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 THE UNIVERSITY 
 
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 LOS ANGELES 
 
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 The California State 
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 members of the Legislature and its officers during the 
 session of the same, and at anj time by the Governor and 
 the offlcersof the Executive Department oi this State, 
 who are required to keep their offices :it the seat of 
 government, the Justices of the Supreme Court, the At- 
 torney-General and the Trustees of the Lihrarj .
 
 JOHN DOEEIEN: 
 
 A NOVEL. 
 
 BY 
 
 JULIA KAVANAGH, 
 
 AVTIIOB OF 
 "NATHALIE," " ADELE," " BESSIE,'' " DOEA," ETC. 
 
 NEW YORK: 
 I> • APPLETON AND COMPANY, 
 
 549 AND 551 BROADWAY. 
 1875.
 
 ?r\ 
 
 * 
 
 JOHN DOEEIEN. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 It was six o'clock, and quite dark, October being- the 
 lime of the year, and yet Mrs. Dorrien, who was to have* 
 been home by five, had "not come back from town. Johnny, 
 as he sat perched up on his high chair, looking- down at the 
 fire in the grate before him, wondered rather anxiously 
 what kept his mother out so late. We call him Johnny 
 because he was only ten years old, and a very little fellow, 
 too, for that time of life. He was not a fine boy, nor yet a 
 handsome one. He was undersized, to begin with, and his 
 little face was thin and pale — the face of a child who stays 
 too much within. Even the firelight, which showed so 
 plainly the turncd-np nose and pointed thin, could not pre- 
 tend to give the glow of health to what it lit up. And yet, 
 seen by that fitful light — there was none other in the room, 
 Johnny being strictly forbidden to touch the petroleum-oil 
 lamp — it had a quaint charm of its own. The brow, around 
 which clustered rich brown curls, was firmly and finely 
 moulded. The eyes, of a dark gray, were so beautiful, so 
 full of light and fire,, and yet so deep and tender, that, if 
 you had seen them once, you never forgot them again, even 
 as the mobile, expressive countenance never left your 
 memory when you had once watched its wonderful play. 
 In repose it had not much to recommend it to favor, for it 
 owed nothing to color or to clear, fine outline. His beau- 
 tiful eyes, and the little, eager, passionate soul that lived in 
 his frail body, and shone out through them, gave Johnny 
 his only claim to that dower of beauty which the sons and 
 daughters of Adam would all so gladly possess.
 
 4 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 He now sat on his high chair, his short legs dangling' 
 down, an open book on his knee. He was looking, as we 
 said, at the fire, wondering why his mother did not come 
 back ; also listening to the kettle's low song, and waiting 
 patiently till some bright flame should shoot up and let 
 him go on with "Aladdin's Lamp." It came at length — 
 a magic flame, that took him straight into the wonderful 
 garden, where Aladdin, alias Johnny, plucked rubies, sap- 
 phires, and emeralds, to his heart's content. That flame 
 lit up to advantage the room in which the boy sat. The 
 low ceiling showed that it belonged to a second floor; but 
 it looked a pleasant room, for all that. In that bright yet 
 uncertain light there was no detecting the worn carpet, the 
 faded damask curtains, the tarnished gilding of the frames 
 on the wall. Every thing looked warm and pleasant, and 
 every thing, after a fashion, was so. Mrs. Dorrien had 
 been affluent once, and had preserved some relics of better 
 days. A few pictures, some good china, an old Japanese 
 cabinet, adorned her second-floor sitting-room. Moreover, 
 she had a woman's art in making the best of every thing ; 
 and, if Mrs. Dorrien had lived in a garret, she would have 
 contrived so that it should not look a depressing one. 
 
 The flame, by suddenly dying away, took Johnny out 
 of the marvelous garden, where trees bore precious stones 
 by way of fruit, to the dim world of a London room. The 
 water in the kettle was boiling now, and surely Mrs. Dor- 
 rien must soon return. 
 
 "I think I shall make the tea," said Johnny, talking 
 aloud to himself. He led a rather lonely life, and' had ac- 
 quired that habit. 
 
 So, jumping down from his chair, he climbed up on an- 
 other, to reach down the tea-caddy from the chiffonnier y 
 and, in doing so, he knocked down an old china teacup 
 and saucer on the floor, where they were at once shattered 
 to pieces. 
 
 "Oh ! what will mamma say?" cried Johnny, bursting 
 into tears — " oh ! what will she say ? " 
 
 For the cup was not merely valuable in itself, but it 
 had been the gift of his dear father to his mother, and, of 
 all her relics of the past, it was perhaps that which she held 
 most dear. 
 
 The question of what Mrs. Dorrien would say was soon
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 5 
 
 solved. Jolmny was still Bobbing bitterly over the frag- 
 ments of the teacup, when the door opened, and his moth- 
 er entered the room. 
 
 "Johnny!" she cried, in an alarmed voice, "what is 
 the matter ? Are you hurt ? — what is it ? " 
 
 "Oh ! I — I have broken the — the cup," sobbed Johnny, 
 desperately. " I wanted to make the tea, and I broke it." 
 
 " But you are not hurt ? " said his mother, anxiously. 
 
 "No; "but I wanted to make the tea, and — " 
 
 Here Johnny gave way to another burst of sorrow. 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien could have cried, too, for the loss of her 
 cup, if the relief of finding that Johnny had come to no 
 harm had not been the stronger feeling of the two. She 
 never left him — and she had to leave him often — but she 
 thought, "What will happen to him while I am out?" 
 And she never opened her own door when she came home 
 that her heart did not throb with a nameless fear. So, 
 though the cup was broken, it was a relief to find Johnny 
 safe and sound. Mrs. Dorrien lit the lamp, and Johnny, 
 picking up the pieces of the broken cup and saucer, placed 
 them on the table before his mother, and, looking up eager- 
 ly in her face, asked if they could not be mended. 
 
 " I am afraid not, my dear," she replied, sadly. " "What 
 is there that, being once broken, can really be mended in 
 this world?" 
 
 With which despondent remark Mrs. Dorrien seemed 
 to dismiss the subject of the broken cup, and, taking off her 
 cloak and bonnet, made the tea. 
 
 Johnny's mother had married late in life, and was now 
 forty-five. She had been lovely in her youth, and was 
 pretty still, with a fresh color, and very black hair and eyes. 
 She was an active, energetic woman, and, when her hus- 
 band's death left her and Johnny, then one year old, desti- 
 tute, she scarcely gave herself time to grieve before she 
 sought for the means of earning a livelihood. She had 
 been reared in comfort, she had never worked unless for 
 her pleasure ; but she fought the battle of life, when her 
 turn came to do so, as bravely as if she had been brought 
 up in the din of that fierce war where the strong never 
 think of sparing the weak. For seven years she had strug- 
 gled on, taking up and dropping various trades on the 
 way, until she had at length found what, alter some pover-
 
 6 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 ty, seemed a handsome competence, in the coloring of 
 photographs. She had been this day to town on business, 
 and Johnny, her sole friend and confidant, now questioned 
 her concerning her success while they took their tea ; a 
 late dinner, or, in plain speech, more than one substantial 
 meal a day, being out of the question for Mrs. Dorrien and 
 Johnny. 
 
 " Little mother " — he always called her so — " did you 
 get that order ? " he asked, fastening his brilliant, search- 
 ing eyes on her face. 
 
 " Yes, dear, I did. It is such a relief to be svire of that 
 money ! We are going to be quite rich now. And what 
 have you been doing, Johnny ? " 
 
 " Well, little mother, I learned my lessons, of course, 
 and then I read about Aladdin. And oh ! little mother, if 
 I only had his lamp, how I would rub and rub it again, 
 and give you heaps of every thing — such heaps ! " cried 
 Johnny, bursting out into a peal of joyous, triumphant 
 laughter ; " and then," he resumed, relapsing into sudden 
 gravity, " you need never color photographs no more." 
 
 "Any more," corrected Mrs. Dorrien, a little sharply. 
 " I wish you would talk correctly. Your father was a gen- 
 tleman, and a thorough scholar, as I have often told you. 
 Give me your Latin grammar." 
 
 "I know my Latin lesson, little mother, indeed I do; 
 but learning it in that French grammar of L'Homond's 
 makes it so difficult," pleaded Johnny. 
 
 " Nonsense ! Your father spoke French like a French- 
 man ; and learning Latin in a French grammar is the verv 
 best tiling for you." 
 
 Johnny handed her L'Homond, and went through his 
 task very creditably. At least his mother, who had to study 
 her own lesson — and hard work she found it — before she 
 heard him repeat his, expressed herself satisfied. 
 
 " And you will teach me Greek, little mother, \v i 11 } r ou 
 not? " asked Johnny, with sparkling eyes. 
 
 " No, my dear, I cannot." 
 
 " Hut you said I was to know Greek," he cried, in blank 
 disappointment. 
 
 " Well, I do hope that you will know it," replied Mrs. 
 Dorrien. " Your father knew Greek thoroughly, I have 
 been told, and so must you be a good Greek scholar.
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 7 
 
 Only" — here Mrs. Dorricn's voice faltered, and her black 
 eyes, though there was not much tenderness in them, rested 
 very fondly on her boy — "only, my dear little lad, I must 
 send you to school. I have not the knowledge, and 1 have 
 not the time, to teach you myself. I must send you to 
 school. 1 ' 
 
 Johnny's color came and went. 
 
 " To a day-school ? " he suggested. 
 
 " No, dear, to a boarding-school." 
 
 Johnny's lip twitched and his little pale face lengthened 
 visibly ; but he was brave by nature, and had been accus- 
 tomed by his mother to much self-restraint, so he only 
 said : 
 
 " Is the school far awav, little mother?" 
 
 " Very far away, my dear." 
 
 " Twenty miles ? " suggested Johnny. 
 
 " My dear, it is not in England," replied his mother, a 
 little nervously; and, to get rid at once of the bitter sub- 
 ject, she informed him that she was going to send him to 
 a boarding-school on the coast of France, and as, though 
 she expected and received unquestioning obedience, she 
 was never unwilling to give good reason for what she did, 
 Mrs. Dorrien explained to Johnny why she had taken and 
 now acted upon this resolution. 
 
 " You see, my darling," she said, with a sigh, " it is all 
 very well for me to color photographs, but you must have a 
 classical education, and be a gentleman as your father was. 
 You must be an accomplished man," said Mrs. Dorrien, 
 warming with her subject — " equal to any position. Per- 
 haps you will have to color photographs after all," she 
 added, with a touch of bitterness; "but one thing I will 
 do for you : I will give you an education fit for a peer's son. 
 I cannot do it in this country, but there is a place on the 
 French coast called Saint-Ives, where living is almost for 
 nothing, and schooling — good schooling — -is amazingly 
 cheap. I shall keep you there for a few }ears, and, cheap 
 though it is, I need not tell you how heavy a sacrifice 
 it will be for me to do this. Only, Johnny, bear in mind that, 
 if you do not work hard — very hard, mind you — I might just 
 as well keep you here and save the money." 
 
 " I will work hard," said Johnny, in a low voice. 
 
 " I want you to have a gentleman's education," resumed
 
 8 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien, with a persistency which showed how bitter- 
 ly she felt her downfall in the world, " because you must 
 be a gentleman. If you should have to color photographs, 
 Greek and Latin will not prevent you from doing it ; and 
 if, as I trust, you will have some better work to do, why, 
 they can only help you with that work. But know them 
 you shall — that is, if you will learn," she added, giving him 
 a sharp look. 
 
 " Indeed, little mother, I will," protested Johnny, who 
 was ready to cry from very earnestness. 
 
 " French you will learn, of course ; English you will 
 keep up with the English teacher ; and if I can afford 
 it, you shall study German. Your father knew every lan- 
 guage in Europe — Russian excepted." 
 
 If Mrs. Dorrien had there and then asked him to in- 
 clude Russian in his studies, Johnny would have said yes 
 without hesitation. They were wholly unlike in person, 
 mind, and temper, but ambition was common to both mother 
 and son. 
 
 " Of course you will have many things to learn besides 
 Greek and Latin," resumed Mrs. Dorrien, after a pause. 
 " I suppose you cannot excel in all — " 
 
 "Why not, if I try?" interrupted Johnny, his little 
 face kindling all over with excitement. 
 
 "You must try," decisively said his mother; "but of 
 course you cannot excel in all ; only, Johnny, you must not 
 fail entirely in any thing that you do attempt. It would 
 half break* my heart ; for, what with the money and the 
 being left alone, I do not know how I shall bear it all ! " 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien took out her pocket-handkerchief and be- 
 gan to cry, but no sooner did Johnny attempt to follow her 
 example than she checked her own tears, and dried his 
 with an emphatic " Nonsense ! " Then, as if repenting the 
 harshness of her tone, she bade the lad come and sit by her 
 on the sofa — it was Johnny's bed at night — and, with her 
 arm caressingly passed round his neck, she spoke to him 
 about the school to which she was sending him, and gave 
 him every particular concerning its head, teachers, and 
 management, which she had been able to ascertain. 
 
 " You see, Johnny," said Mrs. Dorrien, " the head of 
 that school is the Abbe Yeran — one of the most learned 
 men in France, I am told. It is a school of the highest
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 9 
 
 class, though very cheap (of course it is very dear for my 
 means, but never mind that), and the teachers belonging to 
 it are first rate. The abb6 is a rich man, and does not want 
 to make money by his pupils. He wants to make great 
 sciiolaiis of them," said Mrs. Dorrien, speaking in capitals. 
 
 Johnny opened his eyes wide and nodded. 
 
 " So when they are stupid or idle he turns them out at 
 the end of a year," coolly remarked Mrs. Dorrien, giving 
 Johnny a sharp look. 
 
 The boy looked more excited than alarmed at the im- 
 plied threat. His little, eager face plainly said that he did 
 not mean to be turned out by the Abbe Veran. 
 
 " He turned out a great many last year, I am told," re- 
 sumed Mrs. Dorrien, drawing a little upon her imagination 
 for the latter fact, " ' because,' as he properly remarks, 
 ' why should I, who have established this school — not for 
 profit, but for the honor of the thing — why should I keep 
 boys so stupid or so idle that they would only disgrace my 
 teaching?' Of course it takes some interest to get into a 
 school of that kind ; and if Mr. Perry had not answered for 
 you, also if you had not been the child of Catholic parents, 
 you could not have been admitted." 
 
 " O mother ! " cried Johnny, turning white, " will Mr. 
 Perry give you no more photographs to color if — if I do 
 not please the abbe ? " 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien had a great mind to say that such would 
 be Mr. Perry^ undoubted line of action if Johnny did not 
 behave himself at school; but her heart relented at the 
 frightened look of the child, and she hoped that Mr. Perry 
 would not be quite so severe. Indeed, thinking that she 
 might have gone too far, she proceeded to give him quite 
 a glowing account of the beautiful place he was going to, 
 and of the happy life he was to lead there. 
 
 " And when do we go, little mother ? " asked Johnny. 
 
 " You go this day week," answered Mrs. Dorrien, look- 
 ing at the fire. 
 
 " Don't you come with me ? " he asked, in blank dismay. 
 
 " I can't, dear." 
 
 Johnny looked up in his mother's face, as if he could 
 scarcely trust his ears. She had been so jealous of his per- 
 sonal safety that she had rarely allowed him to go to the 
 end of the street alone, and now she was sending him
 
 10 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 across the sea " all alone by himself," as Johnny said in 
 his own thoughts. But even this solitary journey to a 
 strange land was nothing to what followed. 
 
 "And shall I come back all alone, too, for the holi- 
 days ?" asked Johnny, wistfully. 
 
 " " I must try to go and see you for the holidays," an- 
 swered his mother ; but she looked at the fire again. _ 
 
 Johnny was truth itself; to tell no lies cost him no 
 effort, and as he was, so he held all others to be. Words 
 spoken by his mother especially were to him as certain 
 realities as if they had been uttered by the fair goddess 
 who lives in a well ; but if he was truthful and trusting, he 
 was also singularly penetrating for so young a child, and 
 he now looked at his mother in sore perplexity. She said 
 that she must try to go and see him, and therefore that 
 must be true ; and yet Johnny knew that she had no inten- 
 tion of trying — that she would never come, and that his 
 holidays were to be spent in solitude. He was too young 
 to say as much to himself in the clear speech which thought 
 utters to us in our riper years, but he felt it, and the feel- 
 ing it was that which brought to his face that earnest, per- 
 plexed look before which his mother shrank. Poor wom- 
 an ! she liked truth well enough, and, to do her justice, 
 practised it nine times out of the ten; but when truth 
 would be a stumbling-block in her path, why, she stepped 
 aside, and asked of herself, " How could I help it ? " Truth 
 in the present case she considered one of these stumbling- 
 blocks, and therefore she looked at the fire. 
 
 Johnny was much depressed, and his mother, not know- 
 ing how to cheer him, decreed, in her peremptory way, 
 that he was cross and sleepy, and must go to bed. 
 Johnny submitted ; it never occurred to him to dispute her 
 will. Accordingly, the sofa was turned down, and Johnny, 
 having said his prayers and undressed, was tucked in ; 
 but he could not sleep, and the look of his large, brilliant 
 eyes never left his mother. She came and stood over him, 
 half fond, half reproving. 
 
 " I wonder where you get your eyes from ? " she said, 
 smiling down at his Tittle pale face. " They are not like 
 m i no — they are not like your father's. They are Irish eyes. 
 I believe you had an Irish great-grandmother. I suppose 
 the eyes came from her."
 
 JOHN DORRIEN'. 11 
 
 Johnny had no doubt on the subject, having heard his 
 mother utter the above remark a hundred times, at least. 
 
 "Well, they are lovely eyes," resumed Mrs. Dorrien, 
 with a sigh, "and clever eyes, too ; and if you don't learn, 
 Johnny, 1 shall always say the fault was yours." 
 
 " But I will learn — indeed I will, little mother," cried 
 Johnny, with strong symptoms of forthcoming tears. 
 
 "Hush!" said Mrs. Dorrien — "go to sleep directly," 
 and to enforce her commands by the aid of darkness, she 
 carried away the lamp to the next room, where she at once 
 busied herself in looking over Johnny's clothes. At first 
 Johnny's mother saw very well that three little shirts were 
 past mending, and that there was no cure to the frayed 
 edges of two white collars; but after a while there came 
 such a mist over her eyes that she saw nothing more. The 
 natural grief which she had hidden and repressed now 
 overpowered her ; her poor hands shook as she put away 
 one of Johnny's silk neckties, and remembered that other 
 hands than her own would have to settle and tie it round 
 the neck of her boy for many a day to come — unless, indeed, 
 as was most likely, his own little awkward hands were left 
 to perform that office. 
 
 "Oh! how can I do without him? — how can I?" 
 thought the poor mother, sinking down on a chair by the 
 side of her bed, and burying her face in her pillow, that 
 Johnny might not hear her sobbing. "I could be so happy 
 alone with him in a desert! How can I let him go away 
 from me ? Must I let others nurse him when he is ill, and 
 must I die, perhaps, and not see him again ? My boy, my 
 Johnny, all that is left to me out of my poor wasted life, 
 how can I do it ? " 
 
 Cruel, bitter question ! But, though Mrs. Dorrien was 
 not a high-minded woman, she had, as we have already 
 said, plenty of courage and energy. Grief and repining 
 being utterly useless, she now bade them begone. Ma- 
 ternal ambition, the feeling that she was sacrificing her 
 own happiness for that of her darling, and a firm faith that, 
 if she surrendered her child to the keeping of Providence, 
 the trust would be redeemed, gave her strength to bear 
 this sorrow. She raised her face from her pillow, she re- 
 turned to the survey of Johnny's clothes, and, when it was 
 at length time for her to go to bed, she only allowed her-
 
 12 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 self one indulgence — that of going to look at her sleeping 
 
 boy. 
 
 But Johnny was not asleep; his bright eyes were open, 
 his cheeks were flushed. " Little mother," he said, excit- 
 edly, " I will be a great scholar, I will indeed. And you 
 need not be afraid of Mr. Perry, and I will earn plenty of 
 money for you when I grow up and — " 
 
 " Hush, darling, you must sleep," soothingly said his 
 mother. 
 
 She kissed him fondly, she sat down by his side, she 
 took his little fevered hands in her own, she talked to him 
 coaxingly, and little by little she led his thoughts away 
 from the school and Mr. Perry. 
 
 "You were talking to me about Aladdin, were you 
 not ? " said Mrs. Dorrien. " What were you saying, 
 Johnny ? " 
 
 " Oh ! little mother, I was saying that, if I had his lamp, 
 I would rub and rub it till you should have heaps and heaps 
 of gold, and — " 
 
 " There, that will do," interrupted Mrs. Dorrien, vexed 
 to see the excited look coming back to his eyes ; " I wish 
 Mr. Perry had never given you that book. Shut your eyes 
 and go to sleep, child. People can always fall asleep, if 
 they will only shut their eyes." 
 
 Obedient Johnny closed his eyes, and was indeed very 
 fast asleep ere long. But, alas for Mrs. Dorrien's infalli- 
 ble recipe ! In vain she tried its efficacy that night. Sleep 
 came not to her until long after gray morning had stolen 
 into her room. 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 It is bitter to linger over a parting, and there is no need 
 for us to linger over this one. The week has gone by 
 pitilessly swift in its course, thought Johnny's mother. She 
 had worked night and day at his little outfit, she had 
 drained her scanty resources almost dry, that he might 
 want for nothing, and she had gone down to Newhaven to 
 see bim on board the steamer that was to bear him away,
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 13 
 
 and commended him to the care of captain and steward, 
 with a sharp sort of earnestness that plainly said, "You 
 have nothing on board your boat so valuable as my boy." 
 And, having done this, Mrs. Dorrien had kissed Johnny, 
 strictly forbidden him to cry, and left him to all appearance 
 for the purpose of taking the train, and going straight home 
 to Kensington, and there resuming that coloring of photo- 
 graphs which his departure had sadly interrupted. In re- 
 ality, Mrs. Dorrien had retired to the gloom of a dingy cor- 
 ner of the station, and thence she watched the little solitary 
 figure that stood on the deck, so little and so lonely in its 
 plain gray suit, and with its leather bag strapped round its 
 tiny body, the little figure and pale face that were all in all 
 to her. She did not see them long. There was a great 
 stir, a great confusion, and no little noise; then the steamer 
 glided away, and when it could be seen no more, even by 
 her straining eyes, Mrs. Dorrien took the train, and went 
 home — if that place whence her boy was gone could be 
 called home now. Sadly and silently, with her veil down, 
 she went home, a lonely, childless mother. 
 
 Never, in all the ten years of his little life, had Johnny 
 felt so forlorn as he felt when he found himself standing 
 alone on the deck of the boat that was bearing him away 
 to a strange country. He did not cry, he had promised his 
 mother that he would not, and the somewhat severe disci- 
 pline to which Mrs. Dorrien had subjected him had done him 
 this much good, that he could restrain the manifestation of 
 his feelings ; but he looked around him slowly and wistfully, 
 with that gravity of aspect which is so remarkable an attri- 
 bute of childhood. 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien little suspected that by thus sending her 
 boy adrift she had in a great measure shaken the very foun- 
 dations of his moral world. Johnny had not been a spoiled 
 child, nor yet an indulged one ; but he had been cared for, 
 and watched over, as spoiled and pampered children are not 
 always. Mrs. Dorrien washed him, combed him, dressed 
 and undressed him, with her own hands. She learned Latin 
 to teach it to him, no book ever met his eyes without first 
 being read by her, and no child was allowed to say a word 
 to Johnny until Mrs. Dorrien had sifted him thoroughly, and, 
 as she said herself, " turned him inside out." Johnny did 
 not grow up very like his mother, in mind or in temper, for
 
 14 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 all that, but he grew up in blind reliance on her superior 
 wisdom and judgment. And now she had left him, nay, 
 she had sent him forth, and Johnny felt in the condition of 
 a fledgling whom the parent-bird has just turned out of the 
 nest. He did not say in thought that he must rely on him- 
 self alone for the future, but such was his feeling ; and as 
 Johnny, though quick and susceptible, did not belong to 
 the tribe of the weak, but to that of the strong, on that 
 feeling he was to act henceforth. The bond, the great bond 
 between him and his mother, was really broken from that 
 hour of their first parting. To his dying day he loved her 
 fondly, but he never gave her back the authority she had 
 relinquished by sending him among strangers. 
 
 Of this great change Johnny was so far conscious that, 
 even while he looked about him with the keen, observant 
 looks of childhood, he could not forget it. He saw the 
 mighty waste of waters, the boats that glided along or shot 
 across it, the spars of the shipping ; he heard weird cries, 
 strange sounds, and listened with horror to profane oaths, 
 and all the time he also remembered his irresponsible posi- 
 tion with a sort of awe, and was only amazed to see that 
 other people did not seem to think any thing at all about 
 it. Was the world really the same as it had been, now 
 that he, Mrs. Dorrien's little boy, instead of sitting alone in 
 their room on the second floor of the house in Kensington, 
 studying Latin in L'Homond's grammar, or reading about 
 Aladdin, was standing on that narrow deck alone, and look- 
 ing about him with not a soul, so far as it appeared, to 
 watch or control his actions ? His mother, indeed, had com- 
 mended him to a gentleman with a laced cap and a red nose, 
 and, informing him that this was the captain, she had added, 
 in her strict, imperative fashion : 
 
 " Mind you obey him, Johnny." 
 
 So when the boat was fairly on her way, and Johnny's 
 drooping spirits so far revived that he felt hungry, he sidled 
 up to that gentleman, and said, in his little shy voice, which 
 was also a very sweet one — 
 
 " Please, sir, may I eat a biscuit now ? " 
 
 "What?" said the red-nosed gentleman, staring down 
 at him. 
 
 "Please, sir, may 1 eat a biscuit now?" reiterated 
 Johnny.
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 15 
 
 "Yes, yes ; go and ask the steward to give you one," 
 was the hasty reply, for the captain had just raised his 
 glass, and was looking through it. 
 
 "Oh! but I have got them in my leather bag," said 
 Johnny — " seven Abernethy biscuits." 
 
 " Oh ! you have them in your bag, have you?" said the 
 captain, without removing his glass from his right eye — 
 the left one was shut very tightly. " Then, in the name 
 of patience, what do you want me to do for you ? " 
 
 " Please, may I eat one ? " 
 
 " Eat the whole lot of them, if you like, my man," re- 
 plied the captain, with profound indifference. 
 
 Johnny became very red, and drew away abashed. He 
 saw that he bored the captain, and he felt that he must 
 trouble him no more. But he also saw, and he could scarce- 
 ly realize the awful fact, that he had entered a world where 
 little boys could eat up seven Abernethy biscuits unchecked, 
 unscolded, and — uncared for. Why, at that rate, there 
 was no enormity which he, Johnny, Mrs. Dorrien's little 
 boy, could not venture on now ! He might tear his clothes, 
 or spend his pocket-money, two shillings and sixpence, or 
 buy and smoke cigars, or do any other of the immoral 
 actions condemned in the decalogue of boyhood, and who 
 would care to interfere ? Not the captain ! And this was 
 what he had come to, lie, Johnny, who had never walked five 
 minutes alone in the streets of Kensington, he who, even 
 in the pleasant Kensington Gardens, had never been out of 
 the reach of his mother's watchful black eye ! Truly, the 
 woild was an altered world since that morning sun had risen ! 
 
 The conclusion of these philosophical reflections was 
 that Johnny opened his leather bag, took out the other 
 paper bag, in which his seven biscuits had been deposited 
 by his careful mother, and instead of one biscuit, ate two. 
 For, since he was to bear the burden, Johnny thought he 
 might as well have the advantages of irresponsibilitv. 
 
 "All right now?" said the captain, nodding to him, 
 and without waiting for an answer, he walked on. 
 
 The steward also gave Johnny a look, then the steward- 
 ess came and said a few words, then he was once more 
 alone. The boat was out at sea now, land had vanished, 
 a mild hazy sky bent over the smooth green waters, and 
 long-winged white sea-birds flew screaming above them.
 
 16 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 Every poem, every tale, every history Johnny had read 
 now came back to him, and fired his little brain. Wicked 
 sailors shooting holy albatrosses ; brave young heroes cross- 
 ing seas on romantic quests ; noble Christopher Columbuses 
 seeking new worlds — all were with him then, and somehow 
 or other he was one and all of them. He had killed the 
 albatross with his cross-bow ; he was sailing in that huge 
 boat, with its sails out, and its chimney smoking, in order 
 to seek his fortune ; and, above all, he was goiiig to dis- 
 cover America with all his might, and to be carried in 
 triumph by rebellious, penitent sailors, who wore low hats, 
 and blue jackets, and fiat collars, and the chief rebel of 
 whom had a laced cap and a red nose. 
 
 Though Johnny, who had lived much alone, and thus 
 become a great dreamer, indulged himself in these fancies, 
 he found time and attention to bestow on his fellow-pas- 
 sengers. There was an old lady, who looked very poorly, 
 he thought ; then there were two tall men, who did noth- 
 ing but walk up and down the deck, talking all the time ; 
 then there were three little children, who were either 
 screaming or romping or tumbling about everybody's legs ; 
 and then there was a lad of twelve or thirteen, with whom 
 Johnny fell in love at once. He was a handsome boy, 
 with long, dark locks, soft and laughing dark eyes, and a 
 bewitching countenance. But perhaps the black-velvet 
 tunic which he wore fascinated Johnny as much as his beau- 
 ty. " He must be a prince at the very least," thought the 
 child, " to be so magnificently attired." And he watched 
 him furtivery, and, the more he looked at this beautiful 
 stranger, the more was Johnny smitten. He liked every 
 thing about him — the fashion in which he stood or sat or 
 talked or laughed, showing teeth of pearl, was perfection 
 in Johnny's eyes. And then he had such little white hands, 
 like a girl's, and such dainty feet, in such wonderful little 
 boots. He must be a prince. The prince was not alone. 
 A handsome, white-haired, white-bearded man, with a jovial 
 face, accompanied him, and watched Johnny's looks with 
 great amusement. " Do you know that little fellow, Oli- 
 ver ? " he asked. 
 
 Oliver — such was the prince's name — turned his laugh- 
 ing dark eyes rather languidly toward Johnny, and an- 
 swerd softly that he did not know the funny little chap.
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 17 
 
 "lie is a funny little chap," resumed the white-haired gen- 
 tleman, whose, name was Blackmore, and who was the prince's 
 
 papa ; " and, what is more, he cannot take his eyes off you." 
 
 " Can't he?" said Oliver, still speaking softly, but look- 
 ing by no means surprised or elated. "Well, his looks 
 don't hurt me," he composedly added, and, giving Johnny 
 a careless glance, he turned back to a distant contempla- 
 tion of the man at the helm, which Mr. Blackmore's obser- 
 vations had interrupted. 
 
 Johnny, however, having become conscious that the 
 white-haired and white-bearded gentleman was watching 
 him, had suddenly withdrawn his looks from the prince, 
 and bestowed them on the sea. He was not thinking 
 about it ; to say the truth, he was wondering if this beauti- 
 ful creature in black velvet was bound, like himself, for 
 Saint-Ives, and fondly hoping that such might be the case. 
 He was already — being of an imaginative turn — construct- 
 ing a pleasant romance on that slight foundation, when a 
 voice at his elbow said : 
 
 " Well, and what do you think about it? " 
 
 It was Mr. Blackmore who spoke. Johnnj' started and 
 blushed. 
 
 " About what, sir ? " he asked. 
 
 " Why, about the sea that you are staring at so." 
 
 " I thought it was bigger," answered Johnny. 
 
 " Bigger ! — you thought it was bigger ! Had you never 
 seen it before ? " 
 
 No, Johnny had never seen the sea before, and he had 
 thought it was bigger. He said it very simply, and with- 
 out the least wish of being censorious, for all that Mr. 
 Blackmore measured this mite of a thing from head to foot, 
 burst out laughing ; then, addressing the beautiful Oliver, 
 who stood by his side, looking down benignantly at Johnny, 
 he said, gayly : 
 
 " It thought the sea was bigger. What do you think 
 of that, Oliver?" 
 
 But Oliver was too amiable to say what he thought, so 
 he only smiled and showed his beautiful little teeth. 
 
 " That boy has the most extraordinary eyes for a child," 
 resumed Mr. Blackmore. 
 
 "They are Irish eyes," promptly remarked Johnny — 
 " my mother says so."
 
 18 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 He was rather proud of his Irish eyes, though wholly 
 innocent of attaching any personal value to them. Mr. 
 Blackmore laughed aa\ain, and even Oliver looked amused. 
 
 O CD j 
 
 " And do you really travel all alone ? " resumed Mr. 
 Blackmore, looking down with a careless sort of pity on 
 the little gray figure sitting on the bench before him, with 
 its pale, eager face turned up, and its short legs dangling 
 helplessly. Yes, Johnny traveled all alone. 
 
 " And are you not afraid to go alone to France ? " 
 
 " Oh, no ! I am to wait on deck till the man comes for 
 me." 
 
 " Like a parcel to be called for," said Mr. Blackmore, 
 winking shrewdly. 
 
 Johnny colored up to the roots of his brown hair, and 
 Mr. Blackmore went on with his catechising. 
 
 Was Johnny going to Dieppe? No. Then how far 
 beyond Dieppe was he going? 
 
 " I am going to the great school of Saint-Ives," re- 
 plied Johnny, proudly — for he began to think that this old 
 gentleman was a very inquisitive one. 
 
 The amused expression died out of Mr. Blackmore's 
 face, and even Oliver's rather languid countenance became 
 suddenly interested as Johnny uttered the words " Saint- 
 Ives." Father and son exchanged a look ; they both gazed 
 down at Johnny's little insignificant figure. Then Oliver 
 colored faintly, and Mr. Blackmore whistled and said : 
 
 " Well done ! So nothing less than Saint-Ives will 
 answer you ? No wonder you do not think the sea big 
 enough." 
 
 Like all truthful children, Johnny was very simple ; 
 but spite his simplicity, he had an almost feminine quick- 
 ness of perception, which often made clear to him many 
 things beyond either his knowledge or his experience. 
 In a moment it now seemed to be revealed to him that 
 the young prince in black velvet was one of those unfor- 
 tunate pupils who had been turned out of Saint-Ives ; 
 and this was so far true that the head of that establish- 
 ment had, after giving the handsome Oliver a year's trial, 
 advised his father to place him under other tuition. 
 
 "It was Mr. Perry Avho got me in," said Johnny, a 
 little deprecatingly, and as if he thought it needful to 
 apologize for his overweening ambition.
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 19 
 
 " Mr 1 'my ! What Mr. Perry ? " 
 
 And when Johnny in his innocence supplied the need- 
 ful informal ion, and Mr. Perry turned out to be a pho- 
 tographer in London, Mr. Blackmore smiled skeptically ; 
 but being too well-bred a man to contradict even a child, 
 he only smiled, and, having had enough of Johnny by this, 
 he walked to the other end of the deck, followed by his 
 son. 
 
 "I say," said Oliver, laughing in his sweet, low voice, 
 "just fancy that little soft chap thinking Mr. Perry got 
 him into Saint-Ives." 
 
 " My dear boy," said Mr. Blackmore, good-humoredly, 
 "it matters very little how that small boy gets in. The 
 great thing is, not to get out of Saint-Ives as you did. 
 Mark my words, that boy will stay." 
 
 "I should not wonder if he did," replied Oliver, look- 
 ing wholly unmoved by the paternal censure. " I must go 
 and have a talk with him." 
 
 Johnny, who had seen the prince depart with a pang 
 of regret, now saw him return with a throb of shy joy. 
 And nothing could be pleasanter and more winning than 
 Oliver Blackmore's mode of beginning an acquaintance. 
 It might be slightly patronizing, but Johnny did not detect 
 that. 
 
 "My name is Oliver Blackmore," said he, sitting down 
 by Johnny's side, and drawing up one of his legs to nurse 
 it with graceful familiarity. "We have a chateau three 
 leagues north of Saint-Ives — such a big place! They call 
 it La Maison Rouge. My father bought it for the sake of 
 the fishing ; for there is a little river thick with fish that 
 flows through our grounds. And I have a boat of my own, 
 and, when you can get a holiday out of the abbe, why, you 
 must come and see me, and I will take you in my boat, 
 you know. And won't it be jolly!" added Master Oliver 
 Blackmore, shaking his dark curls, and laughing with all 
 the might of his laughing dark eyes in Johnny's face. 
 
 Jolly ! Johnny was overpowered by the vision of bliss 
 thus held forth, and could scarcely stammer out his glad 
 thanks. 
 
 "And since you are going to Saint-Ives," continued 
 Oliver, " please to give my best regards to Mr. Ryan. He 
 is the dearest old brick you ever saw — an Irishman — and
 
 20 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 such a brick ! He teaches English at the abbe's. And 
 also will you tell Madame Blanc, the concierge — that's the 
 door-keeper, you know — that I kiss her on both cheeks ? 
 She was very fond of me, was Madame Blanc. For I was 
 at Saint-Ives, you know ; but they worked too hard there 
 for me, I did not like it; and so my father brought me 
 home, and Mr. Granby undertook me. He says I get on 
 very well. You will like Mr. Granby, and he will give you 
 some good hints, if I ask him. "We have also the house- 
 keeper's room at the chateau — I mean the jam-room. Do 
 3 r ou like apricot-jam ? " 
 
 Johnny modestly confessed that he was not acquainted 
 with that dainty. 
 
 " Ain't you ? Well, we have lots of it ; and you can 
 eat a whole pot, if you like. And now," negligently con- 
 tinued Oliver, leaning back, and so nursing his knee that 
 he seemed inclined to suck it, " what's your name, and who 
 are you ? " 
 
 Johnny told him very simply the little there was to tell 
 about himself. He was Johnny Dorrien, Mrs. Dorrien's 
 little boy, and his father was dead, and he was going to 
 Saint-Ives to work hard and be a great scholar, and it was 
 Mr. Perry who had got him in. 
 
 " Now don't be green," said Oliver, laughing, and look- 
 ing amused. " No one gets in that way at Saint-Ives. 
 The old abbe is too sharp for that. Now, confess that 
 he had a talk with you, and examined you, and made 
 you go through your paces. I know he trotted me out 
 finely." 
 
 "But I never saw him," replied Johnny, coloring vip, 
 and a little indignant to find his word doubted. 
 
 " Well, if you won't tell, you know, you won't," said 
 Oliver, very coolly. 
 
 Johnny was ready to cry with mortification. Oliver 
 stared at these signs of emotion, and so far relented in his 
 skepticism as to remark that, if the abbe had not already 
 examined Johnny, he certainly would do so, as he never 
 took any one upon trust, and that he, Johnny, had better 
 be prepared to go through a trying ordeal. But if Master 
 Oliver Blackmore thought to appall Mrs. Dorrien's little 
 boy by this awful prospect, he was wholly mistaken. John- 
 ny's gray ej'es sparkled, his little turned-up nose sniffed at
 
 JOHN DORItlEN. 21 
 
 the thought of the encounter with the abbe, and his ambi- 
 tious little heart swelled within him. 
 
 " That's right. I see you are game. I was," said 
 Oliver, with an approving nod. "The old abbe poked 
 me about — oh! I don't mean that he actually poked me," 
 for Johnny had stared, "I mean that he tried to get me 
 into a corner — well, I don't mean a real corner, you know 
 — but you know what I mean," a little impatiently ejacu- 
 lated Oliver, getting entangled in his own figures of speech ; 
 " and, though he did his best, I was game, and got through 
 it. But I could not stand the work ; it made my head ache.*' 
 
 " Oliver ! " called Mr. Blaekmore, from the other end of 
 the deck, "come here." 
 
 "So, as I said," continued Oliver, without heeding this 
 summons, "he will try and put you all wrong; and, if he 
 does, he will pack you off home. But I'll tell you what 
 you'll do if he does that ; you'll come to me first, and — " 
 
 " Oliver ! " called Mr. Blaekmore again. 
 
 " And -we'll have a jolly row in my boat," continued the 
 imperturbable Oliver, "and Mr. Granby — " 
 
 " Oliver, are you coming ? " called Mr. Blaekmore a third 
 time ; and his voice was so angry that Oliver raised his 
 eyebrows, and with the remark, " He's growling, I must go 
 now," left Johnny to his reflections. 
 
 Mr. Blaekmore, who was a passionate man, swore as 
 Oliver came up to him. 
 
 " How dare you stay when I called you three times ? " 
 he asked, his angry eyes flashing. 
 
 Oliver, all innocence, protested that he had not heard 
 himself called more than once. 
 
 " That's not true," said Mr. Blaekmore, point-blank. 
 
 Oliver's calmness was not disturbed. There was noth- 
 ing defiant, insolent, or audacious in his sweet face as his 
 father thus taunted him with a lie, but calmness there was, 
 the calmness of a nature which neither praise nor censure 
 can reach. 
 
 " The little boy's name is John Dorrien," he said, after 
 a pause. " His father is dead, and his mother colors photo- 
 graphs, and he is to come and see me." 
 
 Mr. Blaekmore, who had had enough of the little boy, 
 bade; Oliver not bother; whereupon Oliver looked languidly 
 at the sea, and spoke no more.
 
 22 JOHN DOREIEN. 
 
 We said that Johnny was left to his reflections. These 
 were brief. The stewardess came and pounced upon him, 
 and took him down to feed him ; then, somehow or other, 
 he was smuggled into the ladies' cabin, and there a lady 
 would make him take brandy-and-water to prevent sea-sick- 
 ness, of which Johnny showed no symptoms ; and the result 
 of the above dose thus administered was that Johnny fell 
 into a sudden and profound sleep. 
 
 When he woke the boat was still, a dull light was burn- 
 ing in the ladies' cabin, and the ladies were all gone save 
 one, who, with the recent despair of sea-sickness still writ- 
 ten on her face, was putting on her bonnet before the look- 
 ing-glass. 
 
 " Please, ma'am, are we in ? " asked Johnny. 
 
 " Oh, yes, we are in," answered the lady, despondently; 
 " but I am always ill for three days after being in, so it 
 don't matter." 
 
 Johnny did not know how to construe this gloomy 
 speech ; he ventured, however, on another question. 
 
 " And do you know, ma'am, if any one has come for me ? 
 I am to be called for." 
 
 " My dear," answered the lady, " my poor head aches so 
 that I can't say a word. It's distraction to look at myself 
 and tie my bonnet-strings ; and I wish, I do, that Adam and 
 Eve were at the bottom of the sea. It stands to reason 
 that if it were not for them and original sin there would be 
 no such thing as sea-sickness." 
 
 It was plain that this lady was in no frame of mind to 
 give Johnny the desired information, even if she possessed 
 it, which he doubted. He began to feel nervous. Suppose 
 the man had come for him, and, not finding him, had gone 
 away without him ! Johnny's heart sank with fear at the 
 thought, and he crept up-stairs as fast as he could. The 
 night was cold, and the child shivered as he reached the 
 deck, and stood there looking about him. A few faint stars 
 shone in a black sky, and a great many lights twinkled in 
 the town and harbor. There was also, and Johnny was 
 aware of it, a sound of foreign speech as unlike Johnny's 
 French as if it had been Him Instance ; but the anxious boy 
 only thought of the man who w r as to come and fetch him, 
 and seeing a dark form by the gangway, he went up to it 
 and whispered timidly:
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 23 
 
 " Please, sir, are you the man who is to come and fetch 
 me? I am Mrs. Dorrien's little boy." 
 
 The dark form turned round, and Mr. Blackmore's voice 
 answered : 
 
 "What, haven't they come for the little parcel yet? 
 Never mind, thev will be sure to come, unless they forget 
 it." 
 
 And with this piece of comfort, Mr. Blackmore walked 
 away. He was not an unkind man, but he had just dis- 
 covered that part of his luggage had remained behind, and 
 the discovery had tried his temper. Johnny stood where 
 he had left him. He felt cold and dismayed. Suppose the 
 man should forget to call for him ! 
 
 "Well, then," thought Johnny, rallying, and trying to 
 feel stout and brave, " I'll walk to Saint-Jves. I can speak 
 French, and ask my way, and — " 
 
 " Confound that boy," said a gruff voice, " where can he 
 have gone to ?" 
 
 " Please, sir," said Johnny, softly, " is it me you want? " 
 
 " There he is," exclaimed the man, without answering 
 the question. " You have got his traps, have you ? " 
 
 Another man's voice answered something in French 
 which Johnny could not understand ; then that second 
 speaker came and took his hand. The boy looked up at 
 him ; he saw that this man had rather a coarse red face, and 
 that, though decently clad, he was not a gentleman. 
 
 " Par ici" he said, in French. Johnny followed in 
 mute obedience. He felt very like a parcel, after all. 
 
 CHAPTER HI. 
 
 Tiie dark city, the spectral-looking port, the flickering 
 gas-lights on the long, lonely quays, remained forever after 
 like a dream in Johnny's memory, too vivid not to have had 
 some sort of existence, too unreal to be true. But reality 
 returned with an omnibus, into which he was hoisted, and 
 where he found himself alone, the man having gone outside
 
 24 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 to smoke. Johnny crept to the farthest corner, and en- 
 sconced himself there. Ah ! if his mother could have seen 
 her boy in his little gray suit, -with his small, useless 
 hands, that could do so little for him yet in the hard battle 
 of life, thrust into his pockets, and his tired, atixious face 
 vainly peering out of the window into the darkness of the 
 night, and the strangeness of an unknown land ! If she 
 could have seen him, surely her heart would have ached for 
 his loneliness. 
 
 All that Johnny could see at first of the country through 
 which they were driving was that it was very desolate- 
 looking. Then, when a chill breeze came from the sea, 
 and the moon rose and shone in a stormy sky, he saw with 
 awe the darkness of thick clouds hanging over the low, flat 
 land. Once a tall windmill rose black and gaunt above the 
 plain, with its sails spread to the wind ; low down near it 
 a glow-worm-light glimmered in the window of a little cot- 
 tage. A narrow stream glided silently in the darkness, 
 with here and there a streak of silver upon it, and a fleck 
 of sheep, unheeding night, or the coming storm of the 
 threatening clouds, were grazing quietly close by ; but the 
 picture was gone almost as soon as seen, and a long stretch 
 of wood, with gaunt trees and scarce houses, followed in 
 dreary monotony. 
 
 At length, and when Johnny thought that the omnibus 
 would never stop, it stood suddenly still ; the door opened, 
 and the man looked in. 
 
 " Hi ! " he said, nodding. 
 
 The boy alighted, the man took his hand again, the 
 omnibus drove away with great jingling of bells, and the 
 two walked on together in the darkness of a lonely lane, 
 till they came to a wide iron gate, with tall trees nodding 
 above the wall. The earth, still sodden with recent rains, 
 was also strewed with fallen leaves ; the air felt damp and 
 chill, and Johnny shivered, yet he was not cold. His heart 
 beat, his pulses throbbed, his blood w T as on fire with excite- 
 ment, fear, and hope. It -was as in one of the old stories 
 which the boy loved so well. The little knight stood at 
 the castle-gate, and knew not what awaited him within — 
 defeat or victory, glory or shame. A bell rang with a 
 great clangor, then a light flashed through the iron bars, 
 and a fresh-colored woman opened a little door in the great
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 25 
 
 gate. Scared}' had the two entered when a tall, thin, dark 
 man appeared. 
 
 " Are yon John Dorrien ? " he asked, stooping 1 a little 
 to see the child, and speaking in English. 
 
 Johnny answered that he was; then suddenly he added, 
 looking up in the somewhat saturnine face of the speaker: 
 
 " Please, sir, are you Mr. Ryan ? " 
 
 " And how do you know my name? " asked Mr. Ryan, 
 taken by surprise. 
 
 " I traveled with Oliver Blackmore, and he told me to 
 give you his best regards," answered Johnny, with a touch 
 of consequence. 
 
 "Did he, the dear boy ! " cried Mr. Ryan, whose dark 
 face at once beamed like sunshine. " And how did he 
 look ? " 
 
 " He looked very well ; but, please, sir, is that woman 
 Madame Blanc ? — because, if she is, Oliver Blackmore told 
 me that he kissed her on both cheeks." 
 
 Mr. Ryan turned to Madame Blanc, and translated John 
 Dorrien's message. She received it with voluble delight, 
 but all Johnny understood of her discourse was the word 
 " ange" several times repeated. 
 
 "And now, come with me, my lad," said Mr. Ryan, 
 addressing Johnny. "This way — don't fall." 
 
 The admonition came too late. Johnny had stumbled 
 and fallen over the first step of a perron that led to a large 
 house. It was almost invisible ; the trees that grew round 
 it were high, and darkness had come back to the sky. 
 The moon had left it once more for her palace of huge 
 black clouds, and would not return and shine upon earth 
 again. 
 
 "Not hurt, eh?" said Mr. Ryan, picking up Johnny. 
 "Never mind ; you are no Roman, and will not think it ill- 
 luck, will you? Besides, you will have many a stumble 
 before you leave us, will you not, my lad ? " 
 
 " I hope not," replied Johnny, quickly. 
 
 " What, you don't mean to stumble, do you ? " 
 
 " No, sir," answered the boy, stoutlv, " I don't mean 
 it." 
 
 Mr. Ryan whistled, then laughed, a low, amused, chuck- 
 ling laugh. 
 
 " Not if I can help it," added Johnny, fearing he hid 
 2
 
 26 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 been presumptuous, and looking up at his companion's 
 swarthy face ; but Mr. Ryan only laughed again. 
 
 They stood in a wide stone hall, cold and gloomy, a 
 staircase before them, a tall door on their right hand. At 
 this door Mr. Ryan gave a low premonitory knock, then 
 opened it, and gently pushed Johnny into a large and lofty 
 room. How it was furnished, whether its aspect was 
 dreary or pleasant, Johnny knew not. His eyes were riv- 
 eted on a bald man in a black cassock, who sat reading at 
 a desk at the farther end of the apartment, with the light 
 of a little lamp shining on his pale, austere face. No soul 
 waiting for judgment ever looked at Rhadamanthus with 
 more awe than Johnny now looked at the Abbe Veran, the 
 head of the great school of Saint -Ives. 
 
 The abbe slowly raised his eyes from his book, and, 
 without giving Mr. Ryan a glance, he fastened them at 
 once on the boy — at least, Johnny felt as if those eyes, 
 which had nothing remarkable in them save the intensity 
 of their gaze, pinned him in some sort. He was not fright- 
 ened, and they were not, indeed, unkind eyes, but he felt 
 a strange fascination which compelled him to meet that 
 long, fixed look. The abbe said something in French. 
 
 " Sit down, my lad," said Mr. Ryan, who threw himself, 
 with a look of perfect unconcern, on a leather chair, and, 
 thrusting his hands in his pockets, assumed the cool atti- 
 tude of a spectator; at least, so thought Johnny, when, 
 climbing up on what seemed the highest chair on which he 
 had ever sat, he girt himself, so to speak, for the coming 
 encounter. The abbe leaned a little forward, and almost 
 smiled as he looked at the boy before him. He was such 
 a little fellow, and his little pale face, with his large eyes 
 and sharp chin, looked so eager and resolute. Mr. Ryan, 
 too, who was leaning back in his chair, with his head a 
 little bent forward, also looked at Johnny curiously, like 
 one who had not seen him before, and who found that 
 childish face worth the reading. Meanwhile, Johnny was 
 going mentally through his Latin grammar, from the llosa 
 down to the imnm mare of old L'Homond. 
 
 Rut there was no need of such preparations. That sea 
 was not to be sounded on this evening. The abb6 intended 
 nothing so formidable for this first intcrviow, at least. He 
 opened his desk, took out from it a paper folded like a let-
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 27 
 
 ter, gave it tr> Mr. Ryan, who handed it to Johnny, say- 
 
 ing 
 
 "Do yon know this?" 
 
 Johnny became crimson, and his gray eyes Bparkled 
 like diamonds as he replied, excitedly: 
 
 " I wrote it. It is a letter to mamma on her birthday. 
 I wrote it in Latin — I did." 
 
 " Yon did ?" repeated Mr. Ryan, in amused mimicry. 
 " Well, then, we don't know Latin, so just translate it for 
 us into French — into English, I mean, and I shall put it 
 into French for the abbe." 
 
 " But T could put it into French myself — I could," said 
 ambit inns Johnny. " I know French, I do." 
 
 " Oh ! you do ? " repeated Mr. Ryan. " What sort of 
 French, I wonder ? Never mind, fire away." 
 
 And so Johnny, with the two men looking at him, with 
 his heart beating, and his temples throbbing, with his 
 whole being undergoing the strain of a young race-horse 
 who pants to reach the goal — so Johnny, we say, trans- 
 lated into French the Latin letter which he had concocted 
 alone for his mother's eyes, and which she had sent as his 
 best credentials to the abbe. Once or twice the priest's 
 grave face relaxed at Johnny's French ; but the translation 
 was a correct one, and proved what he wanted to know — 
 that Johnny had really and truly written that letter. The 
 composition would have been child's play to a boy regu- 
 larly trained, but it spoke well for the abilities of one who 
 had had no better teaching than poor Mrs. Dorrien's. Mr. 
 Ryan looked at the abb6 and nodded, and the abbe 
 nodded in return, and said a few words. 
 
 " There, we may go now," said Mr. Ryan to Johnny. 
 
 The boy rose with a perplexed look. 
 
 " Is that all?" he asked. 
 
 "To be sure it is — what more do you want?" 
 
 Johnny gave a wistful look at the silent abbe, whose. 
 eyes followed him out, as they had greeted him in, and 
 walked after Mr. Ryan. He i'elt disappointed. He had 
 expected a trying examination, and after it triumph and 
 praise; whereas the examination had been a joke, and 
 praise seemed to be as much out of the question as triumph. 
 
 " What did he say ? I mean the abbe?" he could not 
 help asking of his companion as the door closed upon them.
 
 28 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 " Say ! Wiry, you do not suppose that the abbe had 
 any thing to say about you ? " 
 
 Johnny had supposed it, and was crestfallen at being 
 mistaken. 
 
 "I'll tell you what, boy," resumed Mr. Ryan, "if your 
 bump of love of approbation is a large one, it will starve 
 here, so far as Monsieur l'Abbe goes. He never praises. 
 What he did say was that you were to have some supper, 
 and to go to bed directly." 
 
 He took Johnny to the refectory, a lofty, bare room, 
 where he ate alone, Mr. Ryan, however, looking on with 
 evident interest. He sat back on a form, his long legs 
 stretched out, his dark head leaning against the blank- 
 looking wall, and his hands thrust deep in his pockets, 
 with what Johnny could not help thinking a very rakish air. 
 
 " That's your supper," said he, " bread, cold meat, an 
 apple, and plenty of abundance. Abondance, if you don't 
 know it, is a little w r ine and a great deal of water. No 
 stint of it, such as it is ; nor of bread either ; meat, limited 
 supply." 
 
 " Please, sir," remarked Johnny, fastening his brilliant 
 gray eyes on the English teacher's dark face, " shall I soon 
 begin Greek ? " 
 
 " And what do you want with Greek ? " asked Mr. 
 Ryan, with a stare. 
 
 " I want to read Homer," replied ambitious Johnny. 
 
 " And what have you got to do with Homer, I should 
 like to know ? " 
 
 " My father read Homer," said Johnny, a little proudly. 
 
 " My father made shoes, and I wish he liad not set me 
 to Greek and Latin," replied Mr. Ryan, dryly ; " a little 
 learning and no cash don't go far nowada3 T s." 
 
 He gave his feet a philosophic stare, and Johnny, look- 
 ing at them shyly, was afraid that they were not very well 
 .shod. 
 
 " He's like cousin Mary," thought Mr. R}'an, looking at 
 the boy ; " he has got her eyes." And lie half-sighed, 
 for those gray eyes, so sweet, so dark, so deep and brilliant 
 once, those eyes which Mr. Ryan had liked so well in the 
 by-gone days of his Irish home, though they often tor- 
 mented him sadly, had long been closed in the calm sleep 
 of death, and could vex and bless him no more.
 
 JOHN DOKRIEN. 29 
 
 " Homer 1 — you want to read Homer!" he resinned. 
 Then, with a sudden twinkle in his eye, "I suppose you 
 write verses ? " 
 
 Johnny blushed dreadfully. Even his mother had not 
 fathomed that awful secret. 
 
 " Come, let us hear them," said Mr. Ryan with cool 
 authority. His father had made shoes, and every boy in 
 the school knew it, but not one of those boys had ever 
 dared to fail him in respect or to dispute his slightest wish. 
 It did not now occur to Johnny to resist Mr. Ryan's behest. 
 In great trepidation he began : 
 
 " The lady waited at the gate — " 
 
 " Why so ? " inquired Mr. Ryan ; " could not she get 
 in?" 
 
 Johnny, though rather disturbed, continued : 
 
 " The stars were shining in the sky." 
 
 "And where in the name of common-sense would you 
 have them shine ? " asked Mr. Ryan, with a stare. 
 
 The susceptibility of the poetic temperament revolted 
 at the heartless question. This first sample criticism was 
 too much for Johnny's equanimity. He did not cry, be- 
 cause he would not, but the little mobile mouth quivered, 
 and the gray eyes deepened in the intensity of their gaze. 
 In vain Mr. Ryan said, "Go on." Not another word could 
 Johnny utter. "Ah! I suppose I have stopped you," re- 
 marked Mr. Ryan, coolly. "Never mind, my boy. You'll 
 read Homer yet ; and, what's more, there's a look of John 
 Milton about that head of yours, with the wavy hair and 
 broad white forehead and gray eyes." 
 
 " My name is John Dorrien," said Johnny, his light 
 spirits rising at once. 
 
 " That's right ; now finish your abondanee and goto 
 bed." 
 
 In the dormitory Johnny was surrendered to the rare 
 of the man who had fetched him from the steamer. He 
 gazed shyly around him. He only saw little iron bed- 
 steads, and here and there sleepy eyes looking at him 
 winkingly. Near his own bed he found his luggage, con- 
 cerning which he had had many uneasy thoughts since he 
 had left the steamer. As well as he might he undressed
 
 30 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 himself alone, with his little awkward unaccustomed hands, 
 said his prayers, then crept into his cot. He long lay 
 there awake, listening to the snoring of the boy next him, 
 and looking at the lamp which burned dimly nigh the 
 great black cross at the end of the long, narrow room. 
 
 " You will have your crosses to bear," had said his 
 mother to Johnny, on the last evening they had spent to- 
 gether; "remember that your Lord bore his." 
 
 Johnny remembered it now as he looked at that black 
 cross. He had been reared religiously, and the wonderful 
 story of Bethlehem, Nazareth, and Galilee, was very dear 
 to him. fie had trembled with awe at the miracles ; he had 
 sobbed with sorrow over the agony ; and he had loved, 
 with all his childish heart, that Son of Man who loved man 
 so well that He had become a little child for his sake. He 
 thought of Him now, his Father, his God, his Friend, and 
 he made brave resolves that, with his help, he would be 
 very good, and work very hard at Saint-Ives. Johnny 
 thought of his mother, too, and of the sea, which seemed 
 bigger in his recollection than it had seemed in reality ; of 
 Oliver Blackmore, who was so beautiful in black velvet; 
 of that dark-eyed Mr. Ryan, w T ho thought him like John 
 Milton ; of the abbe, who never praised one — then sudden- 
 ly he was fast asleep. Bat poor Mrs. Dorrien did not sleep 
 that night. For, alas ! she knew, what Johnny only sus- 
 pected, that days must lengthen into weeks, and weeks 
 into months and years, before she could see her boy's face 
 again. 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 The August sky stooped over the hot landscape. Tlie 
 trees looked heavy with sleep ; the birds were hushed ; 
 there was no breath of air, no low murmur of flowing water 
 throughout the silent land ; the very cows that stood in 
 i lie pasture forgot to graze, and stared straight before them 
 with large, drowsy eyes. 
 
 Nowhere did the sultry day brood more heavily than 
 over Saint-Ives. These were the holidays, and the old
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 31 
 
 house was deserted. The pupils had flown. The profess- 
 ors were gone or going. The tall trees which grew round 
 the building cast their broad shadow over the empty play- 
 ground. The sun looked in at the windows of the school- 
 room, and poured a broad flood of light over the vacant 
 forms and ink-stained desks. A spell seemed laid upon the 
 place, and silence, dust, and cobwebs, were to reign su- 
 preme for weeks to come. 
 
 "John," said Mr. Ryan, as the}' walked side by side in 
 the lime-tree alley, which divided the play-ground of the 
 pupils from the little grass-grown garden of the Abbe Ye- 
 ran — "John, how many years is it since you came to us?" 
 
 " Seven years next October, Mr. Ryan," answered John ; 
 " but can it really be seven years ? " 
 
 He stood still to reckon. If he could have looked at 
 himself, as he stood in the summer light, John would not 
 have wondered that seven years had come and gone since 
 he first entered the walls of SaintTves. Mrs. Dorrien's 
 little boy was now a tall, well-built young man of seventeen, 
 who looked twenty. His brown hair still curled around his 
 clear while forehead, and his deep gray eyes still had their 
 old beauty. They were large, brilliant, and thoughtful. 
 He could have been described by them, and recognized by 
 the description, but Mrs. Dorrien herself would scarcely 
 have known her boy's little pale face in that intellectual 
 countenance of mingled brightness and refinement; for, 
 though the youth was not handsomer than had been the 
 child, his mobile features being too irregular for beauty, 
 the sharp quaintness was gone from them, and a passionate, 
 ardent meaning had come in its stead. 
 
 " Yes, it is really seven years," said John Dorrien, look- 
 ing at Mr. Ryan, whose hair had turned iron-gray, and who 
 was also sallower and thinner than of yore. "Would you 
 have thought it was so long, Mr. Ryan?" 
 
 Mr. Ryan, who had been to Ireland in the year of John 
 Dorrien's coming, who had not been there since, and who 
 was going there now — being, indeed, ready dressed for the 
 journey — sighed, and shook his heavy gray locks at the lad. 
 
 " Why, you boy," he said, "I thought it was ten years. 
 I thought it was ages. But never mind that ; let's sit 
 down. And now let me hear these verses of yours again. 
 ' Red glows the east,' you know."
 
 32 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 He threw himself on a stone bench, folded his arms, 
 rested his head against the trunk of a lime-tree, and closed 
 his eyes ; while John, sitting by him, began in a clear voice, 
 which had kept up all its early music : 
 
 " ' Red glows the East, as though some smouldering fire 
 Behind the darkness of those hills had burned 
 Since eve. From earth's broad hearth to highest sky 
 Springs up the kindling flame ; the mountains all 
 Have caught the signal. Fast from peak to peak 
 And land to land it flies, and tidings tells 
 Of joyous vict'ry won o'er dismal night.' " 
 
 Here John paused, and Mr. Ryan opened his eyes with 
 an interrogative " Well ? " 
 
 " I forget what comes next." 
 
 " You don't forget Miriam's address to the sun, I am 
 sure," said Mr. Ryan. " Let us have it." 
 
 Nothing loath, John resumed : 
 
 " ' Swift traveler o'er many a land : 
 
 Oh ! might I but depart with thee at dawn ; 
 At eve return, then o'er yon western ridge 
 Watch thee go down, on some fresh journey bent, 
 Ardent as in thy morn. For breathing-time 
 Thou askest not, unwearied journeyer ; 
 Light, hours, and clime, dispensing in thy path. 
 Thus in the East, that knew thee not till then, 
 Didst thou dawn o'er the new-created earth, 
 Still sleeping green and silent in the shade, 
 Or yellow, like some glittering coin of gold, 
 First stamped with image of a mighty king — 
 From gloomy depths of chaos didst thou rise, 
 Filling void space with ever-spreading light.' " 
 
 John paused, and Mr. Rvan, giving his heavy head of 
 hair a shake, said, in a low, emphatic voice : 
 
 " John, I told you when you came that you had a look 
 .of John Milton about the forehead; well, then, there is 
 nothing finer in John Milton than in what John Dorrien 
 has just repeated to me." 
 
 From which sweeping assertion, which brought a mod- 
 est blush to the lad's cheek, it will be seen that Mr. Ryan 
 was no longer a critic, but a devotee. His worship, indeed, 
 was uncompromising. He was thirty-seven, and believed 
 every word he said — no wonder (hat John, who was seven- 
 teen, believed every word of it, too. He had within him 
 that strong consciousness of talent which is so great a de-
 
 JOIIX DOKRIKN. 33 
 
 luder of youth, for, until experience and judgment have 
 come to the rescue, how is a lad, with great intellectual 
 gifts, to know that he is not a genius? 
 
 " ' Miriam the Jewess ' will be a fine thing — a grand 
 thing ! And when you are a great man, my boy, and the 
 world worships you, you will remember that William Ryan 
 lirst discovered that you were a genius, and first foretold 
 your fame." 
 
 John Dorricn laughed, but his eyes sparkled with more 
 than laughter. 
 
 " That scene between Miriam and the chamois-hunter," 
 resumed Mr. Ryan, "is simply magnificent. The young 
 nun is lovely, and the hermit is fine — fine, sir. And now I 
 must be gone — really gone," said Mr. Ryan, starting up 
 and looking at his watch ; " and Oliver Blackmore has not 
 come, after all." 
 
 His face fell as he said it, and John looked awkward. 
 
 " Something must have prevented him from coming," 
 said Mr. Ryan, meditatively ; " but perhaps he is at the 
 station," he added, brightening up at the thought. "Let 
 us be off, John." 
 
 Saint-Ives was now connected by a railway with Dieppe 
 and Paris, and to the station, which was only a mile off, 
 Mr. Ryan and John Dorrien walked under the hot August 
 sun, John carrying Mr. Ryan's carpet-bag, and Mr. Ryan 
 expatiating on the delight and honor of having his carpet- 
 lug carried by a poet. He also kept looking out for Oliver 
 Blackmore, feeling sure the dear bov would not break his 
 appointment. But neither on the road nor at the station 
 was the dear boy to be seen, and Mr. Ryan's face fell, and 
 disappointment was written in his whole aspect, as it be- 
 came almost certain that the train would come in before 
 Oliver appeared. 
 
 " I hope nothing unpleasant has kept him back," he 
 said, musinrrlv. 
 
 " I hope not," answered John. " I hear the signal, Mr. 
 Ryan." 
 
 " John ! " 
 
 " Yes, Mr. Ryan." 
 
 " I think you must touch up the Hermit a bit. He has 
 been an old soldier, you know. Well, the two characters — " 
 
 " Here's the train," said John.
 
 34 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 The black mass was coming up, puffing and steaming ; 
 it slackened its speed ; it stopped. The two or three pas- 
 sengers who were waiting under the shed, where Mr. Ryan 
 and John were talking, hurried forward, lest there should 
 be no room for them in the long line of carriages ; but Mr. 
 Ryan lingered, and, laying his hand on John Dorrien's 
 shoulder, he looked long and earnestly in the youth's face. 
 
 " God bless your handsome eyes ! " said he. 
 
 John laughed, much amused. 
 
 " Why, Mr. Ryan," said he, " what can there be in my 
 eyes that you are always praising them ? " 
 
 " Good-by," was Mr. Ryan's only answer. He had 
 never told John why he liked those gray eyes of his, and 
 he never would tell him. They were his poem, the poem 
 of his youth and of his first love — a poem fairer and more 
 pathetic than John's " Miriam the Jewess," though Mr. Ryan 
 himself did not know it. He caught up his carpet-bag, 
 and jumped into the first railway-carriage. Scarcely was 
 he in when the train began to move. At once he thrust 
 his head out of the window, and, nodding to John, who 
 stood looking on, he said, emphatically : 
 
 " Remember about the Hermit." 
 
 John smiled brightly. The train moved on, slowly at 
 first, then with a quicker pace. Swiftly it went by, then 
 vanished in the sunlit landscape, speeding on to Paris ; for, 
 before revisiting green Erin, Mr. Ryan meant to have a 
 look at Lutetia. 
 
 John was spending his holidays at Mr. Blackmore's, 
 and toward that gentleman's abode, fully nine miles off, he 
 now walked bravely in the hot August sun. There was 
 not a cloud in the summer sky. The sea shone far away 
 like a sheet of glass, the very air felt burning ; and, though 
 John tried to think of the Hermit, the only conclusion he 
 came to concerning that venerable person was that he lived 
 in a cool mountain-cell, and that he, John, wished he were 
 with him. Suddenly he remembered that, by taking a 
 path to his left, he shoxild lengthen his road a mile or so, 
 but that he should also get the most delightful shade. He 
 cut across a field of yellow stubble, climbed a bank, went 
 down another, and in a few minutes he had entered a long, 
 winding lane, cool, green, and gloomy as a forest avenue. 
 The ferns that grew on either side looked fresh and dewy
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 35 
 
 as in the morning; the dark ivy that clung to the banks 
 and twined round the trunks of the tall trees, whose boughs 
 met overhead, had not a stain of dust on its glossy leaves. 
 Scarcely a stray sunbeam, scarcely a glimpse of blue sky, 
 broke on the green freshness of this path, which seemed to 
 wind forever away through the sunburned landscape. 
 
 John Walked on with renewed vigor, and, as he walked, 
 some pleasant fancies went with him. He thought of the 
 hermit, of Mr. Ryan's predictions, concerning the truth of 
 which no reasonable person could feel a doubt, and of his 
 mother's pride and joy when that grand secret should be 
 revealed to her. He had not seen her for seven years, he 
 did not know when he should see her again ; but she was 
 always in his thoughts, and he now smiled triumphantly 
 to himself as he conjured up her bright, glad face. 
 
 The lane which John was following led him to another, 
 and this to another again ; and so from green lane to green 
 lane he went on, till he came to the little river that flowed, 
 but somewhat farther on, through the grounds lying around 
 Mr. Blackmore's chateau. Here John paused, took a de- 
 licious draught of pure, clear water, threw himself on the 
 grassy earth, and enjoyed the beaut}' of the spot. On one 
 side rose a low slope, with young trees scattered here and 
 there upon it, on the other a verdant wilderness of tangled 
 brushwood; between these two the clear brook, dark and 
 cool, flowed on windingly in mingled shade and sunshine, 
 through brown old stones and drooping weeds, to a light 
 background of shivering aspen-trees. Lying on his back, 
 with the blue sky locking down at him through the heavy 
 boughs, John felt wonderfully cool, refreshed, and happy. 
 His day-dreams, indeed, were of the most delightful nature. 
 What he would be, what he would accomplish, what he 
 would do, suffer, if need be, and go through to gain his 
 ends, he dreamed of then. 1 Le was imaginative, and Imagi- 
 nation sends forth many a ship on that fair sea where Fancy 
 sits at the helm and Hope spreads the sails. Knowledge, 
 with Wisdom on her brow, sat in one boat ; Ambition, in 
 purple attire, steered another; and rosy Love, but rather 
 far away, was in a third. There would soon have been a 
 whole squadron of them, if two angry birds. perch d in a 
 tree hard by, had not begun a loud chattering quarrel, 
 which acted like a squall, and dispersed the fairy lleet.
 
 36 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 Shy Fancy fled at the sound, and John, who was now 
 thoroughly rested, rose and walked on. 
 
 He soon forsook the little river, and turned into a path, 
 where a thatched cottage here and there peeped out of the 
 trees and bushes. A flight of steps cut out in a steep bank 
 led up to a dwelling larger than the rest, but also thatched 
 and low-roofed, and half hidden in verdure. At the foot 
 of these steps John Dorrien suddenly paused and said : 
 
 " Are you coining down ? " 
 
 " No ; come up to me," was the answer. 
 
 John bounded up with the agility of seventeen, and 
 soon stood on the highest step but one. 
 
 " So that is how you kept your promise to Mr. Ryan," 
 he said, looking up at Oliver Blackmore, who leaned over 
 the low gate, looking down at him with innocence on his 
 face — the same handsome face which had caught little 
 Johnny's heart and ruled his childish fancy seven years 
 before. 
 
 " My dear boy," languidly said Oliver, ignoring John 
 Dorrien's remark, " how can you have seen me ? I saw 
 you, but I was looking down — decidedly you must have 
 eyes — a supplementary pair — in the top of your head." 
 
 " Why did you say you would come ? " persisted John. 
 
 " I knew it would please the old fellow," said Oliver, 
 amiably ; " but of course I never intended it." 
 
 " He expected you to the last," said John. 
 
 "Of course he did. August, noon, nine miles, and he 
 expected me ! I declare that man's freshness is delightful ; 
 but, you see, Monsieur Latour is quite as delightful in his 
 way, and far more accessible. Come in, he is in high 
 feather to-day." 
 
 He opened the gate, and John entered a little grassy 
 orchard, which extended in front of the low house. As 
 they walked through it, Oliver said, with a shrewd look 
 in his laughing black eyes : 
 
 " You would never guess Monsieur Latour's last ! My 
 dear boy, he is reading ' Telemachus ' for the first time — 
 he is sixty, if he is a day, and he is reading ' Telemachus ' 
 for the first time ! " 
 
 He said no more, for they had reached the end of the 
 little inclosure, aud Monsieur Latour sat there before an 
 easel, painting a lovely glimpse of the valley below, with
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 37 
 
 its gliding river and picturesque peasant-homes. He was 
 a little man, with a large head, white hair, and a rosy face, 
 
 simple as that of a child. That face beamed again with 
 pleasure and welcome as its owner turned round and saw 
 the new-comer. 
 
 " My dear Monsieur Dorrien," he cried, airily, " I was 
 hoping' for you. Monsieur Blackmore went to see if you 
 were coming, and I am delighted to find that he caught 
 you as you were speeding past, and lured you up to my 
 hermitage. You have not been near me for ever so long, 
 and the picture has progressed since you saw it last. 
 ( lome, now — your candid opinion, if you please." 
 
 John Dorrien liked Monsieur Latour, but he did not 
 like Monsieur Latour's pictures, which were daubs; and, 
 as he did not wish to give him pain, and could not con- 
 scientiously give him pleasure, he shunned his hermitage 
 as a rule. He now regretted having yielded to the temp- 
 tation of coming up. A blush spread over his sensitive 
 face, and it was rather nervously that he said : 
 
 " Do you not remember, Monsieur Latour, that I know 
 nothing of painting ? " 
 
 "I like the impressions of untutored minds," promptty 
 said Monsieur Latour. " Little Jeanne came up the other 
 day, and she saw at once that this was a cow," added Mon- 
 sieur Latour, pointing to a brown patch on the foreground 
 of his picture, which did credit to Jeanne's penetration. 
 " I felt flattered, I can assure you, at that child's testimony 
 to my humble abilities. Come, now," Monsieur Dorrien, 
 what do you think of it ? That little bit on the hill-side is 
 not amiss, is it ? One feels the air moving through those 
 trees — shut your eye, and look at it so. There 1 That 
 foreground, too, I like. I walked a league to get that bit 
 of foreground. I am glad you like it," continued Monsieur 
 Latour, warming with his subject, and convinced that John 
 had been praising him all that time. " You may believe 
 me, Monsieur Dorrien, but when I was a tailor in Paris, 
 cutting out and fitting on coats, I knew I had missed my 
 vocation, and that I should have been a painter. Yes, 
 Monsieur Dorrien, I knew it all along." 
 
 " Ah ! but tell him what the subject of your next 
 picture is to be," urged Oliver, with a look full of mis- 
 chief.
 
 38 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 Monsieur Latour once more suspended his labors, and 
 turned round on John. 
 
 " Have ycu read '' Telemachus ? ' he gravely asked. 
 Then, without waiting- for an answer — " Monsieur Dorrien, 
 I had heard of ' Telemachus ' — who has not ? — but I had 
 never read that wonderful book till chance placed it in my 
 hands the other day. Imagine my feelings ! Why, Mon- 
 sieur Dorrien, ' Telemachus ' is the grandest, the finest 
 book that ever was written ! " 
 
 "And Monsieur Latour's next picture is to show us 
 Calypso on the sea-shore," said Oliver, gravely ; " conceive 
 that, if you can, John." 
 
 Monsieur Latour laughed, and seemed in high glee. 
 
 "A fine subject, Monsieur Dorrien," he said, with a 
 beaming face — " a noble subject. Imagine Calypso, with 
 streaming hair and outstretched arms, the ship of Telema- 
 chus speeding away ; or the grotto — think of the grotto ! " 
 
 " Do, John," entreated Oliver, pathetically. " Think 
 of the grotto — think of Calypso, as painted by Monsieur 
 Latour ! " 
 
 But John could not enjoy this. He felt angry and 
 ashamed to see Monsieur Latour laughed at to his face. 
 He wanted to be gone, and, spite the entreaties of Mon- 
 sieur Latour, begging him to prolong his visit, he persisted 
 in going ; and Oliver, with a pathetic " He will not let me 
 stay with you and enjoy myself, Monsieur Latour," fol- 
 lowed his friend. 
 
 " Two nice 3 7 ouhg fellows," soliloquized Monsieur La- 
 tour, as he resumed his labors, and put a dab of bright 
 green on a tree ; " but Monsieur Dorrien is by no means 
 so amiable as his friend." 
 
 " John," said Oliver, as they went down the steps, " is 
 it that you have no sense of humor, or is it that you are 
 troubled with fears of the next world, and so could not 
 enjoy Monsieur Latour ? " 
 
 John was silent. 
 
 "It must be the next world," resumed Oliver, as they 
 walked side by side. " Strange that you should let it 
 worry you so ! To me this world — a hot one to-day — is 
 both delightful and sufficient ; and I wonder, I do, at those 
 who make themselves wretched in the here below, which 
 is so certain, to be blessed in the hereafter, which is so
 
 JOHN DOR It I EN. 39 
 
 doubtful. Don't tell me that, if it had not been for the 
 next world, you would have learned Greek ! It is not in 
 human nature to go through such torture without hopes 
 of a heavenly reward. From that misery my happy skep- 
 ticism saved me. I could be lazy without one pang of 
 remorse, or one fear of the ten commandments. Mr. Black- 
 more wanted to coax me into it ; but, though I like him — " 
 
 "Yes; if you like any one, you like Mr. Black more," 
 said John, quietly. 
 
 "As you remark, with your delightful candor, if I like 
 any one, I like Mr. Blackmore. He is such a handsome 
 old boy ! Well, then, I could not learn Greek to please 
 him. And you know 1 am not a fool, John." 
 
 " Decidedly not." 
 
 " No ; I am even clever in my way ; but I am lazy, I 
 confess it ; and laziness and the horror of the thing com- 
 bined were too much for my wish to please my father." 
 
 " How, then, did you get on with Mr. Granby ? " 
 
 "Delightfully. We smokel and drank brandy-and- 
 water together by the hour. He was a little soft about 
 Hegel, and wanted to explain to me how all within our- 
 selves, and without ourselves, too, is in the idea, as he 
 kindly expressed it; but if it be true that, dying, Hegel 
 declared of his disciples that only one man had understood 
 him, and that, concerning that man, he had strong doubts 
 — i Et encore tiin-t-il aomprisf says tin' legend— why, I 
 think that Mr. Granby must have been that intelligent 
 person. However, he left Hegel for Comte, I believe." 
 
 John Dorrien was not yet a philosopher. He had not 
 yet forsaken the flowery paths of poetry and eloquence, and 
 knew nothing of Hegel and Comte, unless through hearsay. 
 
 "And what arc you, Oliver?" he asked, standing still 
 to put the question — " a Hegelian or a Positivist ?" 
 
 Oliver laughed gayly. 
 
 " My dear John Dorrien," he said, " let us shake hands ; 
 your innocence docs me ^ood. Hegel is charming, but 
 foggy ; Comte is delightfully clear, but decidedly crazy ; so 
 I am Oliver Blackmore, future owner of a handsome prop- 
 erty ; young, healthy, and wise. I do no one any harm, 
 that I am aware of; my enemies, if I have any, confess I 
 am an amiable young man, though a lazy one — what more 
 can the world or my friends want from me?"
 
 40 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 John Dorrien walked on silently. He felt, though he 
 did not care to analyze it, the difference which there was 
 between his own earnest, passionate, ambitious nature and 
 that of Oliver Blackmore — so easy, so careless, so amiable, 
 and so candidly self-indulgent. 
 
 Every one liked Oliver, and John could not escape the 
 universal lot. He liked his friend. He had also a keen 
 sense of old kindness, for Oliver had redeemed his boyish 
 promises, and Mr. Blackmore had been hospitable for 
 many years; but for all that, John knew in his heart that 
 there was more real sympathy between him and Mr. Ryan, 
 whose hair was iron-gray, than between him and Oliver, 
 whose locks were black as the raven's wing. And yet 
 Oliver's boast of being an amiable fellow was not a vain 
 one. He liked being liked, much as a cat likes being 
 stroked. He ctfuld not do without pleasing, and he laid 
 himself out to please, with every one of the charming gifts 
 which he had received from bountiful Nature. His face 
 was beautiful, his person was graceful, his voice was soft, 
 his manners were easy and winning. He was very clever, 
 and not quite so lazy as he *chose to say. Study he ob- 
 jected to, as he objected to every thing requiring hard 
 work ; but he liked reading, he had plenty of abilities, he 
 was quick, clear-headed, and he had an excellent memory. 
 He had done more than smoke and drink brandy-and-water 
 with his tutor, Mr. Granby. He had read prodigiously un- 
 der the guidance of that gentleman. He was familiar with 
 ancient and modern literature ; and though he read the 
 classics through the medium of translations, what did it mat- 
 ter, since he had no wish to quote ? He was also familiar, 
 thanks to Mr. Granbv, with all the modern views and dis- 
 coveries of science, and with every modern substitute for 
 Christianity as well. He was indeed solid or learned or 
 well-grounded in nothing, not even in English, though he 
 had plenty of that fluency which is now so common a gift 
 in society ; but he passed for a very brilliant young man 
 with the few people who knew him, and with all, save 
 good judges of real merit, who are rare; he would have 
 eclipsed John Dorrien, so silent, so reserved, and also so care- 
 less of shining, though endowed with a soaring ambition, 
 that would have left far behind the few flights in which 
 Oliver had ever indulged. There was, however, no rivalry
 
 JOHN DORR I EN. 41 
 
 between tliese two, and no prospect of any. Oliver was to 
 be rich, he knew it, and relied upon the world's estimate 
 of Mammon with a very correct judgment for one so young'. 
 John Dorrien was his superior, granted ; but what mattered 
 it ? So long as John was poor, what would the world care 
 for John Dorrien's Greek and Latin ? Besides, their paths 
 were to be too wide apart for Envy ever to step between 
 them, with her hateful apple of discord. John was to re- 
 turn to England and fight his battle there; and for reasons 
 which he never mentioned or alluded to, England was to 
 be eschewed by Oliver Blackmore. " England is too fog- 
 gy," he -would remark, in his languid fashion ; " too hazy, 1 
 ought to say. I require clearer .skies, a lighter air, a 
 warmer sun than she can give me ; so I think I shall pitch 
 my tent in this old red chateau of Mr. Blackmore's. I 
 dare say England will not miss me." 
 
 That red house, with its high roof and many windows, 
 and a rich background of trees, now rose before the two 
 friends, and looked a pleasant abode enough in the summer 
 light, and yet Oliver Blackmore did not care to enter it. 
 
 " Let us stay out a while," said he, sinking down on 
 the rich sward — they were in the grounds now — " and en- 
 joy that little whiff of a breeze which is coming from the 
 sea. There is no standing the house in this hot weather; 
 and Mr. Blackmore will conclude that we are still seeing 
 Mr. Ryan off. You can say any thing you please, I feel in 
 the mood to listen ; or if you cannot indulge in original 
 thought, the weather being too hot, repeat some Greek 
 verses. You like it, I know, and I like to hear you. You 
 have a good voice to begin with, and I shall understand a 
 word here and there — it will be like looking at a landscape 
 through one's half-shut eyes." 
 
 " And it will send you to sleep," said John Dorrien, a 
 little dryly. 
 
 "Very likely it will," replied Oliver, candidly; "but 
 why should you grudge me my innocent slumbers ? " 
 
 John yielded. It was enjoyment to him to repeat that 
 sonorous Greek verso, and he knew that after a fashion 
 Oliver liked to hear him. The whole day he had been 
 haunted by a well-known passage in ^Eschylus — the mono- 
 logue of the weary man, who, standing on the roof of 
 Clytemnestra's palace, looks out for the fiery signal that is
 
 42 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 to tell the taking- of Troy, and to deliver him from his long* 
 watch. 
 
 Oliver, as he had said, understood a word here and 
 there, and smiled languidly as John Dorrien's voice ceased. 
 
 " I am afraid," he remarked, " that I do not care for 
 iEschylus. He is too cold for me ; besides, in this case I 
 feel nothing for that Greek slave or sentinel, and, strange 
 to say, I sympathize with Clytemnestra. Agamemnon had 
 been away too long, fighting for another woman, too, and 
 then he brought home Cassandra. I say Clytemnestra has 
 been ill-used by opinion. She only put one inconvenient 
 man out of her way. Would Agamemnon have stuck at 
 such a trifle ? " 
 
 " It is not merely the murder that condemns her," 
 quickly said John — " it is the treason." 
 
 " My dear boy, I shall turn Hegelian, and prove to you 
 that what you call treason is a mere product of your imagi- 
 nation. For if there be nothing real in this world save the 
 idea — The dinner-bell, I protest ! Oh ! why will Mr. Black- 
 more be so barbarous as to dine at this hour ? " 
 
 But there Avas no help for it. Mr. Blackmore was bar- 
 barous, and they must go in and dress. The old red house, 
 which was called a chateau by courtesy, was a pleasant 
 abode. The dining-room on the ground-floor was a low, 
 broad room, a little gloomy, perhaps, but not uncheerful; 
 and when the two young men entered it, and found Mr. 
 Blackmore, handsome and jovial as ever, standing on the 
 middle of the floor to greet them, with his hands in his 
 pockets, and his good-humored face beaming, John thought 
 what a delightful place that chateau was, and how his 
 mother would like it. 
 
 " We are late, I am afraid," said Oliver, demurely, "but 
 we have been seeing Mr. Ryan off." 
 
 " Pack of nonsense ! " interrupted Mr. Blackmore — 
 " you were hard by. I saw you sprawling on the grass, 
 doing nothing, and — " 
 
 " Now, that is hard," said Oliver, looking injured. 
 " Dorrien had been giving me ^schylus, and I was giving 
 him Hegel in return." 
 
 " Now do let these confounded foggy and wild-brained 
 German philosophers alone, will you V " said Mr. Blackmore, 
 impatiently. " Hegel, Fichte, Kant, Comtc — I am sick of
 
 JOHN DOBBDEN. 4.) 
 
 the whole lot. Stick to Locke, a cool, clear-headed Eng- 
 lishman, worth the -whole bundle of them." 
 
 Oliver never argued with his father. He did not like 
 the trouble, to begin with, and then it was so useless. 
 
 "Well, and what had Mr. Ryan to say?" resumed Mr. 
 Blackmore, addressing John. "I hope he gave Oliver a 
 lecture ? " 
 
 " Oliver was not there," replied John, unmercifully. 
 
 Mr. Blackmore turned on his son, and, with a stare, asked 
 where the devil he had been all day. 
 
 " I have been enjoying Monsieur Latour," replied Oliver, 
 unabashed, "and he was delightful, till John came and 
 spoiled him. You know that Monsieur Latour is the retired 
 tailor who paints hideous pictures, and lives in the little 
 cottage up the cavee. Well, Avhile he was fashioning coats 
 and other garments, he neglected literature, and so never 
 lead ' Telemachus.' Fancy that ! — a man who has never read 
 ' Telemachus,' and to whom that son of Ulysses, and Calypso, 
 and Mentor, come with all the freshness of George Sand's 
 last. His raptures are unbounded, and he will read the 
 book to you, and point out the fine passages, and tell you 
 how he means to paint Calypso on the sea-shore, and — " 
 
 Here the entrance of dinner interrupted Oliver's dis- 
 course, to which .Mr. Blackmore had listened with obvious 
 amusement ; but Monsieur Latour was resumed during the 
 meal, and gave ample entertainment to both father and son. 
 Even after dinner, Mr. Blackmore seemed to think that a 
 retired tailor, who solaced his old age by the painting of 
 pictures, and who had never read "Telemachus," was a rare 
 subject for a joke, and he laughed with a loud ha! ha ! as 
 he leaned back in his deep arm-chair, or stamped about the 
 room with his hands in his pockets. 
 
 " Come, John, don't look so doleful about it," said he, 
 giving John Dorrien's shoulder a hearty slap, " and don't 
 be angry with that boy if he does laugh at poor Monsieur 
 Latour. He has nothing better to do, you see. You have 
 to work and to make your way, and his bread is all ready 
 buttered for him, the worthless fellow ! By-the-way," he 
 added, without waiting for any answer, " are you connected 
 with the Paris Dorriens?" 
 
 "I never heard about them before, sir." 
 
 " Ah ! only namesakes. 1 thought so."
 
 44 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 " What are these Dorriens ? " asked Oliver. 
 
 " Very rich — " had begun Mr. Blackmore, but a visitor 
 was announced, and John, who was shy after a fashion, 
 quietly stole away and went out alone into the grounds. 
 
 The day was waning fast. The long red sunlight swept 
 like fire across the greensward, and stole through the silent 
 alleys, lighting up their dewy shade with richest gold and 
 critnson. A peace, a rest after the hot day, had stolen over 
 all things. The trees, half in burning light and half in deep 
 gloom, cast their long shadows before them, as if hastening 
 to cool their parched roots. The daisies in the grass had 
 shut up their pink heads as tight as they could, and were 
 already fast asleep ; and everywhere the faint hum and low 
 murmur of insects and little hidden creatures rose on the 
 air like a welcome to the coming night. John sauntered 
 on a while, then turned back. He took a path that led to 
 the house, and walked along it. The old chateau, that was 
 Oliver Blackmore's home, and was to be his inheritance, 
 gleamed far away at the end of the alley. Its walls looked 
 crimson in the burning light of the setting sun, its windows 
 shone like gold or fire. It appeared a pleasant dwelling, 
 warm and bright, with gay flower-beds around it, and be- 
 yond these the green shelter of fine old trees, rising in 
 heavy masses against the clear French sky. John Dorrien 
 looked at it without envy, but he thought of the rich Paris 
 Dorriens, and he smiled. Who knew but that he, too, 
 might be a rich man yet, with a home like this to take his 
 little mother to? He had promised her that he would rub 
 Aladdin's lamp for her — and why should he not ? For, you 
 see, John Dorrien was young and self-reliant. He had 
 talent, he knew it, and he thought the world was all his 
 own. 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 " Seven years!" thought Mrs. Dorrien, as she sat 
 down alone one evening in September, her pale face and 
 bending figure looking very dim in the grayness of the 
 English twilight ; " well, it has been hard to bear, but what 
 was it to what lies before me ! ; '
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 45 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien might well say so. Her health was bro- 
 ken, her little means were gone, and she owed a hundred 
 pounds, of which twenty were due to Mrs. Henry, her 
 landlady; and Mrs. Henry, who was a widow, who had a 
 family, and who let her 'first-floor furnished, was coming 
 up this evening to settle accounts with Mrs. Dorrien ; for 
 Mrs. Henry wanted her money, and she could not wait, 
 and she would not wait, either, etc., etc. 
 
 " Oh ! what shall I do ? " thought poor Mrs. Dorrien. 
 " O Johnny, Johnny, you will never know what I have 
 had to bear for your sake ! " 
 
 Truly her lot had been a hard one for these seven years. 
 The parting from her boy had been cruel — the suspense of 
 not knowing whether he would be accepted or not, and, 
 when he was so, the fear that he would not get on, had 
 worn her to a shadow. When Time had reconciled her to 
 his absence, and convinced her that Johnny was to be the 
 in ist brilliant scholar of Saint-Ives, Mr. Perry died suddenly ; 
 with him died Mrs. Dorrien's most lucrative occupation, 
 but not the debt which she had contracted to him, in order 
 to pay for her boy's schooling. That debt crushed her ; 
 she sold all her valuables, she worked from morning till 
 night, and still its baleful shadow was spread over her 
 life, deepening more and more as the years went by. 
 
 And Johnny was so happy all this time ! He was 
 always at the head of his class, to begin with. Then he 
 spent his holidays with Oliver; and Mr. Blaekmore's chateau 
 wis quite equal to Windsor Castle, said Johnny ; and the 
 fishing and the boating and the sea-bathing! — why, there 
 had never been any thing like it in his life ! Then, when 
 Mr. Dlaekmore and Oliver once went traveling, and Johnny 
 had to remain at Saint-Ives during the vacation, Mr. Ryan 
 took him in hand and taught him fencing, and Johnny 
 seemed to think that it was almost better than the boating 
 and the fishing; and if all this made Mrs. Dorrien very 
 happy and very proud, it also made her very miserable and 
 very jealous. O Johnny, Johnny, how could you be so 
 happy without your mother? And who and what were 
 that Mr. Blackmore, and that Mr. Ryan, too, that they 
 should bask in the sunshine of your presence, while she 
 was starving in the shade ? 
 
 I£or, though Mrs. Dorrien wrote prettv letters to both
 
 46 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 these gentlemen, thanking 1 them for their kindness to her 
 fatherless boy, she thought in her heart that the compli- 
 ment was by no means on her side, and she wondered that 
 they did not seem to understand what it was for her to let 
 them have the society of a boy like her boy. But these 
 thorns in her lot could have been borne, if it had not been 
 for the debt ; and even that could have been endured, but 
 for a great, a terrible question, which a wiser and less am- 
 bitious woman would have put to herself from the first. 
 What was Mrs. Dorrien to do with the brilliant scholar for 
 whom she had made such stupendous sacrifices of health, 
 money, and almost honesty, since she had contracted debts 
 which she could not possibly pay? She had unfitted her 
 boy for any trade or business by which money could be 
 earned early, and she had no means of advancing him 
 in any of the liberal professions for which she had fitted 
 him. 
 
 No wonder that, as she sat alone on this September 
 evening waiting for Mrs. Henry, Mrs. Dorrien could not 
 look her future in the face. She was staring vacantly at 
 the dull street, when a cab stopped at the door below. It 
 was for the first-floor lodgers, of course. Who came to 
 her ? The early life of this poor lady had been severed 
 from its later years by one of those calamities which alien- 
 ate some natures from their kind. There was that in the 
 past which she could not bear to speak of or to remember. 
 She secured silence and oblivion by the only means in her 
 power, total solitude. She knew no one, called upon no 
 one, received visits from none ; so when there now was a 
 sound of voices on the stairs, and a man's step mingled 
 with them, when a knock at her door followed, and the 
 door opened, and a tall dark form appeared in the opening, 
 and it was plain that cab, voices, step, and visitor, were all 
 for her, she started to her feet in wild terror of the calam- 
 ity which must now be crossing her threshold. 
 
 "All in the dark, little mother?" said a gay young 
 voice. 
 
 The shock was too great. Mrs. Dorrien neither screamed 
 nor fainted, but her head swam, and she would have fallen 
 to the floor, if John had not caught her in his arms. 
 
 " O John," she gasped, " what is it — what has hap- 
 pened ?
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 47 
 
 "Why, nothing, little mother, save that you <!/> not 
 seem to have got my letter." 
 
 "There is nothing — nothing wrong, Johnny?" 
 
 " Wrong ! — no, indeed, little mother," he laughed gayly ; 
 " but do tell me how and where to get a light, that I may 
 see you." 
 
 " Mary Ann ! " called out the sharp voice of Mrs. Henry 
 from the head of the stairs, "bring a light directly." 
 
 Mary Ann, who was coming up, appeared almost as 
 soon as called, and, setting the candlestick on the tabic 
 stared with open mouth and eyes at the new-comer, till 
 her mistress bade her go away, and shut the door. The 
 girl obeyed, and Mrs. Henry remained, and stood looking 
 on, unheeded by mother and son. And now they saw 
 each other as Time had made them. With dismay John 
 looked at a gray, care-worn woman; with mingled sorrow 
 and pride Mrs. Dorricn lost forever that little Johnny from 
 whom she had parted on the deck of the steamer, and found 
 in his stead a tall, manly young fellow, with brown hair 
 curling round his white forehead, and his handsome eyes 
 sparkling beneath his dark eyebrows. 
 
 "Oh, my boy, my boy!" she cried, "how beautiful 
 3 7 OU have grown ! " 
 
 This injudicious exclamation broke the spell which 
 had kept Mrs. Henry silent till then. She had been think- 
 ing of giving Mrs. Dorrien one evening's respite, and her 
 hand was on the lock of the door, when this cry of mater- 
 nal pride exasperated her. What did Mrs. Dorrien mean, 
 she should like to know, by keeping her sons like princes 
 in French colleges, and have them come over for the holi- 
 days, and spending money on traveling, driving up to her, 
 Mrs. Henry's, door in cabs, and then gloating over their 
 beauty ; while her boys had to go to the poorest daj'-school, 
 and never had a day's pleasure from year's end to year's 
 end, and she, Mrs. Henry, worked herself to the bone to 
 keep them, and could not get her own hard-earned money 
 from first floor furnished or second floor unfurnished. She 
 would not stand it — that she would not. So, in her sharp, 
 hard voice, she broke on Mrs. Dorrien's raptures by say- 
 ing: 
 
 " If you please, Mrs. Dorrien, I should like to have that 
 account settled — sorry to interrupt you, but it will not take
 
 48 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 five minutes ; and I was to come this evening, you know. 
 I have got the receipt ready, stamp and all, and as of course 
 you have the money ready, too, there will be no delay ; 
 and I can leave you the light, if you have none ready," 
 added Mrs. Henry, trying to smile, and look gracious. 
 
 No smile came over Mrs. Dorrien's face — she looked 
 from her boy, whom she was clasping in a }^earning embrace, 
 to her landlady, and her poor, sunken eyes took a pitiful, 
 imploring look, and it was in a low, meek voice that she 
 said : " I am so sorry, Mrs. Henry ; but I have been ill all 
 day, and — and I had forgotten — " 
 
 " Forgotten ! " cried Mrs. Henry, in her shrillest tones 
 — " forgotten that you owe me more than a year's rent, 
 Mrs. Dorrien ! Well, I have not forgotten it, nor has my 
 landlord, who never lets me off a day ; and I shall have to 
 pay him next Michaelmas, Mrs. Dorrien; and I don't keep 
 my boys in foreign colleges — I can't afford it ; and they 
 don't drive up to any one's door in cabs." Mrs. Henry was 
 urged to this remark by the stern looks which John was 
 casting on her as he heard his little mother addressed thus 
 disrespectfully ; " and I pay my way, ma'am, and can look 
 any one in the face, ma'am." 
 
 " God help me ! " said poor Mrs. Dorrien, sinking down 
 on a chair, and looking up at John. " O my boy ! my 
 poor boy ! what a welcome home ! " 
 
 Mrs. Henry, who was exasperated by her troubles — and 
 she had plenty of them — but who was not so hard-hearted 
 as she was sharp-tongued, would have relented, on hearing 
 this exclamation, if John had not interfered. 
 
 " Madam," said he, turning upon her with all the injured 
 dignity of seventeen — " madam, how much does Mrs. Dor- 
 rien owe you ? " 
 
 " Don't madam me, sir ! " cried Mrs. Henry, in great 
 wrath, " because I'll not stand it." 
 
 " I mean no impertinence," said John, still speaking lofti- 
 ly ; " T only want to know how much Mrs. Dorrien owes you," 
 
 "Don't interfere, my dear," entreated his mother — 
 " don't." 
 
 The request came too late. 
 
 " Twenty pounds sterling, five shillings, and sixpence," 
 sharply answered Mrs. Henry ; " if you have got the money, 
 I have the receipt."
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 49 
 
 "I have not got the money," answered John, still look- 
 ing stiff and offended ; " but I shall have it — soon, I hope." 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien looked bewildered, and Mrs. Henry incred- 
 ulous. 
 
 " When ? " she asked, shortly. 
 
 John hesitated. 
 
 " In a fortnight, I believe," he answered, at length — 
 " in a week, maybe," he added, noticing Mrs. Henry's low- 
 ering brow. 
 
 The landlady stared at him. 
 
 " And where will it come from ? " she asked, point-blank. 
 
 "That," said John, dryly, "is my concern." 
 
 " Oh ! very well," cried Mrs. Henry, snatching up the 
 light and walking to the door, "that is your concern, on 
 my word ! Well, I know what my concern is, that is all." 
 
 And, giving the door a slam, she left mother and son in 
 the dark. 
 
 "Where are the matches, little mother?" asked John, 
 pretending to speak cheerfully. 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien did not answer. She rose, she looked for 
 the matches, lit a candle with trembling fingers, then, turn- 
 ing her pale, scared face upon her son, she said, faintly : 
 " O John, what is all this ? Why have you come ? — 
 what have you been doing? You have exasperated Mrs. 
 Henry. John, she will take every thing I have, every 
 thing, and turn me out-of-doors to-morrow 1 " 
 
 " No, little mother," he soothingly replied, " she will 
 not — it will be all right ; but do let me look at you. O 
 little mother, how you have fretted ! " 
 
 " I could not help it, dear. My darling, how tall you 
 are ! And you have a beard, too." 
 
 "Not yet, little mother. Are you disappointed?" 
 
 She tried to laugh, but could not. She kept looking at 
 him, seeking, in that clever young face, the sharp features 
 of her little, pale Johnny, in that light and slender form, 
 the little figure in gray, with its leather bag strapped round 
 its waist, which she could never forget. The boy was gone, 
 and, though manhood had not yet come, it was easy to see 
 what manhood would be. But, even while she looked, bit- 
 ter thoughts thrust themselves between Mrs. Dorrien and 
 her boy's face. " O John," she said, again, " what is all 
 this? Why have you come?" 
 3
 
 50 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 " There is nothing wrong, little mother," he quickly 
 answered, divining her thoughts. "I was at Mr. Black- 
 more's, as you know; well, his brother has died suddenly, 
 and he and Oliver came over for the funeral; and they 
 asked me to join them, and I could not resist the tempta- 
 tion of seeing you." 
 
 " And who paid for your expenses ? " 
 
 " Oliver lent me the money." 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien stared at him in blank dismay. 
 
 John colored. 
 
 " There was no time to write and consult you," he said, 
 quickly; "but it will be all right, little mother, on my 
 word, it will. And now," he added, laughing, " can you 
 let me have any thing to eat ? " 
 
 The request suspended Mrs. Dorrien's questions. She 
 became strong, energetic, and active, at once. In a few 
 minutes John was eating eggs, drinking tea, and talking, 
 all at once. 
 
 " Nothing new about Saint-Ives," he said, gayly ; " al- 
 ways first, you know. I wrote to you how I got all the 
 Greek prizes ; but then we fellows at Saint-Ives have a 
 name for Greek, you know. The abbe is a great man. He 
 awed me terriblv when I saw him lirst. I do not mind him 
 
 t/ 
 
 a bit now. But he is strict — quite strict — we must be 
 mediaeval scholars, and grub over our studies. I wrote to 
 you about Ludovic, that surly fellow, who hates me. I 
 shall overtake him in philosophy next year ; and, plodder 
 though he is, I shall be sure to beat him, says Mr. Ryan. 
 He is our great man now, but I have set my heart on being 
 the first man of Saint-Ives. I must, and I will ! " cried 
 John Dorrien, with eyes sparkling at the thought of his 
 triumph ; " and I shall pass an examination for bacheller des 
 lettres, and get such a diploma as no one ever had." 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien's eyes, too, lit at the thought of her boy 
 securing the championship of Saint-Ives ; but the flame soon 
 died out of them as she remembered her troubles and Mrs. 
 Henry. John's sensitive face quickly caught the meaning 
 which he read on his mother's, and, pushing his plate away, 
 he said, eagerly : 
 
 "Poor little mother! you are thinking of that horrid 
 woman — don't mind her; and as to Saint-Ives, what matter 
 if I don't go back to it ? I can work alone now, and I see,
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 51 
 
 oil ! I see," he added, looking dolefully around the hare 
 room, " how dear my scholarship has cost you !" 
 
