 around them abstracting from his heart as a puerility 
 any momentary vexation at words. 'It is a strange 
 place for us to meet in,' he continued, looking round 
 the vault. 
 
 Stephen briefly assented, and there was a silence. 
 The blackened coffins were now revealed more clearly 
 than at first, the whitened walls and arches throwing 
 them forward in strong relief. It was a scene which 
 was remembered by all three as an indelible mark in 
 their history. Knight, with an abstracted face, was 
 standing between his companions, though a little in 
 advance of them, Elfride being on his right hand, and 
 Stephen Smith on his left. The white daylight on his 
 right side gleamed faintly in, and was toned to a blu^ 
 310 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 ness by contrast with the yellow rays from the candle 
 against the wall. Elfride, timidly shrinking back, and 
 nearest the entrance, received most of the light there- 
 from, whilst Stephen was entirely in candlelight, and to 
 him the spot of outer sky visible above the steps was as 
 a steely blue patch, and nothing more. 
 
 ' I have been here two or three times since it was 
 opened,' said Stephen. ' My father was engaged in 
 the work, you know.' 
 
 'Yes. What are you doing?' Knight inquired, 
 looking at the note-book and pencil Stephen held in 
 his hand. 
 
 ' I have been sketching a few details in the church, 
 and since then I have been copying the names from 
 some of the coffins here. Before I left England I used 
 to do a good deal of this sort of thing.' 
 
 ' Yes ; of course. Ah, that's poor Lady Luxellian, 
 I suppose.' Knight pointed to a coffin of light satin- 
 wood, which stood on the stone sleepers in the new 
 niche. ' And the remainder of the family are on this 
 side. Who are those two, so snug and close together ? ' 
 
 Stephen's voice altered slightly as he replied : ' That's 
 Lady Elfride Kingsmore — born Luxellian, and that is 
 Arthur, her husband. I have heard my father say that 
 they — he — ran away with her, and married her against 
 the wish of her parents.' 
 
 ' Then I imagine this to be where you got your 
 Christian name, Miss Swancourt ? ' said Knight, turn- 
 ing to her. ' I think you told me it was three or four 
 generations ago that your family branched off from the 
 Luxellians ? ' 
 
 ' She was my grandmother,' said Elfride, vainly en- 
 deavouring to moisten her dry lips before she spoke. 
 Elfride had then the conscience-stricken look of Guide's 
 Magdalen, rendered upon a more childlike form. She 
 kept her face partially away from Knight and Stephen, 
 and set her eyes upon the sky visible outside, as if her 
 3" 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 salvation depended upon quickly reaching it. Her left 
 hand rested lightly within Knight's arm, half withdrawn, 
 from a sense of shame at claiming him before her old 
 lover, yet unwilling to renounce him ; so that her glove 
 merely touched his sleeve. ' " Can one be pardoned, and 
 retain the offence ? " ' quoted Elfride's heart then. 
 
 Conversation seemed to have no self-sustaining 
 power, and went on in the shape of disjointed remarks. 
 ' One's mind gets thronged with thoughts while stand- 
 ing so solemnly here,' Knight said, in a measured quiet 
 voice. ' How much has been said on death from time 
 to time ! how much we ourselves can think upon it ! 
 We may fancy each of these who lie here saying : 
 
 ' For Thou, to make my fall more great. 
 Didst lift me up on high.' 
 
 What comes next, Elfride? It is the Hundred-and- 
 second Psalm I am thinking of.' 
 
 ' Yes, I know it,' she murmured, and went on in a 
 still lower voice, seemingly afraid for any words from 
 the emotional side of her nature to reach Stephen : 
 
 • " My days, just hastening to their end. 
 Are like an evening shade ; 
 My beauty doth, like wither'd grass, 
 With waning lustre fade." ' 
 
 'Well,' said Knight musingly, 'let us leave them. 
 Such occasions as these seem to compel us to roam 
 outside ourselves, far away from the fragile frame we live 
 in, and to expand till our perception grows so vast that 
 our physical reality bears no sort of proportion to it. 
 We look back upon the weak and minute stem on which 
 this luxuriant growth depends, and ask. Can it be pos- 
 sible that such a capacity has a foundation so small? 
 Must I again return to my daily walk in that narrow 
 cell, a human body, where worldly thoughts can torture 
 me ? Do we not ? ' 
 
 312 
 
A PAIR OP BLUE EYES 
 
 ' Yes,' said Stephen and Elfride. 
 
 ' One has a sense of wrong, too, that such an ap- 
 preciative breadth as a sentient being possesses should 
 be committed to the frail casket of a body. What 
 weakens one's intentions regarding the future like the 
 thought of this ? . . . . However, let us tune ourselves 
 to a more cheerful chord, for there's a great deal to be 
 done yet by us all.' 
 
 As Knight meditatively addressed his juniors thus, 
 unconscious of the deception practised, for different 
 reasons, by the severed hearts at his side, and of the 
 scenes that had in earlier days united them, each one 
 felt that he and she did not gain by contrast with their 
 musing mentor. Physically not so handsome as either 
 the youthful architect or the vicar's daughter, the thor- 
 oughness and integrity of Knight illuminated his features 
 with a dignity not even incipient in the other two. It is 
 difficult to frame rules which shall apply to both sexes, 
 and Elfride, an undeveloped girl, must, perhaps, hardly 
 be laden with the moral responsibilities which attach to 
 a man in like circumstances. The charm of woman, 
 too, lies partly in her subtleness in matters of love. But 
 if honesty is a virtue in itself, Elfride, having none of it 
 now, seemed, being for being, scarcely good enough for 
 Knight. Stephen, though deceptive for no unworthy 
 purpose, was deceptive after all ; and whatever good re- 
 sults grace such strategy if it succeed, it seldom draws 
 admiration, especially when it fails. 
 
 On an ordinary occasion, had Knight been even quite 
 alone with Stephen, he would hardly have alluded to his 
 possible relationship to Elfride. But moved by attendant 
 circumstances Knight was impelled to be confiding. 
 
 ' Stephen,' he said, ' this lady is Miss Swancourt. I 
 am staying at her father's house, as you probably know.' 
 He stepped a few paces nearer to Smith, and said in a 
 lower tone : ' I may as well tell you that we are engaged 
 to be married.' 
 
 "" 313 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 Low as the words had been spoken, Elfride had 
 heard them, and awaited Stephen's reply in breathless 
 silence, if that could be called silence where Elfride's 
 dress, at each throb of her heart, shook and indicated 
 it like a pulse-glass, rustling also against the wall in 
 reply to the same throbbing. The ray of daylight which 
 reached her face lent it a blue pallor in comparison with 
 those of the other two. 
 
 ' I congratulate you,' Stephen whispered ; and said 
 aloud, ' I know Miss Swancourt — a little. You must 
 remember that my father is a parishioner of Mr. Swan- 
 court's.' 
 
 ' I thought you might possibly not have lived at 
 home since they have been here.' 
 
 ' I have never lived at home, certainly, since that 
 time.' 
 
 ' I have seen Mr. Smith,' faltered Elfride. 
 
 ' Well, there is no excuse for me. As strangers to 
 each other I ought, I suppose, to have introduced you : 
 as acquaintances, I should not have stood so persis- 
 tently between you. But the fact is. Smith, you seem a 
 boy to me, even now.' 
 
 Stephen appeared to have a more than previous con- 
 sciousness of the intense cruelty of his fate at the 
 present moment. He could not repress the words, 
 uttered with a dim bitterness : 
 
 ' You should have said that I seemed still the rural 
 mechanic's son I am, and hence an unfit subject for the 
 ceremony of introductions.' 
 
 ' Oh, no, no ! I won't have that.' Knight endea- 
 voured to give his reply a laughing tone in Elfride's 
 ears, and an earnestness in Stephen's : in both which 
 efforts he signally failed, and produced a forced speech 
 pleasant to neither. ' Well, let us go into the open air 
 again; Miss Swancourt, you are particularly silent. 
 You mustn't mind Smith. I have known him for years, 
 as I have told you.' 
 
 314 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 ' Yes, you have,' she said. 
 
 ' To think she has never mentioned her knowledge of 
 me ! ' Smith murmured, and thought with some remorse 
 how much her conduct resembled his own on his first 
 arrival at her house as a stranger to the place. 
 
 They ascended to the daylight. Knight taking no 
 further notice of Elfride's manner, which, as usual, he 
 attributed to the hatural shyness of a young woman at 
 being discovered walking with him on terms which left 
 not much doubt of their meaning. Elfride stepped a 
 little in advance, and passed through the churchyard. 
 
 'You are changed very considerably, Smith,' said 
 Knight, ' and I suppose it is no more than was to be 
 expected. However, don't imagine that I shall feel 
 any the less interest in you and your fortunes whenever 
 you care to confide them to me. I have not forgotten 
 the attachment you spoke of as your reason for going 
 away to India. A London young lady, was it not ? I 
 hope all is prosperous ? ' 
 
 ' No : the match is broken off.' 
 
 It being always difficult to know whether to express 
 sorrow or gladness under such circumstances — all de- 
 pending upon the character of the match — Knight 
 took shelter in the safe words : ' I trust it was for the 
 best.' 
 
 ' I hope it was. But I beg that you will not press 
 me further : no, you have not pressed me — I don't 
 mean that — but I would rather not speak upon the 
 subject.' 
 
 Stephen's words were hurried. 
 
 Knight said no more, and they followed in the foot- 
 steps of Elfride, who still kept some paces in advance, 
 and had not heard Knight's unconscious allusion to 
 her. Stephen bade him adieu at the churchyard-gate 
 without going outside, and watched whilst he and his 
 sweetheart mounted their horses. 
 
 'Good heavens, Elfride,' Knight exclaimed, 'how 
 315 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 pale you are ! I suppose I ought not to have taken 
 you into that vault. What is the matter ? ' 
 
 ' Nothing,' said Elfride faintly. ' I shall be myself 
 in a moment. All was so strange and unexpected down 
 there, that it made me unwell.' 
 
 'I thought you said very little. Shall I get some 
 water ? ' 
 
 ' No, no.' 
 
 • Do you think it is safe for you to mount ? ' 
 
 ' Quite — indeed it is,' she said, with a look of appeal. 
 
 ' Now then — up she goes ! ' whispered Knight, and 
 lifted her tenderly into the saddle. 
 
 Her old lover still looked on at the performance as 
 he leant over the gate a dozen yards off. Once in the 
 saddle, and having a firm grip of the reins, she turned 
 her head as if by a resistless fascination, and for the 
 first time since that memorable parting on the moor 
 outside St. Launce's after the passionate attempt at 
 marriage with him, Elfride looked in the face of the 
 young man she first had loved. He was the youth who 
 had called her his inseparable wife many a time, and 
 whom she had even addressed as her husband. Their 
 eyes met. Measurement of life should be proportioned 
 rather to the intensity of the experience than to its 
 actual length. Their glance, but a moment chrono- 
 logically, was a season in their history. To Elfride the 
 intense agony of reproach in Stephen's eye was a nail 
 piercing her heart with a deadliness no words can 
 describe. With a spasmodic effort she withdrew her 
 eyes, urged on the horse, and in the chaos of perturbed 
 memories was oblivious of any presence beside her. 
 The deed of deception was complete. 
 
 Gaining a knoll on which the park transformed itself 
 into wood and copse. Knight came still closer to her 
 side, and said, ' Are you better now, dearest ? ' 
 
 ' Oh yes.' She pressed a hand to her eyes, as if to 
 blot out the image of Stephen. A vivid scarlet spot 
 316 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 now shone with preternatural brightness in the centre 
 of each cheek, leaving the remainder of her face lily- 
 white as before. 
 
 ' Elfride,' said Knight, rather in his old tone of 
 mentor, 'you know I don't for a moment chide you, 
 but is there not a great deal of unwomanly weakness 
 in your allowing yourself to be so overwhelmed by the 
 sight of what, after all, is no novelty ? Every woman 
 worthy of the name should, I think, be able to look 
 upon death with something like composure. Surely 
 you think so too ? ' 
 
 ' Yes ; I own it.' 
 
 His obtuseness to the cause of her indisposition, 
 by evidencing his entire freedom from the suspicion 
 of anything behind the scenes, showed how incapable 
 Knight was of deception himself, rather than any in- 
 herent dulness in him regarding human nature. This, 
 clearly perceived by Elfride, added poignancy to her 
 self-reproach, and she idolized him the more because 
 of their difference. Even the recent sight of Stephen's 
 face and the sound of his voice, which for a moment 
 had stirred a chord or two of ancient kindness, were 
 unable to keep down the adoration re-existent now that 
 he was again out of view. 
 
 She had replied to Knight's question hastily, and 
 immediately went on to speak of indifferent subjects. 
 After they had reached home she was apart from him 
 till dinner-time. When dinner was over, and they were 
 watching the dusk in the drawing-room. Knight stepped 
 out upon the terrace. Elfride went after him very 
 decisively, on the spur of a virtuous intention. 
 
 ' Mr. Knight, I want to tell you something,' she said, 
 with quiet firmness. 
 
 ' And what is it about ? ' gaily returned her lover. 
 ' Happiness, I hope. Do not let anything keep you so 
 sad as you seem to have been to-day.' 
 
 ' I cannot mention the matter until I tell you the 
 317 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 whole substance of it,' she said. ' And that I will do 
 to-morrow. I have been reminded of it to-day. It is 
 about something I once did, and don't think I ought to 
 have done.' 
 
 This, it must be said, was rather a mild way of 
 referring to a frantic passion and flight, which, much 
 or little in itself, only accident had saved from being a 
 scandal in the public eye. 
 
 Knight thought the matter some trifle, and said 
 pleasantly : 
 
 'Then I am not to hear the dreadful confession 
 now?' 
 
 ' No, not now. I did not mean to-night,' Elfride 
 responded, with a slight decline in the firmness of her 
 voice. ' It is not light as you think it — it troubles me 
 a great deal.' Fearing now the effect of her own 
 earnestness, she added forcedly, ' Though, perhaps, you 
 may think it light after all.' 
 
 ' But you have not said when it is to be ? ' 
 
 ' To-morrow morning. Name a time, will you, and 
 bind me to it ? I want you to fix an hour, because I 
 am weak, and may otherwise try to get out of it.' She 
 added a little artificial laugh, which showed how timorous 
 her resolution was still. 
 
 ' Well, say after breakfast — at eleven o'clock.' 
 
 'Yes, eleven o'clock. I promise you. Bind me 
 strictly to my word.' 
 
XXVIII 
 
 ' I lull a fancy, trouble-tost.' 
 
 Miss SWANCOURT, it is eleven o'clock.' 
 
 She was looking out of her dressing-room window on 
 the first floor, and Knight was regarding her from the 
 terrace balustrade, upon which he had been idly sitting 
 for some time — dividing the glances of his eye between 
 the pages of a book in his hand, the brilliant hues of the 
 geraniums and calceolarias, and the open window above- 
 mentioned. 
 
 ' Yes, it is, I know. I am coming.' 
 
 He drew closer, and under the window. 
 
 ' How are you this morning, Elfride ? You look no 
 better for your long night's rest.' 
 
 She appeared at the door shortly after, took his 
 offered arm, and together they walked slowly down the 
 gravel path leading to the river and away under the trees. 
 
 Her resolution, sustained during the last fifteen 
 hours, had been to tell the whole truth, and now the 
 moment had come. 
 
 Step by step they advanced, and still she did not 
 speak. They were nearly at the end of the walk, when 
 Knight broke the silence. 
 
 ' Well, what is the confession, Elfride ? ' 
 319 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 She paused a moment, drew a long breath; and 
 this is what she said : 
 
 ' I told you one day — or rather I gave you to under- 
 stand — what was not true. I fancy you thought me to 
 mean I was nineteen my next birthday, but it was my 
 last I was nineteen.' 
 
 The moment had been too much for her. Now 
 that the crisis had come, no qualms of conscience, no 
 love of honesty, no yearning to make a confidence and 
 obtain forgiveness with a kiss, could string Elfride up to 
 the venture. Her dread lest he should be unforgiving 
 was heightened by the thought of yesterday's artifice, 
 which might possibly add disgust to his disappointment. 
 The certainty of one more day's affection, which she 
 gained by silence, outvalued the hope of a perpetuity 
 combined with the risk of all. 
 
 The trepidation caused by these thoughts on what 
 she had intended to say shook so naturally the words 
 she did say, that Knight never for a moment suspected 
 them to be a last moment's substitution. He smiled 
 and pressed her hand warmly. 
 
 ' My dear Elfie — yes, you are now — no protestation — 
 what a winning little woman you are, to be so absurdly 
 scrupulous about a mere iota! Really, I never once 
 have thought whether your nineteenth year was the last 
 or the present. And, by George, well I may not ; for 
 it would never do for a staid fogey a dozen years older 
 to stand upon such a trifle as that.' 
 
 'Don't praise me — don't praise me! Though I 
 prize it from your Hps, I don't deserve it now.' 
 
 But Knight, being in an exceptionally genial mood, 
 merely saw this distressful exclamation as modesty. 
 'Well,' he added, after a minute, 'I like you all the 
 better, you know, for such moral precision, although I 
 called it absurd.' He went on with tender earnestness : 
 « For, Elfride, there is one thing I do love to see in a 
 woman — that is, a soul truthful and clear as heaven's 
 320 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 light. I could put up with anything if I had that — 
 forgive nothing if I had it not. Elfride, you have such 
 a soul, if ever woman had ; and having it, retain it, and 
 don't ever listen to the fashionable theories of the day 
 about a woman's privileges and natural right to practise 
 wiles. Depend upon it, my dear girl, that a noble 
 woman must be as honest as a noble man. I specially 
 mean by honesty, fairness not only in matters of business 
 and social detail, but in all the delicate dealings of love, 
 to which the licence given to your sex particularly refers.' 
 
 Elfride looked troublously at the trees. 
 
 ' Now let us go on to the river, Elfie.' 
 
 ' I would if I had a hat on,' she said with a sort of 
 suppressed woe. 
 
 ' I will get it for you,' said Knight, very willing to 
 purchase her companionship at so cheap a price. ' You 
 sit down there a minute.' And he turned and walked 
 rapidly back to the house for the article in question, 
 
 Elfride sat down upon one of the rustic benches 
 which adorned this portion of the grounds, and remained 
 with her eyes upon the grass. She was induced to lift 
 them by hearing the brush of Hght and irregular foot- 
 steps hard by. Passing along the path which inter- 
 sected the one she was in and traversed the outer 
 shrubberies, Elfride beheld the farmer's widow, Mrs. 
 Jethway. Before she noticed Elfride, she paused to 
 look at the house, portions of which were visible through 
 the bushes. Elfride, shrinking back, hoped the un- 
 pleasant woman might go on without seeing her. But 
 Mrs. Jethway, silently apostrophizing the house, with 
 actions which seemed dictated by a half-overturned 
 reason, had discerned the girl, and immediately came 
 up and stood in front of her. 
 
 ' Ah, Miss Swancourt ! Why did you disturb me ? 
 Mustn't I trespass here ? ' 
 
 ' You may walk here if you like, Mrs. Jethway. I 
 do not disturb you.' 
 
 321 X 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 ' You disturb my mind, and my mind is my whole 
 life ; for my boy is there still, and he is gone from my 
 body.' 
 
 ' Yes, poor young man. I was sorry when he died.' 
 
 ' Do you know what he died of? ' 
 
 ' Consumption.' 
 
 ' Oh no, no ! ' said the widow. ' That word " con- 
 sumption " covers a good deal. He died because you 
 were his own well-agreed sweetheart, and then proved 
 false — and it killed him. Yes, Miss Swancourt,' she 
 said in an excited whisper, ' you killed my son ! ' 
 
 ' How can you be so wicked and foolish ! ' replied 
 Elfride, rising indignantly. But indignation was not 
 natural to her, and having been so worn and harrowed 
 by late events, she lost any powers of defence that mood 
 might have lent her. ' I could not help his loving me, 
 Mrs. Jethway ! ' 
 
 ' That's just what you could have helped. You 
 know how it began, Miss Elfride. Yes : you said you 
 liked the name of Felix better than any other name in 
 the parish, and you knew it was his name, and that 
 those you said it to would report it to him.' 
 
 ' I knew it was his name — of course I did ; but I 
 am sure, Mrs. Jethway, I did not intend anybody to 
 tell him.' 
 
 ' But you knew they would.' 
 
 ■ No, I didn't.' 
 
 ' And then, after that, when you were riding on 
 Revels-day by our house, and the lads were gathered 
 there, and you wanted to dismount, when Jim Drake 
 and George Upway and three or four more ran forward to 
 hold your pony, and Felix stood back timid, why did you 
 beckon to him, and say you would rather he held it ? ' 
 
 ' O Mrs. Jethway, you do think so mistakenly ! I 
 liked him best — that's why I wanted him to do it. He 
 was gentle and nice — I always thought him so — and I 
 liked him.' 
 
 32? 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 ' Then why did you let him kiss you ? ' 
 
 ' It is a falsehood ; oh, it is, it is ! ' said Elfride, 
 weeping with desperation. ' He came behind me, and 
 attempted to kiss me; and that was why I told him 
 never to let me see him again.' 
 
 ' But you did not tell your father or anybody, as you 
 would have if you had looked upon it then as the insult 
 you now pretend it was.' 
 
 ' He begged me not to tell, and foolishly enough I 
 did not. And I wish I had now. I little expected to 
 be scourged with my own kindness. Pray leave me, 
 Mrs. Jethway.' The girl only expostulated now. 
 
 ' Well, you harshly dismissed him, and he died. 
 And before his body was cold, you took another to 
 your heart. Then as carelessly sent him about his 
 business, and took a third. And if you consider 
 that nothing. Miss Swancourt,' she continued, drawing 
 closer ; ' it led on to what was very serious indeed. 
 Have you forgotten the would-be runaway marriage? 
 The journey to London, and the return the next day 
 without being married, and that there's enough disgrace 
 in that to ruin a woman's good name far less light than 
 yours ? You may have : I have not. Fickleness towards 
 a lover is bad, but fickleness after playing the wife is 
 wantonness.' 
 
 ' Oh, it's a wicked cruel lie ! Do not say it ; oh, 
 do not ! ' 
 
 ' Does your new man know of it ? I think not, or 
 he would be no man of yours ! As much of the story 
 as was known is creeping about the neighbourhood 
 even now ; but I know more than any of them, and why 
 should I respect your love ? ' 
 
 ' I defy you ! ' cried Elfride tempestuously. ' Do 
 and say all you can to ruin me; try; put your tongue 
 at work ; I invite it ! I defy you as a slanderous 
 woman ! Look, there he comes.' And her voice 
 trembled greatly as she saw through the leaves the 
 323 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 beloved form of Knight coming from the door with her 
 hat in his hand. ' Tell him at once ; I can bear it.' 
 
 ' Not now,' said the woman, and disappeared down 
 the path. 
 
 The excitement of her latter words had restored 
 colour to Elfride's cheeks ; and hastily wiping her eyes, 
 she walked farther on, so that by the time her lover 
 had overtaken her the traces of emotion had nearly 
 disappeared from her face. Knight put the hat upon 
 her head, took her hfl,nd, and drew it within his arm. 
 
 It was the last day but one previous to their depar- 
 ture for St. Leonards ; and Knight seemed to have a 
 purpose in being much in her company that day. They 
 rambled along the valley. The season was that period 
 in the autumn when the foliage alone of an ordinary 
 plantation is rich enough in hues to exhaust the chro- 
 matic combinations of an artist's palette. Most lustrous 
 of all are the beeches, graduating from bright rusty red 
 at the extremity of the boughs to a bright yellow at 
 their inner parts ; young oaks are still of a neutral 
 green ; Scotch firs and hollies are nearly blue ; whilst 
 occasional dottings of other varieties give maroons and 
 purples of every tinge. 
 
 The river — such as it was — here pursued its course 
 amid flagstones as level as a pavement, but divided by 
 crevices of irregular width. With the summer drought 
 the torrent had narrowed till it was now but a thread of 
 crystal clearness, meandering along a central channel in 
 the rocky bed of the winter current. Knight scrambled 
 through the bushes which at this point nearly covered 
 the brook from sight, and leapt down upon the dry 
 portion of the river bottom. 
 
 ' Elfride, I never saw such a sight ! ' he exclaimed. 
 ' The hazels overhang the river's course in a perfect arch, 
 and the floor is beautifully paved. The place reminds 
 one of the passages of a cloister. Let me help you 
 down.' 
 
 324 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 He assisted her through the marginal underwood 
 and down to the stones. They walked on together to 
 a tiny cascade about a foot wide and high, and sat 
 down beside it on the flags that for nine months in 
 the year were submerged beneath a gushing bourne. 
 From their feet trickled the attenuated thread of water 
 which alone remained to tell the intent and reason of 
 this leaf-covered aisle, and journeyed on in a zigzag 
 line till lost in the shade. 
 
 Knight, leaning on his elbow, after contemplating 
 all this, looked critically at Elfride. 
 
 ' Does not such a luxuriant head of hair exhaust 
 itself and get thin as the years go on from eighteen to 
 eight-and-twenty ? ' he asked at length. 
 
 ' Oh no ! ' she said quickly, with a visible disinclina- 
 tion to harbour such a thought, which came upon her 
 with an unpleasantness whose force it would be difficult 
 for men to understand. She added afterwards, with 
 smouldering uneasiness, ' Do you really think that a 
 great abundance of hair is more Hkely to get thin than 
 a moderate quantity ? ' 
 
 ' Yes, I really do. I believe — am almost sure, in 
 fact — that if statistics could be obtained on the subject, 
 you would find the persons with thin hair were those 
 who had a superabundance originally, and that those 
 who start with a moderate quantity retain it without 
 much loss.' 
 
 Elfride's troubles sat upon her face as well as in her 
 heart. Perhaps to a woman it is almost as dreadful to 
 think of losing her beauty as of losing her reputation. 
 At any rate, she looked quite as gloomy as she had 
 looked at any minute that day. 
 
 ' You shouldn't be so troubled about a mere personal 
 adornment,' said Knight, with some of the severity of 
 tone that had been customary before she had beguiled 
 him into softness. 
 
 'I think it is, a woman's duty to be as beautiful as 
 325 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 she can. If I were a scholar, I would give you chapter 
 and verse for it from one of your own Latin authors. 
 I know there is such a passage, for papa has alluded 
 to it.' 
 
 ' " Munditiae, et ornatus, et cultus," &c. — is that it ? 
 A passage in Livy which is no defence at all.' 
 
 ' No, it is not that' 
 
 ' Never mind, then ; for I have a reason for not 
 taking up my old cudgels against you, Elfie. Can you 
 guess what the reason is ? ' 
 
 ' No ; but I am glad to hear it,' she said thankfully. 
 ' For it is dreadful when you talk so. For whatever 
 dreadful name the weakness may deserve, I must 
 candidly own that I am terrified to think my hair may 
 ever get thin.' 
 
 ' Of course ; a sensible woman would rather lose her 
 wits than her beauty.' 
 
 ' I don't care if you do say satire and judge me 
 cruelly. I know my hair is beautiful; everybody 
 says so.' 
 
 ' Why, my dear Miss Swancourt,' he tenderly replied, 
 ' I have not said anything against it. But you know 
 what is said about handsome being and handsome 
 doing.' 
 
 ' Poor Miss Handsome-does cuts but a sorry figure 
 beside Miss Handsome-is in every man's eyes, your 
 own not excepted, Mr. Knight, though it pleases you 
 to throw off so,' said Elfride saucily. And lowering her 
 voice : ' You ought not to have taken so much trouble 
 to save me from falling over the cliff, for you don't 
 think mine a life worth much trouble evidently.' 
 
 ' Perhaps you think mine was not worth yours.' 
 
 ' It was worth anybody's ! ' 
 
 Her hand was plashing in the little waterfall, and 
 her eyes were bent the same way. 
 
 ' You talk about my severity with you, Elfride. You 
 ar^ unkind to me, you know.' 
 326 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 ' How ? ' she asked, looking up from her idle occupa- 
 tion. 
 
 ' After my taking trouble to get jewellery to please 
 you, you wouldn't accept it.' 
 
 ' Perhaps I would now ; perhaps I want to.' 
 
 ' Do ! ' said Knight. 
 
 And the packet was withdrawn from his, pocket and 
 presented the third time. Elfride took it with delight. 
 The obstacle was rent in twain, and the significant gift 
 was hers. 
 
 ' I'll take out these ugly ones at once,' she exclaimed, 
 'and I'll wear yours — shall I ? ' 
 
 ' I should be gratified.' 
 
 Now, though it may seem unlikely, considering how 
 far the two had gone in converse, Knight had never 
 yet ventured to kiss Elfride. Far slower was he than 
 Stephen Smith in matters like that. The utmost ad- 
 vance he had made in such demonstrations had been 
 to the degree witnessed by Stephen in the summer- 
 house. So Elfride's cheek being still forbidden fruit to 
 him, he said impulsively. 
 
 ' Elfie, I should like to touch that seductive ear of 
 yours. Those are my gifts ; so let me dress you in 
 them.' 
 
 She hesitated with a stimulating hesitation 
 
 ' Let me put just one in its place, then ? ' 
 
 Her face grew much warmer. 
 
 ' I don't think it would be quite the usual or proper 
 course,' she said, suddenly turning and resuming her 
 operation of plashing in the miniature cataract. 
 