 " My dear, I do not grudge it," cried his mother, " if 
 only I could keep you there longer, and if it were not for 
 Mrs. Henry ! Oh ! mv dear, why did you provoke her 
 so?" 
 
 John stared. 
 
 " I only promised her her money," said he. 
 
 "But why did you, when it stands to reason that you 
 cannot give it ? " 
 
 John became very red. 
 
 " But if I said it I meant it ! " he exclaimed, very warm- 
 ly, " every word of it, little mother." 
 
 " But you can't give her the money," said Mrs. Dorrien, 
 looking vexed ; " you can't give her what you have not 
 got." 
 
 " But I will get it," insisted John, speaking in a clear, 
 positive voice; " I must and I will, only I should have ex- 
 plained it all to you first, as I would, too, if I had had time. 
 Do you remember," asked John, moving his chair near his 
 mother's, and taking her hand as he spoke — " do you re- 
 member how, on the day when you came home to tell me 
 that I was going to Saint-Ives, I had been reading the story 
 of Aladdin, and wishing for his lamp, so that I might rub 
 and rub it for you?" 
 
 " My dear, I never forgot it," answered Mrs. Dorrien, 
 smiling fondly in his face. 
 
 " Well, then, little mother, I have got a lamp, and I am 
 going to rub it, and to pay Mrs. Henry, and get you back 
 all the pretty things with which you have parted/ Oh ! if 
 I could only get you back other things too — your pretty 
 color and your bright eyes!" he did not add "j'our black 
 hair," but his voice' faltered as he looked at the gray locks 
 which he remembered so glossy and so dark. 
 
 " Go on, Johnny," said his mother; "tell me all." 
 ^ " No one knows any thing about it, save Mr. Ryan," 
 said Johnny, blushing like a girl ; " but the fact is, I have 
 been writing a dramatic poem." 
 
 "A dramatic poem ! " echoed Mrs. Dorrien, staring. 
 
 " Yes ; a poem like Goethe's ' Faust,' or Byron's ' Man- 
 fred,' that's what L mean, little mother." John spoke very 
 coolly, and as if the writing of dramatic poems were as
 
 52 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 much a matter of course as the cutting- of bread-and-butter. 
 Mrs. Dorrien felt that some terrible misfortune was coming, 
 but she did not realize it yet. 
 
 " My boy, John, you cannot be serious ! " she faltered. 
 
 " Why not ? I dare say you think me too young. 
 Well, I cannot help being young. What does one's age 
 signify ? It is one's work that is the thing. Well, I have 
 read all that is written of ' Miriam the Jewess ' to Mr. 
 Ryan, and he thinks highly of it. Shall I repeat some of 
 it to you, little mother ? " 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien said " Yes," with a bewildered look, which 
 made her son laugh. 
 
 "Red glows the East, as though some smouldering fire ! " 
 
 began John ; then he broke off with " But I must tell you 
 the subject first. You must know that Miriam the Jewess 
 is a beautiful girl — all this happens in the middle ages — 
 an orphan, and that she lives alone in a wild place in the 
 Pyrenees. Men hate her because she is a Jewess, and fear 
 her because they think she is a witch. The opening scene 
 shows her alone, in a grand mountain solitude, watching 
 the sun rise in the plain at her feet. And now I shall 
 begin again." 
 
 John went through some hundred lines, then he paused 
 and looked at his mother with that look which says so 
 plainly, " What do you think of it ? " Mrs. Dorrien gazed 
 at her son with mingled pride, delight, and consternation. 
 
 " My dear boy," she said, clasping her hands, " is it pos- 
 sible that you actually wrote those beautiful verses?" 
 
 " Then you do think them good ? " said Johnny, his face 
 beaming with delight. 
 
 ; ' My dear, they are grand ! " 
 
 " That is just what Mr. Ryan says. He says, little 
 mother, there is nothing finer in all Milton." 
 
 " There is nothing half so fine," cried Mrs. Dorrien, who 
 had never been able to finish "Paradise Lost." 
 
 "O little mother, little mother; you are worse than 
 Mr. Ryan, and he is bad enough. Don't you think Miriam's 
 speech rather long ? " 
 
 " Well, perhaps it is," confessed Mrs. Dorrien. 
 
 "Yes, but you see, as Mr. Ryan says, if you take out a 
 line you spoil it all."
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. ,-,3 
 
 "And what ((.iiics after that speech ?" 
 
 "Ah ! it is not written yet. I mean, not written so as 
 for me to read it to you, but I can tell you what it is about. 
 Jacques the chamois-hunter appears, and sees Miriam. The 
 fact is that, rude, ignorant, and rough as he is, he is be- 
 witched by her spiritual beauty. You see, he has a pretty 
 little foolish betrothed called Rose, but he does not care 
 about her, and, without know nig why, he is always haunting 
 Miriam's steps. Then there is a baron, a real mediaeval baron, 
 who wants to carry off Miriam ; then there's a hermit, who 
 converts her ; and, last of all, Jacques and Miriam flee togel h- 
 er, make their way to the sea, and there sail away, and are 
 never heard of more. But all this is quite rough yet, and 
 I have only passages here and there that are really finished. 
 However, 1 shall lookout for publishers to-morrow — but, 
 no, not to-morrow. I must first write out an outline of the 
 subject, and insert the finished passages in their proper 
 places; when that is done, I shall look out for a publisher. 
 Mr. Ryan says there is no doubt that I shall get a handsome 
 sum for it. Of course I must part with the copyright, for 
 Mr. Ryan, who knows all about publishing — he wrote a 
 book on ' Irish Antiquities,' you know — says publishers are 
 too sharp to let such a thing as 'Miriam' slip out of their 
 fingers without securing it. However, when it comes to 
 my second poem, I shall make my own terms, of course. 
 And now, little mother," added John, with his brightest 
 smile, " you know all about my ' Aladdin's Lamp,' and how 
 I mean to pa}' Mrs. Henry." 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien looked at him, and was mute, but she 
 could have cried aloud in her anguish, it was so great. So 
 this was the end of her weary seven years — an unfinished 
 scholar, a boy poet ; and this w r as how John meant to pay 
 Mrs. Henry in a fortnight — nay, in. a week. She did not 
 speak at once, she could not trust herself with speech. At 
 length she said : 
 
 " The poem is not finished ; how, then, can a publisher 
 give you money ? " 
 
 " Mr. Ryan's 'Irish Antiquities' was not finished, and 
 he got money for it," replied John, with a secure smile. 
 " Bless you, little mother, I know all about it." 
 
 Again Mrs. Dorrien was silent. She felt helpless and 
 powerless. Johnny, once so submissive, was strangely
 
 54 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 altered. He was self-confident, self-reliant, and he had 
 been so buoyed up by that Mr. Ryan, that, with all his 
 fondness for her, her opinion, and she saw it very well, 
 was of no account. She knew little enough of poetry — 
 nothing of publishing, but she knew life, and John's " Lamp 
 of Aladdin " filled her with silent despair. Her first act 
 was to go down, see Mrs. Henry, and try to undo the fatal 
 effect of John's grand ways. She had some trouble in 
 pacifying that angry lady — angry especially at having 
 been called " Madam." " I never was called Madam be- 
 fore, Mrs. Dorrien," said she — " never ! " 
 
 " He meant no harm," pleaded the mother ; " he is on- 
 ly a boy, Mrs. Henry ; you have boys of your own — dear, 
 good boys, I know ; don't be angry with mine." 
 
 She tried to smile at Mrs. Henry, who relented a little, 
 but would pretend not to do so ; and thus the quarrel was 
 half made up, and Mrs. Dorrien, having indulged in a few 
 bitter tears on the dark and silent staircase, went back to 
 her son. 
 
 John was writing when Mrs. Dorrien opened the door. 
 A brilliant idea had come to him, and he was putting it 
 down lest it should escape. How handsome he looked, in 
 his mother's eyes, as he sat bending forward, with the light 
 shining on his intellectual face, and his long white fingers 
 thrust through the curls of his brown hair. 
 
 " What are you doing, dear ? " she asked, coming up to 
 him and leaning over his chair. 
 
 " Going on with the outline of Miriam," he answered, 
 with sparkling eyes. " Oh ! little mother, if I can only 
 carry out my idea, what a grand thing it will be ! " 
 
 She sat down and watched him with a sort of a dull 
 despair. So far, at least, as speech went, she let him have 
 his own way. She even listened to more passages from 
 " Miriam the Jewess," and praised them ; but when they 
 parted for the night, John sitting up to go on with his 
 " outline," Mrs. Dorrien gave way to her grief. 
 
 For hours she lay awake that night, watching the pale 
 moonlight on her window-blinds, counting every hour that 
 struck in the clock of Kensington Church, and saying to 
 herself over and over again — " Oh, God help me ! What 
 have I done — what have I done ! " 
 
 Sermons have been written on the vanitv of human de-
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 sires — ever in vain. Man will not submit to Providence — 
 man will, if he can, rule and govern bis little world. Mrs. 
 Dorrien's world was a child ; she had early decreed 4hat 
 her boy should have a classical education, and, now that 
 her object was wellnigh accomplished, she was in despair 
 at her success. She had committed a fatal mistake — she 
 knew it, but only made the discovery in order to fall into 
 another no less fatal than the first. She had raised John 
 too high — she now wondered how she could brins: him 
 down. When Heaven, by placing 1 her in poverty, seemed 
 to show her the humble path which her boy must tread, 
 Mrs. Dorrien had rebelled against the lesson ; and when 
 John came back to her, unfitted for the commoner ways of 
 life, Mrs. Dorrien rebelled again. So while the youth sat 
 up full of ardor and faith, longing for success, money, and 
 fame, feeling sure of them all — had he not Mr. Ryan's ver- 
 dict for it ? — -his mother lay awake planning and plotting 
 how best to counteract all his hopes and lay them in the 
 dust; and scarcely had wish and prayer been fashioned in 
 her breast when they seemed to be heard. And when 
 they had been heard, indeed, and the mother had drawn 
 her son away from that beautiful world of fancy to which 
 she had done so much to lure him, when, wearied with 
 cares and often pierced with sorrow, John Dorrien almost 
 wished that his days were over, and that, like the hireling, 
 he had won his wages, when all his young illusions had 
 laded out of the pages of his book of life, as the bark which 
 bore Miriam the Jewess and her lover had faded away on 
 the far sea-horizon of the poem that was never finished, 
 then Mrs. Dorrien wept and lamented that her praver had 
 been heard, but was not yet corrected, and woidd, had she 
 been able to do so, have again made out John's life accord- 
 ing to her own ideas of what his happiness should be. 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 "Onxy fancy, little mother," said John, the next morn- 
 ing at breakfast, " I quite forgot telling you last night, but 
 there are — there actually are Dorriens, English Dorriens,
 
 56 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 in Paris. Mr. Black more has told me so. Has any thing 1 
 fallen ? " added John, as he saw his mother stoop, as if to 
 pick up something' from the floor. 
 
 "I have got it," she said, looking up again. "What 
 were you saying ? " 
 
 " There are English Dorriens in Paris," repeated John. 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien was always pale now, so she could not be 
 said to turn pale on hearing him ; but yet the life-blood 
 deserted her cheeks, and left them sallow. Her eyes grew 
 dull, her lips parted, and she put down her cup nervously. 
 
 " You are not well," said John, alarmed. 
 
 " Only a spasm — do not mind it. What about these 
 Dorriens ? " 
 
 " Well, there is only one, for Mr. Dorrien's son is dead. 
 It is quite a long story, little mother. These Dorriens left 
 England with King James, but, instead of entering the 
 French army, or trying to rise like gentlemen, since they 
 w r ere such by birth, they founded a commercial establish- 
 ment in Paris, and the house exists still — more than a 
 hundred years old, says Mr. Blackmore. A great whole- 
 sale house for fancy stationery, note and letter-paper, and 
 envelopes. There were a good many Dorriens formerly, 
 but some returned to England and staid there — I wonder 
 if we are related to them ? — and now there is only one 
 French Dorrien left. I don't know why I call him a French 
 Dorrien, for he was born in England, and his wife was an 
 Englishwoman. Well, he is immensely rich, has a most 
 extensive business, to which he is quite a slave, is up at 
 his work at six in the morning, and is never in bed before 
 twelve at night. Mammon ! Mammon ! " said the youth- 
 ful philosopher, shaking his head over Mr. Dorrien. 
 
 " Mr. Blackmore seems to know a great deal about Mr. 
 Dorrien," said Mrs. Dorrien. 
 
 "I am not sure that he has ever seen him ; but he has 
 seen his house, and gives a most picturesque account of it. 
 Such an old, old house, in an old part of Paris, built round 
 a court-yard, and with a large garden behind — a garden 
 with trees that have stood a century, little mother ; and 
 just fancy an ancient marble fountain, with a heathen 
 river-god pouring water out of his stone urn, and — little 
 mother, have you another spasm?" asked John, breaking 
 off in his narrative to look anxiously at his mother's face.
 
 JOHN DORRIEN, 57 
 
 " I am subject to them," she replied faintly ; " but just 
 opeu the window, will you? the air will revive me." 
 
 John obeyed ; he threw the window open ; he came 
 back to his mother, and was full of concern. " O little 
 mother," he said, sorrowfully, "how altered you are! 
 You never had spasms formerly — you never had any 
 thing." 
 
 " Yes, yes, people will alter," said Mrs. Dorrien, a little 
 impatiently. " I am better now. Shut the window, dear. 
 What about that Mr. Dorrien ? How old is he ? — has he 
 any children ?" 
 
 John answered that Mr. Dorrien's son, the only child li<- 
 had ever had, had died some time ago. Mrs. Dorrien sipped 
 her tea, and made no comment. Then all of a sudden she 
 became inquisitive about Mr. Blackmore. What sort of a 
 man was he? Where did his brother die, and where was 
 Mr. Blackmore staying? At the Charing-Cross Hotel? 
 How odd ! That was the last place she, Mrs. Dorrien, 
 would have fancied a man like Mr. Blackmore would stop 
 at. John gave her a puzzled look, but he had nothing to 
 sav for or against the Charing-Cross Hotel. 
 
 Breakfast was over. Mrs. Dorrien went to her room, 
 and presently returned dressed to go out. 
 
 " I do not want you, dear," said she, forestalling his 
 proposal to accompany her. " I would rather you went on 
 with your outline." 
 
 " It will be finished to-day, little mother. I can take it 
 to a publisher to-morrow. lie can give me an answer after 
 to-morrow, and we can settle about terms and all that on 
 the next day. So you see," conclusivelj- added John, " that 
 I have plenty of time to go out with you." 
 
 " Not this morning, dear," said his mother. " I am only 
 going on some tiresome business." 
 
 " To-day is Tuesday," said John, counting on his fingers ; 
 " let me see ; Wednesday, Thursday, Friday — little mother, 
 ' Miriam ' will be disposed of on Saturday or Monday next at 
 the latest, so you need not worry about business, or about 
 that horrid woman below," he added, with a look of dis- 
 gust, as he thought of Mrs. Henry. But Mrs. Dorrien per- 
 sisted in going out on her tiresome business, and also in 
 declining John's society. He should accompany her another 
 time, said she; so she kissed him tenderly, gave him a
 
 58 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 wistful look, and slipped down-stairs as hastily as if she 
 had feared lest he should follow her. 
 
 John had no such thought ; John was blest in the society 
 of " Miriam the Jewess," and had no suspicion that his 
 mother had gone out in order to divide him from that beau- 
 tiful maiden forever. Ah ! happy hours of young poet-love, 
 hours tender and pure, why are you so fleeting? John 
 Dorrien is not a young man now — he has had his share of 
 human bliss and woe, but he always looks back to that 
 morning spent with " Miriam " in his mother's sitting-room 
 on the second floor of the Kensington lodgings, with fond 
 and sad recollection. He loved this " Miriam " so entirely ! 
 He was not jealous of Jacques a bit. Why should he be ? 
 Save when the chamois-hunter was required for dramatic ac- 
 tion, John ignored him, and unscrupulously appropriated the 
 dark-eyed, high-souled Jewess, lovely twin-sister of Scott's 
 " Rebecca." He had her now ; he sat down by her side in 
 the gloom and freshness of the grand old forest-trees, where 
 the green ferns grew high around them, where the wild 
 deer sped by ; while the thrush sang sweetly on the boughs 
 above their heads, and where not even a faint murmur of 
 the far-away world could steal in 'through the low, dim hori- 
 zon that inclosed them. But no, Miriam wanted freer air 
 than that of forests ; besides, John Dorrien was not sure 
 that they abounded in the Pyrenees ; so these two wandered 
 together in a mountain solitude, where the gray torrent 
 leaped down among brown rocks, and passed, all wrath and 
 foam, between its barren shores. 
 
 On they went, climbing till they reached a savage peak, 
 whence they viewed the kingdoms of this world lying be- 
 low at their feet. They saw that world of men and the 
 dun smoke of its cities ; the waving corn and the green 
 pastures of its tilled lands ; the glancing light of its rivers 
 pouring down to the sea, they saw, too ; and, though they 
 held it fair, they loved it not. Had not they (Miriam and 
 John Dorrien) tasted its worthlessness ? Frcm where they 
 stood could they not survey the ruins of Greece and Rome, 
 and the battle-fields of to-day ? Did they not know what 
 became of the dust of conquests, and what was the end of 
 mighty armadas ? Then would they not let that false world 
 go by, and live their own life in their blest solitude ? How 
 they were to fare up there, John Dorrien did not think fit
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 59 
 
 to say; and we may be sure did not, even in his own 
 thoughts, inquire. Why should he? "Miriam the Jewess" 
 was beyond human wants ; and the John Dorrien who 
 climbed the mountain-peak with her partook of her nature. 
 The other John Dorrien, who was now working so hard at 
 a dramatic poem, was a very different person indeed. He 
 wanted success and fame, and plenty of them ; he wanted 
 money, and, though not covetous by nature, he wanted 
 plenty of it too. For this John Dorrien was A*ery practical, 
 after a fashion, and, though he might gaze down on the 
 kingdoms of this world with sublime contempt (in Miriam's 
 company), he knew very well, and had known from his 
 childhood, poor fellow ! that there is no doing without gold 
 or silver. That his dramatic poem would speedily get him 
 an ample supply of both, he did not doubt ; but, indeed, 
 what did John Dorrien doubt? That he was a true poet 
 he felt quite sure; that his dramatic poem would live as 
 long as the English language was equally certain — as cer- 
 tain that he, John Dorrien, would be, or ought to be, buried 
 in Poets' Corner, Westminster Abbey. If he had not had 
 this faith in himself, he could not have written a line, for 
 he was proud, and hated mediocrity. But, though he was 
 not vainer than most clever boys of his age, his classical edu- 
 cation, the consciousness of his great natural gifts, and his 
 entire success in all he had hitherto attempted, rendered 
 his illusion easy. It was sweet and fair, and, while it lasted, 
 rilled his 3'oung life with enchantment. This, one of its 
 last hours, brimmed over with delight. We are told that 
 Circe mingled the wine of Pramnium and newhonev in the 
 cup which she handed to the companions of I lysses ; and 
 so there were various ingredients in that cup which John 
 Dorrien now mixed up so pleasantly for himself. There 
 was money for his mother, and all her missing furniture 
 brought back ; there was the pride she would take in her 
 son's success, and there were, too, the tears she would shed 
 when she saw his dramatic poem printed, and looked up 
 from the title-page to his dead father's portrait, that pale, 
 mild, sad image now gazing down from the wall at John 
 Dorrien. Surely all this was sweet as new honey to the 
 boy's generous heart ; but strong and intoxicating as the 
 wineof the Greek sorceress was the thrilling thought which 
 made his gray eyes flash and sparkle with fire — " You, too,
 
 eo JOHN DORRIEN. - 
 
 will be one of that glorious company," it said, as he looked 
 at the well-remembered volumes on his mother's book- 
 shelves — Virgil's Eclogues — his father's copy — a few of 
 Shakespeare's plays, and Milton's poems. 
 
 Can such bliss fall to the lot of mortals ? Alas ! very 
 rarely. And, though John did not suspect it, his mother, 
 whose pale face now looked in at him from the door, smil- 
 ing faintly, had gone out to seek a spell more potent than 
 that of the white-blossomed Moly ; a spell which drained 
 the cup of all its sweetness, and destroyed its magic for- 
 ever. 
 
 " My dear, arc you not working too hard ? " said Mrs. 
 Dorrien, coming in; "you are so flushed." 
 
 " And you, little mother, are so pale." 
 
 " I am always pale now," replied Mrs. Dorrien, with a 
 half-sigh ; " at least, I think so — for I have had no one to 
 tell me about it." 
 
 She sat down, and pressed her hand to her side. If 
 John lacked the true poetic genius, he failed in none of the 
 poetic sensitiveness. A boy at school had had a pain in 
 his side, and had died. Was his mother going to die ? 
 Miriam vanished as the dread thought shot through him. 
 He was afraid, he was, that his little mother was not well. 
 Should he run for the doctor ? 
 
 " The doctor ! " echoed Mrs. Dorrien, sharply ; but she 
 checked herself, and declined mildly medical interference. 
 At the same time, she confessed she was not very well ; 
 and, if Johnny did not mind staying with her that day, and 
 not going out, she would like it. 
 
 " Mind it ! " cried Johnny — " of course not." He would 
 stay with her, and read her more of Miriam, for he had been 
 working hard while she was out. 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien winced at the proposal, but would not de- 
 cline listening to that dramatic poem of John's, which was 
 to work such wonders for them both. She reclined on the 
 sofa, and John read with all the passion and enthusiasm of 
 one whose heart has been, and is still, in his work. Mrs. 
 Dorrien watched his flushed face and sparkling eyes, and 
 felt so miserable that she had to look away. Why or how 
 had he taken this dreadful fancy for poetry ? It was a per- 
 fect infatuation, and she saw no cure for it. She could not 
 bear it; and, saying she felt exhausted and wanted to sleep,
 
 JOHN DOBRIEN. Gl 
 
 she turned her face to the wall, while John renewed his 
 labors. 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien rallied a little in the afternoon, but she 
 could eat no dinner— perhaps, poor woman ! to leave plenty 
 for John. She took some tea, however; and, after tea, she 
 inspected John's wardrobe. She made sad discoveries there, 
 and was very angry with the lingbre at Saint-Ives. 
 
 " Why, John," she said, quite crossly, " what has be- 
 come of that set of collars which I sent you last year ? I 
 made and stitched them myself — and now do just see the 
 state they are in ! " 
 
 She held one up in indignant amazement; but John, 
 who was thinking whether his poem on solitude ("A charm- 
 ing lyric," said Mr. Ryan) would not do very well spoken 
 by Miriam — 
 
 "0 Solitude, when you and I 
 
 First met upon the wild sea-shore, 
 And waited for the coining roar 
 Of waves, or heard the sea-bird's cry " — 
 
 John, we say, expressed his regret at his mother's an- 
 noyance, but" without that degree of angry warmth which, 
 in Mrs. Dorrien's opinion, the occasion required. 
 
 " You are quite taken up with your poetry," said Mrs. 
 Dorrien, rather sharply. 
 
 "Of course I am, little mother," he answered, gay ly; 
 " I mean to make quite a grand thing of it. And, if you 
 had not been so poorly, I should have gone round to see 
 Oliver Blackmore." 
 
 " Why so ? " asked his mother, quietly. 
 
 "Why, to ask him to help me to get the proper infor- 
 mation about a publisher. I don't want to go to the wrong 
 house, you understand." 
 
 "My dear," nervously said his mother, putting down 
 the damaged collar, "do not be in a hurry. Mrs. Henry 
 will have patience for a while. I mean, it will all be bet- 
 ter than you think, and — and — I would not show the out- 
 line to any one till the poem is more advanced, if I were 
 you." 
 
 "You think I ought to write more of it?" said John. 
 "Perhaps the scene between Miriam and Jacques wants to 
 be developed," he suggested, with sparkling eyes. 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien thought it did. In a moment John's
 
 62 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 manuscript was on the table, and he was up to his ears in 
 Miriam, Jacques, and the Hermit, whom he brought in. 
 Mrs. Dorrien breathed a sigh of relief. Time was her great 
 ally now. Who could say what a few days more might not 
 bring forth ? 
 
 But his impatience of showing his outline to a publisher 
 returned the next morning, and John would certainly have 
 3'ielded to it if Mrs. Dorrien had not been so unwell. She 
 complained of no particular ailment, but she seemed miser- 
 able when John spoke of leaving her, and at all times she 
 looked harassed and worn. John felt very uneasy about 
 his mother, but his uneasiness only rendered him more 
 anxious to show the outline to a publisher, and, as a pre- 
 liminary step, to see Oliver Blackmore. 
 
 "I must, little mother," he said, early one morning, "I 
 really must; and I shall go before breakfast," he added. 
 
 " Very well, do," replied his mother, a little sullenly, 
 for John had spoken in the tone of one who has a will of 
 his own, and who means to use it. He went, but returned 
 earlier than his mother expected him. She gave him a fur- 
 tive look as he opened the door and came in. John's face 
 Avas clouded. Mrs. Dorrien's heart began to beat. 
 
 " Only think, little mother," he cried, in a vexed tone, 
 "they left last night. I should have gone yesterday." 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien was silent, but her face cleared. 
 
 " What will you do now ? " she had begun to say, when 
 the postman's knock was heard below. Mrs. Dorrien started 
 up, then sank back and bit her lip. 
 
 " That dreadful knock ! " she said. " It always terrifies 
 me. I alwaj's used to think it brought me bad news of 
 my Johnny. I ought not to care, now that you are here, 
 but the old nervousness clings to me still. And yet I know 
 that letter is not for me." 
 
 " But it is for you, little mother," said John, who had 
 been listening to various sounds on the stairs during his 
 mother's long explanation, " and I am afraid it is the cause 
 of some difference among the powers that be." 
 
 Such was the case. Mrs. Henry had left the parlor to 
 protest against Mary Ann answering the postman's knock, 
 or any one's knock, on behalf of the people on the second- 
 floor. They had a bell — let the bell be used. As to that 
 letter, it might lie on the bracket in the hall till Mrs. Dor-
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. G3 
 
 rien chose to come down. No servant of hers should wear 
 out her stair-carpet on such an errand, etc. 
 
 Almost all tins John Dorrien had heard. Red as fire, 
 be went down and took the letter from where it lay, while 
 Mrs. Henry, who stood at the parlor-door, and whose bark 
 wis worse than her bite, said something about servants 
 having so much to do in a house like hers. 
 
 " ( )h ! certainly," stiffly replied John, who was boiling 
 over with powerless wrath and useless indignation. 
 
 As he went up-stairs, with the letter in his hand, he 
 recognized the French stamp. Pie looked at it more close- 
 ly, thinking it might be for himself; but no, Mrs. Dorrien 
 was very legibly written upon it, and, what was more, this 
 letter for his mother came from Paris. John was fairly 
 bewildered. 
 
 "I suppose Mrs. Henry was rude?" said Mrs. Dorrien, 
 as he entered the room. 
 
 "Very rude; but, little mother, this is a Paris letter, 
 and it is actually for you." He handed it to her, with un- 
 disguised curiosity in his frank face. Mrs. Dorrien looked 
 very much surprised. A letter from Paris, and for her! 
 Was there no mistake ? She seemed to hesitate to open 
 it, and, when she did so at length, it was with a protest 
 that she could not imagine what this meant. John, to 
 whom it did not seem to occur that his mother could have 
 a secret to be kept from him, stood leaning against the 
 mantel-piece, looking earnestly at her while she read. The 
 letter was not a long one, yet it took Mrs. Dorrien some 
 time to go through it ; and, when she had finished it, she 
 folded it up, put it into the envelope, and laid it oh the 
 table; then she raised her eyes, and looked earnestly in her 
 son's face. 
 
 "John," she said, after a brief pause, which seemed 
 eternal, so silent were these two, so hushed was the room, 
 "I have something to tell you." 
 
 John showed no token of surprise; he knew very well 
 that his mother had something to tell him, and he was even 
 not very far from divining what that something was. 
 
 " You mentioned a family of the name of Dorrien the 
 other day," she resumed, " a commercial family, established 
 in Paris. John, it is your family. The last head of that 
 old commercial firm was your great-grandfather. Your
 
 64 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 father and the present Mr. Dorrien were first-cousins. 
 When I married your father, he took me home to the old 
 house you described to me the other morning. There is 
 not a room in it that I am not familiar with. Those large, 
 dark, old rooms, how well I know them ! And you, my 
 boy, were born in one of them, and, as a little child, you 
 have played on the grass near the old fountain of the river- 
 god, with his marble urn." 
 
 Something in these remembrances proved too much for 
 Mrs. Dorrien ; she laid her head across the table, near which 
 she was sitting, and wept bitterly. 
 
 John never moved from the mantel-shelf, against which 
 he stood leaning. Prepared by intuition though he was 
 for what was coming, he had heard her with amazement 
 and some sorrow. All these years his mother had deceived 
 him ; all these years she had spoken as though he and she 
 were alone in the world, without kith or kin; all these 
 years she had given him to understand that he was born in 
 some remote part of England. Therefore he said nothing 
 — he felt that he had nothing to say. He had no right to 
 reproach her in speech, and he was silent ; but in his heart 
 he knew that he had been cheated and wronged out of that 
 great inheritance — the truth. 
 
 " And now," said Mrs. Dorrien, looking up and drying 
 her tears — "now, John, you may read that letter. It is 
 from your father's cousin, Mr. Dorrien." 
 
 " We have done without him all these years, little 
 mother," said John, coldly; "what do we want with him 
 now ? " 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien colored. 
 
 " The fault may have been mine," she said ; " as soon 
 as he heard about us from Mr. Blackmore, he writes." 
 
 " Did he require a stranger's account to hear about us ? " 
 said John, still speaking coldly. 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien looked nervous. 
 
 " John," she said, in a low voice, and without looking 
 at her son, " that letter is more for you than for me. Read 
 it, then see what you have to say to it. I shall leave you 
 free."
 
 JOHN DOKR1EN. G5 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 The storm which swept James Stuart and his dynasty 
 away from the throne of England sent many a humbler line 
 than that royal one into exile. It was the boast of the Dor- 
 riena that they had given up all, house, land, and country, 
 for the sake of their sovereign. Their old hall in the north 
 passed into the hands of strangers; their ancestral acres 
 were tilled for new masters ; another race than that of the 
 Dorriens saw its stalwart sons and bloomiug daughters 
 grow into strength and beauty round what had once been 
 their hearth. True, the Dorriens had never been very great 
 — most true, they had never been very wealthy ; but they 
 were a race tenacious of their own, and who felt its loss 
 keenly; a proud, stubborn, touchy race, who soon found 
 out that they were of little account in Saint-Germain, and 
 that there was sad wisdom in the voice of him who first 
 said, " Put not your faith in princes." 
 
 The Dorriens did not complain — they were too proud 
 for that. They did not return to England, to be branded 
 as renegades by the vanquished Jacobites, or to be scorned 
 for their poverty and fallen estate by the triumphant fol- 
 lowers of William and Mary. They did what they had 
 ever done since they had borne the name of Dorrien : they 
 shaped their own course, and fought their own hard battle. 
 No one ever exactly knew how they began — the Dorriens 
 were not fond of talking about it; they also knew how to 
 keep their own counsel, and (hey had found it hard enough 
 to lay down the sword and estate of gentlemen without 
 adding to the hardship of their lot by laying it bare to the 
 world's cold eye. They wanted no help, no pity, and they 
 did very well without either. They had already pushed 
 their way up and made money, when, in the year 17 — , 
 they founded the great firm of Dorrien, La Maison Dorrien, 
 as it was called in the Marais. 
 
 Fashion was already deserting, and wholesale commerce 
 invading, that once aristocratic neighborhood of Paris. 
 Among its ancient dwellings was one which the Dorriens 
 were rich enough to purchase from its spendthrift owner. 
 It was a large, old hotel, going to decay, in a gloomy, 
 winding street. A tall gateway, studded with rusty iron
 
 66 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 knobs, shut it in from the outer world. It stood between a 
 wide, grass-grown court and a large, green garden, which 
 spreading trees filled with cool shade. This garden the 
 Dorriens did not touch — they kept inviolate its old trees, 
 where the birds sang in spring, its graveled paths, and its 
 old stone fountain ever pouring out water with a low mur- 
 mur. 
 
 The house, which was three stories high, with a lofty 
 roof, narrow windows, iron balconies, and a perron, they 
 kept for their private residence ; the low buildings that 
 inclosed the court, giving it a cloister-like aspect, and one 
 side of which had been a ballroom, they devoted to 
 business. Other changes they did not make. They did 
 not alter the inconvenient old rooms to modern taste and 
 uses. What they could keep of the old furniture they 
 kept. Maybe they pitied that fallen race on whose decay 
 they were thriving, and, remembering their last Dorrien 
 home, were lenient to this. But they made it bear their 
 name, and had that name engraved above the gate, with 
 the date of their entrance — 1720. Here, in that year of 
 grace, they set up their household gods ; here they dwelt 
 a hundred years and more, proud, retiring, and prosperous, 
 strangers in the land where they throve and made their 
 wealth. Unlike the Irish exiles, these English Dorriens 
 never amalgamated with the French. Their blood never 
 mingled with that of their hereditary foes, and, like the 
 French Protestants in England, they kept up the old lan- 
 guage, the old feelings, and, so far as they could, the old 
 Dorrien race. Whenever there was peace between the 
 two countries, the heir of the Dorriens sailed across the 
 seas, made his way to the north of England, and there 
 sought and generally found some maiden of Dorrien lineage, 
 whom he wedded and brought back. And so the family 
 was perpetuated, the name lived on, and the firm of Dorrien, 
 after weathering many a storm, a terrible one in ninety- 
 three, and an awkward one under the Napoleonic era, more 
 than fulfilled its century, and was a great firm still, the 
 oldest, if not the greatest, in all that part of Paris where it 
 had first laid its seat. Mr. George Dorrien was the head 
 of the firm at the time of which we write, and he had been 
 so for some years. He was a handsome man of fifty, tall, 
 languid, and prematurely gray. He had been reared in
 
 JOHN DORKIEN. 67 
 
 England and sp >ke French well, but with a Blight Eng- 
 lish accent. lie liked neither France nor the French Tui- 
 tion, nor French ways, but he was amiable, and endure,' 
 the country, the people, and their manners. The life of an 
 English country gentleman was that which he would have 
 preferred, and that which he thought to lead when he mar- 
 ried Miss Kenelm the heiress. Before she came into her 
 property, however, circumstances occurred which compelled 
 Mr. George Dorrien to do as his fathers had done before 
 him, and to become the head of the Maison Dorrien. He 
 submitted, but he did not like it. His wife died young ; 
 leaving but one child, a boy, George Dorrien, like his 
 Gather, who grew up willful, wicked, and so unlovable that 
 his grandfather, Mr. Kenelm, disinherited him by his will, 
 and died a week after signing it. Mr. George Dorrien 
 bore that too, and did not even say much to his son on the 
 subject. He was aware that it would be useless ; moreover, 
 he liked a quiet life, and to say the truth he cared very lit- 
 tle about George Dorrien, junior. He knew that the great 
 tradition of their house was broken ; that this worthless 
 boy would never take up the hereditary task, nor carry on 
 the old name with honor. It was hard, but it could not be 
 helped, and no one ever heard Mr. Dorrien complain that 
 this adverse fortune was his. He did not marry again. 
 Mr. George Dorrien rarely made two experiments of tin- 
 same kind. He asked Mrs. Reginald Dorrien, his cousin's 
 widow, to keep house for him ; the lady came ; he liked 
 neither her appearance nor her manners, but what was 
 done was done, and he endured her with that amiable 
 fatalism which was one of the traits of his character. He 
 endured many things in that passive spirit, among the rest 
 the flight of his son, who vanished one night from Paris, 
 kindly leaving his debts behind him, and who was not 
 heard of for three years. 
 
 Mr. George Dorrien had a confidential clerk, who had 
 been thirty years in the service of the Maison Dorrien. His 
 name was Brown; he was steady, industrious, and trust- 
 worthy; but he was not a man of many ideas, and, though 
 his youth and manhood had been spent in Paris, he had 
 never fully mastered the mysteries of the French idiom. 
 There were French clerks, who wrote the French letters, 
 or who dealt with French customers ; Mr. Brown was a
 
 68 JOHN DORR1EN. 
 
 sort of extra, for Mr. Dorrien's own use ; nevertheless it 
 was generally understood that Mr. Dorrien could not have 
 done without Mr. Brown, and, whenever the master of the 
 house was out of the way, Mr. Brown ruled supreme. 
 
 Now, one evening 1 , in the winter of the year 18 — , Mr. 
 Dorrien, who was fond of music, went to the Italian opera, 
 and left Mr. Brown as usual in command of the firm. 
 There was some extra work, and two of the clerks remained 
 beyond their time to do it. They sat in the counting- 
 house, a small room on the ground-floor ; each at a desk 
 on a high stool, each scribbling away as if for dear life, 
 each grumbling at Monsieur Brown as the cause of this 
 extra task, which deprived them of an evening's pleas- 
 ure ; for was it not Monsieur Brown who, by his lament- 
 able ignorance of the French language, had laid this addi- 
 tional burden of fourteen letters on their devoted backs ? 
 
 " Ah ! but," argued Durand, the younger clerk, " let 
 us be fair. What would become of us if Monsieur Brown 
 knew French ? " 
 
 " True," answered his companion Leroux, whose pen 
 continued to fly over his paper, " most true. Without 
 Monsieur Brown's French to relax our minds, existence — " 
 
 Here the door of Monsieur Brown's private room opened, 
 and he appeared on the threshold, with a frown on his high 
 yellow forehead. Monsieur Brown, or rather Mr. Brown, 
 was a man of fifty-five, neat, methodical, and stolid. He 
 frowned as a part of his business authorit}^, but the frown 
 was an exertion of Mr. Brown's will, not of his temper. 
 He belonged to the imperturbable order of men. He was 
 never ruffled, never discomposed, never communicative or 
 reticent. Whether, indeed, he had feelings of an\ T kind 
 was more than any one knew, but every one did know that 
 he was impenetrable, and never uttered one syllable more 
 than he intended uttering. All he now said was, coldly 
 regarding the two youths, who, with a slightly raised color 
 had returned to their task, and whose pens flew once more 
 over the paper — all, we say, that Mr. Brown said, was the 
 one word — "Fini ? " 
 
 Very volubly he was informed that the fourteen letters 
 were nearly finished. Mr. Brown held out his hand, ten 
 letters were put into it ; he read them one by one — he 
 could read French perfectly — returned four to Durand, and
 
 JOHN DOItRIEN. 09 
 
 three to Leronx; then tore three letters, and, placing 
 the torn fragments of two letters on Durand's desk, and of 
 one letter on Leroux's, he returned to his own room, and 
 closed the door on himself. 
 
 .Monsieur Durand raised his hands to his head, as if bent 
 on rending his glossy and highly-scented locks; and Mon- 
 sieur Leroux doubled up his fists, and was walking up to 
 Mr. Brown's door in that warlike attitude, when it opened 
 again, and he shrank away abashed, as Mr. Brown appeared 
 once more. 
 
 " Vite" he said, and closed the door. 
 
 Monsieur Leroux threw himself back in an attitude of 
 mock despair, and exclaimed, in a deep, but subdued voice, 
 "Lost! Lost! Undore!" 
 
 Whereupon Monsieur Durand pathetically entreated him 
 not to expire. 
 
 While these two youths — the older one was not eighteen 
 — went on with their light comedy in the counting-house, 
 and Mr. Brown was nodding over GalignanVs Messen(j> r 
 in his room, tragedy, in the shape of a telegram, was turn- 
 ing round the corner of the street, and approaching the 
 home of the Dorriens. The messenger happened to be a 
 now man, and, as the telegram was simply directed to 
 " Monsieur Dorrien, Rue de la Dame au Marais," he, having 
 no number to guide him, was obliged to apply to a shop- 
 keeper for information. 
 
 " Dorrien ! " said the man. " Why, there is the house 
 before you, close by the gas-light." 
 
 The man looked. A pane in the lamp had been broken 
 by the stone of some mischievous urchin, the light flared in 
 the wintry wind, and flickered across a tall, dark gate before 
 him. Above the gate was a defaced escutcheon, supported 
 by two calm, stone, giant heads, and above these he read, 
 not painted on a board, as in the houses on either side, but 
 deeply cut in the stone, as if defying time, the name of 
 Dorriex, and beneath it the date, 1720. He crossed the 
 street ; he raised the huge iron knocker, and let it fall again 
 heavily. The door in the gate opened noiselessly, and a 
 woman, coming out of the porter's lodge 1 with a light in 
 her hand, asked him what he wanted. Oh ! it was a tele- 
 gram for Monsieur Dorrien, was it ? Then would he please 
 to come this way? She crossed a wide, paved court, be-
 
 70 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 yond which a tall house rose dimly in the dark night, went 
 up the steps of the perron, pushed a door open, entered a 
 flagged hall, and, opening another door, showed him into 
 the counting-house. Durand was just then administering 
 comfort to Leroux. A telegram for Monsieur Dorrien ! 
 Oh ! then Monsieur Brown was the person to give the 
 receipt. So Monsieur Brown's door was tapped at, and, 
 Monsieur Brown having said "Entrez" with that peculiar 
 intonation which was the delight of Durand's youthful 
 heart, the messenger stood in the presence of Mr. Dorrien's 
 confidential clerk. He was as laconic as even Monsieur 
 Brown could wish him to be. Monsieur's signature there, 
 and seven francs fifty centimes was all he asked. He got 
 both signature and money, counted and pocketed the one, 
 never looked at the other, and went his waj', escorted by 
 the portress. When he had reached the great gate, he 
 said to the woman, " What do they sell here ? " 
 
 "Paper." 
 
 " And who lives in those low buildings round the court ? 
 The workmen ? " 
 
 " No — paper. Then she added, explanatorily, " We 
 want no men. We do not make paper here. We only 
 store it, and sell it wholesale." 
 
 " And that date above the gate, what does it mean ? " 
 asked the man, who seemed to be of an inquiring turn. 
 
 " We founded the firm in 1720," replied the portress, 
 in a tone that said, " Who are you, and where do you come 
 from, that you have never heard of the firm of Dorrien ? " 
 
 " Ah, well, I was not born then," said the man. " Good- 
 night," and he vanished down the dark street. 
 
 Mr. Brown, sitting in his room, opened the telegram, 
 read it through, turned round the page to see that there 
 was nothing more, then folded it up neatly, put it in his 
 pocket, and looked at his watch. A quarter to nine — the 
 fourteen letters must be finished by this. Well, the four- 
 teen letters were finished, and Mr. Brown had no need to tear 
 any of them up this time. He nodded his silent approval. 
 Durand and Leroux sprang to their feet, cleared pens, ink, 
 and paper, away by magic, and were gone in a twinkling. 
 
 While they crossed the court, talking and laughing like 
 school-boys, Mr. Brown locked the counting-house door, 
 returned to his own sitting-room, lit a little lamp, which he
 
 JOHN DOREIEN. 71 
 
 had there for that purpose, and went on his usual night 
 round. Through every one of those wide rooms built 
 round the court, all stored with reams upon reams of paper 
 piled to the very ceiling, he went, making every door fast 
 behind him. There were many rooms, and Mr. Brown's 
 principle was " slow, but sure." He now took his time ; 
 he never was in a hurry ; he scanned every shelf with a 
 searching eye ; he looked at the boarded floors, at the cur- 
 tainlcss windows, with their strong wooden shutters, at the 
 ceilings, with their faded Cupids toying in faded clouds, 
 and especially he sniffed the chill air of those empty rooms, 
 asking them for the faintest scent of fire. Mr. Dorrien's 
 premises had-narrowly escaped being burned down a year 
 before this, and it was in consequence of this peril that Mr. 
 Brown had undertaken his present task of surveillance. 
 .The round took him fully three-quarters of an hour, and, 
 when it was ended, it brought him back to the flagged hall 
 at the foot of the staircase, which led to Mr. Dorrien's 
 private apartments. 
 
 Mr. Brown did not live in Mr. Dorrien's house. He 
 could have done so, had he so chosen. Mr. Dorrien had 
 rooms to spare, and Mr. Brown, being single, could not 
 possibly have been troublesome ; but, though Mr. Brown 
 was at his desk by seven in the morning, and often did not 
 leave it till ten at night, it pleased him to have "his own 
 home," as he termed the dull and cheerless tenement which 
 he rented on the third-floor back of a neighboring house. 
 Mr. Brown often dined with Mr. Dorrien and Mrs. Reginald 
 Dorrien, and, whether he did so or not, he never left the 
 house without bidding Mrs. Reginald, as she was called, for 
 brevity's sake, a good-evening. Such was his purpose now, 
 as he slowly went up the great oaken staircase, with its 
 carved iron balusters, all flowers and scroll-work ; and, hav- 
 ing reached the second-floor, he tapped discreetly at the 
 door of Mrs. Reginald's sitting-room. 
 
 " Come in," said a deep voice — a voice, indeed, almost 
 too deep to belong to one of the gentler sex — and, thus 
 authorized, Mr. Brown entered. 
 
 Mrs. Reginald's sitting-room did credit to that lady's 
 taste. It was bright, warm, ami pleasant. Brilliant flowers 
 had been scattered by a liberal hand on the carpet ; the 
 paper on the walls was rich and dark, the furniture was
 
 72 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 handsome and almost luxurious, and Mrs. Reginald herself 
 wore a rich, stiff silk that rustled with every motion of her 
 stately person. "VVe say stately, because we wish to be 
 civil ; gaunt and bony would be more correct epithets. 
 Mrs. Reginald could not help these disadvantages, any more 
 than she could help her chest-voice, and the accident which, 
 by depriving her in early youth of her left eye, had given 
 the remaining orb a dark, not to say sinister, expression. In 
 plain speech, Mrs. Reginald was what was called ugly. She 
 knew it — she was very quick, very clever, very sharp, and 
 very shrewd ; nevertheless, when Reginald Dorrien, worth- 
 less shoot of the good stock, assured her that he was in love 
 with her, she believed him, and was only undeceived when 
 he absconded with her little fortune of two thousand pounds 
 two weeks after the wedding-day. He died soon after this, 
 leaving her penniless. Mr. George Dorrien had then just 
 lost his wife ; all he knew of his cousin's widow was that 
 she had been ill-used, and that her personal appearance 
 was enough to scare away scandal. He proposed that she 
 should come and keep house for him, and Mrs. Reginald 
 gladly accepted. 
 
 Mr. George Dorrien was a fastidious man; his wife 
 had been pretty, and he liked pretty faces. He was shocked 
 when he saw Mrs. Reginald, but he was too courteous and 
 amiable to betray the feeling. His forbearance was re- 
 warded by such a house-keeper as falls to the lot of few 
 single men. Mrs. Reginald was Irish, and she had a vari- 
 ety of gifts which is one of the attributes of the Celtic race. 
 She learned French in no time ; she ruled French servants 
 with amazing tact and shrewdness ; she reduced her cous- 
 in's expenditure one-third, and yet kept a liberal house — 
 iii short, she did wonders, and Mr. George Dorrien knew it, 
 and was both generous and grateful, but it was not in his 
 power to like Mrs. Reginald. Her appearance was to him 
 what a bad drawing, her voice what a discordant note in 
 music, are to connoisseurs, and her sharp, pungent, pitiless 
 speech what all unconventional speech must be to a pol- 
 ished man of the world. Such was the lady who now rose, 
 with no little rustling of her stiff, rich silk skirt, to welcome 
 Mr. Brown. 
 
 " You are late this evening, Mr. Brown," she said, point- 
 ing to an arm-chair before the fire, and resuming her own.
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 73 
 
 " Wc had many letters, many letters," replied Mr. 
 Brown, who found compensation for his forced laconisin in 
 French by a certain redundance in English. " Do you 
 know where Mr. Dorrien spends this evening, Mrs. Regi- 
 nald ?" 
 
 "lie is gone to the Italian Opera — but only for an 
 hour or so. I know he leaves before the ballet. What do 
 you want him for ? " 
 
 Mrs. Reginald's one eye seemed to bore Mr. Brown 
 through and through. 
 
 " I thought I had better go and seek him — seek him, 
 Mrs. Reginald ; but, if he leaves before the ballet, I think — 
 yes, I think I shall wait." 
 
 " Can you tell me what it is about ? " asked the lady, 
 point-blank. "If it is business, keep it to yourself ; if not, 
 out with it, man, and don't beat about the bush." 
 
 " It is not business, Mrs. Reginald," slowly replied Mr. 
 Brown ; " but the telegram was directed to Mr. Dorrien, 
 and perhaps I had better not tell you — yes, I think I had 
 better not," said Mr. Brown, thoughtfully. 
 
 Mrs. Reginald looked up at the ceiling, folded her hands, 
 and tapped her feet. 
 
 " How old are you, Mr. Brown ? " 
 
 " I am fifty-five, Mrs. Reginald." 
 
 "Fifty-live! and you only 'think,' you don't 'know' 
 whether you ought to tell me or not. Now, Mr. Brown, a 
 man of fifty-five who only 'thinks,' and does not 'know,' is 
 simply absurd. When I was nine years old, Mr. Brown, I 
 did not think, I knew what I meant to say or do." 
 
 "You are a very superior woman, Mrs. Reginald, very 
 superior," replied Mr. Brown; but he did not tell Mrs. 
 Reginald what the telegram was about. 
 
 " I know it is about George," she said, sitting straight 
 up in her chair, and with her one dark eye full upon Mr. 
 Brown's stolid face — " I know it is — he has turned up at 
 last." 
 
 Mr. Brown rubbed Ins nose, but remained imperturbable. 
 
 "He was wicked at nurse, wicked at school, wicked at 
 the desk — George will be wicked to the end, Mr. Brown." 
 
 Mr. Brown nodded slowly, but whether in approbation 
 or dissent it was hard to say. 
 
 " And if lie had a particle of shame or pride or honor," 
 4
 
 74 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 said Mrs. Reginald, kindling, " lie would die, Mr. Brown, he 
 would die, and drag down his sins and misdeeds with him 
 into the grave, and set a tombstone, a heavy one, over them 
 — a tombstone on which there should be written no epitaph." 
 
 But Mrs. Reginald's passion — and it was genuine, for 
 she was imaginative and vehement, as well as sharp and 
 shrewd — could wake no corresponding echo in Mr. Brown's 
 matter-of-fact mind. 
 
 " No epitaph would be unbusiness-like, unbusiness-like, 
 Mrs. Reginald," he answered, sedately. " I do not think 
 Mr. Dorrien would allow that." 
 
 " Then he is dead ! " she cried, almost rising from her 
 chair ; and sinking down in it again, she exclaimed, " Thank 
 Heaven ! " Then, as if to explain her meaning, she added 
 more calmly, " at least, he can sin no more." 
 
 " Excuse me Mrs. Reginald, I did not say that Mr. 
 George Dorrien was dead." 
 
 But Mrs. Reginald interrupted him with an impatient 
 wave of her bony hand. 
 
 " There, there," she said, " that will do — keep your 
 secret and your telegram — poor boy, poor Georgie ! " she 
 added, with a sudden rush of tears, "he was a bad boy, a 
 very bad boy, but I remember the little fellow, with his 
 red sash, and his varnished boots, that he was so proud of, 
 and now — " Here the door opened, and Mr. Dorrien en- 
 tered the room. 
 
 " I beg your pardon, Mrs. Reginald," he said, with his 
 usual courtesy, " I believe I came in without knocking." 
 It was Mrs. Reginald whom he addressed, and Mr. Brown 
 that he looked at. " I understood," he continued, still look- 
 ing at the head-clerk, "that a telegram had come, and I 
 knew, of course, that I should find Mr. Brown here." 
 
 Mr. Brown, who had risen, coughed, and Mr. Dorrien, 
 walking up to the fireplace, leaned languidly — he was al- 
 ways languid — against the marble mantel-piece, still looking 
 at Mr. Brown. Mr. Dorrien was a tall, pale, worn man, 
 with regular features and pale-blue eyes, that said very lit- 
 tle, as a rule, of what might be going on within their owner's 
 mind ; but just now there shone in those blue eyes, some- 
 tiling like an anxious gleam of uneasy speculation — as if 
 Mr. Dorrien were prepared for unpleasant news, and hoped 
 for no good tidings.
 
 JOHN DOKKIEN. 75 
 
 " I have received a telegram, sir," answered Mr. 
 Brown, in his deliberate fashion; "and it is not about 
 business/' 
 
 A little sigh of relief escaped Mr. Dorrien,the light died 
 out of his blue eyes, and the interest seemed to pass out of 
 his pale countenance; till with a start as of unpleasant rec- 
 ollection, and a sudden flush, he said : 
 
 " Then it is about Mr. George ? " 
 
 " Yes, sir, it is about Mr. George," said Mr. Brown. 
 
 " Well, and what has he been doing now ? " 
 
 Mr. Brown was silent. 
 
 "I understand," said Mr. Dorrien, in a low voice, "he 
 is dead." 
 
 " Yes, sir, Mr. George Dorrien is dead." 
 
 Mr. Dorrien neither moved nor spoke. He looked like 
 a man on whom a blow has fallen, but he also looked like 
 one who can bear that blow. Nature had not given him 
 that passionate love of offspring which makes doting fathers, 
 and what affection he might have been inclined to bestow 
 on his only child that child had early alienated. His son 
 had wounded him in his love and in his pride, and Mr. Dor- 
 rien was not the man to forget it. 
 
 " Well, Mr. Brown," he said, after a long pause, during 
 which the room was very still, " what else is there ? " 
 
 Mr. Brown handed his master the telegram, but Mr. 
 Dorrien shook his head and handed it silently to Mrs. Regi- 
 nald. It would not have been in that lady's nature to keep, 
 under these circumstances, a solemn and conventional aspect 
 suitable to the occasion. As her cousin offered her this 
 triumph over Mr. Brown, she gave him, Mr. Brown, a nod 
 and a wink of her one eye which might have upset the 
 gravity of another man. But Mr. Brown remained immov- 
 able, and looked all decorous seriousness while Mrs. Regi- 
 nald read the telegram aloud. It was thus worded : 
 
 " Comminaire de Police, Hut' Zero;/, Marseille, ) 
 to Mr. Dorrien, Hue de la Dame, Paris. \ 
 
 " Traveler, named George Dorrieti, died this morning 
 at Hotel de la Croix, Marseille. Began, but could not fin- 
 ish, letter to his father, G. Dorrien. Lies at hotel. Lett 
 a thousand francs in gold, now in my hands. Answer at 
 once by telegram."
 
 76 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 " Is that all ? " asked Mr. Dorrien, when Mrs. Reginald, 
 folding up the paper, handed it back to him. 
 
 " It is all," she answered ; and her voice faltered a little, 
 for again a vision of a bright, handsome boy, with laughing 
 blue eyes, had flashed before her. 
 
 Mr. Dorrien sighed bitterly, and almost smiled. 
 
 " He would have been twenty-two next month," he said ; 
 then he added aloud, sharply, as if he resented this slight 
 betrayal, " Mr. Brown, would it be taxing you too much to 
 ask you to go to Marseilles and see to all that dreary busi- 
 ness ? " 
 
 " I can go to Marseilles, sir ; but the commissary asks 
 for an immediate answer." 
 
 " True ; I shall go round to the office and give it myself. 
 When can you go, Mr. Brown ? " 
 
 Mr. Brown could go to-morrow. There were some little 
 business matters to be attended to, but perhaps Mr. Dorrien 
 would kindly see to them in his (Mr. Brown's) absence. 
 Oh ! yes, Mr. Dorrien — and he said it rather weariedly — 
 would see to every thing. 
 
 And so the conversation drifted away from death to the 
 doings of life, until the little gilt clock on Mrs. Reginald's 
 mantel-piece struck eleven. Mr. Dorrien heard it with a 
 look of pain, for that very clock, a Cupid letting his arrow 
 fly at Time, had been one of his first presents to his }'oung 
 wife, and had struck the hour when his son was born — not 
 in this room, indeed, nor even in this house, but with that 
 same little clear, silvery voice with which it now seemed to 
 sound his death-knell. Mr. Brown, who had no associations 
 with the clock, took out his watch, thought Mrs. Reginald's 
 timepiece must be five minutes slow, and said it was time 
 for him to be off. Mr. Dorrien, who never cared for a tete- 
 d-ttte with his cousin's widow, followed him out, and Mrs. 
 Reginald remained alone. 
 
 This lady was a philosopher in her way, but she was not 
 a follower of the Peripatetic school. " I do my thinking in 
 my arm-chair," she used to say ; and it being considered 
 that Mrs. Reginald was a very active person, who sat but 
 little, the amount of thinking which she did was creditable 
 to the freshness and vigor of her mind. Mrs. Reginald's 
 " thinking " could not be called a diamond of the first 
 Wiiter ; but then she did not mean it to shine before ihe
 
 JOHN DORR I EN. 77 
 
 world, or to be set and mounted in any fashion; and so, 
 instead of being neatly cut up into axioms or into senten- 
 tious epigrams, it was a very loose sort of thing, and might 
 be best likened to a willful nag who galloped off with its 
 owner, or ambled gently into the world of Fancy, as the 
 lady's whim might be. As Mrs. Reginald now sat alcne, 
 looking at her lire, brooding over the sad, brief fate of the 
 dead, she soon wandered away from George Dorrien, his 
 boyhood, his sins, and his death, to a fancy that was ever 
 dear to her. Spite her personal disadvantages, Mrs. Regi- 
 nald had not been able to guard her maiden heart, a true 
 and tender one, from the fond dream of wedded love. She 
 had had two weeks — no more ; Reginald Dorrien had be- 
 haved admirably for those two weeks — and those fourteen 
 happy days had given the wife a tender desire of which 
 neither sorrow, nor treachery, nor time, had been able to 
 quell the longing. 
 
 Mrs. Reginald had wished — eagerly and ardently wished 
 (as she could wish, being a woman of strong will and pas- 
 sions) — to be a mother. Her boy — her Reginald — had been 
 as real to her during those brief hours of her married life as 
 many a babe who sleeps at his mother's breast, or laughs 
 up in his mother's face. She had nursed him, fed him, 
 washed, dressed, and combed him ; she had kissed, and 
 scolded, and whipped Reginald. She had taught him his 
 letters, and made him lisp his first prayersat her knee.; she 
 had watched him through imaginary illnesses, cured him — 
 spite the doctors; sent him to school, educated him, made 
 him a great man, and, finally, married him to a girl of her 
 own choosing, and then bid him and his young wife a stern 
 adieu. It was his duty — every man's duty — to marry; but 
 she, his mother, who had had him to herself all these years, 
 could not share him with another woman, and be second 
 where she had once been first; and so she, his mother, 
 would leave him to his wife, and go and lead her solitary 
 life. 
 
 Now, this day-dream, which ought to have vanished 
 with Reginald's faithless father, did not so depart. It 
 remained behind long after that unprincipled gentleman 
 had fled, and it haunted the deserted woman and clung to 
 her poor sore heart. She had been cheated, betrayed, 
 scorned, contemned, but she knew that the world, as a
 
 78 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 rule, keeps its pity for victims of interesting appearance. 
 A tall, gaunt woman of thirty — with one eye too — is not 
 the sort of Ariadne that the world cares much about. But 
 her child — her boy, if she had one — he would feel for her. 
 His heart would burn over her wrongs, even though her 
 wronger was his own father ; and, if he could do nothing 
 else, he would, by his honor and love, avenge her. 
 
 Alas ! that boy — that Reginald the second, as faithless 
 as Reginald the first — never came to heal the bitter wound 
 in his mother's heart. That fond vision of the future faded 
 away into the darkness of the past. Yet Mrs. Reginald 
 always loved him, after a fashion, and — leading, as she did, 
 a solitary life, so far as her feelings were concerned — she 
 kept him in a corner of her heart, and cherished him there. 
 
 Sometimes Reginald slept very long ; for days and 
 weeks and months he slumbered, and deeper grew his sleep 
 as the years wore on ; but a look, a word, a child's face, a 
 bay's gay voice or ringing laugh, could call him up into sud- 
 den life, and bring him back once more to his mother's eye. 
 
 Now, this evening, as she sat alone, Mrs. Reginald al- 
 lowed her thoughts to stray from the dead to the dream of 
 her youth. 
 
 " My boy — my Reginald — should not have died so," 
 said she, nodding at the fire, " and among cold-hearted 
 strangers — not he; and no Mr. Brown should have gone 
 to bury him. No ; if it had pleased God to have called 
 him in the prime of his manhood, his mother would have 
 watched by his death-bed ; or if that could not be, yet at 
 least the hands that had rocked the baby to sleep would 
 have laid out the man for his last rest." 
 
 Here a tap at the door interrupted Mrs. Reginald's reflec- 
 tions. 
 
 " Come in," she said, somewhat sharply — for whenever 
 Mrs. Reginald had allowed this fancy to master her, she 
 was not fond of confronting her kind. 
 
 The intruder was Mr. Brown. Mr. Brown had come 
 for the telegram. Had not Mrs. Reginald got it? Really! 
 And Mr. Brown's eyes wandered round the room in search 
 of the missing document. 
 
 " Stop ! " And Mrs. Reginald, who had risen, and who 
 stood with her back to the fireplace, extended her hand 
 rather imperiouslj'. " Stop, Mr. Brown, if you please ; I
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 79 
 
 want to know what epitaph you will put on the grave- 
 stone." 
 
 " I think, Mrs. Reginald, that the name and surname of 
 the deceased will do." 
 
 "'George Dorrien, aged twenty-two.' I hope you will 
 add, ' Deeply lamented by his father,' Mr. Brown." 
 
 "If such should be Mr. Dorrien's wish, Mrs. Regi- 
 nald — " cautiously began Mr. Brown. 
 
 " Bah ! " she interrupted, with a look of profound dis- 
 gust. " I tell you that if I had reared a kitten, I should 
 feel more in learning that it hud died than our Mr. Dorrien 
 feels for the death of his only child — of his boy," added 
 Mrs. Reginald, with all the emphasis of her deep voice. 
 
 Mr. Brown thought that, as Mrs. Reginald had not got 
 the telegram — 
 
 " Stop ! " interrupted Mrs. Reginald, taking hold of his 
 arm, and poking the long forefinger of her other hand in 
 the region of Mr. Brown's heart ; " can you tell me what 
 our Mr. Dorrien, so refined, so polite, has got there ? " 
 Here Mrs. Reginald's finger became more expressive than 
 Mr. Brown wished. " Because, if you cannot, I can," con- 
 tinued Mrs. Reginald, releasing him. " Our Mr. Dorrien 
 has got that," said Mrs. Reginald, raising her forefinger 
 aloft, and deliberately tracing the figure of a gigantic circle 
 in the air — "naught, naught, naught," she added, nodding 
 at Mr. Brown, lest he should not have understood her 
 meaning. " And now, if you want the telegram," she said, 
 in a matter-of-fact, business-like tone, "better ask Mr. Dor- 
 rien forit. I gave it back to him." 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 Mr. Brown went to Marseilles, and saw George Dor- 
 rien buried. No pomp marked the funeral of the prodigal 
 son ; no epitaph was inscribed on his plain tombstone. 
 Mr. Brown brought back the unfinished letter, but neither 
 that nor any other paper, nor any document found in the 
 possession of Mr. Dorrien's deceased son, gave the least 
 clew to the manner in which he had spent the last three
 
 80 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 years of his life. There was nothing 1 and no one to tell 
 how he had become possessed of the thousand francs that 
 were found in his valise when he died. The real place he 
 had come from when he stopped at Marseilles was a mys- 
 tery. Toulon had been written in the hotel register, but 
 that was evidently a mistake, for Constantinople was 
 marked on his luggage. Mr. Brown did not think it need- 
 ful to go to the capital of the Turkish Empire in order to 
 make inquiries. It had never been a safe thing to search 
 too closely into Mr. George Dorrien's private affairs. He 
 was dead now, and there was, as it were, an end to him. 
 The very best and kindest thing that could be done was to 
 let him rest in his grave in the cemetery, with the long 
 morning shadow of the cypress-trees falling on his plain 
 stone slab, and the hot Provencal sun resting upon it day 
 after day. 
 
 When Mr. Brown came home, and repeated to Mr. Dor- 
 rien the few meagre particulars which he had been able 
 to collect concerning " Mr. George," the bereaved father 
 heard him out and made no other comment than a grave 
 and rather sad " I am much obliged to you, Mr. Brown." 
 
 Mrs. Reginald, when she heard Mr. Brown's account, 
 observed sharply : 
 
 " It is just as well, Mr. Brown, not to know too much 
 about some people, and George Dorrien never did a more 
 considerate thing than to die off as he did." 
 
 Some time after his son's premature death, Mr. Dorrien 
 went to England, partly for business and partly for a 
 change. He remained several weeks away, and during his 
 absence Mr. Brown reigned supreme. Of course he opened 
 all the letters, and thus it came to pass that a letter 
 directed to Monsieur George Dorrien, Hotel de la Croix, 
 Marseilles, was forwarded to Monsieur George Dorrien, Rue 
 de la Dame, Paris, and was opened and read by Mr. Brown. 
 He had been specially authorized to do so by his master, 
 who had indeed foreseen this particular case, and warned 
 him by no means to wait for his return. 
 
 "There is no knowing," he said rather drearily, " what 
 sort of letters requiring immediate attention may come for 
 my son — and I have no family secrets from yon, Brown." 
 
 " You are very good, sir, very good ; but the responsi- 
 bility, sir — the responsibility may be very great."
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 81 
 
 Mr. Dorrien candidly confessed that it might be so; 
 then after a moment's thought : " If you should be at a 
 loss," he said, " consult Mrs. Reginald. She is shrewd 
 and sensible." 
 
 Now the letter which Mr. Brown received on a morning 
 in February, six weeks after the death of Mr. Dorrien's son, 
 was a letter involving, in his opinion, a perfect host of be- 
 wildering responsibilities. He had scarcely read it through 
 when, with as great an appearance of uneasiness as it was 
 possible for his stolid face to wear, he left his room. With- 
 out even answering Monsieur Durand's modest question of 
 what he was to do next, Mr. Brown walked up-stairs to Mrs. 
 Reginald's apartment. The morning was a fine one, and 
 he scarcely hoped to find Mrs. Reginald within. He did 
 not venture to ask himself what he should do if she were 
 out ; and Fortune indeed so far favored him that he had no 
 need to do so ; Mrs. Reginald had her shawl and bonnet 
 on, but having, luckily for Mr. Brown, mislaid her gloves, 
 she was still within. Nothing was so unusual as for Mr. 
 Brown to come up to her at that hour, and Mrs. Reginald 
 fairly stared at him as he entered her sitting-room, with 
 his pen behind his ear and an open letter in his hand. 
 
 " Bad news?" she said, sharply. 
 
 " Not good news, at least, Mrs. Reginald, not good news. 
 Before he left, Mr. Dorrien bade me, in case any thing of 
 I he kind should occur, apply to you for advice, and if you 
 please I shall do so now." 
 
 " If I please, indeed ! 'Did I tell Mr. Dorrien that I 
 would advise in any business of his ? — never ! Ah ! there is 
 my right-hand glove, but where is the left-hand one ? Mr. 
 Brown, do you see a brown kid glove any where ? " 
 
 "But, my dear Mrs. Reginald, only consider; this is 
 quite a case for a lady's consideration. The late Mr. 
 George — " 
 
 "I know, I know," interrupted Mrs. Reginald, who had 
 found her missing glove, and was walking to the door, "it 
 is about a wife — of course George was not going to leave 
 that mischief out. Of course he married some unfortunate 
 little creature, and ran away from her, the scapegrace! 
 Well, Mr. Brown, other women have been treated so, and 
 have borne it, and she must bear with it too." 
 
 "But, my dear Mrs. Reginald," entreated Mr. Brown,
 
 82 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 following her down-stairs, for the inexorable lady was go- 
 ing down as fast as she could, " there is not merely a wife, 
 as you shrewdly surmised, but a child." 
 
 " Of course ! " emphatically cried Mrs. Reginald, her 
 one black eye sparkling — " of course the villain was not 
 going to leave that out either. Of course he had a child, 
 and ran away from it." 
 
 " I even think he had two children, Mrs. Reginald — I 
 really do. There must be two, Marie and Antony." 
 
 Mrs. Reginald stopped, and looking hard at Mr. Brown 
 began reckoning on her fingers. 
 
 " Then they must be twins, Mr. Brown," she said — "yes, 
 they must be twins." 
 
 " Very likely," replied Mr. Brown ; " but, my dear 
 madam, if you will kindly consider — " 
 
 " And what have I to consider, Mr. Brown ? " interrupted 
 Mrs. Reginald, half stern, half sorrowful. " They have got 
 their mother, and she has them, and I hold her a rich 
 woman, even though she should have to beg her bread and 
 their own — not that I say Mr. Dorrien will allow that — but 
 I say it again, I hold her a rich woman." 
 
 " Well, she is not a poor woman, I suppose, for she 
 mentions in her letter that she brings the sum of five thou- 
 sand francs, which she calls ' mine.' " 
 
 " Oh ! of course," sarcastically remarked Mrs. Reginald, 
 still going down. " George was not going to make a poor 
 woman of his wife. You don't suppose that, Mr. Brown." 
 
 "My dear madam," replied Mr. Brown, looking steadily 
 at Mrs. Reginald, " is that lady, or rather was that lad}', 
 the late Mr. George's wife ? " 
 
 "What?" 
 
 "I say was that lady the late Mr. George's wife? She 
 signs her name as Antoinette, Comtesse d'Armaille." 
 
 Mrs. Reginald stood still, and asked Mr. Brown, with 
 considerable asperity, " What he meant by coming to her 
 with his cock-and-bull story of twins ? " 
 
 " But I never said there were twins, Mrs. Reginald," 
 argued Mr. Brown. " I spoke of two children, and I sup- 
 pose they are the late Mr. George's, for the lady says, 
 ' Marie and Antony kiss papa.' And I also suppose they 
 are the countess's children as well, for in another part of 
 her letter she says, ' My dear Marie and Anton}' make me
 
 JOHN DORR] EX. 83 
 
 every day a happier mother than ever.' If }'ouw T ilI kindly 
 read the letter, Mrs. Reginald, you will understand it all, I 
 am sure." 
 
 Mrs. Reginald's black eye sparkled. " Mr. Dorrien did 
 not request me to open and read his letters," she said dryly, 
 " and I will not do so." 
 
 "But, my dear madam, it is almost indispensable that 
 you should read the letter. This countess, who writes 
 from Mauritius, expresses her uneasiness at not having 
 heard from her beloved George, declares that she will and 
 must follow him, and informs him that, if she should not 
 find him in Marseilles, she will go on to his father's house 
 in Paris. So that this countess, the children, and several 
 servants — she mentions three — may actually be coming 
 here. And, my dear Mrs. Reginald, mark her words — she 
 expressly says, ' You will scarcely have got my letter be- 
 fore you will see me.' " 
 
 Mr. Brown looked uneasily in Mrs. Reginald's face, and 
 Mrs. Reginald fitted on her gloves, buttoned them, and 
 looked hard at Mr. Brown. 
 
 " Well, Mr. Brown," she said, coolly, " what will you do 
 when that countess comes with her children and her ser- 
 vants and her luggage ? " 
 
 She spoke with some appearance of interest, as if she 
 really should like to know what Mr. Brown's line of action 
 would be ; but Mr. Brown was silent. 
 
 " Yes," resumed Mrs. Reginald, nodding at him, " it is 
 an awkward position, and, I say it candidly, Mr. Brown, I 
 should not like to stand in your shoes." 
 
 Mr. Brown did not answer this, but, following Mrs. Re- 
 ginald down-stairs, he made another attempt to soften that 
 obdurate lady. 
 
 " I wish I could persuade you to read the letter, Mrs. 
 Reginald," he said — " I really wish I could." 
 
 '* I dare say you do," was the amused answer. 
 
 " Because you have so much good sense — as Mr. Dor- 
 rien says — " 
 
 " Good-morning, Mr. Brown," interrupted Mrs. Regi- 
 nald, composedly. They had reached the bottom of the 
 stairs, and now stood in the hall, at the head of the perron. 
 " 1 wish you well out of it — yes, Mr. Brown, I wish you 
 well out of it."
 
 84 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 Mrs. Reginald, as we have said, stood at the head of 
 the perron ; before her was the court, and beyond the 
 court the vaulted archway and the great gate. That 
 gate was always open in the daytime, and let in a gray 
 glimpse of pavement from the dull street beyond. But 
 some dark body or other — a carriage, thought Mrs. Regi- 
 nald, who was_ short-sighted — now obstructed that glimpse. 
 
 " Mr. Brown," she said, sharply, " what is that at the 
 gate ? " 
 
 " I really do not know, Mrs. Reginald," answered 
 Mr. Brown, prudently turning to the door of his private 
 room. 
 
 But Mrs. Reginald caught hold of his arm and forcibly 
 held him back. 
 
 "Mr. Brown," she said, "you do know — it is a carriage, 
 and it is actually coming in here, Mr. Brown." 
 
 " Well, Mrs. Reginald, what about it?" replied the im- 
 perturbable Mr. Brown. 
 
 " What about it ! " exclaimed Mrs. Reginald, stamping 
 her foot on the flag of the hall, and almost giving him a 
 shake in her wrath. " Why, what carriage is it? " 
 
 " Perhaps Mr. Dorrien is coming back, Mrs. Reginald, 
 for I see luggage — " 
 
 But here Mr. Brown paused. He knew that Mr. Dor- 
 rien was certainly not in that railway omnibus de famille, 
 which was even then turning into the court, and Mrs. Re- 
 ginald's one eye, fastened on him with unutterable scorn, 
 warned him not to proceed. 
 
 "Well, sir," she remarked, with cutting irony, " why 
 don't you go on ? You see luggage, do you also see a 
 lady, children, and servants as well? Because I do, Mr. 
 Brown." 
 
 Yes, truly Mrs. Reginald did see all these things, for 
 while she was most unwisely keeping Mr. Brown at bay, 
 and wishing him well out of it, a railway-omnibus, with its 
 roof heaped with luggage, was slowly driving into the 
 court. Short-sighted though she was, Mrs. Reginald did 
 not merely see this vehicle, but she also saw a very little 
 and very j'oung lady in black alighting from it; and after 
 the lady a mulatto girl, with a child ; then a nurse with a 
 baby ; then another lady, tall and thin, and not very young ; 
 then another servant, laden with bags, bandboxes, and urn-
 
 JOHN DORRIEX. 85 
 
 brcllas; and, last of all, a negro boy in livery, who gravely 
 carried a large doll. 
 
 "Eight in all," said Mrs. Reginald, nodding at Mr. 
 Brown, folding her arms, and speaking in her deepest and 
 most emphatic voice. " Eight in all, Mr. Brown." 
 
 In the mean while the portress, who had come out of 
 her lodge, looking rather bewildered at this invasion, went 
 up to the little and young lady, and, having exchanged a 
 few words with her, ascended the perron, whence Mrs. 
 Reginald had not stirred one inch. She knew that the 
 generalship of this campaign had passed from Mr. Brown 
 to herself. She was too brave to shrink from her duty, 
 and, though she was by no means confident of victory, she 
 was not going to surrender the fortress in her keeping 
 without firing a shot in its defense. 
 
 '• Madame," said the portress, " this lady, the Countess 
 of Armaille, asks for Monsieur Dorrien. I have told her that 
 he is not in Paris, but she docs not seem to understand." 
 " Ah ! " emphatically said Mrs. Reginald. 
 The countess was coming up the steps of the perron^ 
 and Mrs. Reginald could see her well. She was a little, 
 childish-looking creature, with a round, babyish face. The 
 lids of her soft, dark eyes seemed red with crying, and Mrs. 
 Reginald also noticed that the little countess was thinly 
 elad, in garments more suited to summer than to February, 
 and that she appeared to shiver with the cold. Mrs. Regi- 
 nald's heart relented toward her — it was never a very stern 
 or hard heart — but not Mrs. Reginald's purpose. 
 
 " Madam," she said, coming forward to address her, " I 
 understand that you have asked for Mr. Dorrien ; he is not 
 in France, I am sorry to say." 
 
 "Yes, I know," replied the little lady, with a quivering 
 lip, " but I am his son's widow. — Melanie," she added, turn- 
 ing to the tall and thin lad}', who stood close behind her, 
 "do tell Justine to make haste in with these children, it is 
 so cold." And the poor little lady shivered again. 
 
 " Excuse me, I understood that I was addressing the 
 Comtesse d' Armaille," said Mrs. Reginald, a little sharply. 
 " Yes, yes," impatiently replied the lady, " I am the 
 Comtesse d'Arnuulle, of course ; but I was Mr. George Dor- 
 rien's wife." Here her lip quivered again. — "Melanie, 
 shall we have rooms up-stairs or below ? "
 
 86 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 She had entered the hall, and, turning her heavy, dark 
 eyes to her companion, she addressed her thus, in a languid, 
 appealing tone, the tone of one accustomed to rely upon 
 another for help and guidance. The lady whom she called 
 Melanie compressed her lips in a way that gave a peculiar, 
 though momentary, expression of power and will to her 
 pale, unexpressive face, and replied, with perfect composure, 
 that the rooms up-stairs would be better for the children. 
 
 "Yes, I think so, too," said the little countess. With 
 a sigh she began her ascent ; but scarcely had she gone up 
 two steps, when, resting her head on the iron balusters, 
 she burst into tears. She wept very long and very bitterly. 
 When her sobs had ceased, she looked up, and said, weari- 
 ly, " Tell her, Melanie." 
 
 Whereupon Melanie, turning to Mrs. Reginald, who 
 stood looking on like one petrified, composedly informed 
 her, in foreign English, that the Comtesse d'Armaille had 
 learned her husband's death in Marseilles two days ago, 
 and had not yet recovered from the shock. Mrs. Reginald 
 bent her head, as much as to say, " Of course." Her mind 
 was quite made up now, and she knew what she had to do. 
 She allowed the countess, Melanie, Justine, the children, 
 and even the little negro servant-boy, to continue their 
 ascent, whispered a few words in the ear of Madame Miron, 
 the portress, and, coolly making her way past the strangers, 
 she preceded them, and, opening a door on the first floor, 
 said, " In here, if you please." 
 
 The apartment into which Mrs. Reginald thus ushered 
 them was the great, old drawing-room of the Hotel Dorrien. 
 It had not been used, unless on rare occasions, for some 
 years, and was almost dark till Mrs. Reginald opened the 
 shutters of one of the five tall windows. The light of the 
 dull February morning then stole in upon the curtains, 
 furniture, and chandeliers, all shrouded in gray linen, and 
 showed their ghost-like outlines on a background of shad- 
 owy gloom. The air of this dreary apartment felt very 
 chill, and the little countess shivered as she sank into an 
 arm-chair, and said, a little plaintively, "Melanie, do see 
 about our rooms — I am so tired." 
 
 " Excuse me, madam," remarked Mrs. Reginald, very 
 decisively, " but there are no rooms to see to in this 
 house."'
 
 JOHN DORRIKX. 87 
 
 The countess half raised herself up, and stared at Mrs. 
 
 Reginald. 
 
 " But, madam," she said, amazed, "I am Mr. Dorrien's 
 daughter-in-law, and the Comlesse d' Armaille," she added, 
 impressively. 
 
 " How Mr. Dorrien's daughter-in-law can be the Com- 
 tesse d'Armaill6, is a puzzle to me," dryly said Mrs. Regi- 
 nald ; " but, however that may be — " 
 
 " Melanie," interrupted the countess, raising her hand- 
 kerchief to her eyes, " do tell the lady." 
 
 Melanie compressed her lips, and said, with emphatic 
 deliberation : " Madame married my brother, the Count of 
 Armaille, five years ago. She had been a year a widow 
 when she met Monsieur Dorrien; they were married, pri- 
 vately, of course, and that is how madame still bears the 
 name and title of her first husband." 
 
 "Excuse me," said Mrs. Reginald, "you are very good 
 to explain all these matters to me; but I was going to ob- 
 serve that, however that may be, I cannot, in Mr. Dorrien's 
 absence, receive you in his house." 
 
 It was the countess whom Mrs. Reginald thus addressed, 
 and the countess, withdrawing her handkerchief from her 
 eyes, said, almost sharply, "Are you Mr. Dorrien's wife, 
 madam ?" 
 
 "No, madam, I am not," was the short answer; "but, 
 while Mr. Dorrien is absent, this house is in my keeping. 
 1 am sorry to say that, before he went away, he left no 
 orders concerning his daughter in-law — perhaps because he 
 was not aware of her existence. I must therefore suggest, 
 madam, that you should repair to the nearest hotel, and 
 there wait until I have communicated with Mr. Dorrien, and 
 learned his pleasure." 
 
 The countess heard her, but looked too much surprised 
 to speak. A pale, slight flush rose to the cheek of the late 
 Count d'Armaill6's sister, and, assuming an amazed look, 
 she said : " Are you aware, madam, of what you are doing ? 
 Are you aware that the Countess of Armaille is of a family 
 so ancient that no man in all Mauritius could have aspired 
 to her hand without presumption, my brother excepted, 
 and that, by marrying Mr. Dorrien's son, she committed 
 one of those acts of imprudence which only love can account 
 for?"
 
 88 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 " Ah ! love, indeed," murmured the little countess — 
 " oh ! my poor dear angel ! " 
 
 " George Dorrien an angel ! " mentally ejaculated Mrs. 
 Reginald ; but she respected the little countess's grief, and 
 looked hard at the two children. The mulatto girl had 
 seated herself on the sofa ; the baby was lying in her 
 arms, and the other child, a pale girl, who had her moth- 
 er's dark eyes, stood leaning against her nurse, too tired 
 and listless to be amused even by the big doll which the 
 negro lad was dancing up and down before her. 
 
 " Let Mademoiselle Marie alone," sharply said the lady 
 who was called Melanie. — " Madam," she added, turning 
 to Mrs. Reginald, and speaking rather imperatively, " these 
 children are tired, the comtesse is tired, and I confess that 
 I am tired — is it not time that all this should end ? " 
 
 But of this speech Mrs. Reginald took no notice. She 
 had ascertained that the children were not twins, and that 
 one of them was certainly not George Dorrien's child. For 
 further information, she applied to the countess herself. 
 
 " Madam," said she, " I shall write to Mr. Dorrien to- 
 day. May I ask what you wish me to say to him ? You 
 are the Comtesse d'Armaille, the late Mr. George Dorrien's 
 widow, and these children are — " 
 
 But the little countess only burst into tears, and looked 
 up at the ignored Melanie, who, with her color steadily 
 rising, and with her lips compressing more and more, said, 
 in any thing but a placid voice : 
 
 " The eldest of these children is my brother's ; the 
 younger one is Mr. George Dorrien's." 
 
 "A boy? "eagerly said Mrs. Reginald, forgetting to 
 address the countess. 
 
 " A girl," shortly answered Melanie. 
 ' Mrs. Reginald's face fell, and the light died out of her 
 one dark eye. 
 
 " Ah ! " she said. " Well, madam, I shall write to Mr. 
 Dorrien. Is there any particular request you wish me to 
 put to him ? " 
 
 Mrs. Reginald was addressing the countess again. Be- 
 fore she could reply, Melanie's long pent-up wrath broke 
 forth. 
 
 " Madam," she said, trembling with passion, " the Com- 
 tesse d'Armaille has no requests to address to Monsieur
 
 JOHN DOMUEN. 89 
 
 Dorrien. The Comtesse d'Armaille came to her father-in- 
 law's house to confer an honor, not to receive any thing at 
 his hands. The comtesse — I mention it because you do 
 not seem to know it — is a rich woman. She has land upon 
 land—" 
 
 "And plantations upon plantations," put in the little 
 countess, with a touch of boastful pride. 
 
 " Her daughter, Mademoiselle d'Armaille, is an heiress," 
 resumed the angry Melanie ; " her other daughter, Antoi- 
 nette," she added, with a touch of contempt, " will be poor 
 comparatively with her sister." 
 
 " But I am sure Marie will be kind to little Antony," 
 plaintively said the little countess. 
 
 " Of course she will," resumed Melanie ; " they arc not 
 equals in birth, but still they are sisters, and — " 
 
 " Excuse me," interrupted Mrs. Keginald. " These 
 two poor children look quite worn out ; perhaps, though 
 not equals in birth, they will eaeh take a basin of this hot 
 broth," she added, turning toward the man-servant, who 
 came in with a tray, on which two white basins were steam- 
 ing. 
 
 But Melanie stepped in between the man and the chil- 
 dren. She tightened her lips, and looked almost fiercely 
 at Mrs. Keginald. 
 
 " Do these children stay here or not ? " she asked, im- 
 periously. 
 
 Mrs. Keginald turned to the countess and said kindly, 
 " What will you take, madam ? You look very cold." 
 
 "Oh, I am so cold," said the little countess, shivering. 
 " Perhaps some hot coffee — " 
 
 Melanie did not allow her to proceed. Seizing the tray 
 from the servant's hands, she dashed it with its contents 
 on Mr. Dorrien's Turkey carpet ; then, going up to the 
 little countess, she seized her arm, and, between her sel 
 teeth, she said, " Come ! " 
 
 The countess rose, looking frightened, but not attempt- 
 ing to resist. Indeed, Melanie's wrath acted with the aw- 
 ful rapidity of a whirlwind. The man-servant started back 
 in dismay as he saw the broth spreading on the Turkey 
 carpet; the mulatto girl hurried out of the room with a 
 scared face; little Marie, clinging to her skirts, looked 
 back at her aunt with frightened eyes; the nurse, without
 
 90 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 even trying to hush the baby, who screamed fearfully, 
 walked off as fast as she could ; the negro-boy, still hold- 
 ing the doll, scampered headlong down-stairs ; and the ser- 
 vant-girl, picking up her parcels, which she had laid down 
 at the door, looked at Mrs. Reginald, as if expecting attack 
 and retaliation from that lady ; but Mrs. Reginald stood 
 perfectly still, watching the retreat of her vanquished foe. 
 
 " Come," said Melanie again, " you do not stay here to 
 be insulted." 
 
 " No, I do not stay here to be insulted," said the little 
 countess, nodding with much stateliness at Mrs. Reginald. 
 
 But that lady only shook her head at the young creat- 
 ure, and, looking down at her of one side with her bright 
 eye, she only said, " Poor thing ! " 
 
 " You have not been received as the Comtesse d'Ar- 
 maille should be received," said Melanie, seizing her hand 
 and leading her to the door. 
 
 " No," repeated the countess, drawing herself up, " I 
 have not been received as the Comtesse d'Armaille should 
 be received." 
 
 " Poor little thing ! " ejaculated Mrs. Reginald, shaking 
 her head again over the little widow. 
 
 "And Monsieur Dorrien shall hear of all this," said 
 Melanie, looking as if she would have liked to do Mrs. 
 Reginald some bodily injury. 
 
 " Perhaps, madam, you will kindly favor me with that 
 lady's name," remarked Mrs. Reginald, addressing the com- 
 tesse, who now stood on the threshold of the drawing-room. 
 " Mr. Dorrien would like to know who flung the broth on 
 his carpet, I dare say." 
 
 The countess did not answer, and hastened on, but her 
 sister-in-law turned on Mrs. Reginald, and said, defiantly : 
 
 " My name is Melanie, and, though I was Count d'Ar- 
 maille's sister, I have not and never had any other nain<\ 
 You have put the question because, somehow or other, you 
 knew this ; and depend upon it that, if we ever meet again, 
 I shall remember it for you." 
 
 She lifted up a threatening forefinger to Mrs. Reginald, 
 who raised her eyebrows in supercilious surprise, and, al- 
 most thrusting the little countess down before her, she 
 walked down-stairs. Mrs. Reginald gravely followed, but 
 did not go beyond the head of the perron / thence she sur-
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 01 
 
 veyed the exodus of the invaders. They entered the rail- 
 way-omnibus in the court; the driver, who had been un- 
 loading the baggage, had, to his great disgust, to hoist it 
 up again. Mrs. Reginald looked calmly on, seeming to 
 take a world of interest in the trunks, boxes, and bags, of 
 the little countess. A discreet cough at her elbow made 
 her turn round. 
 
 " Oh, you are there, Mr. Brown," said she. 
 
 " My dear madam, I have been there all the time," re- 
 plied Mr. Brown. 
 
 " In — deed ! Well, I am short-sighted, for I never saw 
 you." 
 
 " Well, you see, ladies " — a gentle cough — " ladies are 
 so — so impetuous." 
 
 " Nonsense ! " 
 
 " No — really it is not — really it is not nonsense, Mrs. 
 Reginald ; and, indeed, I am in great doubt as to how Mr. 
 Dorrien w T ill feel in this matter. The lady was his son's 
 wife, and the child is his son's child." 
 
 Mrs. Reginald measured him from head to foot ; thru 
 from his toe-tips to his bald crown her one eye traveled 
 again. 
 
 " Mr. Brown," she said, austerely, " you are perfectly 
 free to ask that lady, and her sister-in-law, and her children, 
 and her servants, and the negro-boy, and the doll, to re- 
 main here till Mr. Dorrien comes back. Only if you do 
 so " — Mr. Brown hastened to protest that he had no such 
 intentions — " only if you do so," continued Mrs. Reginald, 
 ignoring his protest, " it is your doing, not mine." 
 
 It is almost needless to say that Mr. Brown had no wish 
 to do any thing of the kind, and that Mr. Dorrien's daugh- 
 ter-in-law, grandchild, and suite, drove out of the court un- 
 detained by him. He didjjndeed, go up to the door of the 
 omnibus, and civilly ask the comtesse to favor him with 
 her address. This request the intractable Melanie received 
 with a slam of the door in his face ; that made Mr. Brown 
 start back amazed; that filled Mrs. Reginald's stern heart 
 •with satisfaction ; and that sent Durand and Leroux, peep- 
 ing from behind the green curtain of the counting-house 
 window, into ecstasies of delight, which had not subsided 
 when Mr. Dorrien's clerk returned to them and to his offi- 
 cial duties.
 
 93 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 Two days latter Mr. Dorrien came home. He received 
 Mrs. Reginald's account of what had occurred with his 
 usual impassive countenance, merely saying — 
 
 " Of course, Mrs. Reginald, I attach no blame to you ; 
 but, if I had been at home, my son's widow and her child 
 should not have left my house so." 
 
 " And if I had been at home," tartly answered Mrs. 
 Reginald, shooting a rather defiant glance with her bright 
 eye at him, " they should have received another welcome 
 than that which I gave them." 
 
 Mr. Dorrien waved his hand — it was very delicate and 
 fair, though rather thin — in a graceful, deprecating fashion, 
 and said, in his courteous way, " Of course, of course ; " 
 then, leaving Mrs. Reginald — for this conversation took 
 place immediately on his arrival — he repaired to Mr. 
 Brown's private rooms. 
 
 "Well, Mr. Brown," he said, as that gentleman rose 
 and they shook hands — Mr. Dorrien did sometimes call 
 him Brown, but it was very rarely indeed that he did so 
 — " well, Mr. Brown, I have seen "Mrs. Reginald and heard 
 all about it. It is a pity, but it could nSt be helped, I 
 suppose. Only, will you be kind enough to make some 
 inquiries about that poor young thing ? She came from 
 Mauritius — the consul — we know the consul there, do we 
 not ? — a Mr. Sinclair— yes, I am sure his name is Sinclair 
 — well, he w 7 ill tell us all about her." 
 
 Mr. Brown took a note to that effect. 
 
 " I also think," said Mr. Dorrien, after a pause, " that, 
 until we have the consul's answer, we will let the matter 
 rest, Mr. Brown. And, now, how have things been going 
 on while I was away ? " 
 
 But Mr. Brown had nothing of importance or interest 
 to tell his master. Business w r as dull — when did men of 
 business ever find business otherwise ? Nevertheless, two 
 new houses in the provinces Avanted to deal with them, but 
 he (Mr. Brown) thought that there was no need to be in 
 a hurry. Had Mr. Brown any objection to them ? asked 
 Mr. Dorrien, with sudden interest. Oh! no; but still, 
 Mr. Brown thought there need be no hurry. And so the 
 conversation drifted away from the countess and her child, 
 and returned to them no more. 
 
 Mr. Sinclair was written to, and in due course of time
 
 JOUN DORRIEN'. 93 
 
 Mr. Sinclair's answer came. The Comtesse d'Armaille had 
 been Miss O'Donnell, wrote the consul. She was an or- 
 phan and an heiress, and had been married at fifteen to the 
 Comte d'Armaille, who was forty, penniless, and profligate. 
 He beat and ill-used his little wife, who, soon after his 
 death, contracted a private marriage with Mr. Dorrien's 
 son ; but how George Dorrien had come to Mauritius, and 
 what he had been doing there, Mr. Sinclair prudently pro- 
 fessed not to know. " No good," mentally said Mrs. Regi- 
 nald, when she came to this portion of the letter. 
 
 The birth of her second child compelled the countess to 
 acknowledge her marriage ; this acknowledgment, Mr. Sin- 
 clair confessed, led to some unpleasantness, and George 
 Dorrien, after a while, determined upon going to Europe. 
 That his young wife soon followed him, Mr. Sinclair knew 
 — also that she had not returned to Mauritius. But there 
 closed the information he could give. Mr. Dorrien made 
 no comment upon any of the particulars thus conveyed to 
 him, but he instructed Mr. Brown to take the needful steps 
 in order to discover the countess's whereabouts. 
 
 This, however, proved more difficult than writing to 
 Mr. Sinclair. A young widow with two children, a com- 
 panion, and several servants, were not, it would seem, very 
 bard to find out ; but, somehow or other, Mr. Brown could 
 not do it. He ascertained that the countess had left Paris, 
 and gone to Italy. But, when he had discovered that Sor- 
 rento was the place of her residence, he also learned, almost 
 immediately afterward, that she was gone to Germany. 
 From Germany the countess went to Belgium, thence to 
 England, and thence to Belgium back again ; and so she 
 seemed to wander about Europe, never staying long enough 
 anywhere for Mr. Dorrien to make any attempt to com- 
 municate with her. Once, indeed, when she was wintering 
 in Rome, Mr. Dorrien wrote to her, but his letter was sent 
 back to him by return of post. 
 
 " Mr. Brown," quietly said Mr. Dorrien to the clerk, 
 "you will take no more steps in this matter, if you please." 
 
 Mr. Brown accordingly troubled himself no more with 
 the wanderings of the countess, and quietly informed Mrs. 
 Reginald that it was really quite a relief to have that mat- 
 ter disposed of. 
 
 The relief lasted several years, at the end of which Mr.
 
 94 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 Dorrien received two letters. One, edged with black, bore 
 the postmark of Nice ; the other came from England. They 
 were evidently not business letters, for Mr. Dorrien said 
 not a word of their contents to Mr. Brown — not, at least, 
 for two days after receiving them. Even then he was si- 
 lent concerning the letter from Nice, and all he said of the 
 English letter was, " Mr. Brown, you remember John Dor- 
 rien ? " 
 
 Imperturbable though Mr. Brown was, he gave a little 
 start. It was so many years since the name of John Dor- 
 rien had been mentioned in that house. 
 
 " Yes, sir, I remember Mr. John Dorrien," answered Mr. 
 Brown, after a moment's pause. 
 
 " Well, it seems that his widow is living somewhere in 
 or about London, and that John Dorrien's boy has been 
 brought up at Saint-Ives, and is a very clever young fellow." 
 
 " I am sure I am very glad to hear it, sir." 
 
 " So am I, Mr. Brown." 
 
 Two days later Mr. Dorrien said, in the same careless 
 way : 
 
 " Oh, by-the-by, Mr. Brown, I have written to Mrs. John 
 Dorrien." 
 
 " Indeed, sir ! " 
 
 " Yes, I wrote this morning." 
 
 Mr. Dorrien said no more ; Mr. Brown put no questions ; 
 but the letter which Mr. Dorrien had written and sent that 
 morning was that which Mrs. Dorrien had placed in John 
 Dorrien's hand. 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 Mr. Dorrien never wasted words, spoken or written. 
 In his letter to Mrs. Dorrien, he now implied, briefly^ what 
 it was not convenient to explain at any length. After glid- 
 ing over the long break in their intercourse as gracefully 
 as if it had lasted sixteen days instead of so many years, 
 he alluded to John Dorrien. He was charmed to learn 
 that he w r as a young man of promise, and congratulated 
 her kindly; but he ventured to ask of his dear Mrs. Dor-
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 95 
 
 rien if the place of his father's son, of the last of the Dor- 
 riens after himself, was not by his side in the old house ? 
 Should a stranger be called in to become his successor, and 
 one who did not bear the old name be held worthy of 
 steering- the " Dorrien " on her way down the tide of time ? 
 A slight allusion to Mr. Blackmore, also to the size of the 
 Hotel Dorrien, which would render any domestic arrange- 
 ment easy, and a request for a prompt reply, concluded Mr. 
 Dorrien's epistle. 
 
 John had read this letter in total silence, without one 
 exclamation of surprise, or one comment of approval or 
 blame. He returned it to his mother without uttering a 
 word, but with sorrowful gravity in his face. 
 
 So he, John Dorrien, the poor and obscure lad, was the 
 last of those great and rich Dorriens whom Mr. Blackmore 
 had first mentioned to him ! He was mortified to find, 
 being of a proud and independent spirit, that he actually 
 thought somewhat more of himself for this connection. 
 Was he not the same John Dorrien who had got up that 
 morning resolved to strive for self-won honors ? But this 
 was not all. He felt cut to the heart by his mother's long 
 secrecy, and thoroughly indignant with that rich Mr. Dor- 
 rien, who, after putting them by so many years, now coolly 
 took them up again. Mrs. Dorrien sat with the letter in 
 her hand, striving to read the meaning of her son's face. 
 The pale gleam of an English sun was stealing into the 
 room, and lit up the spot on which the boy stood. She 
 saw the gold shining in his brown hair, the pure blood in 
 his clear cheek, but his grave eyes and compressed lips 
 gave her no clew to his feelings. 
 
 " John," she said, after what seemed to both a long 
 pause of silence, " I told you so ; Mr. Dorrien's letter con- 
 cerns you, and not me. You w T ill have to give it time and 
 thought and — " 
 
 "Little mother," interrupted John, leaving his place to 
 go and sit down by her, " I require little time or thought 
 to answer Mr. Dorrien. I do not know if I ought to led 
 obliged to him for the position he offers me, but I do not." 
 
 And John threw back his head in defiance of Mr. Dor- 
 rien, La Maison Dorrien, commerce, and fortune. His 
 mother gave him a wistful look. 
 
 "If there be a meaning in language," she said, " Mr.
 
 96 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 Dorrien means to leave his business to you ; and the firm 
 of Dorrien has always been a great firm, and a rich one." 
 
 " What was my father in it ? " asked John. 
 
 " What Mr. Dorrien is now, John." 
 
 She said no more. Her son could see that she said this 
 much with reluctance. How or why his father's position 
 had passed to Mr. George Dorrien was evidently not a 
 pleasant subject to the widowed lady. " That Mr. Dorrien 
 has wronged my father," thought John, his gray eyes flash- 
 ing, and his secret resolve was strengthened. 
 
 " Well, little mother," resumed John, coolly, " I have no 
 taste for the Aladdin's Lamp which Mr. Dorrien, who has 
 forgotten us so long, now offers. I will, God willing, climb 
 my way up my own ladder, and trust me, little mother," 
 he added, passing his arm round her, and looking fondly 
 in her face, " though the rungs of my ladder may not be 
 made of gold — his are, I suppose — they will afford me foot- 
 ing firm and sure, and lead to what shall be very good for 
 us both." 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien almost bit her tongue, in order not to make 
 some rejoinder which John might deem unkind. She saw 
 well enough that her docile little boy, her obedient Johnny, 
 had vanished, and that the present John, though tender and 
 devoted, was also very willful, and thoroughly bent on hav- 
 ing a Avill of his own. He did not even make a semblance 
 of consulting her on so momentous a subject as this ; he 
 took not the least pains to untie this Gordian knot; he 
 coolly cut through it, and, having done so, seemed to con- 
 sider the mutter disposed of. 
 
 " My dear," she said, after a pause, " think of what you 
 are doing. If you reject this position, you may never again 
 have such an opportunity." 
 
 " I trust not," quickly replied John. " I mean that T do 
 not wish for the alternative. I do not care for money, little 
 mother, but of course it is a temptation, especially just now ; 
 and since I must not yield to it, I would rather not be 
 tempted." 
 
 Then it was a temptation. Poor John's honest confes- 
 sion gave his mother sudden hope. Her color rose, her 
 dark eyes, which had grown so dim, got back their old 
 light, 
 
 " My dear boy," she said, with a look of surprise, " this
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 97 
 
 is no temptation to shrink from. What ran you see so ol>- 
 jectionable in Mr. Dorrien's proposal V " 
 
 She put the question; she could ask such a thing; she 
 could forget his great dramatic poem, and the fame and for- 
 tune he was to build upon it ! John colored violently. 
 
 " Why, little mother," he exclaimed, in a tone of re- 
 proach, " what have I to do with business? I have not 
 been seven years at Saint-Ives for that. Besides, how could 
 I go on with 'Miriam ' if I were at Mr. Dorrien's ? I sup- 
 pose it is a fine position ; but the mere thought of working 
 from morning till night for money-making is abhorrent to 
 me. I would not submit to such a yoke in order to become 
 a millionaire." 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien smiled with some bitterness. She thought 
 of the life she had led for sixteen years — how she, reared 
 in comfort and wedded to wealth, had been her own ser- 
 vant, how she had worked herself almost blind, and learned 
 to do without the comforts and often the necessaries of life 
 for the sake of the boy who considered her so little, and 
 himself so much. She had done it, and not complained, but 
 had she liked it ? 
 
 " You will think over it," she said, a little coldly, though 
 with a heightened color. 
 
 John shook his head, and almost laughed. 
 
 "I have thought over it," he said, " and my mind is 
 made up. I will not sit on a stool in Mr. Dorrien's office, 
 and lead the life he leads. We may not be very rich, little 
 mother, but we shall soon have a comfortable home of our 
 own, I trust. I shall see about 'Miriam' to-dav, and the 
 result will show you, 1 hope, that I have decided wisely." 
 
 "John, I believe you are very gifted," Mrs. Dorrien 
 spoke emphatically ; " but even great gifts are not acknowl- 
 edged at once. You may meet with checks which will 
 make you regret having been so hasty with Mr. Dorrien." 
 