 The stillness of things was disturbed by a bird com- 
 ing to the streamlet to drink. After watching him dip 
 his bill, sprinkle himself, and fly into a tree. Knight 
 replied, with the courteous brusqueness she so much 
 liked to hear — 
 
 ' Elfride, now you may as well be fair. You would mind 
 my doing it but little, I think ; so give me leave, do.' 
 327 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 ' I will be fair, then,' she said confidingly, and look- 
 ing him full in the face. It was a particular pleasure 
 to her to be able to do a little honesty without fear. 
 ' I should not mind your doing so — I should like such 
 an attention. My thought was, would it be right to 
 let you ? ' 
 
 ' Then I will ! ' he rejoined, with that singular 
 earnestness about a small matter— in the eyes of a 
 ladies' man but a momentary peg for flirtation or jest 
 — which is only found in deep natures who have been 
 wholly unused to toying with womankind, and which, 
 from its unwontedness, is in itself a tribute the most 
 precious that can be rendered, and homage the most 
 exquisite to be received. 
 
 ' And you shall,' she whispered, without reserve, and 
 no longer mistress of the ceremonies. And then Elfride 
 inclined herself towards him, thrust back her hair, and 
 poised her head sideways. In doing this her arm and 
 shoulder necessarily rested against his breast. 
 
 At the touch, the sensation of both seemed to be 
 concentrated at the point of contact. All the time he 
 was performing the delicate manoeuvre Knight trembled 
 like a young surgeon in his first operation. 
 
 ' Now the other,' said Knight in a whisper. 
 
 ' No, no.' 
 
 ' Why not ? ' 
 
 ' I don't know exactly.' 
 
 ' You must know.' 
 
 ' Your touch agitates me so. Let us go home.' 
 
 ' Don't say that, Elfride. What is it, after all ? A 
 mere nothing. Now turn round, dearest.' 
 
 She was powerless to disobey, and turned forthwith ; 
 and then, without any defined intention in either's mind, 
 his face and hers drew closer together; and he sup- 
 ported her there, and kissed her. 
 
 Knight was at once the most ardent and the coolest 
 man alive. When his emotions slumbered he appeared 
 328 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 almost phlegmatic ; when they were moved he was no 
 less than passionate. And now, without having quite 
 intended an early marriage, he put the question plainly. 
 It came with all the ardour which was the accumulation 
 of long years behind a natural reserve. 
 
 ' Elfride, when shall we be married ? ' 
 
 The words were sweet to her ; but there was a bitter 
 in the sweet. These newly-overt acts of his, which had 
 culminated in this plain question, coming on the very 
 day of Mrs. Jethway's blasting reproaches, painted dis- 
 tinctly her fickleness as an enormity. Loving him in 
 secret had not seemed such thorough-going inconstancy 
 as the same love recognized and acted upon in the face 
 of threats. Her distraction was interpreted by him at her 
 side as the outward signs of an unwonted experience. 
 
 ' I don't press you for an answer now, darling,' he said, 
 seeing she was not likely to give a lucid reply. ' Take 
 your time.' 
 
 Knight was as honourable a man as was ever loved 
 and deluded by woman. It may be said that his blind- 
 ness in love proved the point, for shrewdness in love 
 usually goes with meanness in general. Once the passion 
 had mastered him, the intellect had gone for naught. 
 Knight, as a lover, was more single-minded and far 
 simpler than his friend Stephen, who in other capa- 
 cities was shallow beside him. 
 
 Without saying more on the subject of their marriage. 
 Knight held her at arm's length, as if she had been a 
 large bouquet, and looked at her with critical affection. 
 
 ' Does your pretty gift become me ? ' she inquired, 
 with tears of excitement on the fringes of her eyes. 
 
 ' Undoubtedly, perfectly ! ' said her lover, adopting 
 a lighter tone to put her at her ease. ' Ah, you should 
 see them ; you look shinier than ever. Fancy that I 
 have been able to improve you ! ' 
 
 • Am I really so nice ? I am. glad for your sake. I 
 wish I could see myself.' 
 
 Y 329 
 
A PAIR BLUE OF EYES 
 
 ' You can't. You must wait till we get home.' 
 
 'I shall never be able,' she said, laughing. 'Lookt 
 here's a way.' 
 
 ' So there is. Well done, woman's wit ! ' 
 
 ' Hold me steady ! ' 
 
 ' Oh yes.' 
 
 ' And don't let me fall, will you ? '■ 
 
 ' By no means.' 
 
 Below their seat the thread of water paused to 
 spread out into a smooth small pool. Knight sup- 
 ported her whilst she knelt down and leant over it. 
 
 ' I can see myself Really, try as religiously a§ I 
 will, I cannot help admiring my appearance in them.' 
 
 ' Doubtless. How can you be so fond of finery ? 
 I believe you are corrupting me into a taste for it. 
 I used to hate every such thing before I knew you.' 
 
 ' I like ornaments, because I want people to admire 
 what you possess, and envy you, and say, " I wish I 
 was he." ' 
 
 ' I suppose I ought not to object after that. And 
 how much longer are you going to look in there at 
 yourself? ' 
 
 ' Until you are tired of holding me ? Oh, I want 
 to ask you something.' And she turned round. ' Now 
 tell truly, won't you ? What colour of hair do you 
 like best now ? ' 
 
 Knight did not answer at the moment. 
 
 ' Say light, do ! ' she whispered coaxingly. ' Don't 
 r;ay dark, as you did that time.' 
 
 ' Light-brown, then. Exactly the colour of my sweet- 
 Iieart's.' 
 
 ' Really ? ' said Elfride, enjoying as truth what she 
 knew to be flattery. 
 
 'Yes.' 
 
 ' And blue eyes, too, not hazel ? Say yes, say yes ! ' 
 
 ' One recantation is enough for to-day.' 
 
 ' No, no.' 
 
 330 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 'Very well, blue eyes.' And Knight laughed, and 
 drew her close and kissed her the second time, which 
 operations he performed with the carefulness of a 
 fruiterer touching a bunch of grapes so as not to 
 disturb their bloom. 
 
 Elfride objected to a second, and flung away her 
 face, the movement causing a slight disarrangement of 
 hat and hair. Hardly thinking what she said in the 
 trepidation of the moment, she exclaimed, clapping 
 her hand to her ear — 
 
 ' Ah, we must be careful ! I lost the other earring 
 doing like this.' 
 
 No sooner did she realise the significant words than 
 a troubled look passed across her face, and she shut 
 her lips as if to keep them back. 
 
 ' Doing like what ? ' said Knight, perplexed. 
 
 ' Oh, sitting down out of doors,' she replied hastily. 
 
XXIX 
 
 ' Care, thou canker." 
 
 IT is an evening at the beginning of October, and the 
 mellowest of autumn sunsets irradiates London, even 
 to its uttermost eastern end. Between the eye and 
 the flaming West, columns of smoke stand up in the 
 still air like tall trees. Everything in the shade is rich 
 and misty blue. 
 
 Mr. and Mrs. Swancourt and Elfride are looking 
 at these lustrous and lurid contrasts from the window 
 of a large hotel near London Bridge. The visit to 
 their friends at St. Leonards is over, and they are 
 sta)dng a day or two in the metropolis on their way 
 home. 
 
 Knight spent the same interval of time in crossing 
 over to Brittany by way of Jersey and St. Malo. He 
 then passed through Normandy, and returned to 
 London also, his arrival there having been two days 
 later than that of Elfride and her parents. 
 
 So the evening of this October day saw them all 
 meeting at the above-mentioned hotel, where they had 
 previously engaged apartments. During the afternoon 
 Knight had been to his lodgings at Richmond to make 
 a little change in the nature of his baggage; and on 
 332 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 coming up again there was never ushered by a bland 
 waiter into a comfortable room a happier man than 
 Knight when shown to where Elfride and her step- 
 mother were sitting after a fatiguing day of shopping. 
 
 Elfride looked none the better for her change : 
 Knight was as brown as a nut. They were soon 
 engaged by themselves in a corner of the room. Now 
 that the precious words of promise had been spoken, 
 the young girl had no idea of keeping up her price by 
 the system of reserve which other more accomplished 
 maidens use. Her lover was with her again, and it 
 was enough : she made her heart over to him entirely. 
 
 Dinner was soon despatched. And when a prelimi- 
 nary round of conversation concerning their doings 
 since the last parting had been concluded, they reverted 
 to the subject of to-morrow's journey home. 
 
 ' That enervating ride through the myrtle climate of 
 South Devon — how I dread it to-morrow ! ' Mrs. Swan- 
 court was saying. ' I had hoped the weather would 
 have been cooler by this time.' 
 
 ' Did you ever go by water ? ' said Knight. 
 
 ' Never — by never, I mean not since the time of 
 railways.' 
 
 ' Then if you can afford an additional day, I pro- 
 pose that we do it,' said Knight. ' The Channel is like 
 a lake just now. We should reach Plymouth in about 
 forty hours, I think, and the boats start from just below 
 the bridge here ' (pointing over his shoulder eastward). 
 
 ' Hear, hear ! ' said the vicar. 
 
 ' It's an idea, certainly,' said his wife. 
 
 ' Of course these coasters are rather tubby,' said 
 Knight. ' But you wouldn't mind that ? ' 
 
 ' No : we wouldn't mind.' 
 
 ' And the saloon is a place like the fishmarket of a 
 ninth-rate country town, but that wouldn't matter ? ' 
 
 ' Oh dear, no. If we had only thought of it soon 
 enough, we might have had the use of Lord Luxellian's 
 333 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 yacht. But never mind, we'll go. We shall escape the 
 worrying rattle through the whole length of London to- 
 morrow morning — not to mention the risk of being 
 killed by excursion trains, which is not a little one at 
 this time of the year, if the papers are true.' 
 
 Elfride, too, thought the arrangement delightful ; and 
 accordingly, ten o'clock the following morning saw two 
 cabs crawling round by the Mint, and between the 
 preternaturally high walls of Nightingale Lane towards 
 the river side. 
 
 The first vehicle was occupied by the travellers in 
 person, and the second brought up the luggage, under 
 the supervision of Mrs. Snewson, Mrs. Swancourt's maid 
 — and for the last fortnight Elfride's also ; for although 
 the younger lady had never been accustomed to any 
 such attendant at robing times, her stepmother forced 
 her into a semblance of familiarity with one when they 
 were away from home. 
 
 Presently waggons, bales, and smells of all descrip- 
 tions increased to such an extent that the advance of 
 the cabs was at the slowest possible rate. At intervals 
 it was necessary to halt entirely, that the heavy vehicles 
 unloading in front might be moved aside, a feat which 
 was not accomplished without a deal of swearing and 
 noise. The vicar put his head out of the window. 
 
 ' Surely there must be some mistake in the way,' he 
 said with great concern, drawing in his head again. 
 ' There's not a respectable conveyance to be seen here 
 except ours. I've heard that there are strange dens 
 in this part of London, into which people have been 
 entrapped and murdered — surely there is no conspiracy 
 on the part of the cabman ? ' 
 
 ' Oh no, no. It is all right,' said Mr. Knight, who 
 was as placid as dewy eve by the side of Elfride. 
 
 'But what I argue from,' said the vicar, with a 
 greater emphasis of uneasiness, ' are plain appearances. 
 This can't be the highway from London to Plymouth 
 334 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 by water, because it is no way at all to any place. We 
 shall miss our steamer and our train too — that's what 
 I think.' 
 
 ' Depend upon it we are right. In fact, here we are.' 
 
 ' Trimmer's Wharf,' said the cabman, opening the 
 door. 
 
 No sooner had they alighted than they perceived a 
 tussle going on between the hindmost cabman and a 
 crowd of light porters who had charged him in column, 
 to obtain possession of the bags and boxes, Mrs. 
 Snewson's hands being seen stretched towards heaven 
 in the midst of the mel&. Knight advanced gallantly, 
 and after a hard struggle reduced the crowd to two, 
 upon whose shoulders and trucks the goods vanished 
 away in the direction of the water's edge with startling 
 rapidity. 
 
 Then more of the same tribe, who had run on ahead, 
 were heard shouting to boatmen, three of whom pulled 
 alongside, and two being vanquished, the luggage went 
 tumbling into the remaining one. 
 
 ' Never saw such a dreadful scene in my life^ — - 
 never ! ' said Mr. Swancourt, floundering into the boat. 
 ' Worse than Famine and Sword upon one. I thought 
 such customs were confined to continental ports. Aren't 
 you astonished, Elfride ? ' 
 
 ' Oh no,' said Elfride, appearing amid the dingy 
 scene like a rainbow in a murky sky. ' It is a pleasant 
 novelty, I think.' 
 
 ' Where in the wide ocean is our steamer ? ' the 
 vicar inquired. ' I can see nothing but old hulks, for 
 the life of me.' 
 
 ' Just behind that one,' said Knight ; ' we shall soon 
 be round under her.' 
 
 The object of their search was soon after disclosed 
 
 to view — a great lumbering form of inky blackness, 
 
 which looked as if it had never known the touch of a 
 
 paint-brush for fifty years. It was lying beside just 
 
 335 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 such another, and the way on board was down a narrow 
 lane of water between the two, about a yard and a half 
 wide at one end, and gradually converging to a point. 
 At the moment of their entry into this narrow passage, 
 a brilliantly painted rival paddled down the river like 
 a trotting steed, creating such a series of waves and 
 splashes that their frail wherry was tossed like a teacup, 
 and the vicar and his wife slanted this way and that, 
 inclining their heads into contact with a Punch-and- 
 Judy air and countenance, the wavelets striking the 
 sides of the two hulls, and flapping back into their 
 laps. 
 
 ' Dreadful ! horrible ! ' Mr. Swancourt murmured 
 privately ; and said aloud, ' I thought we walked on 
 board. I don't think really I should have come, if I 
 had known this trouble was attached to it.' 
 
 ' If they must splash, I wish they would splash us 
 with clean water,' said the old lady, wiping her dress 
 with her handkerchief 
 
 ' I hope it is perfectly safe,' continued the vicar. 
 
 ' O papa ! you are not very brave,' cried Elfride 
 merrily. 
 
 ' Bravery is only obtuseness to the perception of 
 contingencies,' Mr. Swancourt severely answered. 
 
 Mrs. Swancourt laughed, and Elfride laughed, and 
 Knight laughed, in the midst of which pleasantness a 
 man shouted to them from some position between their 
 heads and the sky, and they found they were close to 
 the Juliet, into which they quiveringly ascended. 
 
 It having been found that the lowness of the tide 
 would prevent their getting off for an hour, the Swan- 
 courts, having nothing else to do, allowed their eyes to 
 idle upon men in blue jerseys performing mysterious 
 mending operations with tar-twine ; they turned to look 
 at the dashes of lurid sunlight, like burnished copper 
 stars afloat on the ripples, which danced into and tan- 
 talized their vision ; or listened to the loud music of a 
 336 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 Steam-crane at work close by; or to sighing sounds 
 from the funnels of passing steamers, getting dead as 
 they grew more distant ; or to shouts from the decks 
 of different craft in their vicinity, all of them assuming 
 the form of ' Ah-he-hay ! ' 
 
 Half-past ten : not yet off. Mr. Swancourt breathed 
 a breath of weariness, and looked at his fellow-travellers 
 in general. Their faces were certainly not worth looking 
 at. The expression ' Waiting ' was written upon them 
 so absolutely that nothing more could be discerned 
 there. All animation was suspended till Providence 
 should raise the water and let them go. 
 
 ' I have been thinking,' said Knight, ' that we have 
 come amongst the rarest class of people in the kingdom. 
 Of all human characteristics, a low opinion of the value 
 of his own time by an individual must be among the 
 strangest to find. Here we see numbers of that patient 
 and happy species. Rovers, as distinct from travellers.' 
 
 ' But they are pleasure-seekers, to whom time is of 
 no importance.' 
 
 ' Oh no. The pleasure-seekers we meet on the 
 grand routes are more anxious than commercial 
 travellers to rush on. And added to the loss of time 
 in getting to their journey's end, these exceptional 
 people take their chance of sea-sickness by coming this 
 way.' 
 
 ' Can it be ? ' inquired the vicar with apprehension. 
 • Surely not, Mr. Knight, just here in our English 
 Channel — close at our doors, as I may say.' 
 
 ' Entrance passages are very draughty places, and the 
 Channel is like the rest. It ruins the temper of sailors. 
 It has been calculated by philosophers that more damns 
 go up to heaven from the Channel, in the course of a 
 year, than from all the five oceans put together.' 
 
 They really start now, and the dead looks of all the 
 throng come to life immediately. The man who has 
 been frantically hauling in a rope that bade fair to have 
 337 Y 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 no end ceases his labours, and they glide down the 
 serpentine bends of the Thames. 
 
 Anything anywhere was a mine of interest to Elfride, 
 and so was this. 
 
 ' It is well enough now,' said Mrs. Swancourt, after 
 they had passed the Nore, ' but I can't say I have cared 
 for my voyage hitherto.' For being now in the open 
 sea a slight breeze had sprung up, which cheered her 
 as well as her two younger companions. But unfortu- 
 nately it had a reverse effect upon the vicar, who,, after 
 turning a sort of apricot-jam colour, interspersed with 
 dashes of raspberry, pleaded indisposition, and vanished 
 from their sight. 
 
 The afternoon wore on. Mrs. Swancourt kindly sat 
 apart by herself reading, and the betrothed pair were 
 left to themselves. Elfride clung trustingly to Knight's 
 arm, and proud was she to walk with him up and down 
 the deck, or to go forward, and leaning with him against 
 the forecastle rails, watch the setting sun gradually 
 withdrawing itself over their stern into a huge bank of 
 livid cloud with golden edges that rose to meet it. 
 
 She was childishly full of life and spirits, though 
 in walking up and down with him ■ before the other 
 passengers, and getting noticed by them, she was at 
 starting rather confused, it being the first time she had 
 shown herself so openly under that kind of protection. 
 ' I expect they are envious and saying things about 
 us, don't you ? ' she would whisper to Knight with a 
 stealthy smile. 
 
 ■ Oh no,' he would answer unconcernedly. ' Why 
 should they envy us, and what can they say ? ' 
 
 ' Not any harm, of course,' Elfride replied, ' except 
 such as this : " How happy those two are ! she is proud 
 enough now." What makes it worse,' she continued in 
 the extremity of confidence, ' I heard those two cricket- 
 ing men say just now, " She's the nobbiest girl on the 
 boat." But I don't mind it, you know, Harry.' 
 338 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 ' I should hardly have supposed you did, even if you 
 had not told me,' said Knight with great blandness. 
 
 She was never tired of asking her lover questions 
 and admiring his answers, good, bad, or indifferent as 
 they might be. The evening grew dark and night came 
 on, and lights shone upon them from the horizon and 
 from the sky. 
 
 ' Now look there ahead of us, at that halo in the air, 
 of silvery brightness. Watch it, and you will see what 
 it comes to.' 
 
 She watched for a few minutes, when two white 
 lights emerged from the side of a hill, and showed 
 themselves to be the origin of the halo. 
 
 ' What a dazzling brilliance ! What do they mark ? ' 
 
 ' The South Foreland : they were previously covered 
 by the cUff.' 
 
 ' What is that level line of little sparkles — a town, I 
 suppose ? ' 
 
 ' That's Dover.' 
 
 All this time, and later, soft sheet lightning expanded 
 from a cloud in their path, enkindling their faces as 
 they paced up and down, shining over the water, and, 
 for a moment, showing the horizon as a keen line. 
 
 Elfride slept soundly that night. Her first thought 
 the next morning was the thrilling one that Knight was 
 as close at hand as when they were at home at Endel- 
 stow, and her first sight, on looking out of the cabin 
 window, was the perpendicular face of Beachy Head, 
 gleaming white in a brilliant six-o'clock-in-the-morning 
 sun. This fair daybreak, however, soon changed its 
 aspect. A cold wind and a pale mist descended upon 
 the sea, and seemed to threaten a dreary day. 
 
 When they were nearing Southampton, Mrs. Swan- 
 court came to say that her husband was so ill that he 
 wished to be put on shore here, and left to do the 
 remainder of the journey by land. ' He will be per- 
 fectly well directly he treads firm ground again. Which 
 339 
 
A PAIR OP BLUE EYES 
 
 shall we do — go with him, or finish our voyage as we 
 intended ? ' 
 
 Elfride was comfortably housed under an umbrella 
 which Knight was holding over her to keep off the 
 wind. ' Oh, don't let us go on shore ! ' she said with 
 dismay. ' It would be such a pity ! ' 
 
 'That's very fine,' said Mrs. Swancourt archly, as 
 to a child. ' See, the wind has increased her colour, 
 the sea her appetite and spirits, and somebody her 
 happiness. Yes, it would be a pity, certainly.' 
 
 ' 'Tis my misfortune to be always spoken to from a 
 pedestal,' sighed Elfride. 
 
 ' Well, we will do as you like, Mrs. Swancourt,' 
 said Knight, ' but ' 
 
 ' I myself would rather remain on board,' interrupted 
 the elder lady. ' And Mr. Swancourt particularly wishes 
 to go by himself. So that shall settle the matter.' 
 
 The vicar, now a drab colour, was put ashore, and 
 became as well as ever forthwith. 
 
 Elfride, sitting alone in a retired part of the vessel, 
 saw a veiled woman walk aboard among the very latest 
 arrivals at this port. She was clothed in black silk, and 
 carried a dark shawl upon her arm. The woman, 
 without looking around her, turned to the quarter 
 allotted to the second-cabin passengers. All the car- 
 nation Mrs. Swancourt had complimented her step- 
 daughter upon possessing left Elfride's cheeks, and 
 she trembled visibly. 
 
 She ran to the other side of the boat, where Mrs. 
 Swancourt was standing. 
 
 ' Let us go home by railway with papa, after all,' 
 she pleaded earnestly. ' I would rather go with him — 
 shall we ? ' 
 
 Mrs. Swancourt looked around for a moment, as if 
 unable to decide. ' Ah,' she exclaimed, ' it is too late 
 now. Why did not you say so before, when we had 
 plenty of time ? ' 
 
 340 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 The Juliet had at that minute let go, the engines 
 had started, and they were gliding slowly away from the 
 quay. There was no help for it but to remain, unless 
 the Juliet could be made to put back, and that would 
 create a great disturbance. Elfride gave up the idea 
 and submitted quietly. Her happiness was sadly 
 mutilated now. 
 
 The woman whose presence had so disturbed her 
 was exactly like Mrs. Jethway. She seemed to haunt 
 Elfride like a shadow. After several minutes' vain en- 
 deavour to account for any design Mrs. Jethway could 
 have in watching her, Elfride decided to think that, if 
 it were the widow, the encounter was accidental. She 
 remembered that the widow in her restlessness was often 
 visiting the village near Southampton, which was her 
 original home, and it was possible that she chose water- 
 transit with the idea of saving expense. 
 
 'What is the matter, Elfride?' Knight inquired, 
 standing before her. 
 
 ' Nothing more than that I am rather depressed.' 
 
 ' I don't much wonder at it ; that wharf was de- 
 pressing. We seemed underneath and inferior to every- 
 thing around us. But we shall be in the sea breeze 
 again soon, and that will freshen you, dear.' 
 
 The evening closed in and dusk increased as they 
 made way down Southampton Water and through the 
 Solent. Elfride's disturbance of mind was such that 
 her light spirits of the foregoing four and twenty hours 
 had entirely deserted her. The weather too had grown 
 more gloomy, for though the showers of the morning 
 had ceased, the sky was covered more closely than ever 
 with dense leaden clouds. How beautiful was the sunset 
 when they rounded the North Foreland the previous 
 evening ! now it was impossible to tell within half an 
 hour the time of the luminary's going down. Knight 
 led her about, and being by this time accustomed to 
 her sudden changes of mood, overlooked the necessity 
 
 ?4i 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 of a cause in regarding the conditions — impressionable- 
 ness and elasticity. 
 
 Elfride looked stealthily to the other end of the 
 vessel. Mrs. Jethway, or her double, was sitting at 
 the stern — her eye steadily regarding Elfride. 
 
 ' Let us go to the forepart,' she said quickly to 
 Knight. ' See there — the man is fixing the lights for 
 the night.' 
 
 Knight assented, and after watching the operation 
 of fixing the red and the green lights on the port and 
 starboard bows, and the hoisting of the white light to 
 the masthead, he walked up and down with her till 
 the increase of wind rendered promenading difficult. 
 Elfride's eyes were occasionally to be found furtively 
 gazing abaft, to learn if her enemy were really there. 
 Nobody was visible now. 
 
 ' Shall we go below ? ' said Knight, seeing that the 
 deck was nearly deserted. 
 
 ' No,' she said. ' If you will kindly get me a rug 
 from Mrs. Swancourt, I should like, if you don't mind, 
 to stay here.' She had recently fancied the assumed 
 Mrs. Jethway might be a first-class passenger, and 
 dreaded meeting her by accident. 
 
 Knight appeared with the rug, and they sat down 
 behind a weather-cloth on the windward side, just as 
 the two red eyes of the Needles glared upon them from 
 the gloom, their pointed summits rising like shadowy 
 phantom figures against the sky. It became necessary 
 to go below to an eight-o'clock meal of nondescript 
 kind, and Elfride was immensely relieved at finding no 
 sign of Mrs. Jethway there. They again ascended, and 
 remained above till Mrs. Snewson staggered up to them 
 with the message that Mrs. Swancourt thought it was 
 time for Elfride to come below. Knight accompanied 
 her down, and returned again to pass a little more 
 time on deck. 
 
 Elfride partly undressed herself and lay down, and 
 343 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 soon became unconscious, though her sleep was light. 
 How long she had lain, she knew not, when by slow 
 degrees she became cognizant of a whispering in her ear. 
 
 ' You are well on with him, I can see. Well, provoke 
 me now, but my day will come, you will find.' That 
 seemed to be the utterance, or words to that effect. 
 
 Elfride became broad awake and terrified. She 
 knew the words, if real, could be only those of one 
 person, and that person the widow Jethway. 
 
 The lamp had gone out and the place was in dark- 
 ness. In the next berth she could hear her stepmother 
 breathing heavily, further on Snewson breathing more 
 heavily still. These were the only other legitimate 
 occupants of the cabin, and Mrs. Jethway must have 
 stealthily come in by some means and retreated again, 
 or else she had entered an empty berth next Snewson's. 
 The fear that this was the case increased Elfride's per- 
 turbation, till it assumed the dimensions of a certainty, 
 for how could a stranger from the other end of the ship 
 possibly contrive to get in ? Could it have been a 
 dream? 
 
 Elfride raised herself higher and looked out of the 
 window. There was the sea, floundering and rushing 
 against the ship's side just by her head, and thence 
 stretching away, dim and moaning, into an expanse of 
 indistinctness ; and far beyond all this two placid lights 
 like rayless stars. Now almost fearing to turn her face 
 inwards again, lest Mrs. Jethway should appear at her 
 elbow, Elfride meditated upon whether to call Snewson 
 to keep her company. ' Four bells ' sounded, and she 
 heard voices, which gave her a little courage. It was 
 not worth while to call Snewson. 
 
 At any rate Elfride could not stay there panting 
 longer, at the risk of being again disturbed by that 
 dreadful whispering. So wrapping herself up hurriedly 
 she emerged into the passage, and by the aid of a faint 
 light burning at the entrance to the saloon found the 
 343 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 foot of the stairs, and ascended to the deck. Dreary 
 the place was in the extreme. It seemed a new spot 
 altogether in contrast with its daytime self. She could 
 see the glowworm light from the binnacle, and the 
 dim outline of the man at the wheel ; also a form at 
 the bows. Not another soul was apparent from stem 
 to stern. 
 
 Yes, there were two more — by the bulwarks. One 
 proved to be her Harry, the other the mate. She was 
 glad indeed, and on drawing closer found they were 
 holding a low slow chat about nautical affairs. She 
 ran up and slipped her hand through Knight's arm, 
 partly for love, partly for stability. 
 
 ' Elfie ! not asleep ? ' said Knight, after moving a 
 few steps aside with her. 
 
 ' No : I cannot sleep. May I stay here ? It is so 
 dismal down there, and — and I was afraid. Where are 
 we now ? ' 
 
 ' Due south of Portland Bill. Those are the lights 
 abeam of us : look. A terrible spot, that, on a stormy 
 night. And do you see a very small light that dips 
 and rises to the right ? That's a light-ship on the 
 dangerous shoal called the Shambles, where many a 
 good vessel has gone to pieces. Between it and our- 
 selves is the Race — a place where antagonistic currents 
 meet and form whirlpools — a spot which is rough in 
 the smoothest weather, and terrific in a wind. That 
 dark, dreary horizon we just discern to the left is the 
 West Bay, terminated landwards by the Chesil Beach.' 
 
 ' What time is it, Harry ? ' 
 
 ' Just past two.' 
 
 ' Are you going below ? ' 
 
 ' Oh no ; not to-night. I prefer pure air.' 
 
 She fancied he might be displeased with her for 
 coming to him at this unearthly hour. ' I should like 
 to stay here too, if you will allow me,' she said timidly. 
 ' I want to ask you things.' 
 
 344 
 
A PAIR Of BLUE EYES 
 
 ' Allow you, Elfie ! ' said Knight, putting his arm 
 round her and drawing her closer. ' I am twice as 
 happy with you by my side. Yes : we will stay, and 
 watch the approach of day.' 
 