 If it had not been for her present and pressing needs, 
 Mrs. Dorrien would have let this matter rest, and trusted 
 to time for her ally. Little though she know of literature, 
 she knew enough of life and its inevitable disappointments 
 to look at it from another point of view than that of san- 
 guine John ; but she had not time to wait. Her position 
 was bitter and critical. John could not return to Saint- 
 Ives, to plunge more deeplv into this poetic abyss. Indeed, 
 5
 
 98 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 that he should dream of becoming a real poet, and look to 
 poetry for his bread and her own, was a sort of insanit}^. 
 She felt angry with his madness, and all the more so that 
 she was in some measure answerable for it. Why had she 
 given him the education of all others most likely to foster 
 literary tastes and faculties ? She had done it, and she felt 
 that she could not now undo it too quickly and too surely. 
 Her argument, however, only seemed to make John restive. 
 He was still too much of a boy not to have plenty of com- 
 bativeness in him. The mere thought of fighting his way 
 up, spite publishers and critics, was delightful to the lad. 
 It would give sweetness to victory to have had a prelimi- 
 nary wrestling. He could not help smiling at the thought ; 
 and in the smile his mother read that she had defeated her 
 own object, and must change her tactics. 
 
 " Besides," she resumed, gravely, " you must consider 
 Mr. Dorrien's kindness in this, John. Is it not making a 
 poor return for it not even to give his offer the trial, say of 
 six months, or a year, just to see how you would like that 
 sort of life ? " 
 
 " Consider Mr. Dorrien ! " echoed John, amazed and dis- 
 pleased. " Why, mother, I did not like to complain of him, 
 since you did not, but what consideration has he shown for 
 us all these years? Has he remembered us? Has he 
 sought us, or made a serious effort to find us? Then,Avhat 
 consideration do I owe him now ? " 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien shook her head impatiently. 
 
 "Young people do not understand," she said, in a fret- 
 ful tone. " But you are right in one thing, John : since I 
 do not complain, you should not do so." 
 
 " But I do not, little mother ; I only prefer my own way 
 to Mr. Dorrien's." 
 
 John laughed the short, independent laugh of ever-pre- 
 sumptuous youth. Mrs. Dorrien was silent again, and 
 pondered. What should she say next? — what argument 
 should she use ? She might tell John that she wished for 
 this tiling, and bid him do it for her sake; and, though the 
 lad might have made another stand for the liberty and the 
 sweetness of his life, he would probably have yielded, for 
 he had a generous nature, and he loved her. But Mrs. 
 Dorrien was proud; she was accustomed to bestow upon 
 John, not to receive from him ; she could not bear to hum-
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 99 
 
 • 
 
 ble herself so far before her son, even though the object she 
 had in view was certainly his welfare, and not her own ; 
 moreover, and though she was not an untruthful woman, 
 in the hardest sense of the word, she was not very fond of 
 the straight, open high-road, and preferred little devious 
 paths of her own. She thought them short cuts, but they 
 were very long rounds sometimes, and led her through 
 much bitterness and sorrow to the goal she wished to reach. 
 Mrs. Dorrien liked them, however, and, rather than tell 
 John plainly what she wished him to do, she now inflicted 
 on herself keen and bitter pain. 
 
 " John," she said, after a pause, " I believe you see I 
 wish you to accept Mr. Dorrien's proposal." 
 
 " I know, mother, that, if you do, it is for my sake," 
 said John, coloring. 
 
 " Of course it is for your sake ; but I have other reasons 
 of which you know nothing, John, and it is only fair to 
 myself, as well as to Mr. Dorrien, that you should know 
 them. John, have you nothing more to ask about your 
 father?" 
 
 "I have no wish to ask what you have no wish to tell," 
 said the youth, gravely. 
 
 "And how could I wish to tell that which was so bitter 
 for me to repeat, so hard for you to hear?" she cried, with 
 sudden passion. "I suppose I must tell j-ou now; but, 
 John, listen, and do not question. I will say all that is 
 needful, but I have not fortitude enough to say more. I 
 had a little fortune of my own when I married your father. 
 He had the firm of Dorrien, La Maison Dorrien, as they 
 called it in Paris, and call it still, I dare say. His grand- 
 father willed it to him: but his first-cousin, Mr. George 
 Dorrien, did not thereby lose his share. He was what is 
 called a sleeping partner. He had neither the tastes nor 
 the position of a man of business ; he married an heiress, 
 and was to be a country gentleman. O John ! it is so hard 
 to say the rest." 
 
 John looked wistfully at his mother; tears flowed down 
 her pale cheeks ; her lips quivered ; her whole being seemed 
 shaken. 
 
 "Do not tell me, little mother," he said, generously. 
 " I will take your word for it all." 
 
 " No, T must tell," said she. " I have begun, I must go
 
 100 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 • 
 
 on. A few words will do. John, your father was very, 
 very unfortunate, more sinned against than sinning ; but, 
 before you were a year old, my money was gone, your fa- 
 ther's share was gone, and Mr. George Dorrien's share had 
 vanished. The firm of Dorrien, which had lasted a century, 
 must have perished, and been utterly disgraced, but for 
 Mrs. George Dorrien's money. That saved it; but your 
 father, your poor father, John, died by his own hand." 
 
 She buried her face in her hands, while John, pale and 
 sorrow-stricken, said not a, word. 
 
 " I could not bear to tell you," she said, looking up. " I 
 would never have told you, if I could — never have darkened 
 your mind, my poor boy, with so sad a story, if I could 
 have helped it." 
 
 " You were wrong, mother," said John, speaking almost 
 sternly, and his very lips were white, "you were wrong. 
 We are all of us willing enough to take the honor that 
 comes to us from our parents — we must also learn how to 
 take the shame." 
 
 " But it was not shame ! " cried Mrs. Dorrien, her face 
 in a flame. "I told you that your father was more sinned 
 against than sinning. He was involved before he knew 
 how or why, and, in his sensitiveness and over-conscien- 
 tiousness, he could not bear to see the ruin he had wrought. 
 Mr. George Dorrien, though he suffered so severely, never 
 reproached him ; the world never thought your poor father 
 other than unfortunate." 
 
 John did not answer, but he was not convinced. He 
 was naturally rigid in his ideas of honor, and, being young, 
 he was severe in his judgments of men. His mother's reve- 
 lation had given him a terrible shock. The father, whom 
 she had always mentioned as so perfect and accomplished a 
 gentleman, whose mild, refined face now looked down at 
 him from the wall — that father had died by his own hand ; 
 and his mother might say what she liked, he had so died 
 because he could not face dishonor. Nothing could, nor 
 ever did, remove that bitter conviction from his soul; but 
 never was it so bitter as in that first hour. 
 
 "You must not set }'ourself up as a judge against your 
 own father," said Mrs. Dorrien, almost angrily. "Mr. Dor- 
 rien, who suffered so much through him, never reproached 
 him; and yet, John, he did suffer. He hated business as
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 101 
 
 much as you do, and he bad (o yoke himself to it. He bad 
 meant to lead a country life, and he had to shut himself up 
 in a great city. Do you wonder that T shrank from him, 
 and purposely let my track be lost? And if he seeks us 
 now, do you wonder that I urge you to please him, and 
 think he has a claim upon you?" 
 
 John was silent. He was going through the pangs of a 
 great mental agony. Undeserved shame was bearing him 
 down to the earth. It seemed to him as if his very pride 
 in the name he bore were gone from him — as if he cared no 
 more for fame, for glory, for the honor of beautiful verse ; 
 but, keenly though he suffered, he had too generous a na- 
 ture to let his mother know all his feelings. , 
 
 "Little mother," he said, sorrowfully, "I do not set 
 myself up as a judge against my own father, nor do I wish 
 to reproach his memory." 
 
 "Do not," she said, almost passionately; "never do 
 that, John, however hard the cost of the past may be to 
 you." 
 
 He could not misunderstand her meaning. His mother 
 considered him bound by that fatal past to accede to Mr. 
 Dorrien's request. And for once they were agreed ; John, 
 though he did not say it, thought so, too. His eyes sought 
 that pale portrait on the wall, and spoke to it in tender, 
 silent language. That erring man was his father, after all, 
 and John Dorrien shrank from none of the claims the name 
 and bond implied. He took up his heavy inheritance, not 
 gladly, but in a stoic spirit. He had once thought thai 
 honor would go back through him to his dead father; and 
 so it would, but through another channel than that which 
 he had dreamed of. The late John Dorrien was not to be 
 the father of a great poet, but his son was to take up the 
 load which the broken-hearted man had laid down, and to 
 redeem his tarnished honor. All these thoughts and feel- 
 ings passed through him as he looked at the portrait, and 
 listened to his mother, but John Dorrien did not speak. 
 
 "And now," resumed Mrs. Dorrien, "you know all — 
 I have no more to say — no more to urge. You can think 
 over Mr. Dorrien's proposal, and answ 7 er it when you please." 
 
 "Mother," asked John, with sorrowful gravity, "what 
 use can I be of to Mr. Dorrien ? — what can I do that another 
 would not do as well ? "
 
 102 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 " You ask it — you can ask it ? " she said, clasping her 
 hands, almost indignantly. " Are you not a Dorrien ? — do 
 you not bear the old name, and is there not something in a 
 name? And does not Mr. Dorrien know that you have 
 been reared at Saint-Ives — that you have studied there, 
 and always been the first ? " 
 
 " We did not study commerce," replied John, giving his 
 mother a wistful look; for Virgil, Homer, Tacitus, and 
 Cicero, the sweetness and grandeur of song, the stateliness 
 of history, the beauty of eloquence, came back to him as 
 he spoke, and smote him with their lost splendor and love- 
 liness. 
 
 » " I think Mr. Dorrien right in wishing for you," emphati- 
 cally said Mrs. Dorrien ; " but, whether he be right or 
 wrong, it is for you to consider these words of his letter: 
 ' Is not the place of his father's son here by my side in the 
 old house ? ' " 
 
 A sharp pang pierced poor John's heart. Pie was but 
 a boy, after all, and did not know how to defend himself. 
 His mother was too much for him, with that sad story in 
 the past, and that claim of honor in the present. He did 
 not know how to resist her, or how to fight his way out of 
 that net which had so suddenly closed round him ; but he 
 found it very hard to }'ield, and to give up the life he loved, 
 the future he had hoped for, at the word of a stranger. 
 
 " Mother," he said, " don't you think that, if I explain 
 to Mr. Dorrien that my tastes and education unfit me for 
 this position — " 
 
 " Oh, of course," she bitterly interrupted, " Mr. Dor- 
 rien will not urge the point, but I know what he will 
 think." 
 
 John bit his lip. That little taunt carried the day. 
 " Very well," he said, " let it be ; but it is hard." 
 
 He could not prevent his lips from quivering. His 
 mother embraced him fondly, and told him that God would 
 bless and reward him ; but, though John repelled neither 
 heavenly blessing nor reward, he could not say to himself 
 that either was his motive for submission. He was obey- 
 ing a stern voice, keener and more subtile than that of con- 
 science, the voice of Honor. He would have thought it dis- 
 honorable in his father's son to act otherwise than as he 
 was now acting. Mr. George Dorrien had taken up a heavy
 
 JOHN DOERIEN. 103 
 
 load sixteen years ago, but John would not shrink now 
 from his share of the burden. 
 
 But though John was imaginative, and could rush upon 
 sacrifice with the fond illusions of youth, to whom heroism 
 always seems so easy; though he was gentle-hearted, and 
 could not mistrust where he loved, he was also shrewd, and 
 giving his mother a wistful, perplexed look, he said to her: 
 "Little mother, does not all this seem very strange to 
 you ? " 
 
 That look, and his evident sorrow, tried Mrs. Dorrien 
 strangely; but she would not give in. With. feverish ea- 
 gerness she completed her triumph by writing off at once 
 to Mr. Dorrien. Her letter was brief, but decisive. She 
 showed it to John, who read and returned it silently. He 
 wished for no reprieve, but he could not help feeling that 
 none was granted to him. Mrs. Dorrien went and posted 
 the letter at once. When she came in, she found Johnny 
 seated at the table, his hand buried in his brown locks, 
 his eyes riveted on the loose pages before him. Yet he 
 was not reading, he was only going back to some happy 
 hours spent out upon the cliffs of the French coast, with 
 the swarthy, ardent, and enthusiastic Mr. Ryan. He was 
 only hearing once more those deep emphatic words, the 
 sweetest that had yet fallen upon his ears, "John, my boy, 
 that is grand," and he was asking himself, with dull and 
 sad wonder, what Mr. Ryan would say. His mother went 
 up to him, and laid her hand upon his shoulder. 
 
 " My dear," she said fondly, " it is hard, I know, but 
 you are not the one to do things by halves. Remember 
 Lot's wife ; there is temptation and peril in looking back. 
 If you are to become a man of business, you cannot go on 
 with poetry. Take these verses of yours, make them up 
 into a packet, and seal it. When you have won a position, 
 when perhaps you are sole master of the Dorrien firm, you 
 can open this packet again, and indulge yourself to your 
 1 1< -art's content." 
 
 She expected remonstrance and opposition, but, though 
 John gave a little .start as she made this bold proposal, and 
 looked at her with strange earnestness, he did not prevent 
 her from carrying out her purpose. He let her gather up 
 his papers, fold them neatly, and seal them up for him ; 
 and he took them thus sealed from her hand, and put them
 
 104 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 away silently. But silence is often the gravestone under 
 which some of our saddest thoughts lie buried, and John 
 Dorrien's thought now was, " Surely all this is my mother's 
 doing." 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 As usual, Mr. Brown had gone up to Mrs. Reginald's 
 sitting-room, and as usual he found that lady warming her 
 toes at the fire, leaning back in her rocking-chair, and hold- 
 ing up a volume so that the light of the lamp on the table 
 near her might fall upon the page ; and though Mrs. Regi- 
 nald was not handsome, she made a very pleasant, warm, 
 and comfortable picture as she sat thus. 
 
 Mrs. Reginald was not merely a great reader, but find- 
 ing life dull at Hotel Dorrien, and not being one to rely 
 upon others for amusement, she turned to books. She chose 
 them both grave and gay. She had, as she said herself, a 
 healthy appetite, and could. digest good food of any kind. 
 She liked Dickens, she liked Shakespeare, she liked history, 
 science in a light way, metaphysics when they agreed with 
 her own views, and the last novel when it was a good one. 
 In short, Mrs. Reginald had a vigorous mind, and did not 
 let it rust. When Mr. Brown, taking a chair and softly 
 rubbing his hands before Mrs. Reginald's cheerful fire, now 
 remarked that she was reading, he meant it as the statement 
 of a fact, not as a question, for he was accustomed to find 
 her so engaged ; but Mrs. Reginald's one eye was down 
 upon him directly. 
 
 " Ah ! you want to know what I am reading," said she. 
 " Where is the use? You never read novels or fiction of 
 any kind. Did you ever read fairy talcs, Mr. Brown, when 
 you were a little boy in a round jacket? But were you 
 ever a little boy ? Of course not ; and of course there never 
 were any fairies for you. But I am Irish, and the fairies 
 and I are first-cousins. I always liked them, pretty little 
 midges, skipping about in the moonlight. And I still like 
 fairy tales, Mr. Brown; for they all come straight from 
 Fairy-land — which is a very delightful country."
 
 JOHN DORKIEX. 105 
 
 Mr, Brown coughed discreetly. Mrs. Reginald was a 
 superior woman, and, because she was so, had flights of 
 fancy. 
 
 " What sort of a place do you think it is, Mr. Brown ? " 
 said she, not considering his cough as an answer, and turn- 
 ing her bright eye upon him, as if expectant of one. 
 
 " I think that is Mr. Dorrien," replied Mr. Brown, sotto 
 voce. 
 
 And Mr. Dorrien it was who now. entered the room ; 
 Mr. Dorrien, graceful, courteous, languid, and refined, as 
 usual, but Mr. Dorrien far more than usually communica- 
 tive and pleasant. Taking a clniir between the two (they 
 sat on opposite sides of the lire), Mr. Dorrien told them all 
 he had been doing that day ; how he and Mr. Phnnmer had 
 made two ineffectual attempts to meet, and had not ac- 
 c implished their object ; and also how he, Mr. Dorrien, had 
 been to the Hotel-de-Ville on business, and had been more 
 than usually disgusted with the arbitrary insolence of the 
 man in office there. Then followed a remark on the weather, 
 which was cold; then another on Mrs. Reginald's looks — 
 which were the looks of health, he averred ; then, gliding 
 gracefully as ever into the subject which had brought him 
 to Mrs. Reginald's sitting-room, he said, quietly : 
 
 " By-the-by, my dear madam, Mrs. John Dorrien and 
 her son will be coming here shortly. I can trust their rooms 
 to vou, I am sure. By their rooms I mean a portion of this 
 large house — a limited one, of course — to be set apart for 
 their use. They do not come as visitors, but as permanent 
 residents." 
 
 Profound silence followed this announcement. Mrs. John 
 Dorrien and her son ! Mrs. Reginald remembered him a ba- 
 by in his widowed mother's arms, and mentally calculated 
 his age ; but she asked aloud if the rooms on this floor would 
 do. Mr. Dorrien assured her they were the very thing, and, 
 turning to Mr. Brown, he said, with studied carelessness : 
 
 "We are going to have an assistant, Mr. Brown. I 
 thought it well to secure this young John Dorrien. He is 
 a lad of promise, and he has the name and youth which we 
 both want, Mr. Brown," added Mr. Dorrien, with a rather 
 dreary smile. 
 
 " Is he not very young, sir? " asked Mr. Brown. 
 
 "Twenty or so, 1 believe."
 
 106 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 " He is seventeen," positively said Mrs. Reginald. 
 
 "Well, then, he will be twenty three years hence," 
 laughed Mr. Dorrien. 
 
 Mr. Brown looked grave. 
 
 " I suppose he comes to learn business ? " he remarked. 
 
 " He comes to learn this business," said Mr. Dorrien, 
 almost sharply ; " he comes to work here — to help us, and 
 to bear his share of the load." 
 
 " He is very young," said Mr. Brown, stroking his chin 
 and looking at his master. 
 
 He has the name of Dorrien, Mr. Brown — that will 
 do for nine out of ten ; he is clever — the first at Saint- 
 Ives." 
 
 " They learn Greek and Latin there, sir," persisted Mr. 
 Brown, evidently not favorably impressed by the prospect 
 of having a youthful scholar from Saint-Ives in the count- 
 ing-house of La Maison Dorrien. 
 
 " They learn mathematics, too, and algebra, and twenty 
 things besides, which open a young man's mind to the 
 practical side of life. At all events," added Mr. Dorrien, 
 " we can give the lad a trial." 
 
 Mr. Brown raised no further objection. He looked 
 stolidly at the fire ; and Mrs. Reginald, turning her brown 
 eye first on him, then on Mr. Dorrien, drew her own con- 
 clusions on what she had just heard. She was both amazed 
 and perplexed. Clerks of seventeen were surely abundant 
 enough in Paris and London that John Dorrien should be 
 left where he was, as he had been left these sixteen years. 
 What, then, did Mr. Dorrien want him for, that he brought 
 his mother to the house in order to secure him ? He had 
 the name, but why should Mr. Dorrien require a boy's 
 name ? Mr. Brown did not like the plan ; and his master, 
 foreseeing that he would not like it, had chosen to tell him 
 nothing about it till the matter was decided beyond recall. 
 And he had come this evening to Mrs. Reginald's sitting- 
 room to tell him, in order that her presence might stifle, if 
 it could not silence, the confidential clerk's opposition. 
 
 " He has alwa} r s been a willful man, in his quiet way," 
 thought Mrs. Reginald, looking shrewdly at Mr. Dorrien's 
 pale, languid face, "and a selfish man in his own civil way, 
 and so he will be to the last." 
 
 "Perhaps the rooms on the ground-door would do bet-
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 107 
 
 tor than those up here ? " she suggested aloud, as if the 
 rooms had been the subject of her silent meditations. 
 
 " No, not the rooms on the ground-floor," said Mr. Dor- 
 rien, quietly, but with perfect decision. 
 
 " They are very good rooms, Mr. Dorrien, and quite 
 useless," persisted Mrs. Reginald. 
 
 "Mrs. John Dorrien will be better up here," coldly an- 
 swered Mr. Dorrien, and, like Mr. Brown, Mrs. Reginald 
 had nothing to do but to submit. Having settled this mat- 
 ter, Mr. Dorrien looked at his watch, exclaimed at the late- 
 ness of the hour, and, rising, he bade both Mrs. Reginald 
 and Mr. Brown a good-evening. 
 
 "Well, Mr. Brown," said the lady, rushing impetuously 
 into the subject as soon as the door had closed upon him, 
 "are you knocked down, prostrate, on your back? — be- 
 cause I am! Mrs. Dorrien here ! And Mr. Dorrien talking 
 of a boy of seventeen as if he really wanted him ; and then 
 these rooms on the ground-floor ! What is he keeping 
 them up for ? Mr. Brown, can you make it out ? " 
 
 "I was not prepared for it," remarked Mr. Brown, ever 
 close and cautious. " I was not prepared for it, Mrs. Regi- 
 nald." 
 
 " You were not prepared for it ! Nonsense ! What 
 do you think of it? Nothing, of course! Do you ever 
 think, Mr. Brown?" added the vehement lady. ""Shall I 
 tell you what I think ? " She paused. Mr. Brown looked 
 up expectant. "Mr. Brown," resumed Mrs. Reginald, sar- 
 castically, " I shall do as you do — I shall keep my thought 
 to myself; but mark my words, Mr. Dorrien thinks himself 
 very clever and very keen, but no good will come of it — no 
 good will come of it." 
 
 Mr. Brown looked at the fire and rubbed his hands, and 
 shunned the look of Mrs. Reginald's keen bright eye. But 
 it was the misfortune of that lady that she could rarely 
 keep her own counsel, or adhere to her wisest resolves. It 
 was impossible for her to withhold from Mr. Browm that 
 information which he most probably did not require, but 
 which would at least convince him that she, Mrs. Reginald, 
 was too acute to be imposed upon. 
 
 " Mr. Brown," she resumed, " do you hear me ? " 
 
 " Y"es, Mrs. Reginald, 1 am attending." 
 
 "Do you remember that passage in the history of De-
 
 108 J° HN DORRIEN. 
 
 cebalus, King of the Daci — but, no, of course you do not. 
 You never read, Mr. Brown ? " 
 
 " I read the newspaper, Mrs. Reginald." 
 " Well, then, this Decebalus, who could at one time of 
 his history ask Trajan to pay him tribute, and who, van- 
 quished by that same Trajan, had to die by his own hand — 
 this same king, I say, had some ups and downs in his life. 
 Once he got into a fix. He was hard pushed by the Ro- 
 mans. They were coming on, on, on, Mr. Brown, with their 
 legions in the van, their auguries, too, and their engineers, 
 and architects, and hungry Roman citizens, panting for 
 barbarian land, in the rear. They were coming on, 1 say, 
 and the German tribes were not all friendly to this Danu- 
 bian king. He had buried his treasure in the bed of the 
 river, and murdered the slaves who had hidden it there ; 
 but, somehow or other, a voice went forth, even among his 
 own people, that the Romans had forced, or would force, 
 the iron gates, and that Decebalus was ended. Now, shall 
 I tell you what I think he did, Mr. Brown? Well, I think 
 he hunted out for some little Decebalus or other, and pro- 
 claimed him his successor in the face of the Daci. Wheth- 
 er he had him raised and borne aloft on a shield, Frankish 
 fashion, is more than I can tell you ; but one thing I am 
 sure of, that he did it to blind his people. ' What,' says 
 Decebalus, ' you think the Romans are pushing me close, 
 do you ? You think I have buried my treasures, and am 
 preparing for death, or flight! You think that a little 
 more, and I shall be a dethroned sovereign ! You never 
 were more mistaken! Why, my kingdom is so sure a 
 thing that, in my anxiety for it, and for my people, I have 
 actually chosen this boy my successor. Would I choose a 
 successor if I had nothing to bequeath? — and would I hit 
 upon a boy if there were danger coming on ? Bless you, I 
 never sat better in my saddle than I do this day.' Now, 
 Mr. Brown, Decebalus may say what he pleases, but such 
 Daci as you and 1 know belter than to believe him. We 
 know that Decebalus never thought of any one save Num- 
 ber One; that he would not have given a farthing for that 
 poor little Decebalus to be alive or dead, and that Dacia 
 and the Daci might all go to perdition, so far as he cared. 
 I say we know it. And now, Mr. Brown," added Mrs. 
 Reginald, tapping Mr. Brown on the waistcoat, and fixing
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 109 
 
 him with her one bright eye, "what do you think of my 
 parable?" 
 
 Mr. Brown coughed. He thought that Mrs. Reginald 
 was a very acute, but also a very dangerous woman. 
 
 " As to what became of the young Deccbalus," resumed 
 Mrs. Reginald, "whether he followed the triumphal car of 
 Trajan, or was murdered by the Daci, let us not inquire. 
 Deccbalus did not care — of that we may be sure, poor boy, 
 poor boy ! " And, folding her arms across her heart, Mrs. 
 Reginald nodded sadly over. the fate of this imaginary De- 
 cebalus junior. 
 
 Mr. Brown began to feel alarmed. 
 
 "My dear madam," said he, almost anxiously, "I hope 
 — I trust — I mean that you do not make such remarks, such 
 comments, indiscriminately, you know ? " 
 
 Mrs. Reginald looked offended, and tartly informed Mr. 
 Brown that she had reached years of discretion. 
 
 " My dear madam, I never doubted it. I only feared 
 lest people might take these little flights of fancy for actual 
 facts — facts, you know. Now let me tell you, quite between 
 ourselves, that Mr. Uorrien's business was never more flour- 
 ishing, more extensive, than it is now." 
 
 "My dear Mr. Brown," exclaimed Mrs. Reginald, with 
 sarcastic emphasis, " did I ever doubt it ? " 
 
 They looked hard at each other; then Mr. Brown, too, 
 discovered that it was late, and, bidding Mrs. Reginald a 
 good-evening, took his leave. 
 
 " As if I did not know," said Mrs. Reginald to herself. 
 "Poor boy! I would not have given up mine, not I; but 
 that Mrs. John Dorrien was always a foolish woman — a 
 foolish woman," said Mrs. Reginald, who, spite of some 
 passages in her own life, thought herself a wise one. 
 
 A week later Mr. Dorrien drove in his carriage to the 
 station of the cliemin cle fer du JVbrd, and brought home 
 John Dorrien and his mother. As they passed under the 
 arched gate-way, and entered the old court-yard, he alighted 
 first, and said, with a smile, " You are welcome." 
 
 The afternoon was calm and golden. There was sun 
 above the old house, and cool shade in the court. The tall 
 chimney-stacks of the high roof rose on the blue sky, where 
 a few last swallows were wheeling with shrill cries, as if 
 rejoicing that they were departing for the south. All else
 
 110 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 was silent, and the quaint, tranquil look of the place, a look 
 of gray age without decay, impressed John Dorrien with 
 the pathetic beauty which clings around the old homes of 
 man. And John knew that this home, if it had not been 
 reared by men of Dorrien blood, had yet sheltered his fore- 
 fathers for several generations. It had been their refuge 
 in days of storm, their fortress during war-time, and once 
 or twice the field on which the battle of life or death had 
 to be fought by them. In that battle, John Dorrien's fa- 
 ther had been worsted. To that house the conquered man 
 had been brought back cold and lifeless. These steps 
 which she now went up, leaning on the arm of her son, the 
 sorrowing widow had descended with her orphan baby in 
 her arms, her eyes dimmed with weeping, her head bowed 
 with humiliation; and this boy, the last of the Dorriens, 
 was to take the family standard in his turn, and carry it in 
 the heat of battle, and fight for its honor, as others had 
 fought before him. There was pride to both in the thought. 
 Mrs. Dorrien walked up the steps of the perron with the 
 look of one who takes possession ; and the deep, gray eyes 
 of her son sparkled as he sprang up by her side. The 
 sacrifice had been a bitter one, but it was over, or John 
 thought that it was. He felt ready to look at his new life 
 with all the fervid illusions of vouth, and to survev with 
 family pride the birthplace to which he was now returning. 
 As they entered the hall, and Mr. BrQwn and Mrs. Reginald 
 both came to meet them, John thought more of a green 
 glimpse of the garden, which he caught through an open 
 door, than of their welcome ; but the sight of these two, 
 of the old clerk whom she had known in her brief pros- 
 perity, of the relative whom she had first met in the early 
 hours of her sorrow, was too much lor the fortitude of Mrs. 
 Dorrien. Mr. Dorrien saw her pale features work ; he felt 
 the coming of a scene, and he hastened to avert the calam- 
 ity. 
 
 "My dear Mrs. Reginald," he said, with his fluent cour- 
 tesy, " will you kindly show Mrs. John Dorrien to her room ? 
 I can see the journey has been too much for her. — Mr. Brown, 
 my young cousin is casting longing eyes at your premises. 
 I am sure he will not be happy unless he sees them by 
 daylight." 
 
 Having thus civilly disposed of his two relatives, Mr.
 
 JOHN DORRIEX. Ill 
 
 Dorricn, much relieved at being rid of them, repaired to 
 his own sanctum, and there read quietly till the dinner-bell 
 
 rang. 
 
 So long as Mr. Dorrien was by, Mrs. Dorrien succeeded 
 in maintaining a sort of composure ; but Avhen, escorted by 
 Mrs. Reginald only, she entered the rooms that had been 
 prepared for her, she gave way, and, hiding her face in her 
 hands, yielded to the bitterness of her sorrow. It was 
 natural, and Mrs. Reginald thought and said so. 
 
 "But then, my dear," she added, resting her hand on 
 Mrs. Dorrien's shoulder as she spoke, "you have your boy, 
 and he seems a nice young fellow — yes, he really does." 
 
 She spoke kindly, but it is a mistake to suppose that 
 people always like kindness; some resent it as another 
 form of patronage, and of these Mrs. Dorrien was inclined 
 te be one. It seemed so bitter to enter this old house 
 again, and to be a guest, not mistress ; to be received and 
 shown to these rooms on the second floor by Mrs. Reginald, 
 whom she had never liked, instead of choosing rooms 
 according to her own taste; and Mrs. Reginald did not 
 lessen the hardship by praising her son, John, Mr. Dorrien's 
 heir-apparent, in that tone. 
 
 " My son is all that I can wish him to be," she said, 
 raisins: her bowed head and checking her tears ; " all that 
 Mr. Dorrien can even expect from him in the position to 
 which he has called him." 
 
 Mrs Reginald withdrew r her hand. 
 
 " I hope the rooms are to your liking, Mrs. John ? " she 
 said, dryly. 
 
 " Oh ! they are very well, thank you," languidly replied 
 Mrs. Dorrien, who did not like being called Mrs. John ; 
 " but who occupies the rooms on the ground-floor now ? " 
 
 " No one." 
 
 " If it makes no difference to Mr. Dorrien, I should pre- 
 fer them to these," continued Mrs. Dorien, in the same 
 languid manner. 
 
 "Mr. Dorrien himself appointed these for you, Mrs. 
 John." 
 
 " He is very kind," said Mrs. Dorrien ; " but I know — 
 and it is an unspeakable comfort to me to know it, Mrs. 
 Reginald — that my dear boy will more than fulfill his ex- 
 perl a lions."
 
 112 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 Mrs. Reginald put her head to one side and looked 
 curiously at the widow with her one bright eye. It en- 
 tertained and saddened her to see this foolish mother either 
 laboring under this infatuation, or, if not herself deceived, 
 trying, at least, to deceive others. " Surely this Mrs. 
 John knew ' our Mr. Dorrien,' if any one did. And surely, 
 knowing him, she could not be quite blind ! " So reasoned 
 Mrs. Reginald within her own mind — and not wrongly. 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien did know her late husband's cousin 
 very well — so well that she had never applied to him 
 through all her troubles. He was not hard, he was not 
 unkind, but no one who knew Mr. Dorrien could expect 
 much from him, or would care to ask him for aid. It was 
 only the strong pressure of necessity, and especially the 
 dangerous influence of "Miriam the Jewess,". that had en- 
 listed Mrs. Dorrien on his side against the dearest wishes 
 of her son. If she had only had a little money, if John 
 had not taken that perilous liking to blank verse, she 
 would never have become a dependent, never have re- 
 turned to this house. Moreover, she was not without 
 some uneasiness — who could tell how it would all turn 
 out? But she could not bear adding the bitterness of fear 
 to the bitterness of memory, and she tried to blind herself 
 a little, and others a good deal, and especially did she at- 
 tempt riding the high horse over Mrs. Reginald, and as- 
 suming the tone and manner of mother to the Dorrien 
 heir-apparent. Unfortunately for this wish of John's 
 mother, Mrs. Reginald's mental vision was of the keenest 
 order, and she was one whom assumption rarely deceived. 
 She ignored Mrs. Dorrien's condescension, spoke no more 
 of John, and simply said that Mr. Dorrien dined at seven. 
 Mrs. Dorrien sighed, and did not think she should be able 
 to appear at the dinner-table for this first evening. Mrs. 
 Reginald, without pressing or remonstrance, promised to 
 send her in some dinner, and so left her. 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien glanced around her sitting-room with a 
 dissatisfied air — she did not like its aspect. The court 
 indeed! — what did she want to overlook the court for? 
 Her bedroom and John's rooms were equally distasteful to 
 her. They were too confined and low, to begin with— 
 besides, Mrs. Dorrien was resolved to have the rooms on 
 the ground-floor ; they were lofty and spacious, and they
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 1 L3 
 
 opened on the garden; and, above all, Mrs. Dorriei) liked 
 them; she would mention the subject to Mr. Dorrien at 
 dinner — for that he would send some message pressing her 
 to go down, Mrs. Dorrien did not doubt; and in that be- 
 lief she dressed herself leisurely, having kindly resolved to 
 be persuaded below by Mr. Dorrien's entreaties. 
 
 But the dinner-bell rang, and no message came. John, 
 indeed, rushed in to dress, and breathlessly lamented his 
 mother's headache, of which he had heard through Mrs. 
 Koginald. But lie took her non-appearance for granted, 
 and, promising to come back as soon as he could, he rushed 
 off again witli the desperate hurry and inexorable punctu- 
 ality of a very young man. 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien felt vexed with John for making no effort 
 to change her resolve, and for going down with that gay, 
 airy look. Poor John ! he could not help it. He had 
 found it hard to give up his own way, but the thing was 
 done, and he was too young, too buoyant and unseliish, to 
 brood over his hardship. Besides, though his mother had 
 sealed up " Miriam," he knew her by heart ; and though 
 he would have nothing to do with her in the daytime, 
 could he not sit up with her at night, and would there not 
 be a secret charm and sweetness in those stolen inter- 
 views? This was comfort, for one thing; but apart from 
 this, was he not in Paris ? Was not the city of the world 
 before him, and had not Mr. Dorrien dropped a kind hint 
 about not meaning to tie him down to work till he had had 
 Paris out '? And then the novelty of it all ! That solemn, 
 most amusing Mr. Brown ! — that delightful Mrs. Reginald ! 
 — that peculiar, interesting Mr. Dorrien, with his pale look 
 and languid ways ; and that quaint, ancient house, in which 
 he, John Dorrien, was actually born ! Were not all these 
 before him, as it were, to study and make much of? But 
 deeper than these feelings lay one of which he said noth- 
 ing to his mother — the feeling that by his sacrifice he had 
 insured her comfort — that if he had to work hard, she who 
 had so long worked hard for him might now take her well- 
 earned rest. The thought made his young heart beat, 
 filled it with a gladness which overflowed, and appeared in 
 his sparkling gray eyes and happy voice. He was very 
 sorry that his mother's head ached, but he was not alarmed 
 about it, and gladness remained his prevailing feeling.
 
 HI JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 The outward signs of this rejoicing were al] his mother 
 saw, and she chafed to find that John Dorrien accepted his 
 position so cheerfully. As she took her solitary dinner, 
 and, when it was over, looked at the wood-fire burning 
 with a mild gloAV on the hearth, Mrs. Dorrien wondered at 
 the ingratitude of young people, and that John did not 
 seem to understand the sacrifice she had made in coming 
 for his sake to Mr. Dorrien's house. And when John came 
 back to her, his account of the dinner did not mend mat- 
 ters. At first she brightened to see him, and her brow 
 cleared, and her poor dim eyes lit at the aspect of her darling. 
 
 " How Avell you look, John ! " she said — " not at all 
 tired." 
 
 " Nor am I, little mother. You, too, look better. What a 
 pleasant sitting-room this is ! May I look at your bedroom ? 
 Why, I declare, little mother," said John, coming back to 
 her with a beaming face, " your room is fit for a queen. 
 Much handsomer than any of the rooms at Mr. Blackmore's. 
 By-the-by, I wonder why Oliver has dropped me all at 
 once, don't you ? It is strange, is it not ? " 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien colored as she met the look of his honest 
 eyes, for it was she who had begged of Mr. Black'more to 
 keep his son and John apart, " till it was all over." 
 
 " Tell me all about the dinner, dear," she said, hastily. 
 
 " Well, little mother," said John, standing by the fire- 
 place, and thence Jooking down at her, " every one was so 
 sorry that you could not come down to dinner ; but Mrs. 
 Reginald said you were much too poorly to think of it." 
 
 " Mrs. Reginald is too kind," dryly said Mrs. Dorrien. 
 
 " And I am in love with Mrs. Reginald, mother," re- 
 sumed John, laughing mischievously. " Well, now, is she 
 not glorious ? She is so clever, so original, and so amusing. 
 I shall enjoy her exceedingly, so shall I Mr. Brown. I am 
 to be in his hands, you know, and to learn all the mysteries 
 of envelopes and note-paper from him. What a wonderful 
 business this seems to be ! " added John, with sudden 
 thoughtfulness. " Why, there is letter-paper here for all 
 Europe, I do believe." 
 
 " It is a great house," replied Mrs. Dorrien, proudly. 
 
 "I saw the garden, too, and the statue of the old river- 
 god, and I remembered what you told me, little mother. 
 It all seems like a dream."
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 115 
 
 "Whal did Mr. Dorrien say ? " 
 
 "Not much. He docs not talk much, I fancy, but he 
 seems willing to be kind. I am to study two hours a day, 
 and work alter that with Mr. Brown. If I have a gift for 
 languages, I am to learn Russian ! The library — a large 
 one, it seems — is to be placed at my command, and I am to 
 see Paris, and begin to-morrow. Sha'n't we go about to- 
 gether, little mother? Mr. Dorrien is fond of music, and 
 will take me to the Italian Opera, I think he said to-morrow 
 night. And only think, little mother," added John, laugh- 
 ing, " you are to be Mrs. John — Mr. Dorrien said so." 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien, who had heard him with more and more 
 impatience as he rattled on, here closed her eyes with so 
 expressive a look of weariness that John asked with con- 
 cern if her headache Avas worse. " Much worse," shortly 
 answered his mother; whereupon he thought it best to 
 leave her, and at once went to his own room. It was a 
 plain room enough, but John admired it exceedingly. He 
 felt excited, pleased, and happy. Business was all at once 
 invested with a roseate hue, and the life before him lost its 
 anticipated gloom. It was early yet ; Mr. Dorrien had 
 gone to the French opera, and John opened his portman- 
 teau, took out some paper, and passing his fingers through 
 the thick curls that clustered round his handsome while 
 brow, he sat down to " Miriam the Jewess." What he 
 said to her, and what she answered him, we need net re- 
 cord here. It was twelve when they parted, and John only 
 fell asleep to dream of her as she stood an the mountain 
 looking with her dark eyes at the rising sun. 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 The days that followed this first day were to John Dor- 
 rien days of enchantment. His mother did not go about 
 with him, as he had hoped she would — to do so would 
 have revived too many bitter recollections of her early mar- 
 ried life ; but, though he did his sight-seeing alone, he could 
 not help enjoying it to the heart's core. There is no real
 
 116 J0IIN DORMEN. 
 
 loneliness for the young, when they have good spirits and 
 good health, and John had both in plenty. His frame was 
 light and active, his temper was happy and hopeful. He 
 had inherited more than his handsome Irish eyes from his 
 great-grandmother. He w T as capable of great sorrows, 
 for his feelings were keen, but it was not in his nature to 
 fret or to repine, or to put by a present joy because there 
 might be trouble in store. Paris, the wonderful city, threw 
 her spell upon him, and John was too eager, too young, 
 and too imaginative, to resist the siren when she came to 
 him clothed either in the dim glories of the past, or in the 
 gay splendor of the present. The weather, too, was lovely, 
 as it almost always is in early October. The sky was clear 
 and blue, the sun was genial, and the air w T as so light that 
 it made one glad to live. John rushed about from one end 
 of Paris to the other, finding strange contrasts without 
 seeking them. One early morning, he lingered about the 
 Temple Gardens, where the Temple Tower of tragic memory 
 once stood; and while children laughed and played around 
 him, his heart thrilled with pity at the vision of a sad-eyed, 
 stately Marie Antoinette, looking down at him from be- 
 hind prison-bars. An hour later, he was sauntering along 
 the shaded alleys of the Bois de Boulogue, watching a gay 
 cavalcade. The ladies were all young and lovely, or at 
 least John thought them so, just as their horses seemed to 
 him the most beautiful in the world; and as they rode 
 swiftly past him, their fresh faces, flowing hair, and fleet 
 motion, charmed the boy's poetic fancy. But time is pre- 
 cious to sight-seers, and John made the most of his. After 
 modern loveliness came classic beauty. The cool green 
 wood, with its lake and its water-fall, was quickly forsaken 
 for the Salle des Antiques in the Louvre. There, faithless 
 to his dark-eyed Miriam, John fell helplessly, hopelessly in 
 love : firstly, with that haughty Diana d la biche, whose 
 right hand draws an arrow from her quiver, and whose left 
 rests so firmly on the head of a captive stag; secondly, 
 with Polymnia, all meditation and poetic grace ; thirdly, 
 with two Roman empresses stately as goddesses, and well- 
 nigh as fair ; and, fourthly and lastly, with the Venus of Milo. 
 How John loved the gracious majesty of her attitude, the 
 sweetness of her beautiful face, the waves of her hair parted 
 back from her classic brovv, and how he raved about her to
 
 JOHN DOIUtlKX. 117 
 
 his mother when lie got home, until Mr. Dorrien took him 
 to the opera, whore a great singer, then in the meridian of 
 her fame, ravished him to the seventh heavens ! And then 
 the pictures the next day, the old Italian masters, so 
 dark, and so rich and holy ; the quaint Dutch painters, the 
 classic Poussins, the historic portraits, the drawings, and 
 indeed the every thing. No wonder that John Dorrien felt 
 in a fever, that the night seemed too long, and the days 
 too short for his ardor. Before the week was out, John knew 
 Notre-Dame better than lie knew the parish church of 
 Saint-Ives. He had visited every other church worth see- 
 ing, discovered every spot made significant by great events in 
 history, become familiar with public gardens, palaces,'and 
 promenades, seen Versailles and Saint-Cloud; by that time 
 too, it must be confessed, he was rather tired. 
 
 "I am afraid you have been overdoing it, John," said 
 Mr. Dorrien, one morning, with his languid smile. " You 
 will be fatigued to-night." 
 
 " Oh ! no, sir," eagerly replied John, blushing, however, 
 as he remembered that he meant to go and have another 
 look at the Venus that afternoon. 
 
 " Ah ! well, we shall see," said Mr. Dorrien, carelesslv. 
 
 Mr. Dorrien was giving a dinner, and that was what he 
 meant by saying that John would be fatigued that evening. 
 There were to be only eight people present in all, Mr. Dor- 
 rien'sown family and Mr. Brown included; yet this dinner, 
 as Mrs. Dorrien could see, was a grave, serious, solemn 
 business dinner. The three strangers were to be Mr. 
 Plummer, an Englishman, and a Monsieur and Madame 
 Basnage, both French. The preparations made for these 
 three people were on so costly a scale that Mrs. Dorricn's 
 curiosity could not be restrained, and little though she and 
 Mrs. Reginald sympathized, she actually invaded that lady's 
 privacy in the afternoon, to obtain needful information. 
 
 Now, Mrs. Reginald was tired, she had been out tin 1 
 whole morning ordering in every thing that money could 
 get, and especially every thing out of season. She had 
 had to make frantic efforts in order to secure green peas 
 to her liking, and had given their weight in gold — as she 
 said, but then she liked iigures of speech — for Mr. Dorrien s 
 favorite strawberries. So Mrs. Reginald was tired and put 
 out, and had just reclined back in her easy-chair, and thrown
 
 118 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 her handkerchief over her face, when Mrs. John's knock at 
 her door disturbed her. Mrs. Reginald tittered a resigned 
 " Come in," but her aspect was not gracious, and her wel- 
 come was formal. 
 
 " I am in such perplexity," exclaimed Mrs. Dorrien, sink- 
 ing down on a chair, and looking at Mrs. Reginald, who 
 sat up straight and stiff. " This dinner, I see, is quite a 
 grand affair, and I really have nothing to wear." 
 
 Mrs. Reginald was a woman, and could sympathize with 
 Mrs. Dorrien in this, but she could suggest no remedy. She 
 looked grave and shook her head. 
 
 "I almost think I had better not appear," continued 
 Mrs. Dorrien. " Who are these people, Mrs. Reginald ? " 
 
 " Business connections of Mr. Dorrien's. Mr. Plummer 
 I know. I never saw the other two." 
 
 " Well, but who are they ? " persisted Mrs. Dorrien. 
 
 "Mr. Plummer has been twenty years in France. He 
 has something to do with Mr. Dorrien's Russian connection, 
 I believe ; as to the other one, he is a great man down in 
 Angouleme, and that is one of the great places for the 
 manufacturing of paper, as you know, Mrs. John. I fancy 
 that he and Mr. Dorrien are going to have some dealings 
 together; and that is all that ./know, Mrs. John." 
 
 This was said pointedly, so as to show Mrs. John how 
 she, Mrs. Reginald, saw very well that to ascertain the 
 quality of the guests, and not to consult her on the difficul- 
 ties of her toilet, had been Mrs. John's object in coming. 
 John's mother saw that she could extract no more from 
 Mrs. Reginald, and after again lamenting to that lady the 
 deficiencies of her wardrobe, a lament which the other now 
 heard with supreme indifference, she left her. Mrs. Dorrien 
 was really annoyed at having to appear before strangers at 
 a disadvantage, but she never seriously intended to remain 
 in her room, and thereby abdicate. Accordingly, when the 
 time came, she donned her old black-silk dress, and tried 
 to persuade herself that the cape of imitation black lace, 
 which covered her neck and shoulders, on the plea of deli- 
 cate health, would do very well as a substitute for ornament, 
 even as her jet ear-rings and bracelets would imply a sort 
 of mourning. John, who knew nothing about dress, and 
 who always thought his mother charming, praised her ap- 
 pearance.
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 119 
 
 " How nice you look, little mother ! " lie said, first sur- 
 veying her from head to foot, then walking- round her. 
 
 " My dear boy, no one could look nice with so shabby 
 an old thing as this is." 
 
 "You mean your dress ! Oh ! little mother, what need 
 you care about that, with such a figure as you have ? I was 
 at the Louvre this afternoon, and I assure you that you 
 have quite the look of the Empress Livia, the wife of Augus- 
 tus, you know." 
 
 "You silly boy," said Mrs. Dorrien, smiling fondly at 
 him, " how can you talk such nonsense to your old mother?" 
 
 " But you are not old," exclaimed John, looking nettled, 
 " you are quite young still." 
 
 " Hush ! " interrupted his mother, kissing him. " I care 
 about neither dress nor age, my dear, if I can but see you 
 in your proper position. And now do get ready, for you 
 have been flirting with Livia, or some other divinity, till 
 you are late." 
 
 " Oh ! I hope not," cried John, looking alarmed, for 
 there was not much of the modern generation about him, 
 and to be late for Mr. Dorrien's dinner would have been a 
 calamity in his eyes. That misfortune did not come to 
 pass. The whole family were gathered in Mr. Dorrien's 
 drawing-room a full half-hour before the guests arrived. For 
 the first time the splendors of that apartment were revealed 
 to John. The lofty frescoed ceiling, the gloomy old furni- 
 ture, the old-fashioned mirrors, tall and narrow, impressed 
 him, not as beautiful, but as ancient, ancestral, and vener- 
 able in their tarnished splendor, tokens of wealthy ease en- 
 joyed by the men and women who had bequeathed to him 
 his blood and name. It seemed made for that languid Mr. 
 Dorrien, leaning back in his deep and dark arm-chair ; for 
 Mr. Brown, sitting straight on his, with business written 
 on his tall yellow forehead and imperturbable face ; for the 
 stiff figure of Mrs. Reginald, clad in silk as stiff as herself; 
 and for his pale and still elegant mother, with her look of 
 decayed gentility. " It is a family pieture by one of the 
 old Dutch masters," thought John, looking round him with 
 that quick sense and keen appreciation oi' the picturesque 
 which was to be one of his chief enjoyments throughout 
 life. That feeling of the fitness of things by no means 
 struck John's mother; and even had she been aware of it,
 
 120 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 she would not have appreciated her share of the family pict- 
 ure. It was bard when the guests arrived to go down to a 
 stately old dining-room, and see the Dorrien plate, and the 
 old Sevres, with the Dorrien crest upon it, and feel at a 
 disadvantage. It was very hard to sit down at Mr. Dor- 
 rien's luxurious table, with Madame Basnage, a florid dame, 
 in amber satin and diamonds, and harder still to see Mrs. 
 Reginald in stiff black moire and velvet, " so plain, but so 
 good," as Mrs. Dorrien could not help remarking regret- 
 fully. But then there was compensation. Mrs. Dorrien 
 was John's mother, and it was impossible for Mrs. Dorrien 
 not to see that John, though silent, modest, and observant, 
 played an important part at Mr. Dorrien's dinner. Mr. 
 Dorrien, indeed, scarcely spoke to or looked at the young 
 man, but he referred to him casually, carelessly, and signifi- 
 cantly, as his relative and successor. Charles V., wearied 
 with the cares of empire, could not have alluded other- 
 wise to a young Philip II. Mr. Dorrien did not imply that 
 he was going to abdicate, but he gave it to be understood 
 that he wished to have a Dorrien at hand whenever he was 
 inclined to do so. Mr. Dorrien, indeed, almost overdid 
 John's Dorrienism, and even bestowed some superfluous 
 regard on Mrs. Dorrien. Her silk dress might be poor, her 
 lace cape imitation, and her jet ornaments contemptible — 
 she was a Dorrien, the mother of the future Dorrien, and 
 he treated her with the most scrupulous and formal polite- 
 ness. What about her poverty ? He, Mr. Dorrien, was rich, 
 and the poverty or wealth of his relatives was nothing to 
 him — perhaps, indeed, it was all the better that the mother 
 of his heir should appear in such humble attire, and con- 
 vince Monsieur Basnage, or any one else, how independent 
 of other money save his own was the present head of the 
 old firm of Dorrien. Something of this Mrs. Dorrien felt, 
 and it was half bitter, and half pleasant ; but, to do her jus- 
 tice, the joy and pride of being John's mother were the 
 strongest feelings of all. Her own position, and especially 
 her son's, occupied her more during the progress of the 
 meal, which was rather formal and silent, than Mr. Dorrien's 
 guests. They were not very interesting. Mr. Flummer 
 was long, lean, and taciturn. He kept his little eyes half 
 shut, and enjoyed Mr. Dorrien's good things with an oc- 
 casional licking and smacking of his lips, which was more
 
 JOIIX DORRIEN. 12i 
 
 expressive of satisfaction than indicative of refinement. 
 Mrs. Reginald shot at him on those occasions a look very 
 like one of disgust ; bnt Mr. Plummer's lids veiled the orbs 
 beneath them, and he was happily unconscious of the dis- 
 pleasure of the lady of the house. Monsieur and Madame 
 Basnage behaved very differently — they were much alike 
 in person and manner, and were, indeed, not merely hus- 
 band and wife, but near relations. Both were stout and 
 florid, and looked good-natured ; both were not merely ig- 
 norant and unrefined, but decidedly vulgar ; and both en- 
 joyed Mr. Dorrien's luxurious dinner, and praised it to each 
 other with a want of tact and good-breeding rare in the 
 French, where these qualities are not so often as elsewhere 
 the exclusive attributes of the well-born and well-educated. 
 Hut this Avas not all ; Monsieur and Madame Basnage were 
 obstreperous and overbearing — they laughed at each other's 
 jokes, they dogmatized over their own assertions, and they 
 contradicted right and left, Mrs. Reginald especially. 
 
 For once, however, that lady's tongue was under special 
 control. Mr. Dorrien had requested her to be particularly 
 attentive to this vulgar pair, and she knew enough of Mr. 
 Dorrien to feel sure that he had an object in view in mak- 
 ing the request, and that this object must be satisfied ; so 
 she bore with their rudeness in stoic silence, though with 
 plenty of disdain in her protruded lip. Perhaps some of 
 that disdain shot at the master of the house, who laughed 
 so frankly and so gavly at Monsieur Hasnage's sallies ; who 
 was- so tenderly attentive to Madame Basnage ; who looked 
 not merely a courteous but even a delighted host. The 
 dinner was inordinately long. Gentlemen do not sit over 
 their wine in France, and Mr. Dorrien would not have sug- 
 gested so uncivilized a custom on the day when his table 
 was graced by the presence of a French lady. So the 
 drawing-room was resorted to at once, and the sort of light, 
 careless conversation suited to the occasion began to ilit 
 about. 
 
 To the surprise of Mrs. Dorrien, Mr. Plummcr promptly 
 made his way to her chair. Mr. Plummer had not much to 
 say. Mr. Plummer seemed to have no other ambition than 
 to ascertain the exact degree of relationship between Mr. 
 Dorrien and Mrs. Dorrien's son. 
 
 " Second-cousins ? — ah ! And no one between — eh ? " 
 Ci
 
 122 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 "No one," laconically replied Mrs. Dorrien, looking 
 dignified at this unceremonious catechizing. 
 
 " Same great-grandfather, then ? " pursued Mr. Plum- 
 mer, who spoke, as he had dined, with his eyes half shut. 
 
 " Yes, sir, the same great-grandfather," replied Mrs. 
 Dorrien, with frigid politeness. 
 
 Monsieur Basnage now came up with a ctip of coffee in 
 his hand, and Mr. Plummer walked away. Monsieur Bas- 
 nage came to give, not to receive, information. Glancing 
 toward Mr. Dorrien and John, both standing near his wife 
 — who leaned back in her arm-chair, full-blown, like a sun- 
 flower — Monsieur Basnage gave Mrs. Dorrien a biographi- 
 cal sketch of himself. Monsieur Basnage had not always 
 been a manufacturer of paper ; he had been in the diamond- 
 trade for years, until his uncle, Monsieur Basnage, the fa- 
 ther of Aurelie, had induced him to leave diamonds and 
 celibacy for Aurelie and paper. His uncle had a fancy for 
 keeping the business in the family, and liked the name of 
 Basnage beyond any other in the Directory. " Not the 
 only person who had that fancy — hem ! " and Monsieur 
 Basnage winked knowingly toward John and Mr. Dorrien. 
 
 Monsieur Basnage was very vulgar, but he was more 
 palatable than Mr. Plummer, and Mrs. Dorrien smiled gra- 
 ciously upon him. Mrs. Reginald might rustle in her 
 moire and velvet ; she was John's mother. 
 
 Discourse of a totally different nature was going on in 
 the mean while nigh Madame Basnage's chair. Mr. Dor- 
 rien — the courteous, the fastidious Mr. Dorrien — was des- 
 canting with that lady on the merits of the great Italian 
 singer of the day, and John was listening, eager and atten- 
 tive. He, too, had heard the singer, and thought her almost 
 equal in beauty and fascination to " Miriam the Jewess." 
 
 Madame Basnage, happy to be talking with so elegant 
 and accomplished a gentleman as Mr. Dorrien, and fanning 
 herself slowly all the time, outdid him in admiring enthusi- 
 asm of the Diva, as she called her. Poor woman ! she did 
 not know that indifference to all men and to all things is 
 the perfection of good manners and taste, so, as we say, 
 she was enthusiastic. 
 
 " She is divine ! " she exclaimed, rapturously. " When 
 she comes in and sweeps across the stage, and looks at you 
 so, and when she raises her hand so, she is divine ! "
 
 • JOHN DORRIEN. 123 
 
 "She, or her diamonds?" asked Mr. Dorrien, smiling; 
 "for you know, madame, that the Diva, as you so justly 
 call her, has the finest diamonds in Europe." 
 
 M idame Basnage burst out into a loud, pealing laugh. 
 
 " What ! you, too, are caught with her diamonds ? " she 
 said, wasrsinsr her head, humorously. — " Ernest," she 
 added, calling out to her husband across the room, only 
 think — Monsieur Dorrien believes in the diamonds ! " 
 
 The Italian singer's diamonds had evidently been dis- 
 cussed between Ernest and Aurelie, for he understood the 
 allusion at once, and, leaving Mrs. Dorrien, walked over to 
 his wife's chair. 
 
 " False — all false ! " he exclaimed, triumphantby. " I 
 know false diamonds from real, monsieur. No, no; she 
 sings like a bird, but her diamonds came from the Palais 
 Royal, or from the Rue Castiglione." 
 
 " And you detected that from your box ? " exclaimed 
 Mr. Dorrien, with polite incredulity. 
 
 " I did, with the greatest ease. I was ten years in 
 the diamond-trade, Monsieur Dorrien — ten years. Be- 
 sides," he modestly added, " it is the easiest thing in the 
 world." 
 
 But Mr. Dorrien shook his head. It was not easy at 
 all, in his opinion. Monsieur Basnage explained to him 
 that he was mistaken, that it really was easy, and showed 
 him how and why; and still Mr. Dorrien was obstinate, 
 and clung to his opinion, and assured Monsieur Basnage 
 that he had known excellent judges to be deceived, and so 
 forth. And so the argument, courteous but tenacious, went 
 on, each holding his ground, till Monsieur Basnage got 
 nettled, and said : " Show me one false diamond with 
 twenty real diamonds of seemingly equal beauty, and see 
 if I do not discover it at a glance, monsieur, at a glance ! " 
 Later, it seemed to Mrs. Dorrien — for this conversation 
 was audible to the whole room — later, we say, it seemed to 
 her that Mr. Dorrien must have purposely brought matters 
 to this point, so prompt was he to take immediate advantage 
 of Monsieur Basnage's challenge. Taking a small kev out 
 of his pocket, he handed it to Mr. Brown, who sat a little 
 in the background, saying quiet lv : 
 
 " Mr. Brown, you have the diamonds — will you be so 
 kind as to let us see them, if you please ? "
 
 124 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 " The diamonds, sir ! " said Mr. Brown, looking doubt- 
 ful, with the key in his hand. 
 
 "Yes, Mr. Brown, the diamonds, if you please. I am so 
 sorry to trouble you." 
 
 Mr. Brown rose and left the room. Mr. Dorrien turned 
 back to Monsieur Basnage and said, pleasantly : 
 
 " I must let you into a bit of a secret, Monsieur Basnage. 
 There are Dorrien diamonds, just as there are Crown dia- 
 monds. My grandfather presented them to his wife, and 
 from her they came to mine. We went to a great ball 
 soon after we were married, and one of the diamonds was 
 lost. I never knew it till my poor wife was on her death- 
 bed, when she confessed that she had had it replaced by a 
 paste diamond. That counterfeit I know, of course, but if 
 you can find it out, say from the distance of your chair to 
 the sofa, why, Monsieur Basnage, I shall confess myself 
 conquered ; and now let us test your skill, for here comes 
 Monsieur Brown with the diamonds." 
 
 Mr. Brown entered the drawing-room as Mr. Dorrien 
 spoke. He carried in his hand a very small inlaid casket, 
 which he placed before his master. Mr. Dorrien rose, went 
 to the other end of the room, and there opened the casket. 
 He spread the contents on one of the sofa velvet cushions, 
 which he placed in a slanting position; then he walked 
 back to his place, saying, with a smile : 
 
 " The ladies, I dare sa} T , will likje a close view. Mon- 
 sieur Basnage, of course, will not." 
 
 No one present, save Mr. Brown and John's mother, had 
 ever seen the Dorrien diamonds, and every one save Mon- 
 sieur Basnage, who determinedly looked up at the ceiling, 
 and Mr. Dorrien, who remained aloof, smiling languidly, 
 gathered round the cushion on which the costly heirloom 
 lay. Philosopher though she was, Mrs. Reginald was not 
 the person least anxious to have a good view. They were 
 beautiful diamonds, clear and pure, full of living, flashing 
 light, and though they were not of extravagant size, they 
 were large enough, and plentiful enough, too, to be of ex- 
 ceeding value. A low tiara, but with a sparkling star in 
 the centre, ear-rings with long drops, a brooch, and a narrow 
 bracelet, shone on the dark velvet of the cushion with 
 purest radiance. Madame Basnage was in ecstasies ; Mrs. 
 Reginald looked, admiring, and puzzled; there was a sad
 
 JOHN DORRIEN". 125 
 
 meaning on Mrs. Dorrien's face ; John seemed to behold all 
 the treasures of Golconda ; and Mr. Plummer looked cool 
 and indifferent, Diamonds, to say the truth, were mere 
 folly to that practical gentleman. And now they all with- 
 drew, save Mr. Brown, who stood by the cushion like a 
 good old dragon guarding the treasures, and it was Mon- 
 sieur Basnage's turn to look. He slightly bent forward, 
 gave the diamonds a good steady gaze, then leaned back 
 in his chair, and suspending his thumb in his waistcoat 
 pockets, he said, with cool triumph : 
 
 " The false diamond is the last but one in the tiara." 
 
 Mr. Dorrien gave a start of surprise, but he quickly 
 rallied, and with his usual courtesy, " I am conquered, Mon- 
 sieur Basnage," said he. You are a marvelous judge." 
 
 Monsieur liasnage looked modest, while every one went 
 to look at t ho counterfeit. To inexperienced eyes it was as 
 clear, as transparent, nay, as brilliant as its companions. 
 Mr. Dorrien laughed as he handed the costly trinkets back 
 to Mr. Biown. 
 
 " The next Mrs. Dorrien must see about that false dia- 
 mond," he said. 
 
 "Have you had them long?" asked Monsieur Basnage. 
 
 "My wife has been dead sixteen years," replied Air. 
 Dorrien, gravely. 
 
 Monsieur Basnage seemed to be reckoning how much 
 the interest of these expensive heirlooms might amount to, 
 but he did not state the figure aloud. 
 
 "It is extravagant," confessed Mr. Dorrien, smiling, 
 " to keep up diamonds, but, you see, they are fine — " 
 
 "Very fine," significantly interrupted Monsieur Bas- 
 nage. 
 
 "And we are a tenacious family. What we once hold 
 we like to keep." 
 
 " Shall I put up the diamonds sir? " asked Mr. Brown. 
 
 "Yes, Mr. Brown, if you will be so kind." 
 
 Tiara, brooch, ear-rings, and bracelets, returned to their 
 inlaid home, and Mr. Brown slipped out of the room, as 
 if he would rather no one should even suspect whither 
 he was going. Mrs. Reginald, raising her eyebrows and 
 pursing up her lips, returned to the fireplace; Mrs. Dorrien 
 repeated these words to herself with a swelling, halt-sor- 
 rowful, half exultant heart, "The future Mrs. Dorrien."
 
 126 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 Her time was over, but her son's wife, whoever she might 
 be, had a proud position before her. 
 
 " Fine — very fine," said Mr. Plummer, close by her 
 side ; " but you had seen them before, had you not, Mrs. 
 Dorrien ? " 
 
 " I had seen them, of course," replied Mrs. Dorrien, 
 coldly. 
 
 " Mr. Dorrien will have to add to them," continued Mr. 
 Plummer. " There should be a necklace, I fancy." 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien was silent. There had been a necklace, 
 and she had noticed its absence. 
 
 " There must be always a necklace," persisted Mr. 
 Plummer. 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien feigned deafness, but never had her hear- 
 ing been more acute than it was then, for Mr. Brown had 
 returned, and Mrs. Reginald, poking his waistcoat, was 
 saying significantly, "Decebalus, Mr. Brown, Decebalus." 
 
 What could Mrs. Reginald mean? "Decebalus?" 
 Mrs. Dorrien had never heard the name before, and what 
 relation could it bear to Mr. Dorrien's diamonds ? The 
 thought pursued her even after the guests were gone, and, 
 the evening's entertainment being over, she had returned 
 to her sitting-room, where John soon joined her. 
 
 John was full of the dinner, which he thought a grand 
 affair, and he had evidently been dazzled by the diamonds. 
 
 " Did you ever see such diamonds, little mother ? " he 
 said to her. " Why, they are like the crown-jewels in the 
 Tower of London. I wonder where Mr. Brown keeps 
 them ? " 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien wondered too, but indeed she wondered 
 about many things which she did not mention to John. 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 It had rained the whole morning. It was raining still. 
 There had been no sight-seeing for John ; that might be 
 why his bright face looked rather clouded as he sat with his 
 mother in her room. Mrs. Dorrien put down her work to
 
 JOIIX DORRIEN. 127 
 
 gaze at him wistfully. John had not been like himself for 
 some days, and it had been raining one day only. What 
 ailed the boy ? 
 
 " I am so sorry you cannot go out, dear ! " she said. 
 
 John looked at the gray, leaden sky, and said nothing. 
 
 " I like to hear your account of what you see," she con- 
 tinued ; " you do pick up such odd bits ! Was not Madame 
 de Sevigne born near here ? " 
 
 " Yes, hard by — Place Royale." 
 
 " You must show me the house. And was not her 
 father killed by Oliver Cromwell in battle?" 
 
 " It is said so." 
 
 " How interesting ! Mr. Dorrien is delighted to see so 
 j - oung a man as you are take pleasure in such things." 
 
 John's face, which had cleared a little, darkened again. 
 
 " But I did not come to Paris to take pleasure in such 
 things," said he, thrusting the tongs in the smouldering 
 wood-fire. 
 
 " Have you nothing to do ? " 
 
 " Nothing that one of the junior clerks could not do 
 twice as well as I do, little mother." 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien, though she felt troubled at the long 
 holiday Mr. Dorrien gave her son, tried to look easy and 
 unconcerned, and said cheerfully: 
 
 " Mr. Dorrien wants you to get used to your new posi- 
 tion." 
 
 " I am quite used to it," coolly answered the boy. 
 
 " Then he wishes you to enjoy yourself before he sets 
 3 r ou to work." 
 
 "And I want to work, and not to enjoy myself," replied 
 John, austerely. "When 'I was at Saint-Ives I wanted to 
 be a great scholar and pass my examination. When that 
 was over I wanted to be a poet, and now that I have given 
 that up I want to be a man of business. Whatever I do I 
 wish to do thoroughly. If I am not to be something in 
 this house, I would rather go back to London at once, look 
 for a publisher, and owe nothing to any one," added John, 
 in the pride and independence of seventeen. 
 
 " But, my dear, business is so difficult ! " began Mrs. 
 Dorrien, trying not to look alarmed at this prospect. 
 
 "Difficult!" echoed John, with a little laugh— "why, 
 little mother, I have already found out that this busiuess is
 
 128 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 all a mistake. You have seen Monsieur Basnage ? — well, 
 shall I tell you what he does? He simply absorbs the 
 best part of our profits, for he manufactures every atom of 
 paper we sell. Why don't we do it ourselves?" asked 
 John, fixing his keen gray eyes on his mother's amazed 
 face. " There is a paper-mill down at Saint-Ives, and there 
 could be a paper-mill on the Bievre, close to Paris. Why 
 should we not have one of our own, make our own paper, 
 and keep the profit Monsieur Basnage now pockets ? " 
 
 " My dear," said Mrs. Dorrien, who felt rather frightened 
 at John's dogmatic tone, " there is no doubt good reason 
 for not doing any thing of the kind. Mr. Dorrien may not 
 care to extend his business." 
 
 " Then he should care," interrupted John, " for the 
 business is by no means so extensive as it looks — I have 
 found that much out." 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien became more and more uneasy. She did 
 not want John to make any unpleasant discoveries, and, 
 with a smile, she assured him that he must be quite mis- 
 taken. He was not behind the scenes yet, and had only a 
 very imperfect notion of La Maison Dorrien. 
 
 John heard her without answering one word ; but his 
 mother felt and saw that he was not convinced. 
 
 The rain had ceased, and John, looking at the patches 
 of blue sky, along which light clouds floated, said that he 
 would go to the Library, Rue Richelieu, and read there for 
 an hour, since neither Mr. Brown nor Mr. Dorrien had any 
 work for him. The new reading-room, so clear, so spacious, 
 with its light columns and frescoes of blue sky, foliage, and 
 clear air, telling readers of the beautiful world of Nature, 
 did not exist then ; but in its stead, a long dull room, lined 
 with books, and overlooking a quiet court with a little 
 garden and a gray statue that seemed to guard forever 
 this calm retreat of learning. Here John, plunging deep 
 into the magic pages of Froissart, gave himself up to chiv- 
 alry and mediaeval lore, and forgot that he had a trouble or 
 a care. 
 
 That swift oblivion, the gift of the young, is not the 
 privilege of their elders. Mrs. Dorrien, sitting in her room 
 and hemming John's pock<;t-handkcrchiefs, could not thus 
 easily put by the anxious thoughts which their recent con- 
 versation had — not suggested, they existed before — but
 
 JOHN DOKRIEN. 129 
 
 rendered more active. By what means, through whom, 
 could she find out the truth? Mrs. Reginald might know, 
 or at least suspect it, and Mrs. Reginald was very free- 
 spoken, only she and Mrs. John, as, to her great disgust, 
 she was now called, did not get on very well together. 
 There was no open breach, but there was a persistent 
 difference of opinion, and with it secret jealousy. Not 
 merely jealousy of position and authority, but actually 
 jealousy of John. Mrs. Reginald had taken a great fancy 
 to the young man. She could imagine that her Reginald 
 would have been like him — not in person, but in his bright 
 ways, in his happy laugh and genial aspect. As often as 
 she could she lured him to her rooms — a proceeding which 
 John's mother viewed with secret displeasure ; and once or 
 twice she had filled the cup of her iniquities by going out 
 with him. To make matters worse, John reciprocated Mrs. 
 Reginald's liking, thought her clever and amusing, took 
 evident pleasure in her society, and never seemed to think 
 that his little mother could be jealous of her — or, indeed, 
 of any one. 
 
 All this it was which made it awkward for Mrs. John 
 now to seek Mrs. Reginald, and get information from her. 
 Great, therefore, was her satisfaction when there came a 
 smart tap at her door, and in answer to her low and lan- 
 guid " Come in," Mrs. Reginald appeared with her cloak 
 and her bonnet on. 
 
 " Well, and where is that boy of yours, Mrs. John ? " 
 slie asked, airily. "I am going out, and I want a beau." 
 
 "John is gone out," replied John's mother, delighted 
 to find the opportunity she wanted, and also rather pleased 
 that Mrs. Reginald should be disappointed. "What a 
 pity he did not know you were inclined for a walk, Mrs. 
 Reginald ! But, do you know, I think it will rain again 
 soon. Do sit down awhile with me. I reallv feel dull, I 
 do." 
 
 " No, I'll not sit," dryly said Mrs. Reginald. " I think 
 you want a lecture, Mrs. John, and I'll give you one stand- 
 ing," pursued Mrs. Reginald, setting her head on one side, 
 so that her one eye might rest the more firmly on Mrs. 
 John in her chair. "You feel dull — dull with a boy like 
 vours! Why, if I had that bov, Mrs. John, I could never 
 feel dull."
 
 130 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 " Not even when he was out, Mrs. Reginald ? " asked 
 Mrs. John, smiling faintly. 
 
 " No," vigorously replied the other lady; "for I should 
 sit and think of him." 
 
 " And so I do," replied Mrs. John, eagerly seizing the 
 opening thus afforded ; " but thinking of one's son and 
 only child often brings on a world of care." 
 
 " Does it ? " was the dry answer. 
 
 Mrs. Reginald seemed to be on her guard — moreover, 
 she was keen and shrewd, but there was a sort of finesse 
 in Mrs. John Dorrien with which the other lady could not 
 cope. John's mother made no direct attempt at procuring 
 information ; she took, to get it, the method against which 
 Mrs. Reginald could least contend. She assumed, as she 
 had done from the first, that her position in the house was 
 unassailable, and that John, as Mr. Dorrien's heir-apparent, 
 was on the very pinnacle of worldly prosperity. 
 
 " Then there's the house," she resumed — " it is such a 
 weight on my mind — it is so large, so — what shall I call it?" 
 
 Mrs. Reginald, still standing, inclined her head still 
 more on one side, and looked curiously at Mrs. Dorrien. 
 
 "My dear Mrs. John," she kindly said, "don't trouble 
 yourself about the house. Even wdien I am gone, Mr. Dor- 
 rien will be quite equal to it, take my word for it." 
 
 " Oh ! dear, that is not what I mean, Mrs. Reginald. 
 But you see if Mr. Dorrien begins consulting a boy like 
 John, who naturally comes to me at this time of day, what 
 will it be later?" 
 
 " Yes, if he does," ejaculated Mrs. Reginald. 
 
 "But, Mrs. Reginald, you do not seem to understand. 
 John's position here is peculiar, very peculiar. He is but 
 a boy, but he is his father's son " — Mrs. Reginald raised 
 her eyebrows at this indisputable proposition — " he is the 
 great-grandson and namesake of that Mr. John Dorrien who 
 was the most successful of all the Dorriens, and who made 
 the firm what it is ; and all these circumstances combined 
 give him a 'weight he could not have otherwise. Indeed, 
 when I think of his position, and of his youth, not eighteen 
 yet, Mrs. Reginald, I get alarmed, lest it should turn his 
 head outright." 
 
 Mrs. Reginald coughed and looked at Mrs. Dorrien with 
 her shrewd bright eye. " No fear of that," she said, drj-ly.
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 131 
 
 " But there is fear, Mrs. Reginald. He is a good boy, 
 but lie was reared in poverty, and Mr. Dorrien makes too 
 much of him ; he gives him money, which I much object 
 to ; he takes him to the opera, and gives him expensive 
 tastes and habits ; and, moreover, he lets him know and 
 understand all day long that he is to have this vast busi- 
 ness, and be some day the possessor of great wealth. It is 
 too much, it is too much, Mrs. Reginald." 
 
 It certainly was too much for Mrs. Reginald. 
 
 " Mrs. John," she said, in her brusque way, " did you 
 ever hear of Garlac of Killaune ? I suppose not. Well, 
 3 r ou must know that this Garlac of Killaune had a step- 
 mother, who made him a cake, a very large cake indeed, 
 but with a stone in it. Now the Garlac's father admired 
 the size of the cake, but the Garlac said to him, ' Ay, ay, a 
 big cake, but little bread.' " 
 
 So dismayed was Mrs. John at the application of this 
 parable that she gave a start, and said, off her guard, "Is 
 the business so bad as all that, Mrs. Reginald ? " 
 
 "Who said it was bad?" replied that lady, perceiving 
 that she had gone too far, and guessing somewhat late that 
 she had fallen into a trap. " My meaning is that John's 
 position here may not be as secure and as eminent as you 
 consider it. He is a boy, as you say, and, boy-like, he may 
 offend or displease our Mr. Dorrien, whom we both know, 
 Mrs. John. What then becomes of a position which he 
 holds only on Mr. Dorricn's pleasure ? If I were you, Mrs. 
 John, I would not trouble myself about }'our boy's future 
 greatness, though maybe I might ask myself if I had been 
 wise in bringing him here? " 
 
 Mrs. John bit her lip and colored. She was more than 
 answered in every sense of the word. 
 
 " John came from duty," she said. 
 
 " Duty fiddlestick ! " replied pitiless Mrs. Reginald. 
 "Don't I know, Mrs. John, didn't you toll me yourself all 
 about it, and how, if your poor husband did some foolish 
 things, he was urged to them? True, those who drove him 
 on risked and lost money, but he risked and lost ten times 
 more. There, don't cry. It is hard to think over it, but 
 knowing this, as you and I do, may I not ask what duty 
 his father's son owes to Mr. Dorrien ? " 
 
 Mrs. John Dorrien looked the picture of dismay as she
 
 132 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 heard Mrs. Reginald. The hand which held her needle 
 and thread shook visibly as she said, " My dear Mrs. Regi- 
 nald, you have not, I trust, ever said a word of this to 
 John ? " 
 
 " Do you think I was likely to do so ? " asked Mrs. 
 Reginald, drawing up her tall figure. 
 
 "Because young people are so impetuous, so rash," 
 pursued Mrs. John Dorrien ; " and then there are matters 
 which I can scarcely bear to think of; and I have never 
 spoken of the past to John." 
 
 " No, poor boy, I dare say you have not," said Mrs. 
 Reginald, in the tone of one who was taking John's part 
 against his mother. 
 
 Mrs. John Dorrien bit her lip again. " I acted for the 
 best," she said. 
 
 " Oh ! of course. The best has a broad back. Well, it 
 is not raining, and I think I shall have my walk all the 
 same. Don't tell John I came for him, it would only make 
 the lad conceited." 
 
 With a nod, she took her leave of Mrs. John Dorrien, 
 who did not feel as if she had had the best of the encoun- 
 ter. Poor woman, she grew very sick at heart as she 
 thought over the past, and faced the present. She was 
 not clear-sighted or keen enough to fathom out the mo- 
 tive which Mr. Dorrien must have had in bringing her 
 and her boy to his house, but she felt sure that John was 
 no great gainer by coming and wasting his youth in his 
 cousin's service. Tardy knowledge, for escape and deliver- 
 ance were impossible now. 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien felt miserable and restless, she could not 
 go on with her sewing. She put it by, and looked over 
 her chest of drawers ; but that would not answer, for she 
 came on a packet of her husband's letters, that seemed like 
 a reproach of what she had done to his son. She closed the 
 drawer, and put the key in her pocket, as if she would for- 
 ever hide away that sad, irreparable past. Mrs. Dorrien then 
 went and looked out from her window. The grass-grown 
 court lay below her, dull, silent, cheerless ; but there was 
 a glimpse of the street beyond, and though it looked dark 
 and dingy from the recent rain, it was better than solitude 
 and bitter thoughts. She put on her bonnet and cloak, 
 and went out at once. The afternoon was well worn, and
 
 JOIIN DORRIEN. 133 
 
 tire dull autumn evening was coming on. The air felt 
 chill and damp. Mrs. Dorrien did not go far, no farther, 
 indeed, than the little old church of Sainte-Elisabeth. It 
 was very quiet, and its gloom and silence did her good. 
 As she knelt and prayed, and looked at the little lamp 
 burning with its feeble light before the altar, hope came to 
 her like that faithful light, and glimmered through the 
 darkness of her troubled thoughts. She had committed a 
 mistake, no doubt, but God is very kind, and she had 
 meant well, and the Almighty would not punish her John 
 for her error. And so, little by little, comfort came to her, 
 and when she went home, Mrs. John Dorrien felt lighter 
 and easier in her mind than when she came out. 
 
 "After all, I am sure it is a good thing for John to be 
 here," she thought, as she passed under the lofty arch of 
 La Maison Dorrien, and crossed once more its cold gray 
 court. " It must be a good thing," she insisted in her own 
 mind, with that obstinate belief in her own wisdom and 
 prudence which onby the severest lessons of experience 
 could correct. 
 
 She had gone up the steps of the'perron, and stood in 
 the hall. There she became aware that the door of the 
 library was ajar. This was one of the rooms on the ground- 
 floor which Mr. Dorrien had denied his cousin's widow, and 
 for which she felt, perhaps for that very reason, a ceaseless 
 longing. She knew that John used to go and read there, 
 and concluding that he had returned from the Imperial 
 Library, and was there now, she went in. 
 
 The room was vacant, but a light was burning on the 
 table — no doubt John had left it there, careless boy. She 
 sat down to wait for him ; then she changed her mind, and 
 thought she would visit the other rooms instead. She took 
 the light and passed through them. 
 
 It was strange that Mrs. Dorrien so wished for those 
 rooms. They were lofty and large, but they "were dull, 
 the furniture was dark and old, and had not beauty as well 
 as antiquity to recommend it. Moreover, these were the 
 rooms in which she had spent the close of her married life, 
 her young husband had sat in that leather chair, in that 
 last bedchamber her boy had been born, and through that 
 French window, opening out on the garden, she and he 
 had passed — she a blooming though not very young moth-
 
 134 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 er, lie a fair, blue-eyed boy. She went up to it, she opened 
 the wooden shutters, and stepped out on the wet grass. 
 The dim moon was shining in the cloudy sky, and, far away, 
 the river-god and his urn looked ghost-like in their pale, 
 gray wintry light. Mrs. Dorrien's heart beat. She longed 
 to call back her lost happiness, her lost youth, her lost 
 every thing, but only tears came at her call, tears that are 
 so much in a woman's life. 
 
 At length she turned back, but, when she would have 
 entered the room again, she almost stumbled in the dark- 
 ness, for the light was gone, and, before she could call 
 John, she heard Mr. Dorrien and Mr. Brown talking in the 
 next room. 
 
 " Nonsense ! " Mr. Dorrien was saying, and his voice 
 had not its usual languid courtesy — " you are afraid of your 
 own shadow, Brown. I tell you I brought that light in 
 here myself, because the farthest room, we said, was the 
 safest." 
 
 " Excuse me, sir, you took the light out again when you 
 went to look for the diamonds.'' 
 
 But Mr. Dorrien was obstinate, and persisted in assert- 
 ing that he had taken and left the light in the room in 
 which both be and Mr. Brown had found it. Mrs. Dorrien, 
 who at first had been inclined to come forward and reveal 
 her presence, seemed rooted to the spot where she stood, 
 behind the thick curtains, on hearing the word " diamonds." 
 
 " Have you got them all, sir ? " asked Mr. Brown. 
 
 " Yes, here they are — the tiara, the brooch, and the 
 bracelet. Try and get more upon them this time, Brown." 
 
 " It is no use, sir ; he will not give more." 
 
 " If he would only give a fair price for them," said Mr. 
 Dorrien, musingly, " I should not mind parting with them." 
 
 " He will not, sir." 
 
 " No, I suppose not. And when do you start, Brown ? ' 
 
 " To-morrow, sir." 
 
 " You are sure he does not know you ? " 
 
 " I have been thirty years out of England, sir." 
 
 " Very true. I am sorry to send you off so far, Brown, 
 but, you see, it would never do here. I met Basnage yes- 
 terday. He has taken a fancy to John." 
 
 " Indeed, sir ! " 
 
 " Yes," dryly replied Mr. Dorrien. " Basnage has a
 
 JOHN DORRIEX. 135 
 
 daughter. It has done very well, Mr. Brown, having this 
 
 boy here." 
 
 Mr. Brown did not answer. The room was so still, that 
 Mrs. Dorrien could hear the little snap of a jewel-case. 
 
 " All right ? " inquired Mr. Dorrien. 
 
 '• All right, sir." 
 
 " Well, then, good-night, Brown — be careful." 
 
 "Very careful, sir." 
 
 " Of course, you will be back by Tuesday ? " 
 
 " Yes, sir, by Tuesday." 
 
 They went out together. On the threshold they proba- 
 bly met John, for Mrs. Dorrien heard his clear young voice, 
 saying, " I shall be glad of the key — I want Plato." 
 
 " Plato, you young Grecian ! — there, take the key." 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien heard them going out together ; she also 
 heard John moving the books. When she felt sure that 
 he was alone, she came out from behind the damask curtain, 
 and, stepping softly across the floor, she appeared before him. 
 
 " Mother ! " he exclaimed, amazed. 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien raised her hand and motioned him to be 
 silent. 
 
 " Do not say that I was here," she said, as she passed 
 by him, on her way out. " I will tell you all about it 
 later." She opened the door and slipped up-stairs unseen 
 to her room. She reached it breathless, glad to have es- 
 caped detection, but filled with trouble and dismay at what 
 she had heard. 
 
 And so this was the use to which Mr. Dorrien put the 
 diamonds he had displayed to his guests only a few even- 
 ings before this ! They had been reset in Paris for his 
 wife, the young heiress, and for a few days they had been 
 in Mrs. John Dorrien's hands. She had tried them all on, 
 and laughingly appeared before her husband thus adorned. 
 
 " Well, my dear," he had said, with a smile, " they suit 
 3'ou charmingly; and who knows but you shall have dia- 
 monds as good and handsome as these some day? " 
 
 And these same diamonds, minus the necklace, which 
 had probably been already disposed of, Mr. Brown was now 
 taking: to England to raise money on. This was the con- 
 dition to which the great firm of Dorrien had fallen — tins 
 was the inheritance, the kingdom, to which Mr. Dorrien 
 had called her son ! Knowing, as she did, the cold, reckless
 
 136 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 character of the man, she understood why he had done so. 
 To take a penniless heir implied wealth, and might help to 
 blind one or two. True, it might leave that one or two 
 clear-sighted, but if ruin lay before him, what did Mr. 
 Dorrien care for the two or three hundreds Mrs. Dorrien, 
 and her debts, and her maintenance, and John's, might 
 cost ? If he lost all, his creditors, and not he, would pay ; 
 and if he did not lose, what matter about the money ? A 
 good card is worth any thing to a gambler who is playing 
 his last stake, and such a card John had been in Mr. Dor- 
 rien's hand. He was worth very little, to be sure, but a 
 little is better than nothing. For La Maison Dorrien was 
 in too low a state to get a moneyed partner, or to lay bare 
 its concerns to a stranger's eye ; but John might be useful 
 now or in the future, and on the chance he had been called 
 in, thanks to his mother, and she was powerless to retrace 
 this fatal step. Mr. Dorrien had paid her debts, brought 
 her to his house, and he held her and John in bondage, 
 none the less sure for being unacknowledged. John might 
 spend the best years of his youth in this house, and what 
 would be his gain in the end ? 
 
 These dreary meditations were not over when John 
 came up with Plato. He evidently expected his mother 
 to explain her presence in the room below, and she did so, 
 but in guarded language. 
 
 " I found the door open and went in," said she, " and 
 Mr. Dorrien and Mr. Brown came in too, but did not see 
 me. They only said a few words, but, as they left without 
 having perceived me, I would rather they should not know 
 that I was there. I had stepped out into the garden, and 
 had no thought or intention of listening to them, till the 
 thing was done, and indeed over. That is all ; but of 
 course it is better not to mention it." 
 
 John looked in some wonder at his mother; he found 
 her manner constrained and cold, but more than this she 
 would not say. Grievous as was her disappointment, Mrs. 
 Dorrien was resolved to bear it in silence, to drop no hint, 
 to make no sign which could enlighten John and give him 
 a clew to his real position. He must learn it sooner or 
 later, but by the time that he did learn it he would, she 
 hoped, have given up " Miriam the Jewess," and there 
 would be that much gain out of their grievous loss.
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. ];;; 
 
 John read Plato, and Mrs. Dorrien brooded over her 
 troubles, till the dinner-bell rang, -when they both went 
 down. When -Mr. Dorrien took his place at the dinncr- 
 table he seemed to be in unusually good spirits. Care had 
 not left a wrinkle on his brow. He drank his wine with 
 zest, he laughed and jested with John, and took him to the 
 play when dinner was over. 
 
 " I shall leave you to take care of the ladies, Mr. 
 Brown," he said, gayly. " You look remarkably well tliis 
 evening, Mr. Brown.''' 
 
 " I feel very well, sir," replied Mr. Brown, whom Mrs. 
 Dorrien had w r atched and observed in vain. No sign of 
 change, for better or for worse, had she seen in his stolid face. 
 
 .Mr. Brown's care of the ladies did not extend beyond 
 ten o'clock, when he left them, and the little party broke 
 up, Mrs. Reginald to go to bed, and Mrs. John to sit up 
 for her son. He did not come home before one in the 
 morning ; he seemed quite happy, not at all tired, and 
 thoroughly oblivious of the fact that he wished for work, 
 and not for pleasure. 
 
 "I suppose you enjoyed yourself ?" said his mother, 
 giving him a wistful look. 
 
 " So much, little mother ! Mr. Dorrien was in such 
 good spirits. I never saw him so merry." 
 
 Poor Mrs. Dorrien sighed ; she began to fear that Mr. 
 Dorrien's good spirits were one of the signs of the times. 
 
 The next morning Mr. Dorrien was sorry to declare 
 that Mr. Brown, who had looked so well, had a very bad 
 cold, and could not come to business. He took his place, 
 and enlisted John as his chief assistant; so John, at least, 
 told his mother. 
 
 "We are very busy just now, little mother," said John, 
 with just a touch of consequence upon him, " and shall 
 be so till the 4th or 5th of next month, says Mr. Dor- 
 rien. This is our paying-time, and it is bills and money, 
 bills and money, all the day long. It is the cashier who 
 pays, of course, but Mr. Dorrien and I look through it first 
 — that is how 1 know. We paid more than ten thousand 
 francs, which is four hundred pounds sterling, to-day. Now, 
 suppose it goes on so for ten days — and Mr. Dorrien says 
 it will — think of all the money that will have left our 
 hands ! "
 
 138 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien winced. She knew how dangerously fine 
 and frail is the barrier between a falling firm and insol- 
 vency. 
 
 " So much of that money goes to Monsieur Basnage," 
 resumed John. " It is a pity, it is indeed, that Mr. Dor- 
 rien will not have a mill. I mentioned it to him to-day, 
 but he says it would be too much trouble. Trouble ! " in- 
 dignantly added John, " as if one ought to care for trouble 
 when one has an end in view." 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien suggested that Mr. Dorrien knew best, 
 but John did not hesitate to scout the idea. 
 
 " Business is not so mysterious as you think, little 
 mother," he said, " and this one seems to me a sort of A 
 B C matter. It is nothing but working hard, and giving 
 one's whole mind to it." 
 
 Mr. Brown's cold prevented his attendance, and com- 
 pelled that of John the next day. In the evening he said 
 to his mother : 
 
 " We paid nine thousand seven hundred and fifty-four 
 francs seventy-five centimes to-day, little mother. Now 
 if we had the paper-mill I shall venture to say that we 
 should not have paid more than two-thirds of that money." 
 
 But, spite this censure, John continued to take note of 
 the money that passed out of Mr. Dorrien's hands with 
 boyish accuracy ; and as Mr. Brown's cold still kept him 
 confined to his room, to Mr. Dorrien's great annoyance, and 
 as bills still came in, and were paid as soon as presented, 
 John had every opportunity of ascertaining to what a sound 
 and wealthy house he had come ; but the more he was im- 
 pressed with its prosperity, the more he regretted the 
 paper-mill — that would have increased it threefold, said 
 John. 
 
 All this time Mrs. Dorrien watched Mr. Dorrien, with- 
 out seeming to do so. She found little or no change in his 
 appearance. His brow was as smooth, his bearing as even 
 and courteous, as ever. " He is accustomed to it," thought 
 Mrs. Dorrien, bitterly. 
 
 " Only think, little mother," said John to her on the 
 Monday morning. " We shall have thirty thousand francs 
 to pay to-morrow, actually thirty, and that is fourteen 
 hundred pounds sterling ! To think of making all that 
 money by note-paper and envelopes ! " His tone was both
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 130 
 
 admiring and exulting, but Mrs. Dorrien's brow was clouded 
 as she thought, " Suppose Mr. Brown should not come 
 back with the money." But Mr. Brown did come back, or 
 rather his cold was cured, and on the Tuesday morning he 
 was at his desk as usual, and John was released by Mr. 
 Dorrien. The young man, however, took care to ascertain 
 and to tell his mother that the thirty thousand francs had 
 been paid. "Half in notes and half gold," said John, 
 amazed, " for I saw it all ! Is it possible, little mother, 
 that I shall ever have so much money as that ? " 
 
 He spoke more in wonder than in covetousness, but his 
 poor mother sighed, " Ah ! if he knew, my poor boy, if he 
 knew how Mr. Dorrien got that money ! " 
 
 John, however, did not know, and did not even suspect; 
 and Mrs. Dorrien, who thought she knew all, or almost all 
 about her son's precarious position in his cousin's house, 
 was mistaken. More information was to come ; and this 
 time she had not to seek for it, to sound Mrs. Reginald, or 
 to listen to Mr. Dorrien and Mr. Brown. Mr. Dorrien him- 
 self was her informant. Tempted by the autumn bright- 
 ness of the morning, Mrs. John Dorrien went down to the 
 garden, about a fortnight after Mr. Brown's return. She 
 was thinking about him, wondering when he would go 
 away again to release the diamonds from their captivity, or, 
 indeed, if he would ever go again, when Mr. Dorrien's voice 
 behind her said : 
 
 "I am glad you are well enough to enjoy this pleasant 
 morning." 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien turned round and saw him, tall, languid, 
 courteous, and smiling. She said the morning was lovely, 
 but confessed no enjoyment in it. 
 
 " Where is John ? " asked her cousin. 
 
 "John is gone out. My dear Mr. Dorrien," she added, 
 impressively, "do you not give that boy too much liberty — 
 ought he not to work ? " 
 
 " He shall soon work, as hard as you wish him to do so," 
 answered Mr. Dorrien, with a smile; " indeed, his whole 
 future, as I have planned it out for him, is not one of idle- 
 ness." 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien guessed that something was coming, and 
 became attentive. 
 
 " If my son had answered my expectations and lived, he
 
 140 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 would have held here the position to which John is des- 
 tined : but he died a few years ago, as I dare say you know, 
 and his child being a girl — " 
 
 They were walking side by side along the one gravel 
 path of Mr. Dorrien's garden. At the word " girl " Mrs. 
 Dorrien stopped. " Was he married ? " she could not help 
 exclaiming. 
 
 " Oh ! yes, were you not aware of it ? He married a 
 Creole lady of some property, a widow and a countess. 
 They had but one child, and that child was a girl, now 
 about ten years old, I believe. The Countess of Armaille 
 — she has persisted in keeping her first husband's name — 
 was, as I said, a lady of property, but she contrived to get 
 through some money and land, and is now in very reduced 
 circumstances, especially since the death of her eldest 
 daughter, the child of her first husband. This young lady, 
 it seems, was rich, but her wealth has not gone to her half- 
 sister. The Countess d' Armaille tried to enforce her claim 
 by law and failed, and the failure, I need scarcely say, im- 
 poverished her utterly. Although I have not much reason 
 to be pleased with that lady, she is, nevertheless, my son's 
 widow, and the mother of my granddaughter. I have, ac- 
 cordingly, offered her a home in my house. She is coming, 
 and in a few days," added Mr. Dorrien, nodding toward 
 the windows on the ground-floor, by which they were then 
 passing, " she will occupy these rooms." 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien was silent. She knew now why Mr. Dor- 
 rien had reserved these rooms. All these days and weeks 
 he had had this in his mind. What would come next ? Mr. 
 Dorrien did not keep her long in suspense. 
 
 " My granddaughter," he continued, " will naturally in- 
 herit all I have to leave, but it is my wish, if the thing be 
 possible, that this house should not pass out of the Dorriens. 
 I have, therefore, brought John here. I find that, though 
 commerce be not his bent — no more was it mine — he has 
 both the will and the ability which it requires. He has 
 only to go on as he has begun, and lie will do very well ; 
 six or seven years hence he can marry my granddaughter, 
 and carry on the business, under my control, of course, 
 while I live. I had a great regard for his father, and I am 
 very pleased to have it in my power to continue that regard 
 to poor John's son."
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 141 
 
 If Mr. Dorrien's granddaughter had been a princess 
 royal he could not have spoken with more condescending 
 good-will than he did ; and, bitter indeed as was her morti- 
 fication to find how secondary a place poor John held in 
 Mr. Dorrien'a house after all, Mrs. Dorrien might have 
 swallowed the bitter pill with a good grace, and not rebelled 
 against this unsuspected rival, if it were not for the dia- 
 monds. But, knowing what she did, it was more than she 
 could bear to find John saddled with a wife as well as with 
 a falling house; and there was decided asperity in her tone 
 as she exclaimed: 
 
 " My dear Mr. Dorrien, how premature !" 
 
 " Well, the young people need know nothing about it 
 yet ; but I have mentioned it to you, my dear Mrs. John, 
 that you may, so far as in your power lies, influence your 
 son. I need not tell you that it is for his good I speak." 
 
 " Of course — of course," she said, bitterly ; " but sup- 
 pose that your granddaughter, Mr. Dorrien, should not like 
 my son — I mean, when she grows up to be a young 
 woman ? " 
 
 " I should be very sorry for John," calmly answered Mr. 
 Dorrien. Mrs. Dorrien could scarcely restrain her indig- 
 nation. " But," continued Mr. Dorrien, " I do not think it 
 possible. John, it seems to me, has a great many of the 
 gifts which are likelv to attract a girl." 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien longed to burst out with — " But what if 
 my son should not like your granddaughter?" but she 
 held her tongue and was silent. She was caught in a trap. 
 Escape was now out of the question. She owed Mr. Dor- 
 rien money, she had broken up her little home at his call, 
 she had half cheated her son into complying with his wishes, 
 she had diverted John's future from its natural course, and 
 forever broken up those classical studies which she had 
 once been so anxious to secure for him. What could she 
 do now but submit, hard though were Mr. Dorrien's terms ? 
 And yet she rebelled, and could not help betraying that 
 rebellion — -which was probably apparent to her companion, 
 for after a brief pause he said : 
 
 " I thought it fair, my dear Mrs. John, to mention these 
 things to you. I need not say what my wishes are; I have 
 just expressed them. But if yours should not coincide 
 with mine in this particular case, why, there is no harm
 
 142 JOHN DORRIExY. 
 
 done. John " — Mr. Dorrien laid his long white hand on 
 Mrs. Dorrien's arm and looked expressively into her face — 
 " John can go back to Saint-Ives to-morrow, if you wish it 
 my dear Mrs. John. He will have had a holiday and seen 
 Paris, and there is no harm done." 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien's hot indignation fell down to zero. John 
 go back to Saint-Ives ! And how was she to keep him 
 there ? Besides, though Mr. Dorrien was too civil to say 
 so, did not his words imply that she should go back to Ken- 
 sington to work, for which, alas ! her bad health and bad 
 sight now unfitted her— to future debts, which no Mr. Dor- 
 rien would come forth to pay ? She shrank from the pros- 
 pect with not unnatural terror and heart-sickening. Besides, 
 was there not that " Miriam," with her fatal Jewish beauty, 
 to lure away her poor boy to the destruction of a poet's 
 lot? Last, and certainly least, the comfort of her new 
 home — comfort coming, too, at a time of life when it is 
 most valued — withheld Mrs. Dorrien from rushing back 
 again to the old laborious and penurious independence. 
 
 " My dear Mr. Dorrien," she said, trying to laugh, " I 
 only expressed a very natural fear lest feelings which neither 
 you nor I can control should interfere with your plans. I 
 need not tell you that young people will sometimes have 
 their own way." 
 
 " Very true ; but their elders can perhaps manage so 
 that the ' own Avay ' of young people shall be such as they, 
 the elders, wish it to be." 
 
 There was a moment's silence after Mr. Dorrien had said 
 these words ; then, swallowing down as best she might the 
 bitterness that would come uppermost, Mrs. Dorrien replied : 
 
 " I shall do my best." 
 
 " I trust you will, and that you may succeed, too — for I 
 like John exceedingly," was Mr. Dorrien's gracious reply. 
 And thus he won the day, so far as this matter went. 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 Winter was over. Spring had come; and spring in 
 Paris often has days so fair that they seem borrowed from 
 summer— days when the wind is not too keen and the sun
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 143 
 
 is not too fierce — days of sweet delusive promise that is 
 rarely fulfilled on the morrow. 
 
 On the morning of such a day, John, who had been out 
 on business — for he was fairly yoked to the car now, and 
 need not complain of too much leisure — came home through 
 Mr. Dorrien's garden, after letting himself in by a postern- 
 door, to save a long round. The sky was cloudless, the 
 sun was genial. There was a twittering of birds and a 
 humming of insects in the air, and here and there little shy 
 daisies peeped out of the grass and lifted up their modest 
 heads in the sunlight. Even the old river-god, bending 
 over his stone urn, had a mellower and a milder look than 
 in the winter-time, when his hair and beard were hung 
 with icicles, and all his outlines were rounded with a chill 
 covering of snow. 
 
 John Dorrien felt within himself that sense of buoyant 
 life which is the great gift of youth. He walked briskly 
 on, whistling as he went, till he came to the fountain, where 
 the sight of a group seated on the stone bench near it sud- 
 denly checked his blithe mood. He ceased whistling, and, 
 if he did not step aside, it was only his good manners that 
 prevented him from doing so. 
 
 The little countess, now Mrs. George Dorrien — for her 
 father-in-law had inexorably insisted that she should drop 
 her first husband's name before she entered his house — sat 
 on one end of the bench. She was still young in years, 
 but had got old and faded before her time, and ever}' trace 
 of beauty was gone forever from her face. Her hands lay 
 idly on her lap, and the weariness of enmd was in her 
 whole aspect. Nigh her sat her sister-in-law. Mademoi- 
 selle Melanie was not much altered. She was the same 
 tall, pale, thin woman who had flung the cup of broth 
 across Mr. Dorrien's drawing-room carpet. That spilt cup 
 had been very fatal to the lady, for Mr. Dorrien had per- 
 emptorily declared that, save to call on her sister-in-law, 
 Mademoiselle Melanie should never cross his threshold. 
 She had, accordingly, taken rooms in the neighborhood, 
 where she slept and boarded, but she spent a considerable 
 portion of her time with Mrs. George Dorrien. She was 
 now as busy and industrious as that lady was idle aud inert, 
 and her needle and thread flew through her work as swift- 
 ly as though the completion of the muslin trimming she
 
 144 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 was engaged on were a matter of life and death. Antoi- 
 nette, Mr. Dorrien's granddaughter, sat on a little chair 
 nigh these two. The light shadow of young foliage — for 
 she sat beneath one of the tall garden-trees — played on the 
 child's little sallow face. She looked straight before her 
 with sad, dark eyes. A big doll lay on her lap, a little 
 Maltese dog was curled lovingly at her feet, but she neither 
 played with the one nor caressed the other. She sat perfectly 
 still, with a listlessness very different from that of her 
 mother, for it was full of pining and sorrow, plainly ex- 
 pressed on her childish face. Now, if John Dorrien could 
 have shunned this group, he would most willingly have 
 done so. He felt a secret contempt for Mrs. George Dor- 
 rien's mental weakness, he heartily disliked Mademoiselle 
 Melanie, and a hint which Mr. Dorrien had dropped, with 
 seeming but intentional inadvertence, concerning Antoi- 
 nette, % had utterly disgusted the youth. He was too gener- 
 ous to dislike the child because of her grandfather's wishes ; 
 but the mere thought that this little girl of ten should suc- 
 ceed to the lovely and high-souled " Miriam " in his affection 
 was odious to him. He shunned her presence whenever 
 he could do so, and it fortunately happened that Antoinette 
 showed no appreciation of his company. She did not ap- 
 pear to dislike him — he was simply indifferent to her, as 
 indeed every thing and every one seemed to be. She now 
 took no notice of his approach, and indeed Mademoiselle 
 Melanie was the only one of the three by whom it was ac- 
 knowledged. 
 
 " A lovely morning, Monsieur John," she said in French. 
 