 So they again sought out the sheltered nook, and 
 sitting down wrapped themselves in the rug as before. 
 
 ' What were you going to ask me ? ' he inquired, as 
 they undulated up and down. 
 
 ' Oh, it was not much — perhaps a thing I ought not 
 to ask,' she said hesitatingly. Her sudden wish had 
 really been to discover at once whether he had ever 
 before been engaged to be married. If he had, she 
 would make that a ground for telHng him a little of her 
 conduct with Stephen. Mrs. Jethway's seeming words 
 had so depressed the girl that she herself now painted 
 her flight in the darkest colours, and longed to ease her 
 burdened mind by an instant confession. If Knight 
 had ever been imprudent himself, he might, she hoped, 
 forgive all. 
 
 ' I wanted to ask you,' she went on, ' if — ^you had ever 
 been engaged before.' She added tremulously, ' I hope 
 you have — I mean, I don't mind at all if you have.' 
 
 ' No, I never was,' Knight instantly and heartily re- 
 plied. ' Elfride ' — and there was a certain happy pride in 
 his tone — ' I am twelve years older than you, and I have 
 been about the world, and, in a way, into society, and 
 you have not. And yet I am not so unfit for you as 
 strict-thinking people might imagine, who would assume 
 the difference in age to signify most surely an equal 
 addition to my practice in love-making.' 
 
 Elfride shivered. 
 
 ' You are cold — is the wind too much for you ? ' 
 
 ' No,' she said gloomily. The belief which had been 
 her sheet-anchor in hoping for forgiveness had proved 
 false. This account of the exceptional nature of his 
 experience, a matter which would have set her rejoicing 
 two years ago, chilled her now like a frost. 
 2 345 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 ' You don't mind my asking you ? ' she continued. 
 
 ' Oh no — not at all.' 
 
 'And have you never kissed many ladies?' she 
 whispered, hoping he would say a hundred at the least. 
 
 The time, the circumstances, and the scene were 
 such as to draw confidences from the most reserved. 
 ' Elfride,' whispered Knight in reply, ' it is strange you 
 should have asked that question. But I'll answer it, 
 though I have never told such a thing before. I have 
 been rather absurd in my avoidance of women. I have 
 never given a woman a kiss in my life, except yourself 
 and my mother.' The man of two and thirty with the 
 experienced mind warmed all over with a boy's ingenu- 
 ous shame as he made the confession. 
 
 ' What, not one ? ' she faltered. 
 
 ' No ; not one.' 
 
 ' How very strange ! ' 
 
 'Yes, the reverse experience may be commoner. 
 And yet, to those who have observed their own sex, 
 as I have, my case is not remarkable. Men about 
 town are women's favourites — that's the postulate — and 
 superficial people don't think far enough to see that 
 there may be reserved, lonely exceptions.' 
 
 ' Are you proud of it, Harry ? ' 
 
 ' No, indeed. Of late years I have wished I had 
 gone my ways and trod out my measure like lighter- 
 hearted men. I have thought of how many happy ex- 
 periences I may have lost through never going to woo.' 
 
 ' Then why did you hold aloof? ' 
 
 ' I cannot say. I don't think it was my nature to : 
 circumstance hindered me, perhaps. I have regretted 
 it for another reason. This great remissness of mine 
 has had its effect upon me. The older I have grown, 
 the more distinctly have I perceived that it was abso- 
 lutely preventing me from liking any woman who was 
 not as unpractised as I ; and I gave up the expectation 
 of finding a nineteenth-century young lady in my own 
 346 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 raw state. Then I found you, Elfride, and I felt for 
 the first time that my fastidiousness was a blessing. 
 And it helped to make me worthy of you. I felt at 
 once that, differing as we did in other experiences, in 
 this matter I resembled you. Well, aren't you glad to 
 hear it, Elfride ? ' 
 
 ' Yes, I am,' she answered in a forced voice. ' But 
 I always had thought that men made lots of engage- 
 ments before they married — especially if they don't 
 marry very young.' 
 
 ' So all women think, I suppose — and rightly, indeed, 
 of the majority of bachelors, as I said before. But an 
 appreciable minority of slow-coach men do not — and it 
 makes them very awkward when they do come to the 
 point. However, it didn't matter in my case.' 
 
 ' Why ? ' she asked uneasily. 
 
 ' Because you know even less of love-making and 
 matrimonial prearrangement than I, and so you can't 
 draw invidious comparisons if I do my engaging im- 
 properly.' 
 
 ' I think you do it beautifully ! ' 
 
 •Thank you, dear. But,' continued Knight laugh- 
 ingly, ' your opinion is not that of an expert, which alone 
 is of value.' 
 
 Had she answered, ' Yes, it is,' half as strongly as 
 she felt it, Knight might have been a little astonished. 
 
 ' If you had ever been engaged to be married before,' 
 he went on, ' I expect your opinion of my addresses 
 
 would be different. But then, I should not-^ ' 
 
 Should not what, Harry ? ' 
 
 ' Oh, I was merely going to say that in that case I 
 should never have given myself the pleasure of propos- 
 ing to you, since your freedom from that experience 
 was your attraction, darling.' 
 
 ' You are severe on women, are you not ? ' 
 
 ' No, I think not. I had a right to please my taste, 
 and that was for untried lips. Other men than those of 
 347 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 my sort acquire the taste as they get older — but don't 
 find an Elfride ' 
 
 ' What horrid sound is that we hear when we pitch 
 forward ? ' 
 
 ' Only the screw — don't find an Elfride as I did. 
 To think that I should have discovered such an unseen 
 flower down there in the West — to whom a man is as 
 much as a multitude to some women, and a trip down 
 the English Channel like a voyage round the world ! ' 
 
 ' And would you,' she said, and her voice was 
 tremulous, • have given up a lady — if you had become 
 engaged to her — and then found she had had one kiss 
 before yours — and would you have — gone away and 
 left her ? ' 
 
 ' One kiss, — no, hardly for that.' 
 
 ' Two ? ' 
 
 'Well — I could hardly say inventorially like that. 
 Too much of that sort of thing certainly would make 
 me dislike a woman. But let us confine our attention 
 to ourselves, not go thinking of might have beens.' 
 
 So Elfride had allowed her thoughts to 'dally with 
 false surmise,' and every one of Knight's words fell 
 upon her like a weight. After this they were silent for 
 a long time, gazing upon the black mysterious sea, and 
 hearing the strange voice of the restless wind. A rock- 
 ing to and fro on the waves, when the breeze is not too 
 violent and cold, produces a soothing effect even upon 
 the most highly-wrought mind. Elfride slowly sank 
 against Knight, and looking down, he found by her soft 
 regular breathing that she had fallen asleep. Not 
 wishing to disturb her, he continued still, and took an 
 intense pleasure in supporting her warm young form as 
 it rose and fell with her every breath. 
 
 Knight fell to dreaming too, though he continued 
 
 wide awake. It was pleasant to reaUze the implicit 
 
 trust she placed in him, and to think of the charming 
 
 innocence of one who could sink to sleep in so simple 
 
 348 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 and unceremonious a manner. More than all, the 
 musing unpractical student felt the immense responsi- 
 bility he was taking upon himself by becoming the 
 protector and guide of such a trusting creature. The 
 quiet slumber of her soul lent a quietness to his own. 
 Then she moaned, and turned herself restlessly. Pre- 
 sently her mutterings became distinct : 
 
 ' Don't tell him — he will not love me. ... I did not 
 mean any disgrace — indeed I did not, so don't tell 
 Harry. We were going to be married — that was why I 
 ran away. . . . And he says he will not have a kissed 
 woman. . . . And if you tell him he will go away, and 
 I shall die. I pray have mercy — Oh ! ' 
 
 Elfride started up wildly. 
 
 The previous moment a musical ding-dong had 
 spread into the air from their right hand, and awakened 
 her. 
 
 ' What is it ? ' she exclaimed in terror. 
 
 ' Only " eight bells," ' said Knight soothingly. 
 ' Don't be frightened, little bird, you are safe. What 
 have you been dreaming about ? ' 
 
 ' I can't tell, I can't tell ! ' she said with a shudder. 
 ' Oh, I don't know what to do ! ' 
 
 ' Stay quietly with me. We shall soon see the dawn 
 now. Look, the morning star is lovely over there. 
 The clouds have completely cleared off whilst you have 
 been sleeping. What have you been dreaming of?' 
 
 ' A woman in our parish.' 
 
 ' Don't you like her ? ' 
 
 ' I don't. She doesn't like me. Where are we ? ' 
 
 ' About south of the Exe.' 
 
 Knight said no more on the words of her dream. 
 They watched the sky till Elfride grew calm, and the 
 dawn appeared. It was naere wan lightness first. Then 
 the wind blew in a changed spirit, and died away to a 
 zephyr. The star dissolved into the day. 
 
 ' That's how I should like to die,' said Elfride, rising 
 349 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 from her seat and leaning over the bulwark to watch the 
 star's last expiring gleam. 
 
 ' As the lines say,' Knight replied — 
 
 '" To set as sets the morning star, which goes 
 Not down behind the darken'd west, nor hides 
 Obscured among the tempests of the sky, 
 But melts away into the light of heaven." ' 
 
 ' Oh, Other people have thought the same thing, have 
 they? That's always the case with my originalities — 
 they are original to nobody but myself.' 
 
 ' Not only the case with yours. When I was a 
 young hand at reviewing I used to find that a frightful 
 pitfall — dilating upon subjects I met with, which were 
 novelties to me, and finding afterwards they had been 
 exhausted by the thinking world when I was in 
 pinafores.' 
 
 ' That is delightful. Whenever I find you have done 
 a foolish thing I am glad, because it seems to bring 
 you a little nearer to me, who have done many.' And 
 Elfride thought again of her enemy asleep under the 
 deck they trod. 
 
 All up the coast, prominences singled themselves out 
 from recesses. Then a rosy sky spread over the eastern 
 sea and behind the low line of land, flinging its livery 
 in dashes upon the thin airy clouds in that direction. 
 Every projection on the land seemed now so many 
 fingers anxious to catch a little of the liquid light thrown 
 so prodigally over the sky, and after a fantastic time of 
 lustrous yellows in the east, the higher elevations along 
 the shore were flooded with the same hues. The bluff 
 and bare contours of Start Point caught the brightest, 
 earliest glow of all, and so also did the sides of its white 
 lighthouse, perched upon a shelf in its precipitous front 
 like a mediaeval saint in a niche. Their lofty neighbour 
 Bolt Head on the left remained as yet ungilded, and 
 retained its gray. 
 
 350 
 
A PAIR OF. BLUE EYES 
 
 Then up came the sun, as it were in jerks, just to 
 seaward of the easternmost point of land, flinging out 
 a Jacob's-ladder path of light from itself to Elfride and 
 Knight, and coating them with rays in a few minutes. 
 The inferior dignitaries of the shore — Froward Point, 
 Berry Head, and Prawle — all had acquired their share of 
 the illumination ere this, and at length the very smallest 
 protuberance of wave, cliff, or inlet, even to the inner- 
 most recesses of the lovely valley of the Dart, had its 
 portion ; and sunlight, now the common possession of 
 all, ceased to be the wonderful and coveted thing it had 
 been a short half hour before. 
 
 After breakfast, Plymouth arose into view, and grew 
 distincter to their nearing vision, the Breakwater ap- 
 pearing like a streak of phosphoric light upon the 
 surface of the sea. Elfride looked furtively around for 
 Mrs. Jethway, but could discern no shape like hers. 
 Afterwards, in the bustle of landing, she looked again 
 with the same result, by which time the woman had 
 probably glided upon the quay unobserved. Expand- 
 ing with a sense of relief, Elfride waited whilst Knight 
 looked to their luggage, and then saw her father ap- 
 proaching through the crowd, twirling his walking-stick 
 to catch their attention. Elbowing their way to him 
 they all entered the town, which smiled as sunny a smile 
 upon Elfride as it had done between one and two years 
 earlier, when she had entered it at precisely the same 
 hour as the bride-elect of Stephen Smith. 
 
XXX 
 
 'Vassal unto Love.' 
 
 JlLLFRIDE clung closer to Knight as day succeeded 
 day. Whatever else might admit of question, there 
 could be no dispute that the allegiance she bore him 
 absorbed her whole soul and existence. A greater than 
 Stephen had arisen, and she had left all to follow him. 
 
 The unreserved girl was never chary of letting her 
 lover discover how much she admired him. She never 
 once held an idea in opposition to any one of his, or 
 insisted on any point with him, or showed any inde- 
 pendence, or held her own on any subject. His 
 lightest whim she respected and obeyed as law, and 
 if, expressing her opinion on a matter, he took up 
 the subject and differed from her, she instantly threw 
 down her own opinion as wrong and untenable. Even 
 her ambiguities and espilglerie were but media of the 
 same manifestation; acted charades, embodying the 
 words of her prototype, the tender and susceptible 
 daughter-in-law of Naomi : ' Let me find favour in 
 thy sight, my lord; for that thou hast comforted me, 
 and for that thou hast spoken friendly unto thine 
 handmaid.' 
 
 She was syringing the plants one wet day in the 
 352 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 greenhouse. Knight was sitting under a great passion- 
 flower observing the scene. Sometimes he looked out 
 al the rain from the sky, and then at Elfride's inner 
 rain of larger drops, which fell from trees and shrubs^ 
 after having previously hung from the twigs like small 
 silver fruit. 
 
 ' I must give you something to make you think of 
 me during this autumn at your chambers,' she was 
 saying. ' What shall it be ? Portraits do more harm 
 than good, by selecting the worst expression of which 
 your face is capable. Hair is unlucky. And you 
 don't like jewellery.' 
 
 ' Something which shall bring back to my mind the 
 many scenes we have enacted in this conservatory. I 
 see what I should prize very much. That dwarf myrtle 
 tree in the pot, which you have been so carefully 
 tending.' 
 
 Elfride looked thoughtfully at the myrtle. 
 
 ' I can carry it comfortably in my hat box,' said 
 Knight. ' And I will put it in my window, and so, 
 it being always before my eyes, I shall think of you 
 continually.' 
 
 It so happened that the myrtle which Knight 
 had singled out had a peculiar beginning and history. 
 It had originally been a twig worn in Stephen Smith's 
 button-hole, and he had taken it thence, stuck it into 
 the pot, and told her that if it grew, she was to take 
 care of it, and keep it in remembrance of him when he 
 was far away. 
 
 She looked wistfully at the plant, and a sense of 
 fairness to Smith's memory caused her a pang of 
 regret that Knight should have asked for that very 
 one. It seemed exceeding a common heartlessness to 
 let it go. 
 
 'Is there not anything you like better?' she said 
 sadly. ' That is only an ordinary myrtle.' 
 
 ' No ; I am fond of myrtle.' Seeing that she did 
 353 z 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 not take kindly to the idea, he said again, ' Why do you 
 object to my having that ? ' 
 
 ' Oh no — I don't object precisely — it was a feeling. 
 — Ah, here's another cutting lately struck, and just as 
 small — of a better kind, and with prettier leaves — 
 myrtus microphylla.' 
 
 'That will do nicely. Let it be put in my room, 
 that I may not forget it. What romance attaches to 
 the other ? ' 
 
 ' It was a gift to me.' 
 
 The subject then dropped. Knight thought no 
 more of the matter till, on entering his bedroom in 
 the evening, he found the second myrtle placed upon 
 his dressing-table as he had directed. He stood for a 
 moment admiring the fresh appearance of the leaves by 
 candlelight, and then he thought of the transaction of 
 the day. 
 
 Male lovers as well as female can be spoilt by too 
 much kindness, and Elfride's uniform submissiveness 
 had given Knight a rather exacting manner at crises, 
 attached to her as he was. ' Why should she have 
 refused the one I first chose ? ' he now asked himself. 
 Even such slight opposition as she had shown then 
 was exceptional enough to make itself noticeable. He 
 was not vexed with her in the least : the mere varia- 
 tion of her way to-day from her usual ways kept 
 him musing on the subject, because it perplexed him. 
 ' It was a gift ' — those were her words. Admitting 
 it to be a gift, he thought she could hardly value a 
 mere friend more than she valued him as a lover, and 
 giving the plant into his charge would have made no 
 diiference. ' Except, indeed, it was the gift of a lover,' 
 he murmured. 
 
 ' I wonder if Elfride has ever had a lover before ? ' 
 he said aloud, as a new idea, quite. This and com- 
 , panion thoughts were enough to occupy him completely 
 till he fell asleep — rather later than usual. 
 354 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 The next day, when they were again alone, he said 
 to her rather suddenly — 
 
 ' Do you love me more or less, Elfie, for what I told 
 you on board the steamer ? ' 
 
 ' You told me so many things,' she returned, lifting 
 her eyes to his and smiling. 
 
 ' I mean the confession you coaxed out of me — that 
 I had never been in the position of lover before.' 
 
 ' It is a satisfaction, I suppose, to be the first in 
 your heart,' she said to him, with an attempt to continue 
 her smiling. 
 
 ' I am going to ask you a question now,' said 
 Knight, somewhat awkwardly. ' I only ask it in a 
 whimsical way, you know : not with great seriousness, 
 Elfride. You may think it odd, perhaps.' 
 
 Elfride tried desperately to keep the colour in her 
 face. She could not, though distressed to think that 
 getting pale showed consciousness of deeper guilt than 
 merely getting red. 
 
 ' Oh no — I shall not think that,' she said, because 
 obliged to say something to fill the pause which followed 
 her questioner's remark. 
 
 ' It is this : have you ever had a lover ? I am 
 almost sure you have not ; but, have you ? ' 
 
 ' Not, as it were, a lover ; I mean, not worth men- 
 tioning, Harry,' she faltered. 
 
 Knight, overstrained in sentiment as he knew the 
 feeling to be, felt some sickness of heart. 
 
 ' Still, he was a lover ? ' 
 
 ' Well, a sort of lover, I suppose,' she responded 
 tardily. 
 
 ' A man, I mean, you know.' 
 
 ' Yes ; but only a mere person, and ' 
 
 ' But truly your lover ? ' 
 
 'Yes; a lover certainly — he was that. Yes, he 
 might have been called my lover.' 
 
 Knight said nothing to this for a minute or more, 
 355 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 and kept silent time with his finger to the tick of 
 the old library clock, in which room the colloquy was 
 going on. 
 
 ' You don't mind, Harry, do you ? ' she said 
 anxiously, nestling close to him, and watching his face. 
 
 ' Of course, I don't seriously mind. In reason, a 
 man cannot object to such a trifle. I only thought you 
 hadn't — that was all.' 
 
 However, one ray was abstracted from the glory 
 about her head. But afterwards, when Knight was 
 wandering by himself over the bare and breezy hills, 
 ftnd meditating on the subject, that ray suddenly 
 returned. For she might have had a lover, and never 
 have cared in the least for him. She might have used 
 the word improperly, and meant ' admirer ' all the time. 
 Of course she had been admired ; and one man might 
 have made his admiration more prominent than that of 
 the rest — a very natural case. 
 
 They were sitting on one of the garden seats when 
 he found occasion to put the supposition to the test. 
 ' Did you love that lover or admirer of yours ever so 
 little, Elfie?' 
 
 She murmured reluctantly, ' Yes, I think I did.' 
 
 Knight felt the same faint touch of misery. ' Only 
 a very little ? ' he said. 
 
 ' I am not sure how much.' 
 
 ' But you are sure, darling, you loved him a little ? ' 
 
 ■ I think I am sure I loved him a little.' 
 
 ' And not a great deal, Elfie ? ' 
 
 ' My love was not supported by reverence for his 
 powers.' 
 
 ' But, Elfride, did you love him deeply ? ' said Knight 
 restlessly. 
 
 ' I don't exactly know how deep you mean by 
 deeply.' 
 
 ' That's nonsense.' 
 
 'You misapprehend; and you have let go my 
 3S6 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 hand ! ' she cried, her eyes filling with tears. ' Harry, 
 don't be severe with me, and don't question me. I 
 did not love him as I do you. And could it be deeply 
 if I did not think him cleverer than myself? For I 
 did not. You grieve me so much — you can't think.' 
 
 ' I will not say another word about it.' 
 
 ' And you will not think about it, either, will you ? 
 I know you think of weaknesses in me after I am out 
 of your sight ; and not knowing what they are, I can- 
 not combat them. I almost wish you were of a grosser 
 nature, Harry ; in truth I do ! Or rather, I wish I 
 could have the advantages such a nature in you would 
 afford me, and yet have you as you are.' 
 
 ■ What advantages would they be ? ' 
 
 ' Less anxiety, and more security. Ordinary men are 
 not so delicate in their tastes as you ; and where the 
 lover or husband is not fastidious, and refined, and of 
 a deep nature, things seem to go on better, I fancy — as 
 far as I have been able to observe the world.' 
 
 ' Yes ; I suppose it is right. Shallowness has this 
 advantage, that you can't be drowned there.' 
 
 ' But I think I'll have you as you are ; yes, I will ! ' 
 she said winsomely. ' The practical husbands and 
 wives who take things philosophically are very humdrum, 
 are they not ? Yes, it would kill me quite. You please 
 me best as you are.' 
 
 ' Even though I wish you had never cared for one 
 before me ? ' 
 
 ' Yes. And you must not wish it. Don't ! ' 
 
 ' I'll try not to, Elfride.' 
 
 So she hoped, but her heart was troubled. If he 
 felt so deeply on this point, what would he say did he 
 know all, and see it as Mrs. Jethway saw it ? He would 
 never make her the happiest girl in the world by taking 
 her to be his own for aye. The thought enclosed her 
 as a tomb whenever it presented itself to her perturbed 
 brain. She tried to believe that Mrs. Jethway would 
 357 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 never do her such a cruel wrong as to increase the bad 
 appearance of her folly by innuendoes ; and concluded 
 that concealment, having been begun, must be persisted 
 in, if possible. For what he might consider as bad as 
 the fact, was her previous concealment of it by strategy. 
 
 But Elfride knew Mrs. Jethway to be her enemy, and 
 to hate her. It was possible she would do, her worst. 
 And should she do it, all might be over. 
 
 Would the woman listen to reason, and be per- 
 suaded not to ruin one who had never intentionally 
 harmed her ? 
 
 It was night in the valley between Endelstow Crags 
 and the shore. The brook which trickled that way to 
 the sea was distinct in its murmurs now, and over the 
 line of its course there began to hang a white riband 
 of fog. Against the sky, on the left hand of the vale, 
 the black form of the church could be seen. On tha 
 other rose hazel-bushes, a few trees, and where these 
 were absent, furze tufts — as tall as men — on stems 
 nearly as stout as timber. The shriek of some bird 
 was occasionally heard, as it flew terror-stricken from its 
 first roost, to seek a new sleeping-place, where it might 
 pass the night unmolested. 
 
 In the evening shade, some way down the valley, 
 and under a row of scrubby oaks, a cottage could still 
 be discerned. It stood absolutely alone. The house 
 was rather large, and the windows of some of the rooms 
 were nailed up with boards on the outside, which gave 
 a particularly deserted appearance to the whole erection. 
 From the front door an irregular series of rough and 
 misshapen steps, cut in the solid rock, led down to the 
 edge of the streamlet,' which, at their extremity, was 
 hollowed into a basin through which the water trickled. 
 This was evidently the means of water supply to the 
 dweller or dwellers in the cottage. 
 
 A light footstep was heard descending from the 
 358 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 higher slopes of the hillside. Indistinct in the pathway 
 appeared a moving female shape, who advanced and 
 knocked timidly at the door. No answer being re- 
 turned the knock was repeated, with the same result, 
 and it was then repeated a third time. This also was 
 unsuccessful. 
 
 From one of the only two windows on the ground 
 floor which were not boarded up came rays of light, 
 no shutter or curtain obscuring the room from the eyes 
 of a passer on the outside. So few walked that way 
 after nightfall that any such means to secure secrecy 
 were probably deemed unnecessary. 
 
 The inequality of the rays falling upon the trees 
 outside told that the light had its origin in a flickering 
 fire only. The visitor, after the third knocking, stepped 
 a little to the left in order to gain a view of the interior, 
 and threw back the hood from her face. The dancing 
 yellow sheen revealed the fair and anxious countenance 
 of Elfride. 
 
 Inside the house this firelight was enough to illumine 
 the room distinctly, and to show that the furniture of 
 the cottage was superior to what might have been ex- 
 pected from so unpromising an exterior. It also showed 
 to Elfride that the room was empty. Beyond the light 
 quiver and flap of the flames nothing moved or was 
 audible therein. 
 
 She turned the handle and entered, throwing off the 
 cloak which enveloped her, under which she appeared 
 without hat or bonnet, and in the sort of half-toilette 
 country people ordinarily dine in. Then advancing to 
 the foot of the staircase she called distinctly, but some- 
 what fearfully, ' Mrs. Jethway ! ' 
 
 No answer. 
 
 With a look of relief and regret combined, denoting 
 that ease came to the heart and disappointment to the 
 brain, Elfride paused for several minutes, as if un- 
 decided how to act. Determining to wait, she sat 
 3S9 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 down on a chair. The minutes drew on, and after 
 sitting on the thorns of impatience for half an hour, 
 she searched her pocket, took therefrom a letter, and 
 tore off the blank leaf. Then taking out a pencil she 
 wrote upon the paper : 
 
 ' Dear Mrs. Jethway, — I have been to vdsit you. 
 I wanted much to see you, but I cannot wait any longer. 
 I came to beg you not to execute the threats you have 
 repeated to me. Do not, I beseech you, Mrs. Jethway, 
 let any one know I ran away from home ! It would 
 ruin me with him, and break my heart. I will do any- 
 thing for you, if you will be kind to me. In the name 
 of our common womanhood, do not, I implore you, 
 make a scandal of me. — Yours, E. Swancourt.' 
 
 She folded the note cornerwise, directed it, and 
 placed it on the table. Then again drawing the hood 
 over her curly head she emerged silently as she had 
 come. 
 
 Whilst this episode had been in action at Mrs. 
 Jethway's cottage, Knight had gone from the dining- 
 room into the drawing-room, and found Mrs. Swancourt 
 there alone. 
 
 ' Elfride has vanished upstairs or somewhere,' she 
 said. 
 
 'And I have been reading an article in an old 
 number of the Present that I lighted on by chance a 
 short time ago ; it is an article you once told us was 
 yours. Well, Harry, with due deference to your literary 
 powers, allow me to say that this effusion is all nonsense, 
 in my opinion.' 
 
 'What is it about?' said Knight, taking up the 
 paper and reading. 
 
 ' There : don't get red about it. Own that experi- 
 ence has taught you to be more charitable. I have 
 never read such unchivalrous sentiments in my life 
 360 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 from a man, I mean. There, I forgive you; it was 
 before you knew Elfride.' 
 
 ' Oh yes,' said Knight, looking up. ' I remember 
 now. The text of that sermon was not my own at all, 
 but was suggested to me by a young man named Smith 
 ■ — the same whom I have mentioned to you as coming 
 from this parish. I thought the idea rather ingenious 
 at the time, and enlarged it to the weight of a few 
 guineas, because I had nothing else in my head.' 
 
 ' Which idea do you call the text ? I am curious to 
 know that.' 
 
 'Well, this,' said Knight, somewhat unwillingly. 
 ' That experience teaches, and your sweetheart, no less 
 than your tailor, is necessarily very imperfect in her 
 duties, if you are her first patron : and conversely, the 
 sweetheart who is graceful under the initial kiss 
 must be supposed to have had some practice in the 
 trade.' 
 
 ' And do you mean to say that you wrote that upon 
 the strength of another man's remark, without having 
 tested it by practice ? ' 
 
 ' Yes — indeed I do.' 
 
 • Then I think it was uncalled for and unfair. And 
 how do you know it is true ? I expect you regret it 
 now.' 
 
 ' Since you bring me into a serious mood, I will 
 speak candidly. I do believe that remark to be per- 
 fectly true, and, having written it, I would defend it 
 anywhere. But I do often regret having ever written 
 it, as well as others of the sort. I have grown older 
 since, and I find such a tone of writing is calculated to 
 do harm in the world. Every literary Jack becomes a 
 gentleman if he can only pen a few indifferent satires 
 upon womankind : women themselves, too, have taken 
 to the trick; and so, upon the whole, I begin to be 
 rather ashamed of my companions.' 
 
 ' Ah, Henry, you have fallen in love since, and it 
 
 a A 361 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 makes a difference,' said Mrs. Swancourt with a faint 
 tone of banter. 
 
 ' That's true ; but that is not my reason.' 
 
 ' Having found that, in a case of your own experi- 
 ence, a so-called goose was a swan, it seems absurd 
 to deny such a possibility in other men's experiences.' 
 
 ' You can hit palpably, cousin Charlotte,' said Knight. 
 ' You are like the boy who puts a stone inside his 
 snowball, and I shall play with you no longer. Excuse 
 me — I am going for my evening stroll.' 
 
 Though Knight had spoken jestingly, this incident 
 and conversation had caused him a sudden depression. 
 Coming, rather singularly, just after his discovery that 
 Elfride had known what it was to love warmly before 
 she had known him, his mind dwelt upon the subject, 
 and the familiar pipe he smoked, whilst pacing up and 
 down the shrubbery-path, failed to be a solace. He 
 thought again of those idle words — hitherto quite for- 
 gotten — about the first kiss of a girl, and the theory 
 seemed more than reasonable. Of course their sting 
 now lay in their bearing on Elfride. 
 
 Elfride, under Knight's kiss, had certainly been a 
 very different woman from herself under Stephen's. 
 Whether for good or for ill, she had marvellously well 
 learnt a betrothed lady's part ; and the fascinating finish 
 of her deportment in this second campaign did probably 
 arise from her unreserved encouragement of Stephen. 
 Knight, with all the rapidity of jealous sensitiveness, 
 pounced upon some words she had inadvertently let fall 
 about an earring', which h© had only partially under- 
 stood at the time. It was during that ' initial kiss ' by 
 the little waterfall : 
 
 'We must be careful. I lost the other by doing 
 this ! ' 
 
 A flush which had in it as much of wounded pride 
 as of sorrow, passed over Knight as he thought of what 
 he had so frequently said to her in his simplicity. ' I 
 362 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 always meant to be the first comer in a woman's heart ; 
 fresh lips or none for me.' How childishly blind he 
 must have seemed to this mere girl ! How she must 
 have laughed at him inwardly ! He absolutely writhed 
 as he thought of the confession she had wrung from him 
 on the boat in the darkness of night. The one con- 
 ception which had sustained his dignity when drawn 
 out of his shell on that occasion — that of her charming 
 ignorance of all such matters — how absurd it was ! 
 
 This man, whose imagination had been fed up to 
 preternatural size by lonely study and silent observations 
 of his kind — whose emotions had been drawn out long 
 and delicate by his seclusion, like plants in a cellar — 
 was now absolutely in pain. Moreover, several years of 
 poetic study, and, if the truth must be told, poetic 
 efforts, had tended to develop the affective side of his 
 constitution still further, in proportion to his active 
 faculties. It was his belief in the absolute newness of 
 blandishment to Elfride which had constituted her 
 primary charm. He began to think it was as hard to 
 be earliest in a woman's heart as it was to be first in the 
 Pool of Bethesda. 
 
 That Knight should have been thus constituted : 
 that Elfride's second lover should not have been one 
 of the great mass of bustling mankind, little given to 
 introspection, whose good-nature might have compen- 
 sated for any lack of appreciativeness, was the chance 
 of things. That her throbbing, self-confounding, in- 
 discreet heart should have to defend itself unaided 
 against the keen scrutiny and logical power which 
 Knight, now that his suspicions were awakened, would 
 sooner or later be sure to exercise against her, was her 
 misfortune. A miserable incongruity was apparent in 
 the circumstance of a strong mind practising its unerring 
 archery upon a heart which the owner of that mind 
 loved better than his own. 
 
 Elfride's docile devotion to Knight was now its own 
 363 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 enemy. Clinging to him so dependently, she taught 
 him in time to presume upon that devotion — a lesson 
 men are not slow to learn. A slight rebelliousness 
 occasionally would have done him no harm, and would 
 have been a world of advantage to her. But she 
 idolized him, and was proud to be his bond-servant. 
 
XXXI 
 
 'A worm i" the bud.' 
 
 vJ NE day the reviewer said, ' Let us go to the cliffs 
 again, Elfride ; ' and, without consulting her wishes, he 
 moved as if to start at once. 
 
 ' The cliff of our dreadful adventure ? ' she inquired, 
 with a shudder. ' Death stares me in the face in the 
 person of that cliff.' 
 
 Nevertheless, so entirely had she sunk her indivi- 
 duality in his that the remark was not uttered as an 
 expostulation, and she immediately prepared to accom- 
 pany him. 
 
 ' No, not that place,' said Knight. ' It is ghastly 
 to me, too. That other, I mean ; what is its name ? — 
 Windy Beak.' 
 
 Windy Beak was the second cliff in height along 
 that coast, and, as is frequently the case with the natural 
 features of the globe no less than with the intellectual 
 features of men, it enjoyed the reputation of being the 
 first. Moreover, it was the cliff to which Elfride had 
 ridden with Stephen Smith, on a well-remembered 
 morning of his summer visit. 
 
 So, though thought of the former cliff had caused 
 her to shudder at the perils to which her lover and her- 
 365 
 
A PAIR Ot" BLtJE EYES 
 
 self had there been exposed, by being associated with 
 Knight only it was not so objectionable as Windy 
 Beak. That place was worse than gloomy, it was a 
 perpetual reproach to her. 
 
 But not liking to refuse, she said, ' It is further than 
 the other cliff.' 
 
 ' Yes ; but you can ride.' 
 
 ' And will you too ? ' 
 
 ' No, I'll walk.' 
 
 A duplicate of her original arrangement with Stephen. 
 Some fatality must be hanging over her head. But she 
 ceased objecting. 
 
 ' Very well, Harry, I'll ride,' she said meekly. 
 A quarter of an hour later she was in the saddle. 
 But how different the mood from that of the former 
 time. She had, indeed, given up her position as queen 
 of the less to be vassal of the greater. Here was no 
 showing off now; no scampering out of sight with 
 Pansy, to perplex and tire her companion ; no saucy 
 remarks on La Belle Dame sans Merci. Elfride was 
 burdened with the very intensity of her love. 
 
 Knight did most of the talking along the journey. 
 Elfride silently listened, and entirely resigned herself 
 to the motions of the ambling horse upon which she 
 sat, alternately rising and sinking gently, like a sea bird 
 upon a sea wave. 
 
 When they had reached the limit of a quadruped's 
 possibilities in walking. Knight tenderly lifted her from 
 the saddle, tied the horse, and rambled on with her to 
 the seat in the rock. Knight sat down, and drew 
 Elfride deftly beside him, and they looked over the sea. 
 
 Two or three degrees above that melancholy and 
 eternally level line, the ocean horizon, hung a sun of 
 brass, with no visible rays, in a sky of ashen hue. It 
 was a sky the sun did not illuminate or enkindle, as is 
 usual at sunsets. This sheet of sky was met by the 
 salt mass of gray water, flecked here and there with 
 366 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 white. A waft of dampness occasionally rose to their 
 faces, which was probably rarefied spray from the blows 
 of the sea upon the foot of the cliff. 
 
 Elfride wished it could be a longer time ago that she 
 had sat there with Stephen as her lover, and agreed to 
 be his wife. The significant closeness of that time to 
 the present was another item to add to the list of 
 passionate fears which were chronic with her now. 
 
 Yet Knight was very tender this evening, and sus- 
 tained her close to him as they sat. 
 
 Not a word had been uttered by either since sitting 
 down, when Knight said musingly, looking still afar — 
 
 ' I wonder if any lovers in past years ever sat here 
 with arms locked, as we do now. Probably they have, 
 for the place seems formed for a seat.' 
 
 Her recollection of a well-known pair who had, and 
 the much-talked-of loss which had ensued therefrom, 
 and how the young man had been sent back to look for 
 the missing article, led Elfride to glance down to her 
 side, and behind her back. Many people who lose a 
 trinket involuntarily give a momentary look for it in 
 passing the spot ever so long afterwards. They do not 
 often find it. Elfride, in turning her head, saw some- 
 thing shine weakly from a crevice in the rocky sedile. 
 Only for a few minutes during the day did the sun light 
 the alcove to its innermost rifts and slits, but these 
 were the minutes now, and its level rays did Elfride 
 the good or evil turn of revealing the lost ornament. 
 
 Elfride's thoughts instantly reverted to the words 
 she had unintentionally uttered upon what had been 
 going on when the earring was lost. And she was im- 
 mejiiately seized with a misgiving that Knight, on see- 
 ing the object, would be reminded of her words. Her 
 instinctive act therefore was to secure it privately. 
 
 It was so deep in the crack that Elfride could not 
 pull it out with her hand, though she made several 
 surreptitious trials. 
 
 367 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 « What are you doing, Elfie ? ' said Knight, noticing 
 her attempts, and looking behind him likewise. 
 
 She had relinquished the endeavour, but too late. 
 
 Knight peered into the joint from which her hand 
 had been withdrawn, and saw what she had seen. He 
 instantly took a penknife from his pocket, and by dint 
 of probing and scraping brought the earring out upon 
 open ground. 
 
 ' It is not yours, surely ? ' he inquired. 
 
 ' Yes, it is,' she said quietly. 
 
 ' Well, that is a most extraordinary thing, that we 
 should find it like this ! ' Knight then remembered 
 more circumstances ; ' What, is it the one you have 
 told me of ? ' 
 
 ' Yes.' 
 
 The unfortunate remark of hers at the kiss came 
 into his mind, if eyes were ever an index to be trusted. 
 Trying to repress the words he yet spoke on the sub- 
 ject, more to obtain assurance that what it had seemed 
 to imply was not true than from a wish to pry into 
 bygones. 
 
 ' Were you really engaged to be married to that 
 lover ? ' he said, looking straight forward at the sea 
 again. 
 
 'Yes — but not exactly. Yet I think I was.' 
 
 ' O Elfride, engaged to be married ! ' he murmured. 
 
 ' It would have been called a — secret engagement, 
 I suppose. But don't look so disappointed; don't 
 blame me.' 
 
 ' No, no.' 
 
 ' Why do you say " No, no," in such a way ? 
 Sweetly enough, but so barely ? ' 
 
 Knight made no direct reply to this. ' Elfride, I told 
 you once,' he said, following out his thoughts, ' that I 
 never kissed a woman as a sweetheart until I kissed you. 
 A kiss is not much, I suppose, and it happens to few 
 young people to be able to avoid all blandishments and 
 368 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 attentions except from the one they afterwards marry. 
 But I have peculiar weaknesses, Elfride ; and because I 
 have led a peculiar life, I must suffer for it, I suppose. 
 I had hoped — well, what I had no right to hope in con- 
 nection with you. You naturally granted your former 
 lover the privileges you grant me.' 
 
 A ' yes ' came from her like the last sad whisper of a 
 breeze. 
 
 ' And he used to kiss you — of course he did.' 
 
 ' Yes.' 
 
 ' And perhaps you allowed him a more free manner 
 in his love-making than I have shown in mine.' 
 
 ' No, I did not.' This was rather more alertly spoken. 
 
 ' But he adopted it without being allowed ? ' 
 
 ' Yes.' 
 
 ' How much I have made of you, Elfride, and how 
 I have kept aloof ! ' said Knight in deep and shaken 
 tones. ' So many days and hours as I have hoped in 
 you — I have feared to kiss you more than those two 
 times. And he made no scruples to . . .' 
 
 She crept closer to him and trembled as if with cold. 
 Her dread that the whole story, with random additions, 
 would become known to him, caused her manner to be 
 so agitated that Knight was alarmed and perplexed into 
 stillness. The actual innocence which made her think 
 so fearfully of what, as the world goes, was not a great 
 matter, magnified her apparent guilt. It may have said 
 to Knight that a woman who was so flurried in the 
 preliminaries must have a dreaful sequel to her tale. 
 
 ' I know,' continued Knight, with an indescribable 
 drag of manner and intonation, — ' I know I am absurdly 
 scrupulous about you — that I want you too exclusively 
 mine. In your past before you knew me — from your 
 very cradle — I wanted to think you had been mine. 
 I would make you mine by main force. Elfride,' he 
 went on vehemently, ' I can't help this jealousy over 
 you ! It is my nature, and must be so, and I Aate 
 369 2 A 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 the fact that you have been caressed before: yes, 
 hate it ! ' 
 
 She drew a long deep breath, which was half a sob. 
 Knight's face was hard, and he never looked at her 
 at all, still fixing his gaze far out to sea, which the sun 
 had now resigned to the shade. In high places it is 
 not long from sunset to night, dusk being in a measure 
 banished, and though only evening where they sat, it 
 had been twilight in the valleys for half an hour. 
 Upon the dull expanse of sea there gradually intensified 
 itself into existence the gleam of a distant light-ship. 
 
 ' When that lover first kissed you, Elfride was it 
 in such a place as this ? ' 
 
 ' Yes, it was.' 
 
 ' You don't tell me anything but what I wring out 
 of you. Why is that? Why have you suppressed all 
 mention of this when casual confidences of mine should 
 have suggested confidence in return? On board the 
 Juliet, why were you so secret? It seems like being 
 made a fool of, Elfride, to think that, when I was 
 teaching you how desirable it was that we should have 
 no secrets from each other, you were assenting in 
 words, but in act contradicting me. Confidence would 
 have been so much more promising for our happiness. 
 If you had had confidence in me, and told me will- 
 ingly, I should — be different. But you suppress every- 
 thing, and I shall question you. Did you live at 
 Endelstow at that time ? ' 
 
 ' Yes,' she said faintly. 
 
 ' Where were you when he first kissed you ? ' 
 
 ' Sitting in this seat.' 
 
 « Ah, I thought so ! ' said Knight, rising and facing 
 her. 
 
 ' And that accounts for everything — the exclamation 
 
 which you explained deceitfully, and all ! Forgive the 
 
 harsh word, Elfride — forgive it.' He smiled a surface 
 
 smile as he continued: 'What a poor mortal I am 
 
 370 
 
A PAIR Oif BLUE EYES 
 
 to play second fiddle in everything and to be deluded 
 by fibs ! ' 
 
 ' Oh, don't say it ; don't, Harry ! ' 
 
 ' Where did he kiss you besides here ? ' 
 
 ' Sitting on — a tomb in the — churchyard — and other 
 places,' she answered with slow recklessness. 
 
 ' Never mind, never mind,' he exclaimed, on seeing 
 her tears and perturbation. ' I don't want to grieve 
 you. I don't care.' 
 
 But Knight did care. 
 
 ' It makes no difference, you know,' he continued, 
 seeing she did not reply. 
 
 ' I feel cold, said Elfride. ' Shall we go home ? ' 
 
 ' Yes ; it is late in the year to sit long out of doors : 
 we ought to be off this ledge before it gets too dark to let 
 us see our footing. I daresay the horse is impatient.' 
 
 Knight spoke the merest commonplace to her now. 
 He had hoped to the last moment that she would have 
 volunteered the whole story of her first attachment. It 
 grew more and more distasteful to him that she should 
 have a secret of this nature. Such entire confidence as 
 he had pictured as about to exist between himself and 
 the innocent young wife who had known no lover's tones 
 save his — iwas this its beginning ? He lifted her upon 
 the horse, and they went along constrainedly. The 
 poison of suspicion was doing its work well. 
 
 An incident occurred on this homeward journey 
 which was long remembered by both, as adding shade 
 to shadow. Knight could not keep from his mind the 
 words of Adam's reproach to Eve in Paradise Lost, and 
 at last whispered them to himself — 
 
 'Fool'd and beguiled : by him thou, I by thee !' 
 
 ' What did you say ? ' Elfride inquired timorously. 
 ' It was only a quotation.' 
 
 They had now dropped into a hollow, and the church 
 tower made its appearance against the pale evening 
 371 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 sky, its lower part being hidden by some intervening 
 trees. Elfride, being denied an answer, was looking 
 at the tower and trying to think of some contrasting 
 quotation she might use to regain his tenderness. 
 After a Uttle thought she said in winning tones — 
 
 ' " Thou hast been my hope, and a strong tower for 
 me against the enemy." ' 
 
 They passed on. A few minutes later three or four 
 birds were seen to fly out of the tower. 
 
 'The strong tower moves,' said Knight, with sur- 
 prise. 
 
 A corner of the square mass swayed forward, sank, 
 and vanished. A loud rumble followed, and a cloud 
 of dust arose where all had previously been so clear. 
 
 ' The church restorers have done it ! ' said Elfride. 
 
 At this minute Mr. Swancourt was seen approach- 
 ing them. He came up with a bustling demeanour, 
 apparently much engrossed by some business in hand. 
 
 ' We have got the tower down ! ' he exclaimed. 
 ' It came rather quicker than we intended it should. 
 The first idea was to take it down stone by stone, 
 you know. In doing this the crack widened consider- 
 ably, and it was not believed safe for the men to stand 
 upon the walls any longer. Then we decided to under- 
 mine it, and three men set to work at the weakest corner 
 this afternoon. They had left off for the evening, 
 intending to give the final blow to-morrow morning, 
 and had been home about half an hour, when down it 
 came. A very successful job — a very fine job indeed. 
 But he was a tough old fellow in spite of the crack.' 
 Here Mr. Swancourt wiped from his face the perspira- 
 tion his excitement had caused him. 
 
 ' Poor old tower ! ' said Elfride. 
 
 ' Yes, I am sorry for it,' said Knight. ' It was 
 an interesting piece of antiquity — a. local record of 
 local art.' 
 
 'Ah, but my dear sir, we shall have a new one,' 
 372 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 expostulated Mr. Swancourt ; ■ a splendid tower — 
 designed by a first-rate London man — in the newest 
 style of Gothic art, and full of Christian feeling.' 
 
 ' Indeed ! ' said Knight. 
 
 ' Oh yes. Not in the barbarous clumsy architecture 
 of this neighbourhood ; you see nothing so rough and 
 pagan an)rwhere else in England. When the men are 
 gone, I would advise you to go and see the church 
 before anything further is done to it. You can now 
 sit in the chancel, and look down the nave through the 
 west arch, and through that far out to sea. In fact,' 
 said Mr. Swancourt significantly, 'if a wedding were 
 performed at the altar to-morrow morning, it might be 
 witnessed from the deck of a ship on a voyage to the 
 South Seas, with a good glass. However, after dirmer, 
 when the moon has risen, go up and see for yourselves.' 
 
 Knight assented with feverish readiness. He had 
 decided within the last few minutes that he could not 
 rest another night without further talk with Elfride upon 
 the subject which now divided them : he was determined 
 to know all, and relieve his disquiet in some way. 
 Elfride would gladly have escaped further converse 
 alone with him that night, but it seemed inevitable. 
 
 Just after moonrise they left the house. How little 
 any expectation of the moonlight prospect— which was 
 the ostensible reason of their pilgrimage — had to do 
 with Knight's real motive in getting the gentle girl again 
 upon his arm, Elfnde no less than himself well knew. 
 
XXXII 
 
 • Had I wist before I kist' 
 
 It was now October, and the night air was chill. After 
 looking to see that she was well wrapped up, Knight 
 took her along the hillside path they had ascended so 
 many times in each other's company, when doubt was a 
 thing unknown. On reaching the church they found 
 that one side of the tower was, as the vicar had stated, 
 entirely removed, and lying in the shape of rubbish at 
 their feet. The tower on its eastern side still was firm, 
 and might have withstood the shock of storms and the 
 siege of battering years for many a generation even now. 
 They entered by the side-door, went eastward, and sat 
 down by the altar-steps. 
 
 The heavy arch spanning the junction of tower and 
 nave formed to-night a black frame to a distant misty 
 view, stretching far westward. Just outside the arch 
 came the heap of fallen stones, then a portion of moon- 
 lit churchyard, then the wide and convex sea behind. 
 It was a coup-iceil which had never been possible since 
 the mediaeval masons first attached the old tower to 
 the older church it dignified, and hence must be sup- 
 posed to have had an interest apart from that of simple 
 moonlight on ancient wall and sea and shore — any 
 374 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 mention of which has by this time, it is to be feared, 
 become one of the cuckoo-cries which are heard but 
 not regarded. Rays of crimson, blue, and purple shone 
 upon the twain from the east window behind them, 
 wherein saints and angels vied with each other in 
 primitive surroundings of landscape and sky, and threw 
 upon the pavement at the sitters' feet a softer repro- 
 duction of the same translucent hues, amid which the 
 shadows of the two living heads of Knight and Elfride 
 were opaque and prominent blots. Presently the moon 
 became covered by a cloud, and the iridescence died 
 away. 
 
 ' There, it is gone ! ' said Knight. ' I've been 
 thinking, Elfride, that this place we sit on is where 
 we may hope to kneel together soon. But I am restless 
 and uneasy, and you know why.' 
 
 Before she replied the moonlight returned again, 
 irradiating that portion of churchyard within their view. 
 It brightened the near part first, and against the back- 
 ground which the cloud-shadow had not yet uncovered 
 stood, brightest of all, a white tomb — the tomb of young 
 Jethway. 
 
 Knight, still alive on the subject of Elfride's secret, 
 thought of her words concerning the kiss^ — that it once 
 had occurred on a tomb in this churchyard. 
 
 ' Elfride,' he said, with a superficial archness which 
 did not half cover an undercurrent of reproach, 'do 
 you know, I think you might have told me voluntarily 
 about that past — of kisses and betrothing — without 
 giving me so much uneasiness and trouble. Was that 
 the tomb you alluded to as having sat on with him ? ' 
 
 She waited an instant. ' Yes,' she said. 
 
 The correctness of his random shot startled Knight ; 
 though, considering that almost all the other memorials 
 in the churchyard were upright headstones upon which 
 nobody could possibly sit, it was not so wonderful. 
 
 Elfride did not even now go on with the explanation 
 375 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 her exacting lover wished to have, and her reticence 
 began to irritate him as before. He was inclined to 
 read her a lecture. 
 
 'Why don't you tell me all?' he said somewhat 
 indignantly. ' Elfride, there is not a single subject 
 upon which I feel more strongly than upon this — 
 that everything ought to be cleared up between two 
 persons before they become husband and wife. See 
 how desirable and wise such a course is, in order to 
 avoid disagreeable contingencies in the form of dis- 
 coveries afterwards. For, Elfride, a secret of no im- 
 portance at all may be made the basis of some fatal 
 misunderstanding only because it is discovered, and 
 not confessed. They say there never was a couple of 
 whom one had not some secret the other never knew 
 or was intended to know. This may or may not be 
 true ; but if it be true, some have been happy in spite 
 rather than in consequence of it. If a man were to 
 see another man looking significantly at his wife, and 
 she were blushing crimson and appearing startled, do 
 you think he would be so well satisfied with, for 
 instance, her truthful explanation that once, to her 
 great annoyance, she accidentally fainted into his arms, 
 as if she had said it voluntarily long ago, before the 
 circumstance occurred which forced it from her ? Sup- 
 pose that admirer you spoke of in connection with the 
 tomb yonder should turn up, and bother me. It would 
 embitter our lives, if I were then half in the dark, as 
 I am now ! ' 
 
 Knight spoke the latter sentences with growing 
 force. 
 
 ' It cannot be,' she said. 
 
 ' Why not ? ' he asked sharply. 
 
 Elfride was distressed to find him in so stern a 
 mood, and she trembled. In a confusion of ideas, 
 probably not intending a wilful prevarication, she 
 answered hurriedly — 
 
 376 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 ' If he's dead, how can you meet him ? ' 
 
 • Is he dead ? Oh, that's different altogether ! ' said 
 Knight, immensely relieved. ' But, let me see — what 
 did you say about that tomb and him ? ' 
 
 ' That's his tomb,' she continued faintly. 
 
 ' What ! was he who lies buried there the man who 
 was your lover ? ' Knight asked in a distinct voice. 
 
 ' Yes ; and I didn't love him or encourage him.' 
 
 ' But you let him kiss you — you said so, you know, 
 Elfride.' 
 
 She made no reply. 
 
 ' Why,' said Knight, recollecting circumstances by 
 degrees, ' you surely said you were in some degree 
 engaged to him — and of course you were if he kissed 
 you. And now you say you never encouraged him. 
 And I have been fancying you said — I am almost sure 
 you did — that you were sitting with him on that tomb. 
 Good God ! ' he cried, suddenly starting up in anger, 
 ' are you telling me untruths ? Why should you play 
 with me like this ? I'll have the right of it. Elfride, 
 we shall never be happy ! There's a blight upon us, or 
 me, or you, and it must be cleared off before we marry.' 
 Knight moved away impetuously as if to leave her. 
 
 She jumped up and clutched his arm. 
 
 ' Don't go, Harry — don't ! 
 
 ' Tell me, then,' said Knight sternly. ' And re- 
 member this, no more fibs, or, upon my soul, I shall 
 hate you. Heavens ! that I should come to this, to be 
 made a fool of by a girl's untruths ' 
 
 ' Don't, don't treat me so cruelly ! O Harry, Harry, 
 have pity, and withdraw those dreadful words ! I am 
 truthful by nature — I am — and I don't know how I 
 came to make you misunderstand ! But I was 
 frightened ! " She quivered so in her perturbation that 
 she shook him with her. 
 
 ' Did you say you were sitting on that tomb ? ' he 
 asked moodily. 
 
 ==« 377 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 ' Yes ; and it was true.' 
 
 ' Then how, in the name of Heaven, can a man sit 
 upon his own tomb ? ' 
 
 ' That was another man. Forgive me, Harry, won't 
 you?' 
 
 ' What, a lover in the tomb and a lover on it ? ' 
 
 ' Oh— Oh— yes ! ' 
 
 • Then there were two before me ? ' 
 ' I — suppose so.' 
 
 ' Now, don't be a silly woman with your supposing 
 — I hate all that,' said Knight contemptuously almost. 
 ' Well, we learn strange things. I don't know what I 
 might have done — no man can say into what shape 
 circumstances may warp him — but I hardly think I 
 should have had the conscience to accept the favours 
 of a new lover whilst sitting over the poor remains of 
 the old one; upon my soul, I don't.' Knight, in 
 moody meditation, continued looking towards the tomb, 
 which stood staring them in the face like an avenging 
 ghost. 
 
 ' But you wrong me — Oh, so grievously ! " she cried. 
 ' I did not meditate any such thing : believe me, Harry, 
 I did not. It only happened so — quite of itself.' 
 
 ' Well, I suppose you didn't intend such a thing,' he 
 said. ' Nobody ever does,' he sadly continued. 
 
 ' And him in the grave I never ojice loved.' 
 
 • I suppose the second lover and you, as you sat 
 there, vowed to be faithful to each other for ever ? ' 
 
 Elfride only replied by quick heavy breaths, showing 
 she was on the brink of a sob. 
 
 'You don't choose to be anything but reserved, 
 then ? ' he said imperatively. 
 
 • Of course we did,' she responded. 
 
 « " Of course ! " You seem to treat the subject very 
 Ughtly?' 
 
 ' It is past, and is nothing to us now.' 
 •Elfride, it is a nothing which, though it may make 
 378 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 a careless man laugh, cannot but make a genuine one 
 grieve. It is a very gnawing pain. Tell me straight 
 through — all of it.' 
 
 ' Never. O Harry ! how can you expect it when so 
 little of it makes you so harsh with me ? ' 
 
 ' Now, Elfride, listen to this. You know that what 
 you have told only jars the subtler fancies in one, after 
 all. The feeling I have about it would be called, and 
 is, mere sentimentaHty ; and I don't want you to 
 suppose that an ordinary previous engagement of a 
 straightforward kind would make any practical difference 
 in my love, or my wish to make you my wife. But you 
 seem to have more to tell, and that's where the wrong 
 is. Is there more ? ' 
 
 ' Not much more,' she wearily answered. 
 
 Knight preserved a grave silence for a minute. 
 ' " Not much more," ' he said at last. ' I should think 
 not, indeed ! ' His voice assumed a low and steady 
 pitch. ' Elfride, you must not mind my saying a 
 strange-sounding thing, for say it I shall. It is this : 
 that if there were much more to add to an account 
 which already includes all the particulars that a broken 
 marriage engagement could possibly include with pro- 
 priety, it must be some exceptional thing which might 
 make it impossible for me or any one else to love you 
 and marry you ' 
 
 Knight's disturbed mood led him much further than 
 he would have gone in a quieter moment. And, even 
 as it was, had she been assertive to any degree he would 
 not have been so peremptory; and had she been a 
 stronger character — more practical and less imaginative — 
 she would have made more use of her position in his 
 heart to influence him. But the confiding tenderness 
 which had won him is ever accompanied by a sort of 
 self-committal to the stream of events, leading every 
 such woman to trust more to the kindness of fate for 
 good results thai} to any argument of her own.^ 
 379 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 ' Well, well,' he murmured cynically ; ' I won't say 
 it is your fault : it is my ill-luck, I suppose. I had no 
 real right to question you — everybody would say it was 
 presuming. But when we have misunderstood, we feel 
 injured by the subject of our misunderstanding. You 
 never said you had had nobody else here making love 
 to you, so why should I blame you ? Elfride, I beg 
 your pardon.' 
 
 ' No, no ! I would rather have your anger than 
 that cool aggrieved politeness. Do drop that, Harry! 
 Why should you inflict that upon me ? It reduces me 
 to the level of a mere acquaintance.' 
 
 'You do that with me. Why not confidence for 
 confidence ? ' 
 
 ' Yes ; but I didn't ask you a single question with 
 regard to your past : I didn't wish to know about it. 
 All I cared for was that, wherever you came from, what- 
 ever you had done, whoever you had loved, you were 
 mine at last. Harry, if originally you had known I had 
 loved, would you never have cared for me ? ' 
 
 ' I won't quite say that. Though I own that the 
 idea of your inexperienced state had a great charm for 
 me. But I think this : that if I had known there was 
 any phase of your past love you would refuse to reveal 
 if I asked to know it, I should never have loved you.' 
 
 Elfride sobbed bitterly. ' Am I such a — mere char- 
 acterless toy — as to have no attrac — tion in me, apart 
 from — freshness? Haven't I brains? You said — I 
 was clever and ingenious in my thoughts, and — isn't 
 that anything ? Have I not some beauty ? I think I 
 have a little — and I know I have — yes, I do ! You 
 have praised my voice, and my manner, and my accom- 
 plishments. Yet all these together are so much rubbish 
 because I — accidentally saw a man before you ! ' 
 
 ' Oh, come, Elfride. " Accidentally saw a man " is 
 very cool. You loved him, remember.' 
 