 Monsieur John replied that it was a lovely morning. 
 His look fell, casually perhaps, on the listless child as he 
 spoke. Mademoiselle Melanie shook her head and raised 
 her eyes, so that the whites alone were visible. 
 
 ""Ah!" she said, mournfully, "it was too much for the 
 dear child; her heart is in her elder sister's grave. She 
 has never recovered it — she never will." 
 
 " Nonsense ! " said Mrs. Reginald, who had come up, un- 
 perceived, and now stood close to them. — " Why do you 
 go, John? " she asked, as the young man, thinking this a 
 favorable opportunity, attempted to slip away. John re- 
 plied that he had work to do. 
 
 " Wait for me — I want you," said the lady. — " Shall I
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 145 
 
 tell you what ails that child of yours ? " she added, ad- 
 dressing Mrs. George Dorrien. " She it too tall for her age. 
 Ten ! she looks twelve years old ! " 
 
 " Creoles mature early," said Mademoiselle Melanie. 
 
 " I would not let her sit so still," resumed Mrs. Regi- 
 nald, persistently ignoring Mademoiselle Melanie and ad- 
 dressing 1 Mrs. George Dorrien. " I would make her run 
 about, or play, or do any thing but sit." 
 
 Melanie's black eyes sparkled, and she compressed ber 
 lips, but not one word did she utter. The little countess 
 shivered, and muttered something about its being very 
 cold. John was wondering how long Mrs. Reginald meant 
 him to stay there, and Antoinette looked as if nothing 
 could move her out of her languor and apathy. The little 
 Maltese dog scratched her hand with his white paw, and 
 thrust his nose into it. But she turned from him weariedly. 
 
 " Be quiet, Carlo," she said, plaintively. 
 
 Mademoiselle Melanie had not answered Mrs. Reginald, 
 and she had no cup of broth to fling across a carpet, and 
 thereby relieve her feelings ; but unluckily Carlo was at 
 hand, and when, in spite of the remonstrance of his little 
 mistress, he again attempted to draw her attention, Made- 
 moiselle Melanie darted forward, pounced upon him, and 
 flung him against the stone god close by. The little creat- 
 ure fell back grievously injured, and howling pitifully. 
 The countess put her fingers to her ears. 
 
 "You brute ! " energetically said Mrs. Reginald ; while 
 John ran and picked up poor Carlo. On seeing her favorite 
 thus treated, Antoinette at first remained in her chair like 
 one petrified ; but when she saw John bring back the dog 
 in his arms, his white coat all blood-stained, she sprang up 
 with sudden life, and flew at Mademoiselle Melanie like a 
 young fury. 
 
 " Oh ! how dare you do it ?" she cried, slapping her in 
 the face — "how dare you kill my poor little Carlo! How 
 dare you ! — how dare you ! " And her rage subsided into 
 a passion of tears. 
 
 The suddenness of the attack seemed to turn Melanie 
 into stone, as indeed it took everyone else by surprise; 
 but when she recovered, the expression of her face became 
 so fell that Mrs. Reginald at once snatched away Antoinei te, 
 placed the child out of her reach, and, holding the woman
 
 146 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 fast, said firmly, " You shall not touch her — I say you shall 
 not ! " 
 
 Melanie did not stir, but she looked at Antoinette, who 
 was sobbing pitifully over Carlo. 
 
 " So that is my thanks," she said, in alow tone. " You 
 did well to hold me. I think I would have killed her ! — 
 now it is over ; but — but I shall never forget it ! " 
 
 " Oh, Carlo is dead, dead ! " sobbed Antoinette — " my 
 Carlo, my little Carlo ! " 
 
 " No, no," said John, soothingly, " he is not dead. 
 Come with me to the kitchen; we will wash his wound." 
 
 He took her hand and led her away. 
 
 " They will all of them be the death of me," pitifully 
 said the little countess. "I wish that dog were dead. 
 Why did you make him howl so, Melanie?" 
 
 " She slapped me in the face," said Mademoiselle Me- 
 lanie, nodding over the fact — " she did — I shall remember 
 it — that was my thanks." 
 
 " She is a very wicked child," said the countess, weep- 
 ing. " I wish it were she was dead instead of my other 
 darling — oh ! I do wish it." 
 
 " I dare say you do," muttered Mrs. Reginald, walking 
 away. " Well, there's only one of them all I care for, and 
 that is Carlo. Poor little fellow ! I dare say the brute 
 has killed or maimed him ! " 
 
 But in this conclusion Mrs. Reginald was fortunately 
 mistaken. Carlo w T as neither dead nor maimed, though he 
 was much hurt. " He will do ! " Such was the verdict 
 delivered by John in the kitchen, whither he had repaired, 
 carrying the poor little fellow in his arms, and followed by 
 Antoinette. The cook was out of the way, and the kitchen 
 — a room of unusual size, with spotless red-tiled floor and 
 shining copper saucepans on the wall — was vacant. The 
 cook's chair and footstool stood by the hearth, where a 
 fragrant pot au feu simmered in the ashes of a low wood- 
 fire. Antoinette, who was always tired, went and sat on 
 the stool, and thence watched John as he took Carlo to the 
 stone fountain and there washed his wound. The little 
 patient creature even allowed the youth to bandage him 
 with his pocket-handkerchief; and when this was done, 
 and John softly laid Carlo on his mistress's lap, she only 
 sighed, and said drearily :
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 147 
 
 " Whore is the use? Aunt will kill him another time, 
 in v poor little Carlo ! " 
 
 "Do you think she would actually kill him?" asked 
 John, in seeming 1 doubt. 
 
 " Yes," replied Antoinette, deliberately, " I am sure 
 she would. She is jealous of Carlo, you know. She hates 
 me to be fond of him. I am glad I slapped her in the face 
 — bad, wicked Melanie ! " And her dark eyes flashed 
 again with resentment, and she kissed Carlo, who gave a 
 whine between pleasure and pain. " My poor little Carlo," 
 said Antoinette, bending fondly over him. " She did it 
 because she knows I am fonder of you than of any one else 
 in the whole wide world." 
 
 " Surely you love your mother better than Carlo ? " 
 argued John, looking down at her. 
 
 Antoinette, who still sat on the cook's footstool with 
 Carlo on her lap, looked up at John Dorrien in some 
 wonder. 
 
 "I love Carlo best," she said, bluntly. " Mamma does 
 not like me — she is always wishing I were dead instead of 
 my sister. I like Carlo better than any thing or any one, 
 and that is why Melanie will kill him. What shail I do 
 without him ?— oh ! what shall I do ? " 
 
 Her tears flowed freely. She was evidently a badly- 
 reared child, with no sense of duty, and little sense of right 
 and wrong ; but John pitied her and her grief. She loved 
 her dog, and she feared for what she loved. 
 
 " Let me have Carlo," he said. " I will keep him in 
 my room, and Mademoiselle Melanie cannot get at him 
 there." 
 
 Antoinette at first looked delighted with the proposal, 
 then her face fell. How was she to live without Carlo, 
 and how would Carlo exist without her? 
 
 " You can come and see him as often as j^ou like," said 
 John. 
 
 " But he will not eat." 
 
 " Yes he will, if you feed him." 
 
 " Where is your room ? Is it far away ? " 
 
 " Come with me, and I will show it to you ; but let 
 me carry Carlo. I shall hurt him less than you do." 
 
 He raised the dog carefully and tenderly, and left the 
 kitchen, followed by Antoinette. On their way up-stairs
 
 148 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 they met Mr. Dorrien. He had just come in, and knew 
 nothing of what had happened, but the bandaged dog at 
 once caught his eye, and he asked, almost sharply, what 
 had happened to Carlo. The little creature was a sort of 
 favorite with him. 
 
 " Melanie took and flung him against the stone god," 
 sobbed Antoinette; "and we are taking him to John's 
 room, that she may not kill him outright." 
 
 Mr. Dorrien looked at John as much as to say, " Is this 
 true ? " and, though reluctanthv, John was obliged to con- 
 firm the child's statement. 
 
 " Ah ! " was all Mr. Dorrien said, and he went on. 
 
 John's mother was out, and John took Antoinette 
 straight to his own room. 
 
 " Put him on your bed," she said, imperatively ; and, 
 when that was done, " Give him your best pillow — the 
 softest. And now put a chair nigh the bed, that he may 
 jump down when he pleases. And a cup ! — have you a 
 cup for him ? Put water in it. It must stand in a saucer, 
 otherwise Carlo will not drink. And now stay while I go 
 and fetch his biscuit." 
 
 " "Well, but I must go and work," argued John. 
 
 " Yes, but Carlo mnst be minded," replied Antoinette, 
 still imperative. " And I think I shall bring him some of 
 that stuff in the marmite down-stairs. It smelled very nice. 
 And don't let him come after me, lest Melanie should get 
 him," she added, from the door. 
 
 John heard her tripping down-stairs and patiently waited 
 for her return, kindly soothing Carlo the while. However 
 distasteful might be to him the prospect of marrying Mr. 
 Dorrien's granddaughter at some future day, John had 
 none of the superfluous of dignity of seventeen about him. 
 He was not ashamed of being kind to a dog, or even to a 
 little girl. Antoinette, to do her justice, did not try his 
 patience too far. She soon came back with the biscuit and 
 the broth, which she offered Carlo, but, alas ! in vain. 
 Carlo turned his head away, and refused to eat or drink. 
 
 " He will not eat. Then he must die, if he will not 
 eat," said Antoinette, with dreary conviction. " My lame 
 sister would not eat, and she died." 
 
 " Your lame sister ? " said John, surprised. 
 
 " Yes ; she had an accident, you know," answered An-
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 149 
 
 toinette. "Oh! it was such an accident! I cannot tell 
 you about it. They think I do not know, but I do. I 
 do," nodded Antoinette. " You will not tell again, if I 
 tell you, will you?" 
 
 " No, I shall not," replied John, with involuntary curi- 
 osity. 
 
 " Well, stoop, and I will tell it in your ear." 
 
 He obeyed, and, raising herself on tiptoe, Antoinette 
 whispered : 
 
 "She did it — she served her like Carlo. She hated 
 her, you know." 
 
 John Dorrien felt both shocked and startled. 
 
 " Does she hate you ? " he asked. 
 
 " Oh ! no," replied the child, seeming surprised at the 
 question. " Of course she likes me, but she hates Carlo, 
 and I must keep him out of her way." 
 
 This meant that Carlo should stay in John's room, but 
 it also meant that Antoinette should remain in that sanc- 
 tum and keep Carlo company. John, who had not fore- 
 seen this, and who dreaded some inroad on his books and 
 papers, tried to convince Antoinette that solitude was the 
 best thing for Carlo in bis present condition; but he was 
 so positively answered that Carlo, if left alone, must die, 
 that he had to yield, and leave Antoinette and Carlo in 
 possession. 
 
 Great was Mrs. Dorrien's surprise, when she came 
 home, to hear a short bark proceeding from her son's room, 
 and surprise turned into amazement when, entering it, she 
 saw little Carlo lying bandaged on a pillow on John's bed, 
 and Antoinette fast asleep on a chair b} r him. The child's 
 head was buried in the counterpane, and Carlo growled 
 fiercely as Mrs. Dorrien approached her. Indeed, he made 
 so much noise that Antoinette awoke. 
 
 " My dear," gently said John's mother, " what is the 
 matter ? Why is Carlo here ? " 
 
 " John brought him here, that, Melanie might not kill 
 him," was the child's grave answer. 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien was not the woman to abstain from ques- 
 tioning on receiving so strange a replv, and Antoinette 
 was as communicative as she could desire. John's mother 
 listened to her with such evident interest and attention 
 that the child's sense of consequence was awakened. She
 
 150 J0HN DORRIEN. 
 
 told the story of Carlo's mishap in full, and also related 
 that other story of her sister's accident, which she had 
 already imparted to John, and she added thereto particu- 
 lars into which he had forgotten to inquire. 
 
 " Well, my dear," soothingly said Mrs. Dorrien, " all 
 this is very sad, but I dare say little Carlo will get well ; 
 only he must not stay here. We will find a nice place for 
 him, dear, where he shall be quite safe. Is that your 
 handkerchief binding him ? No, I see it is John's," and 
 internally the careful mother sighed over the foolish boy's 
 use of those best cambric handkerchiefs w T hich she had 
 only just hemmed for him. 
 
 But Antoinette could not hear of removing Carlo. He 
 must stay, she said, for, if he did not, Melanie would cer- 
 tainlv kill him. Mrs. Dorrien was obliged to acquiesce 
 in this necessity, but she made the best of the incident by 
 getting into Antoinette's good graces and confidence, till 
 the luncheon-bell rang, when Carlo was locked up for se- 
 curity. After luncheon, Mrs. John had a brief and quiet 
 conversation with Mr. Dorrien, to whom she told all that 
 Antoinette had related concerning her half-sister and Me- 
 lanie. Whether through the information she imparted, or 
 because of his own conclusions concerning the violence of 
 temper exhibited in the incident of the dog, Mr. Dorrien 
 informed his daughter-in-law that Mademoiselle Melanie 
 must enter his house no more, not even as a visitor. 
 
 It is hard to say how some people acquire the power 
 which they exercise over others. If Antoinette's story was 
 a true one — if the violence of her mother's sister-in-law had 
 really caused the fatal accident, which first maimed, and per- 
 haps ultimately killed, her elder sister, it was hard to under- 
 stand how the mother of the injured child, to whom that 
 child's death had brought both poverty and dependence, 
 could lament, as she now did, the loss of Mademoiselle 
 M61anie's society. She gave no reason for doing so ; she 
 could not say that she wanted Mademoiselle Melanie for 
 any particular purpose — for profit, for pleasure, for amuse- 
 ment, for consolation or comfort — but looking pitifully 
 up in Mr. Dorrien's face, she uttered a helpless "What shall 
 I do?" which was, perhaps, the best of all reasons. She 
 • lid not love that dark, sinister, tyrannical woman who 
 ruled her, and, indeed, all that came within her reach, with
 
 JOHN DOBRIEN 151 
 
 a rod of iron ; but she had been ruled so long that her 
 liberty terrified her. What should she do, indeed, without 
 Melanie to lean upon, to think, act, and even talk for her ? 
 The vision of such liberty was disastrous to her untutored 
 mind, and bewildered her. Mr. Dorrien, nevertheless, ad- 
 hered to his resolve, and ignored his daughter-in-law's dis- 
 tress. He could not, however, help declaring that in his 
 opinion a person of such violent temper as Mademoiselle 
 Melanie was scarcely fitted to be the close companion of 
 his granddaughter. 
 
 " Yes, I know," plaintively said the little countess, 
 " and she is so dreadful ; but still, you know, what shall I 
 do?" 
 
 But, as we said, Mr. Dorrien ignored her distress, and 
 submission was her only lot. 
 
 Carlo, who recovered more rapidly than could have 
 been expected from the severe treatment he had got, thus 
 won back the freedom of the house, and, indeed, was con- 
 sidered a sort of hero, and became popular. Mrs. Regi- 
 nald took notice of him " because he had been so ill-used, 
 little fellow," and Mr. Dorrien really thought that dog had 
 been invaluable in giving him a decent pretense for expel- 
 ling Mademoiselle Melanie. He also attributed to Carlo 
 the good understanding which had suddenly sprung up be- 
 tween John Dorrien and Carlo's little mistress. 
 
 " You and Antoinette seem to get on very well togeth- 
 er," he said to John on the second morning that followed 
 Mademoiselle Medanie's exile. 
 
 " Yes, sir, we do," answered the lad, blushing ; but the 
 remark annoyed him, and had wellnigh destroyed the very 
 result which Mr. Dorrien wished for. 
 
 John did not become unkind to the child — he was inca- 
 pable of that — he did not even snub Carlo, who seemed to 
 remember that he had received the hospitality of his room, 
 but that same afternoon he had what he considered a de- 
 cisive conversation with Antoinette, whom he found sitting 
 in the garden, with Carlo lying on her lap. Carlo was 
 dull, she said, and she requested, rather imperatively, that 
 John should amuse him. John laughed the idea to scorn, 
 and kindly informed Antoinette that he was much too eld 
 for such nonsense. She might amuse Carlo, but it was 
 out of the question that he should do any thing of the kind.
 
 152 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 In short, he impressed the child Avith the fact that Time 
 had placed between them one of those barriers through 
 which no good-will on either side can ever break. Antoi- 
 nette looked at him in perplexity. She did not think John 
 old, and she brooded over all he said till she could endure 
 this state of doubt no longer ; so, carrying Carlo in her 
 arms, she made her way up to Mrs. Dorrien's room, and 
 peeping in at the door, she said, in her old-fashioned way : 
 
 " Please, may I come in ? " 
 
 " Certainly, my dear," was Mrs. Dorrien's ready an- 
 swer. " Sit down on that low chair. You are tired carry- 
 ing Carlo." 
 
 " No, it's not that, but you live so high up, Mrs. John 
 — so very high up." 
 
 " Mydear, it is only a second floor." 
 
 " Well, but it is high up," plaintively said Antoinette. 
 " I feel so tired when I come up to see you, Mrs. John." 
 
 Mrs. John looked compassionately at the little paleface. 
 "Would that frail bud ever blossom ? But Antoinette had 
 not come up to complain. 
 
 " Mrs. John," said she, looking earnestly at the lady, 
 while she nursed Carlo, who fondly licked her little thin 
 hand, " how old is John ? " 
 
 "He will soon be eighteen. Why do you ask, my 
 dear?" 
 
 " Because that is old — very old, is it not ? " 
 
 " Eighteen is not old, my dear." 
 
 " Oh, but John says so ! " 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien gave a start and looked nervous ; she 
 questioned the child, learned from her all that John had 
 said, and, with a mother's quick intuition, saw at once 
 what his motive for saying it had been. Her heart fell at 
 the thought that Antoinette might be as communicative 
 with her grandfather as she had been with herself ; and, 
 though that was not likely — for Mr. Dorrien seldom ad- 
 dressed a word to his granddaughter, and scarcely looked 
 at her — though, as we say, that was not likely, Mrs. Dor- 
 rien hastened, as far as she was able, to repair the mischief. 
 
 " Well, my dear," she soothingly said, " it is very true, 
 that now John is much older than you are ; but some years 
 hence you will be quite of an age, and it will be all right. 
 You will be a young lady then."
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 153 
 
 Antoinette looked thoughtful, but not satisfied ; she 
 would probably have put more questions if Carlo had not 
 whined. 
 
 " I must go," she said, rising. " Carlo wants to be in 
 the garden. Good-by, Mrs. John." 
 
 " Good-by, my dear. Take care of the steps." 
 
 But doubt still haunted Antoinette's mind, and, instead 
 of going straight down, she stood still on the staircase, and 
 looking up at Mrs. Dorrien, who was bending over the 
 banisters to watch her slow descent, she said : 
 
 " Please, Mrs. John, do you mean that John will stop 
 growing when I am a young lady ? " 
 
 " And, pray, why should John stop growing when you 
 are a young lady?" asked John, who came bounding up 
 the stairs, light, active, and buoyant. 
 
 Antoinette did not answer, and Mrs. Dorrien colored up 
 and tried to laugh. 
 
 " There, dear, mind the steps," she said, going down to 
 help the child. "Give me your hand; there, that will do 
 nicely." 
 
 They went down together, and presently Mrs. John re- 
 turned alone to the room, where John stood waiting for 
 her, in reality, though to all seeming he was looking over 
 the contents of his blotting-case. 
 
 "Poor little thing ! " said Mrs. Dorrien with a sigh as 
 she closed the door, " how delicate she is ! Will she ever 
 get over that cough of hers ? " 
 
 " Do you think she will die ? " asked John, with a look 
 of sudden concern. 
 
 " My dear, I do not say so ; I only fear that she is very, 
 very delicate. And, if you can humor her, do so, my dear. 
 Poor Mr. Dorrien has plans for her which may come to 
 naught, and in the mean while say nothing to the child 
 which might make mischief if repeated." 
 
 John fixed his bright gray eyes on his mother's face, 
 and said, in his straightforward way, " What do you mean, 
 little mother?" 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien coughed. " My dear, you have been talk- 
 ing to Antoinette about your age, and all that. Better 
 make no remarks — let Mr. Dorrien have his plans ; it may 
 all end in naught, as I said." 
 
 They exchanged looks. They had never spoken of
 
 154 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 Antoinette, and Mr. Dorrien's wishes concerning her and 
 John, and yet each understood the other. John remained 
 awhile, red and silent, standing with the blotting-case in 
 his hand ; then he said, distinctly and deliberately, " I shall 
 never marry Antoinette." 
 
 He spoke so positively, so much in the tone of one who 
 knows his mind, that his mother heard him in blank dis- 
 may. At first she could not speak ; at length she said : 
 
 " You surely will not tell Mr. Dorrien so ? You are both 
 so young — the child may die — so many things may happen." 
 
 " I will tell him so if he questions me, mother — I must." 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien was frightened, and tried argument. How 
 could John tell that some years hence his mind would not 
 change ? Why, then, settle this matter so long beforehand, 
 and injure himself with Mr. Dorrien? He need promise 
 nothing, he need only be silent. 
 
 " My mind will not change," replied John ; " I shall 
 never marry Antoinette. She is capricious, ignorant, pas- 
 sionate, and she seems to have no sense of right or wrong; 
 besides, she is a little girl." 
 
 " My dear boy, she will not always be so, and she may 
 alter and improve, and though you dislike her now — " 
 
 " I do not dislike her," protested John, with some ve- 
 hemence ; " on the contrary, I am fond of Antoinette, but 
 I shall never marry her ! " 
 
 " How can you be sure of that, John ? " 
 
 But John was quite sure — and is there any certainty 
 like that of seventeen ? — that his feelings would never alter, 
 so far as Antoinette was concerned. In short, the little 
 girl had no chance, and with a sense of gloomy despair Mrs. 
 Dorrien felt that she had every chance of going back to the 
 old life of poverty. She gazed at him as he stood before 
 her, straight, tall, unbending in attitude and temper ; yet 
 gentle and tender-looking in the pleasant light of the spring 
 morning which fell on his brown curls and fresh, pleasant 
 face ; and she could not help saying, with some bitterness, 
 as she pressed her hand to her aching lips: 
 
 " How can you be so hard to me, John ? " 
 
 "O little mother, how can you say that? I am not 
 hard to you ! You know what brought me here, what made 
 me give up all I cared for ! I did it because you told me 
 that, involuntarily of course, my poor father had wronged
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 155 
 
 I\Ir. Dorrien, and that, so far as I could, I ought to repair 
 that wrong." 
 
 " My dear, I did not say that exactly," faltered Mrs. 
 Dcrrien, rather scared to have this brought up, " at least, I 
 did not make it a matter of duty for you to act as you have 
 acted. I mean," she stammered, " that I left you free." 
 
 This was almost too much for John, but he compelled 
 himself to say quietly : 
 
 " I do not regret having come — since it was right that 
 I should do so ; but no duty, no honor, can make it right 
 that I should be driven into marrying Mr. Dorrien's grand- 
 daughter. And I never will." 
 
 "But, my dear boy, all I ask is that you should keep 
 your own counsel." 
 
 John did not answer. His mother did not seem to un- 
 derstand that this was a matter of honor, that he must tell 
 the truth if he was questioned. " She also ignored the fact 
 that, boy though he was, he had a right to defend his lib- 
 erty. He had never thought of marriage, for maidens like 
 " Miriam the Jewess " rarely lead 3'ouths to so practical a 
 conclusion, but, when the subject was forced upon him, his 
 whole being revolted against compulsion. He could not 
 realize another Antoinette than the one he knew, the pale, 
 childish, capricious child, the passionate, willful, and, as he 
 had quickly detected, very badly-reared mistress of Carlo, 
 who really had little or no sense of right or wrong. Marry 
 her ! He would die first ! 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien did not sleep much that night; she re- 
 volved a hundred plans, none of which seemed good or 
 practicable in the morning, and all of which luckily proved 
 quite useless. Antoinette was delicate, and she had a 
 cough ! But was she threatened with a decline, as her 
 mother averred, and was the climate of the south of France 
 really necessary to her ? The doctor did not go quite so 
 far, though he confessed that Paris did not seem to suit 
 Mr. Dorrien's granddaughter. Mr. Dorrien himself showed 
 less interest in the subject than might have been expected. 
 He was weary of his daughter-in-law's society, and rather 
 dreaded lest his granddaughter should fall ill on his hands. 
 The matter w r as soon settled. Antoinette was pronounced 
 to require the mild air of Mentone, and thither she and her 
 mother both repaired, before April had yielded to May.
 
 156 
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 " I must leave you, poor Carlo," said Antoinette, as she 
 and John parted ; " for Melanie would kill him, you know. 
 You will give him his biscuit, poor little Carlo ! " 
 
 Thus all Mrs. Dorrien's present apprehension came to 
 naught, for once in Mentone, Antoinette and her mother 
 staid there, and Mademoiselle Melanie with them. 
 
 "Mind my words, Mr. Brown," said Mrs. Reginald em- 
 phatically, "Antoinette is no more consumptive than I am. 
 It is all that Melanie'" s doing." 
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 There were rooms to spare in the official regions of 
 l'Hotel Dorrien. Mr. Dorrien had his, Mr. Brown had his, 
 and to John also a room was allotted. There he sat and 
 wrote the formal uninteresting letters of business, which 
 Mr. Brown assigned as his share of the work. John's room 
 was large, dull, and quiet. It overlooked the court-yard, 
 faced the north, and never received a ray of sun. Sitting at 
 his desk, John only saw the tall windows of the house with 
 the high roof, and beyond its dark line the clear Paris sky, 
 where°the swallows belonging to the old mansion wheeled 
 round their nests in rapid circling flight. In this room, 
 with Carlo lying curled round on a chair by him, John 
 Dorrien spent the long, dull, and tedious summer days ; 
 and in this room we find him on a bright summer morning, 
 brooding somewhat discontentedly over his lot. The con- 
 finement, the monotony, and the uselessness of this life of 
 business, seemed hard to the classical scholar of Saint-Ives. 
 The delightful world of poetry and eloquence he had once 
 moved in was closed. Others more favored could enter 
 that happy region and linger there, but its gates must open 
 for him no more, and he had not instead the hard work 
 which might have seemed a compensation to his active 
 mind and ambitious temper. 
 
 "If we only had the paper-mill," he now thought, while 
 his hand idly caressed Carlo's little white head, "or if I 
 were only deeper in the business to take an interest in it !
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 157 
 
 But is it not enough to sicken a fellow, accustomed to 
 work as I have been, to sit here day after day doing noth- 
 ing but watching the swallows ? " 
 
 The sight of these Paris swallows, who darted about 
 with pale breast gleaming in the sun, brought back to 
 John's mind the swallows of Saint-Ives. All at once the 
 life of study he had forsaken came back to him in vivid 
 pictures, such as only young fancy can paint with outlines 
 keen and clear. The room in which he sat, the desk on 
 which lay the letter he had just written, vanished. The 
 scene changed ; a gray, cloister-like light stole in through 
 the tall window of the salle tPetude and fell on the Greek 
 page before him ; the pale, ascetic face of the Abbe Veran, 
 sitting far away on his raised chair ; the dark and blond 
 heads of his fellow-students ; the scribbling of pens on 
 paper ; the buzzing of drowsy flies ; the very murmur of 
 the summer wind through the branches of a young tree 
 waving its boughs outside in happy idleness — all returned 
 to him with strange distinctness. And there were swal- 
 lows, too, in the sky of that autumn morning in the holi- 
 days, when he took the long walk in the low flat country 
 round Saint-Ives with his friend, confidant, and enthusiastic 
 admirer, Mr. Ryan. "What a morning it was ! Rosy clouds 
 flushed the dappled sky of dawn ; they reddened fast the 
 low horizon and the quiet waters in which the cattle stood 
 knee-deep. How lazily these calm, Flemish-looking cows 
 gazed at the broad landscape, tinged with the hues of an 
 early autumn ! The foliage of the mighty oaks which grew 
 on either side of the stream was already sere and yellow, 
 and the tall red ferns below them, which the hot August 
 sun had scorched and shriveled, would soon wither in the 
 cold, equinoctial winds, till not a token would be left of all 
 that tender green beauty which had been so fresh and fair 
 in spring. 
 
 " A glorious world ! " had said Mr. Ryan, in his cheery 
 voice ; " and 'tis all your own, my boy, for this world be- 
 longs to the poet — and you are a poet, m} r lad, if ever 
 there was one." 
 
 And was this delightful time really over for John ?— 
 and could he never go back to "Miriam the Jewess," and 
 Mr. Ryan, and fame, and liberty ? — had it all vanished, as the 
 swallows had vanished out of the cool northern sky of that
 
 158 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 morning ? Yes, it was so. The kind, swarthy face, with 
 its grizzling locks, had passed away out of John's daily 
 life ; the genial voice would cheer him no more — the words 
 of promise and hope would never again fall on the young 
 poet's ear. He was not a poet now — he was Mr. Dorrien's 
 cousin, one of the great Maison Dorrien ; and Mr. Brown, 
 who came in with two letters, laid them on the young 
 man's desk with the scrupulous politeness due to his posi- 
 tion. 
 
 "Work for me, Mr. Brown?" said John, starting up 
 with alacritv at the thought of exertion. 
 
 " One letter to copy, sir, if you please ; the other is for 
 you, and was taken to Mr. Dorrien by mistake. Mr. Dor- 
 rien starts for London at three this afternoon, and he de- 
 sired me to say that he wished to see you again before he 
 
 left." 
 
 " I shall not go out," said John, opening the letter ad- 
 dressed to himself, and which was in Oliver Blackmore's 
 handwriting. 
 
 " If you please, Mr. John," remarked Mr. Brown, " the 
 letter is wanted at once." 
 
 "Then I shall do it at once," replied John, putting 
 down Oliver's letter with a smile. 
 
 The strict discipline of Saint-Ives had taught him obe- 
 dience. Immediately, without giving Oliver's epistle an- 
 other look, he copied the long, dry letter before him. 
 When his task was done, he went into Mr. Brown's room, 
 saying cheerily : 
 
 " Here is the letter, Mr. Brown. Any thing more for 
 
 111C 
 
 9" 
 
 " Nothing more, sir," replied Mr. Brown, with the ghost 
 of a smile flitting across his faded face. 
 
 That young voice and look, so bright and cheerful, 
 always did him good. 
 
 John went back to his sitting-room, where Carlo was 
 waiting for him with a wistful face that seemed to say, "I 
 thought you were really gone, and I am glad you have 
 come back," and snatching up Oliver's letter, he read it 
 twice over, then put it down with an impatient sigh. 
 Oliver wrote pleasantly and banteringly — he never wrote 
 otherwise ; and in a postscript he informed his friend that 
 Mr. Ryan was mourning for him, John Dorrien, as Calypso
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 159 
 
 mourned for Telcmachus, or Ulysses, or both ; and, " by- 
 the-by," airily added Oliver, " the painter of Calypso has 
 gone to finish her in Elysium — in other words, he is dead, 
 and Calypso is to become a sign-board." 
 
 " Poor old fellow ! " thought John ; " he painted bad 
 pictures, but he liked Oliver, who likes no one save Mr. 
 Blaokmore, and who laughs at the dead just as he laughs 
 at the living. Let him ! I like Mr. Ryan's little finger 
 better than I like Oliver's whole body ; and I will see him 
 again — I must ; and I have a great mind not to stay here 
 copying stupid letters, but to be off and try my fate. Mr. 
 Dorrien does not want me, and it is nonsense to stay and 
 lose my time, with the prospect of having to say no to 
 marrying a little girl in the end." 
 
 This marrying of the little girl Carlo, who was innocent- 
 ly licking his paws, unconsciously suggested. The mere 
 thought of it had brought a cloud to John Dorrien's brow, 
 and he stood brooding over his wrongs, present and pros- 
 pective, when the door of his room opened, and Mr. Brown, 
 with fate in his looks and a telegram in his hand, appeared 
 on the threshold. 
 
 " Mr. Dorrien has been thrown from his horse, and has 
 broken his arm," he said, oracularly. " lie is at the res- 
 taurant in the wood, and wants us both directly." 
 
 John was at once all amazement and dismay, and poured 
 forth rapid questions ; but Mr. Brown laconically answered : 
 
 " I know nothing, sir ; only we must go at once, if you 
 please — and Mr. Dorrien does not wish this to be spoken 
 of till he comes home." 
 
 "I shall not mention it," replied John, reddening — and 
 Mr. Brown took care that he should not do so, for within 
 the next two minutes they both entered a cab that was 
 waiting for them in the street. 
 
 That day was a memorable one in John Dorrien's life. 
 It was as one of those landmarks with which Time now 
 and then separates the phases of a human existence, and 
 he never forgot its slightest tokens. The long, silent drive 
 through the sunlit, noisy street ; the hot and glaring avenue 
 of the Champs Elysees, climbing up to its massive trium- 
 phal arch ; the sudden shade and freshness of the green 
 wood on that fata*! morning, remained clear and present to 
 him for years.
 
 160 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 They found Mr. Dorrien sitting alone in one of the 
 private rooms of the restaurant. His arm was already ban- 
 daged and in a sling-, and from the sofa on which he sat 
 he was looking down composedly on the little sunny lake 
 which lay beneath the open window. He turned round 
 on their entrance, and holding out his hand to Mr. Brown 
 (it was the left limb that was injured), he said, quietly : 
 
 " A vexatious accident, is it not, Mr. Brown ? Luckily 
 my old friend, Doctor Parker, was on the spot, and set my 
 arm beautifully ; but he advised me to stay here till the 
 cool of the evening. I fancy I have just a touch of fever," 
 added Mr. Dorrien, speaking as abstractedly of all this as 
 if the case had been that of a total stranger. 
 
 " I hope 3'ou do not suffer, sir," John could not help 
 remarking. 
 
 " Nothing to speak of," replied Mr. Dorrien, with his 
 languid smile ; " but of course there is no going to Lon- 
 don," he added, with an expressive look at Mr. Brown, who 
 returned it gravely, saying, " Of course not." 
 
 " I think of sending John in my stead," resumed Mr. 
 Dorrien, still looking at Mr. Brown. 
 
 " He is very young, sir," replied the clerk. 
 
 " Too young ; but what can we do ? " 
 
 They both spoke as if he had not been present, and 
 John, who was idly looking at the white swans floating on 
 the lake, stared to hear himself thus freely discussed. Mr. 
 Brown was silent. 
 
 " He must go," resumed Mr. Dorrien, almost doggedly. 
 — " John," he added, turning to the youth, " close that win- 
 dow, if you please, and attend to what I say." 
 
 John obeyed, and standing with his back to the wall, 
 and his arms folded, he listened to Mr. Dorrien, grave, 
 attentive, and watchful. There was no need to tell him 
 that he had been brought out there for no common purpose. 
 
 " But for this unlucky accident, I was to leave Paris 
 to-day," began Mr. Dorrien ; " but I was not going to Lon- 
 don, as you suppose — I was going to St. Petersburg, on 
 important business, which you will have to transact in my 
 stead. I take it for granted," added Mr. Dorrien, with 
 some dignity, " that you will not shrink from the fatigue 
 of a long voyage, nor even from annoyance and risk on be- 
 half of the torn."
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 161 
 
 "I shall not," replied John, the quick blood mounting 
 up to his brow. 
 
 " Of course not," resumed Mr. Dorrien, approvingly. 
 "Well, the business you will have to transact is this. You 
 will arrive in St. Petersburg next Tuesday ; } 7 ou will call 
 at once on Mr. Bowers, an Englishman, who has a house 
 of business there, and settle accounts with him according 
 to the instructions contained in this letter, in which arc 
 inclosed your credentials. You will receive the money — 
 fifty-seven thousand francs — leave on Wednesday, and be 
 back here by the 2Gth of this month. You will find it 
 fatiguing, hut feasible," continued Mr. Dorrien, composed- 
 ly. " You are young and inexperienced, but you are also 
 quick-witted and sufficiently determined. I feel confi- 
 dent that you will be successful, and will return safe and 
 sound by the appointed time. While I was waiting for 
 Mr. Brown and you, 1 drew up all the instructions you re- 
 quire. Here is 'Bradshaw' — you will find some information 
 at page 586; but my instructions are better. With these 
 and a well-filled purse, you can find no real difficulty in ac- 
 complishing your errand." 
 
 John fastened his bright gray eyes on the speaker. 
 We have already said it — it was very hard to deceive this 
 young man. Perhaps to guard him against the perils of a 
 1 rusting tenderness, which was the very root of his nature, 
 Providence had bestowed upon him a penetration unusual 
 in his years; perhaps the strong spirit of truth that dwelt 
 within him was a lamp which lit his path in life, and made 
 him quick to detect the falsehood which lies hidden under 
 plausible speech. 
 
 "This is a very unusual way of settling accounts," he 
 said. "Why must either you or I take a long and expen- 
 sive journey to get this money from Mr. Bowers ? " 
 
 " Because we have tried to get it otherwise, and have 
 failed," dryly replied Mr. Dorrien. 
 
 " Is Mr. Bowers unable or unwilling to pay that money ? " 
 
 "He is quite able," said Mr. Dorrien, emphatically, 
 " but decidedly unwilling." 
 
 "But if he can pay, he must," persisted John. 
 
 " And so he will — in the course of time," sneered Mr. 
 Dorrien. 
 
 Then it was time that was precious — it was in delay
 
 162 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 that danger lay. And all for fifty-seven thousand francs — 
 twenty-two hundred and eighty pounds sterling. A large 
 sum, but surely not one that ought to sink the brave Dor- 
 rien ship. 
 
 " If Mr. Bowers is so unwilling to pay, will he pay 
 me ? " asked John. 
 
 " You must make him," answered Mr. Dorrien, looking 
 hard at the boy. " If he is out of town you must follow 
 him ; if he is at home, and will not see you, you must enter 
 the house by some means or other and see him. He will 
 quibble, ask for dela} 7 , say he is ill, do any thing perhaps 
 to make youdose time. Do not mind him, do not believe 
 a word he says. Use threats, if need be, and do not hesi- 
 tate to put them into execution. Shrink from nothing; 
 apply to our consul, and if that will not do, use threats, I 
 say. He is a coward, and will give in. But whatever you 
 do, however you manage, come back by the 27th with 
 fifty-seven thousand francs, for on that day the best part 
 of the money must be handed over to Monsieur Bas- 
 nage." 
 
 This was plain speaking, and John understood it. His 
 color faded at the menace of suspended payments, disgrace, 
 and ruin, which hung over the Maison Dorrien — that Mai- 
 son Dorrien which he had thought solid and sure as the 
 Bank of England. He looked at Mr. Dorrien and at Mr. 
 Brown ; he expected to find them pictures of dismay, but 
 the one was as gracefully composed and the other as im- 
 perturbable as ever. Mr. Dorrien was smoothing his chin, 
 and Mr. Brown was comparing his watch with the bronze 
 timepiece on the black-marble chimney of the room. Had 
 John been mistaken after all ? 
 
 " What is the object of that Mr. Bowers ? " he asked 
 point-blank. 
 
 " To get us into difficulties, and raise another house 
 on the ruins of ours," composedly answered Mr. Dorrien. 
 " No other firm of the kind carries on so much business 
 with Russia as La Maison Dorrien, but if it were gone, or 
 had an awkward check, why, Mr. Bowers has a son here in 
 Paris who is both ready and willing to take its place." 
 
 John knit his brow, and his eyes flashed. 
 
 " Let him," he said, with something like defiance — " let 
 him, I say, and get the money elsewhere."
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 163 
 
 " Will vou kindly tell me how? " sneered Mr. Dorrien. 
 
 " Have you not got the diamonds '? " impatiently de- 
 manded John — " the . bright, costly, useless diamonds ! 
 Pledge them — sell them — do any thing, but do not show 
 Mr. Bowers that you are in his power." 
 
 " Thanks," said Mr. Dorrien, " but the diamonds have 
 already done all they could do for La Maison Dorrien." 
 
 The truth flashed across John Dorrien's brain, and his 
 lip curled with scorn as he realized it. The diamonds had 
 been brought out that evening to dazzle Monsieur Basnage, 
 but these Dorrien diamonds were as worthless after a fash- 
 ion, and cheats as great in their way, as the counterfeit 
 that blazed its false light near their clear lustre. 
 
 " The diamonds are gone," said John, " and Mr. Bowers 
 knows that La Maison Dorrien is in his power, and he 
 thinks he can do it any wrong with impunity ! Has he no 
 fear of affecting his own credit by refusing to pay ? " 
 
 " No," dryly replied Mr. Dorrien ; " besides, he will not 
 refuse to pay ; he will invent some excuse — say your cre- 
 dentials are forged, or that there is a mistake, or any thing 
 that will justify the delay of a few days." 
 
 " And a few days will be fatal to La Maison Dorrien," 
 said John ; " for La Maison Dorrien is a falling house." 
 
 John looked Mr. Dorrien in the face as he uttered these 
 ominous words, and that gentleman felt that the boy had 
 sprung into sudden manhood, and that he must be true 
 with the man who stood before him, for he would tolerate 
 no equivocation and accept no falsehood. 
 
 "La Maison Dorrien has seen better days," replied Mr. 
 Dorrien, bitterly ; " but it may be saved yet." 
 
 "How so?" asked John; "and for how long? You 
 have no capital, and, so far as I can see, no credit. All I 
 do see is a pit, and a deep one, Mr. Dorrien." 
 
 Mr. Brown looked scared at the young man's plain 
 speaking, but though Mr. Dorrien's pale brow flushed, he 
 showed no temper. 
 
 " What else have you got to say ? " he asked, coolly ; 
 " because we are losing time." 
 
 "I have nothing else to say," answered John, as coolly, 
 " but that if I can save the firm I will." 
 
 " Just so," was Mr. Dorrien's composed answer. " Well, 
 Mr. Brown will see you off, and supply what may be want-
 
 164 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 ing in your outfit. — You have brought the money, Mr. 
 Brown ? " 
 
 " Yes, sir, I have." 
 
 " Then I suppose we may consider the matter settled," 
 said Mr. Dorrien, looking rather w T earied. " You need not 
 go home, John — that will spare needless questions." 
 
 " I must bid my mother good-by," replied John, quietly, 
 but very positively. 
 
 " Must you ? " exclaimed Mr. Dorrien, with a laugh. 
 "Well, you will please not to speak of St. Petersburg. 
 You are going to London, as I was." 
 
 " I cannot tell an untruth, sir," said John. 
 
 Mr. Dorrien looked annoyed. 
 
 "Then do not go home," he said, impatiently. "I 
 shall manage that." 
 
 "I can manage it very easily," replied John. "I shall 
 not tell my mother where I am going." 
 
 " Do you not understand that I want no appearance of 
 mystery ? " said his cousin, looking provoked. But John 
 was impracticable. He would neither deceive his mother, 
 nor go without bidding her adieu. Mr. Dorrien and Mr. 
 Brown exchanged perplexed looks. 
 
 " Why trouble about that ? " asked John, with sorrow- 
 ful impatience. " Do you not see, both of you, that this 
 thing, this little bit of m} r stery, is nothing? It is the 
 other thing which is all, and in that I may fail. I am 
 young, as you both of you said a while back, and though I 
 can hand him over your credentials, Mr. Dorrien, it may 
 suit Mr. Bovvers to treat me like a boy, and not give me 
 one farthing of that money." 
 
 " Be not a bo}', then — be a man," said Mr. Dorrien, 
 with a sudden and dangerous light in his languid blue 
 e}'cs. " You are a good shot ; I know you have a steady 
 hand, a sure eye, and a brave spirit. You will not let the 
 firm whose name you bear, and whose honor lies in your 
 keeping, go to ruin for want of pluck. Of course," added 
 Mr. Dorrien, with marked emphasis, " I advise no violence, 
 but you will travel armed. Let Mr. Bowers feel that } 7 ou 
 arc not to be trifled with. You do not look a boy, John ; 
 besides, you have a great advantage. Mr. Bowers thinks 
 his delays and false pretenses have deceived us so far ; he 
 is not prepared for your appearance. Surprise will be
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 165 
 
 your ally ; do not weaken it by any delay 3^011 can avoid. 
 And now," added Mr. Dorrien, rising, "let us go. lam 
 tired of this place." 
 
 John was very silent all the way home. He under- 
 stood now what sort of a firm it was whose fortunes he had 
 been called to share, and whose honor he was asked to 
 save. He understood, too, how weak or how formidable a 
 thing commerce can become in feeble or in unworthy hands. 
 Mr. Dorrien's puerile attempt to dazzle Monsieur Basnage 
 with the diamonds — an attempt which could not delay the 
 fatal payment one hour — filled John Dorrien with con- 
 tempt. The deliberate villainy of Mr. Bowers to hasten 
 the ruin of a falling house by non-payment of a just debt, 
 till payment should come too late for its salvation, filled 
 him with abhorrence. 
 
 "Surely," thought John, in the pride and confidence of 
 youth — " surely, if ever I stand at the helm of the Dorrien, 
 and steer her on, it shall not be with such little tricks ; 
 and surely, too, I shall be able to make her float in waters 
 where no such sharks as that Mr. Bowers are found ! " 
 
 " What is the heavy day next month ? " suddenly 
 asked Mr. Dorrien, addressing Mr. Brown. 
 
 " The 23d is our heaviest day, sir," answered Mr. Brown. 
 
 Mr. Dorrien sighed wearily, and John's dream fled. 
 They had entered the Rue de la Dame, and the old hotel 
 rose before them with its 1720 graven in stone above the 
 mansion gate-way. 1720 ! — a proud boast, but how long 
 would it last V How many more " heavy days " were 
 needed to blot it out forever, as if it had been written on 
 sand, across which a stormy wind was sweeping? 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 The whole of that morning Mrs. Dorrien was haunted 
 with a presentiment of coming evil, against which she 
 strove in vain. Like a presence it followed her about the 
 house. She went to the garden, and found it there, a dark- 
 shadow between her and the bright summer sun. Sixteen
 
 166 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 years ago, in that same dwelling, on a day like this, with a 
 sky as clear and > a sun as bright as those of to-day, that 
 sense of a sorrow' at hand had been with her, and that day 
 had ended in tears and widowhood — in a grief which time 
 had never fairly healed, and troubles of winch John's mother 
 still felt the bitter sting. Therefore she feared, therefore 
 she was anxious, startled at the least sound, moved by 
 every breath ; and yet, what evil could be nigh ? She 
 framed an excuse to send for John, but John had gone out 
 with Mr. Brown an hour ago in a cab, she was told. Well, 
 surely there was no cause for fear in that. John must be 
 safe with Mr. Brown, and Mrs. Dorrien breathed, relieved, 
 and told herself that it was all right, till the fear came 
 back again, darker, deeper, more tormenting than ever. 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien would willingly have sought refuge from 
 her own thoughts in the society of Mrs. Reginald, if that 
 lady had been within ; but she was not, and she did not 
 venture to leave the house and call on any of the few 
 friends of her married life whom she had found again in 
 Paris, as one may find a few leaves still clinging to an 
 autumn tree. She felt chained to home. It seemed as if 
 the trouble she was expecting were a visitor whom she did 
 not dare to disappoint. He might come with his hands 
 full of calamity, but Mrs. Dorrien must wait for him, and 
 abide his stern pleasure. So, woman-like, she sat in her 
 lonely room, still sewing for John, brooding over anxious 
 thoughts, but stitching all the time. 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien had had an old nurse once who was a 
 great dreamer, and who, when any event happened in the 
 day that corroborated her visions of the night, was wont 
 to say, " Well, my dream is out." So did she think at 
 first, that her presentiment was out, when Mr. Dorrien 
 came home with his broken arm in a sling, till John, who 
 brought her the tidings, added quietly : 
 
 " Mr. Dorrien cannot travel, so I am to go in his stead. 
 I came home to bid you good-by, little mother." 
 
 " You are going instead of Mr. Dorrien ? " she exclaimed, 
 with sudden paleness on her faded cheeks. 
 
 " Yes, he has asked me to do so." 
 
 " Then you are going on business — on business to Lon- 
 don ? How odd ! " She spoke with evident uneasiness. 
 All her nameless fears had come back. John was silent.
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 167 
 
 "How odd that Mr. Brown should not go instead of 
 you ! " she continued. John was still silent. 
 
 " Then it is not to London you are going ! " she cried, 
 starting to her feet. " Of course not — where are you going, 
 John?" 
 
 " Little mother," he replied, resting his arm on her 
 shoulder, and looking earnestly in her face, " I must make 
 haste to go — so good-by." 
 
 " But you cannot be going so, now, without your things ! " 
 she cried ; " you must pack up, and your linen has not come 
 back, and — " 
 
 " A carpet-bag will do me," interrupted John. " Mr. 
 Brown is to see me off. What I need he will supply." 
 
 But if John meant to say nothing, this was too much. 
 Visions of a long voyage, of India, of the Atlantic, flashed 
 across his mother's mind and terrified her. She stopped 
 liiin as he was turning to his room, and said, almost an- 
 grily : 
 
 " You must tell me where you are going, John — vou 
 shall!" 
 
 " I cannot," answered John, and his tone was inexorable, 
 as when he told Mr. Dorrien, an hour ago, that he would 
 not leave without bidding his mother good-by. Mrs. Dor- 
 rien heard him, and felt both hopeless and helpless. Here 
 was this boy of hers going off on some perilous journey, she 
 was sure ; and she was not to know the why and the 
 wherefore. He was the most precious thing she had, but 
 she had put this treasure of hers in the keeping of another, 
 who cared little what risks it ran, so his ends were served. 
 
 " My boy, my own boy," she said, clinging to him, " you 
 cannot leave me so ! I must know where you are going, 
 on what errand ! I must ! I cannot trust you so far alone, 
 and not even know why you, a mere lad, are sent instead of 
 Mr. Brown." 
 
 "Mr. Brown is too much wanted at home, little mother; 
 and now let me go, dear, for Mr. Dorrien is waiting for me, 
 and I must take a few things, I suppose." 
 
 What could she do ? She must yield, but she laid her 
 head upon his shoulder, and cried there. John kissed her, 
 and, leading her to her chair, he sat down by her. 
 
 " I shall not be long away, little mother," he whispered, 
 fondly; "you will scarcely know 1 am gone, when — "
 
 168 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 " You have got a revolver !" cried his mother, starting 
 up again, and looking like one scared. 
 
 John reddened, but did not deny. There was a pause, 
 during which each looked at the other. 
 
 " John," at length said his mother, " you shall not go 
 on this journey — I forbid you ! It is dangerous, or you 
 would not carry fire-arms about you. I forbid you to 
 go!" 
 
 " I must go," replied John in a low tone. " No one else 
 can be trusted to do what I am going to do, and the firm 
 requires it, little mother." His look was wistful, his tone 
 very grave. 
 
 " The firm has taken my husband," said poor Mrs. Dor- 
 rien, " and now it wants my boy." 
 
 " But, little mother, I apprehend no danger, none, only 
 Mr. Dorrien says every one travels with fire-arms now, and 
 so he gave me this revolver — a beauty, little mother," added 
 John, smiling. 
 
 " Mr. Dorrien gave it to you ? How dare he ! — how 
 dare he ! " exclaimed Mrs. Dorrien, exasperated. " He 
 drove your father to destruction, and now must he drive 
 you ? " 
 
 John's startled look told her that she had said too much. 
 But she could not recall the imprudent confession, and in 
 her despair she made the most of it. 
 
 " Yes," she said, recklessly, " if your poor father ven- 
 tured too far, if he brought ruin, and nearly disgrace, on 
 the firm of Dorrien, if it all ended in horror and death, Mr. 
 Dorrien was partly the cause. He meant no harm, I know, 
 but he urged him on, as he is now urging you on, John. I 
 say you must not mind him — I say you must not go on 
 this errand; the gain will be his, the peril yours." 
 
 As she spoke John grew paler and paler, till his very 
 lips were white. When she ceased he remained silent, 
 stunned with the revelations her words bore with them. 
 He felt like one who follows a friend trustingly, till he finds 
 that he has been led to the very verge of a pit yawning at 
 his feet. His mother — his own mother— -had deceived him ! 
 One of the keenest pangs he had ever known in his brief 
 life shot through his heart, and his white lips quivered as 
 he said : 
 
 " Then, mother, you have deceived me. It was not my
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 169 
 
 father who wronged Mr. Dorrien — it was Mr. Dorrien who 
 wronged him." 
 
 " I never said your father had wronged Mr. Dorrien," 
 she answered, shrinking from his look. " I said that your 
 father ventured too far, and that Mr. Dorrien was a heavy 
 loser." 
 
 " But you did not tell me that Mr. Dorrien had urged 
 him to venture," insisted John. " If Mr. Dorrien did so 
 urge him, what sense of honor or duty need ever have 
 brought me here ? If Mr. Dorrien lost money, my father 
 lost life ; surely, mother, they were quits, and I might have 
 remained free." 
 
 " You have no right to speak so to me, John," said his 
 mother, trembling with anger and shame, " nor to call me 
 to account in that tone." 
 
 A strong sense of filial duty and reverence was at the 
 root of John's nature, and, though he felt cruelly wronged, 
 he accepted the reproof quietly ; yet he said : 
 
 " I do not wish to vex you, mother, but, if you had told 
 me all the truth, I should not be here this day, leading a 
 life I should never have chosen. I might have shaped my- 
 self another, and surely a happier, destiny than that which 
 lies before me." 
 
 " Well, then, do so still," said his mother, desperately ; 
 " let us go back to England and work there — it is not too 
 late." 
 
 " It is too late," replied John, bitterly — " too late for- 
 ever, mother." 
 
 " It is not. You owe Mr. Dorrien nothing — nothing, I 
 tell you." 
 
 But she had deceived John once, and he did not feel 
 that he could or would trust his conscience in her keeping. 
 The blood came back to his cheek, the light to his eyes, as 
 he answered with some scorn of the desertion she urged 
 upon him : 
 
 "I may owe Mr. Dorrien nothing, but I owe myself 
 much, and to leave now would be dishonorable — it would 
 be base. Mr. Brown and he would have the right to call 
 me coward if I were to do that, indeed." 
 
 She saw the case was hopeless. 
 
 " Then you will go ? " she said — " you will take this 
 journey ? " 
 
 8
 
 170 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 " Yes," said John, " I will. Good-by, mother." 
 
 He kissed her rather coldly, she felt, and going to his 
 room, which he left by another door, thus he parted from 
 her. And it was over, and she had cheated him into this 
 life, which he hated, and brought him to a falling house, to 
 be buried, perhaps, in its ruins ; and she had betrayed her 
 miserable equivocation — all in vain. He was gone — to 
 danger, to death, for all she knew — and she might never 
 see him again. 
 
 This was their parting. John did not come back, nor 
 did she try to see him again. To do so she must have 
 sought Mr. Dorrien's presence, and that she hated, just 
 then, with all the bitterness of her trouble. She sat as 
 John had left her, tearless and heart-stricken ; then, wdien 
 she heard carriage-wheels roll out of the yard, and felt that 
 all was over, she went and lay down on her bed, and let 
 her sorrow come over her in all its dreariness. 
 
 Presently she was roused by the sound of a firm step 
 across the floor of her room and of an abrupt though not 
 unkind voice, which said close to her : 
 
 " Well, and what is it all about ? " 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien raised her heavy lids and looked at Mrs. 
 Reginald, who stood by her bedside, looking down at her 
 with her head on one side. 
 
 " John is gone," piteously said Mrs. Dorrien. 
 
 " That is just it. What is it all about ? Mr. Dorrien has 
 been and broken his arm, and John is gone — goodness 
 knows where ! And what is it all about ? " 
 
 Mrs. Reginald spoke with mingled curiosity and concern. 
 She liked John, and felt a strong interest in his welfare ; 
 and, as she was a person who never allowed any kind of 
 ceremony to stand between her and her pleasure, she had 
 come to John's mother for the information which Mr. Brown 
 had not been willing to supply. 
 
 " Mr. Dorrien has taken him from me, and John is go- 
 ing the way his poor father went," said Mrs. Dorrien. " He 
 is sending him off armed to the teeth, on some errand 
 which he dare not face himself — and, Mrs. Reginald, shall 
 I ever see my boy again ? " 
 
 "Indeed I trust to see John again," hopefully replied 
 Mrs. Reginald, "and be sure that you will, Mrs. John. 
 And now," she added, sitting down by her and taking her
 
 JOHN DOIIRIEN". 171 
 
 hot hand into the kind grasp of her own long, bony fingers, 
 " tell me all about it, dear.' ? 
 
 Mrs. John could not resist that appeal. Her heart was 
 full — she could not carry its burden in silence any longer, 
 so she told Mrs. Reginald all, or almost all — ay, even how 
 she had confessed to John what she had hidden from him 
 till then, and how, spite that confession, he had gone all 
 the same. 
 
 " Of course he did go, the brave boy ! " cried Mrs. Regi- 
 nald, her one eye sparkling. "You would not have had 
 him stay behind like a coward. How could he, Mrs. John ? 
 But the two men should not have sent the lad on such an 
 errand as this seems to be. I told Mr. Brown so. Now, 
 don't you imagine that I think lie runs any risk," she quiet- 
 ly added, as Mrs. Dorrien buried her face on her pillow 
 with a groan; "no, no, that is not what I mean ; but of 
 course he has been sent on important business, and of 
 course, being so inexperienced and so young, he may fail ; 
 and if he does, why, it will just cut him, the proud boy, to 
 the heart." 
 
 " I do not think he will fail," said Mrs. Dorrien, sitting- 
 up, and speaking in a short, broken voice. " John never 
 has failed in any thing he undertook." 
 
 "There, dear, don't mind what I said," soothingly re- 
 plied Mrs. Reginald, " and don't worry yourself. Why, 
 your hand is" like a coal, and your poor face looks on fire. 
 Now don't be ill while John is away." 
 
 " What matter ? " bitterly replied John's mother ; " he 
 would go, though I asked him to stay. What matter even 
 if I die before he comes back ? " 
 
 "Nonsense !" decisively answered Mrs. Reginald, "you 
 are not going to die ; " but she added internally, " You are 
 going to be very ill, poor soul, and no mistake." 
 
 Mrs. Reginald's fears were fulfilled that very evening. 
 As John was on his road eastward, looking at the sun 
 setting over the low landscape, the same warm, red light 
 stole in through the window of his mother's room and 
 flooded the bed where she lay tossing in fever, while Mrs. 
 Reginald sat by her side, softly Baying, "Poor thing! it 
 has been to much for her. Poor thin<r ! " 
 
 And too much for John's mother this last trial nearly 
 proved. She had suffered much for sixteen years, endured
 
 172 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 privation and sorrow. She bad spent sleepless nights and 
 eaten poor food. She had worked hard, too, and known 
 the weariness of the hireling; and now that rest and com- 
 fort and ease had come, they had brought new and bit- 
 ter troubles in their train — troubles which overpowered 
 her, like a burden too heavy for her strength. To have 
 brought John to Mr. Dorrien's house, pledged him to share 
 its ruin, and for all she knew its disgrace, and to have lost 
 something in his regard, and yet to see him go on Mr. 
 Dorrien's errand, in spite of all she could say or do to de- 
 tain him, was too much for her; she had been ailing long, 
 and was ready for disease. 
 
 It came now, and had its day with her — a bitter, cruel 
 day of fever and burning pain. But what evil is there that 
 does not work some good ? From what root of sorrow 
 does not some sweet blossom of comfort spring ? 
 
 Mrs. John and Mrs. Reginald had never been friends — 
 they had never liked each other; and Mrs. Reginald, to 
 say the truth, with her arbitrary ways, sharp speech, and 
 abrupt manners, might fairly bear the blame of such a state 
 of things. Now all this was altered. Mrs. Reginald took 
 it into her head that she had a gift for nursing, and that 
 she could as good as save the life of John's mother, which 
 was in some danger for a week, by nursing her herself. 
 So she took possession of the sick-room, a faithful, tender, 
 and devoted attendant, and, woman-like, she could not 
 help getting to love the poor, helpless sufferer, who said to 
 her with such a wistful look, with a voice so pining and so 
 low, "O Mrs. Reginald, what should I have done with- 
 out you ? " 
 
 Mrs. Reginald's private opinion was that the nurse who 
 attended Mrs. Dorrien under her would have been the 
 death of that lady ; a firm conviction of her own superiority 
 over every one, in whatever she undertook, being one of 
 her characteristics. 
 
 " And is it not well that you have me, dear ? " she 
 once answered aloud, in her brisk, cheerful voice. " Give 
 me that vial," she imperatively added, addressing the 
 nurse, who thought she might venture on pouring out 
 some medicine in a glass. " There, that's the way to do 
 it," continued Mrs. Reginald, nodding at the nurse, who 
 stood in too much awe of her not to submit.
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 173 
 
 She had as great a contempt of amateur nursing as any 
 of her class, but Mrs. Reginald had been a good friend to 
 her, and her tongue was tied. 
 
 "And now take that, and get well," continued Mrs. 
 Reginald, turning to Mrs. Dorrien, and helping her to sit 
 up and take her medicine. 
 
 Here the nurse made a furtive but wholly abortive at- 
 tempt to smoothe the patient's pillow. Mrs. Reginald 
 pounced upon her at once, and, looking at her askance, 
 asked her what she was about, then showed her " how to do 
 it;" and having performed her double duty, and reproved 
 the nurse, who, though florid and good-tempered, looked 
 decidedly affronted, she returned to her arm-chair, and, re- 
 clining back in it, closed her eyes and took a nod. 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien lay awake, thinking in the vague, feeble 
 way in which sick people think. The past and the present, 
 illness and sorrow, all mingled together in her weak mind. 
 That little table, on which the night-lamp shed its faint 
 circle of light, had stood in her room the very night that 
 John was born. Who was that heavy, red-faced woman 
 nodding in her chair ? The nurse ? Yes, she was ill, and 
 wanted a nurse. And that was Mrs. Reginald, with her 
 kind, brown face, who now looked at her so gently and so 
 pityingly. 
 
 *"Mr*s. Reginald!" 
 
 "Yes, dear;" and at once she was by the bedside. 
 
 " Do }-ou think he will ever come back ? " 
 
 " My dear, didn't I tell you that Mr. Dorrien has heard 
 from him, and that he is well ? " 
 
 "Yes; but do you think that he will come back ?" 
 
 " Of course I do." 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien sighed and turned her face to the wall ; 
 after a while she turned back again, saying: 
 
 " Mrs. Reginald, if I should be taken before he comes 
 back, you will be kind to my poor boy, will you not ? You 
 know what this house is, and you see how they use him ; 
 but you will be kind to him, will you not? " 
 
 " Ay, dear, surely," replied Mrs. Reginald, in a moved 
 voice ; " but you will live, and do that part of the busi- 
 ness yourself." 
 
 She spoke cheerfully, but was not so sure of the truth 
 of what she said as she chose to appear. Her heart was
 
 174 J0HN DORRIEN. 
 
 heavy as she went back to her chair, and, no longer at- 
 tempting to sleep, sat there and thought. 
 
 " The poor thing is very weak," she said, in silent so- 
 liloquy — "very weak indeed, and the doctor has said that 
 such weakness may end fatally. Well, it will be hard if 
 the poor boy finds his mother's coffin when he comes back. 
 Poor boy, poor boy ! " 
 
 She shaded her eyes with her hand, that Mrs. Dorrien 
 might not see that they were filling fast. Her heart — a 
 kind and gentle one, spite her abrupt ways — ached for the 
 absent youth, and also for the poor patient lying there be- 
 fore her, with her pale face resting so death-like on her 
 white pillow. Her patience and her resignation had en- 
 deared her to Mrs. Reginald ; and when, two days after this, 
 the physician who attended Mrs. Dorrien pronounced her 
 safe, Mrs. Reginald's " Thank Heaven ! " was as fervent a 
 one as was ever uttered. 
 
 " So now you are all right, my dear," she said to John's 
 mother, with more zeal than prudence ; for to be all right 
 implied that Mrs. Dorrien had wellnigh been all wrong ; 
 " and John will soon be here, says Mr. Brown, and you will 
 be better than ever after this illness, I'll be bound." 
 
 " And it will be worth while having been ill to find so 
 true and kind a friend," answered Mrs. Dorrien, looking at 
 Mrs. Reginald's rather stern face with grateful eyes. 
 
 " Well, perhaps it will," confessed the other lady ; " for 
 you see, my dear," she added, tucking her in and smooth- 
 ing her pillow, " we are fast friends after this. And all I 
 am afraid of is, that we shall botli spoil John." 
 
 On hearing which, John's mother smiled faintly, and 
 asked, in a weak, low voice : 
 
 " What day of the month is it, Mrs. Reginald ? " 
 
 " It is the 26th, my dear." 
 
 " Perhaps he will be here by the 1st," sighed John's 
 mother. 
 
 The secrets of nations are not always well kept. There 
 are whisperings in the air that reveal to listening multi- 
 tudes when calamity is at hand. But nothing in Mr. Dor- 
 rien's offices, counting-house, or ancient dwelling, with its 
 look of comfort and allluence, revealed that danger threat- 
 ened that honorable firm and well-appointed household. 
 Security, calmness, and ease, were impressed on all that
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 175 
 
 Monsieur Basnage saw when he called to transact some 
 slight matter of business with Mr. Dorrien on that same 
 morning of the 26th. But, long after he was gone, Mr. 
 Dorrien sat alone, anxious and moody. A telegram had 
 told him that John had been successful, and was coming 
 home with the money. But what if some accident should 
 occur ? what if the lad should not be back by the 27th ? 
 Every plan that Mr. Dorrien and Mr. Brown had thought 
 of to guard against this contingency, and secure the fifty- 
 seven thousand francs independently of John's prudence or 
 good fortune, had been given up in its turn. To all there 
 was this fatal objection — that some one must be trusted ; 
 and Mr. Dorrien would trust no one with the knowledge 
 that La Maison Dorrien was so hard pushed for money. 
 No ; not the most friendly of bankers, not the trustiest of 
 clerks in a telegraphic office, should have it in his power 
 ever to betray that secret. John would not have been 
 trusted could Mr. Dorrien have helped it. " But then," 
 mused Mr. Dorrien, " he is a Dorrien after all, and there 
 can be no fear." 
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 
 Mu. Brown, sitting in his room and going methodically 
 through his work, had his own thoughts. He hoped that 
 the good ship which he had helped to steer so long would 
 weather this storm ; but then he knew that, when this par- 
 ticular peril was over, some other would come — some fatal 
 leak, some unsuspected strain on the timber of that ancient 
 craft, which kept a noble look, but was rather the worse 
 for the wear and tear of a hundred years. 
 
 So, though Mr. Brown too was anxious about John's 
 return, his anxiety was of a steady kind, like that of one 
 who knows that the game is not won for just one turn of 
 the wheel. His own feeling was that Mr. John would be 
 home before the fatal 27th, but he had not chosen to tell 
 Mrs. Reginald as much ; and when, on the afternoon of 
 that same 2Gth, his room-door opened and John stood be- 
 fore him, pale and rather worn, but with a firm look about
 
 176 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 him, Mr. Brown was neither much surprised nor mucli 
 elated. 
 
 " Glad to see you safe home, Mr. John," said he. " We 
 got your telegram. ■ And so it is all right ? " 
 
 " Yes — all right," said John. " Mr. Bowers was taken 
 by surprise, as Mr. Dorrien had foretold. I had no trouble 
 with him, and here is the money. Is my mother well, Mr. 
 Brown ? " 
 
 Mr. Brown, who had opened the pocket-book which 
 John had laid on the table, and begun counting the notes, 
 paused to reply : 
 
 " I have not seen Mrs. John to-day, but — " 
 
 Here the door of the room opened, and a servant ap- 
 peared with a message from Mr. Dorrien. He wished to 
 see the two gentlemen at once in his own room. 
 
 Mr. Dorrien's own room was on the ground-floor. It 
 was a room full of comfort and ease — not speaking of a 
 fatal 27th coming on the morrow. There were pictures on 
 the walls — good modern pictures — landscapes fresh and 
 dewy, homely scenes, but with laughing peasant-girls in 
 them. There were bronzes — copies of the antique from 
 Barbedienne's — a few books too, and, w T ith these, every 
 quiet comfort which a man learns to prize when life is 
 gently declining. But pleasant though the aspect of this 
 room was, John's face grew almost stern as he entered it ; 
 and, though Mr. Dorrien rose from the couch on which he 
 was reclining and greeted him kindly, the young man kept 
 his upright, unbending attitude. 
 
 " I have brought the money, sir," he said. 
 
 " That is right, John ; you have been very successful, 
 and you had no trouble." 
 
 " None' — Mr. Bowers handed me the money almost 
 without a word." 
 
 " Oh ! you managed it to perfection," said Mr. Dorrien, 
 with his graceful courtesy. 
 
 John shook his head in impatient denial. 
 
 " Any one provided with your credentials could have 
 done as much, sir," said he. 
 
 " No, John, not any one — your name of Dorrien im- 
 pressed Mr. Bowers, you may be sure." 
 
 John did not deny, but remained standing at the head 
 of Mr. Dorrien's couch, taller, more unbending than en r.
 
 JOHN DORRIKN. 177 
 
 There was something hostile in his attitude, but Mr. Dor- 
 rien was bent on conciliation, and said pleasantly. 
 
 " I hope your next journey will be more agreeable than 
 this has been, John ; though it cannot be more fortunate 
 for us than this first one." 
 
 Perhaps there was a little covert sneer in Mr. Dorrien's 
 voice as he spoke thus, but it was not that which kept 
 John silent awhile before he answered. 
 
 " I shall not travel again, sir." 
 
 " Why not ? Your coup d'essai has turned out a mas- 
 terpiece." 
 
 " I mean that I shall not stay here." 
 
 A flash of anxious surprise passed through Mr. Dor- 
 rien's blue eyes. His pale cheek colored slightly as he 
 slowly addded : 
 
 " Are you dissatisfied, John ? What cause of complaint 
 have you ? " 
 
 " None, so far as your treatment of me goes, sir," an- 
 swered John, honestly ; " but I do not like the life." 
 
 He did not add that he had come to La Maison Dorrien 
 under a false impression ; but it Avas in his heart as he 
 looked in Mr. Dorrien's face. 
 
 " You do not like the life! " repeated Mr. Dorrien, with 
 a stare.; and even the imperturbable countenance of Mr. 
 Brown, who had done counting the precious money, be- 
 trayed his amazement. If What do you mean? " 
 
 " I mean that, as any other clerk could do what I do, I 
 need not stay here." 
 
 " And you do not find this out till I have trusted you 
 as I would never dream of trusting a clerk unless he bore 
 the name of Dorrien ! " exclaimed Mr. Dorrien, sitting up 
 on his couch to look at John with cold anger and jealous 
 suspicion. What! the secret which he had guarded so 
 long, that secret which, though it might be known to Mr. 
 Bowers in Russia, was safe still in France ; that secret of 
 his weakness which his enemies, or his rivals, as dangerous 
 as foes, would so triumph over, was in a boy's keeping-, 
 and that boy could dare to speak of leaving him ! 
 
 The doubt, the reproach, stung John. 
 
 " When I leave this house," he said, " I shall forget 
 every thing I have no right to remember." 
 
 "You would have nothing to forget if you had spoken
 
 178 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 a fortnight back," said Mr. Dorrien, sharply. But, spite 
 his resentment and offended pride, he could not help say- 
 ing, " What is your motive ? " 
 
 " I wish to lead another life," answered John. 
 
 His look, his tone, his manner, were straightforward. 
 Mr. Dorrien felt he spoke truly. He shaded his eyes with 
 his hand, and looked covertly at John, who, unmindful of 
 the gaze, stood looking through the open window at the 
 golden sunlight as it was passing across the garden trees. 
 Panting like a caged bird for liberty, he watched the broad 
 boughs waving impatiently, as though they bade the sun 
 set quickly and leave them to the cool and dark repose of 
 night. " They too want to have their own way," thought 
 John. " Well, I shall soon have mine. Mr. Ryan will be 
 glad when I tell him that I have given up Mammon ; but 
 little mother will not like it." 
 
 " We must take time to think over this, John," said 
 Mr. Dorrien, after a pause. " The firm of Dorrien may 
 seem under a cloud, but for all that you will find it worth 
 your while to remain with me. You will give me your final 
 answer to-morrow. — Mr. Brown, I believe you have letters 
 for Mr. John Dorrien." 
 
 Yes, Mr. Brown had two letters, and he placed them in 
 John Dorrien's hand. One was in Mr. Ryan's cramped but 
 welcome handwriting ; the other letter, large, square, edged 
 with black, was the intimation of a death or a funeral. 
 
 " May I go now, sir?" asked John, wondering who was 
 dead, and turning to Mr. Dorrien with the letters in his 
 hand. " I have not seen my mother yet." 
 
 " You had better not go in too abruptly upon her," said 
 Mr. Dorrien. " Mrs. John has been very ill, and — " 
 
 " HI ! — my mother has been ill ! " interrupted John, 
 turning pale. 
 
 " She is out of danger now," composedly said Mr. Dor- 
 rien. 
 
 " Out of danger ! " cried John, " and I never knew it." 
 
 " My dear fellow," said Mr. Dorrien, quietly, " you trav- 
 eled as fast as the post, if not faster." 
 
 " But not faster than a telegram," said John, turning to 
 the door. 
 
 " Which would have worried you, unfitted you for busi- 
 ness, and not made you return one hour earlier."
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 179 
 
 Mr. Dorrien's coolness raised John's indignation to boil- 
 ing 1 heat. 
 
 "The business was yours," said he, with his hand on 
 the door, " but my mother is mine, Mr. Dorrien, and you 
 had no right," he added, with flashing eyes, " to keep her 
 illness or her danger from me while I was doing your 
 errand." 
 
 He left the room, and ran up-stairs in passionate grief 
 and indignation ; nor did he heed Mr. Dorrien's caution. 
 He knew better than to fear that the sight of him would 
 injure his mother. Without knock or warning he entered 
 Mrs. Dorrien's room, and found Mrs. Reginald sitting there, 
 with his mother's hand clasped within her own. The red 
 sunlight lit their two faces, one brown and healthy as ever, 
 but the other so wanlike that John could scarcely know it 
 again. 
 
 " O little mother, how ill you have been ! " he breath- 
 lessly said. 
 
 " Yes, my dear," she feebly replied. " I did not think 
 I should see you again." 
 
 " Mrs. Reginald, how long has my mother been ill ? " 
 asked John, for the change on his mother's face was that 
 of a long and wasting disease. 
 
 " Ever since the day you left." 
 
 John compressed his lips and w r ent to the window. 
 
 " Don't talk, don't flurry her, there's a dear boy," said 
 Mrs. Reginald, following him, and laying her hand on his 
 arm, as she spoke low. 
 
 " I shall not," replied John, coming back to the bedside. 
 
 Standing there, he looked down at his mother in sor- 
 rowful silence. His mother had been ill, so ill that he and 
 she might never have met again in this world, and John 
 remembered that there had been bitterness in their parting 
 — and he had not known it. 
 
 "They never told him his mother was ill," thought Mrs. 
 Reginald, whose look rested upon him. " Shame ! shame ! 
 For what if she had died ? " 
 
 But Mrs. Dorrien only looked up fondly in John's face, 
 and said, kindly: 
 
 " Never mind, dear, it is all over now, and Mrs. Regi- 
 nald has been so kind. And don't you want something to 
 eat, dear?"
 
 180 JOHN DOKRIEN. 
 
 John had eaten on the way, and said he was not hungry ; 
 but Mrs. Dorrien, mother-like, wanted her young to feed, 
 and plaintively insisted. Mrs. Reginald also said that he 
 should have something, and to please them both he con- 
 sented. 
 
 " And I shall see that the boy does eat, Mrs. John," 
 said Mrs. Reginald, rising to go down with John Dorrien. 
 " I will have no cheating, and I shall soon be back, dear." 
 
 "John," said she, as they went down together, "you 
 must not look so woe-begone. Your mother will soon get 
 round. You see she can have every comfort here. Ease, 
 rest, good wine. What letter is this that you have dropped ? " 
 she added, picking up and placing once' more in his hand 
 the black-edged letter which John had forgotten to open. 
 It bore the postmark of Saint-Ives, and at once his thoughts 
 flew to Mr. Blackmore. He had been ailing. Was this the 
 intimation of his decease ? 
 
 But, no, Mr. Blackmore had not been summoned to his 
 account. The bearer of those tidings of which man lives 
 in dread had not reached or crossed the threshold of that 
 old chateau embowered with trees, beneath whose spread- 
 ing shade ran the clear waters of the little stream which 
 John remembered so well. The swift and silent messenger, 
 who comes and makes no sign, had bowed low another 
 bead, the head of a childless man, whose inheritance, a few 
 old books, was to enrich John Dorrien. Mr. Ryan was no 
 more. So said the lettre de /aire part, in John's hand, in- 
 viting him to attend the funeral-service, to take place in 
 the parish church of Saint-Ives, at eleven in the morning, 
 on the 26th of the month. 
 
 "Bad news, John?" said Mrs. Reginald, moved with 
 the amazed grief which she read in John's face. 
 
 " Mr. Ryan is dead," replied John, in a very low voice. 
 
 " My poor boy, I am sorry. I know how you liked 
 him!" 
 
 "And this letter is from him," said poor John, looking 
 at the other letter in his han,d, which now seemed as if it 
 came to him from another world. 
 
 He could say no more. They had reached the bottom 
 of the stairs, and he went out at once to the garden to read 
 Mr. Ryan's letter there — the air of the house seemed sti- 
 fling. The sunlight had not yet faded away from the trees
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 181 
 
 and alleys ; the brown old houses which were around the 
 garden looked warm and genial in its glow, and sent back 
 sheets of gold from their glass windows ; a little bird was 
 hopping daintily in the grass path, pecking on its way ; a 
 bed of gay reines marguerites — pink, crimson, purple, and 
 blue — made a bright patch of color in the green shade ; 
 and every thing seemed airy, cheerful, and lovely, as be- 
 longing to a world knowing neither death nor decay, when 
 John read the last letter which Mr. Rj'an ever wrote to 
 him. It was a happy letter, genial and hopeful, telling 
 John that he (Mr. Ryan) was coming to Paris to see him ; 
 "and we will go over Lutctia together, my boy," wrote 
 Mr. Ryan, " and I will show you a thing or two ; and we 
 will have our day in Versailles like arrant sight-seers, and 
 prowl about those green courts and formal alleys dear to 
 the Grand Monarque and his lords and ladies. And we 
 will call up all the old ghosts that haunt the spot, and walk 
 up and down the tapis vert, and talk of ' Miriam ! ' " 
 
 John Dorrien had shed no tears when he came home 
 and found that his mother had been at death's door while 
 he was away. The blow had been too cruel and too keen 
 to move his young manhood so ; but he could have cried 
 like a child as he read this, and Mr. Ryan's brown face rose 
 before him with its happy smile — that face now hidden for- 
 ever in the little green churchward of Saint-Ives, that smile 
 as utterly vanished as yesterday's sunshine. He could have 
 cried, but he did not. The trials of the last fortnight had 
 steeled and hardened him strangely, and, when Mrs. Regi- 
 nald, who had followed him, came up to him, looking wist- 
 fully in his face, all he said was, " I shall not tell my 
 mother yet, Mrs. Reginald." 
 
 " No, of course not," she answered ; but she felt, as she 
 said it, that she must expect to know no more. 
 
 John went back to his mother's room, and parried her 
 questions as best he might, for Mrs. Dorrien saw at once 
 that something ailed him ; but even she, partly because she 
 was weak, partly because there was that in John's face 
 which forbade it, did not insist upon knowing what that 
 something was. He spent the rest of the da}' witli her, 
 taking Mrs. Reginald's duties and arm-chair, with that 
 lady's gracious consent; but he did not speak much. 
 Thought was with him — and Thought is an absorbing com-
 
 182 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 pardon, who will have the full mind and ear of whoever she 
 fastens on. As he sat bending over the low wood-fire — for 
 Mrs. Dorrien required warmth — he seemed to read his past 
 and his future in the embers. The past, a bright dream 
 already fading — the future doubtful, perplexing, and, which- 
 ever way he turned, full of trouble. 
 
 "What is he thinking of?" wondered Mrs. Dorrien, 
 watching him from her bed. 
 
 Alas ! Mrs. Dorrien's boy — her little Johnny — was solv- 
 ing for himself that riddle of life which she had tried to 
 solve for him, and he found it hard to read. The sanguine 
 mood in which he had told Mr. Dorrien a few hours ago 
 that he wished to lead another life was gone, and jn its 
 stead there had come to him the dullness of sorrow. He 
 wondered now that he had ever cared for " Miriam," for 
 poetry, for fame, for liberty — any thing. Was he a fool, or 
 had Mr. Ryan committed a fatal mistake ? Who knew ? — 
 who could tell ? He brooded long over this question. His 
 mother, who was still watching him, saw him bend over the 
 fire and read a letter twice over by its light, then remain 
 in a long, deep dream ; then rise, go to his room, and come 
 back — her heart, spite her weakness, gave a great throb — 
 with a sealed packet in his hand. Had " Miriam " — his 
 boyish passion, his first love, that fatal " Miriam " whom 
 Mrs. Dorrien still dreaded — won the day at last ? John sat 
 down again, and held the packet for a while — it was not a 
 large one, when you thought of all the promises which it 
 had once held — then he, of whom Mr. Ryan had predicted 
 that he would rival the fame and genius of John Milton, 
 thrust the packet into the fire, and looked at it burning and 
 shriveling with a sad and moody look. 
 
 We are never nearer to submission than after a strong 
 fit of revolt ; it is when we have just claimed and won lib- 
 erty that we oftenest let it escape us once more : so it was 
 with John Dorrien. 
 
 " O my boy, my poor boy, what have you done ? " 
 said Mrs. Dorrien, from her bed, leaning forward as she 
 spoke to see the manuscript burning. She spoke as she 
 felt, in much grief. She did not wish " Miriam " to pre- 
 vail, but neither would she have had her boy's dream end 
 thus. 
 
 " It is better so, little mother," replied John, coming up
 
 JOHN DOURIEN. 183 
 
 to her, and trying to speak cheerfully. " I have burned my 
 ship, and can never go back." 
 
 He did not tell her that he had done it chiefly for her 
 sake, and to secure her the ease and comfort of a safe home; 
 he did not tell her that Mr. Lvau -was dead, and that Faith 
 and Hope had seemed to go down to the grave with that 
 ardent friend ; he abided by the destiny he had chosen, and 
 his regret, if he ever felt any, remained unspoken. And so 
 La Maison Dorrien, which had undone a country gentleman 
 in .Mr. Dorrien, undid a poet in his young cousin. And 
 thus it is forever through life. We have all of us capacities 
 for a hundred positions in which we are never placed. We 
 often have to act the part least suited to our bent, and, 
 when we die, He who made us alone knows how good or 
 how evil, how great or how mean, we might have been. 
 Men of ro3 T al natures never rule; tender-hearted women 
 never love, and fine poets never write a line. Life is too 
 strong for them. A dozen children absorb the energies of 
 one, a plain face conquers the other — the genius has no 
 time. What matter, after all, so we do well what we have 
 to do, so we keep our lives pure, and our souls raised to 
 God? 
 
 The next morning John met Mr. Brown at the door of 
 Mr. Dorrien's room. 
 
 " I hope you are not really going to leave us, Mr. John," 
 said Mr. Brown, with just a shade of uneasiness on his sal- 
 low face. 
 
 " Oh ! no," replied John quietly, " T am not." 
 
 He had a brief conversation with Mr. Dorrien, and it 
 was all settled. By some mysterious intuition or other, 
 Mrs. Reginald seemed to know the point that had been at 
 issue between Mr. Dorrien and his young relative. 
 
 " My dear lad, you have done well," she said, laying her 
 hand on his arm and looking at him with her kind brown 
 eye. " Your poor mother could never battle with life 
 again." 
 
 " No, she could not," answered John, and he bowed his 
 head beneath the yoke — that hard, hard yoke of necessity 
 before which, young or old, we all must bow.
 
 184 J0 HN DORRIEN. 
 
 CHAPTER XVII. 
 
 Another seven years had passed away. They had told 
 heavily on Mr. Dorrien. He locked more languid, more 
 listless, more impassive than ever, as on a beautiful morn- 
 ing in early autumn — a morning clear, fresh, and sunny — he 
 leaned back in a leather arm-chair, and looked out on the 
 garden through the open window of the library. This room 
 was that in which John Dorrien habitually sat, and here his 
 cousin had thought to find him, and was waiting for him 
 now. With a wearied air Mr. Dorrien gazed on the glimpse 
 of blue sky, green foliage, and bright flowers, before him. 
 Nature was silent for him now, and her seasons came no 
 more with their hands full of promises. Silent, too, was 
 that fair world of intellect which his forefathers had gath- 
 ered in that room where volumes in brown calf and tarnished 
 gilding awaited, on long oaken shelves, the leisure hours 
 of the Dorriens. A few modern works had been added by 
 John; also a bronze copy of the Louvre Polymnia, who 
 stood there, with her cheek resting on her hand, and her 
 look of calm meditation — a strange contrast to all the books, 
 circulars^ and commercial papers of every sort, scattered upon 
 John's desk. What brought her here, the fair Grecian 
 muse, whose brow, though thoughtful, was wreathed with 
 flowers? — what brought her to that room, where John sat 
 day after day in anxious meditation, that had nothing to do 
 with his young love, " Miriam the Jewess ? " 
 
 Mr. Dorrien, who had never heard of that episode in 
 his cousin's life, had often wondered at his selection of that 
 slight, graceful figure for his daily companionship. A 
 Demosthenes, a gladiator, or any other vigorous antique, 
 he could have understood as a young man's choice ; but he 
 lacked the key to the past, which might have told him how 
 and why this Polymnia, with her meditative grace, was 
 dear to John Dorricn's heart. 
 
 " A pretty thing ! " he now thought, following with a 
 critical and approving eye the draped outlines of the young 
 muse — " a very pretty thing ! only quite inappropriate here." 
 
 "I beg your pardon, sir," said Mr. Brown, opening the 
 door and casting a hasty glance round the apartment, " I 
 thought Mr. John Dorrien was here."
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 185 
 
 "I tin >ught so too," replied Mr. Dorrieri, with impatience. 
 " I have just got that letter from Monsieur Basnage. What 
 does he mean, Mr. Brown ? " 
 
 He handed the letter to Mr. Brown, who went up to the 
 window and perused it attentively, but the broad sunlight 
 which fell on his yellow face (on him, too, the seven years 
 had told), and thence on the written page, revealed no th- 
 ine: to Mr. Brown's intellect. 
 
 " I do not understand it," said he, after a pause of con- 
 sideration. " Monsieur Basnage seems to refer to some 
 order which he received last month." 
 
 " I gave him none," murmured Mr. Dorrien, shutting 
 his eyes wearily. " I wish Mr. John Dorrien would have 
 these letters directed to himself. Where is the use of fret- 
 tine: me with business which I do not understand?" 
 
 " Mr. John Dorrien does not like to presume," suggested 
 Mr. Brown. 
 
 " Yes, yes, I know he means well, but it is tiresome. — 
 You wanted something, Mr. Brown — can I do any thing 
 for you ? " 
 
 " No, sir, I think notj" candidly answered Mr. Brown. 
 " Mr. Plummer wants to see Mr. John Dorrien about some 
 new people down in Rouen." 
 
 " Who want to have dealings with us ? " suggested Mr. 
 Dorrien. 
 
 " Yes, sir, large dealings — very large dealings." 
 
 "Too large?" 
 
 " I fear so, sir — I fear so. They are very new people." 
 
 Mr. Dorrien seemed to think the matter over. 
 
 "Yes, better leave Mr. John Dorrien to manage with 
 Mr. Plummer," he said, after a pause. " Any thing else, 
 Mr. Brown ? " 
 
 " Verncy brought these." 
 
 Mr. Brown took a chair as he spoke, and handed his 
 master a series of designs for the fancy note-paper which, 
 for the last six months, had become the speciality, as they 
 called it, of the Maison Dorrien. These designs were very 
 varied, very fanciful, and sometimes very pretty or very 
 foolish. One was a Cupid dressed like a postman, and 
 holding out a letter ; another was a flower — a plain heart's- 
 ease, or French pen sec ; a third was an initial letter in a 
 wreath of roses; a fourth was mediaeval in character, and
 
 186 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 mio-ht have adorned a missal — all were executed in water- 
 colors, with great taste and care. 
 
 " The initial letter and the heart' s-ease are to be half- 
 raised," remarked Mr. Brown. 
 
 " Yes, I suppose so. Well, I am sure I can't say whether 
 they will do or not, Mr. Brown," said Mr. Dorrien, putting 
 down the designs on the table before him ; " better leave 
 them here for Mr. John Dorrien — it was he who first brought 
 this branch in, and he understands it very well." 
 
 " It has been very useful," said Mr. Brown, significant- 
 ly — " very useful." 
 
 " Oh, very ; I do not know what we should have done 
 without it, Mr. Brown." 
 
 Mr. Brown thought he knew, but, as his knowledge 
 was not of a pleasant nature, he did not express it in 
 words. 
 
 "Then I shall tell Verney to leave them and call again," 
 said he, nodding toward the designs. 
 
 " Yes, Mr. Brown, if you please ; and will you give this 
 note of Basnasre's to mv cousin, and ask him either to an- 
 swer it himself, or, if he thinks that I should do so, to come 
 and have a talk with me this afternoon ? Now," added Mr. 
 Dorrien, taking out his watch and looking at it, " I think I 
 shall go out — I do not feel very well this morning." 
 
 The door opened as he rose, and Durand — now no 
 longer volatile, but grave, already bald, and indeed rather 
 morose — came in with a telegram. It was for John Dor- 
 rien, but Mr. Dorrien tore it open and glanced over it. 
 
 "Now, this is provoking!" he exclaimed, addressing 
 Mr. Brown in English. " This telegram is from Mr. Hall, 
 of London. I know that, when he was last over, John ap- 
 plied to him for information about having a depot in 
 Buenos Ayres, and here is the answer ; and Mr. Hall is 
 most urgent about our catching the boat. ' See about it 
 at once,' he says. Really Mr. John Dorrien should not be 
 out of the way, in the morning especially." 
 
 "It does not happen often, sir," Mr. Brown remarked, 
 with a half-wistful look, "not often." 
 
 " No, it does not ; and Heaven knows I grudge him 
 nothing, Mr. Brown ; only you see so much rests upon him " 
 — (" So much ! " thought Mr. Brown — " every thing ! ") — 
 " that he cannot be missed with impunity. Well, this
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 187 
 
 must wait, and yet, if it is not attended to to-day, we lose 
 this boat, says Mr. Hall. Well, I think I shall go now, 
 Mr. Brown ; it is no use my staying within, so far as I can 
 
 see." 
 
 So Mr. Dorrienleft the room, and had his horse saddled, 
 and presently rode out, as he did every morning now, car- 
 rying his wearied, languid looks down the Rue de Rivoli, 
 and thence down the Champs Elysees till he reached the 
 shaded avenues of the Bois de Boulogne. 
 
 Mr. Brown placed the letter, the telegram, and the 
 drawings, in his clear, methodical fashion, on the table, so 
 that they should be the first objects to catch John Dorrien's 
 sight when he came in ; then he returned to his own room. 
 He had not long been gone when the door of the library 
 opened again, and John Dorrien himself entered the apart- 
 ment. 
 
 John was twenty-four now. He was not much taller 
 than when we saw him seven years ago, but he was much 
 altered. Strength of body, and gravity of aspect, were the 
 characteristics of his young manhood. John Dorrien had 
 given himself up to business, as he gave himself up to every 
 thing, entirely, and thought and care had left their signs 
 upon him. His gray eyes had all their early fire and ten- 
 derness, but the sunshine seemed to have left his face, till a 
 word, a thought called it back, bright as ever ; for, after all, 
 John Dorrien was young, twenty-four, no more, and though 
 Providence had placed a heavy burden on his shoulders, it 
 was not more than he could bear. Much work and little 
 leisure — such was his portion now, a hard one for the 
 classical scholar of Saint-Ives, and the ambitious boy-poet 
 whom Mr. Ryan had placed on a level with John Milton. 
 
 His keen look at once detected the letter, the telegram, 
 and the drawings, which Mr. Brown had placed in readiness 
 for him. He took the telegram first, stood with it for a 
 while in his hand meditating, then threw it by carelessly. 
 Mr. Hall was very kind, and meant well ; but he, John 
 Dorrien, felt in no hurry to catch the boat; that matin- 
 could wait. Mr. Plummer's epistle met with more favor ; 
 the house in Rouen seemed a safe house to John Dorrien, 
 and he went at once to select such wares as might suit 
 Norman and provincial taste. He crossed the sunlit court, 
 with the sky looking down over the dajk edge of the slate
 
 188 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 roofs ; a swallow was whirling gayly in the blue air, and 
 John gave her a look of envy. " It is well to be you," he 
 thought, " it is well to be you." But once he had entered 
 the dark old rooms in which the paper was stored, piled 
 from floor to ceiling in gray packages of unpromising as- 
 pect, John Dorrien became the man of business, and forgot 
 the swallow, the sunshine, and the clear September sky. 
 
 Monsieur Durand was the custodian of the Dorrien 
 wares, and John Dorrien found him walking about the 
 rooms with a pen behind his ear, and a note-book in his 
 hand. 
 
 "The book of samples, if you please," he said briefly, 
 as he sat down before a large table heaped with portfolios. 
 Monsieur Durand took one of these, placed it before his 
 young master, and resumed his sauntering examination of 
 the wares placed under his care. John Dorrien opened the 
 book of samples, and turned over the contents with quiet 
 attention. Nature had bestowed upon him two of the 
 gifts which help to insure success in business : intuition 
 and tact. Mr. Brown's experience, Mr. Dorrien's judgment 
 and taste, were often at fault ; John Dorrien's mistakes 
 were slight and rare. He seemed to know without effort 
 the thing -which it was wise for him to do. These Rouen 
 people wanted the newest vignette note-paper of the Maison 
 Dorrien ; well, some of the newest they should have, but 
 only that which John Dorrien thought good for them — 
 only that which he considered sure to go off well in the 
 great commercial Norman city. He selected a certain 
 quantity of patterns of note-paper and envelopes, put them 
 by, and said to Durand : 
 
 " You will show these to any one who comes in Mr. 
 Plummer's name, but you will show nothing else." 
 
 Monsieur Durand looked up in a sort of doubt. Only a 
 dozen or two of patterns, when there were dozens upon 
 dozens to dispose of — when some, as Durand knew, hung 
 heavily on the hands of La Maison Dorrien. 
 
 "Only these patterns will you show," repeated John 
 Dorrien, rising. — " When is Verney coming again ? " 
 
 " I believe this is he," replied Monsieur Durand. 
 
 " Then let him come here at once." 
 
 The door of the store-room opened, and a slender, dan- 
 dyish young man, with a very dissipated face, hands -which
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 189 
 
 a prince might have envied, they were so beautiful and 
 white, and dainty little feet, shod in marvelous Parisian 
 boots, entered the dark room in which John Dorrien sat. 
 The new-comer was redolent of the fragrance of the best 
 cigars, and looked at the young merchant through half-shut, 
 languid eyes. 
 
 " One would like to kick that fellow ! " muttered Durand 
 sourly ; but John Dorrien's fine, intellectual countenance 
 onlv relaxed in shrewd amusement. 
 
 J 
 
 " Well, Verney," he said, quietly, " I have glanced over 
 your novelties, and do not like them much. They are not 
 worthy of your usual taste and fancy, Verney. A little too 
 much of the green lady in them. I must have something 
 fresher." 
 
 " In what style ? " asked Verney, languidly. 
 
 " I want it for any large commercial city — give me some- 
 thing—" 
 
 ' ; In the railway line ? " interrupted Verney, with a lit- 
 tle sneer. " I know — an engine on the rail, or any thing of 
 that kind ? " 
 
 " Give me something pastoral or idyllic," resumed John 
 Dorrien, as if he had not spoken — " any thing of Arcadia 
 that you can compass ; and, Verney, I must have it soon, or 
 not at all. Let me see, to day is Monday — well, then, by 
 next Wednesday I shall expect you." 
 
 He rose, as if the matter were dismissed. It was his 
 way of dealing with Monsieur Verney, whose insolent 
 temper could not otherwise be kept within bounds. 
 
 " By next Wednesday, eh ? " he said, carelessly. " Well, 
 I shall see." 
 
 He turned on his heel with a nod and let himself out. 
 As he crossed one of the outer rooms, he found Durand 
 there, still busy with his note-book. 
 
 " So some new commercial town has turned up for the 
 vignette ? " said he, inquiringly. 
 
 " Haa there ? " retorted Durand. 
 
 " Saint-Etienne, Lyons, Rouen '? " continued Verney. 
 
 "Very likely," replied Durand, with great tranquillity. 
 
 " Better tell me— I shall find it out." 
 
 " Do." 
 
 Verney did not answer this, but walked out, then turned 
 back.
 
 190 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 " Have you any matches ? " he asked. 
 
 " You will find some at the tobacconist's opposite," 
 shortly answered Durand, turning his back upon him. 
 
 Verney whistled to himself and went out. Under the 
 lofty archway he met a shabbily -dressed, depressed-looking 
 man, with a roll of paper under his arm. He obsequiously 
 took off his hat to Verney. 
 
 " I believe I have the honor of addressing Monsieur 
 Dorrien ? " 
 
 " Your business is with him ? " said Verney, composedly. 
 " Well, monsieur, how can I assist you ? " 
 
 The man's face brightened, and his depressed eyes took 
 an eager look. 
 
 " I am an inventor, monsieur," he said, " and I have 
 here a new paper, which can make the fortune of any 
 house." 
 
 " Show it to me " coolly said Verney, stretching out his 
 hand for the roll of paper ; but even as the inventor was in 
 the act of slipping off the string that tied it up, John Dor- 
 rien appeared. " That is Monsieur Dorrien," said the un- 
 abashed Verney, walking out into the street, while the in- 
 ventor looked bewildered and amazed ; but though it took 
 a little time to enlighten him concerning his mistake, he 
 discovered it at length, and explained his errand. 
 
 John Dorrien never threw away a chance. A year be- 
 fore this he had detected in a thin youth in a blouse, with 
 feet through his shoes, the talent of Verney, turned it into 
 the only channel that could suit La Maison Dorrien, and by 
 a splendid salary secured the exclusive possession of what 
 Monsieur Verney was pleased to call his genius. It had 
 been a good thing for La Maison Dorrien, but it had been 
 a better one for Monsieur Verney himself, though he did 
 not choose to confess it, but grumbled that these Dorriens 
 were living on his brains, and rolled in their carriages, or 
 rode their thorough-breds, while he hired his wretched hacks, 
 and that even only now and then. John Dorrien, as we 
 said, never threw a chance away ; inventors came to him 
 daily, but he never dismissed one unheard. 
 
 " Please to come here with me," he said, leading his 
 visitor across the court to the library. There they both sat 
 down, and the inventor opened his roll of papers and dis- 
 played its contents.
 
 JOHN DORR1EN. . 191 
 
 " Sir," said ho, with the sad, wearisome earnestness of 
 all such men, " it is a wonderful invention, and it will make 
 your fortune, if you are wise. I have spent a lifetime in 
 perfecting this paper, and a little fortune in getting it man- 
 ufactured; but now that I have it with a patent, I cannot 
 dispose of it ; and, monsieur, I am getting old, and I am 
 very wearied. I want rest and comfort, and I will part 
 with the patent for a moderate sum." 
 
 " I understand," replied John Dorrien, gently, for use 
 had not yet blunted the kindness he could not help feeling 
 for such men, so earnest, so tired,' so heart-sick, so wearied 
 — " I understand, but let us see the paper first." 
 
 He took it up, and was amazed at its beauty. It was 
 only note-paper, but of the richest and the finest quality. 
 The inventor looked at him with glistening eyes. He could 
 not keep silent. 
 
 " Well, monsieur, he said, " you see what it is — cream- 
 laid, vellum, all in one. I call it papyrus. It will rival the 
 finest English paper, and in my opinion surpass it. There 
 is nothing like it in this country." 
 
 "It is very good," said John Dorrien — "very beautiful 
 and good. But what does it cost ? In plain speech, what 
 profit can it yield ? " 
 
 " It is cheap — quite cheap," said the inventor, eagerly. 
 " I have all the figures, all the bills here; " and in a trice a 
 bundle of papers was brought out. John Dorrien checked 
 him. 
 
 " I have no time. now," he said, quietly ; " but if you 
 can come to-morrow morning at eight, I shall be able to 
 enter on this matter with you." 
 
 Reluctantly the inventor took up his papers. He tried, 
 indeed, to persuade monsieur to hear him now, and it was 
 only by blank refusal that John Dorrien won his liberty. 
 Scarcely had the door closed upon him when it opened 
 ae-ain, and Monsieur Durand entered. Monsieur Durand 
 had come to ask monsieur if his cousin could call at four 
 that afternoon. 
 
 " You mean about that clerk's situation ? " said John 
 Dorrien. " Yes, he may come, Durand, but he will not do. 
 We want an older man ; a boy of sixteen cannot suit us. 
 Still I will give him a hearing ; but you know my opinion 
 on the subject."
 
 193 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 " I will take him under my own care if need be," said 
 Durand, eagerly. 
 
 " You are not always within, or at leisure," answered 
 John, a little coldly. 
 
 Durand made no reply, but withdrew. John remained 
 alone, and, as he thought, at leisure ; but he was mis- 
 taken. 
 
 " All I want to know is this," said a well-known voice 
 from the depths of an arm-chair, which stood, half-bidden, 
 near the heavy window-curtain : " John Dorrien, are you a 
 prime-minister, or are you not ? " 
 
 The voice was well known, but it had not been heard 
 for years, and John Dorrien could not repress a start on 
 being thus addressed. At once his look sought the arm- 
 chair, and there discovered the handsome, laughing face 
 of Oliver Blackmore. 
 
 " You ! " he cried, with sparkling eyes — " you, Oliver ? " 
 he added, with a hearty welcome. 
 
 " Yes, my dear boy, it is I — I, just wakened from a 
 most refreshing nap. When I came an hour ago, you 
 were with Verney — who is Verney ? — and I came here and 
 waited, and fell asleep ; then I woke, to find you discussing 
 inventions, I took another nap, foreseeing you would be 
 long about it ; then I woke again, and, lo ! you are reject- 
 ing candidates and granting situations ; and so I show my- 
 self and claim my turn." 
 
 " And you have, and shall keep it," said John Dorrien, 
 heartily. " Well, Oliver Blackmore,. how have you been 
 all these years ? " 
 
 He looked kindly at his old friend. Oliver was little 
 altered. A silky black beard scarcely marred the early 
 boyish beauty of his handsome face. His person had ac- 
 quired strength and grace, and the very mourning which 
 he wore — Mr. Blackmore had not been long dead, as John 
 knew — added to his interesting appearance. He was still 
 the fascinating Oliver whom old and young, rich and poor, 
 all liked with intuitive, unreasoning liking. John's ques- 
 tion he now answered composedly. 
 
 " Oliver Blackmore is dead. Do not start, my dear 
 boy ; I mean, that such a person exists no more — or, if you 
 like it better, never existed, unless by courtesy." 
 