 — ' And loved him a little ! ' 
 380 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 ' And refuse now to answer the simple question how 
 it ended. Do you refuse still, Elfride ? ' 
 
 ' You have no right to question me so — you said so. 
 It is unfair. Trust me as I trust you.' 
 
 ' That's not at all.' 
 
 ' I shall not love you if you are so cruel. It is cruel 
 to me to argue like this.' 
 
 ' Perhaps it is. Yes, it is. I was carried away by 
 my feeling for you. Heaven knows that I didn't mean 
 to; but I have loved you so that I have used you 
 badly.' 
 
 ' I don't mind it, Harry ! ' she instantly answered, 
 creeping up and nestling against him ; ' and I will not 
 think at all that you used me harshly if you will forgive 
 me, and not be vexed with me any more ? I do wish I 
 had been exactly as you thought I was, but I could not 
 help it, you know. If I had only known you had 
 been coming, what a nunnery I would have lived in to 
 have been good enough for you ! ' 
 
 ' Well, never mind,' said Knight ; and he turned to 
 go. He endeavoured to speak sportively as they went 
 on. ' Diogenes Laertius says that philosophers used 
 voluntarily to deprive themselves of sight to be uninter- 
 rupted in their meditations. Men, becoming lovers, 
 ought to do the same thing.' 
 
 ' Why ? — but never mind — I don't want to know. 
 Don't speak laconically to me,' she said with depreca- 
 tion. 
 
 ' Why ? Because they would never then be dis- 
 tracted by discovering their idol was second-hand.' 
 
 She looked down and sighed; and they passed out 
 of the crumbling old place, and slowly crossed to the 
 churchyard entrance. Knight was not himself, and he 
 could not pretend to be. She had not told all. 
 
 He supported her lightly over the stile, and was 
 practically as attentive as a lover could be. But there 
 had passed away a glory, and the dream was not as 
 
 381 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 it had been of yore. Perhaps Knight was not shaped 
 by Nature for a marrying man. Perhaps his lifelong 
 constraint towards women, which he had attributed 
 to accident, was not chance after all, but the natural 
 result of instinctive acts so minute as to be undis- 
 cernible even by himself. Or whether the rough dis- 
 pelling of any bright illusion, however imaginative, 
 depreciates the real and unexaggerated brightness which 
 appertains to its basis, one cannot say. Certain it was 
 that Knight's disappointment at finding himself second 
 or third in the field, at Elfride's momentary equivoque, 
 and at her reluctance to be candid, brought him to the 
 verge of cynicism. 
 
XXXIII 
 
 ■O daughter of Babylon, wasted with misery.' 
 
 A HABIT of Knight's, when not immediately occupied 
 with Elfride — to walk by himself for half an hour or so 
 between dinner and bedtime — had become familiar to 
 his friends at Endelstow, Elfride herself among them. 
 When he had helped her over the stile, she said gently, 
 ' If you wish to take your usual turn on the hill, Harry, 
 I can run down to the house alone.' 
 
 ' Thank you, Elfie ; then I think I will.' 
 Her form diminished to blackness in the moonlight, 
 and Knight, after remaining upon the churchyard stile 
 a few minutes longer, turned back again towards the 
 building. His usual course was now to light a cigar or 
 pipe, and indulge in a quiet meditation. But to-night 
 his mind was too tense to bethink itself of such a solace. 
 He merely walked round to the site of the fallen tower, 
 and sat himself down upon some of the large stones 
 wjhich had composed it until this day, when the chain 
 of circumstance originated by Stephen Smith, while in 
 the employ of Mr. Hewby, the London man of art, had 
 brought about its overthrow. 
 
 Pondering on the possible episodes of Elfride's past 
 life, and on how he had supposed her to have had no 
 383 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 past justifying the name, he sat and regarded the white 
 tomb of young Jethway, now close in front of him. The 
 sea, though comparatively placid, could as usual be 
 heard from this point along the whole distance between 
 promontories to the right and left, floundering and 
 entangling itself among the insulated stacks of rock 
 which dotted the water's edge — the miserable skeletons 
 of tortured old cliffs that would not even yet succumb 
 to the wear and tear of the tides. 
 
 As a change from thoughts not of a very cheerful 
 kind, Knight attempted exertion. He stood up, and 
 prepared to ascend to the summit of the ruinous heap 
 of stones, from which a more extended outlook was 
 obtainable than from the ground. He stretched out 
 his arm to seize the projecting arris of a larger block 
 than ordinary, and so help himself up, when his hand 
 lighted plump upon a substance differing in the greatest 
 possible degree from what he had expected to seize — 
 hard stone. It was stringy and entangled, and trailed 
 upon the stone. The deep shadow from the aisle wall 
 prevented his seeing anything here distinctly, and he 
 began guessing as a necessity. ' It is a tressy species 
 of moss or lichen,' he said to himself. 
 
 But it lay loosely over the stone. 
 
 ' It is a tuft of grass,' he said. 
 
 But it lacked the roughness and humidity of the 
 finest grass. 
 
 ' It is a mason's whitewash-brush.' 
 
 Such brushes, he remembered, were more bristly; 
 and however much used in repairing a structure, would 
 not be required in pulling one down. 
 
 He said, ' It must be a thready silk fringe.' 
 
 He felt further in. It was somewhat warm. Knight 
 instantly felt somewhat cold. 
 
 To find the coldness of inanimate matter where you 
 expect warmth is startling enough; but a colder tempera- 
 ture than that of the body being rather the rule than 
 384 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 the exception in common substances, it hardly conveys 
 such a shock to the system as finding warmth where 
 utter frigidity is anticipated. 
 
 ' God only knows what it is,' he said. 
 
 He felt further, and in the course of a minute put 
 his hand upon a human head. The head was warm, 
 but motionless. The thready mass was the hair of the 
 head — long and straggling, showing that the head was 
 a woman's. 
 
 Knight in his perplexity stood still for a moment, 
 and collected his thoughts. The vicar's account of the 
 fall of the tower was that the workmen had been 
 undermining it all the day, and had left in the evening 
 intending to give the finishing stroke the next morning. 
 Half an hour after they had gone the undermined angle 
 came down. The woman who was half buried, as it 
 seemed, must have been beneath it at the moment of 
 the fall. 
 
 Knight leapt up and began endeavouring to remove 
 the rubbish with his hands. The heap overlying the 
 body was for the most part fine and dusty, but in 
 immense quantity. It would be a saving of time to 
 run for assistance. He crossed to the churchyard wall, 
 and hastened down the hill. 
 
 A little way down an intersecting road passed over 
 a small ridge, which now showed up darkly against the 
 moon, and this road here formed a kind of notch in 
 the sky-line. At the moment that Knight arrived at 
 the crossing he beheld a man on this eminence, com- 
 ing towards him. Knight turned aside and met the 
 stranger. 
 
 ' There has been an accident at the church,' said 
 Knight, without preface. ' The tower has fallen on 
 somebody, who has been lying there ever since. Will 
 you come and help ? ' 
 
 ' That I will,' said the man. 
 
 ' It is a woman,' said Knight, as they hurried back, 
 385 2 B 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 ' and I think we two are enough to extricate her. Do 
 you know of a shovel ? ' 
 
 ' The grave-digging shovels are about somewhere. 
 They used to stay in the tower.' 
 
 ' And there must be some belonging to the workmen.' 
 
 They searched about, and in an angle of the porch 
 found three carefully stowed away. Going round to 
 the west end Knight signified the spot of the tragedy. 
 
 ' We ought to have brought a lantern,' he exclaimed. 
 ' But we may be able to do without.' He set to work 
 removing the superincumbent mass. 
 
 The other man, who looked on somewhat helplessly 
 at first, now followed the example of Knight's activity, 
 and removed the larger stones which were mingled with 
 the rubbish. But with all their efforts it was quite ten 
 minutes before the body of the unfortunate creature 
 could be extricated. They lifted her as carefully as 
 they could, breathlessly carried her to Felix Jethwa/s 
 tomb, which was only a few steps westward, and laid 
 her thereon. 
 
 ' Is she dead indeed ? ' said the stranger. 
 
 ' She appears to be,' said Knight. ' Which is the 
 nearest house ? The vicarage, I suppose.' 
 
 ' Yes ; but since we shall have to call a surgeon from 
 Castle Boterel, I think it would be better to carry her 
 in that direction, instead of away from the town.' 
 
 ' And is it not much further to the first house we 
 come to going that way, than to the vicarage or to The 
 Crags ? ' 
 
 ' Not much,' the stranger replied. 
 
 ' Suppose we take her there, then. And I think the 
 best way to do it would be thus, if you don't mind 
 joining hands with me!' 
 
 ' Not in the least ; I am glad to assist.' 
 
 Making a kind of cradle, by clasping their hands 
 crosswise under the inanimate woman, they lifted her, 
 and walked on side by side down a path indicated by 
 386 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 the stranger, who appeared to know the locality 
 well. 
 
 ' I had been sitting in the church for nearly an 
 hour,' Knight resumed, when they were out of the 
 churchyard. • Afterwards I walked round to the site of 
 the fallen tower, and so found her. It is painful to 
 think I unconsciously wasted so much time in the very 
 presence of a perishing, flying soul.' 
 
 ' The tower fell at dusk, did it not ? quite two hours 
 ago, I think ? ' 
 
 ' Yes. She must have been there alone. What 
 could have been her object in visiting the church- 
 yard then ? 
 
 ' It is difficult to say.' The stranger looked inquir- 
 ingly into the reclining face of the motionless form they 
 bore. ' Would you turn her round for a moment, so 
 that the light shines on her face ? ' he said. 
 
 They turned her face to the moon, and the man 
 looked closer into her features. ' Why, I know her ! ' 
 he exclaimed. 
 
 ' Who is she ? ' 
 
 ' Mrs. Jethway. And the cottage we are taking her 
 to is her own. She is a widow ; and I was speaking 
 to her only this afternoon. I was at Castle Boterel 
 post-office, and she came there to post a letter. Poor 
 soul ! Let us hurry on.' 
 
 ' Hold my wrist a little tighter. Was not that tomb 
 we laid her on the tomb of her only son ? ' 
 
 ' Yes, it was. Yes, I see it now. She was there to 
 visit the tomb. Since the death of that son she has 
 been a desolate, desponding woman, always bewailing 
 him. She was a farmer's wife, very well educated — a 
 governess originally, I believe.' 
 
 Knight's heart was moved to sympathy. His own 
 fortunes seemed in some strange way to be interwoven 
 with those of this Jethway family, through the influ- 
 ence of Elfride over himself and the unfortunate son 
 
 387 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 of that house. He made no reply, and they still 
 walked on. 
 
 ' She begins to feel heavy,' said the stranger, breaking 
 the silence. 
 
 'Yes, she does,' said Knight; and after another 
 pause added, ' I think I have met you before, though 
 where I cannot recollect. May I ask who you are ? ' 
 
 ' Oh yes. I am Lord Luxellian. Who are you ? ' 
 
 ' I am a visitor at The Crags — Mr. Knight.' 
 
 ' I have heard of you, Mr. Knight.' 
 
 ' And I of you. Lord Luxellian. I am glad to meet 
 you.' 
 
 ' I may say the same. I am familiar with your name 
 in print.' 
 
 ' And I with yours. Is this the house ? ' 
 
 ' Yes.' 
 
 The door was locked. Knight, reflecting a moment, 
 searched the pocket of the lifeless woman, and found 
 therein a large key which, on being applied to the door, 
 opened it easily. The fire was out, but the moonlight 
 entered the quarried window, and made patterns upon 
 the floor. The rays enabled them to see that the room 
 into which they had entered was pretty well furnished, 
 it being the same room that Elfride had visited alone 
 two or three evenings earlier. They deposited their 
 still burden on an old-fashioned couch which stood 
 against the wall, and Knight searched about for a lamp 
 or candle. He found a candle on a shelf, lighted it, 
 and placed it on the table. 
 
 Both Knight and Lord LuxelUan examined the pale 
 countenance attentively, and both were nearly con- 
 vinced that there was no hope. No marks of violence 
 were visible in the casual examination they made. 
 
 ' I think that as I know where Doctor Granson 
 lives,' said Lord Luxellian, ' I had better run for him 
 whilst you stay here.' 
 
 Knight agreed to this. Lord Luxellian then went 
 388 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 off, and his hurrying footsteps died away. Knight 
 continued bending over the body, and a few minutes 
 longer of careful scrutiny perfectly satisfied him that 
 the woman was far beyond the reach of the lancet and 
 the drug. Her extremities were already beginning to 
 get stiff and cold. Knight covered her face, and 
 sat down. 
 
 The minutes went by. The essayist remained 
 musing on all the occurrences of the night. His eyes 
 were directed upon the table, and he had seen for some 
 time that writing-materials were spread upon it. He 
 now noticed these more particularly : there were an 
 inkstand, pen, blotting-book, and note-paper. Several 
 sheets of paper were thrust aside from the rest, upon 
 which letters had been begun and relinquished, as if 
 their form had not been satisfactory to the writer. 
 A stick of black sealing-wax and seal were there too, as 
 if the ordinary fastening had not been considered suffi- 
 ciently secure. The abandoned sheets of paper lying 
 as they did open upon the table, made it possible, as 
 he sat, to read the few words written on each. One 
 ran thus : 
 
 ' Sir, — As a woman who was once blest with a dear 
 son of her own, I implore you to accept a warning ' 
 
 Another : 
 
 ' Sir, — If you will deign to receive warning from a 
 stranger before it is too late to alter your course, listen 
 to ' 
 
 The third : 
 
 'Sir, — With this letter I enclose to you another 
 which, unaided by any explanation from me, tells a 
 starthng tale. I wish, however, to add a few words to 
 
 piake your delusion yet more clear to you ' 
 
 389 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 It was plain that, after these renounced beginnings, 
 a fourth letter had been written and despatched, which 
 had been deemed a proper one. Upon the table were 
 two drops of sealing-wax, the stick from which they 
 were taken having been laid down overhanging the edge 
 of the table ; the end of it drooped, showing that the 
 wax was placed there whilst warm. There was the 
 chair in which the writer had sat, the impression of the 
 letter's address upon the blotting-paper, and the poor 
 widow who had caused these results lying dead hard by. 
 Knight had seen enough to lead him to the conclusion 
 that Mrs. Jethway, having matter of great importance to 
 communicate to some friend or acquaintance, had written 
 him a very careful letter, and gone herself to post it ; 
 that she had not returned to the house from that time 
 of leaving it till Lord Luxellian and himself had brought 
 her back dead. 
 
 The unutterable melancholy of the whole scene, as 
 he waited on, silent and alone, did not altogether clash 
 with the mood of Knight, even though he was the 
 affianced of a fair and winning girl, and though so lately 
 he had been in her company. Whilst sitting on the 
 remains of the demolished tower he had defined a new 
 sensation ; that the lengthened course of inaction he 
 had lately been indulging in on Elfride's account might 
 probably not be good for him as a man who had work 
 to do. It could quickly be put an end to by hastening 
 on his marriage with her. 
 
 Knight, in his own opinion, was one who had missed 
 his mark by excessive aiming. Having now, to a great 
 extent, given up ideal ambitions, he wished earnestly to 
 direct his powers into a more practical channel, and 
 thus correct the introspective tendencies which had 
 never brought himself much happiness, or done his 
 fellow-creatures any great good. To make a start in 
 this new direction by marriage, which, since knowing 
 Elfride, had been so entrancing an idea, was less ex- 
 390 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 quisite to-night. That the curtailment of his illusion 
 regarding her had something to do with the reaction, 
 and with the return of his old sentiments on wasting 
 time, is more than probable. Though Knight's heart 
 had so greatly mastered him, the mastery was not so 
 complete as to be easily maintained in the face of a 
 moderate intellectual revival. 
 
 His reverie was broken by the sound of wheels, and 
 a horse's tramp. The door opened to admit the 
 surgeon, Lord Luxellian, and a Mr. Coole, coroner for 
 the division (who had been attending at Castle Boterel 
 that very day, and was having an after-dinner chat with 
 the doctor when Lord Luxellian arrived); next came 
 two female nurses and some idlers. 
 
 Mr. Granson, after a cursory examination, pro- 
 nounced the woman dead from suffocation, induced by 
 intense pressure on the respiratory organs ; and arrange- 
 ments were made that the inquiry should take place on 
 the following morning, before the return of the coroner 
 to St. Launce's. 
 
 Shortly afterwards the house of the widow was de- 
 serted by all its living occupants, and she abode in 
 death, as she had in her life during the past two years, 
 entirely alone. 
 
XXXIV 
 
 ' Yea, happy shall he be that rewardeth thee as thou hast served us.' 
 
 oIXTEEN hours had passed. Knight was entering 
 the ladies' boudoir at The Crags, upon his return 
 from attending the inquest touching the death of Mrs. 
 Jethway. Elfride was not in the apartment. 
 
 Mrs. Swancourt made a few inquiries concerning the 
 verdict and collateral circumstances. Then she said — 
 
 ' The postman came this morning the minute after 
 you left the house. There was only one letter for you, 
 and I have it here.' 
 
 She took a letter from the lid of her workbox, and 
 handed it to him. Knight took the missive abstractedly, 
 but struck by its appearance murmured a few words 
 and left the room. 
 
 The letter was fastened with a black seal, and the 
 handwriting in which it was addressed had lain under 
 his eyes, long and prominently, only the evening 
 beforq. 
 
 Knight was greatly agitated, and looked about for 
 a spot where he might be secure from interruption. 
 It was the season of heavy dews, which lay on the 
 herbage in shady places all the day long ; nevertheless, 
 he entered a small patch of neglected grass-plat enclosed 
 392 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 by the shrubbery, and there perused the letter, which 
 he had opened on his way thither. 
 
 The handwriting, the seal, the paper, the introductory 
 words, all had told on the instant that the letter had 
 come to him from the hands of the widow Jethway, now 
 dead and cold. He had instantly understood that the 
 unfinished notes which caught his eye yesternight were 
 intended for nobody but himself He had remembered 
 some of the words of Elfride in her sleep on the steamer, 
 that somebody was not to tell him of something, or it 
 would be her ruin — a circumstance hitherto deemed so 
 trivial and meaningless that he had well-nigh forgotten 
 it All these things infused into him an emotion intense 
 in power and supremely distressing in quality. The 
 paper in his hand quivered as he read : 
 
 ' The Valley, Endelstow. 
 
 ' Sir, — A woman who has not much in the world 
 to lose by any censure this act may bring upon her, 
 wishes to give you some hints concerning a lady you 
 love. If you will deign to accept a warning before it 
 is too late, you will notice what your correspondent 
 has to say. 
 
 ' You are deceived. Can such a woman as this be 
 worthy ? 
 
 ' One who encouraged an honest youth to love her, 
 then slighted him, so that he died. 
 
 ' One who next took a man of no birth as a lover, 
 who was forbidden the house by her father. 
 
 ' One who secretly left her home to be married to 
 that man, met him, and went with him to London. 
 
 ' One who, for some reason or other, returned again 
 unmarried. 
 
 ' One who, in her after-correspondence with him, 
 went so far as to address him as her husband. 
 
 ' One who wrote the enclosed letter to ask me, who 
 393 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 better than anybody else knows the story, to keep the 
 scandal a secret. 
 
 ' I hope soon to be beyond the reach of either blame 
 or praise. But before removing me God has put it in 
 my power to avenge the death of my son. 
 
 'Gertrude Jethway.' 
 
 The letter enclosed was the note in pencil that 
 Elfride had written in Mrs. Jethway's cottage : 
 
 ' Dear Mrs. Jethway, — I have been to visit you. 
 I wanted much to see you, but I cannot wait any 
 longer. I came to beg you not to execute the threats 
 you have repeated to me. Do not, I beseech you, Mrs. 
 Jethway, let any one know I ran away from home ! It 
 would ruin me with him, and break my heart. I will 
 do anything for you, if you will be kind to me. In 
 the name of our common womanhood, do not, I implore 
 you, make a scandal of me. — Yours, 
 
 'E. Swancourt.' 
 
 Knight turned his head wearily towards the house. 
 The ground rose rapidly on nearing the shrubbery in 
 which he stood, raising it almost to a level with the 
 first floor of The Crags. Elfride's dressing-room lay in 
 the salient angle in this direction, and it was lighted by 
 two windows in such a position that, from Knight's 
 standing-place, his sight passed through both windows, 
 and raked the room. Elfride was there; she was 
 pausing between the two windows, looking at her figure 
 in the cheval-glass. She regarded herself long and 
 attentively in front; turned, flung back her head, and 
 observed the reflection over her shoulder. 
 
 Nobody can predicate as to her object or fancy ; she 
 may have done the deed in the very abstraction of deep 
 sadness. She may have been moaning from the bottom 
 of her heart, ' How unhappy am I ! ' But the im- 
 pression produced on Knight was not a good one. He 
 394 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 dropped his eyes moodily. The dead woman's letter 
 had a virtue in the accident of its juncture far beyond 
 any it intrinsically exhibited. Circumstance lent to 
 evil words a ring of pitiless justice echoing from the 
 grave. Knight could not endure their possession. He 
 tore the letter into fragments. 
 
 He heard a brushing among the bushes behind, and 
 turning his head he saw Elfride following him. The 
 fair girl looked in his face with a wistful smile of hope, 
 too forcedly hopeful to displace the firmly established 
 dread beneath it. His severe words of the previous 
 night still sat heavy upon her. 
 
 ' I saw you from my window, Harry,' she said timidly. 
 
 • The dew will make your feet wet,' he observed, as 
 one deaf. 
 
 ' I don't mind it.' 
 
 ' There is danger in getting wet feet.' 
 
 ' Yes . . . Harry, what is the matter ? ' 
 
 ' Oh, nothing. Shall I resume the serious conversa- 
 tion I had with you last night? No, perhaps not; 
 perhaps I had better not.' 
 
 ' Oh, I cannot tell ! How wretched it all is ! Ah, 
 I wish you were your own dear self again, and had 
 kissed me when I came up ! Why didn't you ask me 
 for one ? why don't you now ? ' 
 
 ' Too free in manner by half,' he heard murmur the 
 voice within him. 
 
 ' It was that hateful conversation last night,' she 
 went on. ' Oh, those words ! Last night was a black 
 night for me.' 
 
 ' Kiss ! — I hate that word ! Don't talk of kissing, 
 for God's sake ! I should think you might with advan- 
 tage have shown tact enough to keep back that word 
 " kiss," considering those you have accepted.' 
 
 She became very pale, and a rigid and desolate 
 charactery took possession of her face. That face was 
 SO delicate and tender in appearance now, that on§ 
 395 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 could fancy the pressure of a finger upon it would 
 cause a livid spot. 
 
 Knight walked on, and Elfride with him, silent and 
 unopposing. He opened a gate, and they entered a 
 path across a stubble-field. 
 
 ' Perhaps I intrude upon you ? ' she said as he 
 closed the gate. ' Shall I go away ? ' 
 
 ' No. Listen to me, Elfride.' Knight's voice was 
 low and unequal. ' I have been honest with you : will 
 you be so with me ? If any — strange — connection has 
 existed between yourself and a predecessor of mine, tell 
 it now. It is better that I know it now, even though 
 the knowledge should part us, than that I should 
 discover it in time to come. And suspicions have 
 been awakened in me. I think I will not say how, be- 
 cause I despise the means. A discovery of any mystery 
 of your past w^ould embitter our lives.' 
 
 Knight waited with a slow manner of calmness. 
 His eyes were sad and imperative. They went farther 
 along the path. 
 
 ' Will you forgive me if I tell you all ? ' she ex- 
 claimed entreatingly. 
 
 ' I can't promise ; so much depends upon what you 
 have to tell.' 
 
 Elfride could not endure the silence which followed. 
 ' Are you not going to love me ? ' she burst out. 
 ' Harry, Harry, love me, and speak as usual ! Do ; I 
 beseech you, Harry ! ' 
 
 ' Are you going to act fairly by me ? ' said Knight, 
 with rising anger; 'or are you not? What have I 
 done to you that I should be put off like this ? Be 
 caught like a bird in a springe ; everything intended to 
 be hidden from me ! Why is it, Elfride ? That's what 
 I ask you.' 
 
 In their agitation they had left the path, and were 
 wandering among the wet and obstructive stubble, with, 
 gijt l^nowing or heeding it. 
 
 396 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 ' What have / done ? ' she faltered. 
 
 ' What ? How can you ask what, when you know 
 so well ? You know that I have designedly been kept 
 in ignorance of something attaching to you, which, had 
 I known of it, might have altered all my conduct ; and 
 yet you say, what ? ' 
 
 She drooped visibly, and made no answer. 
 
 ' Not that I believe in malicious letter-writers and 
 whisperers ; not I. I don't know whether I do or don't : 
 upon my soul, I can't tell. I know this : a rehgion 
 was building itself upon you in my heart. I looked 
 into your eyes, and thought I saw there truth and 
 innocence as pure and perfect as ever embodied by 
 God in the flesh of woman. Perfect truth is too much 
 to expect, but ordinary truth I will have or nothing at 
 all. Just say, then ; is the matter you keep back of the 
 gravest importance, or is it not ? ' 
 
 ' I don't understand all your meaning. If I have 
 hidden anything from you, it has been because I loved 
 you so, and I feared — feared — to lose you.' 
 
 ' Since you are not given to confidence, I want to ask 
 you some plain questions. Have I your permission? ' 
 
 ' Yes,' she said, and there came over her face a 
 weary resignation. ' Say the harshest words you can ; I 
 will bear them ! ' 
 
 ' There is a scandal in the air concerning you, 
 Elfride ; and I cannot even combat it without knowing 
 definitely what it is. It may not refer to you entirely, 
 or even at all.' Knight trifled in the very bitterness of 
 his feeling. ' In the time of the French Revolution, 
 Pariseau, a ballet-master, was beheaded by mistake for 
 Parisot, a captain of the King's Guard. I wish there 
 was another " E. Swancourt " in the neighbourhood. 
 Look at this.' 
 
 He handed her the letter she had written and left 
 on the table at Mrs. Jethway's. She looked over it 
 vacantly. 
 
 397 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 ' It is not so much as it seems ! ' she pleaded. ' It 
 seems wickedly deceptive to look at now, but it had a 
 much more natural origin than you think. My sole 
 wish was not to endanger our love. O Harry ! that 
 was all my idea. It was not much harm.' 
 
 ' Yes, yes ; but independently of the poor miser- 
 able creature's remarks, it seems to imply — something 
 wrong.' 
 
 ' What remarks ? ' 
 
 ' Those she wrote me — now torn to pieces. Elfride, 
 did you run away with a man you loved ? — that was the 
 damnable statement. Has such an accusatipn life in it 
 — really, truly, Elfride ? ' 
 
 ' Yes,' she whispered. 
 
 Knight's countenance sank. ' To be married tp 
 him ? ' came huskily from his lips. 
 
 ' Yes. Oh, forgive me ! I had never seen you, 
 Harry.' 
 
 ' To London ? ' 
 
 ' Yes ; but I ' 
 
 ' Answer my questions ; say nothing else, Elfride 
 Did you ever deliberately try to marry him in secret ? ' 
 
 ' No ; not deliberately.' 
 
 ' But did you do it ? ' 
 
 A feeble red passed over her face. 
 
 ' Yes,' she said. 
 
 ' And after that — did you — write to him as your hus- 
 band ; and did he address you as his wife ? ' 
 
 ' Listen, listen ! It was ' 
 
 ' Do answer me ; only answer me ! ' 
 
 ' Then, yes, we did.' Her lips shook ; but it was 
 with some little dignity that she continued : ' I would 
 gladly have told you ; for I knew and know I had done 
 wrong. But I dared not ; I loved you too well. Oh, 
 so well ! You have been everything in the world to me 
 — and you are now. Will you not forgive me ? ' 
 
 It is a melancholy thought, that men who at first 
 398 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 will not allow the verdict of perfection they pronounce 
 upon their sweethearts or wives to be disturbed by 
 God's own testimony to the contrary, will, once suspect- 
 ing their purity, morally hang them upon evidence they 
 would be ashamed to admit in judging a dog. 
 
 The reluctance to tell, which arose from Elfride's 
 simplicity in thinking herself so much more culpable 
 than she really was, had been doing fatal work in 
 Knight's mind. The man of many ideas, now that his 
 first dream of impossible things was over, vibrated too 
 far in the contrary direction ; and her every movement 
 of feature— every tremor — every confused word — was 
 taken as so much proof of her unworthiness. 
 
 ' Elfride, we must bid good-bye to compliment,' said 
 Knight : ' we must do without pohteness now. Look 
 in my face, and as you believe in God above, tell me 
 truly one thing more. Were you away alone with him?' 
 
 ' Yes.' 
 
 ' Did you return home the same day on which you 
 left it ? ' 
 
 'No.' 
 
 The word fell hke a bolt, and the very land and sky 
 seemed to suffer. Knight turned aside. Meantime 
 Elfride's countenance wore a look indicating utter 
 despair of being able to explain matters so that they 
 would seem no more than they really were, — a despair 
 which not only relinquishes the hope of direct expla- 
 nation, but wearily gives up all collateral chances of 
 extenuation. 
 
 The scene was engraved for years on the retina of 
 Knight's eye : the dead and brown stubble, the weeds 
 among it, the distant belt of beeches shutting out the 
 view of the house, the leaves of which were now red and 
 sick to death. 
 
 'You must forget me,' he said. 'We shall not 
 marry, Elfride.' 
 
 How much anguish passed into her soul at those 
 
 399 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 words from him was told by the look of supreme torture 
 she wore. 
 
 ' What meaning have you, Harry ? You only say 
 so, do you ? ' 
 
 She looked doubtingly up at him, and tried to laugh, 
 as if the unreality of his words must be unquestionable. 
 
 ' You are not in earnest, I know — I hope you are 
 not ? Surely I belong to you, and you are going to 
 keep me for yours ? ' 
 
 ' Elfride, I have been speaking too roughly to you ; 
 I have said what I ought only to have thought. I like 
 you ; and let me give you a word of advice. Marry 
 your man as soon as you can. However weary of each 
 other you may feel, you belong to each other, and I am 
 not going to step between you. Do you think I would 
 — do you think I could for a moment ? If you cannot 
 marry him now, and another makes you his wife, do not 
 reveal this secret to him after marriage, if you do not 
 before. Honesty would be damnation then.' 
 
 Bewildered by his expressions, she exclaimed — 
 
 ' No, no ; I will not be a wife unless I am yours ; 
 and I must be yours ! ' 
 
 ' If we had married ' 
 
 ' But you don't mean — that — that — you will go away 
 and leave me, and not be anything more to me — oh, 
 you don't ! ' 
 
 Convulsive sobs took all nerve out of her utter- 
 ance. She checked them, and continued to look in his 
 face for the ray of hope that was not to be found there. 
 
 ' I am going indoors,' said Knight. ' You will not 
 follow me, Elfride ; I wish you not to.' 
 
 ' Oh no ; indeed, I will not.' 
 
 ' And then I am going to Castle Boterel. Good-bye.' 
 
 He spoke the farewell as if it were but for the day 
 
 — lightly, as he had spoken such temporary farewells 
 
 many times before — and she seemed to understand it 
 
 as such. Knight had not the power to tell her plainly 
 
 400 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 that he was going for ever ; he hardly knew for certain 
 that he was : whether he should rush back again upon 
 the current of an irresistible emotion, or whether he 
 could sufficiently conquer himself, and her in him, to 
 establish that parting as a supreme farewell, and present 
 himself to the world again as no woman's. 
 
 Ten minutes later he had left the house, leaving 
 directions that if he did not return in the evening his 
 luggage was to be sent to his chambers in London, 
 whence he intended to write to Mr. Swancourt as to the 
 reasons of his sudden departure. He descended the 
 valley, and could not forbear turning his head. He saw 
 the stubble-field, and a slight girlish figure in the midst 
 of it — up against the sky. Elfride, docile as ever, had 
 hardly moved a step, for he had said, Remain. He 
 looked and saw her again — he saw her for weeks and 
 months. He withdrew his eyes from the scene, swept 
 his hand across them, as if to brush away the sight, 
 breathed a low groan, and went on. 
 
XXXV 
 
 ' And wilt thou leave me thus ? — say nay — say nay I ' 
 
 i HE scene shifts to Knight's chambers in Bede's Inn. 
 It was late in the evening of the day following his 
 departure from Endelstow. A drizzling rain descended 
 upon London, forming a humid and dreary halo over 
 every well-lighted street. The rain had not yet been 
 prevalent long enough to give to rapid vehicles that 
 clear and distinct rattle which follows the thorough 
 washing of the stones by a drenching rain, but was 
 just sufficient to make footway and roadway slippery, 
 adhesive, and clogging to both feet and wheels. 
 
 Knight was standing by the fire, looking into its 
 expiring embers, previously to emerging from his door 
 for a dreary journey home to Richmond. His hat was 
 on, and the gas turned off. The blind of the window 
 overlooking the alley was not drawn down ; and with 
 the light from beneath, which shone over the ceiling 
 of the room, came, in place of the usual babble, only 
 the reduced clatter and quick speech which were the 
 result of necessity rather than choice. 
 
 Whilst he thus stood, waiting for the expiration 
 of the few minutes that were wanting to the time for 
 his catching the train, a light tapping upon the door 
 402 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 mingled with the other sounds that reached his ears. 
 It was so faint at first that the outer noises were almost 
 sufficient to drown it. Finding it repeated Knight 
 crossed the lobby, crowded with books and rubbish, 
 and opened the door. 
 
 A woman, closely muffled up, but visibly of fragile 
 build, was standing on the landing under the gaslight. 
 She sprang forward, flung her arms round Knight's 
 neck, and uttered a low cry — 
 
 ' O Harry, Harry, you are killing me ! I could not 
 help coming. Don't send me away — don't ! Forgive 
 your Elfride for coming — I love you so ! ' 
 
 Knight's agitation and astonishment mastered him 
 for a few moments. 
 
 ' Elfride ! ' he cried, ' what does this mean ? What 
 have you done ? ' 
 
 ' Do not hurt me and punish me — Oh, do not ! 
 I couldn't help coming; it was killing me. Last 
 night, when you did not come back, I could not bear 
 it — I could not ! Only let me be with you, and see 
 your face, Harry ; I don't ask for more.' 
 
 Her eyelids were hot, heavy, and thick with excessive 
 weeping, and the delicate rose-red of her cheeks was 
 disfigured and inflamed by the constant chafing of the 
 handkerchief in wiping her many tears. 
 
 ' Who is with you ? Have you come alone ? ' he 
 hurriedly inquired. 
 
 ' Yes. When you did not come last night, I sat up 
 hoping you would come — and the night was all agony 
 — and I waited on and on, and you did not come ! 
 Then when it was morning, and your letter said you 
 were gone, I could not endure it ; and I ran away from 
 them to St. Launce's, and came by the train. And 
 I have been all day travelling to you, and you won't 
 make me go away again, will you, Harry, because I 
 shall always love you till I die ? ' 
 
 ' Yet it is wrong for you to stay. O Elfride ! what 
 403 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 have you committed yourself to ? It is ruin to your good 
 name to run to me like this ! Has not your first expe- 
 rience been sufficient to keep you from these things ? ' 
 
 ' My name ! Harry, I shall soon die, and what 
 good will my name be to me then ? Oh, could / but 
 be the man and you the woman, I would not leave you 
 for such a little fault as mine ! Do not think it was 
 so vile a thing in me to run away with him. Ah, how 
 I wish you could have run away with twenty women 
 before you knew me, that I might show you I would 
 think it no fault, but be glad to get you after them all, 
 so that I had you ! If you only knew me through and 
 through, how true I am, Harry. Cannot I be yours ? 
 Say you love me just the same, and don't let me be 
 separated from you again, will you ? I cannot bear 
 it — all the long hours and days and nights going on, 
 and you not there, but away because you hate me ! ' 
 
 ' Not hate you, Elfride,' he said gently, and supported 
 her with his arm. ' But you cannot stay here now — 
 just at present, I mean.' 
 
 ' I suppose I must not — I wish I might. I am 
 afraid that if — ^you lose sight of me — something dark 
 will happen, and we shall not meet again. Harry, if I 
 am not good enough to be your wife, I wish I could be 
 your servant and live with you, and not be sent away 
 never to see you again. I don't mind what it is except 
 that ! ' 
 
 ' No, I cannot send you away : I cannot. God 
 knows what dark future may arise out of this evening's 
 work ; but I cannot send you away ! You must sit 
 down, and I will endeavour to collect my thoughts and 
 see what had better be done.' 
 
 At that moment a loud knocking at the house door 
 was heard by both, accompanied by a hurried ringing of 
 the bell that echoed from attic to basement. The door 
 was quickly opened, and after a few hasty words of con- 
 verse in the hall, heavy footsteps ascended the stairs. 
 404 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 The face of Mr. Swancourt, flushed, grieved, and 
 stern, appeared round the landing of the staircase. He 
 came higher up, and stood beside them. Glancing over 
 and past Knight with silent indignation, he turned to 
 the trembling girl. 
 
 ' O Elfride ! and have I found you at last ? Are 
 these your tricks, madam ? When will you get rid of 
 your idiocies, and conduct yourself like a decent woman ? 
 Is my family name and house to be disgraced by acts 
 that would be a scandal to a washerwoman's daughter ? 
 Come along, madam ; come ! ' 
 
 ' She is so weary ! ' said Knight, in a voice of 
 intensest anguish. ' Mr. Swancourt, don't be harsh 
 with her — let me beg of you to be tender with her, and 
 love her 1 ' 
 
 ' To you, sir,' said Mr. Swancourt, turning to him as 
 if by the sheer pressure of circumstances, ' I have little 
 to say. I can only remark, that the sooner I can retire 
 from your presence the better I shall be pleased. Why 
 you could not conduct your courtship of my daughter 
 like an honest man, I do not know. Why she — a. 
 foolish inexperienced girl — should have been tempted 
 to this piece of folly, I do not know. Even if she had. 
 not known better than to leave her home, you might; 
 have, I should think.' 
 
 ' It is not his fault : he did not tempt me, papa ! I 
 came.' 
 
 ' If you wished the marriage broken off, why didn't 
 you say so plainly? If you never intended to marry, 
 why could you not leave her alone? Upon my soul, 
 it grates me to the heart to be obliged to think so ill of 
 a man I thought my friend ! ' 
 
 Knight, soul-sick and weary of his life, did not 
 arouse himself to utter a word in reply. How should 
 he defend himself when his defence was the accusation 
 of Elfride ? On that account he felt a miserable satis- 
 faction in letting her father go oni thinking and speaking 
 404 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 wrongfully. It was a faint ray of pleasure straying into 
 the great gloominess of his brain to think that the vicar 
 might never know but that he, as her lover, tempted her 
 away, which seemed to be the form Mr. Swancourt's 
 misapprehension had taken. 
 
 ' Now, are you coming ? ' said Mr. Swancourt to her 
 again. He took her unresisting hand, drew it within 
 his arm, and led her down the stairs. Knight's eyes 
 followed her, the last moment begetting in him a frantic 
 hope that she would turn her head. She passed on, 
 and never looked back. 
 
 He heard the door open — close again. The wheels 
 of a cab grazed the kerbstone, a murmured direction 
 followed. The door was slammed together, the wheels 
 moved, and they rolled away. 
 
 From that hour of her reappearance a dreadful 
 conflict raged within the breast of Henry Knight. His 
 instinct, emotion, affectiveness — or whatever it may be 
 called — urged him to stand forward, seize upon Elfride, 
 and be her cherisher and protector through life. Then 
 came the devastating thought that Elfride's childlike, 
 unreasoning, and indiscreet act in flying to him only 
 proved that the proprieties must be a dead letter with 
 her; that the unreserve, which was really artlessness 
 without ballast, meant indifference to decorum; and 
 what so likely as that such a woman had been deceived 
 in the past? He said to himself, in a mood of the 
 bitterest cynicism : ' The suspicious discreet woman who 
 imagines dark and evil things of all her fellow-creatures 
 is far too shrewd to be deluded by man : trusting beings 
 like Elfride are the women who fall.' 
 
 Hours and days went by, and Knight remained 
 inactive. Lengthening time, which made fainter the 
 heart-awakening power of her presence, strengthened 
 the mental ability to reason her down. Elfride loved 
 him, hQ knew, and he could not leave off loving her; 
 40^ 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 but marry her he would not. If she could but be again 
 his own Elfride — the woman she had seemed to be — 
 but that woman was dead and buried, and he knew 
 her no more ! And how could he marry this Elfride, 
 one who, if he had originally seen her as she was, would 
 have been barely an interesting pitiable acquaintance in 
 his eyes — no more ? 
 
 It cankered his heart to think he was confronted by 
 the closest instance of a worse state of things than any 
 he had assumed in the pleasant social philosophy and 
 satire of his essays. 
 
 The moral Tightness of this man's life was worthy 
 of all praise ; but in spite of some intellectual acumen. 
 Knight had in him a modicum of that wrongheadedness 
 which is mostly found in scrupulously honest people. 
 With him, truth seemed too clean and pure an ab- 
 straction to be so hopelessly churned in with error as 
 practical persons find it. Having now seen himself 
 mistaken in supposing Elfride to be peerless, nothing 
 on earth could make him believe she was not so very 
 bad after all. 
 
 He lingered in town a fortnight, doing little else 
 than vibrate between passion and opinions. One idea 
 remained intact — that it was better Elfride and himself 
 should not meet. 
 
 AVhen he surveyed the volutnes on his shelves — 
 few of which had been opened since Elfride first took 
 possession of his heart — their untouched and orderly 
 arrangement reproached him as an apostate from the 
 old faith of his youth and early manhood. He had 
 deserted those never-failing friends, so they seemed to 
 say, for an unstable delight in a ductile woman, which 
 had ended all in bitterness. The spirit of self-denial, 
 verging on asceticism, which had ever animated Knight 
 in old times, announced itself as having departed 
 with the birth of love, with it having gone the self- 
 respect which had compensated for the lack of self- 
 407 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 gratification. Poor little Elfride, instead of holding, as 
 formerly, a place in his religion, began to assume the 
 hue of a temptation. Perhaps it was human and cor- 
 rectly natural that Knight never once thought whether 
 he did not owe her a little sacrifice for her unchary devo- 
 tion in saving his life. 
 
 With a consciousness of having thus, like Antony, 
 kissed away kingdoms and provinces, he next considered 
 how he had revealed his higher secrets and intentions 
 to her, an unreserve he would never have allowed 
 himself with any man living. How was it that he had 
 not been able to refrain from telling her of adumbra- 
 tions heretofore locked in the closest strongholds of 
 his mind? 
 
 Knight's was a robust intellect, which could escape 
 outside the atmosphere of heart, and perceive that his 
 own love, as well as other people's^ could be reduced 
 by change of scene and circumstances. At the same 
 time the perception was a superimposed sorrow : 
 
 ' O last regret, regret can die ! ' 
 
 But being convinced that the death of this regret was 
 the best thing for him, he did not long shrink from 
 attempting it. He closed his chambers, suspended his 
 connection with editors, and left London for the Conti- 
 nent. Here we will leave him to wander without purpose, 
 beyond the nominal one of encouraging obliviousness 
 of Elfride. 
 
XXXVI 
 
 ' The pennie's the jewel that beautifies a'.' 
 
 1 CAN'T think what's coming to these St. Launce's 
 people at all at all.' 
 
 ' With their " How-d'ye-do's,' do you mean ? " 
 
 ' Ay, with their " How-d'ye-do's," and shaking of 
 hands, asking me in, and tender inquiries for you, 
 John.' 
 
 These words formed part of a conversation between 
 John Smith and his wife on a Saturday evening in 
 the spring which followed Knight's departure from 
 England. Stephen had long since returned to India; 
 and the persevering couple themselves had migrated 
 from Lord Luxellian's park at Endelstow to a comfort- 
 able roadside dwelling about a mile out of St. Launce's, 
 where John had opened a small stone and slate yard 
 in his own name. 
 
 ■When we came here six months ago,' continued 
 Mrs. Smith, • though I had paid ready money so many 
 years in the town, my friskier shopkeepers would only 
 speak over the counter. Meet 'em in the street half-an- 
 hour after, and they'd treat me with staring ignorance 
 of my face.' 
 
 ' Look through ye as through a glass winder ? ' 
 
 2 D 409 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 ' Yes, the brazen ones would. The quiet and cool 
 ones would glance over the top of my head, past my 
 side, over my shoulder, but never meet my eye. The 
 gentle-modest would turn their faces south if I were 
 coming east, flit down a passage if I were about to 
 halve the pavement with them. There was the spruce 
 young bookseller would play the same tricks; the 
 butcher's daughters; the upholsterer's young men. 
 Hand in glove when doing business out of sight with 
 you ; but caring nothing for a' old woman when plajdng 
 the genteel away from all signs of their trade.' 
 
 ' True enough, Maria.' 
 
 ' Well, to-day 'tis all different. I'd no sooner got to 
 market than Mrs. Joakes rushed up to me in the eyes 
 of the town and said, " My dear Mrs. Smith, now you 
 must be tired with your walk ! Come in and have 
 some lunch ! I insist upon it ; knowing you so many 
 years as I have ! Don't you remember when we used 
 to. go looking for owls' feathers together in the Castle 
 ruins ? " There's no knowing what you may need, so I 
 answered the woman civilly. I hadn't got to the corner 
 before that thriving young lawyer. Sweet, who's quite 
 the dandy, ran after me out of breath. " Mrs. Smith," 
 he says, " excuse my rudeness, but there's a bramble on 
 the tail of your dress, which you've dragged in from the 
 country; allow me to pull it off for you." If you'll 
 believe me, this was in the very front of the Town Hall. 
 What's the meaning of such sudden love for a' old 
 woman ? ' 
 
 ' Can't say ; unless 'tis repentance.' 
 
 ' Repentance ! was there ever such a fool as you, 
 John ? Did anybody ever repent with money in's pocket 
 and fifty years to live ? ' 
 
 'Now, I've been thinking too,' said John, passing 
 
 over the query as hardly pertinent, • that I've had more 
 
 loving-kindness from folks to-day than I ever have 
 
 before 'since we moved here. Why, old Alderman Tope 
 
 410 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 walked out to the middle of the street where I was, to 
 shake hands with me — so 'a did. Having on my 
 working clothes, I thought 'twas odd. Ay, and there 
 was young Werrington.' 
 
 ' Who's he ? ' 
 
 ' Why, the man in Hill Street, who plays and sells 
 flutes, trumpets, and fiddles, and grand pehanners. 
 He was talking to Egloskerry, that very small bachelor- 
 man with money in the funds. I was going by, I'm 
 sure, without thinking or expecting a nod from men of 
 that glib kidney when in my working clothes ' 
 
 ' You always will go poking into town in your 
 working clothes. Beg you to change how I will, 'tis 
 no use.' 
 
 ' Well, however, I was in my working clothes. 
 Werrington saw me. " Ah, Mr. Smith ! a fine morning ; 
 excellent weather for building," says he, out as loud and 
 friendly as if I'd met him in some deep hollow, where 
 he could get nobody else to speak to at all. 'Twas 
 odd : for Werrington is one of the very ringleaders of 
 the fast class.' 
 
 At that moment a tap came to the door. The door 
 was immediately opened by Mrs. Smith in person. 
 
 'You'll excuse us, I'm sure, Mrs. Smith, but this 
 beautiful spring weather was too much for us. Yes, 
 and we could stay in no longer; and I took Mrs. 
 Trewen upon my arm directly we'd had a cup of tea, 
 and out we came. And seeing your beautiful crocuses 
 in such a bloom, we've taken the liberty to enter. We'll 
 step round the garden, if you don't mind.' 
 
 ' Not at all,' said Mrs. Smith ; and they walked 
 round the garden. She lifted her hands in amazement 
 directly their backs were turned. ' Goodness send us 
 grace ! ' 
 
 ' Who be they ? ' said her husband. 
 
 'Actually Mr. Trewen, the bank-manager, and his 
 wife.' 
 
 411 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 John Smith, staggered in mind, went out of doors 
 and looked over the garden gate, to collect his ideas. 
 He had not been there two minutes when wheels were 
 heard, and a carriage and pair rolled along the road. 
 A distinguished-looking lady, with the demeanour of a 
 duchess, reclined within. When opposite Smith's gate 
 she turned her head, and instantly commanded the 
 coachman to stop. 
 
 ' Ah, Mr. Smith, I am glad to see you looking so 
 well. I could not help stopping a moment to congratu- 
 late you and Mrs. Smith upon the happiness you must 
 enjoy. Joseph, you may drive on.' 
 
 And the carriage rolled away towards St. Launce's. 
 
 Out rushed Mrs. Smith from behind a laurel-bush, 
 where she had stood pondering. ^ 
 
 ' Just going to touch my hat to her,' said John ; 
 'just for all the world as I would have to poor Lady 
 Luxellian years ago.' 
 
 ' Lord ! who is she ? ' 
 
 ' The public-house woman — what's her name ? Mrs. 
 — Mrs. — at the Falcon.' 
 
 ' Public-house woman. The clumsiness of the Smith 
 family! You might say the landlady of the Falcon 
 Hotel, since we are in for politeness. The people are 
 ridiculous enough, but give them their due.' 
 
 The possibility is that Mrs. Smith was getting molli- 
 fied, in spite of herself, by these remarkably friendly 
 phenomena among the people of St. Launce's. And 
 in justice to them it was quite desirable that she should 
 do so. The interest which the unpractised ones of 
 this town expressed so grotesquely was genuine of 
 its kind, and equal in intrinsic worth to the more 
 polished smiles of larger communities. 
 
 By this time Mr. and Mrs. Trewen were returning 
 from the garden. 
 
 'I'll ask 'em flat,' whispered John to his wife. 
 ' I'll say, " We be in a fog — you'll excuse my asking a 
 412 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 question, Mr. and Mrs. Trewen. How is it you all be 
 so friendly to-day ? " Hey ? 'Twould sound right and 
 sensible, wouldn't it ? ' 
 
 ' Not a word ! Good mercy, when will the man 
 have manners ! ' 
 
 ' It must be a proud moment for you, I am sure, 
 Mr. and Mrs. Smith, to have a son so celebrated,' said 
 the bank-manager advancing. 
 
 ' Ah, 'tis Stephen — I knew it ! ' said Mrs. Smith 
 triumphantly to herself. 
 
 ' We don't know particulars,' said John. 
 
 ' Not know ! ' 
 
 'No.' 
 
 ' Why, 'tis all over town. Our worthy Mayor 
 alluded to it in a speech at the dinner last night of 
 the Every-Man-his-own-Maker Club.' 
 
 ' And what about Stephen ? ' urged Mrs. Smith. 
 
 ' Why, your son has been feted by deputy-governors 
 and Parsee princes and nobody-knows-who in India ; 
 is hand in glove with nabobs, and is to design a large 
 palace, and cathedral, and hospitals, colleges, halls, and 
 fortifications, by the general consent of the ruling 
 powers. Christian and Pagan alike.' 
 
 ' 'Twas sure to come to the boy,' said Mr. Smith 
 unassumingly. 
 
 ' 'Tis in yesterday's Si. Zaunce's Chronicle ; and our 
 worthy Mayor in the chair introduced the subject into 
 his speech last night in a masterly manner.' 
 
 ' 'Twas very good of the worthy Mayor in the chair, 
 I'm sure,' said Stephen's mother. ' I hope the boy will 
 have the sense to keep what he's got ; but as for men, 
 they are a simple sex. Some woman will hook him.' 
 
 ' Well, Mr. and Mrs. Smith, the evening closes in, 
 and we must be going ; and remember this, that every 
 Saturday when you come in to market, you are to make 
 our house as your own. There will be always a tea-cup 
 and saucer for you, as you know there has been for 
 413 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 months, though you may have forgotten it. I'm a 
 plain-speaking woman, and what I say I mean.' 
 
 When the visitors were gone, and the sun had set, 
 and the moon's rays were just beginning to assert 
 themselves upon the walls of the dwelling, John Smith 
 and his wife sat down to the newspaper they had hastily 
 procured from the town. And when the reading was 
 done, they considered how best to meet the new social 
 requirements settling upon them, which Mrs. Smith 
 considered could be done by new furniture and house 
 enlargement alone. 
 
 ' And, John, mind one thing,' she said in conclusion. 
 ' In writing to Stephen, never by any means mention 
 the name of Elfride Swancourt again. We've left the 
 place, and know no more about her except by hearsay. 
 He seems to be getting free of her, and glad am I 
 for it. It was a cloudy hour for him when he first 
 set eyes upon the girl. That family's been no good 
 to him, first or last ; so let them keep their blood to 
 themselves if they want to. He thinks of her, I know, 
 but not so hopelessly. So don't try to know anything 
 about her, and we can't answer his questions. She 
 may die out of his mind then.' 
 
 ' That shall be it,' said John. 
 
XXXVII 
 
 ' After many days.' 
 
 Jv NIGHT roamed south, under colour of studying 
 Continental antiquities. 
 
 He paced the lofty aisles of Amiens, loitered by 
 Ardennes Abbey, climbed into the strange towers of 
 Laon, analyzed Noyon and Rheims. Then he went to 
 Chartres, and examined its scaly spires and quaint carv- 
 ing : then he idled about Coutances. He rowed be- 
 neath the base of Mont St. Michel, and caught the 
 varied skyline of the crumbling edifices encrusting it. 
 St. Ouen's, Rouen, knew him for days ; so did Vezelay, 
 Sens, and many a hallowed monument besides. Aban- 
 doning the inspection of early French art with the same 
 purposeless haste as he had shown in undertaking it, he 
 went further, and lingered about Ferrara, Padua, and 
 Pisa. Satiated with medisevalism, he tried the Roman 
 Forum. Next he observed moonlight and starlight 
 effects by the bay of Naples. He turned to Austria, 
 became enervated and depressed on Hungarian and 
 Bohemian plains, and was refreshed again by breezes on 
 the declivities of the Carpathians. 
 
 Then he found himself in Greece. He visited the 
 plain of Marathon, and strove to imagine the Persian 
 
 415 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 defeat ; to Mars Hill, to picture St. Paul addressing the 
 ancient Athenians ; to Thermopylae and Salamis, to run 
 through the facts and traditions of the Second Invasion 
 — the result of his endeavours being more or less 
 chaotic. Knight grew as weary of these places as of all 
 others. Then he felt the shock of an earthquake in the 
 Ionian Islands, and went to Venice. Here he shot in 
 gondolas up and down the winding thoroughfare of the 
 Grand Canal, and loitered on calle and piazza at night, 
 when the lagunes were undisturbed by a ripple, and no 
 sound was to be heard but the stroke of the midnight 
 clock. Afterwards he remained for weeks in the 
 museums, galleries, and libraries of Vienna, Berlin, and 
 Paris ; and thence came home. 
 
 Time thus rolls us on to a February afternoon, divided 
 by fifteen months from the parting of Elfride and her 
 lover in the brown stubble field towards the sea. 
 
 Two men obviously not Londoners, and with a touch 
 of foreignness in their look, met by accident on one 
 of the gravel walks leading across Hyde Park. The 
 younger, more given to looking about him than his 
 fellow, saw and noticed the approach of his senior some 
 time before the latter had raised his eyes from the 
 ground, upon which they were bent in an abstracted 
 gaze that seemed habitual with him. 
 
 ' Mr. Knight — indeed it is ! ' exclaimed the younger 
 man. 
 
 ' Ah, Stephen Smith ! ' said Knight. 
 
 Simultaneous operations might now have been ob- 
 served progressing in both, the result being that an 
 expression less frank and impulsive than the first took 
 possession of their features. It was manifest that the 
 next words uttered were a superficial covering to con- 
 straint on both sides. 
 
 ' Have you been in England long ? ' said Knight. 
 
 ' Only two days,' said Smith. 
 
 ' India ever since ? ' 
 
 416 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 ' Nearly ever since.' 
 
 ' They were makinga fuss aboutyou at St. Launce's last 
 year. I fancy I saw something of the sort in the papers.' 
 
 ' Yes ; I believe something was said about me.' 
 
 ' I must congratulate you on your achievements.' 
 
 ' Thanks, but they are nothing very extraordinary. 
 A natural professional progress where there was no 
 opposition.' 
 
 There followed that want of words which will always 
 assert itself between nominal friends who find they 
 have ceased to be real ones, and have not yet sunk to 
 the level of mere acquaintance. Each looked up and 
 down the Park. Knight may possibly have borne in 
 mind during the intervening months Stephen's manner 
 towards him the last time they had met, and may have 
 encouraged his former interest in Stephen's welfare to 
 die out of him as misplaced. Stephen certainly was 
 full of the feelings begotten by the belief that Knight 
 had taken away the woman he loved so well. 
 
 Stephen Smith then asked a question, adopting a 
 certain recklessness of manner and tone to hide, if 
 possible, the fact that the subject was a much greater 
 one to him than his friend had ever supposed. 
 
 ' Are you married ? ' 
 
 ' I am not.' 
 
 Knight spoke in an indescribable tone of bitterness 
 that was almost moroseness. 
 
 ' And I never shall be,' he added decisively. ' Are 
 you?' 
 
 • No,' said Stephen, sadly and quietly, like a man in 
 a sick-room. Totally ignorant whether or not Knight 
 knew of his own previous claims upon Elfride, he yet 
 resolved to hazard a few more words upon the topic 
 which had an aching fascination for him even now. 
 
 ' Then your engagement to Miss Swancourt came to 
 nothing,' he said. ' You remember I met you with her 
 once ? ' 
 
 417 Z D 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 Stephen's voice gave way a little here, in defiance of 
 his firmest will to the contrary. Indian affairs had not yet 
 lowered those emotions down to the point of controL 
 
 ' It was broken off,' came quickly from Knight. 
 ' Engagements to marry often end like that — for better 
 or for worse.' 
 
 ' Yes ; so they do. And what have you been doing 
 lately ? ' 
 
 ' Doing ? Nothing.' 
 
 ' Where have you been ? ' 
 
 ' I can hardly tell you. In the main, going about 
 Europe ; and it may perhaps interest you to know that 
 I have been attempting the serious study of Continental 
 art of the Middle Ages. My notes on each example I 
 visited are at your service. They are of no use to me.' 
 