 The sensitive face of John Dorrien colored up; in a mo-
 
 JOHN DOR KIEV. 193 
 
 ment he divined all. Oliver Blackmore was not, according 
 to law, the son of the man who had reared him. 
 
 " Never mind, old fellow," said Oliver, with a careless 
 but rather dreary laugh. " I suppose it will make no dif- 
 ference to you ; and even if it did, I must bear it. But I 
 am Oliver Black now ; I have dropped the ' more,' so as 
 not to lead to awkward mistakes — for there is a rightful 
 Oliver Blackmore — the late Mr. Blackmore's heir. He be- 
 haved very fairly — gave me five hundred pounds, when he 
 need not have given me a shilling, but hinted that I had 
 better alter my surname, so I took Black. Any other 
 name would have done me as well, but I had got used to 
 the O. B. on my pocket-handkerchiefs, and at the end of 
 my letters, and so I am Oliver Black, Esquire. My poor 
 old dad ! What a handsome old boy he was ! He meant 
 kindly by me, but he had no time. He has left me neither 
 house nor land, nor gold nor silver, nor name. Yet, if ever 
 I can, I will buy back La Maison Rouge, for his sake. Mr. 
 Oliver Blackmore does not care about the place, and means 
 to sell it. And now, my dear fellow, that you know all 
 this, just give me a plain answer to a plain question. You 
 seem to have a very fair berth of it here. Is your boat 
 large enough to take me in ? Can I have an oar in it ? In 
 plain speech, would that clerk's situation, which I heard 
 asked of you a while back, do for me ? " 
 
 " For you, Oliver ! " said John, with some emphasis. 
 
 " My dear fellow, I entreat that you will have no false 
 shame about it. Forget that Oliver Blackmore, son and 
 heir of James Blackmore, ever existed. He is dead, I tell ' 
 you, dead and buried, and Oliver Black is ready to turn an 
 honest penny the best way he can. Come, shall I reckon 
 up his accomplishments? A tolerable person, and gentle- 
 manlike address ; but that, perhaps, is not a recommenda- 
 tion ; four languages, two of which he possesses fluently, a 
 good arithmetician, tolerably shrewd, and not easily taken 
 in. Surely, when I add that the first year's salary is no 
 object, you can give me a trial." 
 
 "You mean that you can give this thing atrial?" said 
 John. "I do not think, Oliver, that you can realize it." 
 
 " I do not think, my dear boy, that you can realize what 
 it is to fall from tine jolie position to no position at all. 
 It has a most soberizing, chastening influence on the spirit." 
 9
 
 194 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 " Still I cannot fancy you on a high stool at a desk," 
 said John, positively. " You must not think of it, Oliver." 
 
 " You will drive me to despair ! " cried Oliver, raising 
 his hands. " I assure you that a high stool — the loftier 
 the better — is just now the summit of my ambition. Be- 
 sides," added Oliver, in a tone between jest and earnest, 
 " have I not told you that I am to buy back La Maison 
 Rouge ? And do you not understand that the ambition 
 which aspires to the purchase of a Norman chateau must 
 needs stoop, if it would take so sure a spring ? " 
 
 " No," decisively said John, who had acquired the 
 habit of peremptory speech, " that must not be ; but I 
 have something else that may do. We have been estab- 
 lishing depots all over France, in order to get the retail 
 business into our hands, only I have a strong fancy that 
 some of our agents are not quite sound. I had some 
 thoughts of giving them a look, but I think that, after a 
 few conversations with me, you can manage that matter." 
 
 Oliver looked at him with his soft black eyes, and was 
 silent a while. 
 
 " And this is your gift ? " he said, at length. " Are 
 you a partner, John ? " 
 
 John Dorrien smiled. 
 
 " I am not a partner," he answered, " but I am a Dor- 
 rien, and, so, though I am legally nothing, I am practically 
 every thing in the house. As a matter of form I always 
 consult Mr. Dorrien, who always approves whatever I sug- 
 gest. Come and dine with us this evening at seven. I 
 shall have spoken to him, and you will find it all settled. 
 I mean, if it suits you." 
 
 "If!" echoed Oliver, with marked emphasis. "Of 
 course it does, you lucky heir-apparent, for, of course, too, 
 there is no one between you and the Dorrien inheritance." 
 
 " Mr. Dorrien has a granddaughter," a little dryly re- 
 plied John. 
 
 Oliver whistled. 
 
 " And you are not a partner ? " he said. " My dear 
 John, take the advice of a friend, secure the partnership. 
 But, by-the-by, is the heiress young and pretty ? " 
 
 " I have not seen her since she was a child." 
 
 " Ah ! well, heiresses are always young and pretty ! " 
 rejoined Oliver, coolly, " and T see a matrimonial alliance
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 195 
 
 looming in the distance. "Well, well, I also see that you 
 have no more time to spare. Seven, did you say ? Of 
 course I must be punctual ? " 
 
 " Mr. Dorrien would not delay his dinner five minutes 
 for a prince," said John, quietly. 
 
 "And a disinherited prince has no right to keep any 
 one waiting," was Oliver's philosophic comment. " Please 
 tell Mr. Dorrien about the change of name," he added, as 
 they parted, and he stood on the door-step drawing on his 
 gloves. " It is so horribly awkward having to tell that 
 sort of thing one's self! What a curious old place of yours 
 this is, John ! Venerable and imposing, but not cheerful, 
 yet 1 suppose you see a few human beings in it." 
 
 " Not many," candidly answered John. " The Dorriens 
 have never been sociable. Mr. Dorrien has bad health, and 
 I have no time." 
 
 "A monk in a cloister — money your divinity," said Oli- 
 ver. " And what of ' Miriam ? ' I beg your pardon," he 
 added, as John started and colored. " I forgot that was a 
 secret ; but I once overheard you and Ryan in Saint-Ives 
 — how you two did go on, to be sure ! — and I wondered if 
 you kept it on. Of course, I ought to have known better ; 
 all that is done for now. You will not forget about the 
 Black instead of Blackmore, if you please." 
 
 Rather gravely John promised to tell Mr. Dorrien all 
 that was needful, and for a moment he stood and watched 
 Oliver, as the young man crossed the court, and went into 
 the street through the great open gate. 
 
 " Then I was not mistaken," he thought. " I felt long 
 ago that he knew it ; and I was not mistaken, he did know 
 about ' Miriam.' Well, it does not matter now. As he 
 says, all that is done for." He turned back into the li- 
 brary and looked at his watch. It was only one. He had 
 actually a quarter of an hour to spare, fifteen precious min- 
 utes to snatch from the greedy fingers of Time, his pitiless 
 task-master. He stretched out his hand toward one of the 
 book-shelves, he took down a volume, then he placed it 
 back unopened, and went up to his mother's sitting- 
 room. 
 
 That room, since John had become a great man in the 
 firm, was no longer on the second lloor, but on the first. 
 It no longer overlooked the dull court, but the pleasant
 
 196 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 garden. Mrs. Dorrien, who was now an habitual invalid, 
 rarely left it, unless in unexceptionable weather. Day after 
 day she sat sewing', often alone, often, too, cheered by Mrs. 
 Reginald's company. The two ladies were together when 
 John came in upon them. The warm sunshine pouring in 
 through the window showed him Mrs. Dorrien, pale and 
 wearied, in her chair, and Mrs. Reginald, brown and ener- 
 getic, standing by her, and looking down at her with her 
 arms folded, and her head on one side. 
 
 " I tell you it is only bile, my dear," she was saying ; 
 "and if you could get rid of that bile — " 
 
 " My dear, you refer every thing to bile," interrupted 
 John's mother. "-When Madame Basnage died, you said — " 
 
 " It was biliousness," interrupted Mrs. Reginald, in her 
 turn ; " and so it was — she lived upon pate, de fole gras, 
 and it stands to reason that, this being the diseased liver 
 of a fowl — " Here she became aware of John's entrance, 
 and the two ladies greeted the young man with a warmth 
 which showed how dear he was to both. 
 
 " O John, how nice of you to come ! " said his mother, 
 her pale face lighting up at his aspect. 
 
 " There's a good boy," emphatically said Mrs. Reginald, 
 whom time had scarcely altered. She was a little thinner, 
 a little older than when we saw her last, but her brown 
 eye was as keen, and her deep voice as kind and as hearty 
 as ever. 
 
 " Yes, of course I am a good boy," answered John, sit- 
 ting down between the two, " for I have been providing 
 you with a guest, Mrs. Reginald — my old friend Oliver is 
 to dine with us this evening." 
 
 " Oliver ? " cried Mrs. Dorrien, with sudden interest. 
 " Oh ! how is he, John ? He lost his father some time ago, 
 did he not ? " 
 
 " He lost his father, his name, his position, and his for- 
 tune," answered John. " He is no longer Oliver Black- 
 more, but Oliver Black, and, having to earn his bread, he 
 will probably become one of us." 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien was all amazement, consternation, and per- 
 plexity. John had to explain. He did so briefly enough, 
 but quite plainly. 
 
 " Is it possible ? " exclaimed Mrs. Dorrien, folding her 
 hands and shaking her head slowly. " Poor Oliver ! — and
 
 JOHN DORRIEN". 197 
 
 do you really think you can got him into the firm, John ? 
 Suppose Mr. Dorrien should object ? " 
 
 John laughed. 
 
 " Why, little mother," said he, "you will not understand 
 that 1 have more power than Mr. Dorrien himself." 
 
 " Then why are vou not a partner ? " asked Mrs. Dor- 
 rien, looking injured. 
 
 " Where is the need ? " retorted John. 
 
 Mrs. Reginald held up her forefinger. 
 
 "John," said she, "be a partner if you can." 
 
 John laughed again. He was amused at the coincidence 
 of the advice with that of Oliver. 
 
 " What would }-ou say, both of you," said he, " if I were 
 to tell you the substance of a conversation Mr. Dorrien and 
 I had together yesterday evening ? " 
 
 " Tell us all about it, John ! " cried Mrs. Reginald, with 
 a sparkle in her eye ; " and don't give us the substance, 
 which is just the skeleton, but the real flesh and blood, and 
 not a mere pack of bones." 
 
 John shook his head. 
 
 " I have only a few minutes, Mrs. Reginald, I must con- 
 dense. What Mr. Dorrien said was this : ' John, it is time 
 that you should have your proper position in the business. 
 It will give us both more weight. You ought to be a part- 
 ner — Monsieur Basnage was saying something about it only 
 the other day.' " 
 
 " I am so glad," murmured Mrs. Dorrien, with a sigh 
 of relief. 
 
 " Go on," said Mrs. Reginald. " When is it to be, 
 John ? " 
 
 " When I marry," answered John, smiling — " that is 
 Mr. Dorricn's only condition." 
 
 The two ladies exchanged significant glances, then 
 looked very blank. 
 
 " What ! marry that foolish little vixen who flew like a 
 fury at her aunt ? " said Mrs. Reginald in her deep voice — 
 " nonsense ! " 
 
 "What a pity Mr. Dorrien ever took such a fancy into 
 his head ! " exclaimed John's mother, looking at him anx- 
 iously. " He is right in wishing you to marry, John, only 
 I wish it were some one else." 
 
 John smilerl, but spoke not.
 
 198 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 " All ! if it were Mademoiselle Basnage," regretfully 
 continued Mrs. Dorrien ; " such a sweet girl, John, and so 
 rich ! a million francs for her dot ! " 
 
 She sighed as she said it, for of course Mademoiselle 
 Basnage was out of the question. 
 
 " Nonsense ! " said Mrs. Reginald, " a little curly Pari- 
 sian doll, John, only — " 
 
 " I must go," said John, rising, " my time is out. You 
 will not forget, little mother, not to call Oliver by the name 
 of Blackmore, if you can join us. It is a severe trial to 
 him." 
 
 It was a trial, but his troubles sat more lightly on Oli- 
 ver than John Dorrien thought. There is a certain hardness 
 which lies hidden in some easy, pleasant natures, even as 
 the stone is the very heart of a luscious fruit. On parting 
 from his friend, Mr. Black, since such was his name, hailed 
 a cab and drove down the boulevards. On reaching the 
 fashionable regions he. alighted, entered a cafe, all mirrors 
 and frescoes ; sat, smoked a cigar, looked into Figaro, 
 gazed out dreamily at the bright changing scene before 
 him, and sipped something out of a glass every now and 
 then. Beau Brummel had once eaten a pea, and Oliver 
 Black, who had a horror of drinking, pleasantly confessed 
 that he had done so once or twice in the course of his ex- 
 istence. He thus spent a fair portion of the afternoon, then 
 went home to his quiet hotel, Rue du Luxembourg, wrote 
 a few letters, dressed for dinner, and entered the Hotel 
 Dorrien at a quarter to seven. 
 
 Oliver Black was not shown to the great drawing-room 
 on the first-floor. The dining-room was on the ground- 
 floor of the house ; it overlooked the garden, and its two 
 tall windows afforded a pleasant prospect of the graveled 
 alleys, tall trees, and old river-god of that green inclosure. 
 It was preceded by a sitting-room, simplj^ but handsomely 
 furnished, where Mr. Dorricn's family always met for a few 
 minutes before going in to dinner. Two large mirrors gave 
 the room depth and brightness ; and the water-colors on the 
 walls, rich views of Venice, in all the dying glory of her 
 magic sunsets, of her rose-colored palaces, and white-marble 
 churches, made it a room very pleasant to the eye. No 
 door divided it from the drawing-room. Heavy crimson- 
 velvet hangings closed it in when the weather was cold,
 
 JOHN DOKUIEN. 109 
 
 but they were oftener drawn apart, and it was decidedly 
 pleasant to sit in that room and look at the next — to see 
 by the light of the chandelier a bright, cheerful table laid 
 out with all that shining old plate, sparkling crystal, white 
 damask, and fresh flowers, can add of luxurious comfort to 
 man's " daily bread. 1 ' 
 
 In this room, on which he bestowed a quiet but approv- 
 ing look, Oliver Black was welcomed by John Dorrien, and 
 introduced to the master of the house, by whom he was 
 graciously received, but simply as a guest, and without any 
 reference to business. Mr. Brown, too, was present, quiet 
 and collected as usual, and Mrs. Reginald in her stiff silk. 
 She surveyed Oliver Black from head to foot attentively, 
 though rapidly ; then withdrew from the handsome and 
 pleasing face of the young man with a perplexed meaning 
 mi her countenance, which amused John Dorrien. He knew 
 that it was Mrs. Reginald's habit to come to prompt and 
 irrevocable conclusions concerning faces, and it was evident 
 that Oliver's baffled her. 
 
 " Your poor mother is too unwell to come down," she 
 said, turning to John, who expressed his regret. " Poor 
 dear ! " compassionately continued Mrs. Reginald. She 
 had in some sort adopted Mrs. Dorrien and took her ail- 
 ments — and they, alas ! were many — to heart, as if they 
 were a child's. " But she mus't eat," she persisted, " she 
 must have some chicken." 
 
 Oliver Black, talking to Mr. Dorrien, gave a guilty start 
 as he overheard this aparte. He had forgotten Mrs. Dor- 
 rien's existence, and, of course, never mentioned her to 
 John ; but Oliver was never at a loss for a plausible excuse, 
 and, before five minutes were over, he had skillfully ex- 
 plained to his friend the cause of his silence. Three years 
 a<ro he had heard that John had lost his dear mother through 
 a most painful accident, and thus he had shrunk from men- 
 tioning the name of Mrs. Dorrien, concerning whose health 
 he now inquired with evident sympathy. If John was not 
 deceived, he at least betrayed no skepticism ; but Mrs. 
 Reginald, turning right round on her chair, as if she were 
 moving on a pivot, fastened her brown eye full on Oliver 
 Black's handsome face, and said, point-blank : 
 
 " What accident did you say, Mr. Black ? " 
 
 " A railway accident," answered Oliver, in a subdued
 
 200 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 tone, and as if he shrank from the imaginary injuries a falla- 
 cious report had inflicted on Mrs. Dorrien. 
 
 Mrs. Reginald sniffed indignantly. 
 
 " A railway accident, indeed ! As if the poor dear were 
 in a state to go gadding about ! And pray, sir," with an- 
 other boring look at Oliver, "who may have told you this 
 precious cock-and-bull story about Mrs. John ? " 
 
 " Mrs. Septimus Longford. Do you know her ? " 
 
 " No, sir, do you ? " retorted Mrs. Reginald, with what 
 she considered cutting irony. 
 
 "Very slightly," answered Oliver, with his low, pleas- 
 ant laugh. 
 
 " The more's the pity," said Mrs. Reginald, raising her 
 voice as she rose and shook out her stiff silk skirts, " for I 
 should have liked you to give her a message from me con- 
 cerning her veracity. The idea of representing poor Mrs. 
 John, who does not leave her room from one week's end to 
 another, as being in a railway-carriage at all ! Mrs. Long- 
 ford, indeed ! Mrs. Longbow, I say." 
 
 " But, my dear madam, I do not think I should have 
 delivered your message," replied Oliver, giving her his arm 
 to take her in to dinner. " I never deliver unpleasant mes- 
 sages, to ladies especially." 
 
 This was said as suavely as if Mrs. Reginald had been 
 the youngest and fairest of her sex, but it did not mollify 
 the displeasure and mistrust which Oliver's unfortunate 
 white lie had roused within that lady's breast. In vain he 
 was courteous, refined, and charming, during the whole of 
 dinner-time; in vain he was as attentive to her as if his 
 fate in the firm hung on her breath — nothing could soften 
 Mrs. Reginald. War was declared by her on this first even- 
 ing of her acquaintance with John's friend, and with Mrs. 
 Reginald war, once begun, generally meant war to the end 
 of the chapter. 
 
 In the course of the evening Mr. Dorrien gracefully ex- 
 pressed to Mr. Black his approbation of the suggestion 
 made by Mr. John Dorrien, with whom, in the same lan- 
 guid, graceful way, he left him to settle business particu- 
 lars. Oliver bowed, and expressed his acknowledgments 
 after the same quiet fashion, and no more was said till he 
 left. This was early, for the young man was quick to de- 
 tect the signs of weariness on Mr. Dorrien's face, and to
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 201 
 
 set him at liberty. His tact was rewarded by that gentle- 
 man's unqualified approbation, expressed to Mr. Brown al- 
 most as soon as the door closed upon the two young men, 
 John having volunteered to walk down the boulevards with 
 his friend. 
 
 "I think, Mr. Brown, that we may congratulate Mr. 
 John Dorrien on this friend of his," said he. " I feel sure 
 he is the very sort of person we have been wanting all 
 this time." 
 
 " Mr. John's choice of individuals is always good," said 
 Mr. Brown. 
 
 Mrs. Reginald sniffed rather indignantly on hearing 
 this, but she never made any comment on business in Mr. 
 Dorrien's presence, and she kept her opinion of John's 
 friend for Mrs. Dorrien, with whom she went and sat, as 
 usual, for a few minutes before going to bed. She found 
 Mrs. Dorrien pale, sad, and dull, but ready to brighten up 
 at her aspect. 
 
 " Well, dear, and how are you ? " she asked, in her 
 kind, cheery voice, sitting down opposite to her friend, in 
 order to take a survey of her as she said it. 
 
 "Ever so much better for your coming, dear," replied 
 Mrs. Dorrien, who was not given to complain. 
 
 " Of course you are ; but did j r ou eat any chicken ? " 
 
 " A little, thank you." 
 
 " I don't like * a little.' He is a mean, pitiful sneak — 
 have nothing to do with him, dear." 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien smiled, and asked how she liked John's 
 friend. Whereupon Mrs. Reginald tossed her head, and 
 answered briefly : 
 
 " I don't like him, Mrs. John." 
 
 " Don't you ? Why so, dear ? " 
 
 "I don't like him," reiterated Mrs. Reginald, staring 
 hard at a picture on the wall. 
 
 " John says that he is so amiable," said Mrs. John. 
 
 " I don' like him at all," persisted Mrs. Reginald, look- 
 ing up at the ceiling, as if firmly resolved never to utter 
 the cause of her dislike. Her manner made Mrs. Dorrien 
 uneasy. She put more questions. Did Mr. Dorrien like 
 Mr. Black? Oh! yes, very much so. And was he, Mr. 
 Black, going to join the business? Yes, Mr. Black was 
 going to be something or other in the firm, replied Mrs.
 
 202 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 Reginald, tightening her lips, as if she chose to make no 
 further comment. 
 
 " But what is it that you do dislike in him, dear ? " 
 asked Mrs. John, in her most persuasive tones. " You can- 
 not dislike him without a cause." 
 
 " Well, I don't like his ears, to begin with," candidly 
 replied Mrs. Reginald. " Of course you think that is non- 
 sense, but I always go by something or other in my likes 
 and dislikes. With some it is eyes. I fell in love at 
 once with dear John's. With others it is hands or feet, 
 and with Mr. Black it is his ears. You may laugh, but I 
 know what I am saying." 
 
 " Well, dear, and what are his ears like ? " asked Mrs. 
 Dorrien, much amused. 
 
 " Oh ! there is nothing particular in their make or color, 
 but I don't like the way they are set in his head. He 
 caught me looking at them, and tried to hide them by 
 thrusting his long white fingers through his hair, but it 
 would not do. They would stick up. And I don't like 
 him, and there's an end of it, my dear." 
 
 CHAPTER XVIII. 
 
 Time had its full value in La Maison Dorrien. Two 
 days after that on which he had sat at Mr. Dorrien's table, 
 Oliver Black was gone to the w*est and south of France. 
 He spent five weeks in the investigation that had been 
 committed to his care, and carried it out with so much 
 shrewdness, tact, and skill, as to rouse even languid Mr. 
 Dorrien into admiration, and cool Mr. Brown into surprise. 
 John was charmed, Mrs. Dorrien pleased to think that her 
 son had once more evinced his judgment, and every one 
 satisfied, with the exception of Mrs. Reginald, who steadi- 
 ly adhered to her dislike and disapprobation of the new- 
 comer. 
 
 "I don't like him, you knoAV," was all she cared to say, 
 when challenged on the subject. 
 
 " And now what will you do with me ? " laughingly
 
 JOHN DOKRIEN. 203 
 
 asked Oliver of his friend. "You cannot send me about 
 investigating forever, can you?" 
 
 "Never fear but we shall find work for you in La 
 Maison Dorrien, old fellow," answered John, heartily. 
 " Suppose we send you to America next, and let you try 
 your luck with the Yankees ? New York is to be one of 
 our strongholds, I hope." 
 
 " I shall like it, of all things," cried Oliver, looking de- 
 lighted. " And I declare, John," he added, wringing his 
 hand cordially, " you are one of the best fellows in the 
 world. I am sure I don't know what I should have done with- 
 out you," he cordially added, " and I will reward you with 
 a piece of advice : secure the partnership, make your hay 
 while tli<* sun shines, my dear boy." 
 
 " I bide my time," answered John. 
 
 " All wrong, my good fellow 1 No time like the pres- 
 ent ! Suppose Mr. Dorrien should not always be as amiable 
 as he is now — " 
 
 " Suppose Mr. Dorrien has long found out that he can- 
 not do without me ? " interrupted John, smiling. 
 
 "My excellent friend, you are awfully conceited, for a 
 modest young fellow," said Oliver, gayly ; " but I suppose 
 you know La Maison Dorrien, which is a very delightful, 
 liberal house, so far as I am concerned ! " 
 
 " So far as every one is concerned," interrupted John. 
 " You have not been favored, Oliver." 
 
 " Yes, I have," persisted Oliver. " If not in money, at 
 least in courtesy and kindness, most certainly. Don't tell 
 me that Mr. Dorrien's manner to all his employes is the 
 same as it is to me. I tell you honestly that I would not 
 believe you. Mr. Brown, too, is unexceptionable. Mrs. 
 Dorrien is kindness itself. There's only Mrs. Reginald ; 
 poor, dear, one-eyed lady, how she detests me! Now, 
 John, do tell me, you who are in her good graces, how I 
 could secure them ! " 
 
 But John shook his head, and honestly confessed that 
 the secret of Mrs. Reginald's likes and dislikes was within 
 her own keeping. 
 
 "A Doctor Fell affair, and therefore hopeless," said 
 Olivor, trying to look despondent. " Well, Mr. Dorrien 
 has kindly asked me to dinner this evening. I shall try 
 my luck again, and, if I fail this time, give it up for good.
 
 204 • JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 You will tell me to-morrow how far I have been success- 
 ful." 
 
 But Mr. Oliver Black was not to have, the benefit of 
 John Dorrien's opinion on that evening's transactions; for 
 though Mrs. Dorrien was well enough to be present at the 
 dinner-table, her son, to Oliver's surprise, did not appear. 
 No one, however, alluded to his absence ; it was evidently 
 a matter of course, that required and received no comment. 
 The dinner was silent, formal, and dull. Oliver tried to en- 
 liven it now and then, but Mrs. Dorrien's faint smile and 
 Mrs. Reginald's grim silence were not encouraging, and 
 although Mr. Dorrien's cook was an artist, and though his 
 wines were perfect, Oliver sincerely regretted his less lux- 
 urious meal in the Palais Royal, with its sparkling lights 
 and gay aspect, and, above all, its pleasant sense of lib- 
 erty. 
 
 " I really do not think I must favor Mr. Dorrien often with 
 my company," he thought, scarcely repressing a yawn of 
 weariness. " It was too bad of John not to tell me he was 
 not to be present." 
 
 John's absence was a drawback ; but, though Oliver 
 liked his friend's company, he might not have felt Mr. Dor- 
 rien's dinner so great an ordeal but for Mrs. Reginald. 
 That lady's enmity was evidently growing stronger and 
 deeper every time they met. In vain Oliver did his best 
 to please ; he was repelled with something very like viru- 
 lence, and his civil speeches were received with withering 
 contempt. 
 
 Mrs. Reginald had been taking an interest in a poor 
 young Englishman, and had recommended him to John 
 Dorrien's attention. He had, in his turn, devolved part 
 of his duty on Oliver, and it was now the young man's turn 
 to give Mrs. Reginald an account of what had been done 
 for her protege. He did so in his graceful, pleasant way, 
 adding at the close of his speech — " And I assure you, Mrs. 
 Reginald, that when this poor fellow knew it was to j t ou he 
 owed all this, his joy was really doubled." 
 
 Now, this speech might be a little too flowery, but 
 really, when you consider how many thorns and nettles grow 
 along the path of life, and how many unkind people are 
 ever ready to pick them for you and thrust them under your 
 very nose, ought one to be so severe with those amiable
 
 JOIIN DORRIKX. 205 
 
 creatures who scatter a few superfluous blossoms about, and 
 say all sorts of pretty things, in which they don't happen 
 to believe at all ? Surely not ! But alas for Oliver Black's 
 well-meant bit of flattery ! Mrs. Reginald looked at him 
 askance, and grimlv replied : 
 
 " That's humbug, Mr. Black." 
 
 At this awful comment Mr. Dorrien gave a start of 
 amazement, on which a look of profound disgust followed. 
 Mrs. Reginald's blunt, idiomatic English was often distaste- 
 ful to him, but this particular expression of " humbug " was 
 one which he specially detested. Mrs. Dorrien was dis- 
 tressed, and tried vainly not to seem so ; even Mr. Brown 
 showed slight signs of disturbance ; but Oliver Black, pleas- 
 ant, unmoved, and courteous, bowed low to the lady. To 
 all appearance he was unaffected by the strange, rude taunt 
 he had received ; at heart he was not so. Silently he picked 
 up the glove which Mrs. Reginald so persistently and so 
 defiantly flung at him, and from that time forth the war be- 
 tween these two was no pretense, as such wars sometimes 
 are — no tilt and tournament avec armes courtoises, but real 
 fighting, in which, if blood was not shed, it was because 
 the combatants had not the proper weapons. 
 
 The unpleasant silence which followed Mrs. Reginald's 
 unmitigated comment was broken by the entrance of a ser- 
 vant, who brought in a note for Mr. Dorrien. 
 
 "Any thing I can attend to sir ?" asked Mr. Brown, 
 looking at Mr. Dorrien. 
 
 " Oh, no, thank you, Mr. Brown," answered his master; 
 and, with a brief excuse, he rose and left the room. 
 
 The dinner was over, and the dessert (a choice one, as 
 usual) was on the table. 
 
 " Now, Mr. Brown," said Mrs. Reginald, turning to that 
 gentleman, " you heard how Mr. Dorrien commended us to 
 your care ; so please to make us happy." 
 
 " I wish Mr. John Dorrien were here to do it, Mrs. 
 Reginald," answered Mr. Brown, trying to look pleasant 
 and cheerful. " He is a young man — and you like young 
 men, Mrs. Reginald." 
 
 " I do," heartily replied that lady. 
 
 " Do you, really, Mrs. Reginald ? " remarked Oliver, with 
 his pleasant look. " I wonder why ? " 
 
 He was raising his glass and leaning back in his chair ;
 
 206 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 he looked through the ruby liquid as if he were thinking, 
 " What has she to do with young men ? " 
 
 " I like young men," repeated Mrs. Reginald, ignoring 
 his question ; " they are plump, as a rule, and they would 
 do so well for pinching ! " 
 
 Oliver Black put down his glass as if he felt Mrs. Regi- 
 nald's hard fingers in his flesh. He had strong, calm nerves, 
 but this lady could disturb them. 
 
 " Why not young ladies, Mrs. Reginald ? " he asked, 
 trying to laugh. 
 
 " Oh ! they are birds, Mr. Black," she condescended to 
 reply — " all clothes and feathers." 
 
 " Or little children ? " he suggested. 
 
 Mrs. Reginald's brown eye flashed. 
 
 " I never had a child," she said, irefully, " but I could 
 have killed the man, or the woman either, who would have 
 tried to harm my child, harm my boy ! Let them, that's 
 all ! " 
 
 " Oh ! then it was to have been a boy ? " said Oliver, 
 catching at the word. Ee saw that he had found the weak 
 place in Mrs. Reginald's armor, and he mercilessly thrust 
 his sword in to the hilt. " And what was he to have been 
 like, Mrs. Reginald ? Dark and tall ? " 
 
 She was silent. 
 
 " Then, I see, he should have been fair and slender? " 
 
 Mrs. Reginald tightened her lips. 
 
 " Now, my dear madam, pray do let us hear something 
 about that paragon. What was he to have been ? — A gen- 
 ius, of course. — The Dorriens are geniuses by right of birth. 
 — I wish you would not be so cruelly silent. I feel quite 
 an interest in that 3-oung man. He was to have been 
 so—" 
 
 " So true" replied Mrs. Reginald, turning upon him 
 with a look that measured the whole man. 
 
 Oliver laughed, but his color deepened. 
 
 " I am so sorry I could not attend to that business for 
 Mr. Dorrien," said Mr. Brown, raising his voice. 
 
 ". Why so ? " retorted Mrs. Reginald. " I think we get 
 on very well without him," she added, glancing round the 
 table in grim triumph ; " and I dare say he does not miss 
 
 us." 
 
 Mr. Dorrien, to say the truth, did not miss Mrs. Regi-
 
 JOnN DORRIEN*. 207 
 
 nald. He had been glad to escape from her presence and 
 repair to the library, where John sat waiting for hi in. 
 
 " I am afraid you have hurried out to me, sir," said the 
 young man, rising to address his cousin with the courtesy 
 and respect habitual to him ; " yet I said there was plenty 
 of time." 
 
 " I was Only too glad to get away," answered Mr. Dor- 
 rim, throwing himself down in an arm-chair with a look of 
 disgust and weariness. u Mrs. Reginald has taken a dislike 
 to Mr. Black, and quite forgets that she is a Dorrien by 
 marriage, if not by birth ; but we will not talk of all this. 
 — What has happened? — What brings you back, John? — 
 Did you miss the train ? " 
 
 " Nothing has happened," answered John Dorrien, " and, 
 to say the truth, I missed the train on purpose." 
 
 Mr. Dorrien rarely questioned. He knew that when 
 people have something to say, they do say it without 3'our 
 taking that trouble ; so he sat and waited. 
 
 " I thought," resumed John, " that it was not quite fair 
 and honest in me not to tell you my real reason for taking 
 this journey myself instead of asking Black, who has been 
 so successful, to see to this business, in my stead." 
 
 "Well, I did wonder at it," replied Mr. Dorrien ; " but 
 this matter is so much more important than the other, 
 that I did. think you might not care to trust Mr. Black so 
 far." 
 
 " Oliver Black may be trusted much farther," quickly 
 answered John. 
 
 " We do not know much about him," retorted Mr. Dor- 
 rien. " Of course you think well of him- — as to that, so do 
 I ; but a young man who was reared in wealth, and never 
 tried, is always open to doubt." 
 
 " Yes, sir ; but allow me to say that Oliver Black, apart 
 from principle or honesty, has too much judgment to fall 
 into the vulgar temptations which beset young men in po- 
 sitions of great trust. However, he has nothing to do with 
 my coming back this evening." 
 
 A faint gleam of curiosity shone in Mr. Dorrien's blue 
 eyes, but still he did not speak. He disliked the fatigue 
 of it, for one thing; and then he read slight signs of em- 
 barrassment in John Dorrien's face, and it rather amused 
 him. He liked his young cousin very well, but perhaps he
 
 208 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 wanted him too sorely to like him much, and he was not 
 sorry to find him at a disadvantage. 
 
 " You were speaking of marriage to me the other da}'," 
 resumed John. " I have been thinking over what you said, 
 and I agree with you, sir. I think it would be well if I 
 were to marry; and if matters were brought to a final set- 
 tlement between us." 
 
 " Of course it would," replied Mr. Dorrien, with sudden 
 interest ; " and let me tell you, John, that Mademoiselle 
 Basnage is not merely rich, but pretty." 
 
 John raised his eyes to his cousin's in wonder and 
 doubt. 
 
 " Then it was not Miss Dorrien that you alluded to the 
 other evening when we spoke of this," said he. 
 
 " To my granddaughter ? — oh ! no," replied Mr. Dor- 
 rien, almost coldly. 
 
 There was a brief pause. 
 
 " I confess it was of her I thought," said John ; " and 
 my reason for taking this journey was that I wished to see 
 her before matters went further. I have to go to Mar- 
 seilles ; thence I shall go on to Nice, and see Miss Dorrien. 
 I have no intention of calling upon her. I only wish to 
 see her." 
 
 " And could you really not go and look at a young lady 
 without coming back to ask my leave, John ? " remarked 
 Mr. Dorrien, with his smooth irony. 
 
 " I did not come back to ask your leave," replied John, 
 smiling, " but to tell you what I intended doing. It did 
 not seem frank and honest in me to take this liberty with 
 a young lady so nearly related to you without your knowl- 
 edge." 
 
 "Very nice and honorable," murmured Mr. Dorrien, 
 approvingly; "but that you always are, John. Well; seven 
 years ago I did think that such an arrangement might be 
 desirable, and I had the child here that she might be 
 brought up with you ; but it did not answer. And there 
 are other objections. You see, John, we are getting on 
 very well, I grant, but we are often hemmed in for want of 
 capital ; and I cannot help thinking that, as a man of busi- 
 ness, you ought not to marry a poor girl. Miss Dorrien 
 has nothing, and can have nothing, that does not come 
 from the business. Mademoiselle Basnage would bring us
 
 john DomiiEX. 209 
 
 her father's help and forty thousand pounds — a million 
 francs, John," added Mr. Dorrien, emphatically. 
 
 ' ; We might have to pay dear for both," replied John, 
 a little dryly. 
 
 " I grant that the father-in-law is objectionable, so was 
 Madame Basnage, poor lady, but I have seen the daughter, 
 and you may take my word for it, John, she is charming, 
 pretty, modest, and accomplished. I wish you had seen 
 her." 
 
 " I can take your word, sir," said John, quietby. " You 
 are a good judge, and a critical one, but you must allow 
 me to make two objections : Monsieur Basnage is a med- 
 dlesome, domineering man ; is it desirable that he should 
 know too much of our business, or have any right to inter- 
 fere in it? Besides, I have not given up my old fancy. 
 AA e must end by manufacturing our paper, and in that 
 case Monsieur Basnage would be in the way. We are 
 better without him and his forty thousand pounds, if they 
 are bought at the price of liberty." 
 
 " Then you still think of that, John ? " impatiently said 
 Mr. Dorrien. " You are very willful." 
 
 " We are a willful race, I believe. And that papyrus, 
 as the inventor calls it, would be the very thing for us, if 
 "we could secure the patent. I really think it a fine thing. 
 But apart from all this, if our business be worth any thing 
 — and I believe it to be in a fair way of becoming prosper- 
 ous — why should your granddaughter, a Dorrien in blood 
 and name, be excluded from its prosperity ? Capital is too 
 precious in our case to be withdrawn in her favor ; but 
 comfort, luxury, and ultimate wealth, may be hers if the 
 arrangement you contemplated seven years ago be carried 
 out now." 
 
 Mr. Dorrien stroked his chin, and looked half annoyed 
 and half perplexed. 
 
 " All that is very specious, John," he said, rather dryly ; 
 " but suppose that, when matters come to a crisis, you do 
 not care for Miss Dorrien, or that she does not care for 
 you ? " 
 
 " The risk must be run in any case," answered John, 
 promptly. " The objection holds good with Mademoiselle 
 Basnage, as well as with Miss Dorrien." 
 
 " But you would like to begin with Miss Dorrien," an-
 
 210 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 swered Mr. Dorrien, smiling kindly. " Well, have your 
 way, John ; but remember that a woman is none the less 
 charming for having money. I married an heiress ; she 
 was both lovely and amiable." 
 
 He sighed as he uttered the last words. His wife had 
 been dear to him, and something of that old tenderness 
 alighted, but very faintly, to say the truth, on her grand- 
 daughter. Mr. Dorrien was too proud a man to acknowl- 
 edge, to John that, if he had given up the arrangement he 
 had first suggested seven years before this, it was because 
 he had remembered how the youno- man had once shown 
 a decided distaste for it. He did not ask John how or why 
 his feelings had altered ; he ignored the past, and confined 
 his objections to the present time. He did not press them 
 further upon his cousin now ; he was inclined to treat this 
 wish to see Miss Dorrien as a young man's fancy, which a 
 nearer view of the young lady would dispel. Antoinette 
 had not grown up handsome, he was sure, and Mademoi- 
 selle Basnage was really a very attractive girl, apart from 
 her facinating million francs. 
 
 " Let it be so," he remarked aloud. " I mean, have 
 your look at Miss Dorrien, though I thought you wiser 
 than to go by that, John." 
 
 " What else can a man go by, when he does not happen 
 to have known a woman for some years?" asked John ; 
 " but I am afraid, sir, that I am keeping you from your 
 dinner. I dined at the station." 
 
 " Well, I had not finished," acknowledged Mr. Dorrien, 
 " but, on seeing your note, I really thought some calamit}' - 
 had occurred. I was far from suspecting that such a trifle 
 had brought you back." 
 
 " It is not a trifle to me," said John, coloring. 
 
 " Oh ! of course not. Will you not join us ? — your 
 friend is there." 
 
 But John pleaded business, and thought he would at- 
 tend to a few matters he had left by ; besides, he confessed 
 he did not care to have his presence known. He was go- 
 ing away again by the 11.15 train — it was not worth while 
 seeing any one. Mr. Dorrien smiled languidly, but made 
 no comment, and left him. 
 
 John did write a few letters, but he soon put his pen 
 down, and, leaning back in his chair, he indulged in a fit
 
 JOHN DOIIR1EN. 211 
 
 of reverie, lie bad told the truth to Mr. Dorrien, but not 
 that whole truth which so seldom passes our lips ; and John 
 was reticent, perhaps because he was strong. He felt no 
 need in times of trouble to talk of his annoyances ; he 
 wanted none to grieve, or to rejoice, or even to hope with 
 him. He could bear his burden alone, whatever it might 
 be, and just now he cared to share his thoughts with none. 
 Practical as he had become, and hard even in some things 
 — for a man of business must needs be hard if he would be 
 successful in his dealings with other men — John Dorrien 
 had the leaven of the old romance within him still. As a 
 youth, he had indignantly protested against Mr. Dorrien's 
 matrimonial schemes; but, when no attempt was made to 
 force his inclinations, when circumstances removed Antoi- 
 nette from the house, when her name was not even men- 
 tioned by her grandfather, his thoughts began unconsciously 
 to turn to the childish bride who was growing into girlhood 
 far away from him. With time he saw that Mr. Dorrien's 
 plan was a very desirable one in many respects. If he 
 could like Antoinette, and she could like him, it would be 
 a good thing for both. And why should he not like her ? 
 Her faults seemed to fade away from his memory as the 
 years sped on, and he remembered that she had a warm 
 heart, and much sweetness of disposition. As to her being 
 a rather plain child, it only proved that she would be a 
 pretty girl. Besides, how could she be plain with such 
 soft, dark eyes ? And then she was his, or would be his — 
 a something destined to himself exclusively, and which it 
 seemed very sweet to possess. He allowed his thoughts 
 to dwell upon her young image till it became very dear to 
 him, and, before he knew how or why, John Dorrien found 
 himself, if not in love, at least on the brink of that danger- 
 ous feeling. Then, indeed, he awoke ; he roused and ques- 
 tioned himself, and almost angrily resolved to break with 
 this fancy. But he found that it would not do. He had! 
 indulged it so long that it now wellnigh mastered him. 
 Antoinette might have grown up to be antipathetic to 
 him ; she might be the last woman that he would care to 
 spend his life with, but, unless he was sure of it, he could 
 not give her up. 
 
 The moment Mr. Dorrien spoke of marriage to him, John 
 Dorrien's mind was made up. He would see Antoinette,
 
 212 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 and accept Mr. Dorrien's terms, or inform him that the part- 
 nership must have nothing to do with marriage and his 
 granddaughter. He had not shown half the annoyance he 
 had felt on hearing the name of Mademoiselle Basnage. 
 He had never seen her, he detested her father, he longed 
 to free La Maison Dorrien from his yoke, often a hard one ; 
 and, moreover, his youthful pride rose in arms on finding 
 that a second time Mr. Dorrien had chosen a bride for him 
 without first consulting his feelings on the subject. Antoi- 
 nette Dorrien now acquired the one attraction she had 
 failed in till then — opposition, open or covert, from the 
 powers that were. What Mr. Dorrien, his mother, and 
 Mrs. Reginald herself, felt on the matter, John knew without 
 seeking the knowledge. That Mr. Brown would be all for 
 Mammon was as sure as any rule in arithmetic can be. 
 Antoinette had but one friend in her grandfather's house 
 — the boy who had so vehemently declared that he would 
 never marry her, and would never change his mind on that 
 subject. If he had led another life — if he had not been so 
 exclusively confined to the companionship of older people 
 — John might never have cared for her ; but, though un- 
 seen, she was the one youthful element, the one bright spot 
 in the stern monotony of days devoted to toil, and often 
 darkened by care. So, while Mr. Dorrien joined his guests, 
 and John Dorrien sat alone looking at Polymnia, he let a 
 young image, pleasing, though not that of a muse — the 
 image of a dark-eyed girl — flit before him. Presently a 
 scratching was heard at the door of the library, then a low 
 whine. 
 
 "I tell you he is gone — look for yourself, if you don't 
 believe me, foolish fellow ! " So spoke Mrs. Reginald's 
 deep voice, as she opened the door of the library to admit 
 Carlo, who rushed in at his master, giving him through the 
 open door a glimpse of his pale mother leaning weariedly 
 on the banisters on her way up-stairs, and of Mrs. Regi- 
 nald staring in at him in blank amazement. " I declare the 
 dog was right," said she, " and there is John, actually your 
 boy, come back ! " 
 
 "But going again," said John ; "that is why I did not 
 join you, little mother. I hope you had a pleasant evening." 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien looked at Mrs. Reginald, who raised her 
 eyebrows.
 
 JOHN DOKRIEX. 213 
 
 u 
 
 I behaved abominably, John," she . said. " I do not 
 know how I could be so unladylike, so un-Irish, so inhos- 
 pitable, to your friend. I fancy I frightened him away." 
 
 '* What, poor Oliver again ? " 
 
 "Yes — is it not shameful, John? And the worst of it 
 is, that I don't know why I behave so badly." 
 
 " You will behave better next time," suggested Mrs. 
 Dorrien, smiling faintly, but looking at John all the time. 
 
 " I ! " cried Mrs. Reginald — " I should begin again to- 
 morrow if I had the chance. I can't help it. When I see 
 him I feel as Carlo feels when he sees a rat — I must worry 
 him." 
 
 There was something so unreasonable in this frank con- 
 fession of dislike that John could not help laughing, but he 
 did not ask to know what had passed, as he might have 
 asked at another moment, for it was now time for him to 
 be gone. He gave Carlo a pat, Mrs. Reginald a hearty 
 shake of the hand, and his mother a kiss. 
 
 " Wish me luck, little mother," he said. 
 
 " Wish you luck ! " she replied — " why so, John ? What 
 is there new to wish you luck about ? " 
 
 "Nothing new, little mother," he answered, smiling 
 down in her face ; " but will you not wish me luck all the 
 same ? " 
 
 Siie looked up fondly at him, as mothers look at their 
 sons, taking pride in their manhood, and thinking them the 
 kings of their sex. To Mrs. Dorrien the world held not 
 another young man of twenty-five fit to compare with her 
 John, and, if she had known the meaning of his requc-t. 
 she would have scorned the idea of any girl or woman be- 
 ing worthy of him. As it was, she answered, from the 
 fullness of her heart : 
 
 " I wish you more than luck, John — I Avish you happi- 
 ness." 
 
 He laughed, but the words sounded as an omen, and as 
 such he took them. 
 
 "Thank you, little mother," he said, gayly. "I hear 
 my cab at the door, so good-bv." 
 
 lie left them so, with a bright face and a gay look. 
 
 "That boy has got something in his head," remarked 
 Mrs. Reginald, looking after him. 
 
 "He never tells me any thing,'* sighed his mother.
 
 214 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 " My dear, it is business," was Mrs. Reginald's soothing 
 reply. 
 
 It was business, but it was also that John was not of a 
 communicative nature. The honorable scrupulousness of 
 his temper had brought him back to tell Mr. Dorrien of his 
 intentions ; but, if he could hav T e helped it, John Dorrien 
 would have trusted none with the bit of romance in which 
 he was now indulg-inw'. He did not even care that anv one 
 should know in what direction lay the goal of his journey; 
 and if the truth had been told, Oliver Black, who had never 
 shared his thoughts even in his boyish days, was the last 
 whom he would have liked to enlighten on that matter. 
 But we live in glass houses at the best of times — walls 
 which we think of stone are clear and transparent to our 
 neighbor. There is a net in which we all move freely 
 enough till its meshes inclose us ; and so it now was in 
 John Dorrien's case, though he never knew it. 
 
 Oliver Black had left early. He had left with Mr. 
 Brown. Many men of business have a hobby — the one 
 green spot in their barren lives. To collect old engravings 
 was Mr. Brown's. In his dismay at the war between Mrs. 
 Reginald and Mr. Dorrien's guest, he had, much against 
 his wont, broached the theme of his collection. He had 
 some fine, really very fine things — perhaps Mr. Black had a 
 taste that way, and if so he would be most happy to show 
 him the contents of his portfolios. They were more valu- 
 able than numerous — his Morghens he might venture to 
 say were really fine. Indeed, it had often been a trouble 
 to him to think what would become of them after his death. 
 Mr. Dorrien did not happen to care for them, nor Mr. John 
 either ; and Mr. Brown did not wish to trouble them with a 
 useless bequest. 
 
 " Of course not," said Mrs. Reginald, dryly ; " who 
 cares for things in portfolios?" 
 
 " Why not leave them to a museum ? " asked Oliver 
 Black. 
 
 Mr. Brown diffidently feared they might not be held 
 worthy of that honor; but Oliver, who had to the highest 
 degree the kind of good-nature that makes its owner wish 
 to be pleasant to others, promptly suggested that provin- 
 cial museums would be only too glad of such a legacy. 
 
 " We have had a museum lately founded at Saint-Ivcs,"
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 215 
 
 he said. "I know the director intimately. If you will 
 kindly allow me to look at your engravings, I shall be most 
 happy to suggest the matter to Monsieur de la Croix." 
 
 " I hate engravings," said Mrs. Reginald — " cold, hard 
 things." 
 
 But Mr. Brown did not even hear this unkind speech. 
 For once he was overpowered by his feelings — his color 
 rose, his eyes sparkled, Mr. Black was too kind, but still 
 he, Mr. Brown, would be most happy to submit his little 
 collection to his approbation ; and so when Mr. Black rose 
 to go, Mr. Brown suggested that they should walk togeth- 
 er as far as his rooms, if Mr. Black had the time, and there 
 look at the Morghens. He scarcely hoped that Mr. Black 
 would saj- yes to this proposal, but nothing could be more 
 gracious, more good-humored than Mr. Black's assent He 
 should be most happy to see the Morghens, he declared — 
 indeed, to all seeming, Morghens were the delight of Oliver 
 Black's heart. 
 
 And so these two went forth together in the clear star- 
 ry night, and turned round the corner of the street to the 
 dingy house where Mr. Brown lived, and stumbled up the 
 ill-lit staircase that led to his two rooms. How cold, how 
 dismal looked these rooms to the luxury-loving and luxuri- 
 ously-reared Oliver ! With a sort of shudder he asked 
 himself if he should make himself such a sordid home as 
 this for his old age, and with strong disgust he vowed that 
 he would not. His only wonder was, that the old clerk 
 could endure the daily contrast between Mr. Dorrien's 
 stately old mansion and these penurious-looking rooms. 
 But that contrast no longer existed for Mr. Brown, and 
 tluse rooms, such as they were, called him master. Here 
 he could spend his few leisure hours, here he could pore 
 over the Morghens which he now displayed to Oliver. 
 The}' were fine ones, as the young man, though no judge 
 of such things, could see. He looked over them carefully, 
 professed himself delighted with the treat Mr. Brown had 
 given him, and promised to write to the director of the 
 Saint-Ives ?>ii(s&e the very next day. 
 
 Mr. Brown's dull eyes almost sparkled. It had been 
 such a care to think how these Morghens were to be pro- 
 vided for after he was gone, and now here was a fair and 
 honorable home all but open to them. In his gratitude he
 
 216 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 wanted Oliver to go over them again, so that he might 
 point out their special beauties ; but Oliver, thinking that 
 Mr. Brown was getting somewhat of a bore with his Mor- 
 ghens, excused himself, and, pleading letters to write, took 
 his leave. 
 
 Oliver Black was fond of cigars. He liked good ones, 
 or what he held to be such. A cigar-shop opposite Mr. 
 Dorrien's house had just then a supply of what he consid- 
 ered first-rate Kavanas. He turned back to it before 
 walking home. Just as he entered the shop, John Dorrien 
 was stepping into the cab at the door of the Hotel Dorrien. 
 The gas-light fell on his face, and Oliver knew him at once. 
 He knew, too, the clear sounds of his voice — " Chemin-de- 
 fer de Lyon." 
 
 Lyons — what could be taking him there ? But that long 
 line which crosses the heart of France had many stations 
 short of Lyons, and also many beyond it. Swiftly and 
 surely Oliver leaped to a conclusion, and laughed to him- 
 self as he went up to the counter and began selecting his 
 favorite. 
 
 "John Dorrien is gone courting," he thought, much 
 amused. " He was always a close fellow, but for all that 
 I always knew what I wanted to know. He ought to re- 
 member about ' Miriam,' foolish fellow ! " 
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 On a lovely afternoon, serene and fair, such an afternoon 
 as belongs to southern climes, and is rarely seen unless be- 
 neath calm southern skies, John Dorrien, who had left Nice 
 some hours, slowly drove up the steep road leading to the 
 little southern village of La Ruya, which, for the last three 
 years, had been Mrs. George Dorrien's residence. There 
 was no token of it yet. Far below the road lay the Medi- 
 terranean Sea, blue, calm, and soft, and sleeping lazily in 
 the sunshine. To the right rose rocks of gray granite, 
 bristled with mighty aloes, whose huge leaves and bare 
 roots hung above the path. Above these again, tall and
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 217 
 
 Blender cv press-trees, of dark Oriental aspect, were seen on a 
 background of blue sky ; and here and there came a 
 glimpse of green gardens, with the tender verdure of 
 orange-trees. The first aspect of the south is full of en- 
 chantment. It looks like fairy tales and the Arabian 
 Nights come true. The captive princess of the one, the 
 favorite sultana of the other, might alike dwell here. The 
 world looks like one where rain, or hail, or harsh tempests 
 come not — a world wdiere the days are all sun and the 
 nights all stars ; a world where there might be genii, or 
 magicians, or fairies, but wdiere it provokes you to iind any 
 thing commonplace, tame, or dull. 
 
 John Dorrien, who had never been in the south before 
 this, also thought that he had never seen any thing so 
 grand or so beautiful as that which he now gazed on, and 
 he came to the conclusion that Mr. Dorrien's daughter-in- 
 law had chosen a terrestrial paradise to live in, till he ar- 
 rived at La Ruya itself; but here the world of fairies and 
 lovely ladies suddenly vanished, and the beautiful decidedly 
 gave waj r to the picturesque. 
 
 A few poor and mean dwellings, painted yellow, clus- 
 tered together at the foot of a huge rock, on the very top 
 of which rose one of those old ruined towers which are to 
 be found along the Mediterranean ; a token of the days 
 gone by, when the Crescent ruled the southern sea, and 
 the Frank could barely hold his own. The old keep still 
 had a look of defiance, and stood out boldly on the clear 
 sky, seeming to say, " See what I have been ! " but the 
 houses which had been reared in its shadow crumbled 
 away in the sun without any such boast in their aspect. 
 An aged woman, withered and brown, sat on the thresh- 
 old of a shattered door, spinning with the old-fashioned 
 distaff. A group of sunburnt children thrust their heads 
 out of a paneless window above her, to stare at the stran- 
 ger who came to La Ruya. The other houses remained 
 blank and silent, as if they were tenantless. Only one 
 dwelling, with a more decent look than the rest, had 
 pretensions to size, and showed tokens of life ; this was an 
 inn. Hotel du Chapeau Vert was inscribed in large char- 
 acters on its sign-board ; but John Dorrien looked in 
 vain for some representation of the green hat; there was 
 none. 
 
 10
 
 218 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 " I shall stop here," he said to the driver, who raised 
 his eyebrows. 
 
 " He hoped monsieur would get something to eat, that 
 was all." 
 
 The question seemed an open one, yet two tables of 
 deal wood, spread under a trellised vine in the open air in 
 front of the inn, implied that Louis Brun, the innkeeper, 
 did undertake to feed his guests — when he had any. 
 
 " I shall risk it," said John Dorrien, paying the man 
 his fare and alighting. A woman in a white cap — a sure 
 sign that she was not a southern by birth — came out to 
 receive him. " I have come here to have a walk and see 
 the country," said John Dorrien ; " I suppose I can get 
 Some dinner." 
 
 " At what hour ? " asked the landlady dubiously. 
 
 "Let us say five o'clock." 
 
 " If monsieur would not mind six — the voiture does not 
 come in before five." 
 
 "And does the voiture bring in the dinner?" 
 
 " We have not many travelers, monsieur," said the 
 woman, reddening a little. 
 
 " Very well, let it be six." 
 
 " Does monsieur sleep here ? " 
 
 But John having ascertained that another voiture would 
 take him on to Viragues, and that thence he could get 
 back to Nice, thought he would depart with it — an answer 
 that seemed to relieve Madame Brun grcatfy. Leaving 
 her to her evident satisfaction, John Dorrien followed the 
 high-road. It led him up a hill, with monotonous planta- 
 tions of olive-trees on either side, and here and there a 
 lonely farm, until it brought him at length to a church, 
 standing alone on the brow of the mountain, and overlook- 
 ing the deep valley beneath. A carved cross and three 
 huge ilex-trees gave the little piazza in front of the portico 
 a calm, monastic look. This was no village church, with 
 peasant-dwellings clustering around it, as children gather 
 round their mother's knee in love and reverence, but an 
 austere and lonely teacher, raising her voice in the desert, 
 as John the Baptist once raised his, calling on sinners to 
 repent and mend their ways. John pushed the door open 
 and entered. As he passed from the southern brightness 
 of the day to the more than Gothic gloom within, he stood
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 219 
 
 irresolute, for at first he saw little or nothing ; but gradual- 
 ly the darkness seemed to fadeaway, and he was aware 
 of a brown old place, very quaint and very low, Avith heavy 
 arches and stained-glass windows, and a few ancient pict- 
 ures over its altars. The oaken benches were black with 
 age, and here and there a gleam of tarnished gold shone 
 through the perpetual twilight of the place, telling of the 
 departed splendor and rich endowments of former ages. 
 It was quite solitary, but a murmur of chanting came from 
 behind the high altar. The singers were invisible. Not 
 one token of common every-day life was to be found here. 
 No little child was saying its prayers — one of the most 
 beautiful sights in the Catholic churches of Catholic coun- 
 tries ; no wearied woman knelt, resting herself in worship 
 from the toil and cares of the day; no bareheaded man 
 was humbly seeking strength wherewith to bear the bur- 
 den of his life, and yet, even when the chanting ceased, as 
 it did suddenly, the presence of God filled this silent, lonely 
 church, and made it beautiful and holy, and John Dorrien 
 felt that it was home, for it was the Father's house, 
 
 When the young man came out, he found a tall and 
 pale Franciscan monk standing in the sunlit porch. He 
 questioned him, and learned that this was a convent of 
 monks, and also the parish church of La Ruya, and of manv 
 a»similar hamlet ; for the parish was large and scattered, 
 siid the monk, and the church had been built when tin- 
 land was almost a desert, and not for its present uses, so 
 unless on a Sunday it was not much frequented. 
 
 " Sunday ! " thought John Dorrien, as he went down 
 the hill — " this is Wednesday. Pity I cannot Wait to see 
 Mrs. George Dorrien and her daughter coming here." But 
 as this was impossible, he settled on a most diplomatic 
 method of ascertaining from Madame Brun, whom he did 
 not wish to question too openly, where the two ladies 
 were to be found, and his plans were laid by the time he 
 reached the Chapeau Vert. This time he walked round 
 the little inn, and entered it by a back-door, which he found 
 ajar. 
 
 Tho Chapeau Vert was a straggling tenement, and it 
 was not till he had crossed two rooms, strung with ropes 
 of onions, that John Dorrien reached an apartment of 
 higher pretensions. This was a low, dark room, of which
 
 220 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 the gloom and freshness were grateful after the heat and 
 sun of the day without. It was also evidently destined to 
 the accommodation of select guests, when the " Green 
 Hat " was honored with such, for it had a walnut-tree 
 wood buffet, a stra vv -bottomed arm-chair, and a deal table, 
 pleasantly placed near the open window. A screen of 
 vine-leaves divided this from the garden, and the same 
 vine hung in festoons round the adjacent kitchen-window. 
 John Dorrien sat down in the arm-chair and waited till 
 Madame Brun, whose white cap he saw flitting in the 
 kitchen, should be disengaged, in order to address her. 
 
 " Well," suddenly said a young voice, of which he 
 liked the pleasant ring, " have the hens made up their 
 minds yet ? " 
 
 A dubious, preparatory cough was Madame Bran's an- 
 swer. It gave John time to look at the speaker. In the 
 square, vine-hung frame of the kitchen-window, he saw the 
 face of a young girl, who stood in the garden outside, lean- 
 ing forward, with her arms carelessly folded on the window- 
 sill. She was young, and she had all the charm of youth, 
 its airy grace and happy brightness. She also had dark 
 eyes, and the freshness of a rose. 
 
 " Silence means consent," she resumed, gayly. " How 
 many eggs am I to take, Madame Brun ? " 
 
 " Why, the fact is," replied Madame Brun, going to the 
 window and lowering her voice mysteriously — " the fact is, 
 I do not know if I can let you have any eggs, Mademoiselle 
 Antoinette." 
 
 "No eggs!" exclaimed the young girl, in a tone of 
 dismay. " O Madame Brun, she will be so cross ! " 
 
 " Yes, and I am so sorry," resumed Madame Brun ; 
 " but, you see, we have got a traveler." 
 
 "A traveler ! O Madame Brun, what is he like ?" 
 
 This was spoken in a tone of breathless curiosit}', which 
 made John Dorrien lean back in his chair and keep out of 
 sight. 
 
 " Quite a monsieur," promptly and decisively answered 
 Madame Brun ; " and if 1 cannot give him eggs, what am 
 I to give him, Mademoiselle Antoinette?" 
 
 " Well, but what are we to eat?" retorted Mademoi- 
 selle Antoinette. " He cannot be so hungry as we are, I 
 
 am sure."
 
 JOHN DORRfHX. 221 
 
 "Are you so hungry as all that, mademoiselle?" 
 
 .Mademoiselle Antoinette declared she was starving, and 
 .Madame Brun asked the world what she was to do. 
 
 " How many eggs have you got ? " resumed the young 
 girl. 
 
 " Three." 
 
 " Then give him one, and I shall take the other two." 
 
 She was turning away, but Madame Brun arrested her. 
 
 " .Mademoiselle, I can never oiler him one egg^ she 
 declared, remonslra lively. 
 
 " Then I shall take the three, and she can have the two ; 
 all the better, Madame Brun." 
 
 She wailed for no further argument, but vanished, as 
 John Dorrien guessed, from the sudden stream of sunshine 
 that entered the kitchen when her figure left the window. 
 One of the doors of the room where he sat opened on the 
 garden. Through this door he at once walked out. A fig- 
 tree and five or six orange-trees gave their shade to .Madame 
 Brun's garden. Heavy-leaved gourds were trailing every- 
 where, and tomatoes were ripening in the sun. The place 
 had a thoroughly southern air of neglect, for, where Nature 
 is prodigal of her gifts, man is niggardly of his labor; but 
 southern, too, was the fragrance of the roses, which grew 
 right and left in careless beauty. Through this little wil- 
 derness John Dorrien walked till, directed by a loud cack- 
 ling of remonstrance, he came to the hen-coop. He there 
 found Mademoiselle Antoinette, busy in rifling its contents. 
 She was half kneeling on the gravel. The sun shone on 
 her bare dark head, and John Dorrien saw her better than 
 within. She was very unlike what he remembered her, 
 wholly unlike what he had imagined her to be. Her dark 
 eyes, which he recollected so languid and so sad, were full 
 of fire and softness; the once sallow cheek was fair and 
 blooming, the little wistful face was all merry dimples; 
 there was nothing pensive about this Antoinette, though 
 the clear, well-formed brow and expressive mouth told of 
 intelligence and decision. He stood watching her with in- 
 voluntary eagerness, and she, unconscious of his observa- 
 tion, was addressing a large white hen. 
 
 "I can only find two," she said; "Madame Brun says 
 there are three. What have you done with the other one? 
 Have you eaten it, gourmande f "
 
 222 JOHN DORKIEN. 
 
 Before the white hen could answer this pertinent question, 
 John Dorrien stirred slightly. Antoinette looked round, 
 saw him, started up, and dropped the two eggs in her hand. 
 They fell down on the ground, and were broken — not 
 cracked, but really broken, with the yellow yelk and liquid 
 white mixing up in the gravel at her feet. Nothing could 
 exceed Antoinette's blank dismay at this mishap. Her 
 color actually faded, and she seemed too much absorbed in 
 the calamity to think of him who had caused it. John 
 Dorrien bowed slightly, and walked away. 
 
 The garden was soon compassed. He turned back to 
 the house, and found Madame Brun standing on the steps 
 of her kitchen-door. 
 
 " I have been the cause of a misfortune," he said, smil- 
 ing ; " I have just made a young lady break two eggs." 
 " She has broken them ! " cried Madame Brun, aghast. 
 " Let that be no trouble on my account," he quickly 
 responded ; "I do not care for dinner. But may I ask 
 who that young lady is ? I feel sure I have already seen 
 her." 
 
 " Oh, that is Mademoiselle d'Armaille," said Madame 
 Brun. " But is monsieur sure that he does not care for 
 dinner?" she dubiously added. 
 
 " Quite sure. — Are the D'Armailles one of the families 
 belono-ino: to the neighborhood ? " 
 
 Madame Brun shook her head in denial. The D'Ar- 
 mailles came from ever so far away, she said — from some 
 place beyond the sea ; and, indeed, Mademoiselle Antoi- 
 nette was not a real D'Armaille, only people call her so, be- 
 cause her mother was the Countess d'Armaille. 
 
 " And this young lady lives with her mother, I sup- 
 pose ? " said John. 
 
 Madame Brun stared. Why, did not monsieur know — 
 but of course he did not, being a stranger — that Madame 
 d'Armaille had been dead more than a twelvemonth ? that 
 Mademoiselle Antoinette lived with her aunt, Mademoiselle 
 Melanie, who was as ill-tempered to her as she well could 
 be ? " How Mademoiselle Antoinette can bear it," con- 
 tinued Madame Brun, wanning with her subject, " is more 
 than I can imagine; but she has the sweetest temper in the 
 world, I do believe. She is just like a bird ; and, when her 
 aunt grumbles, she just goes chirruping about, and does not
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 823 
 
 mind. She is very fond of birds," added Madame Brim, di- 
 gressively, " and has a tame sparrow that goes about with 
 her in the country. Sometimes he is perched on her finger, 
 sometimes on her head. Indeed, she could lame any thing. 
 The lizards in the garden come out to her when she sinus 
 to them. And there was a iine uproar once when her aunt 
 caught her feeding the mice in the kitchen. I must say 
 that was too much. But, you may believe me, sir, my bees, 
 any bees, never sting Mademoiselle Antoinette — never. I 
 do believe all these little creatures know that she would 
 not hurt them." 
 
 John Dorrien was so much amazed to find that Antoi- 
 nette's mother had been dead more than a year, and that 
 Mr. Dorrien had remained ignorant of the fact, that he 
 scarcely heeded any other portion of Madame Bran's dis- 
 course; but when he recovered from that surprise he could 
 not help wondering that the landlady of the Ohapeau Vert 
 should know so much of the domestic concerns of the late 
 Madame d'Armaille and her daughter, and also be on such 
 familiar terms with the latter. 
 
 Madame Brim herself explained the Fact. She had been 
 Madame d'Armaille's servant till that lady's death, whim 
 she married Brim. She was not going to stay with Made- 
 moiselle Melanie — not she. 
 
 " And so Madame d'Armaille has been dead a year? " 
 said John, scarcely able to believe it. 
 
 "Oh, yes, a year last Saturday week; they had her 
 bout de Van in the parish church. Mademoiselle Melanie, 
 who is no better than a heathen, never went ; but Made- 
 moiselle Antoinette was there, of course, and nearly cried 
 her eyes out. Poor little thing ! I always say it is no fault 
 of hers if she has not a bit of religion." 
 
 " Not a bit of religion ! " repeated John Dorrien, slowly. 
 
 " Well, no ; they none of them had any, you see, and 
 the cliild has grown up a little heathen. I taught her a 
 prayer or two," added Madame Brim, shaking her head, 
 "but that Melanie found it out, and laughed at her — and 
 young people cannot bear being laughed at." 
 
 "True," said John Dorrien, gazing abstractedly before 
 him and knit ting his brows, "young people, as you say, can- 
 not bear it." 
 
 He looked dull and wearied, thought Madame Brun.
 
 224 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 Was he — spite his professions of not caring for dinner — 
 was he hungry ? She thought of the broken eggs with 
 much vexation, for suppose the voiture did not bring her in 
 those stores on which she reckoned for his meal, and sup- 
 pose it went forth, to the shame of the Chapeau Vert, that 
 a guest had not even one egg wherewith to break his fast 
 while abiding beneath its roof? Bread she had, and sour 
 wine, and stale cheese, but Madame Brun could not offer 
 such unpalatable viands as those to such a monsieur as the 
 one who stood in her presence. Any one could see he was 
 used to the best of every thing ! If she could only dish 
 him up a chicken en blanquet it would be quite a pleasure. 
 Perhaps Baptistina would let her have a chicken. But, no ; 
 ever since she had threatened Baptistina's Andrea off her 
 premises, there had been war between them. It was not 
 to be thought of. There was nothing for it but to trust to 
 the voiture y and, failing this, to utter an honest and heroic 
 " Je n'ai rien." 
 
 "I think I shall go out again," said John Dorrien, sud- 
 denly rousing himself from the fit of abstraction which had 
 led to Madame Brun's uneasy soliloquy. " I have seen the 
 parish church. What other object of interest is there about 
 here ? " 
 
 " There is the dark valley," replied Madame Brun, 
 brightening at the thought of getting him out of the way 
 for a decent space of time, for he could not go to the dark 
 valley without being some hours absent, at least. 
 
 John Dorrien said he would go to the dark valley ; and 
 having inquired the way to it, which apparently offered no 
 complications, he again went forth. Madame Brun watched 
 him as he walked away, with downcast eyes and gloomy 
 brow, and thought : 
 
 " That's the way with monsieurs. They get dispirited 
 when any thing interferes with their meals. How soon he 
 would brighten if I could set a nice hot fowl before him ! 
 And see how downhearted he is because he thinks he will 
 get nothing to eat ! "
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 225 
 
 CHAPTER XX. 
 
 Joux Dorrien was young, and he had the hearty ap- 
 petite of a young man who enjoys unbroken health. 
 Though he could bear the loss of a meal, the meal itself 
 could not be a matter of indifference to him. Yet his din- 
 ner had nothing 1 to do with the gloomy looks which Madame 
 Brim had noted, and interpreted according to her fears. 
 He had had anxieties and cares before this day, but they 
 had been wholly unlike the perplexity which now troubled 
 him. Madame Brun had uttered words, and implied facts, 
 which startled and grieved him. Was this young girl, so 
 pleasant to look at, but so badly reared, was she the girl 
 around whose image his young fancy had lingered for years, 
 and of whom he had thought, in the old church on the hill, 
 as kneeling down in one of those dark benches by her 
 mother's side, or tripping down the sunlit steps of the por- 
 tico, in all the charm and grace which innocent piety can 
 bestow on maidenhood ? With abhorrence he thought of 
 receiving a wife from Mademoiselle Melanie's hand, and fresh 
 from her teaching; but with infinite pity he thought, too, 
 of the sad-eyed little mistress of Carlo, reared by that sinis- 
 ter woman, and with involuntary tenderness of the bright 
 girl whose lot it was to live with that unkind companion. 
 But we are complex creatures at the best, and with these 
 feelings others were inextricably mingled. It is sweet to 
 snatch a brand from the burning, and so, notwithstanding 
 his bitter disappointment, John Dorrien could not help 
 feeling a sort of pleasure in not finding his ideal woman 
 ready made at his hand: she was all wrong, and that was 
 very sad, but he could make her all right, and that would 
 be very delightful. Why should not this Antoinette be 
 his Eve, in the dearer sense of the word ? Adam gave his 
 flesh and blood only, but John would give his spiritual be- 
 ing, his inner and better self, to be hers for evermore. 
 That she would accept his teaching, and bow to it with a 
 woman's graceful submission, he did not doubt ; for, alas ! 
 this good John Dorrien had the weakness of his sex, and 
 what could woman be made for but to tread in the path 
 marked out by her master, man, and reverently follow his 
 footsteps? That Antoinette Dorrien should think for her-
 
 226 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 self in those awful and momentous matters of faith, John 
 would not admit. She was a girl, and of course she would 
 do as she was bid, and believe as she was told. 
 
 Absorbed in these thoughts he walked on, mechani- 
 cally following the winding path pointed out by Madame 
 Brun, till it brought him to the foot of the mountain. The 
 way had not seemed long, and he had not raised his eyes 
 from the ground, when he suddenly stood in a gap of the 
 cliff, and, looking up, found himself at the entrance of a 
 gloomy little gorge. "The character of the spot was so 
 impressive that for a moment John forgot all else. How 
 sileut, how austere was this narrow solitude ! How steep 
 and dark rose those rocks against the blueness of the sky, 
 save where here and there they flushed red in the sunlight! 
 And what a low murmur, as of remonstrance or discontent, 
 came from the mountain-torrent, which, after leaping down 
 among the rocks like living silver, made its way into a lit- 
 tle gully, and vanished there ! 
 
 He threw himself down on the grassy earth, and for a 
 while he forgot the sudden trouble which had risen in his 
 life. With the eager and passionate fondness of a man 
 reared in cities, he gazed on all those tokens of her lovely 
 life which Nature had scattered around him in the princely 
 profusion of one who fears no stint. Tufts of beautiful 
 maiden-hair fern grew in every cranny where the spray and 
 freshness of the water-fall could reach. Graceful plants 
 hung down in banners from the rocks, or trailed along the 
 earth in the. richest luxuriance. Wherever the young man 
 looked he saw beauty and grace mingling fearlessly with 
 savage sternness, and whatever he saw filled him with de- 
 light. Oh, for the days when he loved "Miriam the Jew- 
 ess," and when, free from toil and care, he wandered with 
 her in spots like this ! 
 
 That buried dream, so long put by, recalled that other 
 dream, resting at least on some foundation of reality, but 
 which a few words from Madame Brun had so recently 
 broken, and with it came back the most cruel perplexity. 
 Should he give up this young girl, and let her drift down 
 the tide of life her own way, while he took his ? lie owed 
 her nothing, he was in no manner pledged to her, and 
 should be doing her no wrong. Her own grandfather had 
 ceased to wish for the fulfillment of his original plan, and
 
 JOHN DORRIEN'. 227 
 
 preferred the possession and enjoyment of large capital 
 to the empty boast of leaving the business to unborn sons 
 of his own blood. He urged Mademoiselle Basnage upon 
 John Dorrien, and Mademoiselle Basnage, John knew, had 
 been reared in a convent, and had therefore been accus- 
 tomed to say her prayers without being laughed out of it. 
 And then Antoinette Dorrien, though declined by him, 
 would never know it. She would not undergo the humili- 
 ation and pain of a woman whom a man has seen, looked 
 at, and rejected. She could live on in this southern ham- 
 let on her grandfather's allowance, she could spend her 
 davs and years beneath these blue skies, and lead the qui- 
 etly sensuous southern life — that life which, so far as it 
 -mi's, is complete and fair. Was it so hard a lot, to one 
 who had known none other, to see the sun shine day after 
 day, and watch the lovely change of summer to autumn, 
 of autumn to winter, of winter back again to spring? Was 
 not all this beauty a sort of Eden ? 
 
 Happy Antoinette to live among such scenes ! — happy 
 if she only knew it; for alas! happiness is nothing with- 
 out the consciousness of its existence ; and Adam's fatal 
 disobedience has not necessarily acquired for himself or his 
 posterity the knowledge of such blessings as are still left 
 after the fall. Sometimes men and women have glimpses 
 of their own bliss; sometimes, like travelers in the desert, 
 they see the Gardens of Irem, and tremble because they 
 are* but a vision, soon to vanish, leaving only arid waste 
 behind; sometimes it is so, but, as a rule, what heart is 
 blessed so far as to be aware of its own good V 
 
 " Yes," thought John Dorrien, with a sigh of pity and 
 regret, "that must be her lot, after all — to stay here. 
 Welt, it is not so hard a fate; she will get married, and — " 
 
 He paused at this prospect. His heart beat with a jeal- 
 ous throb, his brow flushed with a sudden pain. His fancy 
 had made this girl his so long that he could not give her 
 up now without a pang. It was one thing to marry Made- 
 moiselle Basnage, pretty, accomplished, amiable, and pious ; 
 and it was another thing to contemplate that this perverted 
 Antoinette, so long dreamed of as his own, should become 
 the Antoinette of another man. 
 
 John Dorrien rose. He kicked a stone out of his path ; 
 he was troubled, irritated, and perplexed. He wanted this
 
 228 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 girl ; lie could not give her up, and yet his reason told him 
 that, in taking her, he was steering headlong toward that 
 matrimonial wreck which it is so fearful a thing to con- 
 template from the shore. 
 
 Take away the fact that he, the disciple of the Abbe 
 Veran, the rigid, uncompromising Christian, ought to have 
 nothing in common with this poor young pervert, was it 
 not the merest folly, even in a common-sense point of 
 view, to seek life-long union with a girl whose every feel- 
 ing must be at variance with his own ? Was not commu- 
 nity of belief one of the essentials in so close a bond as 
 that of marriage? How could he, the Christian man, who 
 prided himself on the grand privilege of his faith, choose 
 this misguided girl to be the future mother of his children ? 
 Was it not merely wrong, but also dangerous ? So spoke 
 Reason; but that Charity, which the Apostle placed be- 
 yond all else — that pure flame, which, though it may burn 
 for man or woman, is ever caught from the fire of Divine 
 love, is above all things generous, and every generous im- 
 pulse of his nature now pleaded for Antoinette in the heart 
 of John Dorrien. He already' loved her a little, and he 
 pitied her very much. He longed to bring back this lamb, 
 straying in the dreariness of unbelief, to the pleasant pas- 
 tures and sweet waters of his own faith. Oh, if he could 
 but teach her a twofold love, how sweet, how pure a re- 
 ward this would be ! His heart beat at the thought ; then, 
 after a pause of doubt, he said to himself, with all the reck- 
 lessness of a strong desire, " Why not venture ? " 
 
 He walked back to the inn in a oalmer mood. As he 
 approached the hamlet, he looked curiously around him, 
 wondering where the dwelling of Antoinette Dorrien could 
 be. He paused as he passed by the open gates of a stately 
 but deserted villa, .which his abstraction had prevented 
 him from noticing before. White bills, defaced with " Pro- 
 priete a vendre " upon them, were stuck on the two pillars 
 which guarded the entrance. The vases that had adorned 
 them once were broken, and the aloes in them burned up 
 with the sun. Red geraniums and tall rose-trees still 
 bloomed above the high walls, but their very luxuriance 
 had a desolate meaning. The villa stood alone, and far 
 away in the green grounds, with a long avenue of cypress- 
 trees leading to its closed doors. A grand vista of glassy
 
 JOHN DORRIEN: 229 
 
 sea, mountain, and sky, rose above the low-terraced roof of 
 the house It all seemed like a dream of beauty to John 
 Dorrien, but beauty here wore a lonely and forsaken as- 
 pect, which, spite the smiling southern sky, was not with- 
 out pathos. He pushed the gate open, and entered. As 
 he crossed the grass-grown threshold, a bird flew away 
 with a startled rush of wing, but no token of life met his 
 view. He went on between those dark and solemn c} r press- 
 trees, On which the setting sun cast a golden light, and the 
 very loveliness of all things seemed strange and unreal. 
 
 He reached at length the shut-up house, and walked 
 round. Every door and casement was closed. Long-im- 
 prisoned festoons of vine veiled the lower windows. Me- 
 senibrvanthemum hung from the balconies, and swayed in a 
 little breeze which came from the sea. The air was pure and 
 balmv, and the sweetness of the south stole through the 
 voung man's senses, bringing back, like the echo of distant 
 music, every classic and romantic vision of his youth. That 
 deserted garden seemed meant for lovely ladies and gallant 
 cavaliers to disport in. Here they might sit in the shade, 
 and tell love-tales all the day long. Here, too, as he wan- 
 dered oti, and the garden became a wilderness, John felt 
 that in this Nature, so gracious and so fair, the Galatea of 
 an older world might have hidden in the shade, or that 
 Corydon might have piped on his wonderful reed, and Da- 
 mcetus might have striven for the carved cup which was to 
 reward the skill of the victor. 
 
 He reached at length the boundary of this fair domain 
 — a low sunlit bank, which divided the garden from a 
 plantation of olive-trees rising above it in terraces, Italian- 
 fashion. In some places the bank merged into a wall of 
 loose stones, covered with golden mosses and dainty ferns 
 and rich sedums, and weeds unknown to the north ; a low 
 boundary-wall, crumbling away in the sunshine, which had 
 been baking it into yellow and red for many a summer — a 
 wall which would have betm the delight of a painter's eye, 
 and in which he would have reveled as a miser may revel 
 in a golden treasure; and, sitting on this wall, John Dor- 
 rien now saw Antoinette reading. He stood still — he did 
 not want her to see him, nor did she. She sat very quietly, 
 regardless of the sun, intent and happy; and suddenly, 
 though alone, she burst into a loud peal of girlish laughter,
 
 230 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 sweet and clear as a bell. Much would John have liked to 
 know what it was in the little yellow Tauchnitz volume in 
 her hand that moved her to this lonely mirth ; but, unwill- 
 ing- that she should see and recognize him, he turned away 
 unperceived, walked back through the lonely cypress ave- 
 nue, and thence made his way to the Chapeau Vert. 
 
 He found Madame Brun proud, beaming, and hospi- 
 table. Would monsieur like to break his fast at once ? She 
 had just received a large slice of ham. Mademoiselle An- 
 toinette had brought it. 
 
 " She is so good ! " gushingly added Madame Brun. 
 " Her conscience pricked her for the eggs, and, Madame 
 Clarke having sent her the ham, she had brought it to 
 make amends to my traveler." 
 
 " Mademoiselle Antoinette is very kind," said John 
 Dorrien, smiling ; " but if food is so scarce in this locality, 
 I think she ought to keep that ham ; for, after all, I can go 
 away and eat elsewhere." 
 
 " Well, so I said," naiively replied Madame Brun ; " but 
 Madame Clarke sent other things besides the ham ; and 
 Mademoiselle Melanie was out when the hamper came, and 
 never knew any thing about the ham which Mademoiselle 
 Antoinette brought at once to me. She cannot take it 
 back now ; and monsieur may as well have it, for it would 
 only be wasted." 
 
 John Dorrien could not gainsay this argument, and, as 
 dinner was utterly out of the question in this earthly para- 
 dise, in which, moreover, he did not intend prolonging his 
 stay, he accepted Madame Bran's offer, and made what that 
 lady called a goUter on bread, ham, and sour wine. Madame 
 Brun herself waited upon him, and he took the opportunity 
 of questioning her concerning the deserted villa. 
 
 " Oh ! that was Madame Clarke's house," promptly re- 
 plied Madame Brun. " They were such good people, and 
 so fond of Mademoiselle Antoinette. It was a sad day for 
 her when they went awa} r to Nice." 
 
 " And will they not come back ? " asked John Dorrien. 
 
 " Oh ! no, never," mysteriously replied Madame Brun. 
 
 John could not but ask, as it w r as evidently intended that 
 he should, why the Clarkes were not to come back to their 
 own house. The reply was promptly and freely given. The 
 Clarkes could not come back because they had been found
 
 JOHN DORM EX. ^,]{ 
 
 out. Would monsieur believe it ? It turned out that these 
 Clarkes were nobody ! They were very rich, but had been 
 11 xt to nothing in their own country — peasants, masons — 
 Heaven knew what ! They had come to tins simple, unsus- 
 pecting La Ruya, and, taking advantage of its innocence, 
 Lad passed themselves off for people of consequence, and 
 been received and visited as such by the seven great families 
 who had villas here. But they had been found out — by the 
 merest accident; and, being much mortified at the sorry 
 figure they cut after the discovery of their mean origin, 
 they had left La Ruya in disgust, put up their villa, on 
 which they had spent so much money, for sale, and gone to 
 Nice, whence they would never return. 
 
 "It is a pity though for La Ruya,'' added Madame Brun, 
 " for they were rich, and spent plenty of money ; and Made- 
 moiselle Melanie might have held her tongue, but they did 
 not like her much, and she would have her revenge. An 
 English gentleman, who came here to paint the dark valley, 
 first let it out, but no one liked to take it up ; however, 
 Mademoiselle Melanie, who is as spitefid as a cat, said to 
 them one day, when the villa wanted repairs, what a com- 
 fort it must be that they understood all about building, for 
 they could not be taken in. Madame Clarke tried to make 
 it out that her husband had been an architect, but he shook 
 his fist and swore, and said in his bad French that he had 
 been a mason, and was not ashamed of it. and that those 
 who did not like it might leave it. He was a good sort of 
 man was Monsieur Clarke, but madame was so vexed and 
 affronted that she would not have staid an hour longer if 
 she could have helped it, and that was how they went away. 
 It was a great pity for Mademoiselle Antoinette, who was 
 always with their children, and vety nice young ladies they 
 were — quite pretty and well-behaved, and all so fond of 
 Mademoiselle Antoinette. For, you see, she was a count- 
 ess's daughter, and it was a fine thing for them to speak of 
 their friend Madame la Comtesse d'Armaille,'" added Ma- 
 dame Bain, with that shrewd insight into the weaknesses 
 of their betters which the so-called lower classes are apt to 
 display. " Well, Mademoiselle Antoinette liked them, too, 
 poor young lady, and used to study with the Demoiselles 
 Clarke, and run about the garden and the grounds ; and, 
 even now that they are gone, she climbs over the wall and
 
 232 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 jumps and wanders about there, and she is always reading 
 those books which the Clarkes left behind them." 
 
 John Dorrien, who had been careful not to check Madame 
 Brun's loquacity, now supposed that Mademoiselle Antoi- 
 nette's abode was not far from the villa of the Clarkes. 
 
 " Oh ! very near it," said Madame Brim ; "a little low 
 house, painted yellow. Monsieur would see it when he left 
 by the voiture. There was a garden with roses in front." 
 
 John had no more to learn. He would leave La Rirya, 
 and the Chapeau Vert, and Madame Brim. The rickety 
 car that was to take him on soon appeared. He climbed 
 up on the roof, and the slow vehicle stole up the hill, and 
 ere long passed by the dilapidated dwelling where Antoi- 
 nette grew nigh Mademoiselle Melanie, as a fresh wild-flower 
 may grow in the shelter of a prickly thorn. John Dorrien 
 could not help looking for her, and he saw her again. She 
 had come out to look at the car going by, and she stood on 
 the threshold of the low door, with the gloom of a dark 
 room behind, and the warm sunlight from the west pouring 
 on her bare head and fresh young face. She looked at the 
 car with the grave curiosity of a child, and this time her 
 tame bird was perched on her finger, and pecked it. There 
 was no desire and no regret in the dark eves of Antoinette. 
 She knew, she guessed nothing. No presentiment told her 
 that the traveler who gazed down at her so steadily, and 
 whose look she returned with calm unconsciousness, was 
 the arbiter of her fate, and had mentally decided on what 
 her destiny should be. Perhaps, though he knew it not 
 himself, the clear, silvery laugh of the lonely girl had won 
 the day, and fixed the fate of John Dorrien, as well as that 
 of Antoinette, for evermore. 
 
 The car went up the hill, then rattled down on the other 
 side, and vanished ; and Antoinette, turning away, and en- 
 tering the house, said, to the sallow woman sitting there: 
 
 " The diligence has just gone by, and, aunt, it is as 
 stupid as ever." 
 
 For, alas ! so it is with the wisest of us. Our destiny 
 goes by, and we do not recognize it. We see an old red- 
 and-ycllow car going up-hill, and we do not know till all is 
 over, sometimes till years have pissed, and turned the dark 
 locks gray, and made the bright eyes dim, that it was a 
 wonderful chariot, coming straight from Fairy-land.
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. ;J,'33 
 
 John Dorrien knew better than Antoinette how full of 
 meaning- that day in La Ruya had been for him ; but what 
 he knew he kept to himself!, and, when he met Mr. Dorrien 
 again, there was nothing in his aspect that told thequietly- 
 observant blue eyes of that languid gentleman of the sharp 
 struggle which liad gone on within. To all seeming, the 
 only important item in his information was the death of 
 Mis. George Dorrien, and the long concealment of it by her 
 sister-in-law. Mr. Dorrien's pale cheek took a faint tinge 
 of red as he learned how he had been deceived. 
 
 " 1 must see to this," he said, a little sharply, " and I 
 must take Miss Dorrien out of Mademoiselle Melanie's 
 hands, place her in some house — in some convent — " 
 
 " Why not bring her here, sir, under your own care?" 
 interrupted John Dorrien. 
 
 This was the only intimation he gave that he still clung 
 to the wish of making Antoinette his wife ; but Mr. Dor- 
 rien understood his meaning, and replied, slowly : 
 
 " Well, yes, as you say, John, why not bring her here ? " 
 
 He said no more, nor did John Dorrien, but this much 
 sufficed, and it was all that passed on the subject between 
 these two. Neither Mrs. Reginald nor John's mother knew 
 where he had been, nor what was in part his errand. That 
 business journey was held of no more account than any 
 other. Oliver Black himself, however shrewd his surmises 
 may have 1 been, had no opportunity of testing their correct- 
 ness by questioning his friend. The day before that on 
 which John Dorrien arrived, he was sent to the west of 
 France by Mr. Dorrien. He remained two months away, 
 and when lie came back Antoinette had been some time in 
 her grandfather's house. 
 
 CHAPTER XXI. 
 
 No one, not even John, ever knew what correspondence 
 passed between Mr. Dorrien, Mademoiselle Melanie, and 
 Antoinette Dorrien, before it was finally settled that her 
 grandfather's house was henceforth to be the young girl's
 
 234 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 home. Mr. Dorrien's confidence in John, so far as business 
 went, was unlimited ; but every thing of a private nature 
 he jealously kept to himself, and this thing proved no ex- 
 ception. The only information Mr. Dorrien gave to John 
 was conveyed indirectly one evening at dinner. 
 
 " Mrs. Reginald," he remarked, " will you kindly have 
 a room prepared for my granddaughter, Miss Dorrien ? She 
 will be coming here in a few days." 
 
 Mrs. Reginald's spoon remained uplifted on its way to 
 her mouth. 
 
 " Is Miss Dorrien alone ? " she asked, in her deepest 
 bass. 
 
 " Quite alone. Her mother has been dead more than a 
 year; and that strange person — Mademoiselle Melanie — 
 though she has chosen to say that she will travel with 
 Miss Dorrien, is no more to be admitted to this house than 
 she was formerly — not even as a visitor." 
 
 " I am delighted to hear it," emphatically answered 
 Mrs. Reginald. 
 
 " Perhaps," continued Mr. Dorrien, "you will also be 
 so kind as to go and meet Miss Dorrien in my stead. I 
 should find it awkward and unpleasant to tell any lady — ■ 
 even Mademoiselle Melanie — that she must not enter my 
 house. Miss Dorrien will arrive next Friday by the after- 
 noon train. I hope you are disengaged ? " 
 
 " Oh ! quite," answered Mrs. Reginald, trying not to 
 look like a warrior ready for battle ; but the spark in her 
 brown eye showed that Mademoiselle Melanie, no less than 
 Oliver Black, had the power of raising her ire. 
 
 No more was said on the subject. Mrs. John Dorrien, 
 who was present, looked uneasily at her son on hearing 
 the name of Antoinette. He answered the look with a 
 kind smile that said, " Do not be afraid." 
 
 But afraid Mrs. John Dorrien was, after a fashion ; for 
 when she left the room, and John came out with her, she 
 laid her hand upon his arm, and, looking wistfully up in his 
 face, she said in a low, entreating tone : 
 
 '• You will not be hasty, John ? " 
 
 " No, little mother," he quietly answered — " I shall 
 not," 
 
 " She is your cousin, you know, and Mr. Dorrien's 
 granddaughter; and I dare say she is much improved."
 
 JOHN DOllRIEX. 235 
 
 "Little mother," said John, laughing; " I shall be very 
 kind to her." 
 
 But no more then, than when he came back from La 
 Ruya, did he tell his mother that he had seen Antoinette, 
 and heard her laugh as she sat on the wall, and fallen in 
 Love with her. 
 
 When Mrs. Dorricn colored photographs, and earned 
 her bread and Johnny's, and did not know how to make 
 both ends meet, she rarely troubled herself with cares of 
 which she did not feel the pressure. But, now that these 
 troubles were over, she vexed her spirit with many useless 
 speculations. Would John and Antoinette take to each 
 other? How would John behave? And how would all 
 this affect the important matter of the partnership, whieh, 
 alter being mentioned once, had been dropped as entirely 
 as if the question had never been raised? So thought Mrs. 
 Dorrien as she sat alone in her room that evening; and, 
 when Mrs. Reginald came in and looked at her, the thoughts 
 at once expressed themselves in speech. 
 
 "O Mrs. Reginald," she exclaimed despondingly, "how 
 will it all end? — I mean between John and Antoinette?" 
 
 "My dear, I can tell you to a T," airily replied the 
 lady, taking a chair, and sitting down opposite her friend, 
 with her hands upon her knees. "They will love, or they 
 will hate, each other, of course; and, whichever they do, 
 they will be sure to fight." 
 
 "Fiffht! Mrs. Reginald!" exclaimed Mrs. Dorrien, 
 with a little start — for she was fastidious about speech, 
 and had never got fairly accustomed to her friend's nervous 
 English. 
 
 "Call it quarreling, if you like, my dear," answered 
 Mrs. Reginald, with much equanimity ; " whatever name 
 you give it, it's human nature. Children do nothing else, 
 and young people are only older children ; as to that, so 
 are we all children — all of us, my dear." 
 
 "Boys are quarrelsome," said Mrs. Dorrien, with a 
 little sigh, "but dear John never was; and girls — " 
 
 "Girls," interrupted Mrs. Reginald, " are their papas' 
 daughters, and inherit the paternal propensities. They do 
 not do it after the paternal fashion, but 'tis all one. Human 
 nature, dear — human nature. Don't I feel that 1 shall 
 like to go and fetch that girl, and take her out of that
 
 236 J OHN DORRIEN. 
 
 Mademoiselle Melanie's claws ! I wonder why I do like it, 
 but I do — on the same principle, I suppose, that men and 
 nations like war. There's excitement in it, to begin with ; 
 and then there's strategy — which is as good as chess, any- 
 day ; and then — " 
 
 " Pray don't ! " entreated Mrs. John Dorrien, piteously. 
 " I cannot bear to think that John and Mr. Dorrien's grand- 
 daughter should disagree ! ' ; 
 
 " Oh ! they may not disagree," composedly retorted 
 Mrs. Reginald, " but fight they will. I tell you that we 
 shall see them, this little Antoinette, who was a vixen, and 
 John, who, though good, is not an angel — I tell you we 
 shall see them at it. Let us hope that John will come out 
 of the contest with flying colors ; but I don't know — I don't 
 know — women are apt to have the best of it." 
 
 John's mother looked injured. 
 
 " I cannot believe that my dear boy will allow himself 
 to be brought into any quarrel with Miss Dorrien," said 
 
 she. 
 
 " Now that's just like a mother," retorted Mrs. Regi- 
 nald, laying her hand on Mrs. Dorrien's arm, " so like a 
 mother! Why, your dear boy, who is the best boy in the 
 world, is a most provoking boy, with his cool ways. And 
 he thinks a good deal of himself, for all he is so modest ; 
 and he will argue on a pin's-head, if you give him the 
 chance ; and he's almost always right, which is more than 
 a woman can bear," candidly added Mrs. Reginald. 
 
 " O Mrs. Reginald, I thought you liked John ! " re- 
 monstrated John's mother. 
 
 " Of course I do like him, the dear boy ! " 
 
 " And if he and Miss Dorrien fall out, what is to be- 
 come of the partnership ? " 
 
 " Well, dear, let us hope the}' will not fall out, and let 
 us do our best to keep them friends. 
 
 " But it is so unjust that John should depend for his 
 position upon a girl's fancy or caprice, Mrs. Reginald." 
 
 Mrs. Reginald rubbed her nose with her forefinger. 
 
 "Not John's fault," she .suggested. 
 
 " John's fault ! " John's mo1 ber was all amazement. 
 
 "Not too sure of himself and his value !" continued 
 Mrs. Reginald, shrewdly. 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien looked affronted.
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 237 
 
 " Not too fond of his own way and his own opinions," 
 persisted Mrs. Reginald. 
 
 "I am afraid he is," reluctantly confessed Mrs. Dorrien. 
 
 "And I am sure of it," honestly said Mrs. Reginald, 
 "and for all that he is the best and dearest boy in the 
 world ; and it will all end well, my dear." 
 
 And what with the praise, and what with the predic- 
 tion, John's mother felt somewhat comforted. 
 
 That strategy which Mrs. Reginald justly considered 
 one of the charms and attractions of war, proved at fault in 
 her case, in the matter of Antoinette Dorrien's arrival. 
 Mademoiselle Melanie left La Ruya a day earlier than that 
 which had been agreed upon between her and Mr. Dorrien ; 
 aud thus, instead of being met at the station, she had the 
 satisfaction of driving up to the door of her enemy, and 
 sending him in word that mademoiselle had arrived. 
 
 " Monsieur is out," replied the portress. " Every one 
 is out," she added, " but I think Madame Reginald is at 
 home." 
 
 "Then tell her," angrily retorted Mademoiselle Melanie. 
 
 The portress sent a message through a servant, who, 
 after a brief interval, during which Antoinette and her aunt 
 sat perfectly still in the cab, came back with the intimation 
 that Madame Reginald was at home, and was waiting for 
 Mademoiselle Dorrien in her sitting-room. 
 
 The man standing at the door of the cab had delivered 
 his message with the impassiveness of Fate, but Antoinette 
 colored on hearing him, and darted a quick, uneasy look at 
 Mademoiselle Melanie, who only smiled disdainfully, and 
 sharply said : " Well, why don't you get out ? Don't for- 
 get your bird," she sarcastically added, as Antoinette care- 
 fully lifted up a little cage, out of which a tiny brown 
 thing was vainly attempting to peep. "I know," angrily 
 continued Mademoiselle Melanie, " vou think more of that 
 bird than you do of me." 
 
 "I am very fond of Joli," said Antoinette, "and you 
 know, aunt, how fond of me he is ; how he never flics awav, 
 nor—" 
 
 " Rubbish ! " interrupted Mademoiselle Melanie. " Get 
 down, do." 
 
 She gave her cold cheek to the young girl to kiss, 
 scolded the cabman because he attempted to move her
 
 238 J0HN DORKIEN. 
 
 trunk instead of that of her niece, and sullenly returned 
 the young girl's wistful look as she alighted, and stood 
 hesitatingly on the threshold of her new home, with the 
 little cage in her hand. 
 
 " I shall come soon and see you, aunt," she said, softly. 
 
 This promise Mademoiselle Melanie ignored, but, cast- 
 ing an ireful look toward the windows which she supposed 
 to belong to Mrs. Reginald's apartment, she muttered, an- 
 grily : ' 
 
 " Her sitting-room ! as if I would condescend to enter 
 it! My brother was Count d'Armaille," added Mademoi- 
 selle Melanie, leaning back in the cab, and looking digni- 
 fied ; " you may tell her so if you like. — Drive on ! " 
 
 The cabman drove off as he was bid, and Antoinette 
 stood alone under the archway, with her trunk by her side, 
 and the impassive servant waiting her pleasure. 
 
 " Shall I show mademoiselle up-stairs ? " he at length 
 suggested. 
 
 Antoinette did not answer at once. She felt rather 
 chilled at her reception, and stood listening to the cab, as 
 it drove away, and looking at the silent, nagged court be- 
 fore her. The servant, thinking she had not understood his 
 offer, repeated it, and attempted to take the cage from her. 
 
 "Thank you; I remember the way," she gravely an- 
 swered, " and I always carry my bird myself." 
 
 She crossed the court, and went up the steps with her 
 long traveling-cloak hanging on her arm. As she passed 
 bv the library, she remembered that her mother and she 
 had lived there, and with a sudden impulse she opened the 
 door and went in. The room was not much altered. The 
 windows still let in a green glimpse of the garden, the 
 laded gilding of the books still shone from the walls, the 
 leather chairs, dark and massive, did not look much the 
 worse for the wear of all these years. The only difference 
 between the past and present aspect of the room was in an 
 open bureau, in which were scattered papers, and on these 
 lay a little round ball of white wool. 
 
 " Carlo ! " cried Antoinette, darting forward with a sud- 
 den and joyous impulse — " I am sure you are Carlo." 
 
 Carlo's only reply to this greeting was a low growl, and 
 a display of still shining white teeth. Antoinette drew 
 hack in sudden alarm.
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 230 
 
 " Do not be afraid, he will not hurt yon," said John Dor- 
 rien, who had that moment entered the room through the 
 window opening: on the garden. 
 
 It was thus they met. 
 
 " I am your cousin, John Dorrien," he said, smiling, and 
 holding out his hand. 
 
 " Are you ! " answered Antoinette, in seeming doubt, 
 " I should not have known you again — Carlo has forgotten 
 me," she quickly added. 
 
 " You have left us so long," apologetically replied John ; 
 " but have you long been come ? — we did not expect you 
 till to-morrow." 
 
 "Yes, she is so tiresome," pettishly said Antoinette; 
 "she did it on purpose, you know. 1 have only just come, 
 and I am to go up to Mrs. Reginald's sitting-room. This 
 is the way, is it not ? " 
 
 " Yes, this is the way," he replied, following her to the 
 door, and opening it for her ; " but why will you not shake 
 hands with me, Cousin Antoinette ? " 
 
 " I beg your pardon," she said, with a start and a deep 
 blush. She bent her abashed face as she held out her hand 
 to him ; but that hand remained inert in his, and made no 
 effort to return his cordial pressure. With the same pas- 
 siveness she met Mrs. Reginald up-stairs. That lady wel- 
 comed her kindly, slightly commented on her having taken 
 the wrong train as "a pity," and finally asked if she did 
 not feel tired, and would not be glad to go to her own 
 room. This remark only did Antoinette answer. 
 
 "I am not very tired," she replied, "but I fancy my 
 little bird is. I shall be glad to take him to my room; 
 but must I not see Mr. Dorrien first ? Perhaps he is in 
 now," she suggested. 
 
 " My dear child, Mr. Dorrien is out, Mrs. John is out, 
 and I have not long been in," answered Mrs. Reginald, 
 with a touch of asperity. " AYe expected neither you nor 
 your bird until to-morrow, you know." 
 
 Antoinette looked at her in some wonder, but said, 
 quietly : 
 
 " Then I must wait till Mr. Dorrien comes in." 
 
 There was something so very tranquil in her tone that 
 Mrs. Reginald set her head on one side to give her one of 
 her looks ; then she looked at the sparrow, still vainlj r at-
 
 240 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 tempting to peep out of his cage ; then, drawing a deep 
 breath, she walked to the door. Antoinette followed her, 
 still carrying her cage, and her long cloak still trailing on 
 the floor ; but she did not look round at John Dorrien. 
 The young man, though he had much to do just then, re- 
 mained standing by Mrs. Reginald's fireplace, with his el- 
 bow resting on the marble slab of the chimney, and his 
 eyes fastened on the door which had closed upon Antoi- 
 nette. Thus did Mrs. Reginald find him when she returned 
 at the end of a few minutes. She went straight up to him. 
 
 " John, my dear bov ! " she kindly said, " what are you 
 thinking of?'" 
 
 He looked at her and smiled slowly, but did not answer 
 the question. Mrs. Reginald nodded sagely. 
 
 " A nice little thing," she said, " but — " 
 
 " But what ? " asked John. 
 
 " Not easily dealt with, I fancy." 
 
 " What makes you think so, Mrs. Reginald ? " 
 
 " Nothing and every thing," was the sententious and 
 mj'sterious reply. 
 
 " Say one thing, Mrs. Reginald." 
 
 " Well, then, she is cool, for one thing. She gave me 
 quite a calm, surprised look when I said she had taken the 
 wrong train." 
 
 " Did she ? " laughed John, looking amused ; "but she 
 reddened too, Mrs. Reginald." 
 
 " Very slightly," was Mrs. Reginald's dry answer. 
 " You will have to mind your P's and Q's, John, or you 
 will not be on a bed of roses if you have many dealings 
 with that young lady." 
 