 ' I shall be glad with them. . . . Oh, travelling far 
 and near ! ' 
 
 ' Not far,' said Knight, with moody carelessness. 
 ' You know, I daresay, that sheep occasionally become 
 giddy — hydatids in the head, 'tis called, in which their 
 brains become eaten up, and the animal exhibits the 
 strange peculiarity of walking round and round in a 
 circle continually. I have travelled just in the same 
 way — round and round like a giddy ram.' 
 
 The reckless, bitter, and rambling style in which 
 Knight talked, as if rather to vent his images than to 
 convey any ideas to Stephen, struck the young man 
 painfully. His former friend's days had become cankered 
 in some way : Knight was a changed man. He himself 
 had changed much, but not as Knight had changed. 
 
 'Yesterday I came home,' continued Knight, 'with- 
 out having, to the best of my beUef, imbibed half-a-dozen 
 ideas worth retaining.' 
 
 ' You out-Hamlet Hamlet in morbidness of mood,' 
 said Stephen, with regretful frankness. 
 
 Knight made no reply. 
 
 ' Do you know,' Stephen continued, ' I could almost 
 418 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 have sworn that you would be married before this time, 
 from what I saw ? ' 
 
 Knight's face grew harder. ' Could you ? ' he said. 
 
 Stephen was powerless to forsake the depressing, 
 luring subject. 
 
 ' Yes ; and I simply wonder at it.' 
 
 ' Whom did you expect me to marry ? ' 
 
 ' Her I saw you with.' 
 
 ' Thank you for that wonder.' 
 
 ' Did she jilt you ? ' 
 
 ' Smith, now one word to you,' Knight returned 
 steadily. ' Don't you ever question me on that subject. 
 I have a reason for making this request, mind. And if 
 you do question me, you will not get an answer.' 
 
 ' Oh, I don't for a moment wish to ask what is 
 unpleasant to you— not I. I had a momentary feeling 
 that I should like to explain something on my side, and 
 hear a similar explanation on yours. But let it go, let 
 it go, by all means.' 
 
 ' What would you explain ? ' 
 
 ' I lost the woman I was going to marry : you have 
 not married as you intended. We might have compared 
 notes.' 
 
 ' I have never asked you a word about your case.' 
 
 ' I know that.' 
 
 ' And the inference is obvious.' 
 
 ' Quite so.' 
 
 ' The truth is, Stephen, I have doggedly resolved 
 never to allude to the matter — for which I have a very 
 good reason.' 
 
 ' Doubtless. As good a reason as you had for not 
 marrying her.' 
 
 ' You talk insidiously. I had a good one — a miser- 
 ably good one ! ' 
 
 Smith's anxiety urged him to venture one more 
 question. 
 
 ' Did she not love you enough ? ' He drew his 
 419 
 
A. PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 breath in a slow and attenuated stream, as he waited 
 in timorous hope for the answer. 
 
 ' Stephen, you rather strain ordinary courtesy in 
 pressing questions of that kind after what I have said. 
 I cannot understand you at all. I must go on now.' 
 
 ' Why, good God ! ' exclaimed Stephen passionately, 
 ' you talk as if you hadn't at all taken her away from 
 anybody who had better claims to her than you ! ' 
 
 ' What do you mean by that ? ' said Knight, with a 
 puzzled air. ' What have you heard ? ' 
 
 ' Nothing. I too must go on. Good-day.' 
 
 ' If you will go,' said Knight, reluctantly now, ' you 
 must, I suppose. I am sure I cannot understand why 
 you behave so.' 
 
 ' Nor I why you do. I have always been grateful 
 to you, and as far as I am concerned we need never 
 have become so estranged as we have.' 
 
 ' And have I ever been anything but well-disposed 
 towards you, Stephen ? Surely you know that I have not ! 
 The system of reserve began with you : you know that.' 
 
 ' No, no ! You altogether mistake our position. 
 You were always from the first reserved to me, though 
 I was confidential to you. That was, I suppose, the 
 natural issue of our differing positions in life. And 
 when I, the pupil, became reserved like you, the master, 
 you did not like it. However, I was going to ask you 
 to come round and see me.' 
 
 ' Where are you staying ? ' 
 
 ■ At the Grosvenor Hotel, Pimlico.' 
 
 ' So am I.' 
 
 'That's convenient, not to say odd. Well, I am 
 detained in London for a day or two ; then I am going 
 down to see my father and mother, who live at St. 
 Launce's now. Will you see me this evening ? ' 
 
 ' I may ; but I will not promise. I was wishing to 
 be alone for an hour or two ; but I shall know where 
 to find you, at any rate. Good-bye.' 
 420 
 
XXXVIII 
 
 'Jealousy is cruel as the grave.' 
 
 oTEPHEN pondered not a little on this meeting with 
 his old friend and once-beloved exemplar. He was 
 grieved, for amid all the distractions of his latter years 
 a still small voice of fidelity to Knight had lingered on 
 in him. Perhaps this staunchness was because Knight 
 ever treated him as a mere disciple— even to snubbing 
 him sometimes; and had at last, though unwittingly, 
 inflicted upon him the greatest snub of all, that of taking 
 away his sweetheart. The emotional side of his constitu- 
 tion was built rather after a feminine than a male model ; 
 and that tremendous wound from Knight's hand may 
 have tended to keep alive a warmth which solicitousness 
 would have extinguished altogether. 
 
 Knight, on his part, was vexed, after they had parted, 
 that he had not taken Stephen in hand a little after the 
 old manner. Those words which Smith had let fall 
 concerning somebody having a prior claim to Elfride, 
 \^ould, if uttered when the man was younger, have pro- 
 voked such a query as, ' Come, tell me all about it, my 
 lad,' from Knight, and Stephen would straightway have 
 delivered himself of all he knew on the subject. 
 
 Stephen the ingenuous boy, though now obliterated 
 421 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 externally by Stephen the contriving man, returned to 
 Knight's memory vividly that afternoon. He was at 
 present but a sojourner in London ; and after attending 
 to the two or three matters of business which remained 
 to be done that day, he walked abstractedly into the 
 gloomy corridors of the British Museum for the half- 
 hour previous to their closing. That meeting with 
 Smith had reunited the present with the past, closing 
 up the chasm of his absence from England as if it 
 had never existed, until the final circumstances of his 
 previous time of residence in London formed but a 
 yesterday to the circumstances now. The conflict that 
 then had raged in him concerning Elfride Swancourt 
 revived, strengthened by its sleep. Indeed, in those 
 many months of absence, though quelling the intention 
 to make her his wife, he had never forgotten that she 
 was the type of woman adapted to his nature; and 
 instead of trying to obliterate thoughts of her alto- 
 gether, he had grown to regard them as an infirmity it 
 was necessary to tolerate. 
 
 Knight returned to his hotel much earlier in the 
 evening than he would have done in the ordinary course 
 of things. He did not care to think whether this arose 
 from a friendly wish to close the gap that had slowly 
 been widening between himself and his earliest acquaint- 
 ance, or from a hankering desire to hear the meaning 
 of the dark oracles Stephen had hastily pronounced, 
 betokening that he knew something more of Elfride 
 than Knight had supposed. 
 
 He made a hasty dinner, inquired for Smith, and 
 soon was ushered into the young man's presence, 
 whom he found sitting in front of a comfortable fire, 
 beside a table spread with a few scientific periodicals 
 and art reviews. 
 
 ' I have come to you, after all,' said Knight. ' My 
 manner was odd this morning, and it seemed desirable 
 tp call; but that you had too much sense to notice, 
 422 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 Stephen, I know. Put it down to my wanderings in 
 France and Italy.' 
 
 ' Don't say another word, but sit down. I am only 
 too glad to see you again.' 
 
 Stephen would hardly have cared to tell Knight just 
 then that the minute before Knight was announced he 
 had been reading over some old letters of Elfride's. 
 They were not many; and until to-night had been 
 sealed up, and stowed away in a corner of his leather 
 trunk, with a few other mementoes and relics which had 
 accompanied him in his travels. The familiar sights 
 and sounds of London, the meeting with his friend, had 
 with him also revived that sense of abiding continuity 
 with regard to Elfride and love which his absence at the 
 other side of the world had to some extent suspended, 
 though never ruptured. He at first intended only to 
 look over these letters on the outside ; then he read one ; 
 then another ; until the whole was thus re-used as a 
 stimulus to sad memories. He folded them away again, 
 placed them in his pocket, and instead of going on with 
 an examination into the state of the artistic world, had 
 remained musing on the strange circumstance that he 
 had returned to find Knight not the husband of Elfride 
 after all. 
 
 The possibility of any given gratification begets a 
 cumulative sense of its necessity. Stephen gave the rein 
 to his imagination, and felt more intensely than he had 
 felt for many months that, without Elfride, his life would 
 never be any great pleasure to himself, or honour to his 
 Maker. 
 
 They sat by the fire, chatting on external and 
 random subjects, neither caring to be the first to 
 approach the matter each most longed to discuss. On 
 the table with the periodicals lay two or three pocket- 
 books, one of them being open. Knight seeing from 
 the exposed page that the contents were sketches only, 
 began turning the leaves over carelessly with his finger. 
 423 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 When, some time later, Stephen was out of the room. 
 Knight proceeded to pass the interval by looking at the 
 sketches more carefully. 
 
 The first crude ideas, pertaining to dwellings of all 
 kinds, were roughly outlined on the different pages. 
 Antiquities had been copied; fragments of Indian 
 columns, colossal statues, and outlandish ornament 
 from the temples of Elephanta and Kenneri, were care- 
 lessly intruded upon by outlines of modern doors, win- 
 dows, roofs, cooking-stoves, and household furniture; 
 everything, in short, which comes within the range of a 
 practising architect's experience, who travels with his 
 eyes open. Among these occasionally appeared rough 
 delineations of mediaeval subjects for carving or illumi- 
 nation — heads of Virgins, Saints, and Prophets. 
 
 Stephen was not professedly a free-hand draughts- 
 man, but he drew the human figure with correctness 
 and skill. In its numerous repetitions on the sides and 
 edges of the leaves. Knight began to notice a peculiarity. 
 All the feminine saints had one type of feature. There 
 were large nimbi and small nimbi about their drooping 
 heads, but the face was always the same. That profile 
 — how well Knight knew that profile ! 
 
 Had there been but one specimen of the familiar 
 countenance, he might have passed over the resemblance 
 as accidental; but a repetition meant more. Knight 
 thought anew of Smith's hasty words earlier in the day, 
 and looked at the sketches again and again. 
 
 On the young man's entry. Knight said with palpable 
 agitation — 
 
 ' Stephen, who are those intended for ? ' 
 
 Stephen looked over the book with utter unconcern : 
 ' Saints and angels, done in my leisure moments. They 
 were intended as designs for the stained glass of an 
 English church.' 
 
 ' But whom do you idealize by that type of woman 
 you always adopt for the Virgin ? ' 
 424 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 ' Nobody.' 
 
 And then a thought raced along Stephen's mind, 
 and he looked up at his friend. 
 
 The truth is, Stephen's introduction of Elfride's 
 lineaments had been so unconscious that he had not 
 at first understood his companion's drift. The hand, 
 like the tongue, easily acquires the trick of repetition 
 by rote, without calling in the mind to assist at all; 
 and this had been the case here. Young men who 
 cannot write verses about their Loves generally take to 
 portraying them, and in the early days of his attachment 
 Smith had never been weary of outlining Elfride. The 
 lay-figure of Stephen's sketches now initiated an adjust- 
 ment of many things. Knight had recognized her. The 
 opportunity of comparing notes had come unsought. 
 
 ' Elfride Swancourt, to whom I was engaged,' he 
 said quietly. 
 
 ' Stephen ! ' 
 
 ' I know what you mean by speaking like that.' 
 
 ' Was it Elfride ? You the man, Stephen ? ' 
 
 ' Yes ; and you are thinking why did I conceal the 
 fact from you that time at Endelstow, are you not ? ' 
 
 ' Yes, and more— ,-more.' 
 
 ' I did it for the best ; blame me if you will ; I did 
 it for the best. And now say how could I be with you 
 afterwards as I had been before ? ' 
 
 ' I don't know at all ; I can't say.' 
 
 Knight remained fixed in thought, and once he 
 murmured — 
 
 ' I had a suspicion this afternoon that there might 
 be some such meaning in your words about my taking 
 her away. But I dismissed it. How came you to know 
 her?' he presently asked, in almost a peremptory 
 tone. 
 
 ' I went down about the church ; years ago now.' 
 
 ' When you were with Hewby, of course, of course. 
 Well, I can't understand it.' His tones rose. ' I don't 
 
 2E 425 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 know what to say, your hoodwinking me like this for 
 so long ! ' 
 
 ' I don't see that I have hoodwinked you at all.' 
 
 'Yes, yes, but' 
 
 Knight ^rose from his seat, and began pacing up 
 and down the room. His face was markedly pale, and 
 his voice perturbed, as he said — 
 
 ' You did not act as I should have acted towards you 
 under those circumstances. I feel it deeply ; and I tell 
 you plainly, I shall never forget it ! ' 
 
 ' What ? ' 
 
 ' Your behaviour at that meeting in the family vault, 
 when I told you we were going to be married. Decep- 
 tion, dishonesty, everywhere ; all the world's of a piece ! ' 
 
 Stephen did not much like this misconstruction of 
 his motives, even though it was but the hasty conclusion 
 of a friend disturbed by emotion. 
 
 ' I could do no otherwise than I did, with due regard 
 to her,' he said stiffly. 
 
 ' Indeed ! ' said Knight, in the bitterest tone of 
 reproach. ' Nor could you with due regard to her have 
 married her, I suppose ! I have hoped — longed — that 
 he, who turns out to be you, would ultimately have 
 done that.' 
 
 ' I am much obliged to you for that hope. But you 
 talk very mysteriously. I think I had about the best 
 reason anybody could have had for not doing that.' 
 
 ' Oh, what reason was it ? ' 
 
 ' That I could not.' 
 
 'You ought to have made an opportunity; you 
 ought to do so now, in bare justice to her, Stephen ! ' 
 cried Knight, carried beyond himself. ' That you know 
 very well, and it hurts and wounds me more than you 
 dream to find you never have tried to make any repara- 
 tion to a woman of that kind — so trusting, so apt to be 
 run away with by her feelings — poor little fool, so much 
 the worse for her ! ' 
 
 426 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 ' Why, you talk like a madman ! You took her away 
 from me, did you not ? ' 
 
 ' Picking up what another throws down can scarcely 
 be called " taking away." However, we shall not agree 
 too well upon that subject, so we had better part.' 
 
 ' But I am quite certain you misapprehend some- 
 thing most grievously,' said Stephen, shaken to the 
 bottom of his heart. ' What have I done ; tell me ? I 
 have lost Elfride, but is that such a sin ? ' 
 
 ' Was it her doing, or yours ? ' 
 
 ' Was what ? ' 
 
 ' That you parted.' 
 
 ' I will tell you honestly. It was hers entirely, en- 
 tirely.' 
 
 ' What was her reason ? ' 
 
 ' I can hardly say. But I'll tell the story without 
 reserve.' 
 
 Stephen until to-day had unhesitatingly held that she 
 grew tired of him and turned to Knight ; but he did 
 not like to advance the statement now, or even to think 
 the thought. To fancy otherwise accorded better with 
 the hope to which Knight's estrangement had given 
 birth : that love for his friend was not the direct cause, 
 but a result of her suspension of love for himself. 
 
 ' Such a matter must not be allowed to breed dis- 
 cord between us,' Knight returned, relapsing into a 
 manner which concealed all his true feeling, as if con- 
 fidence now was intolerable. ' I do see that your reti- 
 cence towards me in the vault may have been dictated 
 by prudential considerations.' He concluded artifi- 
 cially, ' It was a strange thing altogether ; but not of 
 much importance, I suppose, at this distance of time ; 
 and it does not concern me now, though I don't mind 
 hearing your story.' 
 
 These words from Knight, utttered with such an air 
 of renunciation and apparent indifference, prompted 
 Smith to speak on — perhaps with a little complacepcy 
 427 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 — of his old secret engagement to Elfride. He told 
 the details of its origin, and the peremptory words and 
 actions of her father to extinguish their love. 
 
 Knight persevered in the tone and manner of a dis- 
 interested outsider. It had become more than ever 
 imperative to screen his emotions from Stephen's eye ; 
 the young man would otherwise be less frank, and 
 their meeting would be again embittered. What was 
 the use of untoward candour ? 
 
 Stephen had now arrived at the point in his ingenu- 
 ous narrative where he left the vicarage because of her 
 father's manner. Knight's interest increased. Their 
 love seemed so innocent and childlike thus far. 
 
 ' It is a nice point in casuistry,' he observed, ' to 
 decide whether you were culpable or not in not telling 
 Swancourt that your friends were parishioners of his. 
 It was only human nature to hold your tongue under 
 the circumstances. Well, what was the result of your 
 dismissal by him ? ' 
 
 ' That we agreed to be secretly faithful. And to 
 insure this we thought we would marry.' 
 
 Knight's suspense and agitation rose higher when 
 Stephen entered upon this phase of the subject. 
 
 ' Do you mind telling on ? ' he said, steadying his 
 manner of speech. 
 
 ' Oh, not at all.' 
 
 Then Stephen gave in full the particulars of the 
 meeting with Elfride at the railway station ; the neces- 
 sity they were under of going to London, unless the 
 ceremony were to be postponed. The long journey of 
 the afternoon and evening; her timidity and revulsion 
 of feeling; its culmination on reaching London; the 
 crossing over to the down-platform and their immediate 
 departure again, solely in obedience to her wish ; the 
 journey all night ; their anxious watching for the dawn ; 
 their arrival at St. Launce's at last — were detailed. 
 And he told how a village woman named Jethway was 
 428 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 the only person who recognized them, either going or 
 coming ; and how dreadfully this terrified Elfride. He 
 told how he waited in the fields whilst this then re- 
 proachful sweetheart went for her pony, and how the 
 last kiss he ever gave her was given a mile out of the 
 town, on the way to Endelstow. 
 
 These things Stephen related with a will. He 
 believed that in doing so he established word by word 
 the reasonableness of his claim to Elfride. 
 
 ' Curse her ! curse that woman ! — that miserable 
 letter that parted us ! O God ! ' 
 
 Knight began pacing the room again, and uttered 
 this at further end. 
 
 ' What did you say ? ' said Stephen, turning round. 
 
 ' Say ? Did I say anything ? Oh, I was merely 
 thinking about your story, and the oddness of my 
 having a fancy for the same woman afterwards. And 
 that now I — I have forgotten her almost; and neither 
 of us care about her, except just as a friend, you 
 know, eh ? ' 
 
 Knight still continued at the further end of the room, 
 somewhat in shadow. 
 
 ' Exactly,' said Stephen, inwardly exultant, for he was 
 really deceived by Knight's off-hand manner. 
 
 Yet he was deceived less by the completeness of 
 Knight's disguise than by the persuasive power which 
 lay in the fact that Knight_had never before deceived 
 him in anything. So this supposition that his com- 
 panion had ceased to love Elfride was an enormous 
 lightening of the weight which had turned the scale 
 against him. 
 
 ' Admitting that Elfride could love another man after 
 you,' said the elder, under the same varnish of careless 
 criticism, ' she was none the worse for that experience.' 
 
 ' The worse ? Of course she was none the worse.' 
 
 ' Did you ever think it a wild and thoughtless thing 
 for her to do ? ' 
 
 429 
 
A PAIR OF' 6LUfi EVe;S 
 
 ' Indeed, I never did,' said Stephen. ' I persuaded 
 her. She saw no harm in it until she decided to 
 return, nor did I ; nor was there, except to the extent 
 of indiscretion.' 
 
 ' Directly she thought it was wrong she would go no 
 further ? ' 
 
 'That was it. I had just/ begun to think it 
 wrong too.' 
 
 ' Such a childish escapade might have been misre- 
 presented by any evil-disposed person, might it not ? ' 
 
 ' It might ; but I never heard that it was. Nobody 
 who really knew all the circumstances would have done 
 otherwise than smile. If all the world had known it, 
 Elfride would still have remained the only one who 
 thought her action a sin. Poor child, she always per- 
 sisted in thinking so, and was frightened more than 
 enough.' 
 
 ' Stephen, do you love her now ? ' 
 
 ' Well, I like her ; I always shall, you know,' he said 
 evasively, and with all the strategy love suggested. ' But 
 I have not seen her for so long that I can hardly be 
 expected to love her. Do you love her still ? ' 
 
 ' How shall I answer without being ashamed ? What 
 fickle beings we men are, Stephen ! Men may love 
 strongest for a while, but women love longest. I used 
 to love her — in my way, you know.' 
 
 ' Yes, I understand. Ah, and I used to love her in 
 my way. In fact, I loved her a good deal at one time ; 
 but travel has a tendency to obliterate early fancies.' 
 
 ' It has — it has, truly.' 
 
 Perhaps the most extraordinary feature in this con- 
 versation was the circumstance that, though each inter- 
 locutor had at first his suspicions of the other's abiding 
 passion awakened by several httle acts, neither would 
 allow himself to see that his friend might now be speak- 
 ing deceitfully as well as he. 
 
 ' Stephen,' resumed Knight, ' now that matters are 
 43° 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 smooth between us, I think I must leave you. You 
 won't mind my hurrj^ing off to my quarters ? ' 
 
 ' You'll stay to some sort of supper surely ? Why 
 didn't you come to dinner ! ' 
 
 ' You must really excuse me this once.' 
 
 ' Then you'll drop in to breakfast to-morrow.' 
 
 ' I shall be rather pressed for time.' 
 
 'An early breakfast, which shall interfere with 
 nothing ? ' 
 
 ' I'll come,' said Knight, with as much readiness as it 
 was possible to graft upon a huge stock of reluctance. 
 ' Yes, early ; eight o'clock say, as we are under the same 
 roof.' 
 
 ' Any time you like. Eight it shall be.' 
 
 And Knight left him. To wear a mask, to dissemble 
 his feelings as he had in their late miserable conversa- 
 tion, was such torture that he could support it no longer. 
 It was the first time in Knight's life that he had ever 
 been so entirely the player of a part. And the man he 
 had thus deceived was Stephen, who had docilely looked 
 up to him from youth as a superior of unblemished 
 integrity. 
 
 He went to bed, and allowed the fever of his excite- 
 ment to rage uncontrolled. Stephen — it was only he 
 who was the rival — only Stephen ! There was an anti- 
 climax of absurdity which Knight, wretched and con- 
 science-stricken as he was, could not help recognizing. 
 Stephen was but a boy to him.- Where the great grief 
 lay was in perceiving that the very innocence of Elfride 
 in reading her little fault as one so grave was what had 
 fatally misled him. Had Elfride, with any degree of 
 coolness, asserted that she had done no harm, the 
 poisonous breath of the dead Mrs. Jethway would have 
 been inoperative. Why did he not make his little docile 
 girl tell more? If on that subject he had only exer- 
 cised the imperativeness customary with him on others, 
 ^11 might have been revealed. It smote his heart lik§ 
 43? 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 a switch when he remembered how gently she had 
 borne his scourging speeches, never answering him with 
 a single reproach, only assuring him of her unbounded 
 love. 
 
 Knight blessed Elfride for her sweetness, and forgot 
 her fault. He pictured with a vivid fancy those fair 
 summer scenes with her. He again saw her as at their 
 first meeting, timid at speaking, yet in her eagerness 
 to be explanatory borne forward almost against her 
 will. How she would wait for him in green places, 
 without showing any of the ordinary womanly affecta- 
 tions of indifference ! How proud she was to be seen 
 walking with him, bearing legibly in her eyes the thought 
 that he was the greatest genius in the world ! 
 
 He formed a resolution ; and after that could make 
 pretence of slumber no longer. Rising and dressing 
 himself, he sat down and waited for day. 
 
 That night Stephen was restless too. Not because 
 of the unwontedness of a return to English scenery; 
 not because he was about to meet his parents, and settle 
 down for awhile to English, cottage life. He was in- 
 dulging in dreams, and for the nonce the warehouses of 
 Bombay and the plains and forts of Poonah were but 
 a shadow's shadow. His dream was based on this one 
 atom of fact : Elfride and Knight had become separated, 
 and their engagement was as if it had never been. 
 Their rupture must have occurred soon after Stephen's 
 discovery of the fact of their union ; and, Stephen went 
 on to think, what so probable as that a return of her 
 errant affection to himself was the cause ? 
 
 Stephen's opinions in this matter were those of a 
 lover, and not the balanced judgment of an unbiassed 
 spectator. His naturally sanguine spirit built hope 
 upon hope, till scarcely a doubt remained in his mind 
 that her lingering tenderness f6r him had in some way 
 been perceived by Knight, and had provoked their 
 parting. 
 
 432 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 To go and see Elfride was the suggestion of impulses 
 it was impossible to withstand. At any rate, to run 
 down from St. Launce's to Castle Boterel, a distance 
 of less than twenty miles, and glide like a ghost 
 about their old haunts, making stealthy inquiries 
 about her, would be a fascinating way of passing the 
 first spare hours after reaching home on the day after 
 the morrow. 
 
 He was now a richer man than heretofore, standing 
 on his own bottom ; and the definite position in which 
 he had rooted himself nullified old local distinctions. 
 He had become illustrious even sanguine clarus, judging 
 from the tone of the worthy Mayor of St. Launce's. 
 
XXXIX 
 
 'Each to the loved one's side.' 
 
 1 HE friends and rivals breakfasted together the next 
 morning. Not a word was said on either side upon 
 the matter discussed the previous evening so glibly and 
 so hollowly. Stephen was absorbed the greater part of 
 the time in wishing he were not forced to stay in town 
 yet another day. 
 
 ' I don't intend to leave for St. Launce's till to-morrow, 
 as you know,' he said to Knight at the end of the meal. 
 ' What are you going to do with yourself to-day ? ' 
 
 ' I have an engagement just before ten,' said Knight 
 deliberately ; ' and after that time I must call upon two 
 or three people.' 
 
 ' I'll look for you this evening,' said Stephen. 
 
 'Yes, do. You may as well come and dine with 
 me ; that is, if we can meet. I may not sleep in 
 London to-night ; in fact, I am absolutely unsettled as 
 to my movements yet. However, the first thing I am 
 going to do is to get my baggage shifted from this place 
 to Bede's Inn. Good-bye for the present. I'll write, 
 you know, if I can't meet you.' 
 
 It now wanted a quarter to nine o'clock. When 
 Knight was gone, Stephen felt yet more impatient of 
 434 
 
A PAIR bF BLUE £YfeS 
 
 the circumstance that another day would have to drftg 
 itself away wearily before he could set out for that spot 
 of earth whereon a soft thought of him might perhaps be 
 nourished still. On a sudden he admitted to his mind 
 the possibility that the engagement he was waiting in 
 town to keep might be postponed without much harm. 
 
 It was no sooner perceived than attempted. Look- 
 ing at his watch, he found it wanted forty minutes to 
 the departure of the ten o'clock train from Paddington, 
 which left him a surplus quarter of an hour before it 
 would be necessary to start for the station. 
 
 Scribbling a hasty note or two — one putting off the 
 business meeting, another to Knight apologizing for not 
 being able to see him in the evening — paying his bill, 
 and leaving his heavier luggage to follow him by goods- 
 train, he jumped into a cab and rattled off to the Great 
 Western Station. 
 
 Shortly afterwards he took his seat in the railway 
 carriage. 
 
 The guard paused on his whistle, to let into the next 
 compartment to Smith's a man of whom Stephen had 
 caught but a hasty glimpse as he ran across the platform 
 at the last moment. 
 
 Smith sank back into the carriage, stilled by per- 
 plexity. The man was like Knight — astonishingly like 
 him. Was it possible it could be he? To have got 
 there he must have driven like the wind to Bede's Inn, 
 and hardly have alighted before starting again. No, it 
 could not be he ; that was not his way of doing things. 
 
 During the early part of the journey Stephen Smith's 
 thoughts busied themselves till his brain seemed swollen. 
 One subject was concerning his own approaching actions. 
 He was a day earlier than his letter to his parents had 
 stated, and his arrangement with them had been that 
 they should meet him at Plymouth; a plan which 
 pleased the worthy couple beyond expression. Once 
 before the same engagement had been made, which he 
 435 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 had then quashed by ante-dating his arrival. This time 
 he would go right on to Castle Boterel ; ramble in that 
 well-known neighbourhood during the evening and next 
 morning, making inquiries ; and return to Plymouth 
 to meet them as arranged — a contrivance which would 
 leave their cherished project undisturbed, relieving his 
 own impatience also. 
 
 At Chippenham there was a little waiting, and some 
 loosening and attaching of carriages. 
 
 Stephen looked out. At the same moment another 
 man's head emerged from the adjoining window. Each 
 looked in the other's face. 
 
 Knight and Stephen confronted one another. 
 
 ' You here ! ' said the younger man. 
 
 'Yes. It seems that you are too,' said Knight, 
 strangely. 
 
 ' Yes.' 
 
 The selfishness of love and the cruelty of jealousy 
 were fairly exemplified at this moment. Each of the 
 two men looked at his friend as he had never looked 
 at him before. Each was troubled at the other's 
 presence. 
 
 ' I thought you said you were not coming till to- 
 morrow,' remarked Knight. 
 
 ' I did. It was an afterthought to come to-day. 
 This journey was your engagement, then ? ' 
 
 ' No, it was not. This is an afterthought of mine 
 too. I left a note to explain it, and account for my not 
 being able to meet you this evening as we arranged.' 
 