 The words were scarcely uttered when Mrs. Reginald 
 regretted them ; but they seemed to produce no effect on 
 John Dorrien, who merely said: 
 
 " I wonder when I have been on a bed of roses, Mrs. 
 Reginald ? " and, looking at his watch, he left her without 
 waiting for an answer. 
 
 lie had not long been gone when Mrs. Reginald, who 
 was standing at her window, watching for the return of 
 Mrs. John Dorrien, saw that lady crossing the court-yard. 
 She tapped the window-panes energetically ; John's mother 
 looked up, saw her, and nodded and smiled. Presently she 
 entered the room, a little flushed and out of breath, as she
 
 JOIIX DORRIEN. £41 
 
 was often now. Mrs. Reginald greeted her with a breath- 
 less " She's come, dear ! " 
 
 " Come ! " 
 
 "Yes, dear; took the wrong train on purpose. Made- 
 moiselle Melanie brought her to the door — did it on pur- 
 pose — reckoned on taking her in to Mr. Uorricn and delv- 
 ing him — but she was disappointed of that, at least," added 
 Mrs. Reginald, a little grimly, " for I was the only one 
 within. John met her on the stairs, I suppose, for they 
 came in together." 
 
 • Mrs. Dorrien looked anxious at once. She sat down on 
 a chair, she untied her bonnet-strings, she tied them again 
 nervously, and at length she said : 
 
 " How is she ? — how do you like her ? " 
 
 "Oh, she is like most girls," carelessly replied Mrs. 
 Reginald ; " a little red and white thing, with black eyes 
 and ever so much hair. And she travels with a sparrow in 
 a cage — and she has a will of her own, or I am much mis- 
 taken." 
 
 Now, as it was one of Mrs. Reginald's weaknesses never 
 to be mistaken, Mrs. Dorrien knew what that meant. She 
 looked more anxious, more nervous than ever. 
 
 " How do you think John likes her ? " she asked. 
 
 " My dear, how can I tell ? A man of twenty-four or 
 so, and a woman of fifty-odd, don't look at a girl of eigh- 
 teen from the same end of the telescope." 
 
 There was not much in this to comfort Mrs. Dorrien, 
 nor, when, on learning that Antoinette was in her room, 
 she went there to welcome her, did the young girl's man- 
 ner and bearing make her feel easier in her mind. 
 
 Antoinette's room was on the second floor of the house ; 
 it faced the west and overlooked the garden. It was a 
 handsome room, and, with Mr. Dorrien's approval, but at 
 John's suggestion, Mrs. Reginald had added a few pretty 
 trifles to it, and thus given it a youthful, girlish aspect. 
 
 Antoinette was looking at an exquisite little bronze 
 paper-weight, and had not yet put it down out of her hand, 
 when Mrs. Dorrien entered her room and greeted her with 
 a kind and maternal, but not very truthful, " My dear child, 
 how glad 1 am to have you baek again ! " 
 
 Antoinette smiled, and returned this welcome very pret- 
 tilv — for there was something sweet and amiable about her 
 11
 
 242 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 — but also very quietly, and still holding' the paper-weight 
 (two greyhounds plaj'ing together) in her hand. 
 
 " That is John's choice," quickly said Mrs. Dorrien, 
 smilinff. 
 
 " Mr. Dorrien is very kind," replied Antoinette ; but she 
 put down the handsome trifle with unmistakable indiffer- 
 ence. 
 
 " How altered you are ! " resumed Mrs. Dorrien, look- 
 ing at her from a distance — " how improved ! I should 
 never have known you." 
 
 Antoinette smiled, but did not seem inclined to respond 
 to Mrs. Dorrien's advances. It was plain that she took 
 every attention and every civil speech as a matter of course. 
 She was Mr. Dorrien's granddaughter, coming back to Mr. 
 Dorrien's house, and she knew it. Mrs. Dorrien looked at 
 her, still smiling:, but with uneasiness in her smile. Was 
 this girl of eighteen — this little red and white thing, as 
 Mrs. Reginald called her — going to cast her shadow be- 
 tween John and the sun of Mr. Dorrien's favor ? Truly 
 that would be hard. 
 
 "You are tired, dear," she said, gently. "I shall let 
 you rest ; only I could not resist the impulse of coming up 
 to you." 
 
 " You are very good," softly replied Antoinette. " Do 
 you know if Mr. Dorrien has come in yet ? " 
 
 " He is out for the day, my dear ; you took us all by 
 surprise, you know. But," she added, seeing a little cloud 
 casting its shadow on Antoinette's clear brow, "Mr. Dor- 
 rien will be in for dinner, of course. Shall I send you word 
 when he returns ? " 
 
 " Thank you," quietly replied Antoinette, " I dare say 
 he will send for me." 
 
 " Then an revoir, dear," said Mrs. Dorrien, ignoring 
 this check. "Oh, what a darling little bird! Mind Mr. 
 Dorrien's favorite cat, dear." And with this warning she 
 kindly pressed the young girl's hand and left her. 
 
 Mr. Dorrien did not come in till a few minutes before 
 dinner, and he entered the library rather hastily for one 
 usually so composed and languid. 
 
 " What is this Mr. Brown tells me?" he exclaimed, ad- 
 dressing John, who was bending over his desk — "Miss 
 Dorrien has actually arrived !"
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. •.>(:; 
 
 " She came an hour ago," replied John, leaning back 
 iii his chair, and noting the angry flush on Mr. Dorrien's 
 brow. 
 
 Mr. Dorrien was angry. He had contemplated being 
 unexpectedly called away an hour before his granddaugh- 
 ter's arrival, and he felt annoyed at being balked ; but lie 
 seldom or never expressed displeasure, and he did not do 
 so now. 
 
 " Do tell me what this means, John," he said, rather 
 fretfully. " Mr. Brown knows nothing about it." 
 
 He handed his cousin a letter which had been directed 
 to him by mistake. John smiled, said he would see to the 
 matter, then added : 
 
 " Miss Dorrien has been resting some time ; do you 
 wish to see her now, sir? " 
 
 " It will do when Miss Dorrien comes down to dinner," 
 carelessly answered Mr. Dorrien, looking at the clock. 
 " Are you fast or slow, John ? " 
 
 " Neither, sir." 
 
 " Oh, you go like the sun ! Well, then, we shall soon 
 meet, for Mrs. Reginald is punctuality itself." 
 
 "I am afraid her journey has fatigued Miss Dorrien," 
 remarked John, still pressing Antoinette on her grand- 
 fa ther's attention ; " she looks pale." 
 
 Mr. Dorrien compared his watch with the clock, and, 
 ignoring John's remark, said he was decidedly slow, and 
 left the library to dress for dinner. 
 
 The pretty sitting-room on the ground-floor where Mr. 
 Dorrien's family always met before dinner, was vacant 
 when John entered it this evening. His mother and Mrs. 
 Reginald had already passed into the dining-room, where he 
 heard them talking, and Mr. Dorrien and Antoinette were 
 not yet come. He sat down, and was looking out of the 
 window, half hidden by its heavy curtains, when the door 
 opened, and Antoinette entered. Her plain black dress 
 fell down to her feet in Quakeress-like simplicity of outline ; 
 her narrow collar and cuffs were of a dead white, unre- 
 lieved by lace or edging ; she wore neither ring, nor brooch, 
 nor ear-rings of any kind. She might not possess them ; 
 but John thought that she looked as if the heavy plaits of 
 dark hair which adorned her young head were the only 
 ornaments she would care to wear.
 
 244 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 She did not see him till he rose to greet her, and then 
 she drew back with a little start of shy surprise. Before 
 John had time to address her, and, while he was handing 
 her a chair, the ladies in the next room, who had been talk- 
 ing of other matters, had made some unfortunate remarks. 
 
 " And so he has not seen her? " said Mrs. John Dorrien. 
 
 " Not he," replied Mrs. Reginald. " The young lady 
 will find that our Mr. Dorrien is not exactly what she takes 
 him for." 
 
 "Thank you, I do not care to sit down," answered An- 
 toinette, with a raised color, declining the chair which John 
 had brought forward. " I believe this is the way ; " and 
 she walked straight to the velvet hangings, and, passing 
 through them, appeared before Mrs. Reginald. 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien looked confused, but Mrs. Reginald was 
 not a whit dismayed, and only remarked, as she saw An- 
 toinette : 
 
 " Mv dear Miss Dorrien, are you in mourning- ?" 
 
 " No," answered Antoinette, whose lips quivered a little, 
 " I am not ; but I have been." And her voice sank sadly. 
 
 " Why, my dear child," said Mrs. Reginald, kindly, but 
 decisively, " if you are not in mourning pray go up to 
 your room and put on some little bit of pink, or blue, or 
 scarlet, or any thing, for Mr. Dorrien has a perfect horror 
 of black." 
 
 Antoinette drew herself up rather haughtily. 
 
 " I am sorry," she said, " I have nothing of the kind." 
 
 " Well, then, take these roses. — John, come here like 
 a good lad, and prick your fingers for me," said Mrs. Regi- 
 nald, calling out the young man who had remained in the 
 next room, and now appeared at her summons. " I sup- 
 pose you provided our epergne with these roses in Miss 
 Dorrien's honor ? " 
 
 John did not answer, but drew out two bright roses 
 from the crystal epergne and silently handed them to Mrs. 
 Reginald. She walked up with them to Antoinette, as if 
 they were offensive weapons, and, leading her to a mirror, 
 said decisively : 
 
 " Now where shall I put this one in for you ? I suppose 
 your hair is all your own ? " 
 
 Antoinette, who had looked somewhat distant, and on 
 the defensive, suddenly relaxed, and laughed gayly at Mrs.
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 245 
 
 Reginald's question, and, taking the roses from that lady's 
 hand, promptly fastened one in the thick masses of her 
 wavy hair, and slipped the other into the front of her black- 
 dress. 
 
 " Will that do?" she asked, turning round again, and 
 speaking rather mockingly. 
 
 Before Mrs. Reginald could answer, Mr. Dorrien's tall 
 figure appeared in the opening made by the velvet hang- 
 ings, and he paused there for a moment, looking at them 
 all with something like displeasure, and at Antoinette with 
 marked coldness. Whether her black dress annoyed him, 
 as .Mrs. Reginald had foreseen that it would, or whether 
 he thought she took too great a liberty in adorning herself 
 with flowers from his tabic, certain it was that his calm 
 blue eyes rested on his granddaughter with so little friend- 
 liness that the young girl, who had taken two steps toward 
 him, paused irresolute in the middle of the room. 
 
 "You are welcome, my dear Antoinette," he said ; but 
 never was welcome so icily uttered. " I did not expect 
 you, however, before to-morrow." 
 
 "lam sorry," answered Antoinette, in a low tone, "but 
 my aunt would have it so." 
 
 "I was not aware that Mademoiselle Melanie — I be- 
 lieve that is the lady's name — was your aunt," said Mr. 
 Dorrien, in his most measured accents. 
 
 Antoinette did not reply. He color faded, her eyes 
 grew dim. She stood before her grandfather in mute and 
 girlish helplessness. There was something about her so 
 gentle and so youthful in its gentleness, that it went 
 straight to John Dorrien's heart. • 
 
 " Perhaps Mademoiselle Melanie did net wish Miss Dor- 
 rien to arrive to-morrow," he suggested, smiling. " Friday 
 is an unlucky day, you know, sir." 
 
 Mr. Dorrien condescended to relent. 
 
 " Well, my dear," he said, holding out his hand to his 
 granddaughter, drawing her toward him, and printing a 
 cold kiss on her forehead, "you are welcome, Thursday or 
 Friday. — I believe I am late, Mrs. Reginald. — John, you 
 will sit next your cousin, I suppose?" 
 
 His manner was courteous now, and, for one habitually 
 so reserved, pleasant ; but first impressions are dee]) and 
 strong at the age of Antoinette, and never so long as their
 
 246 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 intercourse lasted could she get over the coldness of Mr. 
 Dorrien's welcome. And yet, as we said, his manner un- 
 derwent a marked change. Youth is a sweet and lovely 
 thing in itself, and, when Antoinette took her place at her 
 grandfather's table, she looked a charming and pleasant 
 addition to the family group. Her black dress set off the 
 lily fairness of her skin ; her cheek was fresh as the rose 
 in her hair, her features were not very regular, indeed, but 
 her eyes were soft and bright, and she had the sweetest of 
 smiles, and a dimple in her little chin, and the most beau- 
 tiful dark hair, and the prettiest neck, in the world. The 
 background behind her set off this youthful grace and 
 beautv. The large oak dresser, rich and brown in hue, and 
 carved with griffins and chimeras, seemed to have been put 
 there on purpose to show how young and dainty and grace- 
 ful was Mr. Dorrien's granddaughter. And Mr. Dorrien, as 
 we said, looked graciously upon her. His eye was pleased 
 with Antoinette, and his taste approved of her. She was 
 feminine and attractive, and, though she was a little silent, 
 she looked clever, and yet refined. Mr. Dorrien detested 
 any thing in the shape of a blue-stocking, but he was too 
 intellectual himself to like a simpleton. His own wife had 
 been eminently feminine, pleasing, and in her way — a femi- 
 nine way — accomplished. At the same time it was a great 
 relief to him to find, in the course of conversation, that An- 
 toinette knew nothing of music. He congratulated her on 
 having escaped such a calamity. 
 
 " Think how invaluable is the blessing of never being a 
 bore to your friends," he remarked; "of never hearing 
 most false, civil speeches, of never being entreated to sing 
 or play, while the ardent wish that you should decline the 
 request is felt all the time by your petitioners ! " 
 
 " I might play alone," replied Antoinette, who colored 
 slightly. 
 
 " You might, but people never do," was the quiet re- 
 joinder. 
 
 There was just a flash which shot through Antoinette's 
 dark eyes, but she looked at her plate, and was silent ; in- 
 deed, it was a silent meal. John Dorrien, and his mother 
 saw it with some uneasiness, was attentive to all his young 
 cousin's wants, but otherwise he did not intrude himself 
 upon her. He seemed to think that, when he did not suffer
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 047 
 
 her glass to be empty, and saw that her plate was heaped, 
 he had fulfilled all his duty to her. Mrs. Dorrien remem- 
 bered how determinedly, in the days gone by, the young man 
 bad set his face against Antoinette, and, though she hoped 
 that his position in his cousin's house was a safe one, sin; 
 also thought that, not to displease Mr. Dorrien, if it were 
 possible, would be the wisest plan for John. 
 
 There was a change for the better after dinner. Out of 
 compliment to his granddaughter, no doubt, Mr. Dorrien 
 condescended to spend an hour in Mrs. Reginald's sitting- 
 room that evening. Of his own accord, he languidly sug- 
 gested that Antoinette should see the sights. Mr. Dorrien 
 himself had no time to accompany his granddaughter, of 
 course, but Mrs. John would take her to the churches, and 
 John would spare a few hours, lie was sure, to accompany 
 her, when the fatigue was too much for his mother. 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien looked nervously at her son. He was so 
 dreadfully straightforward, was poor John — quite capable 
 of saying, " I am very sorry, but just now I have no time." 
 Even if he did consent, would his consent be gracious? 
 Well, there was nothing equivocal about his agreement 
 with Mr. Dorrien's suggestion. His gray eyes smiled as 
 he turned to Antoinette, and he declared himself most hap- 
 py to do the honors of Paris and its environs to hiscousin. 
 .Miss Dorrien thanked him demurely, but her pretty head 
 was averted, and her dark eyes looked straight before her 
 at the little clock on the mantel-piece. If such a thing had 
 been possible, Mrs. Dorrien would have fancied that An- 
 toinette had no wish to see Paris ; but John soon roused 
 her from her indilference, or, rather, he soon discovered 
 that it was apparent, not real. He went and sat by her, 
 and engaged her in conversation. With what should they 
 begin? — with the churches, the palaces, or the museums ? 
 Did she like pictures ? Would she prefer the public gar- 
 dens first ? In short, what should they do on the morrow ? 
 At first Antoinette declared that she liked every thing in a 
 way that meant she liked nothing: but soon her manner 
 thawed, her face turned to John's, its delicate bloom deep- 
 ened, her eyes laughed, her lips smiled, she was beaming, 
 and that expectation of pleasure which is so keen and so 
 charming at eighteen shone in her whole aspect. 
 
 John's voice, though clear, was never loud; the room
 
 248 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 was large, and Mr. Dorrien's chair stood far away from 
 the low couch on which the two cousins were sitting. 
 He knew the purport of their discourse* but he knew no 
 more. He watched their fresh, eager young faces with 
 languid interest, as a wearied traveler, sitting on low twi- 
 light shores, may watch the sunlight shining on other 
 journeyers, and see them set off in its fervid glow for the 
 happy mountains far away. Well, they, too, will be tired 
 yet, ardent and joyous though they are now ; they, too, will 
 long for rest before those fair summits are reached ; thev, 
 too, will see that the beauty and the glory of those heavenly 
 heights vanish on a near view. 
 
 Yet how pleased they both looked ! — how soft were the 
 broken murmurs of their two voices, Antoinette's so sweet 
 and girlish, John's so fine, so clear, so mellow ! Did they 
 so soon like each other? They looked like it, foolish, sim- 
 ple young things, so ready for the nonsense of love. It 
 was what he had once wished for, yet the thought of the 
 coming courtship and love-making cloyed on him as sweet- 
 ness may cloy on a sick palate, and there was just a touch 
 of sarcasm in his voice as he said aloud : 
 
 " Pray may a third person venture to know what you 
 are going to do to-morrow ? " 
 
 Antoinette and John exchanged a conscious look, and 
 laughed in unison. Mr. Dorrien half raised himself in his 
 arm-chair, and gazed at them with his wearied blue eyes, 
 that always seemed as if they had been looking at the 
 world so long. It was John who answered. 
 
 " We have just agreed to take a cab and go off in the 
 morning without knowing whither, like the people in the 
 fairy tales." 
 
 "Did they take cabs?" asked Mr. Dorrien, dryly. 
 
 " No, of course not," cried Antoinette, clapping her 
 hands ; " and, John " (the old familiar name seemed to 
 slip out), "we will not take a cab; we will go on foot, 
 and trust to Fate, and, as I shall lead you, we shall be 
 sure to go astray, and we shall get desperately hungry, 
 and — " 
 
 Mr. Dorrien raised his hands. 
 
 "There, there," he said, languidly, " I ask to know no 
 more ; you have conjured up a vision of horrors. Hungry 
 in Paris ! Well, my dear, only please to find your way
 
 JOHN DORRIE.Y M'.i 
 
 back for our seven-o'clock dinner, and to remember that I 
 never wait five minutes for living' creature." 
 
 Antoinette colored a little, and looked at her grandfather, 
 then at John. Had her little flight of fancy been so indec- 
 orous that there was need for Mr. Dorrien to speak so 
 sourly? Her eyes sought John Dorrien's in silent ques- 
 tioning, and his answered her kindly. Very plainly they 
 said, " No, there was no harm in it — do not mind." Even 
 more than this it seemed to Antoinette that the kind, hand- 
 some eyes told her. 
 
 "Do not be afraid," they appeared to say. "Never 
 fear any thing or any one in this house. Am I not your 
 friend, and will I not always be so ?" 
 
 That such was their meaning it seemed to Antoinette 
 on that first day, and that she had read them truly she 
 learned again and again in Mr. Dorrien's house. 
 
 CHAPTER XXII. 
 
 That pretense to avoid the society of his granddaughter 
 for a few davs, at least, which Mr. Dorrien had meant to 
 invent, came to him, the very next morning, without any 
 wish on his part. Little as he interfered with business now, 
 it was necessary for him to be absent a week, and he was 
 even compelled to leave his home without seeing Antoinet te, 
 or holding with her a conversation as to her exact position 
 in her new home, which something in her manner made him 
 think imperatively necessary. 
 
 Miss Dorrien did not miss her grandfather. There is no 
 denying that her face cleared when she came down to break- 
 fast and learned that he was gone. 
 
 "But you shall not miss your holiday, dear," said Mrs. 
 Dorrien, graciously. "John will give lis this day, will he 
 not, dear John, and we shall have the carriage, and go and 
 see the sights ? " 
 
 John smiled kindly, but a sudden cloud, as of annoyance 
 or restraint, passed over Antoinette's bright face. It was 
 soon gone, not so soon, though, that John did not sec it,
 
 250 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 and wonder why the pleasant mood of the evening had not 
 outlived the night. 
 
 " I wish you joy," here remarked Mrs. Reginald. 
 " Sight-seeing is a grand invention for fatigue and loss of 
 time combined in one. — By-the-way, my dear, were you in 
 the garden this morning ?" ' 
 
 She addressed Antoinette, who deliberately went on 
 sipping her coffee before she answered : 
 
 " No, Mrs. Reginald, I was not." 
 
 " Why does she deny it?" thought John, who, sitting 
 in the library at his early work, had seen her flitting about 
 the alleys, and watched her graceful young figure with 
 pleasure. 
 
 " And did you see any one ? And if it was not Antoi- 
 nette, who could it be ? " asked Mrs. Dorrien, with sudden 
 uneasiness. 
 
 " Her fetch, my dear," dryly answered Mrs. Reginald. 
 " The world is full of fetches, indeed, and some people have 
 an unusual share of them. You think they are here — bless 
 you, no such thing, they were there all the time ! " 
 
 This was said so pointedly, and with so boring an eye 
 fastened upon Antoinette, that the young girl put down 
 her cup with a half-frightened air. 
 
 " I shall soon be at your commands, little mother," said 
 John, hastening to change the subject. 
 
 "And we shall soon be ready, dear," replied his mother, 
 in equal hurry to interfere with Mrs. Reginald's warlike 
 propensities. 
 
 Antoinette said nothing, but rose at once, and silently 
 left the room. 
 
 " I am not sure, after all, that I saw her," said Mrs. 
 Reginald, with some compunction, " but I certainly did see 
 something very like her in the garden this morning." 
 
 " Ah, indeed you did," thought John, ruefully. " And 
 why did she deny it ? " 
 
 " I shall be ready in five minutes, dear," said his mother, 
 as she passed by his chair, looking fondly down in his 
 thoughtful face. " And you know, dear," she hesitatingly 
 added, "that it is quite as great a trial to me as it is to 
 you." 
 
 She evidently considered him as great a victim to the 
 duty of escorting Antoinette as she considered herself one
 
 JOHN DOIIRIEN. 251 
 
 to that of chaperoning Mr. Dorrien's granddaughter. John 
 could not help smiling at her strange misapprehension of 
 his feelings. It did seem strange that neither his mother 
 nor Mrs. Reginald should gness that he cared for this young 
 girl. Mrs. Reginald was ready to attack her right and left, 
 und his mother spoke of accompanying her as of a burden 
 to he borne, or a task-to be gone through. And yet what 
 pleasure had his youth known that he should not enjoy the 
 relaxation of a pretty girl's company, and not feel the charm 
 of her youth and freshness ? He could not imagine why 
 she had uttered that foolish untruth, but when she came 
 down and joined his mother and him, and walked down the 
 perron by his side, with a light and dainty step, looking so 
 demure as she drew on her gloves, he forgave her; and 
 when the} r entered the carriage and drove away, John, sit- 
 ting opposite Antoinette, and looking in her soft, dark eyes, 
 forgot all about it. 
 
 "And now, my dear boy," said Mrs. Dorricn, shutting 
 her eyes and leaning back in the carriage with a wearied 
 sigh, " now take us where you like, and tell dear Antoinette 
 about every thing." 
 
 John did as he was bid, and he began by taking Antoi- 
 nette over the old ground which he knew so well. Once 
 they entered on the sight-seeing, Antoinette's gravity 
 thawed and vanished like snow in the sunshine. Her eyes 
 sparkled, her face beamed, her little, nervous hands shook 
 with excitement. 
 
 " The Temple ? Was that the Temple ? " and she looked 
 up in the air for an invisible dungeon. 
 
 " My dear, there is not a fragment of it left," pettishly 
 said Mrs. Dorrien. 
 
 "Yes, but it was here," quickly replied Antoinette; 
 " this is the very spot." 
 
 The broad sunlit place on which the Bastille once stood 
 possessed the same incontrovertible charm. The great 
 prison-house in which Latude ate his heart away has van- 
 ished. A tall column, with no austere figure on the top, 
 but with an airy genius of Liberty, brightly gilt, shaking 
 his defiant torch over the city, and looking very ready to 
 take wing and seek some other region, marks the spot 
 where the mediaeval fortress once frowned. Antoinette, 
 who had been a decided royalist at the Temple Gardens,
 
 252 J0 HN DORRIEN. 
 
 here became a vehement little democrat. Mrs. Dorrien 
 looked uncomfortable, but John only smiled. He was still 
 young in years, but hard work, business, and dealings with 
 men, had blunted the early keenness of his feelings. He 
 found it pleasant to watch the manifestations of inexpe- 
 rience so complete as that of Antoinette. The freshness 
 which could resist the commonplace nineteenth-century as- 
 pect of the Place de la Bastille with its great glare of light, 
 its omnibuses and railway-stations, and conjure up in their 
 stead the long-departed stronghold of despotic power, 
 amused him. Something of this Antoinette was quick to 
 detect in his smile — something, but not all. 
 
 " I suppose it is very foolish in me to think so much of 
 what people suffered long ago," she said in a little injured 
 tone, " but I cannot help it." 
 
 " My dear, it is not foolish," said Mrs. Dorrien, uneasily ; 
 " no one thinks so, only you see they were not all angels 
 that were shut in there." 
 
 " I am sure they were all innocent," cried Antoinette, 
 warmly ; " all victims of kings and ministers and favorites." 
 
 " Madame de Brinvilliers, for instance," said John. 
 
 " Well, perhaps she did not poison people after all," 
 persisted Antoinette : 
 
 Mrs. John Dorrien opened her eyes, but John compos- 
 edly remarked: 
 
 " Perhaps she did not. There are two terrible draw- 
 ings of her by Lebrun in the Louvre. In one she leans 
 back on a pillow with a cross in her hand, her face still 
 gasping with the pain of recent torture. In the other she 
 is going to the scaffold, with all the horror of her coming 
 doom in her staring eyes and parted lips. When you see 
 this last drawing, Miss Dorrien, note the cruel profile, and 
 perhaps } r ou will agree with Lebrun himself, who thought 
 that Madame de Brinvilliers was very like a tigress." 
 
 Antoinette was startled, but she soon rallied, and said 
 demurely — 
 
 " Perhaps he made her so, Mr. Dorrien." 
 
 " Oh, come ! " exclaimed Mrs. Dorrien, trying to be very 
 friendly and easy, " no more Miss Dorriens or Mr. Dorriens, 
 if you please. — And, John, ray dear boy, tell Antoinette 
 something pleasant, and show her some nice bits of old 
 Paris. Has she seen the Place Royale ? "
 
 JOHN DORRIKX. ■.>;,:; 
 
 " My dear mother, it is all very well to lock at the 
 Place Royale now, with its quaint old houses, and its look 
 of decayed greatness, and think it pleasant ; but remember 
 the duels that were fought there ! — not tame duels, with 
 just one pistol-shot or a sword-thrust, but regular encoun- 
 ters on horseback, where the seconds fought on their own 
 account, as well as the principals." 
 
 " Oh, dear, how dreadful ! " cried Antoinette, with a 
 shudder; but in the same breath she added, " Is it nigh 
 here, Mr. Dorrien ? — John, I mean." 
 
 " Close bv, if you wish to see it." 
 
 Almost as he spoke they entered the Place, and drove 
 slowly round it. The spot was quiet. The heavy-built 
 old houses, with their steep roofs, were sleeping lazily in 
 the sun ; the galleries on the ground-floor looked dark, 
 rather damp, and deserted; the little inclosed garden in 
 the centre had a forlorn aspect. Every thing spoke now 
 of tame, sedate, bourf/eois ways ; and it was hard to be- 
 lieve that hot-blooded young men had once come here in 
 the early morning, and, more for the love of fighting than 
 for hate or for honor, wakened the echoes of the. now tran- 
 quil dwellings with the clash cf their swords, and dyed the 
 stones of the pavement with their blood. What frenzy 
 possessed them ? Were they not nobly born, rich, and 
 young? What more would they have had? Why must 
 they rush so eagerly to those fatal conflicts, where wounds 
 were almost always deadly and where the scaffold often 
 awaited the survivor? 
 
 John told Antoinette the story of some of those famous 
 duels, then he made her alight to look at the white eques- 
 trian statue of Louis XIII. in the garden. The king who 
 with ruthless hand put down those unhallowed encounters 
 now guards the spot where they oftenest took place. He 
 wears the long flowing locks and cavalier garb of his fiery 
 contemporaries ; but for his look of calm command, you 
 might take that young man, with the clear, handsome pro- 
 file, for one of those ill-fated gentlemen whom he sent to 
 the block. 
 
 "How cruel he must have been!" indignantly said 
 Antoinette 
 
 " Hard, not cruel," c n-reeted John. 
 
 "My dear, is not all this rather dreary?" said Mrs.
 
 254 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 Dorrien, when they joined her again. " Can }ou not tell 
 your cousin something pleasant out of the past ? " 
 
 " The Past is very jealous of his pleasant things, little 
 mother, and keeps them as hidden as the sea keeps its 
 pearls. But, as for its wickednesses, the hoary old sinner 
 lays them bare before us with unblushing coolness." 
 
 "Yes, but duels are horrible things," persisted Mrs. 
 Dorrien ; " let us have a look at the Seine— at any thing." 
 
 When Antoinette saw the beautiful river flowing be- 
 tween its churches and its palaces, and spreading its azure 
 bosom beneath the golden sun, she was at first mute with 
 admiration and delight ; and when she spoke it was to say 
 under her breath : 
 
 " How beautiful ! how grand ! And this church far 
 away is Notre-Dame, you say; and this is the Louvre; 
 and what church is this ? The oldest in Paris ? Oh, yes, 
 do let us see it ! " 
 
 If John had asked her to climb to the top of Notre- 
 Dame, to see all the pictures in the Louvre, or to go and 
 look at all the animals in the Jardin des Plantes, she would 
 have uttered as cheerful a yes, so eager was the sight- 
 seeing appetite of this young creature on the first day of 
 her Paris experiences. The little Place facing the church 
 was very peaceful at this hour. On a bench in the shade 
 of the horse-chestnut trees, whose red, withered leaves 
 strewed the earth, sat a pale old man in a black-silk cap, 
 and a middle-aged woman knitting a blue stocking, and 
 looking at tw T o children playing. It was all as tranquil as 
 though the roar of the great city were not going on hard 
 by. Saint-Germain l'Auxerrois, though ancient, has not 
 remained unchanged. But notwithstanding this inevitable 
 destiny, it still has an impressive and characteristic aspect. 
 Through the arches of the covered gallery, which extends 
 in front of the church, the tarnished gilding and fading red 
 and azure of the mediaeval porch take one back to those 
 by-gone ages when color reveled in all its splendor, and 
 the cold grayness of stone had not }^et prevailed over it. 
 Within the church it is all a rich gloom of low arch and 
 stained glass, never to be forgotten — a gloom which fills 
 the side aisles and chapels, and pervades the place. An- 
 toinette peeped in curiously at the sculptured tombs in one 
 chapel. It was open, and a man in a blue apron was dip-
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. .'-,;, 
 
 ping a brush in a pail of water, and cleaning the white 
 marble effigy of a gentleman who evidently had never be- 
 longed to the nineteenth century. But, though he had 
 In 'en dead some two or three hundred years, he was still 
 taking his ease in an attitude of graceful repose. He was 
 half sitting up, leaning on his left elbow, with a roll of 
 paper in his hand, and his other hand resting on an open 
 volume before him. He had a comely face and a good pro- 
 file, and Antoinette seemed pleased to see him made neat 
 and trim by the brush and water of the man in the blue 
 apron, who, on being questioned, informed her that his 
 name was Restang — "And that is his brother," he added, 
 pointing with his brush to a kneeling figure on the other 
 side of the chapel. " I shall do him by-and-by." 
 
 The kneeling gentleman, who clasped a book to his 
 heart, and was by no means so good-looking as the recum- 
 bent one, seemed much in the need of a scrubbing. 
 
 " You would like to see him done too, would you not? " 
 whispered John. 
 
 Antoinette would have liked it dearly, but she resisted 
 the temptation, and turned away with a "No, thank you" 
 more heroic than truthful. She seemed inclined to become 
 more cool and self-possessed, but it would not do ; the bright- 
 ness of the Rue de Rivoli,the stateliness of the Tuileries, 
 the verdure of its gardens, with sparkling fountains and 
 white statues shining in the sun, enchanted her. 
 
 When the carriage took her slowly round the wide 
 Place de la Concorde, with its obelisk, its statues of French 
 cities, and its fountains, and when John told her that on 
 this spot, so bright, so gay, a king's blood had been shed, 
 and a queen had died on the same scaffold ; when he told 
 her the name and history of every building, dome, and 
 tower, rising into blue air above the dimness of the city 
 roofs, Antoinette seemed to be listening to some wonder- 
 ful romance. Again and again her little gloved hands 
 twitched in her Lap, and her red lips quivered as she lis- 
 tened to him with grave, intent eyes. 
 
 "There, that will do for this morning," said Mrs. Dor- 
 rien. "Take us to the wood, dear. I think you promised 
 us luncheon there, did you not? " 
 
 So, from the brightness of white-stone buildings and 
 sunny streets, they passed into the shade and freshness of
 
 256 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 the wood. How green, how tranquil seemed these long 
 avenues ending in a bright spot of light ! Never, thought 
 Antoinette, accustomed to the luxuriant vegetation of her 
 southern home, but not familiar yet with the cool and dewy 
 charm of the northern verdure — never had there been any 
 thing so poetic and so fair in those sylvan shades through 
 which flowed silent streams, with the whitest of swans and 
 the fairest of wild-fowl on their bosom. John took his 
 mother and his cousin to the same restaurant where he 
 had gone to seek Mr. Dorrien on that eventful day that 
 had turned the tide of his destiny. 
 
 " You do not know what that day has been to you as 
 well as to me," he thought, as he looked at Antoinette's 
 young face. " I wonder what you would say if you knew 
 that your fate was decided in this very room seven years 
 ago — your fate as well as mine ? " 
 
 Unconscious of the turn his thoughts were taking, 
 Antoinette was leaning out of the window, feeding the 
 ducks and laughing carelessly. She seemed merry, happy, 
 and at her ease, and whea luncheon was over, and Mrs. 
 Dorrien sujrarested that she should take a walk with John, 
 the .young girl made no difficulty, but gayly consented. 
 So they went out together, and, as they stepped forth in 
 the shade, Antoinette could not help saying, " Mrs. Dor- 
 rien was right. Mv feet were longing to be on the grass. 
 This is delightful ! " 
 
 " You must often come here with my mother," he said, 
 kindly. 
 
 " I suppose you cannot come — I mean you arc too 
 busy," doubtfully remarked Antoinette. 
 
 " Yes, I have a good deal to do." 
 
 "And you get up ever so early," said she, gravely — 
 " at six, don't you ? " 
 
 He looked at her ; she colored and laughed. 
 
 "I was up early myself this morning," she said, stoop- 
 ing to pick up a daisy. " You cannot imagine what a 
 contrast this place is to La Ruya," she quickly added. " I 
 feel quite surprised to find a daisy." 
 
 The little white flower shook in her hand, and there 
 was something almost frightened in her face as she spoke. 
 But John Dorrien seemed unconscious of her flurried and 
 alarmed manner, and smiled at the little starry blossom
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. •;;,; 
 
 which she held. lie smiled, but, swift and keen as an ar- 
 row shot by an unerring hand, came the thought, "Poor 
 little innocent daisy, you helped to hide a fib just then." 
 
 The beauty of the day was gone for him — for Antoinette, 
 too, it seemed to have departed. She asked to go back to 
 Mrs. Dorrien, and when that lady gently scolded her for 
 returning so soon, assuring her she could have seen noth- 
 ing, it was almost petulantly that Antoinette answered she 
 had seen plenty. Mrs. Dorrien was troubled. Had these 
 two been differing already? In her anxiety to efface any 
 unfortunate impression which John might have made on 
 his cousin's mind, she suggested, and indeed insisted, that 
 he should end the day by driving them round to look at 
 the [nvalides. John assented, and, though Antoinette ut- 
 tered a feeble disclaimer, the temptation of seeing some- 
 thing new was not to be resisted. 
 
 The hour for seeing the tomb of the first Napoleon was 
 over, the gorgeous chapel was closed, but the home of the 
 old soldiers was still open. Antoinette gazed with awe at 
 the historical cannons which guard the entrance to the 
 gardens. 
 
 " And that is a cannon ! " she cried. " I never saw a 
 cannon before. O John, do tell me all about this one, 
 please." 
 
 " My dear cousin, there is not much to tell. This par- 
 ticular cannon belongs to the reign of the great monarch 
 who built this very Hotel des Invalides. There is his em- 
 blem, the sun in full beam, witli the Nee pluribus irrtpar, 
 which no one can make out, so pray excuse me. Oh ! this 
 Latin motto is very easily read," he added, smiling, as An- 
 toinette bent over another cannon — " it means the last 
 argument of kincfs." 
 
 " That is to say, that, when every thing else fails, it 
 must come to lighting," suggested Antoinette. 
 
 . " You have, defined it very accurately," answered John. 
 " Ultima ratio return means that, and nothing else." 
 
 ^\i t li much indignation, the young girl declared that it 
 was abominable. 
 
 " Do you think so ?" asked John, smiling. 
 
 "Don't you?" was her retort, with just a little scorn- 
 ful curl of her lip. 
 
 "Certainly not. I think fighting the legitimate end of
 
 258 JOHN COURIER. 
 
 all argument. It must always come to that, and all human 
 and divine things must end in the triumph of strength." 
 
 " So you worship strength ? " said she. 
 
 " I do," was the unhesitating reply. " And I think that 
 truth is very strong," added John, in a tranquil, even 
 voice. 
 
 Antoinette looked at him with uneasy wonder in her 
 dark eyes, like one who has heard some speech of an un- 
 known tongue, but she did not pursue the argument. On 
 either side of the gravel path leading to the building spread 
 gay parterres, and on either side of these again are the 
 little gardens of the old soldiers. John took her to look at 
 them, while his mother sat on a bench in the sun. 
 
 " Go on, and do not mind me," she said. " You will 
 find me in the chapel, when you have seen all that is worth 
 
 seeing 
 
 The narrow strips of ground through which John and 
 his cousin passed were very different in aspect. Some 
 were charmingly neat and trim, and others were all weeds 
 and neglect. Some, too, were decidedly culinary. Parsley 
 abounded in one, and another was given up to strawberries. 
 With the taste of this warrior Antoinette could sympathize, 
 for, as she confidentially informed John, she was very fond 
 of strawberries herself, but it puzzled her to think what 
 that neighbor of his could do with all the parsley he grew. 
 This mystery being far beyond John's depth, he did not 
 even attempt to explain it, but led his cousin through the 
 vast building. Every thing interested and amused her, es- 
 pecially the kitchen, with its huge marmite. She looked 
 at the plate in the room in which it is kept ; she peeped 
 in at the refectory ; she saw the old men gathering together 
 at the beat of the drum, one-eyed, one-armed, and one- 
 legged, sad tokens of that argument of kings which she 
 had so vehemently condemned ; and, when she had seen 
 all, they went to the chapel, a cold, white building, where 
 dusty flags hung heavily in the sunshine, streaming upon 
 them through the tall windows. How calmly and silently 
 they faded away up there, those poor little bits of colored 
 Hoth, to keep or win which lives had been given! Dull 
 though they looked, they had been dyed in the red heart's 
 blood of a nation, and now the fierce breezes of battle 
 would never fan them again ; for the dun smoke of powder
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 2o9 
 
 they had the faint breath of incense ; for the cannon's roar, 
 the solemn voice of the organ ; for the love and honor that 
 had once borne them so high, the boast of the victorious 
 stranger, who had hung them up there as trophies in the 
 temple of his God. 
 
 Antoinette looked up at all these relics of by-gone war- 
 fare, trying to make them out, till her head ached, and she 
 was glad to leave off and join Mrs. Dorrien, who was kneel- 
 ing near the altar. 
 
 " And now we have done our sight-seeing for to-day," 
 said Mrs. Dorrien, with a sigh of relief, as they drove home, 
 " and I hope, dear, that you liked it." 
 
 Antoinette, with every appearance of sincerity, declared 
 that she was delighted; and she was even more explicit 
 to John himself, when they met again in the little sitting- 
 room before dinner. They were alone. Mrs. Dorrien's 
 sight-seeing: had been too much for her. She had sent word 
 that she could not come down, and Mrs. Reginald, darting a 
 severe look at Antoinette, as much as to say, " That is your 
 work," had left the room to go up to " poor dear Mrs. John," 
 and regulate her bill of fare. It was then that Antoinette 
 spoke. She sat by the fireplace, looking at the low wood- 
 fire, with a pleased smile on her lips. The lamp burned on 
 the central table with a mild glow ; the warm and cheerful 
 coloring of the little room was around the young girl, and 
 now and then a (lame shot up from the hearth, and lit up 
 her face, that fair, girlish face, which John, sitting on the 
 other side of the hearth, now strove to read. For good or 
 for evil it had come across his life, and it was much to him. 
 
 "How delightful it has been to-day!" said Antoinette, 
 suddenly looking up. " I don't know how to thank you, 
 John." 
 
 " For what ? " 
 
 "Oh! for everything. It is delightful to go over a 
 grand old city like this with you. You bring back the 
 past, and make it present and living again." 
 
 "Then let us have many such days," he suggested. 
 
 "Oh! yes," she willingly responded, "let us. I could 
 go on forever, you know." 
 
 She laughed, a clear silvery laugh, which reminded John 
 of that afternoon when he had seen her sitting on the wall 
 reading the little yellow volume of Tauchnitz. And yel
 
 260 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 how unlike she was what he had imagined her to be even 
 then ! There was something very fearless and open about 
 this young girl, in spite of these two untruths ; no awkward 
 shyness, and yet plenty of reticence and reserve. Her 
 looks, her manners, were as easy and as free as if she had 
 lived in the world all her life. Her mind might not have, 
 been cultivated according to the approved methods, but it 
 was a clear, firm mind, and Mademoiselle Antoinette seemed 
 to have stored it with plenty of information. John had 
 found her familiar with almost every topic which that day 
 had suggested. She had made no display of her little 
 knowledge. She seemed unconscious that it was not ex- 
 pected of her, and she wore it naturally, as rich women 
 wear silks and jewels. There was also in her manner to 
 himself something which John had not expected. It was 
 amiable and sweet, but it was of a sweetness, he felt, in 
 which he, as an individual, had no part. The vainest cox- 
 comb who ever lived could not have appropriated the sun- 
 shine of that young girl's looks and smiles. She seemed 
 no more to care on whom they fell than a rose may care 
 what winds receive its fragrance. " She is very winning," 
 he said in his own thoughts, " but she does not want to win 
 or to be won." 
 
 Winning though he thought Antoinette, the young girl 
 had not fascinated his mother. Mrs. John Dorrien was full 
 of trouble and care about Mr. Dorrien's granddaughter, and 
 when her friend entered the room with a cheering, " Well, 
 dear, and what will you have?" her answer was a some- 
 what dolorous " Oh ! any thing, dear," so suggestive of 
 anxiety that, dropping all thought of proposing a chicken 
 and Burgundy as restoratives, Mrs. Reginald at once sat 
 down opposite Mrs. Dorrien, and, looking at her sideways, 
 said emphatically: 
 
 " AVhat ! have they been worrying you ? " 
 
 " Oh ! my dear Mrs. Reginald, she has not done it in- 
 tentionally, poor little thing ; but I am very, very anxious." 
 
 " About her, of course ? " 
 
 "About her and John. It will never do — never. He 
 is so dreadfully plain-spoken, poor John! and so austere, 
 too, you know, that he will be sure to be too honest with 
 Mr. Dorrien." 
 
 " Well, but about what, dear?"
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. :jiil 
 
 " Whv, you see, the poor child hud been reared by that 
 dreadful woman ; and we visited two churches to-day, ami 
 I could see in her whole manner that she has not a bit of 
 religion*" 
 
 .Mrs. Reginald whistled. 
 
 "Now, you know, if dear John will ever marry a girl 
 of that sort, and if he will not, why, Mr. Ddrrien will be 
 affronted." 
 
 "Do you think he cares much for the young lady?" 
 asked Mrs. Reginald. " I don't, though even his cat docs. 
 Strange! she has already taken to the child, and rubs up 
 to her quite amiably. And she has pretty ways with her, 
 has Miss Dorrien. She has almost coaxed back her old 
 Carlo. Yes, she has pretty ways with her. As I passed 
 her room this morning the door was ajar, and I saw her 
 within. She stood in the light of a sunbeam that came in 
 through the window, with that sparrow of hers on her fin- 
 ger, and she did not look a bad child, Mrs. John ; but it is 
 hard lines on a young thing to be badly reared, you see." 
 
 Mrs. John confessed it was, and again reverted to John's 
 austerity and Mr. Dorrien's possible displeasure. 
 
 " Never mind, dear ; eat your dinner, and don't take it 
 to heart," said Mrs. Reginald, rising and speaking in her 
 most cheering accents. " A little heathen is she V Well, 
 then, I'll convert her, and I'll begin this very evening. 
 Don't be frightened ; I shall be very quiet about it/' 
 
 To be quiet, amiable, seductive, and calm, to conquer 
 Antoinette's heathenism by fascination jis much as by argu- 
 ment, was indeed Mrs. Reginald's wise intention. How 
 did it happen, alas! that instead of attaining this desirable 
 object, she had something very like a quarrel with Mr. 
 Dorrien's granddaughter that same evening ? 
 
 Alas ! how does it come to pass that our best and most 
 benevolent intentions are so often defeated ? 
 
 The dinner went off very well. Mrs. Reginald drew out 
 Antoinette, and made her talk of what she had seen, listened 
 with real, not feigned, interest to the young girl's viva- 
 cious accd*unt of the day's sights, made John talk too, and 
 show otf to advantage, which he could do, having the gill 
 of easy speech and quick repartee, and altogether was so 
 agreeable, that Miss Dorrien got quite accustomed to her 
 formidable appearance, and looked at her without a trace
 
 262 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 of uneasiness. Every thins:, as we say, went off charmingly 
 while John was present. It was only when the ladies were 
 alone that they differed. 
 
 John went to work after dinner. His mother remained 
 in her room, Antoinette joined Mrs. Reginald in that lady's 
 sitting-room. As she opened the door and entered, she 
 was rather surprised to find Mrs. Reginald surveying vari- 
 ous ladies' dresses in the piece, and which lay spread out 
 on the back of her dark sofa, displaj'ing their vivid hues in 
 the lamp-light. 
 
 "Now, my dear, here's a choice for you," said Mrs. 
 Reginald, beckoning her to her side, " blue, very hand- 
 some; mauve, charming, but rather light; bottle-green, 
 too dark ; purple, too garish ; gray, too dull. Take the 
 blue, dear. A handsome poplin — Irish, of course. Your 
 mother was of Irish stock. You will look very well in it." 
 
 Antoinette remained silent for a minute, during which 
 she colored steadily ; then she said, quietly. 
 
 "Thank you ; I do not wish to wear blue." 
 
 She sat down without giving any of the dresses a look. 
 
 "My dear, your grandfather objects to black," compos- 
 edly remarked Mrs. Reginald. " I chose these colors for 
 you, but, if you like another better, say so. To be sure I 
 did not ask for pink, or red, never having fancied them 
 much myself." 
 
 "I like nothing so well as black," replied Antoinette, a 
 little coldly. 
 
 " That, my deap, has very little to do with the busi- 
 ness," sarcastically retorted Mrs. Reginald, " and her likes 
 or dislikes are the last thing a young thing like you should 
 consult." 
 
 Antoinette looked at her in some wonder, but she did 
 not lose her temper. All she said was : 
 
 "I am really very much obliged to you for the trouble 
 you have taken, Mrs. Reginald, but what am I to do? I 
 really dislike all these colored dresses, and I really do like 
 black." ' 
 
 "My dear" — with much asperity — "your grandfather 
 cannot endure black, and you must not wear it." 
 
 Antoinette smiled with perfect good temper, and said, 
 quite calmly : 
 
 " If Mr. Dorrien will not let me wear black, let him tell
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 363 
 
 me what color I am to wear, and I will — even blue— much 
 though I dislike it. ' 
 
 This way of settling the question was very baffling-. 
 It was also irritating'. Few people like to have their taste 
 censured, and of these few Mrs. Reginald was not one. 
 And then to have a little chit of a thing like this girl set- 
 ting up to having a will of her own was rather too much. 
 Unluckily she could not say, with any regard to truth, 
 that Mr. Dorrien had actually requested her to change the 
 hue of his granddaughter's attire. All he had said was, as 
 he placed a certain sum of money in her hands on the 
 morning of his sudden departure : 
 
 "Will you kindly see that Miss Dorrien is provided 
 with whatever she may require?" Which did not exactly 
 mean, "Will you see that Miss Dorrien no longer wears 
 black?" In short, Mrs. Reginald had gone too far. She 
 knew it, and was exceedingly affronted with Antoinette's 
 quiet rebuff. 
 
 "Oh, very well, my dear ! " said she, loftily, sweeping 
 away the dresses, and tossing them in a heap as she spoke, 
 " very well, please yourself. It is a very good rule, when 
 one can put it into practice." 
 
 " Well, I really think it is," good-humoredly replied 
 Antoinette. 
 
 Mrs. Reginald sat down without deigning her anv an- 
 swer; but, of course, after so unpropitious a beginning, she 
 could not attempt to convert Antoinette. 
 
 CHAPTER XXIII. 
 
 1 ntowaud circumstances may sometimes delay a decla- 
 ration of war, but we all know that when a monarch, a na- 
 tion, or an individual, is bent upon it % war is an inevitable 
 catastrophe. Mrs. Reginald was determined to set Antoi- 
 nette's religion to rights if she could, or, failing this, to 
 make lier declare her creed. The next day but one, which 
 was Sunday, gave her the opportunity with which a blue- 
 poplin dress had unfortunately interfered on the Friday 
 evening.
 
 264 J° HN DORRIEN. 
 
 " Well, my dear," said she, as they sat at breakfast, 
 " are you getting ready to come with me to Saint-Eliza- 
 beth ? " 
 
 " No-o," replied Antoinette, a little slowly, as she stirred 
 her coffee ; " I am not going out this morning ; but thank 
 you very much, Mrs. Reginald," she added, with her pretty, 
 winning smile. 
 
 The smile was very sweet, but it meant war all the 
 same. Mrs. Dorrien looked flurried, John was not present, 
 breakfast was an irregular, unpunctual meal, but Mrs. Regi- 
 nald carried on hostilities with much spirit, and marched 
 straight into the enemy's camp. 
 
 " And what is your reason for not coming ? " she asked, 
 point-blank. " Are you unwell ? " 
 
 " Oh, no ! " answered Antoinette, unhesitatingly, " but I 
 prefer staying at home." 
 
 " That's candid," dryly said the elder lady. 
 
 Antoinette, who had had the advantage till then, now 
 lost ground decidedly. Mrs. Reginald's tone offended her, 
 and she said, with that dignity which is the weakness of 
 the young, " I think it better to be still more candid, Mrs. 
 Reginald, and to put this matter on a right footing once 
 for all. I know I shall shock you, but I cannot help it. I 
 do not sro to churches, because I do not believe what is 
 taught in them — my reason and religion cannot agree. 
 
 " That's a pity for your reason," composedly answered 
 Mrs. Reginald, who now felt sure of her enemy's discomfi- 
 ture ; " but perhaps you will allow me to ask — I am an 
 inquisitive old woman — how you found out that religion 
 and your little bit of reason could not be friends ?" 
 
 " I would rather not argue the matter," said Antoinette, 
 coloring. " I know you think me lost — a child of perdition." 
 
 Mrs. Reginald raised her hands. 
 
 " My dear," she interrupted, " I think nothing of the 
 kind ; but I do thing you very silly. I am not merely an 
 old woman, but a rude one, you see, John Dorrien," she 
 exclaimed, as the young man now entered the room. 
 " What do you think of your cousin? She does not be- 
 lieve what is taught in churches, and religion and her rea- 
 son cannot agree." 
 
 Antoinette became crimson, and darted a half-deprecat- 
 ing half-defiant look at John. He seemed to be neither
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 2G5 
 
 shocked nor surprised, but fixed the gaze of his deep gray 
 eyes on her face, and smiled provokingly. This was too 
 much even for Antoinette's good temper. She rose, her 
 face in a flame, her eyes sparkling with tears. 
 
 " You have no right to turn me into ridicule because I 
 am honest, and not a hypocrite," she said, a little indig- 
 nantly ; " I do not intrude my opinions, I do not laugh at 
 what I consider superstition or nonsense. Why must I be 
 laughed at ? " 
 
 " Hoity toity ! " cried Mrs. Reginald ; but John Dorrien 
 became grave, and said, quietly : 
 
 " I beg your pardon, 1 did not mean to offend you." 
 
 Antoinette sat down, and said more calmly : 
 
 "I do not wish to be offended, but I do wish for fair 
 play." 
 
 " My dear," said Mrs. Reginald, " I only wanted to 
 know how or when your reason enlightened you on so mo- 
 mentous a subject?" 
 
 "I know you think me silly," said Antoinette, reluc- 
 tant to own herself beaten. Mrs. Reginald composedly 
 nodded, which did not mend matters — " you have said so, 
 but, wise or foolish, I surely have a right to take care of 
 my own soul — " 
 
 " My dear," interrupted the incorrigible Mrs. Reginald, 
 "are you sure that you possess a soul? For that you 
 have one is just one of the things that are taught in 
 churches." 
 
 Antoinette was silent. 
 
 " What a beautiful day ! " said Airs. John Dorrien, look- 
 ing out at a patch of blue sky above the garden trees. 
 
 " Yes," said Antoinette, " it is tempting." And, as 
 breakfast was over, she went out. John followed her. 
 
 " He takes it very quietly," said Mrs. Reginald. 
 
 "Yes," answered Mrs. Dorrien, with a sigh, "but John 
 will never marry a girl of that kind." 
 
 " Small blame to him," tartly replied Mrs. Reginald. 
 
 Antoinette had walked on rather fast. She was at the 
 other end of the garden when John overtook her. At Hie 
 sound of his step she looked round sharply. She still 
 smarted from her defeat. She knew she had not come out 
 victoriously from the recent encounter, and that she had 
 been more successful with blue poplin than with theology, 
 12
 
 266 J0HN DORRIEN. 
 
 so, when she looked at John Dorrien, her whole aspect said, 
 "Are you going to preach?" But aloud she merely 
 remarked, " I thought you were going to Saint-Elizabeth." 
 
 " I have been there this morning," he answered, com- 
 posedly, " and since you are not going out, Antoinette, 
 will you allow me to have a little talk with you ? " 
 
 His manner was very grave. Antoinette drew herself 
 up slightly. 
 
 " Pray, John," she said, " do not. I wish to be friends 
 with you— with Mrs. Reginald it is plain that I cannot. 
 But I think you are both considerate and reasonable, which 
 she is not ; so, since we cannot agree on the subject, pray 
 let us not talk of religion." 
 
 John gave her a look of grave surprise, then he smiled. 
 
 " Do you know Latin ? : ' he asked. 
 
 « No — yes — very little," stammered Antoinette ; " the 
 verbs are such a nuisance. I left it off when Tom Clarke 
 left La Ruya." 
 
 John laughed, but he had to change his ground. 
 
 " Do you know Greek ? " 
 
 " Of course I don't," a little impatiently. " Why do 
 you ask ? " 
 
 " Greek is a noble language. The ' Iliad ' is the no- 
 blest poetry in the world. But it would be rather absurd 
 in me to tell you — in Greek — about the wrath of Achilles, 
 son of Peleus, and how he and Atrides, King of Kings, 
 quarreled and parted." 
 
 Antoinette was quick to understand, and a blush, which 
 was not one of pleasure, suffused her face. She tried to 
 laugh and look unconcerned. 
 
 " Thank you," she said. " Religion is Greek to me ; I 
 could not understand it, Thank you, John;" and she 
 dropped him a little mocking courtesy. 
 
 " No," said John ; " how could you understand a lan- 
 guage of which you have not even been taught the alphabet ? 
 No sane person would venture to pronounce on a science 
 which he or she had never studied, and every one decides 
 as a matter of course in that most momentous of questions 
 — the relations of man to God. And so you, Antoinette, 
 who have so unfortunately been reared in unbelief — even 
 you do not hesitate to use such words as superstition and 
 nonsense in connection with the Christian's creed."
 
 JOHN DORKIEN. Zft 
 
 The reproof, though very gently uttered, was a severe 
 one. Antoinette blushed, but this time it was with shame. 
 She hung down her head abashed, and said quite humbly : 
 
 "I am very sorry, John — I did not mean to be rude ; 
 but Mrs. Reginald did provoke me." 
 
 " Yes" he said, smiling-, " she did ; and, to tell you the 
 truth, I came out here to speak of that with you. Shall we 
 walk or sit?" 
 
 "Oh, let us sit," she answered, with a resigned air. 
 
 So they sat down on an old stone bench that seemed to 
 be waiting for them. The spot was sheltered and inclosed ; 
 no token of tall houses or dark roofs breaking on the pale 
 bine of the October sky was visible. The}' sat in the shade 
 of a tall horse-chestnut tree, but the genial warmth of the 
 sun was around them. The song of birds was silent now, 
 but there was a happy fluttering in the heavy boughs, a 
 rush of wings or a twitter every now and then — and all 
 these were very pleasant to hear. Before them, at the end 
 of the path, they could see the ancient river-god, ever lean- 
 ing on his urn, whence trickled a little streamlet. It played 
 on its way with a sunbeam, which darted in and out of the 
 clear thread of crystal till it rested quivering on the shal- 
 low bosom of the water in the basin below. From this 
 rose up tall reeds, ferns of tender green, and large-leaved 
 arums, half hiding the heathen deity. Mosses and lichens 
 clung to his gray stone limbs ; man had turned away from 
 his worship, forsaken his altars, and set him there to adorn 
 a garden; but Nature, kinder than man, still clothed him, 
 as of yore, in her softest garments, and decked him with 
 her fairest foliage. 
 
 "Well," said Antoinette, a little impatiently, " what is 
 it, John ? " 
 
 " Well, I only want to say this — Mrs. Reginald will be 
 a good, kind friend to you, if you will only let her." 
 
 " Oh, please, I would rather not have Mrs. Reginald's 
 friendship," exclaimed Antoinette, looking alarmed. " She 
 does not like me, and that is bad enough ; but, if she liked 
 me, I should have no more chance with her than Job, my spar- 
 row, would have with Ninette, the cat. You see, John," 
 she added, demurely, "you have known Mrs. Reginald 
 many years, and you are accustomed to her, but, for those 
 who are not, the good lady is simply dreadful,"
 
 268 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 " And yet you may want a friend," said John, looking 
 at her almost wistfully. " My mother is far too much of 
 an invalid to stand between you and any trouble, but Mrs. 
 Reginald could, and would do so, if you would let her, An- 
 
 toinette." 
 
 "Well, I shall not prevent her," composedly replied 
 Antoinette. 
 
 " Do not," persisted John, ignoring the mock gravity 
 with which she spoke. " Her opinion weighs more with 
 Mr. Dorrien than that of any one else in this house." 
 
 " Oh, dear ! and I refused to wear blue poplin, and I 
 would not go with her to Saint-Elizabeth ! " said Antoi- 
 nette, laughing. " Do you think she will write all my sins 
 to Mr. Dorrien, John ? " 
 
 " She will certainly consider it her duty to tell them," 
 answered John, quietly ; " but there will be no need for her 
 to write. Mr. Dorrien came back last night. He never 
 joins us at breakfast," he added, in answer to Antoinette's 
 look of surprise. 
 
 It was more than surprise which the young girl felt — 
 it was a sort of mortification. How little, how very little, 
 was her presence to Mr. Dorrien ! Perhaps, having always 
 been one of a small family, in a narrow home, she did not 
 take into sufficient account the separation which exists be- 
 tween the members of large households. One thing she 
 now felt keenly, however. She had been as sunshine in her 
 mother's house, and even Mademoiselle Melanie's sternness 
 would relax in her presence; but Mr. Dorrien required her 
 not to brighten that inevitable gloom which settles upon 
 the lives of men who have outlived youth, its freshness, its 
 hopes, and its joys. She felt pained, but she was offended 
 too, as much so, at least, as her natural sweetness of temper 
 would allow her to be, and she straightened her slender 
 neck, and curled her lip, very slightly, perhaps, but per- 
 ceptibly, to John Dorrien's attentive gaze. He felt inclined 
 to utter a few words of warning, but he did not, and per- 
 haps it was as well. Warning, as a rule, is spoken in vain. 
 Beacons are scattered over all the shores of this world's 
 troubled sea. They are seen miles away, they burn night 
 and day with clearest light, and what shipwreck have they 
 yet prevented? What nation, what sovereign, what man 
 or woman but has rushed to meet the doom that might so
 
 JOUN DORRIEN. 269 
 
 easily have been arrested ? So, with the consciousness that 
 he had perhaps said too much, John was silent. Moreover, 
 there was no time for him to speak. A servant was coming 
 toward them. 
 
 " I believe Mr. Dorrien wants you," said John, rising. 
 
 " Oh ! then I suppose I am going to be tried, sentenced, 
 and executed," said Antoinette, endeavoring to look un- 
 concerned. "Well, it must be done." 
 
 Mr. Dorrien did want his granddaughter, and, trying to 
 keep up that look of easy indifference, Antoinette followed 
 Hie servant to her grandfather's presence. 
 
 Mr. Dorrien was in his room on the ground-floor. The 
 curtains had not been drawn, and there was a sort of warm, 
 subdued gloom in it, that was soothing to the eye. The 
 heavy hangings, the rich and dark furniture, the deep colors 
 of the Turkey carpet, were all in harmony, and Mr. Dorrien, 
 pale and wearied, looking half asleep, lay on the long, low 
 couch, as if he had no other purpose in life than to dream 
 it away in a state of calm ennui, with his hand resting on 
 a gray Angora cat, who purred on her cushion near him. 
 He rose to receive his granddaughter, welcomed her, and 
 helped her to a chair with his usual languid courtesy. 
 
 But perhaps because almost every thing bored him, Mr. 
 Dorrien was not a man of many words, and rarely used cir- 
 cumlocution when he could avoid it. Having first ascer- 
 tained that his granddaughter was quite well, but, as she 
 felt, with a girl's quickness, without taking the least inter- 
 est in her answer, he said, quietly : 
 
 "How is it you are at home this morning, Antoinette? 
 Mrs. Reginald "says you declined accompanying her to 
 Saint—" 
 
 Mr. Dorrien paused, at a loss for the name of his parish 
 church, which, indeed, he rarely frequented. 
 
 "Saint-Elizabeth," suggested Antoinette. "Yes, I 
 preferred staying within." 
 
 She said it simply, without the least appearance of for- 
 wardness, but Mr. Dorrien looked fastidious. 
 
 " My dear child," he exclaimed, with just a touch of im- 
 patience, " allow me to give you a piece of information. 
 No one can look more absurd than the young woman who 
 assumes to be an esprit fort. It is also very unbecoming 
 in a person of your sex."
 
 270 J HN DORRIEN. 
 
 Antoinette thought it better not to answer so singular 
 a remark as this, but she certainly had never thought of re- 
 ligion as becoming before this moment. 
 
 " I can make allowances for your unfortunate rearing," 
 continued Mr. Dorrien, " but I trust you will have the good 
 sense to see your mistake. Mrs. Reginald is a leetle im- 
 petuous, and all that, but John is most temperate, and a 
 rational talk with him will soon give you sounder ideas of 
 religion than you seem to entertain." 
 
 " Perhaps — " began Antoinette. 
 
 "Excuse me," interrupted Mr. Dorrien, "I wish for no 
 sort of argument on this subject, and I lay no sort of com- 
 pulsion upon you — I only wish you to know my feeling on 
 the matter." 
 
 Antoinette bent her head in acknowledgment, and Mr. 
 Dorrien, having looked fastidious a little while longer, 
 broached another topic. 
 
 " I have also a favor to ask of you. It is that you will 
 not wear black. It is a mournful, depressing color, and 
 most ungirlish. Mrs. Reginald will kindly see that you 
 have whatever is fitting." 
 
 Antoinette colored to the roots of her dark hair. It was, 
 indeed, almost too much. To be referred to John for the- 
 ology, and to Mrs. Reginald for the toilet ! What girlish 
 temper but must rebel at this ? She was silent, however. 
 Mr. Dorrien looked at her. Was it her silence or some- 
 thing in her aspect, that brought a cloud to his countenance 
 as he gazed on that pleasant, girlish face ? 
 
 " How old are you ? " he asked, almost abruptly. 
 
 " Eighteen." 
 
 " You look older ; but then you are not at all like your 
 father, who was fair." 
 
 " I am like my mother." 
 
 "Yes, I believe you are; " this was said as if Mr. Dor- 
 rien had seen his daughter-in-law so dimly, or so long ago, 
 that he could feel no sort of certainty with regard to her 
 appearance. 
 
 " Well, as I said," he resumed, " Mrs. Reginald will see to 
 all your girlish wants while }'ou remain with us. In other 
 matters, if such should occur, you can apply to John Dorrien." 
 
 "And not to you, sir? " Antoinette could not help ex- 
 claiming.
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. :!] \ 
 
 "No, not to me," very decisively replied Mr. Dorrien ; 
 "you see, my dear child," he continued, " I am out of 
 health. 1 have a great deal to think of, and it is out of 
 the question that 1 should be troubled with every little trifle 
 that may occur. John is your cousin, most willing to 
 oblige you — in short, it is much the best plan." 
 
 For the first time Antoinette displayed some warmth. 
 
 " I shall endeavor not to trouble him," she said. 
 
 " Indeed ! And pray may I ask why so ? " inquired 
 Mr. Dorrien, with a look of surprise in his blue eyes. 
 
 Antoinette would not, or could not, answer that question. 
 
 "Very awkward," resumed Mr. Dorrien, dryly. "You 
 seem to have an unfortunate prejudice against Mr. John 
 Dorrien, and yet he is precisely the person with whom it is 
 most needful that you should be on good terms." 
 
 "Surely Mr. John Dorrien is not the master of the 
 house ! " said Antoinette. 
 
 "Of course not; I only spoke of } T our relations with 
 him. Perhaps I had better say a few words on that sub- 
 ject. Yes," continued Mr. Dorrien, as if arguing the mat- 
 ter with himself, "I think I had. You see, my dear, I 
 have brought you here in the hope that John and you may 
 so far like each other as to become one. 1 have no fortune 
 to give you. All my capital is invested in this business, 
 and cannot be alienated from it; and after me this business 
 must go down to John. He is very able, and he is a Dor- 
 rien— the last, 1 believe. In short, this is a settled thing, 
 which cannot be altered, but which naturally affects your 
 position — unless, as I say — " 
 
 " Never ! " interrupted Antoinette, rising so vehement- 
 ly that her chair nearly fell. " I like Mr. John Dorrien ; 
 I do not complain of the position you give him ; but — " 
 
 "I beg you will say no more," interrupted Mr. Dorrien, 
 looking amazed, but perhaps as much with the noise An- 
 toinette's chair had made, as with her vehement protest ; 
 " vou quite mistake and misunderstand, and I must ask 
 you to consider my well-meant words unspoken. I have 
 no intention of persuading you into this. 1 have and 
 claim no sort of power over Mr. John Dorrien's feelings. 
 If, at the end of a few months, you both find that acquaint- 
 ance has not created mutual liking, you can either go to 
 some other home, which I shall provide for you, or remain
 
 272 J0HN DORRIEN. 
 
 here witli John and his wife. It is necessary that Mr. John 
 Dorrien should marry, and he has promised me to do so 
 before the year is out." 
 
 " And I suppose I got the first chance," said Antoinette, 
 trying to laugh, but with tears of mortification in her eyes, 
 
 " I think we need say no more on this subject," re- 
 marked Mr. Dorrien, very coldly. "I have already re- 
 quested that you will consider my words unspoken." 
 
 Antoinette, who had resumed her seat, probably con- 
 sidered these last words as a dismissal, for she rose again. 
 Mr. Dorrien did not detain her, but rose too. His look wan- 
 dered over her whole person, resting with evident disfavor 
 on her black dress. The fastidious meaning came back to' 
 his face as he remarked : 
 
 " You will kindly remember what I said about black, 
 will you not, my dear ? " 
 
 " Oh, certainly," replied Antoinette, looking resigned 
 and a victim. " What color shall I wear ? " 
 
 " Any thing not too dark. Good-morning, mj' dear." 
 
 He shook hands with her kindly enough, and thus they 
 parted. As the door of Mr. Dorrien's sitting-room closed 
 upon her, Antoinette found herself face to face with John. 
 She drew back a little, looked at him Math a defiant sort of 
 coldness, then passed on. Mr. Dorrien's interference had 
 certainly not helped much toward the good understanding 
 of these young people ; but then to be sure that Antoi- 
 nette should like John Dorrien, and marry him ultimately, 
 was not a matter which lay very near to Mr. Dorrien's heart. 
 
 CHAPTER XXIV. 
 
 Although she had been so signally defeated, Antoi- 
 nette showed that her temper was a good one, by not bear- 
 ing malice toward Mrs. Reginald. She did, indeed, look 
 pensive for a day or two, and declined going out sight- 
 seeing, on the plea of headache ; but one bright morning 
 she shook off all signs of despondency, and, putting in her 
 fresh young face at the door of Mrs. Reginald's sitting- 
 room, she said, demurely :
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 273 
 
 " May I come in, Mrs. Reginald ? " 
 
 "Yes, my dear, certainly," was the prompt reply. 
 " Headache better ? " 
 
 " Gone," answered Antoinette, gayly. " Mrs. Regi- 
 nald," she said, sitting down on the first chair she found, 
 " Mr. Dorrien has referred me to you on all matters of 
 dress. I should like — since I am not to wear black — I 
 should like to wear gray." 
 
 " Gray ! — a young thing like you, fresh and rosy, in 
 gray ! Nonsense ! Turn Quakeress at once." 
 
 u The Quakers are very nice people, I am sure," replied 
 Antoinette, demurely ; " but the women wear hideous bon- 
 nets. I would rather not put my head into one of those 
 things." 
 
 " Wear pink or blue, dear," insisted Mrs. Reginald. 
 
 '• Pink and blue are for little children," said Antoinette, 
 still demure. 
 
 " Well, then, take one of their new-fangled colors — 
 mauve, magenta, solferino." (These were the new colors 
 then, reader !) 
 
 " If you please, it must be gTay," interrupted Antoi- 
 nette, looking gently obstinate ; " but I do not mind any 
 bright trimming that may please you, Mrs. Reginald." 
 
 With this concession Mrs. Reginald had to be satisfied. 
 The gray dress was forthwith discussed, ordered that same 
 day, and made the next, and it proved to be elegant, be- 
 coming, and lady-like. Mr. Dorrien condescended to praise 
 it; John, though he said nothing, thought that Antoinette 
 looked very well in it ; and Mrs. Reginald gloried in it 
 openly, and took a decided fancy to Antoinette on the 
 strength of it. It may be, too, that she liked the young 
 girl all the better for having prevailed over her. At all 
 events, she called her Ninette, and was in the highest good- 
 humor with her — a fact of which she gave her proof by 
 driving her about Paris. 
 
 Mrs. John Dorrien was again unwell, and John was 
 very busy. Mrs. Reginald was not a willing guide, like 
 Mrs. Dorrien, nor a deeply-informed one, like John, but 
 she took a hearty pleasure in all she saw, which would 
 have roused the most lanjruid of siy-ht-seers. Languid 
 Antoinette certainly was not, yet the spirit with which 
 Mrs. Reginald entered into the task before her was con-
 
 274 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 tagious, and gave a new zest to the young girl's keen en- 
 joyment. 
 
 History is the dramatic life of humanity, and ancient 
 cities are history under one of its most vivid aspects. We 
 cannot gaze on their monuments, tread their streets, watch 
 their rivers, but voices speak to us on every side, telling us 
 marvelous old stories out of the past. The dead do not 
 really die in these capitals of nations. The Gaul makes 
 way for the Roman, the Roman for the Frank, the heathen 
 temple becomes the Christian cathedral, and the Seine 
 girds them in the self-same embrace, and the same clear 
 sky smiles down upon them, while generation flows over 
 generation, like the waves of the river going down to the 
 sea. That dimness of the past which makes history so 
 vague and unsatisfactory fades away when we stand on 
 the spots where her great dramas have been played oat. 
 Mediaeval kings and queens were with Antoinette when 
 she saw those dark towers of the ancient palace which 
 frown above the river. The gay and accomplished Valois, 
 and those women of world-known beauty who gathered 
 around them, looked down at her from the windows of the 
 Louvre opposite. The palace has undergone some changes, 
 true ; but Mary Stuart once lived here, in all the freshness 
 of her unrivaled loveliness ; and here, too, another Mary, 
 less beautiful, no doubt, but not less ill-fated, left that 
 royal dwelling for a prison, and the prison for a scaffold. 
 Who could look coldly on the stones to which such memo- 
 ries cling? Not an impressible, imaginative girl like An- 
 toinette Dorrien. 
 
 Moreover, she had for all kinds of sight-seeing the 
 healthy appetite of eighteen — she never seemed to get too 
 much of it. She had a young, elastic frame, and felt 
 fatigue when she got home, and not a second before. 
 Tragic associations interested and saddened her a little, 
 but could not depress her. She had the gift of the young. 
 She thought that the past was really past indeed, and that 
 it had acted its cruel wrongs and great sorrows once for all ; 
 that the future would never act the self-same tragedies 
 over again with new actors, and before a new audience. 
 The great illustrious dead slept in their graves at last — 
 they had paid a heavy price for their greatness, but now 
 they were at peace, and it was well. In the mean while
 
 John dorriex. 275 
 
 they made a fine stormy background for the present, and 
 that, too, was well. So Antoinette enjoyed herself to her 
 heart's content, and was charmed with every thing. In- 
 deed, she lost her heart again and over again. After 
 spending a delightful morning in the Tuileries gardens 
 with Mrs. Reginald, she fell in love with them. The cool 
 gloom of the horse-chestnut trees, the stately avenues, the 
 white sunlit statues and vases, the sparkling fountains, 
 and the little formal garden-plots, with their old-fashioned 
 flowers, enchanted her. She proclaimed Lenotre a genius, 
 and the Tuileries gardens the finest in the world. The 
 next spot to which she succumbed was the seductive Palais 
 Royal. To walk under those galleries, to look at those 
 fascinating shops, and to feel the airy life of the gar- 
 den around you all the time, seemed the perfection of 
 bliss. 
 
 " Oh ! I must come here every day," she said, enthusi- 
 astically; "I must indeed, .Mrs. Reginald. And, oh! do 
 look at those ear-rings — a rose-bud with a pearl ; or at these 
 — a pair of enamel shoes, with heels and buckles to them. 
 Can you imagine any thing beyond it?" 
 
 " Nothing more absurd, certainly," was hard-hearted 
 Mrs. Reginald's curt reply. " You do not suppose Mr. 
 Dorrien would allow you to wear a pair of shoes in your 
 rats, do you ?" 
 
 Antoinette suppressed a sigh. She certainly felt a 
 longing for the ear-rings ; and they were so ridiculously 
 cheap. And so all the pleasant places of Paris passed be- 
 fore her girlish eyes, and after these she saw its curiosities, 
 museums, and galleries, and wondered more and more. 
 The Louvre bewildered her, as well it might. It rather 
 oppressed her, too. Ages seemed to brood in those stately 
 halls, which were as the graves of dead nations and ex- 
 tinct races ; the graves, too, of forms of thought from which 
 man drifts farther and farther every day. When shall we 
 have again in marble such stately women and Godlike 
 men as those whom the Greek statuaries have left us ? 
 When shall our painters see the heavens open, and all its 
 saints overflowing with holiness and love, rapt in adoration, 
 such as the old Italian painters surely saw them once on a 
 time ? We have gained much, but, woe betide us ! have 
 we not lost more than all our gains '? What are we since
 
 276 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 we have a poorer standard of the outward man than the 
 heathen Greek, and of the inward man than the mediaeval 
 Christian ? 
 
 Something of this was revealed to the mind of the un- 
 taught girl, who, for the first time, was brought face to 
 face with antique and Christian art. 
 
 " Mrs. Reginald, 1 ' said she, after looking intently at 
 the Polyrnnia, " would you not like to see such a woman as 
 this, so calm, so still, so grave, and yet so sweet ? " 
 
 " My dear, she is a muse," was the prudent reply, " and 
 muses, you know, live up on Parnassus. So where is the 
 use of wanting them down here ? " 
 
 " Well, I should like to see such a woman as that," 
 half-sighed Antoinette. 
 
 " John has a very good copy of this lady," said Mrs. 
 Reginald — "you may look at her in the library. Poor 
 John ! I suspect he once flirted with the muses." 
 
 " You think that John wrote poetry ? " exclaimed An- 
 toinette, in amazement. " Why, Mrs. Reginald, he is so 
 matter-of-fact." 
 
 " Is he ? ? " 
 
 " Oh ! dreadfully, Mrs. Reginald. I find it quite op- 
 pressive, though he is so good." 
 
 " Really ! " 
 
 " But I assure you I mean it, every word. He is so 
 positive, and exact, and — " 
 
 " You silly thing," interrupted Mrs. Reginald, kindly, 
 though peremptorily, " do you think John will tell you, or 
 any one, all his dreams, feelings, and fancies ? He is a man 
 of business now, and an ambitious one; but he was an 
 ambitious scholar once, and I am sure he then intended be- 
 ing something very different from the John Dorrien whom 
 you know. Perhaps he meant to be a great speaker, per- 
 haps he intended being a great poet, because his mistake 
 is, and always has been, to fancy that he can compass his 
 ends and never be baffled in what he undertakes. It is 
 that, to be sure, which has raised him to his present position, 
 and also made La Maison Dorrien what it is. But it has its 
 drawbacks — it has its drawbacks, and so John will find some 
 day, if he does not mind." 
 
 " How so ? " asked Antoinette, curiously. 
 
 " My dear, John is too trusting and too proud, and a
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 2T7 
 
 proud man who trusts must suffer for it in the end. And 
 now let us have a look at the Italians." 
 
 A different impression, and yet one not less deep than 
 that which she had derived from Greek statuary, awaited 
 Antoinette when they went among the Italian painters up- 
 stairs. She was prepared for the beauty, but not for the 
 holiness ; for the marvelous color, but not for the fervor 
 and intensity of religious feeling which she saw here dis- 
 played ; but this time she made no comments. She did not 
 ask her companion if she would not like to see such wom- 
 en as these saints with the golden aureole around their 
 fair young heads, and the roses of paradise in their virgin 
 hands. She did not wonder at those ardent martyrs who 
 smiled at pain, who looked up at the heavenly Jerusalem 
 during all their torments, and who saw, through the pale 
 and soft splendor of the wonderful city, the happy angels 
 bending down with wreaths and boughs of triumphant 
 palm. 
 
 She was silent, and it was a pity, for Mrs. Reginald had 
 an answer quite ready for her, an answer which would, of 
 course, have settled Antoinette's infidel tendencies in no 
 time. Indeed, the young girl was chary of communicating 
 her impressions that day, and when Mrs. Dorrien smilingly 
 said to her at dinner, " Well, my dear, what did you see 
 to-day worthy of note ? " Antoinette looked up at the ceil- 
 ing, as if in doubt, and replied, after a pause : 
 
 " Oh ! we saw so many things, and there were two or 
 three that amused me much, Mrs. John. In the Egyptian 
 Museum we saw skeins of thread, real Egyptian thread, you 
 know. Also balls of thread that seemed to have been just 
 wound off, and fragments of cloth, in one of which was a 
 darn, not over-neatly made — which was a comfort to me." 
 
 " All this is deeply interesting," said Mr. Dorrien, " and 
 it shows what benefit you derived from your sight-seeing." 
 
 Antoinette gazed at her grandfather in some wonder ; 
 then she blushed, and looked at her plate, and said not 
 another word till lie had left them for the evening. 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien had retired to her own room ; Mrs. Regi- 
 nald, who was tired, was sleeping in her rocking-chair ; and, 
 when John came up at nine o'clock, he found his cousin with a 
 book in her lap, which she was not reading, and her eyes sad- 
 ly fixed on the bright wood-fire. He went and sat by her.
 
 278 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 " What ails you ? " he ashed, in a friendly, direct way. 
 
 Antoinette gave a little start, but, with the same open- 
 ness, she answered : 
 
 " I am sorry Mr. Dorrien dislikes me ! " 
 
 " Dislikes you, Antoinette ? " 
 
 " Oh ! yes, he does," she persisted, calmly. " Do not 
 imagine it was what I said at dinner that displeased him. 
 He had been gazing at me for some time with a look of 
 thorough dislike. I thought it was my fancy, but when I 
 spoke I learned that it was not." 
 
 John looked sorry, but he was too honest to assure An- 
 toinette that she was utterly mistaken ; he knew she was 
 not. Mr. Dorrien might not actually dislike his grand- 
 daughter, but he certainly did not like her. For some rea- 
 son or other, she found no favor in his eyes. Perhaps he 
 could not forgive her being so utterly unlike a Dorrien as 
 she was. Such was Antoinette's own impression. 
 
 '• I am too like my mother to please Mr. Dorrien," she 
 said, looking up at John. She tried to laugh, but the tears 
 
 in this house." 
 
 " Surely not," said John, with his bright smile. 
 
 " Oh ! I am not blind," said Antoinette, still wanting 
 to look brave. " Mrs. Reginald is very kind, but she only 
 endures me. Mr. Dorrien sneers at me when I open my 
 lips ; and Carlo — why, Carlo likes you best now ! And you 
 are laughing at it all! " she added, darting a look of quick 
 resentment at him. 
 
 In her displeasure she attempted to rise, but, taking 
 her hand, he gently compelled her to resume her seat. 
 
 " I cannot let you go and include me among your ene- 
 mies," he said. 
 
 Antoinette gave him a doubtful look. She could not 
 forget what Mr. Dorrien had said to her, but she read no 
 confirmation of his words in the young man's eyes. They 
 were handsome eyes, as she saw, and full of friendly kind- 
 ness, but there was nothing lover-like in the look those 
 dark-gray eyes bent upon her. 
 
 " I did not mean that I had enemies," she said, a little 
 reluctantly, "of course not — but — "
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 279 
 
 '• You meant that no one liked you in this house," he 
 said, filling up the gap her pause had made. " Do you 
 really think so? " 
 
 Antoinette hung her head and looked a little ashamed. 
 
 '• You are good to me," she answered, at length. " I 
 beg your pardon ; I was wrong not to remember it. You 
 were kind that first evening, and you are kind still, but — " 
 
 " But," he interrupted, with a smile, " you do not think 
 John's kindness worth much. And yet, Antoinette, I am 
 the friend you must turn to in this house. Mr. Dorrien has 
 told you as much, I know. He is wearied and out of health. 
 Slight cares are too much for him, and % so I am virtually 
 master here. Do not think I boast; the burden is often a 
 heavy one ; there are days and weeks when I work harder 
 than any slave ; but, since it must be done, I do it ungrudg- 
 ingly, and now and then I have my reward. Now, I will be 
 honest with you," he added, with a bright smile lighting up 
 his whole face like sudden sunshine ; " it will be very pleas- 
 ant for me to please you — if you will allow me, Antoinette.' 
 
 She laughed, a little, derisive laugh. 
 
 " Thank you," she said, " but I shall be generous, and 
 not put you to the proof." 
 
 John looked more puzzled than displeased. 
 
 " Do you really think I could not be as good as my 
 word ? " he asked. 
 
 "Indeed I do," she roundly answered, but once more 
 quite good-humored. " I am dying to have a piano and 
 learn music. I need not tell you that, after the congratu- 
 lations I received the other day from Mr. Dorrien on my 
 fortunate ignorance of music, I am not going to ask him for 
 an instrument and lessons," she added, raising her fine, 
 dark eyebrows. 
 
 " And is that all? " said John, looking amused. "Do 
 you really think a piano and a few lessons beyond my reach ? 
 Well, you certainly have no great opinion of my power in 
 this house." 
 
 " But it is the noise, the practising the scales and exer- 
 cises, and so forth," she said, impatiently ; " it is all that 
 which Mr. Dorrien could- not endure." 
 
 But John did not seem to consider this an insuperable 
 objection. 
 
 " I dare say you could modify his views on that subject,"
 
 280 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 he said, quietly ; " besides lie is so rarely at home, that 
 your study of music need not interfere with him in the least. 
 I shall order in a piano to-morrow, and ask about a pro- 
 fessor." 
 
 He was taking out his pocket-book to make a note of it, 
 when, with a raised color and lowered eyes, Antoinette 
 said, quickly : " No, thank you ; I was only jesting. I — I 
 really do not care about it, after all." 
 
 John looked at her in grave surprise, and his look said 
 so plainly, " You are not telling the truth, and I do not 
 believe you," that Antoinette turned her flushed face away 
 as if she had been smitten ; then suddenly she looked back 
 at him, and said, with flashing eyes, breathing displeasure 
 and defiance: "I wish I had never come here ! I like } 7 ou, 
 John, but I hate having to depend upon you — it is not fair 
 — it is not right. I am Mr. Dorrien's grand-daughter, after 
 all." 
 
 "How can I expect you to understand?" asked John, 
 half smiling, half sorrowful ; " but, Antoinette, remember 
 this — while you idled your youth in orange-gardens, and 
 dreamed pleasant dreams, my youth was spent in this 
 house in toil, and such cares as youth should never know. 
 Such empire as I possess here I have bought at heavy cost. 
 I have given the days and years which never return to 
 man's life, and what have I got in exchange, Antoinette ? 
 Power — grudge it me not, and do not wonder that I hold 
 it fast — do not grudge"~me either that I can do something 
 to please you." 
 
 "Oh, no," said Antoinette, "I grudge you nothing, 
 John ; but I wish I had never come here." 
 
 " You do not like me enough to endure wanting me, 
 Antoinette. Well, I have no claim to your liking — you 
 are free to withhold it ; I can only do my best to please 
 you. Remember that, if my being master here displeases 
 you, the fault is none of mine." 
 
 There was a patience in his look and voice that subdued 
 her waywardness. 
 
 " Don't think me mean," she said, coloring up — " don't, 
 John." 
 
 " No, why should I ? " 
 
 "And don't think that I will be too proud to let 3-ou 
 please me. That is not it."
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 281 
 
 "Then what is it?" 
 
 " I find it hard that I should want any one's kindness 
 — even yours, John — in my grandfather's house." 
 
 " Well, I dare say it seems hard to you," he said, after 
 a pause ; " but you will let me got you a piano, after all ? " 
 
 " No," said Antoinette, looking steadily before her, 
 while the tell-tale blood spread over her neck and face. 
 u Thank you very much, but I had rather not." 
 
 She kept her ej'es averted ; then suddenly she turned 
 round. John was looking at her with a gaze so perplexed, 
 and yet so searching, that she gave a little start. Neither 
 spoke. Their silence woke Mrs. Reginald, who jumped 
 straight up in her chair. 
 
 " Of course," she said, peremptorily — " Versailles to- 
 morrow. Try to come with us, John. Bless you, I heard 
 all you were saying! "she added, with that positiveness 
 of people who have been asleep, and who will never con- 
 fess it. 
 
 CHAPTER XXV. 
 
 The sun shone on the cold sfateliness of Versailles. 
 What wide and silent streets this once roj'al town had ! — 
 what long avenues of tall trees passed through it ! — what 
 a look of something dead and utterly by-gone there was 
 about the large stone-houses ! Ruin or decay had not 
 touched them, and yet they were desolate of aspect, even 
 though flowers bloomed on their iron balconies, and laugh- 
 ing children peeped out of the windows. "When we go 
 down with the smooth tide of Time, we care little for the 
 changes which he brings; but when, casting us on one 
 shore, he flows between us and the other, we are conscious 
 of a great gulf, which nothing can bridge over. Ver- 
 sailles may swarm with thousands, legions of armed men 
 may tread her streets, foreign invaders may sleep in her 
 deserted palaces — all these pass away as shadows from a 
 mirror; they cannot fill up that strange, wide gap between 
 what has been and what is, between the splendor of gener- 
 ations of kings and the barren coldness of the present time.
 
 282 JOHN DOKRIEN. 
 
 And so, though the king be gone, Versailles is all royal. 
 Indeed, it is that, or it is nothing — nothing, at least, that 
 the stranger will care to see, or to remember. Monarchy 
 never had so splendid a mausoleum as that large, silent 
 palace. The actual unfitness of its rooms and galleries as 
 places to be lived in set it apart from every other royal 
 dwelling. The long, stately gardens, with their terraces, 
 their flights of steps, their idle fountains, and lichen-eaten 
 statues, have a sad and heavy majesty from which the 
 homely royalty of our own time would shrink with uncon- 
 querable ennui. The children who play on the grass, the 
 old soldiers who sit in the sun, the idlers who wander in 
 the cool, green alleys, are the only kings and queens who 
 now can visit the gardens of Versailles. For they have 
 nothing buried in that huge white grave which stands up 
 there, shining so coldly in the sun — neither absolute power, 
 nor prestige, nor the obeisance of courtiers, nor the love of 
 nations. Sun-heat is genial to them, and cool shade re- 
 freshing ; they can enjoy the spray of the slender fountain 
 springing up to meet the sunshine, and laugh at the old 
 marble gods and goddesses ; at Latona with her frogs, at 
 Saturn with his bellows. 
 
 One of these queens Antoinette was when she went 
 about Versailles with Mrs. Reginald, looking at all its 
 marvels with the eagerness of a child turning: over the 
 pages and gazing at the images of the most splendid pict- 
 ure-book that was ever put before childish eyes. John 
 had been unable to come, but he had provided Miss Dorrien 
 with a voluminous guide-book. She consulted its pages 
 diligently, and imparted their contents to Mrs. Reginald 
 with much zeal for that lady's information, also her own 
 impressions of all she saw. 
 
 " O Mrs. Reginald, did you ever see such a palace as 
 this ? " she exclaimed, from the moment that they entered 
 the court, in the centre of which rises the equestrian statue 
 of the great French king. 
 
 " No, but others have," the elder lady composedly an- 
 swered. " I have a dreamy recollection that the Escurial 
 covers — well, I will not say how many square miles, for 
 fear of mistakes." 
 
 " Mrs. Reginald, you see that clock ? " 
 
 " No, my dear ; my sight is bad."
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 283 
 
 " 01), what a pity ! The book says its hand was stopped 
 three times — at the death of Louis XIV., at that of Louis 
 XV., thru at that of Louis XVIII. How did they do it, 
 Mrs. Reginald ? Did they let it be quiet from one king's 
 death to that of another ? or — " 
 
 "My dear," interrupted Mrs. Reginald, laying her hand 
 on the young girl's arm, " never mind the clock ; it goes 
 fast enough now, king or no king. But look at that balcony, 
 it was there your namesake, Mane Antoinette, came out 
 to face the yelling mob below, and, so far as she knew, 
 death. A brave woman — not a wise woman — but a brave 
 woman, if ever there was one." 
 
 The tragic images thus called up sobered Antoinette 
 for a while ; but when they entered the palace and ascended 
 the majestic staircase, and entered the Galerie des Batailles 
 her ardor woke anew. 
 
 " Mrs. Reginald, look at those gray columns and the pict- 
 ures — do look ! " 
 
 " No," answered Mrs. Reginald, with the calmest per- 
 versity ; " you may look, and tell me what you see ; I like 
 to hear you." 
 
 Thus encouraged, Antoinette rattled away. Every 
 picture of a battle was gazed at, every room was visited 
 and commented upon. 
 
 " Mrs. Reginald, did you know that this shabby little 
 room was one of Madame de Maintenon's? We saw her 
 portrait a while ago — that lady with the beautiful dark 
 eyes." 
 
 " All these ladies had fine eyes," was Mrs. Reginald's 
 irrelevant reply. " I suppose there is no beauty without 
 fine eyes. John's are the finest I ever saw." 
 
 Antoinette took no notice of this remark, but, consult- 
 ing her book, exclaimed eagerly: 
 
 " I declare we have missed Marie Antoinette's room. 
 Her portrait is in it. Perhaps it was from that very room 
 that she had to go out on the balcony. And it is quite an 
 historic room, for two queens died there, and two kings 
 were born in it. Do let us see it." 
 
 "Yes, my dear," good-humoredly assented Mrs. Regi- 
 nald; "but if you will see every room in which queens 
 have lived and died, and kings have been born, or em- 
 perors slept or dined — why, you will find it hard work."
 
 284 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 But Antoinette did not fear fatigue ; with light, un- 
 wearied feet she flitted about the palace, Mrs. Reginald 
 following her indeed, but sitting down, and often shutting 
 her eyes whenever she could do so. And thus she saw, as 
 she wished to see them, rooms made memorable by history, 
 though they have kept so few tokens of the past they 
 once inclosed. Here three gardes-du-corps had given their 
 blood for Marie Antoinette, and thus saved her for the 
 scaffold. Here the Czar Peter had slept, and there the 
 man to whom Versailles owed its splendor and greatness, 
 the haughty monarch whom all France had worshiped, 
 and before whom Europe had once trembled — here Louis 
 XIV. had ended his long life. The bed, of faded velvet, 
 in which he died with a simple fortitude which even his 
 enemies could not deny, is still adorned with the elaborate 
 needle-work of the young and noble damsels whom Madame 
 de Maintenon reared in Saint-Cyr. His shadowy presence 
 still haunts that room, a small one for so great a sovereign. 
 Antoinette tried to fancy that his majesty had just risen, 
 put on one of his big wigs, and was stepping out on high- 
 heeled shoes, and in all the splendor of gold-embroidered 
 velvet and finest Mechlin lace, to the salle du conseil. She 
 tried to call up the crowd of courtiers in the ceil de bcenf, 
 all wigged, all clad in velvet and lace no whit inferior to 
 the king's, all waiting for the sun of their worship to ap- 
 pear ; but no — her imagination could not go so far. The 
 past was past indeed — past and buried, in a grave so deep 
 that no angel's trumpet would call it forth to resurrection 
 and to second life. 
 
 Twice Antoinette walked round that room, as if she 
 were never to see it again. It impressed her more than 
 any thing else — more than that gorgeous galerie de glaces, 
 with its mirrors, its statues, pilasters, trophies, and paint- 
 ings of victory, which is the sad and significant epitome of 
 that reign of splendid follies and fatal conquests. 
 
 " And now, have you seen Versailles ? " asked Mrs. 
 Reginald, when they went out into the garden. 
 
 " Yes, but not the Trianons," coaxingly said Antoinette. 
 " Just one look at them, Mrs. Reginald." 
 
 To Trianon they went, and there they found John Dor- 
 rien waiting for them. Both Mrs. Reginald and Antoinette 
 brightened at his aspect.
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 "Now that is kind!" cried the elder lady; while the 
 younger one exclaimed heartily: 
 
 "() John, why did you not come sooner? It has been 
 glorious ! " 
 
 John smiled kindly at her happy face and bright eyes, 
 and Mrs. Reginald laughed. 
 
 " As if the boy did not know Versailles by heart ! " she 
 said. " But I am glad you came, John," she added, mak- 
 ing her way to a sunny bench, and sitting down, " for now 
 you will take this insatiable young lady off my hands, and 
 I can wait for you here." 
 
 No one ever argued with Mrs. Reginald, but Antoinette, 
 in her inexperience, made the attempt. Mrs. Reginald 
 shook her head, and kindly, but most positively, checked 
 her first words. 
 
 " No use, dear — my mind is made up. — What news, 
 John ? " 
 
 " Mr. Dorrien does not come home this evening. I have 
 taken it upon myself to put off dinner till eight." Mrs. 
 Reginald nodded approvingly. " Oliver Black has come 
 back, and will dine with us." 
 
 Approbation vanished from Mrs. Reginald's face. 
 
 " 1 am heartily sorry for it," she said, emphatically, and 
 catching Antoinette's surprised look, she added: "A 
 handsome young man, my dear, charming, and John's dear- 
 est friend, but whom I cannot endure." 
 
 " Charming, and John's dearest friend, and you cannot 
 endure him ! " echoed Antoinette, with a little curl of her 
 lip. " Why, Mrs. Reginald is that possible ? " 
 
 " Quite," sarcastically replied Mrs. Reginald. " He 
 deals in untruths — tells them by the dozen." 
 
 "You are giving Oliver Black a nice character," inter- 
 rupted John, looking displeased. 
 
 "His own, my dear boy," kindly retorted Mrs. Regi- 
 nald. " You have heard of the old Venetian glasses, that 
 shiver at the touch of poison? — well, then, my regard is as 
 brittle a cup as a Venetian glass. Put a lie into it, and it 
 cracks asunder. I despise lies, big or little," she added. 
 bending her one eye on Antoinette with so Bevere a mean 
 ing that the young girl colored deeply. "There, that will 
 do," resumed Mrs. Reginald, in a calmer tone ; " I make 
 you lose time, and Oliver Black is not worth it."
 
 286 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 She nodded at them, and they turned away, walking 
 down one of the alleys, and leaving the Grand Trianon be- 
 hind thetn. John Dorrien paused in the path, and asked 
 Antoinette if she did not wish to see the palace. 
 
 " No, thank you, I have had enough of palaces to-day," 
 replied Antoinette, with some asperity. She took out her 
 handkerchief, and fanned herself, saying it was dreadfull}' 
 hot. Her looks, her manner, her voice, even — all were 
 altered. Their frank gayety and hearty enjoyment had 
 vanished ; keen annoyance and moody discontent were 
 written on her face. 
 
 That girlish face, so young, so fresh, and now so clouded, 
 John's eyes scrutinized with quiet but very keen attention. 
 Those eyes of his, which his friend thought the finest ever 
 seen, were also very penetrating eyes, that saw both far 
 and deep. It was not in John's power to read his young 
 companion's face, and not draw swift and unpleasant con- 
 clusions from her altered looks. But his thoughts were si- 
 lent, not expressed. He made no allusion to Oliver Black, 
 or to Mrs. Reginald's prejudice against him. He did not 
 seem to perceive the change which the few Avords that had 
 been spoken by his old friend had produced in Antoinette. 
 He did his best to lead her mind away from thoughts which 
 were evidentl}* not pleasing. He spoke to her of her name- 
 sake, and she soon forgot her annoyance, whatever its cause 
 might be. 
 
 Antoinette knew — who does not ? — the tragic history 
 of the royal lady; but there was a vagueness in her knowl- 
 edge which lent that sad tale a deeper pathos, if deeper 
 can be, than that of reality. Was this the little palace 
 which the young queen had so loved ? — were these the 
 shady paths along which her happy feet had wandered ? 
 Every now and then she paused and looked at John. 
 
 "Is it possible? — can it be true?" she asked, with her 
 dark eyes fixed on him in earnest inquiry. 
 
 "Can what be true?" said he. 
 
 " That this is the very place in which Marie Antoinette 
 lived?" 
 
 " Why not ? Besides, you have seen nothing yet." 
 
 He took her along those green solitudes and lonely 
 ways which give the lesser of the two Trianons its peculiar 
 charm. Once they rested on a grassy bank, and Antoi-
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 nette, clasping her bands around her knees, looked down 
 in depths of dark, green gloom, full of mossy rocks and 
 glossy ivy, twining round ancient trunks, and northern ver- 
 dure of tall trees climbing on a pale sky. How unlike the 
 orange-gardens and straight cypresses and cloudless azure, 
 flushed with golden sunset, of her southern home ! A little 
 brown bird flew down from a bough, and lit on the path 
 before her. He hopped daintily in its shade and sunshine, 
 pecking on his way, and Antoinette watched him wistfully. 
 
 " I suppose his grandfather was here in the queen's 
 time," she said, looking up at John, who smiled. 
 
 "If not his grandfather, at least some ancestor of his," 
 he answered. "Some careless little brown bird, who Hew 
 in these alleys when the queen pined in her prison, and 
 who sang on his bough when she laid her head on the 
 block." 
 
 "Do not!" entreated Antoinette, with a shudder — "I 
 Avould rather not think of it." 
 
 " Then why come here ? " he asked. " The whole cart h 
 is haunted, if Ave look at it rightly ; but, of all its haunted 
 spots, which is more pitifully so than this? Here a queen, 
 young, beautiful, and beloved, played at idyls, and pasto- 
 rals, and village-life, as poor children play at kings and 
 queens. There beyond is the little white temple of love, 
 with the statue of Amour vainqueur, rising in its solitary 
 altar. Who so much as this Austrian princess might think 
 that young heat lieu god faithful, and whom did he ever de- 
 sert so entirely ? He gave her the welcome of a nation, 
 and she died amid its curses. He brought every heart to 
 her feet, only to alienate from her the heart of her own 
 child. He promised and gave her the love of a king, and 
 he surrendered her to the foul touch of an executioner. 
 Surely no woman was ever so cruelly bet raved by love." 
 
 "But some were true to her," said Antoinette. 
 
 " Some were true," he repeated. "What is the truth 
 of some — ay, of many, if we compare it with the cruel 
 treachery of one ? Remember, that all should be true, and 
 that, when one betrays, the wrong seems frightful to a loyal 
 heart." 
 
 "Let us go," impatiently said Antoinette, rising as she 
 spoke. " 1 want to see Trianon, and not to hear philoso- 
 phy."
 
 288 J0HN DORRIEN. 
 
 " Are you sure you dislike philosophy ? " he ashed, with 
 perfect good-humor, but rising at her behest. " I fancied 
 the other day — but perhaps I was mistaken — that you had 
 a decided turn for philosophic speculations." 
 
 Antoinette stood still in the middle of the path, and 
 tapped her feet on the gravel with evident vexation, while 
 with a heightened color she said : 
 
 " Now, John, let us understand each other once for all 
 — I shall never interfere with you, but please not to inter- 
 fere with me. I will not be catechised by any one — no, 
 not by Mr. Dorrien himself." 
 
 " Mr. Dorrien will never catechise you, Antoinette — he 
 will pass sentence on you, should he think fit to do so ; 
 but he will give you no previous warning, certainly no 
 trial." 
 
 Antoinette's dark eyes flashed fire. 
 
 " That is a threat," she said ; " thank you, John." 
 
 " It is no threat," he answered. " Must I always re- 
 mind you that you can rely on me — that, come what will, 
 I will be true to you ? " 
 
 " Why, in what peril do you think me ? " she asked, 
 throwing her head back with a sort of scorn. 
 
 " In none, if you like it. But, Antoinette, I have a 
 faculty of which you may not be aware — I do not mistrust 
 easily, but neither am I easily deceived. A word, a look, 
 tell me much — the rest I guess. I tax you with nothing ; 
 but this I tell you — you have chosen an unsafe path — such 
 a path as may end in your undoing." 
 
 Antoinette gave him a scared look. 
 
 " What do you mean ? " she faltered. 
 
 " Nothing now. It has not yet come to plain-speaking 
 between us ; later you will feel that it would have been 
 wiser in you to have trusted me." 
 
 Antoinette looked as if she could reply; her lips parted 
 to speak, then she checked herself, and, laughing carelessly, 
 said : 
 
 " I have heard that the old oracles spoke in riddles, 
 John, and, on my word, you surpass them." 
 
 The taunt and the mocking look that accompanied it 
 seemed to be unheeded by John Dorrien. Sensitive though 
 he was by nature, he had learned perfect self-command in 
 the stern school of business, and such girlish stab3 as An-
 
 JOHN DOKRIEN. ^89 
 
 toinettc could deal him were very little indeed to the young 
 man. 
 
 " Here is Marie Antoinette's little pastoral," he said; 
 t! that central house was for her husband, Louis XVI. — In. 
 matson du seigneur. This building was her dairy. Her 
 brother-in-law was the miller of yonder little mill. What 
 do you think of it all, Antoinette ? " 
 
 She did not answer. She stood, like one entranced, 
 close to the brink of a little lake to which, as they spoke, 
 John had brought her. 
 
 The spot was very silent; no other visitors were there 
 to break its quiet charm. The pale October sky, the still 
 lake, the quaint little brown houses scattered here and 
 there — all seemed to sleep in the same tranquil, golden 
 light. The yellow poplar-boughs of the tree the queen had 
 planted rose in the blue air; the boat in its moorings 
 seemed to be waiting to convey the royal dairy -maid across 
 the water; the swans floating on its calm waves looked as 
 if they thought she would soon come out to feed them. So 
 at first it seemed to Antoinette, but a second look told her 
 another story. The breath of life was gone forever from 
 the queen's Arcadia ; decay was in the aspect of those for- 
 saken dwellings ; mildew had invaded their crumbling walls 
 and untrodden steps, and the wildness of tall grasses and 
 weeds, and trailing brambles, shrouded them on every side, 
 and looked as if it would soon inclose them forever. Xever 
 more, felt Antoinette, would kings and queens play here at 
 village-life. More than two generations of tragic history 
 had gone by since those royal personages had laid down 
 their state in this sylvan place, and a chilliness as that of 
 their own graves now hung over it. In vain the sun shone ; 
 in vain happy birds built their nests in the trees, and there 
 sang love-songs every spring; in vain bountiful Nature 
 tenderly clothed these frail ruins in her fairest verdure ; 
 every day they faded farther and farther back into the dim- 
 ness of the past ; every day the shadow of forgetfulness 
 was stealing something from them. 
 
 It is hard to feel the utter nothingness of all mortal 
 
 O 
 
 things when we are in the heyday of our youth ; it is hard 
 to see how weak a grasp of life and its joys we have at the 
 best of times. Antoinette felt rebellious, and turned away 
 with a quivering lip. 
 13 '
 
 290 JO nN DOBRIEN. 
 
 "Let us go," she said; "it is dreary here." 
 
 They found Mrs. Reginald, not where they had left her, 
 but sitting on the steps of the Petit Trianon, nigh some 
 blue vases, in which still bloomed pale geraniums. 
 
 " Do you know what I have been doing ? " she asked, 
 as they drew near. " No, of course you do not. Well, I 
 have been sitting here in the Octoher sun, and listen- 
 ing to two shabby children who were playing near me. 
 The little girl wore a dilapidated straw-hat, and the boy 
 boasted a torn jacket. I suppose they crept in like rats, 
 while the keeper was looking another way. Well, the lit- 
 tle gipsies were merry enough, after a dreary fashion of 
 their own; for what do you think they were singing? — 
 ' Trianon, Trianon.' They sang it to some Gregorian chant 
 or other, and, on my word, I felt quite eerie. It sounded 
 like the dirge of the place. At last some one came, and 
 they flew off like a couple of sparrows." 
 
 " This is a sad and dreary place," said Antoinette, look- 
 ing at the closed windows of the little palace — " very dis- 
 mal." 
 
 " Dismal ? " echoed Mrs. Reginald, setting her head on 
 one side, and peering into the young girl's face. " Why", 
 child, what change has come over the spirit of your dream ? 
 It was all so glorious a while back." 
 
 " That was Versailles, not Trianon," replied Antoinette, 
 blushing a little ; " besides," she frankly added, " I am tired 
 
 now." 
 
 And fatigue it doubtless was which made her so silent 
 all the way home that, unless in monosyllables, and to 
 answer some question or direct remark, she never opened 
 her lips. 
 
 CHAPTER XXVI. 
 
 " Miss Dorrien— Mr. Oliver Black." It was Mrs. John 
 Dorrien who performed the introduction, half an hour before 
 dinner. John had found some letters to read on his return, 
 Mrs. Reginald had gone up to her own room to rest for a 
 few minutes, and John's mother was doing her best to en-
 
 JOHN DORRIEN'. 291 
 
 tertain John's friend, when the door of the little sitting 1 - 
 room which preceded the dining-room opened, and Antoi- 
 nette entered. She had exchanged her gray walking-dress 
 for one of pale-green silk; she had fastened in her hair a 
 flower from the bouquet which John had given her, and 
 which she carried in her hand. A narrow black velvet 
 clasped her slender white neck ; a little gold bracelet, in- 
 herited from her mother, glittered on her round wrist; and 
 when she stood before Oliver Black, a little shy and awk- 
 ward, perhaps, with dark eyes swiftly raised to his, and as 
 quickly withdrawn, she looked a very pleasant and attrac- 
 tive picture of girlhood. 
 
 " Mv dear, you do not look at all tired!" exclaii 1 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien, giving Antoinette's blooming face a compla- 
 cent look. 
 
 " I am rested now," was the low answer, and Antoinette 
 went and sat down in the farthest chair she could find, with 
 face studiously averted from the gaze of the handsome 
 young man before her. Her eyes were bent on the carpet. 
 She could not see the look of pleased surprise with which 
 his rested on her slight figure, clad in rich pale raiment, on 
 the graceful turn of her neck and small, well-shaped head, 
 on her fresh young face, fair and blooming even in the half 
 darkness of the spot where she sat. 
 
 " My dear, how far you sit !" said Mrs. Dorrien, looking 
 round at her — " does your head ache ? " 
 
 Oh ! no, Annette's head did not ache, but she liked to 
 sit away from the light. Was she pleased with Versailles? 
 Oh, yes, very much indeed. John had joined them? Yes, 
 John had met them at Trianon. 
 
 The words were almost inaudible, being spoken in John's 
 bouquet. 
 
 " And he gave you some flowers, I see," said Mrs. Dor- 
 rien, still looking round at the young girl, as if determined 
 to make her talk. 
 
 Antoinette's face was raised from the flowers in a mo- 
 ment. It was all in a flame, and she bit her lip as she an- 
 swered, with an effort : " Yes, John gave me these," and she 
 laid them carelessly upon the marble mantel-shelf. 
 
 Oliver Black probably saw that she was ill at case, and 
 did not wish to be noticed, for he at once kindly came to 
 the rescue.
 
 292 J0H ^ DORRIEN. 
 
 " What an uncomfortable house to live in that Versailles 
 must have been ! " he said, lounging back in a very easy 
 arm-chair, and looking both handsome and indolent ; " and 
 Trianon — do vou remember the awful sofas in Trianen, Mrs. 
 Dorrien ? Pseudo-Greek, I believe, and deplorably straight 
 and stiff." 
 
 " Are there any sofas in Trianon ? " asked Mrs. Dorrien, 
 looking surprised. 
 
 " Perhaps there are not," he airily replied, not a whit 
 disconcerted, " but they would be stiff and hard if there 
 were any, you know, so that comes to the same thing — does 
 it not, Miss Dorrien ? " 
 
 Before the lady could answer, the door opened, and 
 John's tall, straight figure and bright face appeared in the 
 aperture. 
 
 " Only for a few minutes, Black," he said, apologetical- 
 ly, looking at his friend. 
 
 "To be sure," cried Oliver Black, starting up with per- 
 fect willingness. 
 
 " Will you be long, dear ? " asked his mother, looking 
 at him somewhat reproachfully. 
 
 " No, little mother, we shall come back directly," an- 
 swered John, smiling. 
 
 The door closed upon them. 
 
 " My dear," said Mrs. Dorrien to Antoinette, who had 
 not stirred from her shady place, " are you afraid of Mr. 
 Black?" 
 
 " Oh ! no," hesitatingly answered Antoinette, " not at 
 all. I suppose," she added, " he is the gentleman whom 
 Mrs. Reginald does not like ? " 
 
 " Yes ; dear Mrs. Reginald and Mr. Black do not get 
 on. It is a pity ; I think him a very pleasant young man ; 
 but you really have no need to be nervous about him. Mr. 
 Dorrien is kind to him, for John's sake. I am sure the 
 poor young fellow may bless the day when he first saw — 
 My dear," she added, breaking off, and looking on the car- 
 pet, " do you see my smelling-bottle anywhere ? " 
 
 Antoinette rose, and began looking for the smelling- 
 bottle on the floor, but it was not to be found. 
 
 " I hope I left it up-stairs — I hope I did not lose it as I 
 came back from Saint-Elizabeth's ! " exclaimed Mrs. Dor- 
 rien, uneasily. " It was John's falher gave it to me, and I
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 203 
 
 value it so much. I must look for it in my room." She 
 rose as she spoke. 
 
 " Shall I go and help you look for it, Mrs. John ? " 
 asked Antoinette, who had all the happy willingness of 
 the young to run upon errands. 
 
 "No dear, thank you. John will be coming back 
 directly. Stay here." 
 
 She gently pressed Antoinette back into her chair, and 
 placing John's bouquet on her lap, with a significant smile, 
 she left the room. As she was closing the door, Antoinette 
 heard her saying, to some one outside: 
 
 "Has John already done with you?" 
 
 " Yes; see what a worthless fellow I am, after all, Mrs. 
 Dorrien. He is coming directly." 
 
 li was the voice of Oliver Black who thus answered her. 
 
 " I miss my smelling-bottle," said Mrs. Dorrien, half 
 hesitatingly; then, lowering her voice to a whisper — hut 
 Antoinette's hearing was keen, and not a word escaped 
 her — "You must not be affronted at Miss Dorricn's man- 
 ner, Mr. Black. It is not pride, but shyness, that makes 
 her so. You are too much a man of the world not to un- 
 derstand that." 
 
 Mr. Black made some inaudible reply, then entered the 
 room, and closed the door. Antoinette looked at the flow- 
 ers on her lap, and crimsoned steadily. Oliver Black walked 
 straight toward her with sparkling eyes and outstretched 
 hands. 
 
 " O my darling, Iioav well you did it ! " he said with a 1< >w 
 4a ugh. 
 
 She raised her head as if she had been stung. 
 
 "Do not come near me," she said, her very lips turning 
 Avhite. " If you do I shall leave the room." 
 • " My dear creature ! " he exclaimed, amazed, but speak- 
 ing very low, " what have I done ? " 
 
 "Oh! nothing, nothing," she answered, seeming ready 
 to cry, and sitting down again, for she had half risen ; " hut 
 — but I shall never be able to go through this." 
 
 "Yes, yes, you will," he soothingly replied, approach- 
 ing her as he spoke. 
 
 " I tell you I shall leave the room," she said, in a low, ex- 
 cited tone, and again rising. " Don't you seel would rather 
 die than be found out ? Don't you see 1 am dying with fear?"
 
 294 J0 IIN DORRIEN. 
 
 Oliver Black's handsome face expressed mingled vexa- 
 tion and amusement. 
 
 " Well, you do keep me at arm's length," he said, so 
 far obeying her behest as to remain standing before her ; 
 " and now let us make the best of the few minutes before 
 us. How are you, dearest ? But I need not ask — you look 
 charmingly. How are you getting on with them all ? 
 John gives you flowers. I hope he is not already making 
 love to you." 
 
 Antoinette tossed her bouquet on the table, and said, 
 
 petulantly ; 
 
 " Mr. John Dorrien is too sure of his ground to take 
 
 that trouble." 
 
 Oliver laughed a low, gay, amused laugh. 
 " Poor John ! " he said, softly. " How do you like him ? 
 Not much, I hope." 
 
 " Not at all — I detest preaching ! " 
 
 " How dare he preach to you ? " exclaimed Oliver. 
 " He always was a conceited prig, though ; but how comes 
 he to preach to you? " 
 
 " Am I not a heathen ? " said Antoinette. 
 " My darling, why did you let that out ? " he asked, a 
 little impatiently. He stood facing her, leaning with his 
 back to the mantel-piece, and his arms folded across his 
 breast. His eyes looked down into her face, as she sat op- 
 posite him, with her hands clasped on her lap, and her look 
 raised to his. 
 
 " Why should I have hidden it ? " she asked, with evi- 
 dent surprise. " Since he must dislike me, better give him 
 good cause for his dislike." 
 
 " A man's liking for a woman is a very complex affair," 
 replied Oliver, smiling. " Suppose your very heathenism 
 attracts this pious John? He may love your soul, poor, 
 dear fellow, as well as your inheritance, and your pretty 
 face. He may try to convert you. He may succeed. And 
 then good-by to poor Oliver Black ! " 
 
 Antoinette's face dimpled all over with smiles at the 
 mock-sorrowful tone with which he spoke. Her look soft- 
 ened, and rested on Oliver Black with shy tenderness. 
 
 " How am I to make myself hated ? " she asked. " You 
 say he must hate me, or — " 
 
 " He will stick to La Maison Dorrien like a leech," sug-
 
 JOHN DOHRIEN. 295 
 
 gested Oliver. " Yes, he must hate you. Can't you be 
 very disagreeable, Antoinette, very repellent, etc., I mean, 
 when you two arc alone, for please never to try that in the 
 presence of Mr. Dorrien." 
 
 The warm blood rushed up to Antoinette's face in a 
 crimson glow. 
 
 "I cannot promise that," she said, shortly. 
 
 "Don't promise it, but try to do it," answered Oliver, 
 good-humoredly. "Of course it will be excessively difficult 
 for you to be disagreeable ! " 
 
 "I did not mean that," she interrupted, half laughing; 
 " but indeed I cannot promise to be one thing when I am 
 alone with John, and another when I am not." 
 
 Oliver looked annoyed, and she added, deprccatingly : 
 
 " You do not know what I have already had to bear. I 
 shall never be able to go through it ! — oh, never ! I shall 
 be found out, and I shall die with shame ! I am sure they 
 are all watching me. The very first morning I was here I 
 got into trouble. I went down early to the garden. I 
 thought I could slip out to aunt through that back door we 
 had talked of, you know, and I was seen, and I denied it, 
 and I am sure," said Antoinette, with a faltering voice, 
 " that John had seen me, and did not believe me." 
 
 " My dear girl, why did you deny it?" asked Oliver, 
 opening his eyes wide, and looking puzzled. "Take my 
 word for it, the truth is alwa}*s the safer plan ; and an un- 
 truth that has not a very strong motive for it is always 
 dangerous. You should have said that you came down to 
 the garden tempted by the beauty of the morning, that 
 you rememdered so well the old river-god, and your happy 
 childhood, etc. A bit of sentiment would have come in 
 charmingly." 
 
 "But, then," said Antoinette, looking at him in evident 
 perplexity, "I should have told ten lies instead of one." 
 
 "Yes, but you would not have been found out, and — " 
 
 Here the door opened, and John Dorrien entered the 
 room. He gave Oliver Black a surprised look, which the 
 young man answered with an amazed start. 
 
 "Don't scold, John," he cried, raising his hands depre- 
 catingly. "I declare, I forgot all about Mr. Brown. I 
 came in here in my heedlessness, and, having entered on 
 an argument with Miss Dorrien, forgot to take myself off."
 
 296 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 " What was the argument about ? " asked John Dorrien, 
 smiling, and sitting down as he spoke. 
 
 " I contended that Windsor Castle beat Versailles hol- 
 low, and began describing it for Miss Dorrien's benefit. I 
 am a first-rate hand at description, you know, John." . 
 
 " Do you think that of Mr. Black ? " asked John, bend- 
 ing the searching look of his gray eyes on Antoinette's 
 face. 
 
 Her color came and went. She was burning with 
 shame, and trembling with fear. 
 
 " I have no doubt Mr. Black describes charmingly," she 
 stammered ; " but— but the gift is one I am not capable of 
 appreciating. I think I shall go and help Mrs. Dorrien to 
 look for her smelling-bottle," she breathlessly added. So 
 saying, she rose and walked out of the room. 
 
 Oliver stared, and whistled softly. 
 
 " John," he asked, in an undertone, " which is it? Has 
 Miss Dorrien taken a dislike to me, or — I say it with due 
 caution — has she got a temper ? " 
 
 John did not answer one word. He sat looking at An- 
 toinette's vacant place, as if her girlish figure filled it still, 
 and lie could read the meaning of her changing face and 
 dark eyes. 
 
 "I beg your pardon," he exclaimed, with an absent 
 start. " I am afraid I was not attending. What did vou 
 say ? " J 
 
 " Charming ! " cried Oliver Black, bursting out into a 
 hearty laugh. "Miss Dorrien leaves the room, declaring 
 she does not care for a word I say, and you quite as plainly 
 inform me that you have not taken the trouble of attending 
 to me. Well, well, Mr. Brown will listen when I make 
 that inquiry about Monsieur Basnage, which I forgot for 
 the young lady's sake." 
 
 He left the room, undetained by John Dorrien. 
 
 " What could they be talking of ? " thought the young 
 man, still looking at Antoinette's vacant chair. 
 
 As Oliver closed the door, he saw Antoinette on the 
 stairs. She was standing there in the cold, trying to re- 
 cover her composure. On seeing Oliver Black, she turned 
 round. 
 
 " Oh ! never put me in such a position again," she said, 
 addressing him in a low, alarmed tone — " oh 1 never do it."
 
 JOHN DORRIEX. 297 
 
 "Very well," he composedly answered. Then added, 
 " You will Hud a note fu your bouquet this evening, if you 
 let it fall." 
 
 Antoinette looked petrified. Oliver Black laughed 
 softly, and at once entered Mr. Brown's room. He entered 
 it with the same happy, smiling face which he always wore 
 — that face so sweet, so genial, so pleasant, which had won 
 Antoinette's heart, which had fascinated her languid grand- 
 father, and in which even the cold, prudent eyes of Mr. 
 Brown found a charm. Nothing could be pleasanter than 
 the manner after which Oliver now discussed business with 
 the old cleric. His very way of sitting down and drawing 
 his chair forward to the table, and saying, " Now, Mr. 
 Brown, just a five minutes' talk, if you please," was warm 
 and cheering. And then he was so clever ! His clever- 
 ness was nothing like that of John Dorrien. He did not 
 overpower you with new, acute, penetrating views, show- 
 ing you too plainly that you had been all wrong, and that 
 old experience was valueless when put in the same scale 
 with young intuition. No; but he understood you at a 
 word, carried out your views in a moment, and never con- 
 tradicted you. Mr. John Dorrien was invaluable, of course 
 — quite a genius, indeed; but he was self-opinionated and 
 dogmatic, and Mr. Oliver Black was as modest as he was 
 clever. So he and Mr. Brown got on charmingly now as 
 ever; and the old clerk looked at him over his spectacles 
 and smiled, an 1 explained ; and Oliver Black talked for ten 
 minutes or so, giving information, and yet finding out a 
 thing or two which Mr. Brown never suspected; and as, 
 when this talk was over, there was still a minute to spare 
 before dinner, he walked out of the old stone house into 
 the dingy old street, with his handsome dark eyes smiling 
 under the brim of his hat, fascinating even the rather acrid 
 lady in the 'cigar-shop, while he wrote on the counter a few 
 lines destined to be slipped in among the roses which that 
 unsuspecting John Dorrien had given Antoinette. Oliver 
 Black was quite boyish enough to enjoy cheating his un- 
 conscious rival under his very nose. The mere thought, 
 indeed, put him into good spirits, and rendered him delight- 
 ful company during the dinner, which, but for him, would 
 have been rather a dull meal. 
 
 Mrs. Reginald and Mrs. John Dorrien had joined An-
 
 298 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 toinette and John when Oliver Black entered the sitting- 
 room once more. • Only Mr. Brown* was wanting-, and he 
 came almost immediately. It was well understood that 
 Mr. Brown never left business till the last extremity, and 
 for him to appear was therefore the signal for all to go in 
 to dinner. Mr. Brown took in Mrs. Reginald, Oliver Black 
 gave his arm to Mrs. Dorrien, and John, as a matter of 
 course, was left to Antoinette ; but, spite this happy ar- 
 rangement, the meal, as we have said, was a dull one. 
 
 Mr. Brown was hungry and silent ; Mrs. Reginald was 
 tired, and, having resolved not to be disagreeable to Oliver 
 Black, she saw no other means of avoiding that pitfall than 
 locking herself up in a citadel of freezing politeness and 
 reserve. Mrs. Dorrien had not found her smelling-bottle, 
 and could have cried, so great was her concern. Antoi- 
 nette was nervous and uneasy, and John Dorrien had some 
 thoughts of his own which made him rather abstracted. 
 Oliver Black alone was in the best of spirits, and, as we 
 said, delightful company. He was twenty-six, he had good 
 health, a good appetite, and he was enjoying an excellent 
 dinner and first-rate wines, with all the pleasant surround- 
 ings which wealth gives, in the company of an agreeable 
 girl, who was fond of him, and whose dowry was, or would 
 be, as he thought, La Maison Dorrien. 
 
 The present is much to men of Oliver Black's tempera- 
 ment and tendencies. They have no keen ambition, no 
 far-seeing desires, stretching out into the dimness of the 
 future. The warm air of the room, the scent of John's 
 roses — what matter that thej' were John's? their fragrance 
 was none the less sweet — the brilliancy of wax-lights, the 
 sparkle of crystal, the ruby hue of Burgundy, the delicate 
 flavor of perfect French cookery, the rosy hue of Antoi- 
 nette as she sat opposite him, in silk attire, fresh and dainty 
 as a flower — all these present possessions, which he felt 
 certain of securing quickly and for good, were sufficient to 
 exhilarate Oliver Black. This pleasant, lively mood he 
 kept till the close of the meal, when Mrs. Reginald re- 
 marked to Antoinette : 
 
 " My dear, how sweetly your roses smell ! " 
 
 " They do," answered Antoinette ; " but I am afraid 
 they will fade. I must go and put them in water as soon 
 as dinner is over."
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 299 
 
 She spoke with a sort of eagerness, looking jealously at 
 the roses, which she had placed on a side-table behind her, 
 within reach of her hand. Oliver Black understood her very 
 well. Antoinette's dark eyes, as they turned round and 
 met his once more, were telling him that her flowers should 
 not fall nor be picked up by him. He smiled at Mr. Brown, 
 whom he was addressing, but after that he was rather silent. 
 
 " I dare say the gentlemen have business to talk over," 
 remarked Mrs. Reginald, somewhat austerely, as she rose 
 after dessert, thus implying, for Oliver Black's benefit, that, 
 if she complied with the English custom of leaving gentle- 
 men to their wine, she did so with a qualification. 
 
 Antoinette pushed back her chair with a sort of eager- 
 ness, and clutched her bouquet with both her little hands, 
 as if she feared it would escape her. Oliver looked at her 
 and smiled again as he rose. She had to pass by him on 
 her way to the door. 
 
 " You have dropped this," he said, stooping and seeming 
 to pick up something ; and, before she was aware of his in- 
 tention, his note had been thrust into her hand. 
 
 Surprise, the fear of discovery, the sense of danger, ren- 
 dered her helpless and mute. She turned so pale that it 
 was well no one was minding her just then. But Oliver 
 had chosen the right moment. John was looking another 
 way, Mr. Brown was sipping a glass of wine, and Mrs. 
 Reginald and Mrs. Dorrien were already at the door. The 
 very audacity of the act also saved it from detection, and 
 as Antoinette recovered her presence of mind she saw that 
 she had nothing to do but to abet Oliver's daring fiction. 
 
 " Thank you," she murmured faintly, and hurried on 
 without looking behind her. 
 
 She was scarcely outside the door and at the foot of the 
 staircase, when she said, hurriedly : 
 
 "I must go and put my flowers in water at once ; " and 
 up she ran, as if the slip of paper in her hand were a coal 
 of fire. 
 
 She did not feel as if she could breathe till she entered 
 her room, and even then she locked herself in, like one pur- 
 sued. With trembling hands she lit her candle and read 
 Oliver's note. It ran thus: 
 
 " Tell M to take you to the Pare de Menceau to- 
 morrow morning at ten."
 
 300 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 As soon as she had read this brief missive, Antoinette 
 burned it, and with a sigh of relief saw it shrink up into a 
 black scroll at her feet. But the relief was short-lived, and 
 the fear soon came back. It is hard to be caught in a net, 
 even though our own hands have tied the knot of its meshes, 
 and Antoinette felt snared by a lie which she had helped 
 to fashion, which she abetting passively, and she kuew that 
 she was powerless to tear that cruel net asunder. She was 
 proud, and she hated the baseness of deceit. She was of a 
 free and open temper, and she revolted against the thraldom 
 of the part she was acting ; but pride and revolt showed 
 her no means of escape. Oliver Black chose concealment, 
 and, having once consented to it, she must not, she dare 
 not, betray their joint secret. Indeed, she now knew what 
 he had always known, though she had failed to realize it, 
 that such betrayal would be fatal to them both. Mr. Dor- 
 rien had left her no doubt on the subject, and John had un- 
 consciously given Mr. Dorrien's words new force. She had 
 been brought to her grandfather's house to marry her cousin, 
 and, save as his future wife, she was nothing in that house. 
 That mijrht be hard — it was hard and bitter too — but it was 
 so, and all her love for Oliver Black, and all his for her, 
 would not change it. She buried her face in her hands ; 
 she tried to think, but thought would not come — not, at 
 least, such thought as helps us in our need. Nothing came 
 but the bitter reflection : " I am a deceiver ; I shall be found 
 out ; they will all despise me, and I shall have deserved it." 
 
 The thought of such contempt, and of having brought 
 it on herself, galled her inexpressibly. Until this evening, 
 she had not felt it much ; she had put off her cares, for 
 Oliver Black's return ; woman-like, she trusted in him. He 
 who had drawn her into this secret engagement would de- 
 liver her from its perils ; he would speak to Mr. Dorrien ; 
 he would claim her; he would set John Dorrien aside; he 
 would make all fair and easy, and let daylight in on this 
 unpleasant darkness. But Oliver Black had come, and his 
 first words had dispelled that illusion. It was evident that 
 he had no wish for daylight, that he meant matters to re- 
 main in their present obscurity, that he intended being 
 John Dorrien's friend and Antoinette's lover at the same 
 lime, and that he would wait to claim her from Mr. Dorrien 
 "till matters wore an aspect wholly different from that which
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 301 
 
 thev had now. The conviction filled Antoinette with a 
 sort of dull despair at her utter helplessness. 
 
 She had no past experience to i';ill hack upon and help 
 her out of her troubles. Her life had always been free, 
 open, and harmless; she had never had an}- thing to hide, 
 and was not familiar with the ways of falsehood. Her in- 
 nocence had not been that of virtue, but of childhood, and 
 she had fallen into the first temptation, not so much because 
 she liked wrong, as because she knew practically very little 
 about it. Madame Brun had defined her well in calling her 
 a little bird. A little bird she had been, singing gayly on 
 the green bough, till a cunning hand had snared and caged 
 her, and now she was caught, and she might beat her breast 
 against the bars of her prison — all in vain. 
 
 A knock at the door of her room disturbed Antoinette's 
 somewhat bitter reflections. "With a guilty start, she went 
 and opened it. Mrs. Reginald appeared on the threshold, 
 smiling, and yet reproving. 
 
 " Why, my dear," she said, coming in, " what ails you? 
 What keeps you up here all this time ? Are you un- 
 well ? " 
 
 "My head aches," faltered Antoinette. 
 
 "Does it?" retorted Mrs. Reginald, with her shrewd 
 siib^-look ; " then I suppose your head made you forget your 
 ilowers, for, though you came up to put them in water, there 
 they are half withered. Let me tell you, though, Miss 
 Dorrien," she added, going and putting the roses in Antoi- 
 nette's water-jug, " that John's Ilowers deserve better treat- 
 ment ; but then," she added, reflectively, "what should 
 you know of John's worth ? "Why, I suppose that John 
 would as soon lay down his life and die as do a mean 
 tiling." 
 
 She paused and looked hard at Antoinette, not, to say 
 the truth, that she thought in the least about her, but be- 
 cause she was just then assimilating the real John and that 
 imaginary Reginald who had been fading out of her life of 
 late years. Antoinette, however, turned pale under that 
 fixed look, and averted her troubled face, while Mrs. Regi- 
 nald resumed, composedly : 
 
 tk Hut, of course, you know nothing of all that. You 
 put him, I dare say, on a level with that little Mr. Black, a 
 man of that sort, whereas light and darkness are not more
 
 302 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 different than our John, the best, the finest fellow that ever 
 breathed, and that little sneak of a fellow whom he brought 
 here, Heaven knows why." 
 
 " Defend me from my friends," is an old saj'ing. Never 
 had Antoinette felt so nigh hating John as she did now, on 
 hearing him thus exalted by this injudicious partisan at the 
 expense of Oliver Black. Her color rose, her dark eyes 
 flashed. She had to bite her lips to check the sharp an- 
 swer which resentment dictated, and prudence forbade. 
 
 "And even if you did not care for John's roses," con- 
 tinued Mrs. Reginald, whom the unnatural restraint she 
 had laid on her tongue at dinner had rendered aggressive, 
 "you might care for the poor flowers. Why," she added, 
 settling their drooping heads in the water-jug, " don't you 
 know Eve brought them from paradise?" 
 
 " Did she ?" echoed Antoinette, in a tone which placed 
 Eve among the fables of a worn-out creed. 
 
 " My poor child," said Mrs. Reginald, putting her hands 
 behind her back, and speaking with exasperating kindness, 
 "I wonder you can look at these roses, at any flowers, and 
 not feel devout." 
 
 But theology, as expounded by Mrs. Reginald, was 
 never very attractive, and Antoinette, though habitually 
 gentle and averse to sharp speech, was fairly roused. Her 
 own troubled conscience had turned every word uttered by 
 her visitor into the bitterest taunt, and John's roses paid 
 for it all. She gave them a lofty look, and said, carelessly : 
 
 " Oh ! I know that there are many beautiful things in 
 Nature." 
 
 "Nature — nonsense!" dogmatically said Mrs. Regi- 
 nald — " I am sick of Nature. It is Nature here and Na- 
 ture there, and I say that Nature is like Mrs. Gamp's friend, 
 Mrs. Harris — no one has ever seen her." 
 
 " Then there is no such thing as the laws of Nature ? " 
 asked Antoinette, a little defiantly. Oliver had told her a 
 good deal about the laws of Nature, and she had not for- 
 gotten the lesson. 
 
 "The laws of Nature!" ironically repeated Mrs. Regi- 
 nald — " I am afraid I don't understand, my dear ; but, as I 
 never heard of there being laws and no Law-giver, will you 
 kindly tell me who made these laws you speak of? Was 
 it Nature whom I call Mrs. Harris, or some one above her ?
 
 JOHN DORKIKN. 303 
 
 You talk so positively of the laws of Nature, that I sup- 
 pose you know all about the matter." 
 
 " I have not expressed myself correctly," said Antoi- 
 nette, reddening with vexation. 
 
 "Of course you have not," replied the pitiless lady. 
 " Shall I tell you why, my dear ? — because there is no way 
 of expressing nonsense correctly. When the fool said in his 
 heart there is no God, he did not go beyond that word ' no,' 
 fool though he was ; he knew better than to talk about 
 the laws of Nature. Why, child, your little sparrow there 
 would know better than to say that, if he could talk." 
 
 " You are very hard upon me, Mrs. Reginald," exclaimed 
 Antoinette, feeling and looking ready to cry with vexation. 
 " I never said there was no God." 
 
 " No but you spoke of Nature, which is the modern po- 
 lite way of putting the Almighty out of sight. There is 
 something rather brutal about an atheist, of course, but, do 
 you know, I rather respect the man. He is out and out a 
 burglar, if I may so speak; but as for your plausible swin- 
 dler, who tries to cheat himself and others out of all faith by 
 such juggling of words as ' Nature ' and all that trash, why 
 I despise him. I could just fancy little Mr. Black to talk 
 in that style," added Mrs. Reginald, who had that quality 
 valued by Doctor Johnson of being a good hater. 
 
 This unconscious home-thrust roused Antoinette. Her 
 eves lit, her lips quivered. 
 
 "And science, Mrs. Reginald," she said, indignantly — 
 " what have you got to say to science ? — you were speak- 
 ing of it a while ago." 
 
 "A bushel of chaff and a grain of wheat," said Mrs. 
 Reginald, coolly. " The wings of old Father Time fan 
 the chaff away, and the wheat remains ; but men often take 
 generations to discover that pure grain, and yet young 
 things in thcr teens like you quote science against the 
 Almighty. There was a king once, King Alfonso the 
 Wise, I believe, who was a great astronomer, and looking 
 at the heavens (with eyes of science, according to the sys- 
 tem of Ptolemy), he was so puzzled by the absurdities he 
 saw there, that he said : ' If God had consulted me on all 
 these matters, I could have given him some good advice.' 
 Poor little wise kino- ! It never occurred to him, you see, 
 that God could be right and Ptolemy be wrong, for Ptolemy
 
 304 JO HN DORRIEN. 
 
 was science, and when was science ever mistaken ? " sar- 
 castically added Mrs. Reginald. " And though the little 
 king is dead, my dear, I can see that you have fallen in 
 with some of his posterity." 
 
 Antoinette started to her feet like one who has been 
 stung. 
 
 " My head is better. I shall go down with you, Mrs. 
 Reginald," she said, hurriedly. 
 
 " She has got enough of it," thought Mrs. Reginald, 
 with a grim smile of triumph. " This way, my dear," she 
 said aloud, as Antoinette was passing by the door of her 
 sitting-room. " The gentlemen have found out some won- 
 derful piece of business to talk over, and we must be com- 
 pany to each other to-night." 
 
 Antoinette, who had dreaded seeing Oliver again, fear- 
 ing lest every look of her eye, lest every motion of her 
 face, should betray her secret, was disappointed not to see 
 him, and entered Mrs. Reginald's apartment with a de- 
 pressed look. She sank down rather weariedly in the first 
 chair she found, and gazed listlessly at Mrs. Dorrien's pale, 
 faded face and faint smile of welcome. 
 
 " You look tired, dear," said the lady. " Yes, Ver- 
 sailles is so fatiguing. Dear John never understood it was 
 too much for me. Poor boy, how he raved about it years 
 ago, and how full he was of it when he came back ! Do 
 you remember, Mrs. Reginald ?" 
 
 " Of course I do. The dear boy always was enthusias- 
 tic ! " 
 
 And being fairly launched on the illimitable sea of John 
 Dorrien's attributes, the two ladies soon left land behind, 
 and, so far as Antoinette was concerned, got out of sight, 
 while she staid, rather sad and lonely, on the shore of her 
 own thoughts. She had no part to act, since Oliver was 
 not present. She was safe from that terrible danger of 
 discovery which was to her as the sword of Damocles; but 
 then she had no chance of letting him know that she would 
 not meet him on the next morning, of saying, with studied 
 carelessness, " I am so tired that 1 shall not stir out-of- 
 ioors to-morrow," or any such speech, unmeaning to other 
 cars, significant to his. He did not come, the ladies prosed 
 amicably about John, the hand of the clock traveled over its 
 white dial, and still Oliver did not appear.
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 305 
 
 " Ten ! " suddenly exclaimed Mrs. Reginald. " My dear 
 Mrs. John, go off to bed directly. — As for you, dear, 1 think 
 your room will do your head good. You have been very 
 
 dull." 
 
 " Yes," said Antoinette, rising. " I do not feel good 
 for much." 
 
 And so, bidding them both good-night, she went back 
 to her own room, feeling, with a sort of gladness in her in- 
 most heart, " I am not to blame now, if I go and meet Oli- 
 ver to-morrow. It is that I cannot do otherwise." 
 
 But, when she opened the door of her room, closed it, 
 and set her candle down on the table by the open window, 
 through which the night-air came, making the flame trem- 
 ble, and all but die, in that chill breath, it seemed to An- 
 toinette as if her spirit were quelled like that flame, and 
 was fainting away within her. Mrs. Reginald's biting 
 speeches, which she had forgotten below, being absorbed 
 in other thoughts, all came back to her now, like ghosts 
 who had remained behind in that solitary chamber, lying 
 in wait to haunt her on her return. There are some per- 
 sons who have a knack of speaking in sword-thrusts, and 
 whose weapon is never sheathed in the thinnest of scab- 
 bards. Mrs. Reginald could not hint or imply an}' thing. 
 She could not tell Antoinette that she was all wrong, un- 
 less in the hardest of plain speech. She could not praise 
 John unless with her whole heart, she could not censure 
 Oliver Black unless with unmitigated bitterness and ani- 
 mosity, and thus every blow she dealt told and pierced 
 deep. 
 
 Antoinette's whole being felt in a tumult, as even- 
 thing that had been said between her and Mrs-. Reginald 
 now came back to her mind. She all but detested that 
 overbearing lady, but she could not forget a word she had 
 uttered. The praise of John stung her again as it had 
 stung her when spoken. She felt the cutting sarcasm lev- 
 eled at Oliver Black as she might feel a blow on the face. 
 Even Mrs. Reginald's theology, though hateful in manner, 
 had disturbed her unbelief. Do what she would, rebel 
 against it as she might, something had been moved within 
 her, something that vexed her inmost heart. Antoinette 
 had been reared in passive irreligion, which Oliver had 
 without effort transformed into an active feeling. With
 
 306 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 the eagerness and ardor of the young, she had rushed into 
 the new creed opened before her. A beautiful and marvel- 
 ous law, pervading all the visible world, had dazzled her 
 imagination, but now that first glow seemed strangely 
 faded, and twilight, deepening into darkness, was closing 
 round her. Belief will always have strong odds against 
 unbelief in the eternal war which these two wage one 
 aarainst the other in the soul of man. For belief asserts, 
 and unbelief denies, and, if one is hard sometimes, the 
 other is ten times harder always. 
 
 Antoinette was but a girl, and she had gone neither far 
 nor deep in the path she was treading. Yet these few 
 steps made her aware that she was blind, and did not know 
 the way. Her mind now felt in a tumult. Her own anxie- 
 ties, the truth or untruth of religion, seemed inextricably 
 mingled. What should she do, what ought she to believe, 
 followed each other in her troubled thoughts as wave fol- 
 lows on wave of the sea. As she went to the window and 
 closed it, she saw a large bright star shining in the dark- 
 ness of the sky. She gave it a long look of jealous sorrow. 
 
 "What need we care about a future life, my darling?" 
 Oliver Black had once said to her when she questioned him 
 on the subject. " No one knows any thing about it, then 
 what need we care ? " 
 
 The words now came back to her with strange bitter- 
 ness. The very trouble and anxiety of the present made 
 the future seem more precious. " Who and what are you ? " 
 she said in her heart, as she still looked at that light, so 
 remote, though so clear — " what are you, that you should 
 have lived thousands of years, that you should live on thou- 
 sands more, while I have had but a few years, and may die 
 to-morrow ? You are all but immortal — harm cannot reach 
 you ; and I was born to suffer, to pass and to perish ! " 
 
 Alas ! the heavens and their planets never yet gave an 
 answer to these questions of the aching human heart. Our 
 sorrows cannot reach so high, and dim their splendor. They 
 look down at us serene and silent, and go on their path in 
 the sky, leaving us on earth sad, weary, and forlorn, till we 
 drop down into the darkness of the grave. From the mo- 
 ment that she had entered her grandfather's house, it had 
 seemed to Antoinette that, when she saw Oliver Black 
 again, all her troubles would be over, and all would go well
 
 JOHN DOEREEN. 307 
 
 with lier ; and, now that she had seen him, she was sorrow- 
 ful even unto death, and, turning' back from the window, 
 she flung' herself on her knees beside her bed — not to pray, 
 but to weep — with her face buried in her pillow. 
 
 CHAPTER XXVII. 
 
 That feeling of secretiveness which guided Mr. Dorricn 
 in almost every action of his daily life, which he might de- 
 liberately put aside in an emergency, but only to resume it 
 again as soon as the opportunity occurred for doing so, had 
 influenced him in a matter of considerable importance, so 
 far as Antoinette was concerned. John Dorrien had proved 
 invaluable to his cousin. Mr. Dorrien had found it pleasant 
 to lean on that young man, so clever, so hard-working, so 
 thoroughly in earnest about all he took in hand. But we 
 do not always love those Avho minister to our necessities; 
 and John, though respected and valued by his cousin, was 
 not loved. Mr. Dorrien could surrender his authority, be- 
 cause his judgment compelled him to do so, but he was not 
 generous enough to give his affection, and, what was more, 
 he withheld it deliberately. 
 
 "He had given up a position of great trust and author- 
 ity to Mr. John Dorrien — that was enough." 
 
 On that principle, Mr. Dorrien also gave John no more 
 of his confidence than he was strictly obliged to yield him. 
 What he could hide from him he did ; such knowledge of 
 his private matters as be could keep, he kept; and he did 
 so all the more jealously that he was compelled to be so 
 open in every thing pertaining to business. It had annoyed 
 him more than he oared to show to be told by his yoiin^ 
 relative of the deceit Mademoiselle Melanin had practised 
 upon him, and he had not chosen that John, though he 
 knew this much, should know more. According! v. and 
 without saying a word to him on the subject, Mr. Dorrien 
 had written to Oliver Black, and requested him to extend 
 his journey as far as Nice, and there look into this matter, 
 which he detailed fully, ending with the intimation that
 
 308 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 he, Mr. Dorrien, would feel much obliged if he, Mr. Black, 
 would kindly keep the result of his inquiries for Mr. Dor- 
 rien's own private hearing. 
 
 "Poor John ! " thought Oliver, laughing softly to him- 
 self; "he wanted to keep it very quiet, and, lo ! Mr. Dor- 
 iien sends me to the very nest of his dove.?' 
 
 This was not exactly the case. Mr. Dorrien's instruc- 
 tions, while they concerned Mademoiselle Melanie only, did 
 not even imply that Mr. Black need see that lady ; but Mr. 
 Black had his own views — his temper was cool and daring, 
 and, at the risk of forfeiting Mr. Dorrien's favor, he chose 
 to set about this matter after a fashion of his own. 
 
 Unconscious of the thunder-bolt that was going to fall 
 upon her, Mademoiselle Melanie sat picking greens in the 
 parlor — more kitchen than parlor — of the little house of 
 La Ruya, of which John Dorrien had never crossed the 
 threshold. The door stood half-open, and a flood of au- 
 tumn sunshine filled the shabby room, with its old com- 
 monplace brown furniture. The strong warm light fell on 
 Mademoiselle Melanie's sitting figure, clad in rusty black 
 garments. It touched her sallow face and hair of iron gray, 
 and flickered on her thin, restless hands. As Oliver Black 
 stood in the entrance, throwing his shadow on the red tiles 
 of the floor, he thought that, if this lady's niece were like 
 her aunt in appearance, John need never fear a rival in his 
 future bride's favor. He gave a rapid look round the room 
 in search of Miss Dorrien. A bird in his cage in the win- 
 dow, a few wild-flowers in a glass on the table, and a straw 
 hat hanging against the wall, told about her ; but she was 
 invisible. He heard her, however, singing gayly up-stairs, 
 with a light, cheerful young voice, that matched with the 
 beauty of the sunny morning. While Oliver stood thus 
 looking and listening, he was undergoing examination from 
 eyes no less searching than his own. Mademoiselle Melanie 
 put by her vegetables, rose, and, going up to him, said, in 
 a cool, yet aggressive voice : 
 
 " They do not live here." 
 
 She spoke in French. In the same language Oliver an- 
 swered blandly : 
 
 " I believe I have the honor of addressing Mademoiselle 
 Melanie." 
 
 She gave him a swift look of her dark eyes. Did she
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 309 
 
 detect some subtile mockery in his tone? Was she gifted 
 with that sort of intuition which belongs to low, keen minds, 
 who see earthly things all the better that they never cau 
 soar into higher and purer regions ? Or was his English 
 accent, though slight, enough to betray him to one who 
 must long have been on the watch for discovery? Oliver 
 could not tell, but he felt that she knew who had sent, and 
 what had brought him. 
 
 "Deep calleth on deep," says the Psalmist, in words of 
 terrible import. 
 
 As these two stood facing each other, a meaning passed 
 from Mademoiselle Melanio's dark eyes, keen and hard, to 
 those other dark eyes of Oliver Black's, so laughing and so 
 soft; and from his it went back to hers. Each knew that 
 in the other one standing there an accomplice could be found 
 at need — one ready and willing for guilt. No compact 
 passed between them, and yet in a moment, and by that 
 look, the way to a future understanding was made clear and 
 easy. 
 
 " I am Mademoiselle Melanie," said the lady, in answer 
 to his question. 
 
 " And I am sent by Mr. Dorrien," said he. 
 
 She motioned him carelessly to be seated, and, resum- 
 ing her own chair, uttered a laconic " Well?" 
 
 " Well, Mr. Dorrien has learned with surprise that his 
 daughter-in-law, Mrs. George Dorrien, had been dead a year 
 and more." 
 
 "A year and a month," corrected Mademoiselle Me- 
 lanie. 
 
 " Mr. Dorrien has accordingly requested me to ask you 
 to explain, as no doubt you can, how he happened to be 
 kept in ignorance of so important a fact as this." 
 
 " I might say show me your credentials," she answered, 
 defiantly ; " but, as I do not care for them, nor for Mr. Dor- 
 rien, I will simply say this — I have nothing to explain." 
 
 " Excuse me if I say that Mr. Dorrien should have been 
 apprised of Mrs. George Dorrien's death ? " 
 
 M idemoiselle Melanie laughed scornfully. 
 
 " What did he care for his son's widow ? He never 
 troubled himself about her once she was here. What did 
 she care about him ? She was not Mrs. George Dorrien 
 once she left his house. She was the Comtesse d'Armaille."
 
 310 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 " Excuse me again. Mr. Dorrien has a granddaughter. 
 He had a right to know that she had become an orphan." 
 
 " Why so ? Did he ever write a line to know whether 
 she was alive or dead ? And what did it matter that she 
 was an orphan ? Her mother was the silliest little fool 
 that ever lived ! " 
 
 " Excuse me again," returned the imperturbable Oliver 
 Black, " but a pecuniary question was involved in this mat- 
 ter. Mrs. George Dorrien received an allowance from Mr. 
 Dorrien, and he has learned with surprise that receipts pur- 
 porting to be signed by her at dates subsequent to that of 
 her death are lying at the bankers in Nice." 
 
 Mademoiselle Melanie raised her eyebrows, as if in some 
 scorn of this stranger's obtuseness. 
 
 " If Mr. Dorrien had questioned the banker," answered 
 she, " he might have learned that I have always signed the 
 receipts for my sister-in-law, from the first to the last." 
 
 "Indeed!" said Oliver, looking much surprised, al- 
 though he was already aware of that fact, so significant of 
 the relations between the two ladies. 
 
 " Yes, sir, indeed ! " echoed Mademoiselle Melanie, look- 
 ing more defiant than ever. 
 
 Oliver Black smiled good-naturedly. 
 
 " I shall leave that matter to Mr. Dorrien," he said ; 
 "but allow me to ask — I no longer speak as commissioned 
 by him — how it never occurred to you that Mr. Dorrien 
 might have views for his granddaughter with which your 
 long silence has probably interfered." 
 
 The sudden flash in Mademoiselle Mclanie's dark eyes 
 showed Oliver that he had found the weak spot in her armor. 
 
 "Views! — what views?" she cried, excitedly. "He 
 shall not do what he likes with my niece ! I know what 
 you mean, sir; but neither Mr. Dorrien, nor that little beg- 
 gar, his cousin, nor that Mrs. Reginald, with her one eye, 
 shall dispose of my niece, sir ! " 
 
 Oliver smiled, amused at tins sudden burst ; he also 
 eyed Mademoiselle Melanie curiously. After all, she was 
 only a woman, and her feelings (as women call their nerves) 
 could get the better of her. He certainly felt infinitely her 
 superior in this respect, and he wondered — he really did — 
 what could move him thus into utter forgetfulness of his 
 self-control.
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 311 
 
 "I am afraid I have gone too far," he began, with ap- 
 parent hesitation ; but if he spoke slowly it was because 
 he was listening 1 to a light step coming down the stairs, 
 and purposely gave it time to draw nearer ; " but, to say 
 the truth — " here the door opened, and Antoinette entered 
 the room. 
 
 She paused just for one moment, with the door in her 
 hand, looking at the stranger in surprise ; then she closed 
 the door, and came forward slowly, while Mademoiselle 
 Melanie said, with bitter emphasis: 
 
 k " Monsieur is a friend of Mr. Dorrien's, Antoinette." 
 
 A cold shadow seemed to pass over the young girl's 
 bright, surprised face ; she stood awhile, silent and reserved ; 
 then she said, but without any show of emotion or friend- 
 liness : 
 
 " Pray, how is Mr. Dorrien, sir ? " 
 
 Oliver Black, standing before her as in the presence of 
 some exalted lady of the land, answered, with the deepest 
 deference, that Mr. Dorrien was quite well. Mr. Dorrien's 
 granddaughter was probably not accustomed to such show 
 of respect, for she gave the courteous stranger a look of 
 some wonder, then, with a little bend of her head, she went 
 on and sat by the window, and began settling the cage of 
 her bird. 
 
 "You are going down the road," said .Mademoiselle 
 Melanie, rising and looking hard at Oliver Black; "so am 
 T. We can talk as we walk along, and thus you need lose 
 no time." 
 
 "You are most considerate," replied Oliver Black, with 
 his dark eyes full of laughter. 
 
 It amused him exceedingly to see how quickly Made- 
 moiselle Melanie and he came to the mutual understanding 
 that Antoinette was to be excluded from the knowledge 
 of whatever passed between them. With a deep, reverent 
 bow to Miss Dorrien, who rose and courtesied shyly, he left 
 the house, standing by to let Mademoiselle Melanie pass first. 
 
 From the window where she stood Antoinette saw them 
 go clown the road. Her surprise at the sudden appearance 
 of this handsome stranger was mingled with vague uneasi- 
 ness. When a life is very still and lonely, every breath 
 ruffles its surface, every new face is pregnant with a mean- 
 ing which seems either blissful or fatal.
 
 312 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 Antoinette could not go on feeding her bird. She took 
 up her work, and threw it down again ; she felt restless 
 and perplexed. The world, under the aspect of Oliver 
 Black, had entered her solitude, and, though the glimpse 
 had lasted but one moment, it effaced every other image. 
 Whatever spot of the room she looked at, he seemed to be 
 standing there, looking at her with a sort of courteous ad- 
 miration in his handsome young face and soft, dark eyes, 
 which Antoinette would not have been woman if she had 
 not understood. 
 
 Mademoiselle Melanie did not remain lon^ awav. She 
 no sooner entered the parlor than Antoinette broke in upon 
 her with eager inquiry. 
 
 " O aunt, who is that gentleman ? " 
 
 " A friend of your grandfather's, it seems." 
 
 " Do not you know his name, aunt ? " 
 
 " His name ? — let me see. Oh, yes, he told me his 
 name — Oliver Black." 
 
 " Why, John Dorrien had a friend called Oliver Black- 
 more ! " cried Antoinette, eagerly. 
 
 " I dare say that is the same. He is something or other 
 in Mr. Dorrien's firm." 
 
 " Oh, how sorry I am I did not know that ! " cried An- 
 toinette, with sincere concern in her look and voice ; " he 
 would have told me all about him, I am sure." 
 
 " About him ! — and what do you want to know about 
 him ? " asked Mademoiselle Melanie, turning sharply on her 
 niece. 
 
 " I should like to know whether he is alive or dead," 
 replied Antoinette, with a sigh. " Poor Carlo ! " 
 
 " Oh, I beg your pardon," said Mademoiselle Melanie, 
 with a short laugh. "I really thought you meant your 
 cousin, Mr. John Dorrien." 
 
 "No," quietly answered Antoinette, "I did not — poor 
 little Carlo ! I suppose he is very old now ? Do you think 
 that Mr. Black will call again, aunt V " 
 
 " I should say not — unless he has fallen in love with 
 you," sarcastically answered Mademoiselle Melanie. 
 
 "Then I wish he may have fallen in love with me," ex- 
 claimed Antoinette, a little petulantly, "for I want to hear 
 all about Carlo." 
 
 The opportunity she wished for came that same after.
 
 JOHN DORIUKX. 313 
 
 noon, for, on a proteose which even Antoinette felt to be 
 slight indeed, Oliver Black called again. As he pushed 
 open the door of the little parlor, and entered, Mademoiselle 
 Melanie gave him a sharp, amazed stare, then looked from 
 him to her niece with so much significance that Antoinette, 
 who was sewing, bent her blushing face over her work, and 
 scarcely knew how to raise it again. 
 
 After a while she rallied sufficiently to put that question 
 concerning Carlo which lay so near her heart. Oliver Black 
 looked all deferential interest as he replied : 
 
 "Oh! certainly. A beautiful lil tie white creature ! I 
 remember him perfectly. A great favorite with Mr. Dor- 
 rien." 
 
 "But it was to John I left him," exclaimed Antoinette, 
 "to John Dorrien himself. Has he given him to Mr. Dor- 
 rien?" she asked, with a look of disappointment. 
 
 Oliver thought so, but was not sure. Of one thing only 
 he was certain : Carlo, on the day on which he left Paris, 
 was in excellent health and spirits, and certainly, if an ar- 
 dent wish to bite Mr. Black's shins could be taken as proof 
 of either state, Mr. Black's declaration was a very true one. 
 Antoinette brightened as she heard him, then, meeting his 
 look of silent admiration, she again bent over her work. 
 
 The thought of love is one that is quick to come to 
 woman in her youth. The gates of ambition are ready foi 
 man. He can hope to attempt them all, and to win one in 
 the end. Woman knows early that her frail hand can open 
 but one door, that which leads to the lost paradise of her 
 first mother, Eve. In that Eden it is given her to wander 
 a few days. A few heavenly mornings she can spend there 
 when the flowers are still in their prime, when the dew of 
 heaven still lies on the grass. Later, the same thorns and 
 briers which are Adam's inheritance will invade Eden it- 
 self, and turn it into the every-day world ; but at first it is 
 all celestial, and, like all beautiful things, it seems within 
 reach, easy to win, easier still to keep. 
 
 Antoinette would have been no woman if she had not 
 felt as Oliver Black meant her to feel, as Mademoiselle Me- 
 lanie's sharp looks and sour manner implied, that he had 
 come back for her. And he conveyed his meaning all the 
 more successfully that he need act no part in order to do 
 so. Antoinette without beauty, without even an unusual 
 14
 
 314 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 share of woman's graces, was eminently pleasing- and at- 
 tractive. She had a subtile charm which other women failed 
 to comprehend, and certainly could not imitate, and by 
 which the hearts of men, young and old, were drawn tow- 
 ard her, without effort on her part. Her soft eyes, her 
 laughing lips, and blooming young face, were great en- 
 slavers, even when she had no wish to subdue. But, to 
 do Oliver Black justice, though he was man enough to ap- 
 preciate these fleeting charms, more solid attractions than 
 mere outward graces drew him toward Mr. Dorrien's grand- 
 daughter. He saw her through the magic prism of fortune 
 and golden hopes. The heiress of La Maison Dorrien, the 
 girl through whom a position, a luxurious home, and all 
 the comforts and elegances of life could be won, must have 
 been plain indeed, if he had not found a certain fairness in 
 her face ; but, being as she was, he thought her charming, 
 fell in love forthwith, and lost no time in making her fail 
 in love with him. 
 
 The task was an easy one, too easy by far. Mademoi- 
 selle Melanie had unlocked the gate of the citadel, and An- 
 toinette w T as left undefended at the enemy's mercy. Alas ! 
 she never thought of resistance. A man, young, handsome, 
 and pleasing, implied by every glance of his eyes, and every 
 tone of his voice, that to him she was fair among women ; 
 and she believed him, and tender gratitude for being thus 
 chosen mingled with her belief. He came asking for love 
 in every word and look, and Antoinette gave him what he 
 asked for, and never attempted to deny. The very truth 
 of her nature was against her, and when the wakening 
 came, and with it fear, it was all too late. 
 
 Some business or other which Mademoiselle Melanie 
 and Mr. Black had to transact, but which to Antoinette 
 seemed both perplexing and endless, made that gentleman 
 call every day, sometimes twice a day, for a week. He 
 came from Nice, and ignored Madame Brun's establish- 
 ment. Oliver Black was no Spartan, and he contended 
 that, as this world was full of good things, as it abounded 
 in fowl, fish, game, delicious fruit, and delicate viands, a 
 man of sense ought, considering that life was brief and 
 uncertain, to make the best of his time. Accordingly he 
 staid, "on principle," at the best hotels, and never, un- 
 less under the direst necessity, encountered discomfort of
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 315 
 
 any kind. His continued visits were a very pleasant va- 
 riety in Antoinette's dull life, but seemed to be quite a 
 trouble to .Mademoiselle Melanie. 
 
 " I wish that young man would not pester me so," she 
 would say, fretfully. " He surely must have time to lose 
 to be coming- so often. Why, all this could have been set- 
 tled the- very first day, if lie had any sense in him." 
 
 When Antoinette heard this and similar speeches, what 
 could she do but turn her blushing' face away, and conclude 
 that Oliver Black lingered over business and came twice 
 a day for her sake. She wondered — simple child ! — at her 
 aunt's blindness, and she never thought that that aunt of 
 hers was Oliver Black's accomplice — that she had been sold 
 by the one and bought by the other. 
 
 And so matters went on, till Oliver Black ceased com- 
 ing, without having bid Antoinette adieu, or implied, even 
 remotely, that his visits must soon cease. Antoinette 
 wondered, then she grew dull, then she fretted, then she 
 woke to the consciousness that this stranger of whom she 
 knew so little was dear to her. He had come at the mo- 
 ment when his suit could scarcely help prospering — when 
 the death of her mother, and the ungenial bitterness of her 
 aunt — when the loneliness of her life, severed from friend- 
 ship, social intercourse, pleasure, and even the slightest 
 recreations, unless such as her lonely walks could give her, 
 made Antoinette's whole being feel the want of something 
 to cling to — something that could love her a little, and 
 that she could love very much in return. That want Oliver 
 supplied. In a moment, without a thought, without a fear, 
 she had given him her heart. She did not know, she did 
 not even suspect it, till he suddenly vanished out of the 
 life he was making so bright. Then, indeed, she felt with 
 unutterable bitterness that she was in his power, and that 
 she might never see him again. Before she had time to 
 recover from the shock of the discovery, Oliver returned as 
 suddenly as he had departed. With sparkling eyes he 
 looked into her happy face, and while he read her scent 
 there, he told her his — if not in words, at least in a lan- 
 guage which Antoinette understood. 
 
 Mademoiselle Melanie received her visitor with marked 
 coldness, and when he was gone she turned to her niece 
 with much severity of aspect. The young girl stood in
 
 316 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 the window, gazing at the mountains far away. They 
 looked very gorgeous in their autumn beauty, with their 
 rocky heights all flushed and burning in the light of the 
 setting sun. But Antoinette saw them not. She had just 
 opened the door of Eden, and slipped in ; and in her para- 
 dise the sun never set, and autumn, however fair, never 
 came. 
 
 "Antoinette!" said Mademoiselle Melanie, almost 
 sternly. 
 
 Antoinette looked round at her relation with startled 
 eyes ; she had a presentiment of what was coming. 
 
 " That Mr. Black must not be coming after you, you 
 know." 
 
 "Aunt!" Antoinette could say no more; she was 
 crimson. 
 
 " Mr. Dorrien has other views," resumed Mademoiselle 
 Melanie, rather bitterly. " I believe he intends you for 
 that cousin of his — the tall bo} r , to whom you gave Car- 
 lo." 
 
 Antoinette's color faded, and for a moment she looked 
 the picture of dismay ; but she rallied quickly, and an- 
 swered steadily : 
 
 " I remember John Dorrien very well, and I am sure I 
 shall never marry him." 
 
 " And suppose Mr. Dorrien insists upon it ? " 
 
 " Mr. Dorrien does not care enough about me to insist 
 upon any thing ; but I am very sure I shall never marry 
 John Dorrien." 
 
 Mademoiselle Melanie nodded and looked ironical. 
 
 " Yes, yes," said she ; " but when it comes to the point 
 you will do it." 
 
 "But why should I?" cried Antoinette, indignantly. 
 " What kindness has my grandfather shown me, that I 
 should marry any one at his bidding? Has Mr. Black said 
 any thing about it to you ? " she added, with sudden fear 
 and perplexity. "Is that why he comes here? " 
 
 Mademoiselle Melanie looked at her with a sort of con- 
 tempt. 
 
 " You must be very dull indeed," she answered, "if you 
 do not see that Mr. Black is coming on his own account." 
 
 Antoinette answered not one word, but she looked once 
 more at the mountains. The red sunlight had faded away
 
 JOHN DORRIEN'. 317 
 
 from their rugged peaks ; they rose in dark and stern out- 
 lines in the pale evening sky. But Antoinette smiled 
 divinely ; she had entered paradise once more. 
 
 Mademoiselle Melanie said not another word ; she had 
 said enough. She was out when Oliver called the next 
 morning; and he made his opportunity good, and John 
 Dorrien's bride was lost and won before Mademoiselle 
 .Me.lanie's return. She seemed very angry when Oliver 
 Black went up to her, leading Antoinette, and, with a look 
 of manly frankness, told her what had happened, and that 
 her niece and he, having discovered that they could not 
 live apart and be happy, were now pledged to each other 
 for ever and ever. 
 
 " A pair of fools," she said, eying them contemptuous- 
 ly, as they stood before her hand in hand — " a pair of fools. 
 Antoinette is penniless, and what have you, sir ? " 
 
 "The will to work for two," answered Oliver, smiling. 
 
 But, spite this charming answer, Mademoiselle Melanie 
 was not pacified at once. Antoinette had to coax her 
 round, and even to shed a few tears, before her consent 
 was won. It was not given unconditionally. 
 
 " No one," stipulated Mademoiselle Melanie, " and 
 above all, Mr. Dorrien, should be told a word of what had 
 happened." And, until Antoinette had solemnly pledged 
 herself to secrecy, Mademoiselle Melanie maintained the 
 greatest rigor of aspect. 
 
 "Very well, aunt," exclaimed the young girl, somewhat 
 emphatically; "but 3 r ou ought to know that Mr. Dorrien 
 does not care what becomes of me." 
 
 "I know what I am saying," persisted Mademoiselle 
 Melanie, morosely. — "Are you aware," she added, looking 
 hard at Oliver Black, " that Mr. Dorrien formerly thought 
 of betrothing his granddaughter to your friend John Dor- 
 rien, and that he may still have that fancy, for all I know 
 to the contrary ? " 
 
 Consternation and dismay appeared on Oliver Black's 
 handsome face. 
 
 "You cannot mean it," he said, in a low tone — "you 
 cannot mean that ? " 
 
 " Oh ! yes, I do," sarcastically answered Mademoiselle 
 Melanie, " every word of it." 
 
 " O Antoinette," said the young man, taking her hand,
 
 313 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 and looking sorrowfully down in her face, " what will you 
 think of me — I am supplanting my best friend? " 
 
 " You are supplanting no one," answered Antoinette, 
 looking up at him with her clear eyes. " I would never 
 have had him — never, Mr. Black." 
 
 Mademoiselle Melanie laughed, and even Oliver Black 
 smiled ; but Antoinette no more read the smile of the one 
 than she understood the laugh of the other; and thus the 
 girl's fate was decided, and she fell into the pit which a 
 woman's mingled greed and revenge, and an unscrupulous 
 man's ambition, had dug beneath her feet. 
 
 CHAPTER XXVIII. 
 
 There was this much good in Oliver Black, that he 
 liked Antoinette none the less for deceiving her. The sim- 
 plicity and inexperience which made her so easy a prey, the 
 childish trust which never suggested a doubt of truth, were 
 sweet to him. He was also young enough to feel fond of a 
 girl who liked him so frankly, and whatever was amiable in 
 his nature went forth toward Antoinette, and endeared him 
 to her with every passing hour. And amiable Oliver was 
 after a fashion. He had grown up so in manner and bear- 
 ing quite naturally. It was pleasant to him to be liked. 
 Principle he had not, and did not care to have ; he sincerelv 
 thought it superfluous. Yet he Avas not incapable of a 
 certain honesty of judgment. The one really good trait in 
 him had appeared at Mr. Blackmore's death. On learning 
 how he legally stood, the unacknoAvledged child of a gen- 
 tleman, the penniless son pf a man of fortune, Oliver had 
 accepted his hard fate with philosophic composure, and nol 
 uttered one word to reproach the man who, after rearing 
 him in habits of luxury, left him shame and poverty by waj 
 of inheritance. He was man enough not to rail at Fortune, 
 and candid enough to confess to himself that he might have 
 behaved no better than Mr. Blackmore — "perhaps not half 
 so well," said Oliver to his own thoughts ; " besides, the old 
 boy liked me, and he would have done something for me if 
 he had had time, I know."
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 319 
 
 But with this temperate view of his wrongs ended Mr. 
 Oliver Black's impartiality. Set him face to fare with life 
 and other men, and he was resolved to get the best to be 
 had out of both. He must have comfort, he must have case, 
 he must have money, and smoke the best cigars, and drink 
 choice wines, and wear broadcloth, and have the love of 
 some pretty woman or other ; and he must stand well in life, 
 and gild that fatal bar in his scutcheon, and float smoothly 
 down the tide of fortune. That he, Oliver Black, should 
 sink, and not swim, was as much out of the question as that 
 he should not make a stepping-stone of John Dorrien, when 
 his old friend so kindly gave him the opportunity of doing 
 so. It is hard to fight one's way up, to make a fortune out 
 of nothing by way of beginning — some men have done it, 
 nay, do it daily; but ( Miver Black was too indolent to at- 
 tempt any thing of the kind — to step in another man's shoes 
 was far more easy. John Dorrien had been slaving seven 
 years to raise a falling house, but Oliver Black felt no scru- 
 ple in supplanting him, and reaping the fruit of his labor. 
 To save himself from so grievous a fate as that of poverty 
 was merely self-preservation, and self-preservation is a law 
 of Nature, and Oliver Black was the man to obey it without 
 a particle of remorse. It was awkward, it was unpleasant 
 even, but it must be done — to throw away such a chance 
 would be to deserve never to have another. 
 
 The thought, indeed, of taking the place of his friend did 
 not come at once. There was not much hypocrisy or self- 
 deceit about Oliver's inner man, but then; was enough to 
 make him comfortable within as he was pleasant without. 
 He laid down to himself no deliberate plan of treachery. 
 Why should he ? When a man is always ready to pluck 
 the fruit at hand, must he be forever scheming about rob- 
 bing orchards ? When it suited him to do wrong, he did it, 
 but he took no pleasure in it. He was not cruel, he was not 
 unkind, but he had a terrible attribute, which many men 
 whose actions were worse than his never had. He was re- 
 morseless — he knew little pity, and no regret. 
 
 Thus, when it occurred to him that Mr. Dorrien's grand- 
 daughter might be worth having, he at once made up his 
 mind to see her; and when, having seen her, he found that 
 she was quite pleasant enough in his eyes to make marriage 
 endurable with her, no foolish scruples held him back. He
 
 320 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 had studied this life, and always seen that in the world's 
 eyes success justifies most things. With regard to the life 
 to come, he quietly ignored it. He had early reduced his 
 decalogue to one simple command : " Make Oliver Black 
 comfortable in this world, and as to the next, why, my dear 
 boy, will it not be time to see about that when Oliver Black 
 gets there ? " 
 
 One of the pleasant necessities of this world now lay 
 upon him in the duty of making love to Antoinette, and 
 his love-making was all the more fervent that he had little 
 time to spare. He had ingeniously telegraphed himself 
 very unwell with influenza to Mr. Dorrien ; but even influ- 
 enza is limited, and he knew he could not prolong his absence 
 beyond ten days, so he made the best of his time and of his 
 opportunities. These were few ; Mademoiselle Melanie 
 was too mistrustful to leave him alone with Antoinette. 
 She watched him closely and keenly ; yet two or three times 
 circumstances were too much for her, and the lovers had a 
 view of their inner nature which her presence might have 
 delayed. 
 
 The first time that this happened, the revelation she 
 thus got made a deep impression on Antoinette. She had 
 taken her lover to her favorite haunt, the deserted villa of 
 the Clarkes. Mademoiselle Melanie had said, " Go on first 
 — I shall follow you directly," but something had no doubt 
 occurred to delay her, for they went on alone, and looked 
 for her in vain down the road when they stood by the iron 
 gate. 
 
 "I told her we were coming here," said Antoinette, 
 pushing the gate open. " She knows where to find us." 
 
 She walked on, with her light, dainty step and graceful 
 carriage, looking, thought Oliver, a very charming young 
 creature in that deserted avenue of cypress-trees. They 
 were very old and solemn of aspect, and they rose in dark 
 majesty, with here and there a flush of sunset touching a 
 projecting bough, and the pale-blue air of a southern sky for 
 a background to their sombre masses. Oliver's sensuous na- 
 ture was not without poetry. Those heathen emperors who 
 sent Christians to the lions, who poisoned or murdered their 
 best friends, who stopped at nothing, had a keen sense of 
 the beautiful for all that. They liked the finest statues and 
 the fairest gardens, and they made themselves homes of
 
 JOHN DORRIEX. 321 
 
 which the loveliness has remained as a byword. Oliver's 
 moral unscrupulousness by no means interfered with his ap- 
 preciation of scenery. It was delicate and refined, and he 
 now found a tender charm in the aspect of this deserted 
 garden. 
 
 " We can wait for aunt here," said Antoinette, sitting 
 down on the upper step of the perron leading to the for- 
 saken house. 
 
 She, too, felt the sweetness of that fair evening hour. 
 She clasped her hands around her knees, she looked at the 
 faint-blue promontory stretching on the pale sea, at the rich 
 mountains stooping down with their forest-crown to the 
 rocky shore, and she felt blest in her very heart. A large, 
 beautiful star was rising slowly above the horizon, and, as it 
 rose, Antoinette's eyes followed it, and her spirit seemed to 
 rise with it higher and higher to new regions of happiness 
 and beauty. 
 
 Oliver, too, felt happy. He had half stretched himself 
 at her feet, and his hand had sought and was clasping one 
 of hers, so little, so soft and warm. His look rested on her 
 rosy young face with tender pleasure. What a dear little 
 thing she was ! — how sweet, how graceful ! How pleasant 
 it would be to have her in his house, not clothed in such 
 shabby garments as those she wore — Oliver had no weak- 
 ness for beauty unadorned — but attired in shining silks, 
 with glittering jewels and soft laces, and all that can give a 
 more delicate grace to woman's loveliness ! 
 
 "Darling," he suddenly said, " don't you hate being 
 poor ? " 
 
 Antoinette, who was far gone in Eden, felt somewhat 
 startled at so terrestrial a question ; but she replied, with a 
 pleasant laugh : 
 
 " No ; why should I ? I have been used to it too long." 
 
 " Well, I have not, that is true," he said. But yet don't 
 you hate it ? " 
 
 " No," she slowly answered, " I do not." 
 
 She would have added that poverty with him had some- 
 thing delightful in it, but maiden modesty held back the 
 frank confession. Oliver looked at her with some wonder. 
 Was she speaking her real sentiments, or was this one of 
 those conversational untruths which people are apt to utter 
 almost unmeaningty ?
 
 322 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 " Why should I hate being poor ?" she resumed. "I 
 am youmx, I have good health, I never feel dull, and — 
 and— " 
 
 " And what ? " 
 
 " And there is some one who says he is very fond of 
 me," she said, in a low voice. 
 
 " You are a darling ! But for all that, my dear girl, I hate 
 being poor. The mere thought that my pocket might be 
 empty some day sends a cold thrill through me. Moreover, 
 and above all things, I hate seeing you poor, and poor you 
 shall not be ; no, as true as my name is Oliver Black, you 
 shall be a rich girl yet." 
 
 " Thank you," she laughed. u I suppose you mean to 
 make a fortune for me ? " 
 
 " Of course I do, and to take you to my poor father's 
 chateau ; but, en attendant, you shall have your own, ay, 
 that you shall. Nothing shall stand between me and that 
 object." 
 
 " My own ? " asked Antoinette, smiling. " And what 
 is my own, Oliver ? " 
 
 " Your grandfather's inheritance, to be sure. John Dor- 
 rien is the best fellow in the world, but it makes my blood 
 boil to see how he has usurped your place. You must get 
 it back, Antoinette. John must be content to be a clerk, 
 as I am. What would have been your father's, if he had 
 lived, must be yours. It is not fair that a third or fourth 
 cousin should possess it." 
 
 " Well, I do not think it is," said Antoinette, naively. 
 " Only, if my grandfather does not like me, what can be 
 done ? " 
 
 " But your grandfather shall like you, and you shall not 
 be defrauded, not while I have brains, and will, and energy, 
 to prevent it," rejoined Oliver, with much emphasis. " Let 
 John Dorrien take his proper place in the firm, the first, if 
 you like, but let him do no more. It is too bad that he 
 should be lord and master in Mr. Dorrien's house." 
 
 " It is hard," said Antoinette, reflectively. " O Oliver, 
 do look at that star ; how clear, how glorious it is ! " 
 
 Oliver, did not look at that star, but at Antoinette's face, 
 raised in tender admiration. His own darkened a little. 
 How slight an impression he had produced, and yet this was 
 not* the first time that he had placed John Dorrien before
 
 JOHN DORRIEX. 323 
 
 her as the usurper of her rights. How was this? Was 
 there some fatal flaw in this girl's nature, some feminine 
 weakness, that rendered her incapable of resentment and 
 ambition ; some imperfection, that denied her that active 
 love of money which leads the many so far? 
 
 Antoinette's next remark turned that uneasy doubt into 
 unpleasant certainty. His question had awakened a train 
 of thought of which he was unconscious. The allusion to 
 her unknown father had recalled her little, childish mother, 
 and with the memory came a question, startling and awk- 
 ward to a man of Mr. Black's turn of mind. 
 
 "Oliver do vou think it is any use praying for the dead ? " 
 
 Oliver's arched eyebrows nearly met, though he looked 
 smilingly up into the face of his young mistress, but he was 
 too self-possessed to answer her with a sneer, so he said, 
 gently : 
 
 kl Well, it can do them no harm. But why do you put 
 the question, darling ? " 
 
 " Because," sadly said Antoinette, "Aunt Melanie says 
 it is no use, that all is over when life is ended, and that the 
 dead have no souls to pray for. What do you think, Oli- 
 ver?" 
 
 She looked at him with anxious, pleading eyes. Wom- 
 an-like, she came to her lover as to a teacher, and, woman- 
 like, too, she had felt with this first love the wakening of 
 spiritual longings for soul and immortality. Antoinette had 
 been reared in simple, practical irreligion. Mademoiselle 
 Melanie was an open infidel, and Antoinette's mother stood 
 too much in awe of her sister-in-law to go against her teach- 
 ing, if teaching it could be called. Mademoiselle Melanie's 
 atheism was simple negation. She never worried herself 
 about the truth or error of religion. She had other thoughts, 
 other cares, other sources of bitterness. To all that An- 
 toinette could ask or say she returned a scornful " No," or, 
 " Don't be a fool," by way of answer, until the child ceased 
 to question, and Mrs. George Dorrien weepingly requested 
 her never to talk to her aunt on those subjects. It was too 
 dreadful, she said. Indeed, she considered the theme so t ly- 
 ing, that she eluded it entirely, and, being too indolent and 
 too languid to give her child any teaching of her own, she 
 allowed her to grow up as she pleased, untaught to adore 
 or to pray, simply conscious that men and women used
 
 324 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 certain forms of worship, but that one could live very easily 
 without them. 
 
 Books had done little to supply the deficiency. Antoi- 
 nette had read general literature, and this, as a rule, does not 
 say much of the spiritual world. It often misinterprets it, 
 and oftenest of all it ignores it. " Let us not talk of these 
 things," it seems to say to the reader in Virgil's memorable 
 words to Dante ; " but look and pass on." Guar da e passa 
 — sad words to deal with man's greatest hope and noblest 
 aspiration — thought ! But, so it is. Christianity, by hav- 
 ing passed into the hearts of ail, has lost the place which 
 ancient wisdom gave to its philosophic speculations. The 
 catechism has taught us more than Plato ever knew, and 
 divine truths have become common good. But perhaps the 
 great number who possess such knowledge do not realize 
 the utter ignorance of those to whom it has not been grant- 
 ed ; and Antoinette was sadly, strangely ignorant. Even 
 her brief intercourse with the Clarices had done nothing to 
 enlighten her. They held erratic views on most subjects, 
 and as every member of the family seemed inclined to travel 
 on a separate spiritual path, Antoinette had found it more 
 pleasant and more convenient not to attempt following any 
 of them. That too was easy, for they were not zealous, and 
 cared chiefly for the society of the Countess d'Armaille's 
 daughter. Thus, when she now turned to Oliver for knowl- 
 edge, Antoinette had a good fund of ignorance for him to 
 work upon ; but she had also a wakening, questioning spirit, 
 and this made the task rather trying and awkward. 
 
 Oliver was not ignorant, by any means. He had been 
 taught religion by Abbe Veran, and irreligion by Mr. Gran- 
 by. He had also flirted with every philosophic system of 
 the da\ r , and made himself a little creed of his own — pleas- 
 ant, comfortable, easy, and convenient. Mr. Granby gave 
 him a tincture of Hegel to begin with, but Oliver was too 
 matter-of-fact to believe that all he felt within and saw 
 without himself was, as Mr. Granby expressed it, " a de- 
 velopment of the idea." He might have been an Hegelian 
 so far as moral laws went, for he really considered them 
 amiable illusions; but he liked his sensations, and objected 
 to calling them ideas. 
 
 " Nonsense, Mr. Granby ! " he said coolly ; " the flavor 
 I find on this cognac is something more than the develop-
 
 JOHN DORRIKX. 325 
 
 mcnt of an idea. I have a fancy I should like Comte — let 
 us try him." 
 
 Mr. Granbv did not like Comte, but he wanted to please 
 his pupil, so they went into Comte for a time. Positivism 
 was rather congenial to Oliver's turn of mind, but Comte 
 himself amused him exceedingly. Foolish man, who had 
 no faith in penance, and who ate dry bread for his dessert, 
 who denied the divine origin of man, and who invented 
 the religon of humanity, who prayed for hours daily, and 
 had no God. 
 
 "Don't you think, Mr. Granbv, that Comte was rather 
 cracked?" asked Oliver, who, if he was willing to worship 
 humanity, was like many another disciple of Comte, only 
 willing to do so provided humanity meant himself. 
 
 " Most of these clever fellows are cracked," composedly 
 answered Mr. Granby ; w but these vagaries have nothing 
 to do with Comte's method, you know." 
 
 "Of course not. I wonder if that. Clotilde de Vaux, 
 whom Comte adored in life, and worshiped in death — did 
 he not pray to her, Mr. Granby? I wonder if she was 
 handsome, or whether her beauty was a product of the 
 idea ? " 
 
 Mr. Granby thought the lady was plain. Women who 
 exercised such extraordinary fascination were often plain 
 — they left so much to the imagination. 
 
 Philosophy thus studied was pleasant enough, and so 
 Oliver trifled with Hegel and Comte, and went through pan- 
 theism, and eclecticism, and every other "ism," until, as 
 we have said, he made himself a little creed of his own. 
 He ignored the Almighty with Comte, and agreed with pan- 
 theism that the universe, instead of being created, had 
 simply developed itself. He did not, however, go far or 
 deep into the question of his origin. (Jul bono? What 
 matter where we come from, or, as to that, where we go to, 
 so long as the present time can be made pleasant? He was 
 young, he was handsome, he was strong, or held himself so. 
 The world was all before him, the world and its kingdoms. 
 He too had heard the voice which tempted Eve, and through 
 whose sorcery Adam fell — "Ye shall be gods." It was 
 pleasant to self-love, to pride, to bow to no Divine Master, 
 to hold the old ideas of sin and virtue worn-out creeds, and 
 to laugh softly at the weak herds who cling to them still.
 
 326 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 It was comfortable to believe, with one of his philosophers, 
 that man " has a sovereign right to all he can do ; " and that 
 those laws which the decencies of civilization require are 
 the only restraint he need acknowledge. Oliver had neither 
 the low instincts nor the violent passions which make vul- 
 gar criminals. He could take the good out of life, out of 
 men and women, and yet not steal nor kill. Even when 
 from Oliver Blackmore he became Oliver Black, his philo- 
 sophic speculations produced no apparent change in his 
 manner or feelings. He was still the same pleasant, easy, 
 good-humored young man that he had been. The keen am- 
 bition which his downfall had wakened, the remorseless 
 determination to still enjoy the good things of this world 
 that had come with poverty, were not to be read in the 
 soft and laughing dark eyes, or in the irresistible smile, of 
 the late Mr. Blackmore's unacknowledged son. 
 
 What the world did not know, Oliver did not see any 
 necessity to tell it ;^ and he would have found it more con- 
 venient not to touch on such vexed questions as these 
 which Antoinette now raised with her searching eyes fast- 
 ened on his. So, though he answered her, he felt his 
 ground first. 
 
 " Dearest," he said, with a half sigh, " why talk of such 
 things ? Men and women are fated to disagree on some 
 topics, and this, I fear, is one. They are trained differently, 
 and, sad to say, grow far, too far, apart." 
 
 Atoinette fired up at once. 
 
 " Why should that be ? " she asked. 
 
 " Oh ! why indeed ? " he sighed. " Well, I do think that 
 star wonderfully beautiful." 
 
 " You will not answer me," said Antoinette, mortified. 
 " You think I could not understand these matters. I am 
 not so ignorant as you think." 
 
 Oliver protested he did not think her ignorant — " only 
 of course her opportunities in La Ruya — " 
 
 "As if I had always lived in La Ruya," interrupted An- 
 toinette. " Why, we only came here two years ago, when 
 aunt was so unlucky at Monaco." 
 
 "Poor Mademoiselle Melanie ! " feelingly said Oliver, 
 taking care not to look surprised — "was she so very un- 
 lucky ? " 
 
 " Oh ! very. She gambled all Ave had, and we have been
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 327 
 
 dreadfully pinched ever since. But I had musters before 
 then, and I have learned plenty of things." 
 
 " Where ? " asked Oliver. 
 
 " In London, in Brussels, in Rome," was the triumphant 
 answer. " We did not stay long anywhere, however; and 
 aunt never would let me learn music. Of course, once she 
 had taken to Monaco, it was out of the question. But 
 when the Clarkes were here," added Antoinette, looking 
 wistfully at the closed windows of the villa, " I studied 
 with them." 
 
 " Crochet ? " suggested Oliver. 
 
 "All sorts of things," answered Antoinette, with much 
 dignity. "Latin with Tom." 
 
 " How old was Tom ? " 
 
 "Thirteen. I got on better with Latin than he did; 
 but, then, poor Tom was stupid. And I am sure I could 
 understand all about those things which you think so much 
 beyond me." 
 
 " I only thought you might not be accustomed to philo- 
 sophic speculations," said Oliver. 
 
 "What matter? I am sure I could understand them 
 all the same," answered Antoinette, with the calm audacity 
 of young people. 
 
 Oliver smiled, and ventured on gratifying her. Cau- 
 tiously and skillfully he played with some of the vexed 
 questions which lie at the root of belief and unbelief. An- 
 toinette was profoundly ignorant of these matters, but she 
 was quick, and she listened with rapt attention. Oliver 
 could be fluent when he pleased, and her intent face both 
 pleased and flattered him. Not for any thing would An- 
 toinette have lost a word which he uttered. It seemed so 
 fine, so grand, that wonderful vision of an uncreated world 
 ever developing itself in vast, unbroken progress — man the 
 Lord and God of it all. 
 
 " How splendid ! " cried Antoinette, looking around her, 
 as if this beautiful universe suddenly bore another meaning. 
 
 Oliver smiled good-naturedly at her enthusiasm. 
 
 "Yes, darling," he softly said, "it is splendid, as you 
 say ; but you are large-minded, and can understand. Wom- 
 en, as a rule, do not take to pantheism ; they are rather 
 narrow, and prefer monotheism." 
 
 " And yet it is so fine, so very fine, that hidden power
 
 328 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 pervading all we see," said Antoinette, still ardent. "And, 
 Oliver, what do you think about praying for the dead ? " 
 
 If Oliver had been a zealot, he could scarcely have helped 
 being gently exasperated at so outrageous a question. Here 
 was a would-be pantheist talking with monotheist ideas of 
 the dead ! As if the dead were more than a memory or a 
 name ! But, being no zealot, and being willing to make 
 allowances for the emotional nature of woman, he checked 
 a strong temptation to laugh, and, struck with a brilliant 
 idea, plunged into that portion of positivism which the dis- 
 ciples of Comte have so prudently discarded. 
 
 " Dearest," he said, tenderly, " why not pray to the 
 dead, instead of praying for them ? Their immortality is 
 in our hearts. A man must worship his mother, wife, and 
 daughter. They are his guardian angels in life, and to 
 them, should they die first, he prays. A father, husband, 
 and son, are the same objects of tender worship to woman. 
 Let there be no sad visions of future woe, for if there are 
 rewards there must be punishments. Let it all be the ten- 
 derness and devotion of loving hearts, of the feeling that 
 binds «$, dearest." 
 
 Here Mademoiselle Melanie opportunely came up, and 
 pantheism and positivism, to Oliver's great relief, were 
 dropped for the while, but for the while only. Antoinette 
 Dorrien was at the time of life when the mind is most 
 eager to solve the great problem which lies in wait for us 
 all, as the sphinx of old lay in wait for her victims. Life 
 and death are involved in the momentous riddles she utters. 
 But is not every one of us an OSdipus ? Do we ever doubt 
 our wisdom when we rush on fate ? Do we care for the 
 bones of the victims which lie scattered on the cavern 
 where broods that great iniquity, with the lovely face of 
 woman to seduce, and the loathsome body of the serpent 
 to crush those whom she ultimately devours ? 
 
 Oliver, who was no fanatic of unbelief, would have been 
 quite willing to let Antoinette's religion alone, so long as 
 it did not interfere with her obedience to his wishes ; but, 
 when she forced these questions upon him, he was subtle 
 enough to see that it might be well if he had a double hold 
 upon her. Thus it was that she became his in soul as well 
 as in heart. Twofold bondage, which implied much that 
 Antoinette had never foreseen, and which made her weak
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 329 
 
 and helpless in her lover's hands, as a tool is in the hands 
 of a skillful master. 
 
 She did not feel or even suspect this till Oliver had long 
 been gone. She had been out (me morning sketching, for 
 she drew well, and especially with much fancy and taste, 
 and she came in warm, flushed, and tired, but charmed with 
 her morning's work. 
 
 " O aunt," she said, " it has been so delightful ! " 
 
 " Have you finished the water-fall ? " asked Mademoiselle 
 Melanie, sharply. 
 
 Antoinette blushed a little and hung her head. She 
 had begun to draw a water-fall some time back, but had 
 made no progress with her task. Once a goat perched on a 
 rock had tempted her irresistibly. The water-fall could 
 wait, but the goat certainly could not. Another time there 
 was an effect of sunlight so beautiful but so fleeting, that 
 it would have been a mortal pity not to catch it ere it faded 
 away; and so she had been lured by one thing and by an- 
 other, and the water-fall remained unfinished, with the out- 
 lines of its trees and rocks on the sky, and a blank where 
 the- foam of water should have been. 
 
 "No, I did not finish the water-fall," hesitatingly an- 
 swered Antoinette. " The fact is, aunt, I found a group of 
 ferns so lovely that it would have been a shame not to do 
 them at once ; and really, aunt, 1 think they are not amiss ; 
 and then there is plenty of time for the water-fall you know." 
 
 " Is there ? We are going to Paris after to-morrow — to 
 Mr. Dorrien's house. At least, you are," bitterly added 
 Mademoiselle Melanie. " He has written — here is his letter." 
 
 The sketch-book nearly fell from Antoinette's hands, 
 her surprise was so great, but on surprise joy quick!}' fol- 
 lowed. 
 
 "O aunt," she cried, " is it possible? Has Oliver al- 
 ready spoken to Mr. Dorrien ? " 
 
 " There never was such a simpleton as that girl ! " con- 
 temptuously exclaimed Mademoiselle Melanie, and she curt- 
 ly reminded her niece that Oliver not yet having returned 
 to Paris, nothing was less likely than that he should have 
 spoken to Mr. Dorrien. 
 
 " But then he will come back, aunt," said Antoinette, 
 with gladness still in her eyes ; " and, as he is one of the 
 firm, why, I shall see him often, very often, and he will
 
 330 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 speak to Mr. Dorrien in time, and Mr. Dorrien will give him 
 a good position, and he will be all right again. Poor Oli- 
 ver ! You know, aunt, how badly his relations have used 
 him. It seems there was a flaw in his father's marriage to 
 his mother," continued Antoinette, looking at her aunt with 
 great innocence, " and his cousin took advantage of it to 
 rob him of his property. And he is so fond of the old house 
 he was born in ! He hopes to buy it back some day. To 
 buy back one's own house— that is hard. I wish Mr. Dor- 
 rien would lend or give him the money." 
 
 Mademoiselle Melanie laid her hand on the young girl's 
 shoulder, and, looking in her face with a cold, hard look, she 
 said : 
 
 "Remember that Mr. Dorrien is to know nothing of 
 your engagement to Oliver." 
 
 " I know you made me promise that," answered Antoi- 
 nette, with a blank face ; " but now, aunt, how can it be ? 
 Why, I may see Oliver everv day." 
 "What about it?" 
 
 " O aunt," exclaimed the young girl, with a frightened, 
 deprecating look, " you know I am so stupid — I am, I real- 
 ly am," she said, almost, humbly. " I do not know how to 
 tell a lie." 
 
 " You will learn ! " laughed Mademoiselle Melanie. 
 " No, no," cried Antoinette, alarmed, " I cannot ; I can 
 never learn that — I am too stupid." 
 " Rubbish ! " 
 
 But Antoinette persisted that she was stupid, and could 
 not do it. 
 
 " Well, then, do not," said her aunt, changing her tac- 
 tics, for she knew of old that Antoinette could be obstinate, 
 " do not tell a lie. Keep your counsel. Mr. Dorrien will 
 never ask you if you are engaged to Oliver Black, and all 
 you have to do is not to tell him." 
 
 " Oh, of course," cried Antoinette, brightening, " I can 
 do that ; besides," she added, with a happy smile, " Oliver 
 will soon tell him all about it himself." 
 
 This difference was easily settled, but Joli proved the 
 cause of one far more serious. 
 
 " You are not going to take that sparrow," authorita- 
 tively said Mademoiselle Melanie, when they were packing, 
 and she saw Antoinette settling the cage.
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 331 
 
 " Not take my little Joli ?" cried Antoinette, indignant- 
 ly. " Leave Joli behind — never ! " 
 
 " I say you shall not take him." 
 
 " Aunt, I will. Nothing will make me forsake Joli." 
 
 " Say another word, and I will wring the little wretch's 
 neck," cried Mademoiselle Medanie, getting in one of her 
 blind rages. 
 
 "And if you do, aunt," answered Antoinette, who was 
 very white, "I will never see you again." 
 
 Mademoiselle Melanie burst out laughing, and Joli, 
 who was hopping about in his cage, chirruped at his little 
 mistress. 
 
 Antoinette felt quite triumphant at her victory, and, in 
 her good-humor, made no difficulty in acceding to various 
 hints which her aunt gave concerning her guidance in Mr. 
 Dorrien's house, until Oliver should have spoken to that 
 gentleman. From a distance it all seemed very easy, and 
 then Antoinette felt so sure that her lover would lose no 
 time in making all right. 
 
 But the all right of youthful hope is very apt to turn in- 
 to the all wrong of experience. Difficulties which she had 
 not anticipated hemmed in Antoinette on every side. She 
 very soon saw that discovery would ruin both Oliver and 
 herself, and she kept their joint secret, not merely because 
 she had promised to do so to her aunt, but because she 
 could not help herself. She still hoped that her lover's re- 
 turn to Paris would be the end of her probation, but she 
 soon lost that illusion. Only one thing was certain : how- 
 ever she might rebel, Oliver Black was her master. She 
 felt it when they met again. She felt it when she was 
 alone in her room on the evening of the day when she had 
 gone to Versailles. Mrs. Reginald half suspected her ; J< >lm 
 had uttered a warning which had filled her with shame and 
 fear. To pay Mademoiselle Melanie a stolen, surreptitious 
 visit, was to rush upon discovery, and what to a girl un- 
 used to deceit seemed perdition ; but for all that Antoinette 
 did not dare to disobey her lover. " If I do not do it," she 
 thought, " he will do something dreadful, like the slipping 
 of the note in my hand this evening, and he will be ruined, 
 and all will be lost."
 
 332 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 CHAPTER XXIX. 
 
 Mademoiselle Melanie was making coffee with a 
 little machine ingeniously constructed so as to tumble 
 every five seconds, and thus either spill the water within, 
 or extinguish the blue flame of the spirit without. The 
 contrivance was one which would have tried any one's tem- 
 per, and it drove Mademoiselle Melanie half wild. Even 
 when she had compelled this erratic machine into a sort 
 of steadiness, she stood over it, giving the flickering blue 
 flame a moody look, which became thoroughly scornful as 
 it wandered to the poor furniture, faded paper hangings, 
 and low ceilings of the room in which she was preparing 
 her morning meal. 
 
 Mademoiselle Melanie was a rebel at heart, and she 
 carried on a perpetual and useless quarrel against Fate. 
 Just now her lot was not a pleasant one, and retrospect 
 seemed exceedingly bitter. How steady and sure had been 
 the downward course of her life ! A luxurious home in the 
 tropics with her brother and her sister-in-law, a still com- 
 fortable home, though no longer luxurious, with her sister- 
 in-law and her second husband, then Mr. Dorrien's house, 
 not a home, but a very fair place to visit in, then the south 
 of France and the ease of southern life, till that fatal Mona- 
 co brought restricted means and their bitterness, and now 
 these dingy rooms on the third floor of an old house in the 
 Marais ! 
 
 Our heart makes our home. Many a brave spirit, trust- 
 ing and hopeful, has been glad of the shelter of rooms as 
 poor as these which Mademoiselle Melanie now scorned ; 
 but where is the use of arguing against discontent ? This 
 woman would have found some fault with her lot if it had 
 been cast rn a palace, and her present position was certain- 
 ly neither pleasant nor exhilarating. 
 
 "Why does she not come or write ?" thought Made- 
 moiselle Melanie ; " the little ungrateful viper, she leaves me 
 by as soon as she can." 
 
 The thought was still passing through her mind, when 
 a smart ring at the door seemed to answer it. Mademoi- 
 selle Melanie went and opened it, and there, on the dark
 
 JOHN DORK1E.V. 333 
 
 landing, stood Antoinette, fresh as a rose, and smiling as 
 the morning. 
 
 "O aunt, how are you?" she said, throwing her arms 
 around Mademoiselle Mclanie's neck and kissing- her. " Now 
 please do not scold," she added, dcprecatingly, " for I am so 
 hungry, and I came out without waiting lor breakfast." 
 
 This was touching the right chord. Mademoiselle M('- 
 lanie was too much of a woman not to like to feed tli*' 
 creature she loved after her own hard fashion ; so she now 
 allowed herself to be kissed, and she showed her niece in, 
 and looked at her kindly enough. 
 
 " Why, I declare you are making coffee," cried Antoi- 
 nette, in great glee. "Oh, the little darling machine! And 
 see, aunt, I passed by a baker's, and bought the prettiest, 
 and, I am sure, the most delicious little rolls you ever saw. 
 If we only had a little fresh butter," she added, with a sigh 
 of regret. 
 
 Mademoiselle Melanie tried to remain grim and forbid- 
 ding, but she could not. This girl, to whom she was almost 
 always harsh, was her soft spot, after all, and then it was 
 pretty, even in her severe eyes, to see Antoinette taking off 
 her hat and gloves, and flitting about in her becoming attire, 
 and with her graceful motions. It was pleasant to see how 
 softly and neatly she brought forth all that was needful for 
 the morning meal; how she seemed to know without being 
 told where she was to find every thing she wanted. 
 
 " A clever little monkey ! " thought Mademoiselle M6- 
 lanie. " Yes, a clever one indeed." 
 
 " And now it is all ready, aunt," said Antoinette, look- 
 ing at. the table with a critical yet satisfied air. " Shall we 
 begin ? " 
 
 They sat down, and, as she poured out the coffee, An- 
 toinette, heaving a little sigh, said in a depressed tone : 
 
 " When did you see Oliver, aunt ? " 
 
 " In La Ruya," dryly replied Mademoiselle Medanie. 
 " Why should I see him now? He does not want me any 
 longer, does he?" 
 
 " Oh, pray do not be sarcastic, aunt," implored Antoinette. 
 "Poor Oliver! He has put himself in a nice mess with all 
 this. He wants to talk to us, I suppose, for he slipped a 
 note into my hand last night bidding me tell you to take 
 me to the Pare Monceaux this morning. I know the place;
 
 334 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 it is one of the prettiest I ever saw, but so very, veiy far 
 away, and we are to be there by ten o'clock, says Oliver." 
 
 " Then you would not have come but for that ? " said 
 Mademoiselle Melanie. 
 
 "How could I?" answered Antoinette. "I did not 
 dare to ask leave to come, lest I should be forbidden to do 
 so, and you do not know what it is to be in that large 
 house, and to feel like a poor little mouse, and every one 
 like a great, great big cat watching you, and ready to 
 pounce upon you." 
 
 She looked very doleful. Mademoiselle Melanie's eyes 
 sparkled. What was it? What did they do to her ? How 
 did they use her? They were unkind, she knew they were ! 
 And so, while they took their breakfast, she listened, with 
 a dark and eager look, to the tale of Antoinette's wrongs. 
 The coffee-machine had put Mademoiselle Melanie in a bad 
 temper, which she wanted to vent upon some one. Antoi- 
 nette's blooming face had conjured the storm from herself, 
 but it should light on some devoted head, and Mr. Dorrien 
 and his whole household now came in for the benefit of the 
 lady's displeasure. Antoinette heard her out, and took no 
 exception to all her bitter comments, until John got his 
 share, when she uttered a decisive protest. 
 
 " No, aunt, you are all wrong," said she. " John is very 
 good and very kind to me, and I am also sure that he is 
 true.' 
 
 " Then you had better marry him ! " disdainfully re- 
 torted Mademoiselle Melanie, as she pushed away her 
 empty cup, and stood up to change her dress previous to 
 going out. 
 
 " I have no doubt it would be a very good thing for me, 
 in every sense of the word, to marry John Dorrien," compos- 
 edly replied Antoinette; "but I have a strong fancy that, 
 even if I wished for such a thing, it would be of no use, and 
 that John is much too good and too wise to have any thing 
 to do with me." 
 
 Mademoiselle Medanie stared in blank surprise, but An- 
 toinette did not seem to think she had said any thing un- 
 usual, and drew on her gloves with perfect tranquillity. 
 
 " In what part of the garden is he to meet us ? " asked 
 Mademoiselle Medanie. 
 
 " He did not say, aunt."
 
 JOIIN DORRIEN. 335 
 
 " Convenient ! " was the dry answer. " I shall go to 
 the Colonnade." 
 
 It is a long drive from the Marais to Monceaux, and it 
 was long past ten when the two ladies alighted at the tall 
 gilt gates which open into the beautiful green gardens. 
 Mademoiselle Melanie went at once to the Colonnade, and 
 sat on a bench near it, but Antoinette felt restless, and 
 said she must walk about awhile. She did not go far, but 
 kept within the shadow of the gray columns which encircle 
 the dark and still waters. Streaks of golden sunshine tipped 
 the rich ivy wreathed round every stone shaft, and played 
 on the surface of the little lake below; but gloom, soft, 
 o-reen, and deep, inclosed the spot. The air was fresh, 
 and children and nurse-maids favored the more open spaces. 
 Antoinette looked shyly round her, but there was no sign 
 of Oliver. Perhaps he would not come, and that all her 
 risk was vain. What would they think of her at La Mai- 
 son Dorrien ? How would it all end? A swan was sail- 
 ing toward his home in a little islet in the lake. Antoi- 
 nette paused to look at him, and, internally addressing him, 
 she said : 
 
 " No one will ask you where you have been. Your 
 house is your own, and — " 
 
 Here an arm was slipped within hers, and, looking round 
 with a start, she saw the laughing face of Oliver Black 
 bending toward her. 
 
 "I am late," he said — "so sorry, darling. But John 
 Dorrien seemed to guess I was coming to you — he would 
 not let me go." 
 
 "O Oliver," said Antoinette, with a frightened face, 
 " I am afraid, I am, that he does guess ! " 
 
 " What makes } t ou think so ? " asked Oliver, almost 
 sharply. 
 
 " Any thing and every thing," she replied. " Oliver, 
 must this last much longer ? " 
 
 " If you mean our present position," he answered, cool- 
 ly, " remember, dearest, that it has not lasted twenty-four 
 hours yet." 
 
 " But I cannot bear it," she remonstrated — " I cannot 
 indeed, Oliver. It makes me feel such a guilty thing ! " 
 
 " My dear girl, you are not guilty — is not that enough ? " 
 
 "But I do feel guilty," persisted Antoinette — "ever so
 
 336 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 guilty ; and, though you will not confess it, I am sure, Oli- 
 ver, that so do you." 
 
 Oliver looked annoyed. 
 
 " My darling," he said, with just a touch of temper, 
 " you ought to remember what I have already told you — 
 there is no absolute right, no absolute wrong in any thing. 
 Of course our position is unpleasant and awkward. It 
 would be more agreeable to meet and talk in the old 
 garden of La Maison Dorrien than to do so here. If you 
 dislike concealment, you may be sure that it has no attrac- 
 tions for me ; but the fault is not ours. John Dorrien is 
 the best fellow in the world, but he has done, and is doing, 
 all the mischief. He has accepted your inheritance, and he 
 means to keep it. Of course he is willing to share it with 
 you, but unluckily there is no such willingness on your 
 side — ergo, John Dorrien must give way. I see no help 
 for it. For my part I regret it — I always liked him since 
 I saw him on board the steamer, the queerest little fellow. 
 So far as I am concerned, I could get on elsewhere as well 
 as at Mr. Dorrien's — better, perhaps. I must be fond of 
 you, Antoinette, to tolerate this position." 
 
 She had heard him with downcast eyes ; she now looked 
 up again. 
 
 '• Is it right ? " she asked once more. 
 
 Oliver laughed at her persistency. 
 
 " But since there is no absolute right, no absolute 
 wrong in any thing," he argued, " every man with an atom 
 of sense knows that right and wrong are as inextricably 
 mingled in human affairs as they are in human beings. 
 Now look at John Dorrien, a good fellow, a sincere Chris- 
 tian, but one who clings to the goods of this world as 
 much as you and I do, Antoinette. I do not blame him, 
 I only state the fact. He will fight hard to keep his posi- 
 tion, and we must fight hard to keep him out of it. He 
 finds plenty of arguments on his side of the case, so do we 
 on ours. The only question at stake is who shall win ? 
 That is the real right and wrong. Of course if he prevails 
 he will give Providence the praise; and if he fails he will 
 submit to its decrees ; whereas, if I fail, I shall simply 
 think that I committed some blunder; and, if I succeed, I 
 shall call myself a clever fellow." 
 