 ' So did I for you.' 
 
 ' You don't look well : you did not this morning.' 
 
 ' I have a headache. You are paler to-day than you 
 were.' 
 
 ' I, too, have been suffering from headache. We 
 have to wait here a few minutes, I think.' 
 
 They walked up and down the platform, each one 
 more and more embarrassingly concerned with the 
 436 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 awkwardness of his friend's presence. They reached 
 the end of the footway, and paused in sheer absent- 
 mindedness. Stephen's vacant eyes rested upon the 
 operations of some porters, who were shifting a dark and 
 curious-looking van from the rear of the train, to shunt 
 another which was between it and the fore part of the 
 train. This operation having been concluded, the two 
 friends returned to the side of their carriage. 
 
 ' Will you come in here ? ' said Knight, not very 
 warmly. 
 
 ' I have my rug and portmanteau and umbrella with 
 me : it is rather bothering to move now,' said Stephen 
 reluctantly. ' Why not you come here ? ' 
 
 ' I have my traps too. It is hardly worth while to 
 shift them, for I shall see you again, you know.' 
 
 • Oh, yes.' 
 
 And each got into his own place. Just at starting, 
 a man on the platform held up his hands and stopped 
 the train. 
 
 Stephen looked out to see what was the matter. 
 
 One of the officials was exclaiming to another, ' That 
 carriage should have been attached again. Can't you 
 see it is for the main line ? Quick ! What fools there 
 are in the world ! ' 
 
 ' What a confounded nuisance these stoppages are ! ' 
 exclaimed Knight impatiently, looking out from his 
 compartment. ' What is it ? ' 
 
 ' That singular carriage we saw has been unfastened 
 from our train by mistake, it seems,' said Stephen. 
 
 He was watching the process of attaching it. The 
 van or carriage, which he now recognized as having 
 seen at Paddington before they started, was rich and 
 solemn rather than gloomy in aspect. It seemed to be 
 quite new, and of modern design, and its impressive 
 personality attracted the notice of others beside himself. 
 He beheld it gradually wheeled forward by two men on 
 pach side : slower and more sadly it seemed to approach: 
 437 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 then a slight concussion, and they were connected with 
 it, and off again. 
 
 Stephen sat all the afternoon pondering upon the 
 reason of Knight's unexpected reappearance. Was he 
 going as far as Castle Boterel ? If so, he could only 
 have one object in view — a visit to Elfride. And what 
 an idea it seemed ! 
 
 At Plymouth Smith partook of a little refreshment, 
 and then went round to the side from which the train 
 started for Camelton, the new station near Castle Boterel 
 and Endelstow. 
 
 Knight was already there. 
 
 Stephen walked up and stood beside him without 
 speaking. Two men at this moment crept out from 
 among the wheels of the waiting train. 
 
 • The carriage is light enough,' said one in a grim 
 tone. ' Light as vanity ; full of nothing.' 
 
 ' Nothing in size, but a good deal in signification,' 
 said the other, a man of brighter mind and manners. 
 
 Smith then perceived that to their train was attached 
 that same carriage of grand and dark aspect which had 
 haunted them all the way from London. 
 
 ' You are going on, I suppose ? ' said Knight, turning 
 to Stephen, after idly looking at the same object. 
 
 ' Yes.' 
 
 ' We may as well travel together for the remaining 
 distance, may we not ? ' 
 
 ' Certainly we will ; ' and they both entered the same 
 door. 
 
 Evening drew on apace. It chanced to be the eve 
 of St. Valentine's — that bishop of blessed memory to 
 youthful lovers — and the sun shone low under the rim 
 of a thick hard cloud, decorating the eminences of the 
 landscape with crowns of orange fire. As the train 
 changed its direction on a curve, the same rays stretched 
 in through the window, and coaxed open Knight's half-, 
 closed eyes, 
 
 438 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 'You will get out at St. Launce's, I suppose?' he 
 murmured. 
 
 ' No,' said Stephen, ' I am not expected till to- 
 morrow.' Knight was silent. i 
 
 ' And you — are you going to Endelstow ? ' said the 
 younger man pointedly. 
 
 ' Since you ask, I can do no less than say I am, 
 Stephen,' continued Knight slowly, and with more 
 resolution of manner than he had shown all the day. 
 ' I am going to Endelstow to see if Elfride Swancourt 
 is still free ; and if so, to ask her to be my wife.' 
 
 ' So am I,' said Stephen Smith. » 
 
 ' I think you'll lose your labour,' Knight returned 
 with decision. 
 
 ' Naturally you do.' There was a strong accent of 
 bitterness in Stephen's voice. 'You might have said 
 hope instead of think^ he added. 
 
 ' I might have done no such thing. I gave you my 
 opinion. Elfride Swancourt may have loved you once, 
 no doubt, but it was when she was so young that she 
 hardly knew her own mind.' 
 
 ' Thank you,' said Stephen laconically. ' She knew 
 her mind as well as I did. We are the same age. If 
 you hadn't interfered ' 
 
 ' Don't say that — don't say it, Stephen ! How 
 can you make out that I interfered? Be just, 
 please ! ' 
 
 ' Well,' said his friend, ' she was mine before she was 
 yours — you know that ! And it seemed a hard thing 
 to find you had got her, and that if it had not been 
 for you, all might have turned out well for me.' Stephen 
 spoke with a swelling heart, and looked out of the win- 
 dow to hide the emotion that would make itself visible 
 upon his face. 
 
 « It is absurd,' said Knight in a kinder tone, ' for 
 you to look at the matter in that light. What I tell you 
 is for your good. You naturally do not like to realize 
 439 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 the truth — that her Uking for you was only a girl's first 
 fancy, which has no root ever.' 
 
 ' It is not true ! ' said Stephen passionately. ' It was 
 you put me out. And now you'll be pushing in again 
 between us, and depriving me of my chance again ! 
 My right, that's what it is ! How ungenerous of you to 
 come anew and try to take her away from me ! When 
 you had won her, I did not interfere ; and you might, I 
 think, Mr. Knight, do by me as I did by you ! ' 
 
 ' Don't " Mr." me ; you are as well in the world as 
 I am now.' 
 
 ' First love is deepest ; and that was mine.' 
 
 ' Who told you that ? ' said Knight superciliously. 
 
 ' I had her first love. And it was through me that 
 you and she parted. I can guess that well enough.' 
 
 ' It was. And if I were to explain to you in what 
 way that operated in parting us, I should convince you 
 that you do quite wrong in intruding upon her — that, 
 as I said at first, your labour will be lost. I don't 
 choose to explain, because the particulars are painful. 
 But if you won't listen to me, go on, for Heaven's sake. 
 I don't care what you do, my boy.' 
 
 ' You have no right to domineer over me as you do. 
 Just because, when I was a lad, I was accustomed to 
 look up to you as a master, and you helped me a little, 
 for which I was grateful to you and have loved you, you 
 assume too much now, and step in before me. It is 
 cruel — it is unjust — of you to injure me so ! ' 
 
 Knight showed himself keenly hurt at this. 
 ' Stephen, those words are untrue and unworthy of any 
 man, and they are unworthy of you. You know you 
 wrong me. If you have ever profited by any instruction 
 of mine, I am only too glad to know it. You know it 
 was given ungrudgingly, and that I have never once 
 looked upon it as making you in any way a debtor 
 to me.' 
 
 Stephen's naturally gentle nature was touched, and 
 440 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 it was in a troubled voice that he said, 'Yes, yes. I 
 am unjust in that — I own it.' 
 
 ' This is St. Launce's Station, I think. Are you 
 going to get out ? ' 
 
 Knight's manner of returning to the matter in hand 
 drew Stephen again into himself. ' No ; I told you I 
 was going to Endelstow,' he resolutely replied. 
 
 Knight's features became impassive, and he said no 
 more. The train continued rattling on, and Stephen 
 leant back in his corner and closed his eyes. The 
 yellows of evening had turned to browns, the dusky 
 shades thickened, and a flying cloud of dust occasion- 
 ally stroked the window — borne upon a chilling breeze 
 which blew from the north-east. The previously gilded 
 but now dreary hills began to lose their daylight aspects 
 of rotundity, and to become black discs vandyked against 
 the sky, all nature wearing the cloak that six o'clock casts 
 over the landscape at this time of the year. 
 
 Stephen started up in bewilderment after a long still- 
 ness, and it was some time before he recollected himself. 
 
 ' Well, how real, how real ! ' he exclaimed, brushing 
 his hand across his eyes. 
 
 ' What is ? ' said Knight. 
 
 ' That dream. I fell asleep for a few minutes, and 
 have had a dream — the most vivid I ever remember.' 
 
 He wearily looked out into the gloom. They were 
 now drawing near to Camelton. The lighting of the 
 lamps was perceptible through the veil of evening — each 
 flame starting into existence at intervals, and blinking 
 weakly against the gusts of wind. 
 
 ' What did you dream ? ' said Knight moodily. 
 
 ' Oh, nothing to be told. 'Twas a sort of incubus. 
 There is never anything in dreams.' 
 
 ' I hardly supposed there was.' 
 
 ' I know that. However, what I so vividly dreamt 
 was this, since you would like to hear. It was the 
 brightest of bright mornings at East Endelstow Church, 
 
 2T 441 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 and you and I stood by the font. Far away in the 
 chancel Lord Luxellian was standing alone, cold and 
 impassive, and utterly unlike his usual self : but I knew 
 it was he. Inside the altar rail stood a strange clergy- 
 man with his book open. He looked up and said to 
 Lord Luxellian, " Where's the bride ? " Lord Luxellian 
 said, " There's no bride." At that moment somebody 
 came in at the door, and I knew her to be Lady 
 Luxellian who died. He turned and said to her, " I 
 thought you were in the vault below us ; but that could 
 have only been a dream of mine. Come on." Then 
 she came on. And in brushing between us she chilled 
 me so with cold that I exclaimed, " The life is gone out 
 of me ! " and, in the way of dreams, I awoke. But here 
 we are at Camelton.' , 
 
 They were slowly entering the station. 
 
 ' What are you going to do ? ' said Knight. ' Do 
 you really intend to call on the Swancourts ? ' 
 
 ' By no means. I am going to make inquiries first. 
 I shall stay at the Luxellian Arms to-night. You will 
 go right on to Endelstow, I suppose, at once ? ' 
 
 ' I can hardly do that at this time of the day. 
 Perhaps you are not aware that the family — her father, 
 at any rate — is at variance with me as much as with 
 you.' 
 
 ' I didn't know it.' 
 
 ' And that I cannot rush into the house as an old 
 friend any more than you can. Certainly I have the 
 privileges of a distant relationship, whatever they 
 may be.' 
 
 Knight let down the window, and looked ahead. 
 ' There are a great many people at the station,' he said. 
 • They seem all to be on the look-out for us.' 
 
 When the train stopped, the half-estranged friends 
 
 could perceive by the lamplight that the assemblage of 
 
 idlers enclosed as a kernel a group of men in black 
 
 cloaks. A side gate in the platform railing was open, 
 
 442 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 and outside this stood a dark vehicle, which they could 
 not at first characterize. Then Knight saw on its upper 
 part forms against the sky like cedars by night, and 
 knew the vehicle to be a hearse. Few people were at 
 the carriage doors to meet the passengers — the majority 
 had congregated at this upper end. Knight and 
 Stephen alighted, and turned for a moment in the 
 same direction. 
 
 The sombre van, which had accompanied them all 
 day from London, now began to reveal that their 
 destination was also its own. It had been drawn up 
 exactly opposite the open gate. The bystanders all 
 fell back, forming a clear lane from the gateway to 
 the van, and the men in cloaks entered the latter con- 
 veyance. 
 
 ' They are labourers, I fancy,' said Stephen. ' Ah, it 
 is strange ; but I recognize three of them as Endelstow 
 men. Rather remarkable this.' 
 
 Presently they began to come out, two and two ; and 
 under the rays of the lamp they were seen to bear 
 between them a light-coloured coffin of satin-wood, 
 brightly polished, and without a nail. The eight men 
 took the burden upon their shoulders, and slowly 
 crossed with it over to the gate. 
 
 Knight and Stephen went outside, and came close 
 to the procession as it moved off. A carriage belong- 
 ing to the cortege turned round close to a lamp. The 
 rays shone in upon the face of the vicar of Endelstow, 
 Mr. Swancourt — looking many years older than when 
 they had last seen him. Knight and Stephen involun- 
 tarily drew back. 
 
 Knight spoke to a bystander. ' What has Mr. 
 Swancourt to do with that funeral ? ' 
 
 ' He is the lady's father,' said the bystander. 
 
 ' What lady's father ? ' said Knight, in a voice so 
 hollow that the man stared at him. 
 
 ' Th? father of the lady in the coffin. She died in 
 443 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 London, you know, and has been brought here by this 
 train. She is to be taken home to-night, and buried 
 to-morrow.' 
 
 Knight stood staring blindly at where the hearse had 
 been ; as if he saw it, or some one, there. Then he 
 turned, and beheld the lithe form of Stephen bowed 
 down like that of an old man. He took his young 
 friend's arm, and led him away from the light. 
 
XL 
 
 Welcome, proud lady.' 
 
 rlALF an hour has passed. Two miserable men are 
 wandering in the darkness up the miles of road from 
 Camelton to Endelstow. 
 
 ' Has she broken her heart ? ' said Henry Knight. 
 ' Can it be that I have killed her ? I was bitter with 
 her, Stephen, and she has died ! And may God have 
 no mercy upon me ! ' 
 
 • How can you have killed her more than I ? ' 
 
 ' Why, I went away from her — stole away almost 
 — and didn't tell her I should not come again; 
 and at that last meeting I did not kiss her once, 
 but let her miserably go. I have been a fool — a 
 fool ! I wish the most abject confession of it before 
 crowds of my countrymen could in any way make 
 amends to my darling for the intense cruelty I have 
 shown her ! ' 
 
 ' Your darling ! ' said Stephen, with a sort of laugh. 
 'Any man can say that, I suppose; any man can. I 
 know this, she was my darling before she was yours ; 
 and after too. If anybody has a right to call her his 
 own, it is I.' 
 
 'You talk like a man in the dark; which is what 
 445 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 you are. Did she ever do anything for you ? Risk her 
 name, for instance, for you ? ' 
 
 ' Yes, she did,' said Stephen emphatically. 
 
 ' Not entirely. Did she ever live for you — prove she 
 could not live without you — laugh and weep for you ? ' 
 
 ' Yes.' 
 
 ' Never ! Did she ever risk her life for you — no ! 
 My darling did for me.' 
 
 • Then it was in kindness only. When did she risk 
 her life for you ? ' 
 
 ' To save mine on the cliff yonder. The poor child 
 was with me looking at the approach of the Puffin 
 steamboat, and I slipped down. We both had a narrow 
 escape. I wish we had died there 1 ' 
 
 ' Ah, but wait,' Stephen pleaded with wet eyes. ' She 
 went on that cliif to see me arrive home : she had 
 promised it. She told me she would months before. 
 And would she have gone there if she had not cared 
 for me at all ? ' 
 
 ' You have an idea that Elfride died for you, no 
 doubt,' said Knight, with a mournful sarcasm too nerve- 
 less to support itself. 
 
 ' Never mind. If we find that — that she died yours, 
 I'll say no more ever.' 
 
 ' And if we find she died yours, I'll say no more.' 
 
 ' Very well — so it shall be.' 
 
 The dark clouds into which the sun had sunk had 
 begun to drop rain in an increasing volume. 
 
 ' Can we wait somewhere here till this shower is 
 over ? ' said Stephen desultorily. 
 
 ' As you will. But it is not worth while. We'll hear 
 the particulars, and return. Don't let people know who 
 we are. I am not much now.' 
 
 They had reached a point at which the road branched 
 
 into two — just outside the west village, one fork of the 
 
 diverging routes passing into the latter place, the other 
 
 stretching on to East Endelstow. Having come some 
 
 446 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 of the distance by the footpath, they now found that the 
 hearse was only a little in advance of them. 
 
 ' I fancy it has turned off to East Endelstow. Can 
 you see ? ' 
 
 ' I cannot. You must be mistaken.' 
 
 Knight and Stephen entered the village. A bar of 
 fiery light lay across the road, proceeding from the half- 
 open door of a smithy, in which bellows were heard 
 blowing and a hammer ringing. The rain had increased, 
 and they mechanically turned for shelter towards the 
 warm and cosy scene. 
 
 Close at their heels came another man, without over- 
 coat or umbrella, and with a parcel under his arm. 
 
 'A wet evening,' he said to the two friends, and 
 passed by them. They stood in the outer penthouse, 
 but the man went in to the fire. 
 
 The smith ceased his blowing, and began talking to 
 the man who had entered. 
 
 ' I have walked all the way from Camelton,' said the 
 latter. ' Was obliged to come to-night, you know.' 
 
 He held the parcel, which was a flat one, towards the 
 firelight, to learn if the rain had penetrated it. Resting 
 it edgewise on the forge, he supported it perpendicularly 
 with one hand, wiping his face with the handkerchief he 
 held in the other. 
 
 ' I suppose you know what I've got here ? ' he 
 observed to the smith. 
 
 ' No, I don't,' said the smith, pausing again on his 
 bellows. 
 
 ' As the rain's not over, I'll show you,' said the bearer. 
 
 He laid the thin and broad package, which had acute 
 angles in different directions, flat upon the anvil, and 
 the smith blew up the fire to give him more light. 
 First, after untying the package, a sheet of brown paper 
 was removed : this was laid flat. Then he unfolded a 
 piece of baize : this also he spread flat on the paper. 
 The third covering was a wrapper of tissue paper, which 
 447 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 was spread out in its turn. The enclosure was revealed, 
 and he held it up for the smith's inspection. 
 
 ' Oh — I see ! ' said the smith, kindUng with a chas- 
 tened interest, and drawing close. ' Poor young lady — 
 ah, terrible melancholy thing — so soon too ! ' 
 
 Knight and Stephen turned their heads and looked. 
 
 ' And what's that ? ' continued the smith. 
 
 'That's the coronet — beautifully finished, isn't it? 
 Ah, that cost some money ! ' 
 
 ' 'Tis as fine a bit of metal work as ever I see — that 'tis.' 
 
 ' It came from the same people as the coffin, you 
 know, but was not ready soon enough to be sent round 
 to the house in London yesterday. I've got to fix it on 
 this very night.' 
 
 The carefully-packed articles were a coffin-plate and 
 coronet. 
 
 Knight and Stephen came forward. The under- 
 taker's man, on seeing them look for the inscription, 
 civilly turned it round towards them, and each read, 
 almost at one moment, by the ruddy light of the coals : 
 
 TOife at Spenaet |^tig0 ILnxtUtan, 
 
 iFifteentl^ Baron l^nieHtati; 
 
 Mti JFeituarg lo, i8— . 
 
 They read it, and read it, and read it again — 
 Stephen and Knight — as if animated by one soul. 
 Then Stephen put his hand upon Knight's arm, and 
 they retired from the yellow glow, further, further, till 
 the chill darkness enclosed them round, and the quiet 
 sky asserted its presence overhead as a dim grey sheet 
 of blank monotony. 
 
 ' Where shall we go ? ' said Stephen. 
 
 ' I don't know.' 
 
 A long silence ensued. . . . ' Elfride married ! ' said 
 448 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 Stephen then in a thin whisper, as if he feared to let 
 the assertion loose on the world. 
 
 ' False,' whispered Knight. 
 
 ' And dead. Denied us both. I hate " false " — I 
 hate it ! ' 
 
 Knight made no answer. 
 
 Nothing was heard by them now save the slow 
 measurement of time by their beating pulses, the soft 
 touch of the dribbling rain upon their clothes, and the 
 low purr of the blacksmith's bellows hard by. 
 
 ' Shall we follow Elfie any further ? ' Stephen said. 
 
 ' No : let us leave her alone. She is beyond our 
 love, and let her be beyond our reproach. Since we 
 don't know half the reasons that made her do as she 
 did, Stephen, how can we say, even now, that she was 
 not pure and true in heart ? ' Knight's voice had now 
 become mild and gentle as a child's. He went on : 
 ' Can we call her ambitious ? No. Circumstance has, 
 as usual, overpowered her purposes — fragile and delicate 
 as she — liable to be overthrown in a moment by the 
 coarse elements of accident. I know that's it, — don't 
 you?' 
 
 ' It may be — it must be. Let us go on.' 
 
 They began to bend their steps towards Castle 
 Boterel, whither they had sent their bags from Camel- 
 ton. They wandered on in silence for many minutes. 
 Stephen then paused, and lightly put his hand within 
 Knight's arm. 
 
 ' I wonder how she came to die,' he said in a broken 
 whisper. ' Shall we return and learn a little more ? ' 
 
 They turned back again, and entering Endelstow a 
 second time, came to a door which was standing open. 
 It was that of an inn called the Welcome Home, and 
 the house appeared to have been recently repaired and 
 entirely modernized. The name too was not that of 
 the same landlord as formerly, but Martin Cannister's. 
 
 Knight and Smith entered. The inn was quite 
 449 2 F 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 silent, and they followed the passage till they reached 
 the kitchen, where a huge fire was burning, which roared 
 up the chimney, and sent over the floor, ceiling, and 
 newly-whitened walls a glare so intense as to make the 
 candle quite a secondary light. A woman in a white 
 apron and black gown was standing there alone be- 
 hind a cleanly-scrubbed deal table. Stephen first, and 
 Knight afterwards, recognized her as Unity, who had 
 been parlour-maid at the yicarage and young lady's-maid 
 at the Crags. 
 
 ' Unity,' said Stephen softly, ' don't you know me ? ' 
 
 She looked inquiringly a moment, and her face 
 cleared up. 
 
 ' Mr. Smith — ay, that it is ! ' she said. ' And that's 
 Mr. Knight. I beg you to sit down. Perhaps you 
 know that since I saw you last I have married Martin 
 Cannister.' 
 
 ' How long have you been married ? ' 
 
 ' About five months. We were married the same day 
 that my dear Miss Elfie became Lady Luxellian.' Tears 
 appeared in Unity's eyes, and filled them, and fell down 
 her cheek, in spite of efforts to the contrary. 
 
 The pain of the two men in resolutely controlling 
 themselves when thus exampled to admit relief of the 
 same kind was distressing. They both turned their 
 backs and walked a few steps away. 
 
 Then Unity said, 'Will you go into the parlour, 
 gentlemen ? ' 
 
 ' Let us stay here with her,' Knight whispered, and 
 turning said, ' No ; we will sit here. We want to rest 
 and dry ourselves here for a time, if you please.' 
 
 That evening the sorrowing friends sat with their 
 hostess beside the large fire. Knight in the recess 
 formed by the chimney breast, where he was in shade. 
 And by showing a little confidence they won hers, and 
 she told them what they had stayed to hear — the latter 
 history of poor Elfride. 
 
 45° 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 ' One day — after you, Mr. Knight, left us for the last 
 time — she was missed from the Crags, and her father 
 went after her, and brought her home ill. Where she 
 went to, I never knew — but she was very unwell for 
 weeks afterwards. And she said to me that she didn't 
 care what became of her, and she wished she could die. 
 When she was better, I said she would Uve to be 
 married yet, and she said then, " Yes ; I'll do anything 
 for the benefit of my family, so as to turn my useless 
 life to some practical account." Well, it began like this 
 about Lord Luxellian courting her. The first Lady 
 Luxellian had died, and he was in great trouble because 
 the Httle girls were left motherless. After a while they 
 used to come and see her in their Httle black frocks, for 
 they liked her as well or better than their own mother — 
 that's true. They used to call her "little mamma." 
 These children made her a shade livelier, but she was 
 not the girl she had been — I could see that — and she 
 grew thinner a good deal. Well, my lord got to ask 
 the Swancourts oftener and oftener to dinner — nobody 
 else of his acquaintance — and at last the vicar's family 
 were backwards and forwards at all hours of the day. 
 Well, people say that the little girls asked their father 
 to let Miss Elfride come and live with them, and that 
 he said perhaps he would if they were good children. 
 However, the time went on, and one day I said, " Miss 
 Elfride, you don't look so well as you used to; and 
 though nobody else seems to notice it I do." She 
 laughed a little, and said, " I shall live to be married 
 yet, as you told me." 
 
 ' " Shall you, miss ? I am glad to hear that,'' I said. 
 
 ' " Whom do you think I am going to be married 
 to ? " she said again. 
 
 ' " Mr. Knight, I suppose," said I. 
 
 ' " Oh ! " she cried, and turned off so white, and afore 
 I could get to her she had sunk down like a heap of 
 clothes, and fainted away. Well, then, she came to 
 451 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 herself after a time, and said, " Unity, now we'll go on 
 with our conversation." 
 
 ' " Better not to-day, miss," I said. 
 
 ' " Yes, we will," she said. " Whom do you think 
 I am going to be married to ? " 
 
 ' " I don't know," I said this time. 
 
 ' " Guess," she said. 
 
 ' " 'Tisn't my lord, is it ? " says I. 
 
 ' " Yes, 'tis," says she, in a sick wild way. 
 
 ' " But he don't come courting much," I said. 
 
 ' " Ah ! you don't know," she said, and told me 
 'twas going to be in October. After that she freshened 
 up a bit — whether 'twas with the thought of getting 
 away from home or not, I don't know. For, perhaps, 
 I may as well speak plainly, and tell you that her home 
 was no home to her now. Her father was bitter to her 
 and harsh upon her ; and though Mrs. Swancourt was 
 well enough in her way, 'twas a sort of cold politeness 
 that was not worth much, and the little thing had a 
 worrying time of it altogether. About a month before 
 the wedding, she and my lord and the two children used 
 to ride about together upon horseback, and a very pretty 
 sight they were ; and if you'll believe me, I never saw 
 him once with her unless the children were with her too 
 — which made the courting so strange-looking. Ay, 
 and my lord is so handsome, you know, so that at last 
 I think she rather liked him; and I have seen her 
 smile and blush a bit at things he said. He wanted 
 her the more because the children did, for everybody 
 could see that she would be a most tender mother to 
 them, and friend and playmate too. And my lord is 
 not only handsome, but a splendid courter, and up to 
 all the ways o't. So he made her the beautifullest 
 presents ; ah, one I can mind — a lovely bracelet, with 
 diamonds and emeralds. Oh, how red her face came 
 when she saw it! The old roses came back to her 
 cheeks for a minute or two then. I helped dress her 
 452 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 the day we both were married — it was the last service 
 I did her, poor child! When she was ready, I ran 
 upstairs and slipped on my own wedding gown, and 
 away they went, and away went Martin and I ; and no 
 sooner had my lord and my lady been married than the 
 parson married us. It was a very quiet pair of weddings 
 — hardly anybody knew it. Well, hope will hold its 
 own in a young heart, if so be it can; and my lady 
 freshened up a bit, for my lord was so handsome and 
 kind.' 
 
 ' How came she to die — and away from home ? ' 
 murmured Knight. 
 
 ' Don't you see, sir, she fell off again afore they'd 
 been married long, and my lord took her abroad for 
 change of scene. They were coming home, and had 
 got as far as London, when she was taken very ill and 
 couldn't be moved, and there she died.' 
 
 ' Was he very fond of her ? ' 
 
 ' What, my lord ? Oh, he was ! ' 
 
 ' Very fond of her ? ' 
 
 • Very, beyond everything. Not suddenly, but by 
 slow degrees. 'Twas her nature to win people more 
 when they knew her well. He'd have died for her, I 
 believe. Poor my lord, he's heart-broken now ! ' 
 
 ' The funeral is to-morrow ? ' 
 
 ' Yes j my husband is now at the vault with the 
 masons, opening the steps and cleaning down the walls.' 
 
 The next day two men walked up the familiar valley 
 from Castle Boterel to East Endelstow Church. And 
 when the funeral was over, and every one had left the 
 lawn-like churchyard, the pair went softly down the 
 steps of the LuxelHan vault, and under the low-groined 
 arches they had beheld once before, lit up then as now. 
 In the new niche of the crypt lay a rather new coffin, 
 which had lost some of its lustre, and a newer coffin 
 still, bright and untarnished in the ^lightest degree. 
 453 
 
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES 
 
 Beside the latter was the dark form of a man, kneel- 
 ing on the damp floor, his body flung across the coffin, 
 his hands clasped, and his whole frame seemingly given 
 up in utter abandonment to grief. He was still young — 
 younger, perhaps, than Knight — and even now showed 
 how graceful was his figure and symmetrical his build. 
 He murmured a prayer half aloud, and was quite un- 
 conscious that two others were standing within a few 
 yards of him. 
 
 Knight and Stephen had advanced to where they 
 once stood beside Elfride on the day all three had met 
 there, before she had herself gone down into silence 
 like her ancestors, and shut her bright blue eyes for 
 ever. Not until then did they see the kneeling figure 
 in the dim light. Knight instantly recognized the 
 mourner as Lord LuxeUian, the bereaved husband of 
 Elfride. 
 
 They felt themselves to be intruders. Knight pressed 
 Stephen back, and they silently withdrew as they had 
 entered. 
 
 ' Come away,' he said, in a broken voice. ' We have 
 no right to be there. Another stands before us — 
 nearer to her than we ! ' 
 
 And side by side they both retraced their steps down 
 the grey still valley to Castle Boterel. 
 
 THE END