 Antoinette gave him a wistful, perplexed look.
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 337 
 
 " John Dorrien is very religious, is be not ? " she said, 
 slowly. 
 
 " Yes, and Providence is one of his hobbies, poor dear 
 John Dorrien ! For my part I contend that a wise man's 
 Providence is of his own fashioning. Let us take ourselves. 
 We have been reared in comfort and ease. It is absurd to 
 suppose that we should not suffer cruelly if we fell into 
 real hard poverty. We owe it to ourselves not to allow 
 such a catastrophe. Mind, I do not say that Providence 
 owes it to us. I say we owe it to ourselves, and I for one 
 am resolved to fight my way back to what I have lost. 
 Look at yourself, my darling, look at your little soft hands " 
 — he took up one as he spoke — " and tell me if they were 
 made for the same work as Jeannette's poor red paws. It 
 is monstrous to suppose that you should ever exchange 
 places with that creature." 
 Antoinette laughed. 
 
 "Jeannette would not mind taking my place," said 
 she. 
 
 " Well," coolly replied Oliver, " let her — if she can. 
 But you see she cannot — she cannot become the well-born, 
 pretty, refined girl you are. Can she, now ? " 
 
 Antoinette smiled, for the voice of flattery is sweet to 
 a girl's ear when it is that of the man she loves. 
 
 "Poor Jeannette," she said, " must she keep her red 
 hands and be a drudge to the end ?" Then suddenly, and 
 with her eyes fixed on his face, "Oliver, what do you 
 think John Dorrien would say on all this ? I mean what 
 would his opinions be ?" 
 
 " My dearest, did we meet to discuss John Dorrien and 
 his opinions ? Now just sit down here, and let us talk of 
 something else. Mr. Dorrien is very fond of you, of course : 
 well—" 
 
 " Oh, no, Mr. Dorrien docs not like me at all," inter- 
 rupted Antoinette. 
 
 " Not like you '? — impossible ! " 
 
 " Indeed he does not. I really think he dislikes me." 
 Oliver looked incredulous and perplexed, but Antoi- 
 nette, when he questioned her, which he did very closely, 
 brought forward so many little proofs to strengthen her as- 
 sertion, that he reluctantly admitted Mr. Dorrien was not a 
 model grandpapa. 
 15
 
 338 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 "You must improve him, darling 1 ," he said, gayly ; " be, 
 as you can if you only choose, winning and pretty. Surely," 
 he added, glancing at her in pleased admiration — " surely 
 you can coax a grandfather's heart." 
 
 "No," very decisively answered Antoinette. "There 
 is something about Mr. Dorrien that keeps me at arm's- 
 length. You will understand when you see us together. 
 John has seen it, and he has told me that he will be my 
 friend ; for John is very kind, though I betray him." 
 
 " My dear child, there can be no betrayal where there 
 is no trust ; but by-the-by, what did you mean when you 
 said that you feared John guessed something ? " 
 
 He bent his eyes searchingly on her face. Antoinette 
 looked ready to cry. 
 
 " I am very miserable," she said. " I do not remember 
 John's exact words. Let me see — yes, he said yesterday, 
 when we were at Versailles, that I had chosen an unsafe 
 path, and I am afraid he must guess all about us." 
 
 Oliver smiled derisively. 
 
 "Impossible, my dear chi-ld ! " he remarked, with gen- 
 tle pity for her fears. " Why, John had not seen us to- 
 gether when he said that. No, no, depend upon it he 
 meant something else; he always was fond of preaching, 
 was John Dorrien ; only we may just as well be on our 
 guard, and not betray what he must not know — you un- 
 derstand, dearest ? " 
 
 " Yes," despondently answered Antoinette, " I do un- 
 derstand. I am sure it is all wrong, and I am very, very 
 miserable, for every word I hear about lies and treachery 
 seems meant for me." 
 
 Oliver bit his lip, and looked both grave and perplexed. 
 He was not troubled with conscientious scruples himself, 
 and he was not prepared to find them in others; yet here 
 were these weeds, for so he held them, springing up in 
 most unwelcome soil, and how to uproot them he knew 
 not. Argument seemed thrown away upon this girl, in 
 whose power he had placed himself. His philosophy had 
 evidently taken no deep root in her mind, and he sincerely 
 regretted having tried its power upon her. He had opened 
 the flood-gate of a passionate young soul, that would know, 
 that would question, that would seek the truth, and he 
 found it troublesome. Every human soul holds within it-
 
 JOHN DOKRIEN. 339 
 
 self the faculties of doubt and belief. Oliver had given the 
 preponderance to doubt; he really liked no law, human or 
 divine, but human law he was too sensible to violate. He 
 had keen passions ; he was fond of money, of pleasure, of 
 ease, but he would never have placed himself within the 
 reach of judge or jury to gratify these tastes. If he had 
 been a Christian, he would have had the same wholesome 
 dread of Divine judgment, and never put it in the power 
 of Heaven to find him out; but greatness and generosity 
 were not in him, and he would have been careful not to do 
 too much for the Almighty. The formula which he had 
 chosen, that he would admit nothing which his reason did 
 not sanction, was acceptable to his tastes and inclinations. 
 It pledged him to nothing; his moral world remained 
 free. 
 
 Reason, which burns with so pure a flame in fine minds, 
 is a very dim sort of candle indeed in low ones. It never 
 told this young man that he Avas to lay any restraint on his 
 passions, save so far as his safety was concerned ; then, in- 
 deed, it became clear, firm, and inexorable. Oliver had the 
 greatest contempt for common rogues and vulgar villains: 
 they were fools. 
 
 A man of this temperament could not be a zealot. He 
 had no strong faith in his own opinions, and, having in 
 him a touch of that poetry which feels what is graceful and 
 becoming, he rather liked religion of a certain kind for 
 women. He had as a boy read tin 1 lives of the saints, and 
 remembered some very pretty Legends in those old Bol- 
 landists. If Antoinette had been a believer in those relics 
 of a mediaeval past, he would have been loath to disturb her 
 simple faith. It would have been so much easier to leave 
 her to her gentle superstitions, as he condescendingl v 
 called those records of the great and the good. But this 
 could not be. He found an inquiring soul and a blank 
 page, or one on which very little had been written; that 
 little he did his best to efface. He was no zealot, as we 
 have already said, and if he had meddled with Antoinette's 
 religion, such as it was, it was because he could not very 
 well manage her without so doing. A girl who thinks 
 about her soul is less liable to be a docile Instrument in a 
 man's hands than the girl who is not sure that she has got 
 one; but Antoinette's natural integrity now suddenly in-
 
 340 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 terfered with these calculations, and gave him difficulties 
 upon which he had not reckoned. 
 
 " My dear creature," he remarked, with a sort of can- 
 dor in his look and tone, "what am I to say that will set 
 your mind at ease ? As soon as I can see my way clear, I 
 will claim you openly ; in the mean while we must stay as 
 we are." 
 
 She looked at him, and he returned the look with a cer- 
 tain hardness in his gaze that quelled her. A kind of fear 
 not of her position merely, but of Oliver Black himself, 
 now crept round her heart for the first time. She had 
 given herself a master, and she felt it. 
 
 " My darling," he said, very tenderly, " why will you 
 not trust in me ? Up to the present I have got on admi- 
 rably with Mr. Dorrien. He actually tells me things he 
 hides from John — on my word he does ; and, what is more, 
 it is none of my seeking. It all comes from himself. I 
 really believe — I do — that, of his own accord, he will give 
 up that absurd plan of fastening John to you, and that, 
 without being unjust to dear John, who is the best and 
 worthiest fellow in the world, he will be just to you. 
 John is quite right in thinking that he deserves something 
 handsome from La Maison Dorrien. He does. Let him 
 have it; but let him not have you, my treasure. Be only 
 patient a little while — a very little while — and I shall make 
 all right, depend upon it." 
 
 He smiled so kindly, he spoke so confidently, that fear 
 left Antoinette, and trust came back, as if by magic. 
 
 " Oh ! yes," she warmly cried, " I know you will — I am 
 sure of it." 
 
 "Of course I will," he returned, cheerfully, pleased, 
 spite his cynicism, to meet the fond, confiding look of her 
 soft, dark eyes. " It will be all so easy, if you will only let 
 me manage." 
 
 To trust in the man she loves, to lean upon him, is a 
 woman's irresistible impulse. Most willingly did Antoi- 
 nette now throw her burden upon Oliver. Of course he 
 would manage all. What ailed her that she had not seen 
 that ? And of course, too, he meant well and kindly to 
 John. What ailed her that she had not seen that too? 
 And so she .listened to his plausible speech, and held it a 
 very gospel; and all that had frightened her pride or
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. :;il 
 
 alarmed her conscience seemed to vanish as baleful mists 
 fade away in the morning' sun. 
 
 " And now," said Oliver, well pleased at the result of 
 his eloquence — "now let us settle about our little inter- 
 views and our letters. Your aunt will be invaluable in 
 that respect." 
 
 " Will she ? " 
 
 So spoke Mademoiselle Melanie, who now stood before 
 the pair, pale with anger at their long forgetfulness of her 
 existence. Antoinette gave a guilty start, and blushed 
 crimson; but Oliver only laughed gayly in the irate lady's 
 face. 
 
 " Of course she will," he resumed, in a light tone. 
 "What should we do — what should we ever have done," 
 he pointedly added, " without that kind aunt?" 
 
 Antoinette gave him a frightened look; she thought his 
 audacity so great in thus addressing Mademoiselle Melanie. 
 But the event justified his daring: the lady tightened her 
 lips, and looked above the two heads of the lovers as they 
 sat on the wooden bench, and, smiling after a lofty fashion 
 of her oavu, said it was a fine day. 
 
 " Yes, but I must go," hesitatingly remarked Antoi- 
 nette, looking at Oliver as if fearful lest he should detain 
 her. 
 
 He had no such inclination. He did not mean to linger 
 long over this affair; but he was not prepared for immedi- 
 ate detection, and he really thought that Antionette had 
 been out too long already. 
 
 " This is how you must account for your absence," he 
 said, rising, and taking her arm — "you must say thai you 
 went to see your aunt, but of course you have already said 
 I hat." 
 
 " No, I said nothing." 
 
 Oliver looked vexed. 
 
 " My dear creature, how could you be so imprudent ? 
 Why, you must have been missed, and — " 
 
 "Oh! I left word that I should not be in for break- 
 fast." 
 
 "Very silly, very imprudent," remarked Oliver, look- 
 ing more and more amazed. " There was no need lor it, 
 moreover. However, the mischief is done, and all you have 
 to do now is to mend it as best you can. Say that you
 
 343 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 went to see- your aunt, and have breakfast with her, and 
 that she took you out driving', and brought you here. That 
 w T ill account for your long- absence — besides, the nearer 
 truth one keeps, the better it always is." 
 
 Antoinette heard him abashed, and answered not one 
 word. She felt humbled and ashamed at the part she was 
 acting ; mortified, too, at having the very words she was to 
 speak dictated to her ; and yet she saw no help for it, and 
 she was honest enough to confess to herself that, even if 
 Oliver had not suggested this explanation of her absence, 
 she could have given none other. 
 
 " Mademoiselle Melanie and I," continued Oliver, " will 
 settle all about our future meetings. I have no time to do 
 so now with you — besides, it will require consideration." 
 
 The real truth was, that Oliver had no plan at all, and 
 did not care to have one. He was no subtle plotter, laying 
 deep schemes, but a bold gambler, ready to seize on chances, 
 and, if need were, to make them. Brief as had been this 
 morning's interview with Antoinette, he felt that it had 
 lasted long enough, and he shrewdly guessed that the less 
 the voung girl knew about his plans and views the better 
 it would be for his cause. It is rare, indeed, when the ser- 
 pent does not come between the Adams and Eves of this 
 world, and sow discord where there should be love, and be- 
 tween these two he was coming early and fast. 
 
 " I dare not drive home with you," said Oliver, with a 
 sigh, as he handed Antoinette and her aunt into a little 
 open carriage which he hailed for them ; " but I shall see 
 you this evening, I hope. GOod-by, darling." 
 
 And thus they parted ; and Antoinette looked wistfully 
 after her lover, and wondered at this brief interview, which 
 she had come so far to seek. 
 
 " Well," impatiently said Mademoiselle Melanie, " what 
 comes next ? What have you both decided upon ? When 
 is that John Dorricn to walk out?" 
 
 Her eyes sparkled at the thought. Antoinette was 
 startled, and replied with a half-frightened air : 
 
 " We have decided upon nothing, aunt. Besides, I 
 leave it all to Oliver." 
 
 " Then you are a simpleton," sharply answered her aunt, 
 tightening her lips. " What is he ? — nothing ; and you 
 are all, remember that."
 
 JOHN DORRIKN. 343 
 
 "I am very little, aunt," replied Antoinette, somewhat 
 
 sadly — " ind I, L think, sometimes, that 1 am nothing at 
 
 all."' 
 
 She never thought so more than when the carriage drove 
 her to the door of the Hotel Dorrien, and she found herself 
 face to face with her grandfather on alighting at the old 
 gates. He raised his hat with frigid courtesy to .Mademoi- 
 selle Melanie, who all but laughed with triumph in her face, 
 and, taking his granddaughter's arm, he led her across the 
 court to the house. 
 
 "You have been out with that lady, I presume?" he 
 said, as they walked up the perron. 
 
 "Yes," answered Antoinette, trying to look uncon- 
 cerned, " I have." 
 
 "Then I beg that you will do so no more. Indeed, T 
 expect that you will hold no intercourse with Mademoiselle 
 — I forget her name. — Brenu," addressing a porter who 
 was passing by, " is Monsieur John in the storeroom ? 
 Yes. Well, then, tell him, please, that I beg he will let 
 me see those papers. — As I was saying, my dear," resumed 
 Mr. Dorrien, turning to Antoinette, " I expect you will hold 
 no intercourse with that lady while you are under my roof. 
 I should object to it." 
 
 He spoke with no appearance of anger, but his careless 
 coldness was all the more mortifying. Of this, too, he 
 seemed unaware; and the "good-morning, my dear," with 
 which he parted from Antoinette as they had ascended the 
 perron, and he entered his own rooms and left her at the 
 foot of the staircase, was essentially urbane and gentleman- 
 like in its coldness. 
 
 CHAPTER XXX. 
 
 Small slights sting the young very sharply. That 
 armor which we all must don if we would pass scathless 
 through life, and which grows so hard, and encases us so 
 well that in the end only the keenest weapon can pierce 
 it, and inflict a wound, is very weak and thin in our youth.
 
 344 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 Then blame is not to be endured, a word of reproof is an 
 insult, indifference is unutterable mortification. Alas ! of 
 all things, that is the one we can least understand. We 
 are so much to ourselves, and it seems so strange that we 
 should be so little to others. 
 
 When the door of his room closed on Mr. Dorrien, An- 
 toinette stood as he had left her, shame and mortification 
 struggling in her heart, and in the meaning of her expres- 
 sive face. She had not rallied from either feeling when she 
 heard a light foot spring up the steps of the perron behind, 
 and, turning round hastily, she saw John Dorrien, with some 
 papers in his hand. A flush of glad surprise passed across 
 his features as he saw Antoinette. The young girl's esca- 
 pade had been the subject of Mrs. Reginald's comments, 
 not loud, but deep, at the breakfast-table. 
 
 " That little thing will come to grief," had said Mrs. 
 Reginald, shaking her head ominously ; " and it is a pity, 
 because she is a nice little thing, spite her nonsense." 
 
 " She must have been very badly reared," remarked 
 Mrs. Dorrien, indignation proving stronger than her wish 
 to make the best of Antoinette to her son. " I am sure," 
 she feelingly added, " that Mademoiselle Basnage would 
 not have behaved so." 
 
 John, though silent, had had his own thoughts. His 
 prevailing fear had been lest Antoinette's ignorance of 
 Paris and its ways should have led her into some danger. 
 His first feeling on seeing her safe again was one of relief, 
 but, quickly reading the meaning of her troubled counte- 
 nance, he exclaimed : 
 
 . " What ails you, Antoinette ? Have you met with any 
 unpleasantness ? " 
 
 " Oh ! no," answered Antoinette, turning her head 
 away, that he might not see the tears in her eyes, "my un- 
 pleasantness is not out, but in. John, I wish I had never 
 entered this house." 
 
 John Dorrien looked both sorry and perplexed. He 
 took her hand, and, gently loading her through the glass 
 door that opened on the garden, he said, kindly, as he 
 walked by her side: 
 
 " Perhaps I can help, perhaps I can advise. Take a 
 turn with me, and tell me all about it." 
 
 He spoke so kindly, he looked so concerned, that An-
 
 JOHN DORRIKX. 345 
 
 toinctte's heart opened to him — so far, at least, as it could. 
 So, letting him lead her to the stone bench by the river-god, 
 she sat down there and told him her trouble. Why did Mr. 
 Dorrien treat her so ? Why was he so unkind, not to say 
 despotic, as to forbid her holding any intercourse with her 
 aunt ? 
 
 " But she is not your aunt," objected John, gently. 
 
 "What matter? I have always called her aunt." 
 
 "Yes, it seems hard," he soothingly replied; " but re- 
 member that, while you are under Mr. Dorrien's care and 
 guardianship, you must obey his wishes, even in this." 
 
 " Why so?" she asked, indignantly. "It is so unjust. 
 If there be anv thing wrong about aunt, why did he leave 
 me with her when my poor mother died?" 
 
 " Mr. Dorrien did not know of Mrs. George Dorrien's 
 death till I told him of it," answered John, quickly. 
 
 Antoinette's look of surprise made him aware of his self- 
 betrayal. He colored deeply, then, laughing a little, to 
 cover his embarrassment, said, " I was in the south this 
 year, and thus learned the truth, which, for some purpose 
 of her own, Mademoiselle Melanie had concealed." 
 
 He tried to speak with seeming unconcern, but he was 
 not successful. Antoinette darted a quick look at him, and 
 read the story of the past in his face. In a moment she 
 guessed it all. He was the stranger whose questions con- 
 cerning herself and her mother, when repeated in part by 
 Madame Brim, had long perplexed her, until her girlish fancy 
 had identified him with Oliver Black. The young man's 
 laughing denial had only confirmed her belief. " How 
 could I be so foolish?" she now swiftly thought. "Did 
 not Madame Brun say that young man hail curly brown 
 hair, and is not Oliver's hair dark and silky ? Of course it 
 was John ! " 
 
 Yes, of course it was John, and so she had been brought 
 to this house not because Mr. Dorrien's heart 3 T earned tow- 
 ard his son's child, after his long forgetfulness, but because 
 Mr. Dorrien's young cousin had willed it so. Her heart 
 beat with involuntary emotions, her brow crimsoned willi a 
 sudden shame, as, for the first time, she guessed that, in 
 some sort, John cared for her. She rose, he rose too, and 
 so they stood face to face, both silent, both embarrassed 
 and troubled, till Mr. Dorrien suddenly came up to them,
 
 346 J0 HN DORRIEN. 
 
 and, giving them any thing but a pleased look, said, with 
 marked emphasis : 
 
 " You seem to have forgotten, John, that I am waiting. 
 I suppose those are the papers in your hand ? " 
 
 " They are, sir, and I beg your pardon. I came out here 
 with Miss Dorrien, and — " 
 
 "Yes, yes, so I see; but Miss Dorrien will have the 
 goodness to wait awhile. I particularly want to go out 
 this morning — if one can call twelve o'clock early," added 
 Mr. Dorrien, looking at his watch. 
 
 Antoinette, without saving a word, or giving either Mr. 
 Dorrien or John a look, walked away toward the house. 
 
 She had scarcely reached her room when the luncheon- 
 bell rang. She would gladly have remained where she was, 
 but did not dare to do so. Mrs. Dorrien and Mrs. Reginald 
 only were present. Mr. Dorrien and John were engaged, 
 said Mrs. Dorrien, with a look of mystery and consequence 
 that implied — " I know something, and you do not." 
 
 " You made us very anxious this morning, my dear," 
 said Mrs. Reginald to Antoinette ; and with this brief re- 
 mark she dismissed the matter of the young girl's delin- 
 quency. 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien was not so easily pacified. She was a 
 mother, and touchy, as most mothers are. A mother's in- 
 stinct also told her that her son had undergone some wrong 
 at Antoinette's hands, and she felt affronted. That Antoi- 
 nette should not appreciate John w T as simply monstrous ! 
 She lost no time in showing the young lady her mistake. 
 
 " I wish Monsieur Basnage would bring his daughter to 
 town this winter," she said, addressing Mrs. Reginald across 
 the table, and ignoring Antoinette utterly. 
 
 " Do you ? " replied Mrs. Reginald, opening her eyes 
 wide. " Why so." 
 
 " I want to see her again," said Mrs. Dorrien, with a nod 
 and a smile ; " I take a particular interest in that young 
 lady." 
 
 " Well, I cannot say that I do," composedly remarked 
 Mrs. Reginald. " Monsieur Basnage is no favorite of mine, 
 and, if his daughter is like him, she — " 
 
 " Oh ! she is charming ! " Mrs. Dorrien hastened to in- 
 terrupt — " a charming girl ; accomplished — reared in a con- 
 vent—"
 
 JOHN DORREEN. 347 
 
 "A doll!" interrupted Mrs. Reginald, who was in one 
 of her obstinate, fractious moods. '"All girls reared after 
 a pattern are dolls, as a matter of course ; and French girls 
 are the most dolly girls I ever saw," added Mrs. Reginald, 
 fastening her obstinate brown eye on Mrs. Dorrien. 
 
 " Well, well," said the lady, giving up the argument in 
 despair, but smiling good-humoredly as she did so, " I sus- 
 pect, dear, that neither are you nor am I a fair judge of this 
 matter. Now, John's opinion of Mademoiselle Basnage 
 would be worth something." 
 
 . "And what do boys know about girls?" asked the in- 
 domitable Mrs. Reginald. "Nothing, or worse than noth- 
 ing. Bless you, the more dolly they are, the better they 
 like them," she added somewhat bitterly, as she remembered 
 that it was for a doll of the worst kind that she had been 
 betrayed and forsaken. 
 
 "Well, Mr. Dorrien is no boy," persisted Mrs. Dorrien, 
 who was bent on impressing the silent and apparently in- 
 different Antoinette with a sense of the unknown Made- 
 moiselle Basnage's merits, " and he says that Mademoiselle 
 Basnage is charming." 
 
 John's entrance put an end to the argument. He hur- 
 ried over his meal, scarcely spoke, never looked at Antoi- 
 nette, and left, with an apology, before the repast was fairly 
 ended. 
 
 " Poor John ! " sighed Mrs. Dorrien ; " he has a hard life 
 of it." 
 
 "My dear, he likes it," said Mrs. Reginald, kindly ; " de- 
 pend upon it, too, that it has saved him from much mischief. 
 Why, good for little though his friend Mr. Black, for in- 
 stance, is, yet you may be sure that, if he had worked as 
 hard as our John has, he would not be such a pitiful little 
 fellow as he is." 
 
 It required all Antoinette's self-control not to break 
 out on hearing this uncalled-for attack; but what right 
 had she to speak, to take the part of Oliver, or utter even 
 a protest in his behalf? Burning with silent ami useless 
 indignation, she rose from the table as soon as she could 
 decently do so, and retired to her own room. 
 
 Her thoughts there were not pleasant, and were as 
 varied, though not so bright, as the colors of the rainbow. 
 With a girl's rapid intuition, she guessed that she had
 
 348 JO nN DORRIEN. 
 
 been preferred to Mademoiselle Basnage, and she was 
 touched and sorry that it was so ; for, if John had only 
 left her in her solitude, would not every thing have gorie 
 on well between her and Oliver ? Whereas now — 
 
 Her tears flowed at the thought of the perplexities 
 which Mr. Dorrien's prohibition of intercourse with her aunt 
 
 must produce. 
 
 " Oh, if I could only be free from all this concealment ! " 
 she thought, with some passion — " if I only could ! " 
 
 Here the door of her room opening, and Mrs. Regiuald 
 walking in, scarcely gave her time to hide her tears. 
 
 " Yes, my dear," said the lady, sitting down, " you are 
 in trouble, I know, and so I have come to comfort and to 
 preach.— Why, child," she added, with her brown eye full 
 on Antoinette, " what possessed you to go out this morn- 
 ing, and make Mr. Dorrien look black as night ? "_ 
 
 " I have been accustomed to go out alone," said Antoi- 
 nette, gravely. 
 
 " In La Ruya, not in Paris, where you are Mr. Dorrien's 
 granddaughter, and your position — " 
 
 "Then I wish I 'had no position," interrupted Antoi- 
 nette, her lip quivering. 
 
 " There never was any thing so unreasonable as these 
 young things ! " exclaimed Mrs. Reginald, looking round 
 Antoinette's room, and appealing to an imaginary audi- 
 ence. " Here we are, all ready to be fond of her, if she 
 will let us. Any one can see that John — well, never mind, 
 there is no girl but finds that out for herself — only even 
 John was not pleased, as I think you must have seen at 
 luncheon." 
 
 Antoinette blushed a little, for, remembering what had 
 passed in the garden, she did not think that anger had 
 caused John's taciturnity. Interpreting her silence as ac- 
 quiescence, Mrs. Reginald resumed, convincingly : 
 
 " You are a lucky girl, I say, and all you have to do is 
 to take your luck." 
 
 Antoinette raised her eyebrows. 
 
 " Really, Mrs. Reginald," she said, a little dryly, " I do 
 not know what luck you mean." 
 
 " You don't know ! — you don't know ! " hotly retorted 
 the elder lady — " I say you do know, you little cheat 1 
 Why, what greater luck can a girl have than to get the
 
 JOHN DORKIKX. 349 
 
 chance of a man who is the very soul of truth and honor — 
 of a man who would die rather than do a mean thing ? " 
 
 Antoinette turned very pale, and, knitting her fine, dark 
 eyebrows, looked through the window. 
 
 " It is a pity such goodness should be thrown away 
 upon me, 1 ' she said, somewhat bitterly. "I am not good 
 or pious enough — " 
 
 " And why are you not ? " interrupted Mrs. Reginald, 
 who seemed unable to hear her to the end. 
 
 " O Mrs. Reginald, I have told you that my reason — " 
 
 " Nonsense ! " again interrupted Mrs. Reginald. " Rea- 
 son is a very fine thing, but we cannot test every tiling by 
 it. I knew an ignorant peasant once who would not be- 
 lieve in the antipodes. His reason and his senses both 
 told him that this thing could not be. What, this fiat 
 earth round ! — men and women topsy-turvy ! No, no, Pat- 
 sy was too clever to take that in. My dear, reason alone 
 never yet taught us any thing, neither science nor religion. 
 No sane person seeks science unscientifically, but ninety- 
 nine out of a hundred seek religion irreligiously. I could 
 laugh at them, if it were not so very, very dreary. Hu- 
 mility is the A B C of all religion, and he or she who asks 
 God otherwise than as a child seeks its father will never 
 find him." 
 
 Antoinette had never been so spoken to before, and she 
 looked at Mrs. Reginald with some wonder in her eyes. 
 She was impressed, and yet she scarcely understood lan- 
 guage so strange and new. 
 
 " Well, Mrs. Reginald," she objected, " what is one to 
 do with one's reason ? " 
 
 " Reason again ! " interrupted the lady — " why, you 
 obstinate; creature, what is reason '? Don't you see that it 
 varies in individuals, and is modified by all the accidents 
 of birth, education, and life ? Does not one man's reason 
 tell him that there is a God, and another man's reason as- 
 sure him that there is none ? Besides, do you love right 
 and hate wrong ? There, don't look offended. I only 
 want to tell you this : If reason be your only moral code, 
 it goes neither far nor deep. The purer, the nobler part 
 of man — that part which will suffer for God, for country, 
 for justice, ay, even for the lovely flower of honor — has not 
 much to do with mere reason, my dear. For reason has no
 
 350 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 right to condemn ns to sacrifice, and, what is more, reason 
 has never done it ; so, if you go by reason, you may cer- 
 tainly avoid foolish things, but you will never do great 
 ones, and, what is almost as bad, you will be incapable of 
 recognizing and admiring greatness in others. There, that 
 will do for to-day," she added, rising, and perceiving An- 
 toinette's sad, depressed look ; " you will soon find out 
 practically the truth of what I say. Now, I do not want 
 to be uncharitable," continued Mrs. Reginald, " but you 
 know, my dear, that there is nothing like a comparison for 
 showing forth the truth. Well, then, just imagine Mr. 
 Black arguing on that subject ! Why, I can hear the man 
 talking : ' My reason requires that I should have money, 
 but my reason forbids me to be dishonest, for society pun- 
 ishes dishonesty, and so I must get on, and not steal.' That 
 is what reason would tell little Mr. Black." 
 
 Antoinette gave Mrs. Reginald a scared look. That 
 lady's antipathy for Oliver was so unreasonable a feeling, 
 that she had almost ceased to care about it ; but Mrs. Regi- 
 nald's guesses concerning him were often so keen and 
 shrewd that they appalled the girl's heart. Were they 
 mere guesses, or did Mrs. Reginald know any thing ? 
 
 " I wonder what the little fellow would say on all these 
 topics," musingly continued Mrs. Reginald. Oliver was by 
 no means short, but his enemy invariably stigmatized him 
 as little. " I once knew a Mr. Poole who would have it 
 that his first great-grandfather had been a monkey. It was 
 evidently a comfort to him to think so. Well, I did wish 
 he had a tail, for his sake ; he would have liked to wag it, 
 poor mean fellow ! I believe they have given up the mon- 
 keys now. I dare say little Mr. Black thinks he came from 
 an Ascidian jelly-bag." 
 
 Antoinette felt as if this were beneath her anger ; but 
 she could not help looking Mrs. Reginald in the face and 
 saying, with some scorn 
 
 "65 
 
 What can Mr. Black have done to you that you so 
 hate him, Mrs. Reginald ? " 
 
 " Nothing," candidly replied Mrs. Reginald. " I know 
 what you mean — that I am a dreadful old woman, unchari- 
 table, and all that, and that, with such a bitter tongue and 
 temper, I had better never open my lips about religion. 
 Well, my dear, you may be right, and 1 am worth very
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. .'jjl 
 
 little, and I really know nothing whatever against little 
 Mr. Black. Only" — Mrs. Reginald raised her forefinger 
 impressively, and fastened her brown eye on Antoinette's 
 f ace — " only I never was mistaken but once in my estimate 
 of man, woman, or child ; and the moment I saw John's 
 friend I disliked him, and thought ill of him." 
 
 Tears rose to Antoinette's eyes, and her lip quivered. 
 She was stung and she was hurt. 
 
 " Then, Mrs. Reginald," said she, a little warmly, "it is 
 hard to stand well with you. I mean that, as you go by 
 your impressions — " 
 
 "You little goose!" interrupted Mrs. Reginald, smiling 
 down at her very kindly, " what have you to do with Mr. 
 Black? And don't you see that I like you? — and don't 
 you understand that it is because I like you that I have 
 been talking you over all this time? And do you know 
 whv I like von '? Why, because your mother was an O'Don- 
 nell, and because you are not a doll, like Mademoiselle Bas- 
 
 nage." 
 
 " Whom you have never seen," said Antoinette, who 
 could not help smiling. 
 
 " Never mind, I know she is a doll. And now let us 
 kiss and be friends. Why, you still look cross ! You surely 
 do not mind all I say about Mr. Black ? It is nothing to 
 you, is it ? " 
 
 Antoinette colored deeply. 
 
 " What should Mr. Black be to me ? " she asked, in some 
 trepidation. " It is only because it seems so unjust — " 
 
 " Never mind about the injustice," coolly retorted Mrs. 
 Reginald. " If he stays long with us you will find him out ; 
 and so will John," she ominously added — " so will John, 
 my dear." 
 
 And, without seeming to notice Antoinette's look of 
 confusion and dismay, she emphasized her words with a 
 nod, and thus left her.
 
 352 JOHN DORRIEN, 
 
 CHAPTER XXXI. 
 
 The night wind was moaning around the Hotel Dor- 
 rien, and Antoinette sat in her room, listening to it with a 
 beating heart. That wind was in her favor ; it would en- 
 able her to steal out of the house unheard — for it was one 
 thing to be forbidden by Mr. Dorrien to see her aunt, and 
 it was another thing to obey him. She must and she would 
 see Mademoiselle Melanie. Besides, how could she help 
 it ? Were not these the only means left in her power to 
 have any intercourse with Oliver Black ? He had managed 
 to make a whispered appointment with her that same day, 
 and, come what might, Antoinette was bent upon keeping 
 it. 
 
 " What, will you not stay with us, dear ? " Mrs. Regi- 
 nald had said, as she saw her passing by the door of her 
 sitting-room. 
 
 " I must write to the Clarkes," Antoinette had answered, 
 hesitatingly. 
 
 She had not yet learned to tell an untruth boldly, and 
 she smarted under the consciousness of her meanness as 
 she went on to her own room ; but, once she was there, 
 she forgot all save the adventure before her. She waited 
 for an hour till the house was quiet, and even the kitchen 
 regions had ceased to emit their usual evening clatter ; 
 then, opening her window softly, as if that act could be- 
 tray her, she peeped out. Big clouds were passing gustily 
 across the November sky. The trees of the garden shook 
 their thin boughs to the night air ; the pale moon looked 
 out for a while, and shed a faint, gray light on the gravel 
 paths ; then, shrouding herself in her palace of mist, she 
 vanished slowly and was seen no more. 
 
 Antoinette closed her window, and, opening her door, 
 listened again to the sounds of the house. Only the faint- 
 est murmur of life rose up to her from below. Mr. Dorrien 
 was out — that she knew ; Mr. Brown had long been gone, 
 .iinl John, no doubt, was with Mrs. Reginald and his moth- 
 er. All she had to do was to slip down-sfairs, steal out 
 into the garden, and let herself out through the postern- 
 door. " Mademoiselle Melanie will be waiting for you there 
 at nine," Oliver had whispered that afternoon ; while An-
 
 JOHN DORKIEN. 353 
 
 toinette, with averted eyes and a beating heart, had pre- 
 tended to be looking at an album on the table of the little 
 drawing-room. 
 
 " Nine o'clock," she now thought, closing her door very 
 so ftly — " it can't be far from nine. I had better not keep 
 aunt waiting." 
 
 She was soon ready. She stole out on tiptoe', locked 
 her door, and slipped down-stairs. She met no one ; and, 
 passing by the door of Mrs. Reginald's sitting-room, she 
 reached the hall safely. The gas burned there with a clear 
 bright light, which fell on the black-and-white marble floor. 
 Antoinette looked at the doors around her. They were all 
 closed and silent. Swiftly and noiselessly she opened that 
 which led to the garden, and took out the key, which she 
 put into her pocket. To her infinite relief no creaking of 
 the hinges betrayed her, and she stood safe and free out- 
 side. She remained thus a while to gather breath, for her 
 heart beat so that she felt almost stifled ; then like a shad- 
 ow she Hit ted along the path, watching fearfully the gleam 
 of light that stole out from the library-windows, and fell 
 on the sward. John was there, then, and not with Mrs. 
 Reginald, as she had thought. What an escape she had 
 had ! The rest was easy. The postern-door was nothing, 
 and Antoinette stood there till she heard a knock outside. 
 
 " Who is there ? " she ashed softly. 
 
 " Open," replied a low, angry voice. 
 
 " Well, but who are you ? " persisted Antoinette, who 
 wanted to be sure of her aunt's indent it v. 
 
 "If you do not open, I shall walk round and come in at 
 the front-door," was the wrathful answer. 
 
 There could be no doubt this time that Mademoiselle 
 Melanie was the speaker, and Antoinette opened the door 
 softly, peeping round it with a laughing face, on which the 
 flaring gas-light from the neighboring lamp-post fell. 
 
 She was slipping out into the narrow lane, when Made- 
 moiselle Melanie pushed her aside, and swiftly entered the 
 garden. 
 
 " Aunt ! " exclaimed Antoinette, in a low, alarmed tone, 
 " what are you doing?" 
 
 " Well," retorted Mademoiselle Melanie, standing still, 
 and confronting her, "what about it? Are you afraid lest 
 I should go to your grand friends and disgrace you?"
 
 354 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 " O aunt you know that is not it," replied Antoinette, 
 in an agony of fear ; " but, since we must not be seen, would 
 it not be better to go away at once ? " 
 
 Without heeding her, Mademoiselle Melanie walked on 
 toward the house. She seemed to feel a perverse pleasure 
 in exciting Antoinette's uneasiness by seeking the very 
 peril the young girl was most anxious to shun. When she 
 came within view of the library - windows, and caught, 
 through the shrubs and trees, the faint gleam of light steal- 
 ing forth from the half-closed shutters and falling on the 
 grass, she said to Antoinette, who followed her, shivering 
 with apprehension — 
 
 "What light is that?" 
 
 " It is John's light. He sits there writing," answered 
 Antoinette, in her lowest whisper. 
 
 Mademoiselle Melanie laughed, and the laugh, though 
 low, sounded so distinct in the stillness of the garden, that 
 Antoinette gave up in despair all hope of concealment. 
 But Fortune favored the audacious lady. She walked up 
 and down the front of the house with reckless curiosity ; 
 then, having seen as much as the closed doors and windows 
 would let her see, she turned back. Oh, what a sigh of 
 relief did Antoinette breathe when they had passed the 
 postern-door, and were fairly out of the dangerous garden ! 
 With the quick reaction of the young, she laughed at her 
 own fears, and said gayly : 
 
 " O aunt, I never was so frightened in all my life. How 
 daring you are ! " 
 
 Mademoiselle Melanie smiled in austere triumph. She 
 was no coward ; she knew it, and gloried in her bravery. 
 
 "Have we far to go?" asked Antoinette, glancing 
 doubtfully at the narrow lane along which they were walk- 
 ing. " I do not like the look of this place, do you, aunt ? " 
 
 " What do I care about it ? " retorted Mademoiselle Me- 
 la nic, impatiently. 
 
 Antoinette put no more questions. Their goal was 
 soon reached, and, with another sigh of relief, Antoinette 
 ran up the narrow stairs of her aunt's abode, chatting all 
 the way. 
 
 " Now, aunt, you are going to treat us," she said ; " you 
 must, you know. What are we going to have?" 
 
 "What will you have ?" asked Mademoiselle Melanie,
 
 JOHN DORRIEX. 355 
 
 taking the key of her apartment from her pocket, and open- 
 ing the door. 
 
 Antoinette entered the kitchen at once, opened a cup- 
 board, looked around her, then said, coaxingly — 
 
 " O aunt, let us have some pancakes ! " 
 
 Mademoiselle Melanie was not like the traditionary con- 
 ventional villain, always on the stilts of her own wickedness. 
 Wickedness with her was very much a matter of temper, 
 and therefore perhaps she always went farther in its ways 
 than she had intended. Harsh and unkind though she often 
 was to Antoinette, she nevertheless liked her as she liked 
 nothing and no one else, so she now smiled almost kindly in 
 the girl's face, and said, pleasantly enough, " Yes, let us 
 have pancakes." 
 
 Antoinette was delighted at this unexpected concession. 
 She liked pancakes. Moreover, they recalled a pleasant 
 evening in her young love, when she and Oliver had made 
 them together in La Ruya. To make them again was al- 
 most like going back to those unclouded days of La Ruya. 
 _"I see you have got eggs, aunt," she said; "but have 
 you milk ?— yes, quite right. Well, then, have you flour ? 
 No — yes, you have — don't you see it there ? O aunt, what 
 a treat we are going to have ! But I must lose no time." 
 
 At once she set to work. She had scarcely begun, 
 when there was a ring at the door. Mademoiselle Melanie 
 went and opened it, and from the kitchen Antoinette heard 
 Oliver Black's disappointed exclamation : 
 
 " What, she is not here ! " 
 
 "You will find her in the kitchen," answered Mademoi- 
 selle Melanie, and the next moment Oliver Black's handsome 
 face appeared at the kitchen-door looking in at Antoinette. 
 
 "Oh, come and help me!" she cried — "oh, do; it will 
 be such fun ! " 
 
 "And pray what are you doing? " he asked, without 
 coming in. 
 
 " Pancakes — come and help me." 
 
 " No, darling, not on any account, I am afraid of the 
 flour, and if you will take my advice," he added, rather 
 gravely, "you will not meddle witli it for the same reason." 
 
 Antoinette looked in his face with some wonder, and 
 said, with mock gravity — 
 
 " But I am not afraid of flour, Oliver."
 
 356 J0 HN DORRIEN. 
 
 " And to-morrow morning," he dryly remarked, " when 
 the maid gives a shake to Mademoiselle Dorrien's clothes, 
 she will detect a little white spot, and, having tested it chem- 
 ically, she will pronounce it to be flour. Query— how comes 
 Mademoiselle Dorrien to have any thing to do with flour ? 
 The matter's submitted to the cook, the cook carries it to 
 Mrs. Reginald, who transmits it to Mr. Dorrien, who cate- 
 chises his granddaughter, who bursts into tears. On such 
 slight accidents hang the fates of empires and of ill-fated 
 lovers." 
 
 Antoinette laughed, but she also looked ready to cry. 
 This perpetual secrecy was very hard to bear, for one who 
 had been accustomed'to the most thoughtless liberty. 
 
 " Oh dear ! oh, dear ! " she cried, stamping her foot in 
 vexation, " can I not make even pancakes in peace ? " 
 
 " No, darling, you cannot," retorted the inexorable Ol- 
 iver? "besides, my dearest," he added, more tenderly, " I 
 am jealous of the pancakes. They absorb your mind, they 
 take up your attention, ay, and your smiles, and you must 
 think of nothing, and no one, save Oliver Black when he is 
 present." 
 
 "Very well," submissively replied Antoinette, taking 
 off the apron she had put on, and giving the mixture she 
 had begun preparing a regretful, wistful look — " very well ; 
 but what will Aunt Melanie say at this waste of her good 
 things ? " 
 
 "If Aunt Melanie has the least consideration," replied 
 Oliver, smiling, " she will kindly attend to this matter while 
 we talk over our little affairs." 
 
 Antoinette did not look sanguine of this result, but she 
 proved to be mistaken. Mademoiselle Melanie did agree to 
 take up her niece's deserted post, and, without even a look 
 of ill-humor, repaired forthwith to the kitchen, leaving the 
 door open, however — kitchens and sitting-rooms are often in 
 close conjunction in cheap apartments in Paris — so as to 
 hear every word that passed between Oliver and Antoi- 
 nette. 
 
 A low wood-fire smouldered on the hearth, a little lamp 
 burned with a bright clear light on the table ; dingy though 
 the room was, fire, light, and evening, gave it a look of 
 comfort. 
 
 " And now," said Antoinette, drawing her chair to one
 
 JOHN DOIIKIEW 357 
 
 side of the fireplace, and looking at Oliver, who was sitting 
 down on the other side — "now, Oliver, tell me all sorts of 
 things. No, stay where you are," she added, as he wanted 
 to draw his chair near hers. "I like being free to look at 
 you." 
 
 She spoke her thoughts. To look at her lover freely, 
 openly, was pleasant, after the humiliation and restraint of 
 her daily life. She was not one of those girls for whom 
 concealment has any charms; she hated it as a bondage, 
 and also as a sort of baseness, which hourly stung her pride. 
 Oliver stroked his silky black beard and smiled. 
 
 "You are awfully pretty to-night, Antoinette," he said. 
 Antoinette blushed, then laughed, then looked demure. 
 
 " What next ? " she asked. 
 
 " You are decidedly prettier than Mademoiselle Bas- 
 nage," he continued. 
 
 Antoinette's bright eyes became riveted on him in sud- 
 den and silent wonder. 
 
 " And how do you know that?" she asked at length. 
 
 " I had the honor of dining with Mademoiselle Basnasre's 
 papa last night, and, as mademoiselle appeared, I can form 
 an opinion. 
 
 Antoinette still looked surprised and perplexed. 
 
 "I had no idea that you knew them, 1 ' she said, after a 
 pause. 
 
 " Oh, I knew Monsieur Basnage before I knew you, dar- 
 ling — very slightly, of course — but mademoiselle I did not 
 see before yesterdav." 
 
 " Well, what is Mademoiselle Basnage like ? " asked 
 Antoinette, with evident curiosity and interest. 
 
 " A fair girl — blue eyes, blond hair, sylph-like figure, 
 etc." 
 
 Antoinette was silent awhile, then she said, half in jest, 
 half in earnest — 
 
 " Blondes are insipid." 
 
 "Decidedly so," replied Oliver, smiling; "no rule of 
 beauty is more absolute. But, like all rules, it admits of 
 exceptions; and of these Mademoiselle Basnage is one. 
 She is not merely pretty, but also quite sparkling. John 
 pays you a rare compliment, Miss Dorrien, if he really de- 
 clines that young lady for your sake." 
 
 "I did not know that he had ever seen her," replied
 
 358 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 Antoinette, whose face was in a glow, certainly not caught 
 from the mild fire at which she was looking ; her eyes were 
 downcast, and Oliver looked at her long and keenly with- 
 out meeting her gaze. 
 
 " Come, now, darling," he said, in a tone of careless 
 banter, " be honest, and confess that John has been making 
 love to you. Do not look so affronted ; he has a right to 
 make love to you, you know." 
 
 This was said with a despondent sigh. 
 
 " No man has such a right, unless he receives it from 
 me," answered Antoinette, with a little flash of her dark 
 eye. 
 
 " And you have not given it to John ? That is right, 
 darling ; never do. I cannot spare you." 
 
 "I have not given it to him, aad he has not implied the 
 least wish for it," said Antoinette, with some emotion. 
 " What he was when I came to Paris — kind and friendly 
 — he is still — very friendly — but no more." 
 
 "Dear old John! He shows his bad taste there; and 
 yet I cannot be angry with him, darling — I cannot, on my 
 honor. Well, you wonder that I know these Basnages ; 
 and so you may. Monsieur I have known months, as one 
 knows men in business — that is to say, not at all. I met 
 him yesterda} T in the Palais Royal, and he button-holed me, 
 and was so friendly, by Jove ! that there was no making 
 him out. Nothing would do him, but that I should dine 
 with him at his own house that same evening. I tried to 
 get out of it, but I saw that it would only be reculer pour 
 mieux sauter. So I thought I would have it over, and see 
 what the man wanted. I did not find it out till dinner was 
 nearly over. A most luxurious little dinner it was, with 
 plenty of Madame Veuve Cliquot's best. Some one must 
 have told him my tender failing for that widowed lady's 
 vintage, and so, being bent on fascinating me, he gave it 
 out with no sparing hand. The only result of his diploma- 
 cy was that all dinner-time I thought, " What does the man 
 want ? " 
 
 " I know," said Antoinette, forcing a little laugh ;•" Mon- 
 sieur Basnage cannot get John Dorrien for his daughter, 
 and so he wants you." 
 
 "You have hit the right nail on the head," replied Oli- 
 ver, gayly. " Of course that was a premibre entrevue ; only,
 
 joiin dorrien. 359 
 
 to spare my coyness, I was not apprised of the fact, and 
 was most unconsciously surveyed by .Mademoiselle Bas- 
 nage's blue eyes. I must say it was taking an unfair ad- 
 vantage of my bachelor innocence, but forewarned is fore- 
 armed. I will not be so entrapped in a hurry ; and, if I am 
 again asked to dinner by business friends, I shall put a few- 
 pertinent inquiries. Have you got daughters? Married 
 or unmarried ? How many ? And, unless the answers are 
 satisfactory, I decline absolutely." 
 
 Antoinette laughed very gayly on hearing this. She 
 had forgotten all about Monsieur Basnage's invitation, and 
 its motives, but Mademoiselle Melanie, who had been listen- 
 ing in the kitchen to the conversation, now came out with 
 a basin in her hand, and said, in her eager way : 
 
 " Well, Mr. Black, and what did Monsieur Basnage 
 want with you? " 
 
 " To show him to Mademoiselle Basnage," answered 
 Antoinette — " at least, he says so, conceited young- 
 man ! " 
 
 " Monsieur Basnage wanted business information," re- 
 plied Oliver, " and, instead of getting it, he gave it." 
 
 " What was it?" asked Mademoiselle Melanie, still ea- 
 ger, and coming nearer. 
 
 On hearing the word business, Antoinette's face fell 
 and she looked doleful. Oliver Black, who sat with his 
 elbow leaning on the marble slab of the chimney, smiled 
 down at her. 
 
 " Perhaps Antoinette can tell us what Monsieur Bas- 
 nage wanted to find out," he said, carelessly. 
 
 But in vain his tone was light; alarm suddenly spr< sa 1 
 over Antoinette's countenance. 
 
 " Oh, pray do not ask me !" she entreated ; "I know- 
 nothing — and do let us have the pancakes. Aunt, may I " 
 — with pathetic eyes — " may I toss the pancakes here, on 
 this fire ? it is quite bright now." 
 
 "Yes, of course ymi may," replied Mademoiselle Mela- 
 nie, seeming in great good-humor. 
 
 Antoinette started up and ran to the kitchen for the 
 frying-pan. 
 
 "What is it?" asked Mademoiselle Melanie, fastening 
 her sinister eves on the young man's, and sinking her 
 voice to a whisper.
 
 360 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 He shook his head a little impatiently, and did not an- 
 swer. Antoinette came back in high glee, brandishing a 
 little frying-pan. 
 
 " This is business," she said, addressing the pair before 
 her. " Aunt, are you ready ? " 
 
 Mademoiselle Melanie was ready, every thing was soon 
 ready, as well as Mademoiselle Melanie. A little rickety 
 table was drawn forward and set out, such crockery as 
 Mademoiselle Melanie's meagre stores afforded was pro- 
 duced, and what Antoinette considered the business of the 
 evening began. 
 
 Every one knows, or ought to know, what the tossing 
 of pancakes is, and how thrilling is the operation to the 
 tyro in that act. For is not every thing at stake ? — is it 
 not pancakes or no pancakes — to be or not to be ? 
 
 Antoinette tossed her pancakes with a face full of breath- 
 less fear at every venture, with a cry of delight at every suc- 
 cess. Oliver Black looked at her with a half-amused, half- 
 moody look. She was a clever girl, to be sure, but she 
 was rather childish too. She was very fond of him, of 
 course, but it seemed, strangely enough, as if he could pro- 
 duce no durable impression upon her. He made no attempt 
 to renew the subject of Monsieur Basnage ; he doubtless 
 felt that the moment was unpropitious. He let her toss 
 her pancakes, set them on the table, praise them, laugh at 
 them, and finally eat them — he let her do all these things, 
 we say, in peace. He had no objection to help her in the 
 latter part of the business — for he too liked pancakes — and 
 he uttered not a word that could break the harmony of the 
 evening, till Mademoiselle Melanie, who felt both irritated 
 and impatient at his obstinate silence, uttered an impera- 
 tive "Well, Mr. Black?" 
 
 " Well, what ? " he calmly rejoined. 
 
 " Will you cell us what it is ? " 
 
 "What what is?" he asked, as if he had wholly forgot- 
 ten ; then carelessly, " Oh ! what Monsieur Basnage wanted 
 me for. Business, and, unfortunately, business bearing 
 much upon ourselves." 
 
 lie cast a look full of pathos at Antoinette, but it lit on 
 a crisp brown bit of pancake into which her little teeth 
 wen; biting, and was lost. The words were not thrown 
 away, however, and she said promptly:
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 3d 
 
 "O Oliver, whal have we to do with that tiresome Mr. 
 Basnage's business?" 
 
 " A great deal, I am sorry to say. This matter may 
 separate us for a long time." 
 
 Antoinette's color came and went; she pushed her 
 plate away with a look of dismay. 
 
 Oh, what was it? Were they sending him away? 
 Would it be for long ? 
 
 lie shook his head. No, that was not it, but he feared 
 he should have to leave La Maison Dorrien. In short, he 
 was afraid that it was no longer the firm for him. 
 
 Antoinette looked most woe-bcgone. The gladness of 
 the evening had departed ; trouble was coming, and there 
 was no shunning it now. 
 
 " Well," he said, desperately, " since you will know the 
 truth" — Antoinette had expressed no such wish — "I must 
 tell it to you. Monsieur Basnage thinks that John has per- 
 suaded Mr. Dorrien to have a paper-mill, or a factory, or a 
 icsine, or that sort of thing, of his own. The consequence 
 to Monsieur Basnage will be serious, of course, for he will 
 thus lose one of his best customers, and that was what he 
 wanted to find out from me. I told him nothing, you may 
 be sure. I was not going to betray business secrets to him, 
 to begin with." 
 
 " Of course not," cried Antoinette, eagerly. 
 
 Mademoiselle Melanie smiled grimly. Oliver resumed 
 with perfect candor: 
 
 "Besides, I know nothing, so, as I said, I got instead 
 of giving information. Well, the results of this scheme, 
 which will be unpleasing to Monsieur Basnage, will simply 
 be fatal to us." 
 
 "How so?" asked Antoinette, opening her e\ r es in 
 amazement. 
 
 " Why, because all Mr. Dorrien' s available capital must 
 needs be involved in it." 
 
 " And there will be none for his granddaughter," cried 
 Mademoiselle Melanie, her eyes sparkling with anger. 
 
 " Yes, that is it," said Oliver, nodding. " I did hope 
 that, as time wore on, and you and John found out that 
 Mr. Dorrien's plan was not to be thought of — I did hope 
 that I might speak to Mr. Dorrien, and, putting by this 
 cruel secrecy, opcnlv ask him for his granddaughter's hand ; 
 16
 
 362 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 but now Mr. Dorrien could return me only one answer : 
 ' Sir, you are penniless, and my granddaughter is portion- 
 less. I wish you a very good-morning.' In short," added 
 Oliver, with a deep sigh, " we are worse oft" than ever." 
 
 Antoinette looked very grave. More grave than sor- 
 rowful, and Oliver was quick to perceive it, though he chose 
 to ignore the fact. Mademoiselle Melanie folded her arms 
 across her breast, and, nodding ironically at her niece's lover, 
 asked — 
 
 " Well, and what will you do ? " 
 
 " Go off to America," he answered, with a gloomy laugh, 
 " or to California, or to Australia, or to anywhere, in short, 
 where money can be made ; and when I have made a decent 
 fortune, come back and claim this little girl, who takes it 
 all so coolly." 
 
 A deep blush spread over Antoinette's face. 
 
 " What can I do, Oliver ? " she asked. " If I could on- 
 ly help you ! Oh, if I could, how willingly I would do so ! " 
 
 " Help me ! Why, of course you can help me," he 
 slowly replied. 
 
 "I?" And at once she looked startled and afraid. 
 What was he going to ask of her ? 
 
 "Why, yes," he pursued, studiously ignoring the look ; 
 " for you can find out from John what truth there is in all 
 this." 
 
 " O Oliver ! Why, John never says a word upon busi- 
 ness to me or to any one." 
 
 " Could you not lead the conversation to it ? " 
 
 " Oh, no, indeed I could not ! " 
 
 " Say you would not ! " sharply remarked Mademoiselle 
 Melanie. , 
 
 " No, I could not," persisted Antoinette. " Indeed, 
 Oliver, you may believe me, I cannot do it." 
 
 There was something almost pathetic in her earnest- 
 ness. 
 
 " Then do not," good-naturedly replied Oliver ; " but 
 one thing you can do, darling, without broaching the 
 subject with John : you can find out the truth by slight 
 tokens. Go to the library for a book ; see if there be a 
 stray letter about, an architect's card, some pamphlet on 
 paper-mills ; in short, you are too clever not to discover 
 something or other."
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 3G3 
 
 " But, Oliver, what good will it do?" asked Antoinette 
 with an effort. "If the thing is to be, you will know it 
 soon enough." 
 
 " Yes, but suppose that lean so manage that the thing 
 should not be?" he quietly replied. "John is the best fel- 
 low in the world, he means well, but he is awfully venture- 
 some and ambitious. I consider this scheme of his the per- 
 dition of Mr. Dorrien's business. All his capital will be 
 sunk it it, and in the event of a war, of a revolution, or of 
 any thing of the kind, he will have nothing to fall back 
 upon. It is sheer madness, and, because it is madness, 
 John will not say a word of it to me. If I only had a hint 
 to go by, I could lead Mr. Dorrien to the subject." 
 
 "Tell him what Monsieur Basnage has said," eagerly 
 interrupted Antoinette. 
 
 Oliver rebuked her with a look. 
 
 "My dearest, that would be downright treason." 
 
 Antoinette hung her head abashed ; he resumed: 
 
 " No, I must, as I said, have a hint to go by. If I have, 
 I can, I hope, influence Mr. Dorrien. At least, I can try. 
 If I fail, I shall at least have done my duty, and endeav- 
 ored to save his fortune, and yours too, my poor darling ! " 
 
 "Why should that John Dorrien risk the money? It 
 is not his," here remarked Mademoiselle Melanie. 
 
 " Of course not," replied Oliver ; " he is all wrong there, 
 but he does not see it in that light, poor fellow." 
 
 " Stand bv him, do," cried Mademoiselle Melanie, wrath- 
 fully. 
 
 " Yes, I do stand by him so far as his intentions go," 
 sturdily replied Oliver. " A more honest man than John, 
 I do not know." 
 
 " Bah ! " said she. 
 
 They did it well, these two, but inexperience is not al- 
 ways simplicity, and Antoinette, looking at them in some 
 perplexity, was but half convinced. Somehow or other 
 their speech had not the ring of true gold in her ear. She 
 sighed deeply, hung her head despondently, and said, in a 
 low tone : 
 
 " I am very sorry, Oliver. I am sorry that John com- 
 mits such a mistake, and that I cannot help you ; but I am 
 too stupid. I should never know how to do it." 
 
 This was not what Oliver had expected, but he bore
 
 3G4 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 the disappointment with philosophic composure, shrugged 
 his shoulders, laughed, said he had always thought of Cali- 
 fornia as a conclusion, and the diggings as the best way 
 of getting out of difficulties. His gayety was forced, and 
 his mirth rather dreary. Antoinette's tears fell slowly. 
 She was troubled, grieved, and very unhappy. This life 
 of secrecy, plotting, and spying, was too much for a nature 
 which was both frank and pure, and which, though touched 
 by strange evil, was not yet tainted. Regardless of pan- 
 cakes, she laid her head on the table, and, with a smothered 
 sob, wished that she were dead. Oliver went and com- 
 forted her at once. 
 
 " Now, darling," he whispered in her ear, "you must 
 not. For perhaps John will give it up, or something will 
 turn up ; in short, it may be all right." 
 
 " Then why did you worry me ? " asked Antoinette, 
 smiling up at him through her tears-. " The pancakes are 
 cold, and not good, and I dare not stay any longer, and it 
 has all been that horrid business." 
 
 " Well, dearest," said Oliver, without detaining her, 
 " it shall not be business the next time you come here, and 
 as to what I said about finding out any thing, do not mind 
 it, you might commit some fatal mistake — better not." 
 
 u Yes," said Mademoiselle Melanie, smoothing down 
 with suspicious alacrity, " better not, Antoinette, } r ou 
 might commit a mistake, as Oliver says." 
 
 " You think me very silly," said Antoinette, pouting as 
 she put on her hat. 
 
 They both protested that they did not, but still urged 
 her not to attempt finding out any thing, lest she should 
 give rise to suspicion. 
 
 " Very well," she impatiently answered; " but I know 
 you think me stupid. Of course I am " — she remembered 
 having said it — " and therefore, as I said, I must not med- 
 dle in this." 
 
 Oliver laughed, and made some pleasant answer, and 
 said he would walk back with her and Mademoiselle 
 Melanie as far as the postern-door. There was not much 
 said on the way. Antoinette's heart was sinking at the 
 fear of discovery, though she would not confess her appre- 
 hensions. Had she been alone with Oliver, she might 
 have done so, for his manner to her was almost always
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 3G5 
 
 gentle and kind ; but to brent lie a word to her aunt on the 
 subject might have roused that lady to some act of daring 
 which would have terrified the young girl cutof her senses, 
 so she was silent; but Oliver seemed to guess what her 
 thoughts were, for, as they stood all three at the little 
 door, he whispered : 
 
 " Do not be afraid, darling. I shall stay here a quarter 
 of an hour, to make sure that you arc safe in." 
 
 "Oh! no, no," whispered Antoinette, turning her pale, 
 startled face toward him. "To know that you are there 
 would make me lose all presence of mind. Pray go — pray 
 go away at once." 
 
 Her entreaties, though spoken low, were so urgent 
 that Oliver could not resist them; so, merely waiting to 
 see her open the door, which made no noise, glide in like 
 a shadow, and close it again ever so softly, he walked 
 away with Mademoiselle Melanie. 
 
 They did not speak till they were fairly out of the nar- 
 row lane, and once more in the open streets, now almost 
 silent, with their closed shops and deserted pavements. 
 Now and then a carriage rumbled away in the distance, or 
 the footsteps of some belated passenger were heard in the 
 darkness; but Paris, though not asleep, was getting drow- 
 sy, and preparing for the long and deep slumber of t he night 
 
 "Well," said Mademoiselle Melanie, getting impatient 
 at Oliver's persistent silence, " what does all that mean?" 
 
 "No good," he answered, dryly. There was a pause; 
 then he remarked, abruptly, " Strange that Mr. Dorrien 
 should care so little for so charming, sweet, and winning a 
 creature as Antoinette." 
 
 " Then you are sure he does not care for her ? " said she. 
 
 " Oh ! quite sure." This was spoken with a deep sigh. 
 "One might almost imagine that he does not look upon 
 her as his son's child." 
 
 He had waited till they came to a lamp-post to put this 
 home-thrust, and, looking full in her face as he uttered it, 
 he waited for her reply ; but Mademoiselle Melanie bore 
 the look with a stolidity that defied all scrutiny, and mere- 
 ly saying, " This is my house; thank you, good-night," 
 she rang the bell, was admitted, and closed the door in 
 his face, as if unaware that he had remained standing 
 there. Oliver laughed as he walked away. Nothing
 
 36G JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 Mademoiselle Melanie said or did could affront him, but 
 her manner strengthened rather than weakened the doubt 
 he really entertained. 
 
 It had come, when or how he scarcely knew ; some- 
 times he fancied he had first felt it at La Ruya on finding 
 Antoinette so unlike a Dorrien, and also, it seemed to him, 
 older looking than eighteen. Sometimes he traced that 
 unpleasant suspicion to a remark made by Mrs. Reginald 
 in his presence: 
 
 " Surely, child, you are more than eighteen," she had 
 said, after looking hard at Mr. Dorrien's granddaughter. 
 " No ? Ah ! well, I remember you always did look older 
 than you were." 
 
 A few careless questions had enabled Oliver to ascer- 
 tain from Antoinette herself that this " always " must re- 
 fer to the time when she had come back to her grand- 
 father's house, after her elder sister's death. Suppose she 
 were herself that elder sister, the destitute heiress of that 
 Count d'Armaille, who was the boast of Mademoiselle 
 Melanie's life, and that it had been George Dorrien's child 
 who had died ? Would not that account for Mademoiselle 
 Melanie's evident affection, otherwise inexplicable to Oli- 
 ver, for her sister-in-law's daughter ? 
 
 "It is all very hazy," he now thought, turning away 
 from Mademoiselle Melanie's door, and walking slowly 
 back to his own lodging. " She does look more than 
 eighteen. She is girlish enough sometimes, but sometimes, 
 too, she is quite womanly. And Mr. Dorrien does not like 
 her, that is certain, and that Melanie is capable of any 
 trick. I wonder the idea has never occurred to him. Such 
 substitution would have been wonderfully easy. Well, if 
 she be not a Dorrien, it will certainly be found out in the 
 end, and then it will be all over — all over indeed ! " 
 
 Even without any such catastrophe coming to pass, 
 Oliver was much inclined to think that it was all over. He 
 had committed a mistake, and he saw it. To win Antoi- 
 nette's heart, was not to win with it the certainty of Mr. 
 Dorrien's inheritance, and of John's position. Mr. Dorrien 
 was a cool, not a doting grandfather, and Antoinette was 
 getting quite unmanageable. She was charming, certainly, 
 and Oliver liked her ; but suppose she were the penniless 
 niece of Mademoiselle Melanie, he felt that it must be all
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 367 
 
 over. Something else he must try; that would never do. 
 He sighed as he remembered how pretty she looked when 
 setting out the pancakes ; but he could bear it. If he had 
 married Antoinette, he would have made her a very fair 
 sort of husband. There was nothing cruel or actively un- 
 kind about him, and he had no strong hates; but he could 
 slip oil' a love or a friendship much more easily than he 
 could his gloves, which were always rather tight-fitting. 
 He had never had but one genuine feeling in his life — his 
 liking for his dead father. It was neither passionate nor 
 deep, but it was true. As to Antoinette, she was charm- 
 ing, but so was blue-eyed Mademoiselle Basnage ; and An- 
 toinette; had been growing troublesome and rather per- 
 verse of late. She had provoked him already, she would 
 provoke him again ere he had reached the end of his jour- 
 ney. The wind had been with him up to the present, but 
 it seemed to be veering now. A squall was coming, as 
 sure as his name was Oliver Black. Whether it would 
 originate in Antoinette's disobedience, or in her doubtful 
 parentage, Oliver did not know; he only knew that it 
 would be her doing, and that he would beware of her. 
 Now suppose she were not Mr. Dorrien's granddaughter, 
 how could Mademoiselle Basnage be brought into play? 
 He stood still to cogitate awhile, but soon discarded the 
 thought with a puff of the cigar ho had lit on parting from 
 Mademoiselle Melanie. Cui bono? He was not a far- 
 seeing schemer, by any means. Life was too uncertain, 
 too changeful for deep-laid plots, thought Oliver Black. 
 There was but one thing to do : never to lose a chance, 
 and to be ready for any thing that might turn up. 
 
 A wide-reaching maxim, if ever there was one, and one 
 admirably suited to men of this man's turn of mind. 
 
 CHAPTER XXX1T. 
 
 Whex she closed the postern-door and stood in the 
 garden, Antoinette did not move for several minutes. She 
 was dreadfully frightened, and she knew it; and she also
 
 368 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 knew that her very fear was it itself a danger. " I must 
 be quite cool and quite calm," she said to herself, " for if I 
 lose my presence of mind, why, I am simply undone. The 
 first thing is to be sure that I am really alone." 
 
 It was not very likely that any one should be wander- 
 ing in a dark garden on a dreary November night, for it 
 was now past eleven; but in her present mood Antoinette 
 thought all things probable, and she looked about her as 
 anxiously as if she expected Mr. Dorrien or Mrs. Reginald 
 to appear from behind every tree. No such vision came, 
 however. The moon had long been gone, and heavy clouds 
 obscured the sky. The garden was intensely dark. Antoi- 
 nette heard the plash of the fountain, but caught no 
 glimpse of its pale stone figure. She stole along on tip- 
 toe, shivering with fear when the gravel creaked under her 
 feet, but yet making her way to the house. When she 
 came within view of the library- window's, she saw with a 
 sinking heart that John's light was still burning. "What 
 should she do ? Suppose that in the stillness of the night 
 he heard her opening the door, and, coming out, caught 
 her in the act of entering the house surreptitiously ! 
 What should she do then ? What should she say? That 
 she had gone out to take the air, at that hour, on such a 
 night as this? John would never believe her, and she 
 would have all the shame of a useless lie ! 
 
 " I cannot risk it ! " thought Antoinette, in the agony of 
 her fear. "I will spend the night here rather than under- 
 go so bitter and so deserved a humiliation." 
 
 For with fear there came to her that remorse which is 
 born of danger. Going out, Antoinette had only felt that 
 she was venturing on an escapade, sanctioned by her aunt's 
 presence, and excused by her grandfather's tyranny. But 
 coming in she felt guilty and penitent. Oh ! it was 
 wrong, very wrong indeed to go about so at night — so 
 wrong that, come what might, she, Antoinette, would never 
 do it again. For what had come of it ? Cold pancakes, 
 no pleasure, dreary business talk, and now shame and dan- 
 ger lying in wait for her behind that door which she would 
 have given worlds never to have opened. In her fear she 
 almost thought of spending the night in the garden, if, as 
 she began to apprehend, John's vigil was to be prolonged 
 into the small hours. At all events she could wait awhile.
 
 JOHN DORRIEX. 369 
 
 and see if there was no chance of his retiring before she 
 ventured on that dreadful door. 
 
 "But nothing is harder in life, in tilings great or small, 
 than to follow out a purpose. When Antoinette decided 
 upon not venturing within until John had retired, she 
 reckoned without the changes of the night. Before she 
 had been a quarter of an hour in the garden, the clouds 
 which obscured the sky had melted into heavy rain ; before 
 half an hour was over, she was wet through, and stood 
 shivering in the unavailing shelter of the house-wall. She 
 leaned against it vainly, cowering from the storm; but the 
 wind, which drove the rain full in her face, also seemed to 
 pierce her through, and with a feeling of despair Antoi- 
 nette asked herself if she must spend the night thus. 
 
 At length John's light vanished. That little gleam, 
 which had been so full of terror to her, suddenly left the 
 grass, and the garden became as dark and cheerless as 
 twelve o'clock, now striking far away, and a rainy night 
 could make it. Antoinette lost no time. She stole on 
 tiptoe to the door, and with a beating heart put in the 
 key. It turned smoothly in the lock, but, alas ! that door 
 which, as she had ascertained, was never bolted, now re- 
 sisted all her efforts. It was fast, evidently secured from 
 within. The truth flashed across her mind. She had com- 
 mitted a fatal mistake. The door was not left unbolted, 
 as she had foolishly thought. Only it was not yet secured 
 when she looked at it at night, and it was unfastened 
 when she saw it in the morning. "Then I must spend 
 the night here," thought Antoinette, " and get in as best 
 I may in (he morning. I dare say I shall get my death of 
 cold ! Well, any thing is better than to be found out." 
 
 But even this dreary comfort was denied her. As she 
 turned away from the door, wondering whether the river- 
 god would afford her better shelter than the cold and bare 
 house-wall, the library window was suddenly thrown open, 
 and John Dorricn walked out with a swift, firm step, like 
 one who has a purpose. He passed by her without seeing 
 her. He was evidently going to the postern-door to make 
 it safe. Antoinette's heart leaped with a sudden hope. 
 Why should she not steal in through the opening he had 
 left, and make her way to her own room undetected and 
 Unseen? In a moment she stood within the warm library,
 
 370 J HN DORRIEN. 
 
 which lamp and fire filled with comfort, and she was cross- 
 ing it swiftly, when Carlo started up from where he lay 
 curled on his master's bureau, and sprang toward her with 
 a sharp and sudden bark, that soon changed into a glad 
 whine of welcome. But the bark had been heard, and, be- 
 fore Antoinette had time to reach the door that opened on 
 the landing, John Dorrien stood by her side. 
 
 " At last ! " he said. " O Antoinette, never do that 
 again — never ! And you are wet through ! — Do you want 
 death, then, as well as destruction?" 
 
 He was very pale, and his white lips quivered with 
 emotion. Antoinette heard him, and could not utter one 
 word of reply. She felt she could have died with very 
 shame. It was not merely her return that was detected, 
 but her absence that had been perceived all along. 
 
 " I do wish I were dead ! " she cried, clasping her hands 
 above her head in a passion of despair. " O John, John, 
 do not be hard upon me ! " 
 
 He went and closed the window, then, coming back to 
 her, he led her to the fire, and, taking off her wet cloak, 
 made her sit down and dry herself. 
 
 " You are shivering," he said, pityingly, and forgetting 
 his displeasure as he saw the plight she was in. " O 
 Antoinette, never do that again ! — never ! never ! " 
 
 He now spoke and looked so kindly that she felt instant 
 relief. A while ago to be detected by him had seemed the 
 hardest portion of her hard lot, and now she was so sure of 
 his help and protection that she thought nothing of it. Of 
 course he would not betray her, of course he would help 
 her out of this danger, and of course, being so good and 
 kind, her friend — had he not always said so?— he would 
 forgive her folly and keep her counsel. 
 
 " John," she said, looking earnestly in his face, " I went 
 to see my aunt Melanie." 
 
 " Yes," he answered, looking at the fire, " I know you 
 did." 
 
 She wondered in silent anguish what more he knew, 
 hut of this John said very little. He had to go out himself 
 by the back-door, he remarked, and he had seen her with 
 her aunt walking a few yards before him. It was not diffi- 
 cult for him to guess how she had gone out, and how she 
 'i icaut to come in. He had sat up for her, he added, but
 
 JOHN DORRIEX. 371 
 
 she had tried the door so softly that the attempt had es- 
 caped his ear. "I am grieved that you should be so wet,'' 
 he continued, regretfully ; " but it never occurred to me 
 that you would stay out in that rain. "Was I not your 
 friend, Antoinette ? ' 
 
 "O John, forgive me!" she entreated, " I shall never 
 do it again — never! " 
 
 "Do not, for another time you might be detected, and 
 that would be sad." 
 
 He said no more, put no questions, and he uttered no 
 reproaches. That she should dry her wet feet seemed his 
 chief thought. 
 
 " If you could have a fire in your room," he said, regret- 
 fully; "but that is impossible. — How you shiver! Wait 
 a while, I shall bring you some wine." 
 
 He started up, and was gone before she could remon- 
 strate. 
 
 " He does not believe me, or, at least, not half believe 
 me," said Antoinette to her own sad heart; "and so while 
 I was making pancakes for Oliver, and plotting against 
 him, he was sitting up for me, and only wanted to save me 
 from the snare I had run my foolish head into. — O Carlo, 
 Carlo," she added, as the little fellow, still on the bureau, 
 looked, with a whine, in her face, " you did well to give me 
 up for him." But to be thus feelingly addressed was not 
 Carlo's object. He wanted caresses, and, not getting these, 
 he stretched out a paw, wherewith he scratched his former 
 mistress's shoulder. 
 
 " Then you do like me after all," softly whispered An- 
 toinette ; " you do like me, Carlo." 
 
 She turned her face toward the dog, and in so doing 
 her eye fell on a broad sheet of paper lying open before 
 her. It was covered with lines, and bore the following 
 heading, in a round hand : 
 
 " Plan tic V Uslne." 
 
 All that Oliver had told her about John's plans, all that 
 he had urged her to find out, rushed back to her mind. 
 Mechanically she stretched out her hand as if to take the 
 paper, then drew it back with a sort of horror at the thought 
 of paving back John's trusting kindness by treachery so
 
 372 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 shameful. " Never, never ! " she thought, turning back to 
 the fire with a smile that seemed to defy the temptation. 
 
 Antoinette was still smiling and pacifying Carlo with a 
 caress, when her color, which had returned a little, died 
 away ; she had heard Mr. Dorrien's voice in the hall address- 
 ing his young cousin. 
 
 "How late you sit up to-night, John ! " he was sajing. 
 " Is there extra work ? " Wild with fear, Antoinette did 
 not wait to hear John's reply, but looked about her for 
 means of escape. If the window had still been open she 
 would have fled out once more into the dark night ; but 
 John had closed and fastened it. Quick as thought she 
 flew across the room, and, opening the door of the next 
 apartment, closed it again on herself, regardless of the sud- 
 den darkness which she thus entered. And it was well 
 that she was so prompt, for, without giving John time to 
 say a word, Mr. Dorrien opened the door of the library, and 
 entered the room almost at the same moment that his 
 granddaughter had taken refuge in the next. 
 
 " I thought you were out, sir," said John, when a look 
 had told him, to his infinite relief, that Antoinette had es- 
 caped. 
 
 " No, my head ached ; I staid within and fell asleep in 
 my chair. You opened a door, John, and that woke me. 
 What a good, bright fire you have ! mine is out." Mr. 
 Dorrien, who looked pale and ill, sat down in the chair 
 which Antoinette had left vacant, and warmed his thin 
 hands at the cheerful glow of the blazing w r ood. 
 
 " How is the paper-mill going on ? " he asked, after a 
 while, glancing at the sheet which had caught Antoinette's 
 eye. 
 
 " Oh ! very well indeed," replied John, with sudden 
 animation. " Do you wish to hear any thing about it, 
 sir ? " 
 
 " Not to-night ; I am not equal to it, John. Tell me, 
 rather, how you are getting on with Miss Dorrien." 
 
 John stood facing his cousin. A sudden glow, which 
 did not escape Mr. Dorrien's notice, overspread his coun- 
 tenance, but he answered quietly enough : 
 
 " Miss Dorrien has not been here long, sir." 
 
 " Come, John, that is not a straightforward answer," 
 said Mr. Dorrien, a little impatiently, " and therefore not
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. ;;;;; 
 
 such an answer as you should give me on this subject. I 
 feel pretty certain," he added, with a touch of irony, " that 
 you know how you stand in the young lady's favor." 
 
 John was silent awhile. When he spoke, it was with 
 remarkable gravity of look and manner. 
 
 " I fear I have committed a mistake," he said — " I mean 
 that Miss Dorrien and I are perhaps not suited to each 
 other." 
 
 Mr. Dorrien looked annoyed. 
 
 " You ought to marry, John," he said ; " you know what 
 passed between us on that subject. I wish you had never 
 taken that crotchet about Antoinette in your head. I wish 
 she had never come here. I wanted you to see Mademoi- 
 selle Basnage. She is in Paris now — a charming girl, whose 
 money would have been invaluable to us. Can you not see 
 her, at least?" 
 
 "But, if I see Mademoiselle Basnage with that inten- 
 tion," replied John, smiling, "what becomes of the paper- 
 mill?" 
 
 Mr. Dorrien did not answer at once. When he spoke 
 at last, it was to say, rather dryly : 
 
 " Are you sure that Miss Dorrien and you will not suit ? " 
 
 "No," replied John, hesitatingly, and involuntarily 
 glancing toward the door of the next room, "I am not sure 
 — I only fear." 
 
 "Time will show," said Mr. Dorrien, rising. "Good- 
 night, John. Your fire has done me a world of good. Are 
 j-ou sitting up still?" 
 
 "Only for a little while longer," answered the young 
 man. 
 
 Mr. Dorrien left him. John listened to his step going 
 up-stairs, and thought how slow and heavy it was getting. 
 Not till it ceased did he venture to open the door of the 
 next room. He went to it, lamp in hand, but no token of 
 Antoinette did he see. He called her softly , she did not 
 answer. She was gone, evidently; but how had she es- 
 caped? A blast of wind, which stirred the curtains of 
 a window looking on the court, and which nearly extin- 
 guished his lamp, made the mystery clear. Antoinette 
 had gone out that way. He closed the window, crossed 
 the library, and tried the front-door. It was ajar. Antoi- 
 nette had evidently jumped down into the court, stolen up
 
 374 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 the perron steps, and, opening the house-door, which had 
 been left unbarred for Mr. Dorrien, made her way up-stairs 
 to her room. If John could have doubted that such was 
 the case, he was convinced of it when, going up to his own 
 apartment, he saw a gleam of light coming out from be- 
 neath the threshold of Antoinette's chamber. With a sigh 
 of relief he passed on. 
 
 CHAPTER XXXIII. 
 
 "Is she better?" 
 
 "Not much." 
 
 A pause ; then Mrs. Reginald's voice resumed, dryly : 
 
 " A very odd cold, John. Very odd to leave one's win- 
 dow open, at this time of the year, and never find it out till 
 the morning." 
 
 John did not answer. Mr. Dorrien's voice was heard 
 below*, and this brief dialogue, which took place on the 
 stairs near the door of Antoinette's room, ended abruptly. 
 But the dcor was ajar, and though both Mrs. Reginald and 
 John spoke low, not a word escaped Antoinette's ear; she 
 tossed restlessly in her bed, and turned her flushed face to 
 the wall as Mrs. Reginald looked in at her to say kindly — 
 
 " Well, dear, do you want any thing more ? " 
 
 " No, thank you," answered Antoinette, in a low tone, 
 but without looking round. 
 
 " John sends you Carlo to keep you company," pursued 
 Mrs. Reginald. 
 
 " John is very kind," said Antoinette, with a deep sigh ; 
 " but I do not think Carlo cares to be with me." 
 
 Carlo wagged his tail, as if in denial, and jumped up on 
 the bed of his former mistress, favoring her so far as to lick 
 her hands ; then, lying by her side, he looked up in her face 
 with a grave, wistful look. 
 
 " John is very fond of that little ball of white wool," 
 resumed Mrs. Reginald, "and Carlo is very fond of John. 
 We thought the creature would fret to death when John 
 was away before you came. '
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. :;;;, 
 
 Antoinette did not answer. She was evidently in no 
 mood for conversation. Mrs. Reginald waited awhile, bus- 
 tled about the room, stirred up the fire, put a chair in its 
 place, then left the sick girl. She closed the door softly, 
 and went down-stairs. 
 
 " 1 suppose she overheard me. Well, T do think it odd 
 to leave one's window open on such a night as that was, 
 and never find it out till one wakens up in a raging fever 
 in the morning." 
 
 Chastisement rarely fails to tread in the very footsteps 
 of our sins. So Antoinette had found it. In the first place, 
 she was very ill; in the second, Mrs. Reginald's evident in- 
 credulity was so keen a sting to her young pride that she 
 did not know how to bear it. " Peehe cachd est a moitie 
 pardonne," says the French proverb, whether meaning that 
 the absence of scandal really diminishes the heinousness of 
 sin by not spreading its contagion, or because it intends to 
 convey the low moral lesson that wickedness is essentially 
 a matter of opinion, such we know was Oliver's theory ; but 
 Antoinette's conscience had never given full consent to the 
 convenient doctrine. Yet impunity might have warped 
 her moral sense, as it does that of so many others ; and it 
 was good for her that, though John saved her from the 
 shame of discovery, he could not guard her against the bit- 
 terness of suspicion. 
 
 " Mrs. Reginald does not believe it," thought Antoinette, 
 still tossing in her bed ; " who would ? Of course I did 
 not leave my window open for the rain and damp to come 
 in ; of course she feels that I have told an untruth, and of 
 course she suspects what the truth is. And John ? John, 
 who knows it, what must he think of me? John, who is 
 so different from what I am." 
 
 Yes, John Dorricn was very different indeed from Mr. 
 Dorrien's granddaughter. His life was pure, austere, self- 
 denying, and open as the day. When she compared her- 
 self with him, and felt how mean a part she was playing, 
 and how incapable he was of such baseness, she felt more 
 than humbled — she felt taught. God's grace was so far 
 with her still that she did not ask circumstances to bear 
 the burden of her sins. She knew she could have acted 
 differently. She also knew that she was not naturally 
 base and ungenerous. Yet she had fallen so easily into
 
 376 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 temptations that did not seem as if they could come near 
 him. How and why was this, if it was not that John Dor- 
 rien had a higher standard than she had ? John Dorrien was 
 a very good young man, but he was by no means perfect. 
 There were gleams of temper, of self-reliance, of love of ap- 
 probation, of willfulness in John, which showed him to be 
 one of sinning Adam's sons. Antoinette had seen all these 
 traits in him, but she had seen also that, when it came to 
 actions, it was impossible to suspect John of any not clear, 
 open, and upright. A strength not all his own upheld him. 
 It bore him through temptation and trial ; and, with a 
 woman's quickness of perception, Antoinette saw that too. 
 Alas ! why had she not got that strength ? Oh ! hard 
 was the lot that ever denied rest, that cast her, most un- 
 willing mariner, on stormy, adverse seas, and never let her 
 reach that haven of peace whence John looked down at her 
 with a pity so humiliating to modesty and pride. That 
 sense of mortification and shame which his kindness had 
 suspended, had awakened anew in the solitude of her sick- 
 room. Antoinette could have groaned aloud in the bitter- 
 ness of her regret and her abasement. Why had she done 
 this ? Why had she run such a dreadful risk ? After all, 
 Mademoiselle Melanie could not compel her ; Oliver Black, 
 who so wished for secrecy, had no right to purchase it at 
 her expense. Oh ! why had she been so foolish ? And 
 on the question followed the fervent resolve never to run 
 such a risk again, never to put herself in that terrible po- 
 sition. 
 
 Such thoughts as these do not make a day spent in a 
 sick-room seem short. Sad and long was this day to An- 
 toinette, even though toward its close Mrs. John Dorrien 
 kindly came in to sit with her. 
 
 "Well, dear," said she, taking her post at Antoinette's 
 bedside, and producing her work, with the evident inten- 
 tion of remaining — " well, dear, how do you feel now ? — 
 better? I am so glad. You have been poorly so long 
 that it has made us all anxious. Did you like the books 
 John sent you? He chose them himself; they are favor- 
 ites of his." 
 
 Antoinette languidly replied that John was very kind, 
 but that her head ached, and so she had not read the 
 books.
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 377 
 
 "Headaobes are cruel things," said Mrs. Dorricn. " I 
 used to have dreadful headaches when John was a child. 
 The dear little fellow was such a good nurse." 
 
 Her voire sank tenderly as she recalled her son's boy- 
 hood. Antoinette heaved a deep sigh, and said, despond- 
 ently : 
 
 " I suppose John was always good. Some are, and 
 some," she added, gloomily, "are always wicked." 
 
 " John was good," quietly said Mrs. Dorrien, " but he 
 bad a temper, and I was very strict with him. John is 
 naturally too self-reliant and obstinate, and rather passion- 
 ate, but he has a high sense of honor — he had it even as a 
 child ; and he never could do a mean thing — that saved 
 him from many a fault ; but I was very strict with John, 
 though you would not think so now." 
 
 " Do you think it gave him much trouble to be good?" 
 asked Antoinette. 
 
 "It would have given him more to be wicked," answered 
 John's mother, with a shrewd smile ; " but it did give him 
 trouble to be good — it always does, my dear. I like neat 
 sewing, and so, I dare say, do you, but it cannot be done 
 without trouble." 
 
 " He is very clever — I mean, he knows a great many 
 things — did that give him trouble too ? " 
 
 " Of course it did. John was always ambitious, and he 
 worked hard. Mr. Black, who is clever too, though not so 
 much so as John, did not like work, and could not stay at 
 the Abbe Veran's. Mr. Ryan, the English teacher, thoughl 
 so much of dear John's poems, and the}' were so beautiful ! 
 There is nothing finer in Milton.'' 
 
 " John's poems ! Oh, do let me see them ! " cried An- 
 toinette, eagerly. " Are they printed ? — are — " 
 
 " Burned, my dear," interrupted Mrs. Dorrien, with plain- 
 tive earnestness. " When John felt that he must take to 
 business, that he must fill his dear father's place in this 
 house, and become Mr. Dorrien's support, he burned his 
 poems that be was so proud of — he burned them with his 
 own hand. The dear boy ! I was lying ill in bed, as you 
 are now, and he stood there, as it were, near the fireplare, 
 and the light of the fire shone on this dear boy's face when 
 I saw him thrust the packet into the fire. He laughed, but 
 it tried him sorely, and I am sure that many a time after
 
 378 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 that, when he was so grave for a lad of seventeen, he was 
 thinking of his beautiful verses, and of the man he might 
 have been. It was a great sacrifice, and," added Mrs. 
 John Dorrien, with a voice that faltered slightly, then her 
 dim eyes kindled, " it was a noble thing for a boy to do. 
 
 " He burned them ? " repeated Antoinette, slowly. 
 " John must have a very strong will." 
 
 " Yes, dear, he has ; he seldom gives up what he has 
 once set his mind on. That has given him great influence 
 over Mr. Dorrien," added John's mother, with imprudent 
 pride. " How flushed you are, dear ! — are you better? " 
 
 " So much better," eagerly answered Antoinette. " Do 
 you know, Mrs. Dorrien, I think I shall get up." 
 
 " Do, dear — John will be so glad to see you again," 
 answered the fond mother, who, if one could hold a con- 
 versation with the sun, would have said as much to him 
 about his getting up in the morning. 
 
 So Antoinette rose and dressed herself languidly, and, 
 being alone, did not go down at once, but satby the fire, 
 and, looking at its dying embers, thought of John burning 
 his poems. How hard he must be at heart! — how severe 
 to be thus early capable of self-renunciation ! — and, inevi- 
 table and galling conclusion, how he must despise her ! 
 
 She leaned her cheek upon her hand, and looked round 
 her room. It seemed very long ago since she had entered 
 it first, and been rather wearied with John's praises, 
 uttered by his mother's lips. On her table lay the little 
 paper-weight, that exquisite toy which he had selected for 
 her. Those Palissy vases were his choice, too. Hers had 
 been, so far as he went, the tender welcome of a young- 
 betrothed in her new home. She felt it now, and remem- 
 bered how it had offended her then — how scornful she had 
 been of his presumption ! Alas ! she did not feel scorn- 
 ful as she brooded over the past ; she only felt ashamed 
 and humiliated. She did not want John's affection, but it 
 was hard to lose his esteem, and deserve the loss. 
 
 A low whine broke on her sorrowful meditations. She 
 looked, and saw Carlo, who had got tired of her company, 
 scratching at the door to get out. John's voice, which was 
 heard in the hall below, increased the clog's impatience, 
 and his entreating whine became a loud and indignant 
 bark of remonstrance.
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 379 
 
 " Oh ! you may go," impatiently said Antoinette, open- 
 ing the door for the dog — " go to that perfect John by ali 
 means, Carlo." 
 
 Carlo, quite indifferent to the scornful emphasis of her 
 voice, trotted down-stairs, wagging his tail with pleasure at 
 bis release. 
 
 " I detest John ! " thought Antoinette, with a sudden 
 revulsion of feeling ; " he takes every thing from me — even 
 that poor little dog's liking. Yes, I detest him." 
 
 It was in this altered mood that she went down-stairs. 
 The dinner hour was nigh, and Antoinette at once entered 
 the sitting-room next the dining-room. She had a vague 
 hope that she might find Oliver there, but in his stead she 
 found Mrs. Reginald, who uttered an exclamation of pleased 
 surprise on seeing her. 
 
 " Why, who would have thought it ! " she cried. " I 
 fancied you were going to keep your bed for a week yet." 
 
 Antoinette demurely replied that she was almost well 
 — at least, much better. 
 
 " Yes, my dear," kindby said Mrs. Reginald. " You are 
 better, I am happy to see it, and better you must keep." 
 
 " Oh ! I am so much better," answered Antoinette, smil- 
 ing, "and it does feel pleasant, Mrs. Reginald, to be down 
 here again." 
 
 " Of course it does. Let me tell you that, among the 
 pleasant things of life, home is one. And this is your 
 home, dear; yonr grandfather's house to begin with, and 
 — of course you know it — your own later, if 3011 like it." 
 
 Antoinette's pale face became crimson, but she looked 
 at her hands folded in her lap, and said not one word. Mrs. 
 Reginald resumed : 
 
 "You see, my dear, young people think they know all 
 about love and marriage, and the truth is, they do not. 
 Now, if you went to market for a bird to put into a cage, 
 which would you buy first, the cage or the bird ? " 
 
 " The cage," answered Antoinette, after a moment's 
 thought. 
 
 "Why so, dear ? " 
 
 "Lest the bird should escape, Mrs. Reginald." 
 
 " Just so, and you Avould get a good cage with strong 
 wires, and no weak places, such a cage as your bird could 
 never get out of. Well, my dear, love is the bird, and mar-
 
 380 JOHN DOKRIEN. 
 
 riage is the cage. If you get } r our bird first, there are many 
 chances that you will not have time to choose the right 
 sort of cage to put him into, and so he may fly off with him- 
 self, and you will never catch him again. Whereas, if you 
 provide yourself with a good strong cage, and put your 
 bird into it, why, my dear, you must be very careless if he 
 ever gets out." 
 
 Antoinette looked gravely in her face — then said : 
 
 " But what if I never get the bird to put into the cage, 
 Mrs. Reginald ? " 
 
 "Why, then, my dear," briskly replied the elder lady, 
 " you will still have a good, first-rate cage for your money." 
 
 "A cage and no bird!" exclaimed Antoinette, looking 
 somewhat dismayed. 
 
 " Yes, it is hard," said Mrs. Reginald, gazing at the fire, 
 and speaking a little huskily, " it is hard to look at the 
 empty cage, and to think, ' Oh ! my bird, who was so bonny, 
 and who sang so prettily once on a time, why did you fly 
 away forever and ever, and leave me a poor, lone woman, 
 for the world to laugh at ? ' " 
 
 She had reversed the case, but Antoinette did not re- 
 mind her of it. She crept up gently to the spot where 
 Mrs. Reginald was standing on the hearth, and stole her 
 little soft hand within that lady's bony fingers. Mrs. Regi- 
 nald was neither young nor beautiful, and it seemed strange 
 that she should ever have thought of love as of an abiding 
 guest, but she had a warm heart and keen feelings, and 
 she had cast upon the faithless waters bread that had never 
 returned to her outstretched hand. 
 
 " My goodness ! " suddenly cried Mrs. Reginald, " I 
 never thought about poor dear Mrs. John's jelly. Poor 
 dear ! poor dear ! No jelly ! " 
 
 And in a moment she was gone, leaving Antoinette 
 standing alone on the hearth, looking down at the fire, and 
 turning over Mrs. Reginald's parable. 
 
 "I caught my bird first," thought Antoinette, with a 
 sigh, "and I left the cage to chance, and chance is not 
 sending it, and it is weary work keeping a poor fluttering 
 bird in one's hand all that time, especially when not a soul 
 must know about it, when no one must ever hear it sing, 
 or catch a blink of its little bright eye ! " 
 
 Antoinette's own eyes, those soft, dark eyes which were
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 381 
 
 the charm of her young face, were dim at the thought. She 
 had not time to linger over it, The door opened, and < )li- 
 ver came in. He cast a swift look round the room, thru 
 came to her with open arms. Antoinette shrank from him 
 with startled looks. 
 
 " Is any one there?" asked Oliver, in dumb show. 
 
 "No, no," she answered, audibly; "but, oh! Oliver, 
 this must not last. I mean this fear of discovery. It 
 would kill me." 
 
 "Dearest, you do not know how I have suffered," he 
 answered, soothingly. "To know you ill, to guess that 
 coming out to your aunt's had been the cause, and to be 
 powerless, not even to be able to show the anxiety I felt 
 — it was dreadful." 
 
 He spoke quite pathetically, and Antoinette held out 
 her hand, and looked at him with kind, pitying eyes. 
 
 " Poor Oliver ! " she softly whispered ; " but we must 
 never do it again — oh ! never ! " 
 
 "What! does any one suspect?" asked Oliver, with a 
 suddenly anxious look. 
 
 "Suspect!" she echoed. "O Oliver, the door was 
 locked, and — and it was John who let me in." 
 
 The shame of that moment seemed to live over again, 
 and she buried her face in her hands as she thought of it. 
 She could not see the sudden pallor which overspread the 
 countenance of her lover as she made this disclosure. 
 
 " Well," he said at length ; but by the time he spoke 
 the word he had recovered his composure. 
 
 "Well," said Antoinette, looking up, "he had seen me 
 with aunt in the street, it seems, and he actually sat up to 
 let me in. He was very kind — he always is ; he put no 
 questions ; he went to look for some wine for me, for I had 
 waited in the garden till I was very wet; but, while he 
 was away, I vowed from the bottom of my heart never 
 more to run such a risk." 
 
 " Of course not," replied Oliver, wondering at her sim- 
 plicity ; for, of course, to commit the same imprudence over 
 again was not to be thought of. " But where were you, 
 darling, when he went to look for the wine?" 
 
 "In the library," answered Antoinette; "he found me 
 out so : I was standing in the garden, and Carlo — " 
 
 " Confound the little beast ! " interrupted Oliver, im-
 
 382 JOHN DORRrESr. 
 
 patiently ; " but that is not what I mean," he added, in 
 another tone. " When you were in the library, dearest, I 
 hope you made your opportunity good, and found out some- 
 thing' about the paper-mill." 
 
 His eager black eyes were fastened on her face with a 
 look so searching that Antoinette shrank before it. A 
 strange feeling of fear came over her — a feeling that con- 
 quered even her indignation at the suggestion Oliver's 
 question implied. At length she looked up, and said as 
 bravely as she could : 
 
 " Do you mean that, while he was getting me wine to 
 warm me, as I stood shivering, I should have searched 
 among his papers for the information you wanted ? " 
 
 " Yes," composedly answered Oliver, ignoring the re- 
 sentful tone in which she spoke. " I do not suppose you 
 could ever have a better opportunity than that." 
 
 " Oliver, how could I be so base ? " asked Antoinette, 
 in a low tone. 
 
 A flash, as of lightning, shot through Oliver Black's 
 laughing eyes. Their pupils contracted, and their look 
 became so fell that Antoinette's cheek blanched ; but that 
 look was so brief that she wondered if the changing fire- 
 light had not deceived her. Indeed, she might well put 
 the question to herself. He laughed so pleasantly in her 
 face, he looked so thoroughly amused. 
 
 " Why, dearest," said he, softly, " you cannot mean 
 that such a foolish scruj>le would stop you ? " 
 
 " Foolish ! " she repeated, bewildered. 
 
 " Yes," said he, still laughing softly ; " for where would 
 be the harm ? " 
 
 " Where ? " 
 
 "Ay, where ? I do not ask you to injure him, my dar- 
 ling, t only inflict one injury upon him, and that I can- 
 not and will not repent." 
 
 " You need not," said she, with imprudent frankness ; 
 " he does not want me." 
 
 She knew nothing of men, this Antoinette. She did 
 not realize the strange sad fact that a woman is never 
 dearer to a man than when some other man seeks her. 
 
 " He has spoken to you," said Oliver, quickly. 
 
 " Oh ! no ; but I know it." 
 
 There was a pause. A step on the staircase warned
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 383 
 
 them to be careful. Antoinette took up «a little band- 
 screen, and looked at the Chinese lady depicted thereon. 
 Oliver admired the roses in a vase on the table. " Elate at 
 this time of the year," he murmured, in the languid tones 
 of a man of the world ; but the bit of acting was not need- 
 ful, the step passed by the door, and the pair were not 
 interrupted. 
 
 " We must lose no more time," he resumed, in a cool, 
 practical tone. " You may have other means of procuring 
 information, which you will not object to ; and of course 
 you will avail yourself of them." 
 
 Antoinette was silent. 
 
 "You must," he insisted, not harshly, though very 
 gravely; "our whole future now hangs on a few precarious 
 chances, which we must seize. I have always heard that 
 Fortune favors the brave — a saying which I read thus : 
 That young flirt has a kindly feeling for venturesome 
 spirits; she sits blindfolded on her wheel, and scatters 
 her prizes right and left, seeming quite impartial, but she 
 is not. She can peep through her bandage, and aim at 
 some, while she leaves others by; and these ' some' arc 
 not, as a rule, the prudent, my dear, they are the auda- 
 cious." 
 
 "And so that is your creed!" exclaimed Antoinette, 
 in a low tone — " that is your creed, Oliver! " 
 
 " My dear," he coolly answered, " if you want dogma, 
 and all that sort of thing, go to John Dorricn. He has 
 them at his finger's ends — his Bible, his ' Fathers of the 
 Church,' his ' Spiritual Combats and Gardens ' encumber his 
 table. I declare I admire him prodigiously. I can only 
 get through the newspaper and a French novel now and 
 then; yet he, wonderful young man, goes through them 
 all, and attends to business as well ! " 
 
 Antoinette heard him, and felt very heart-sick. . She 
 felt, too, that her love had embarked in a boat so light 
 that it would soon be swamped by life's bitter waters, and 
 she made a desperate effort to save it from final wreck. 
 
 " Do not, Oliver," she entreated, with something like 
 pathos. " I cannot bear to hear you speak so." 
 
 "My dear girl, I will not," he said, with his pleasant 
 smile. " I have no wish to worry you with my opinions. 
 I am not at all like your pious people — I never tease any
 
 384 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 one about these things. You will do me the justice to ac- 
 knowledge that I have never interfered with you." 
 
 He said it so plausibly that she stared at him in amaze- 
 ment. 
 
 " But you told me there was no God ! " cried Antoi- 
 nette, with unpolished bluntness of speech. 
 
 Oliver looked horrified, and raised his handsome hands 
 deprecatingly. 
 
 " Why, you little heathen," he said, " you don't mean 
 to say you do not believe in what you call God, and I — 
 well, let us say a first Great Cause. Of course there is 
 something, only I contend that no one knows what that 
 something is ; and really I do not see any necessity for such 
 knowledge. I can get on very comfortably without it." 
 
 Antoinette felt too miserable to answer him. Was 
 this the love she had dreamed of — this terribly cvnical 
 talk, with a " darling " and a " dearest " here and there to 
 sweeten its bitterness ? 
 
 " O Oliver," she said, pitifully, " have you nothing else 
 to say ? " 
 
 Her look softened him. 
 
 " My dearest," he said, almost fondly, " what am I to 
 say ? We seem to be at cross-purposes. I want to have 
 you, and I seek for the only means in my power. Lend 
 me a helping hand, and all will go well, and we shall be 
 as happy as the day is long. But remember that golden 
 opportunities are scarce, and that it is a rare mercy if we 
 have not been interrupted ten times, and that we are los- 
 ing moments more precious than diamonds, in foolish talk. 
 Let us at least agree on something. You have heard of 
 Mr. Brown's Morghens, which I am to get accepted by the 
 Museum of Saint-Ives ? That is a very safe subject. 
 Whenever I talk of them, you will know my meaning, 
 though no one else can even guess it." 
 
 " I don't understand," said Antoinette, looking bewil- 
 dered. 
 
 " Dearest, it is so easy. If I say ' I am disappointed 
 about Mr. Brown's Morghens ; I thought to get on better 
 at Saint-Ives,' you will know there is a hitch. If, on the 
 contrary, I praise Mr. Brown's Morghens, why, you will 
 conclude that I am progressing, as I am sure to do, if you 
 will but help me, you perverse darling."
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 385 
 
 " What am I to do?" asked Antoinette, -with a wearied 
 sigh. 
 
 "Oh! it I toll you it will be the old story. I want 
 you to -get me information concerning the paper-mill, that 
 is all. It can injure no one," he added, emphatically — 
 " no one, on my word, and it will really be rendering a 
 great service to your grandfather." 
 
 Antoinette heard him out patiently; then, burying her 
 face in her hands, she communed with her own heart. 
 
 " Shall I, or shall I not ? " she thought. She was very 
 wearv ; she longed for liberty, for love openly confessed, 
 for something like happiness. And, after all, why should 
 Oliver deceive her? Perhaps he did mean well, and that 
 John was unconsciously rushing to ruin, and binding down 
 her grandfather's house to some imprudent scheme preg- 
 nant with destruction. What if she were to yield, and 
 please Oliver by making at least the effort, which was all 
 he asked from her. She looked up. Her color came and 
 went, her lips quivered. 
 
 u .Mv darling," said he, taking both her bands in one 
 of his, "you will do it — I know you will." 
 
 " 1 will die first ! " said Antoinette, looking with a 
 proud smile in his face ; for youth, which thinks death so 
 remote, is ever ready to brave it, and, even as lie spoke, 
 the baseness of the treason had risen before her in all its 
 nakedness. 
 
 "Oil! very well," replied Oliver, with a resigned air, 
 " I must think of something else. These are hot-house 
 roses, of course," he added, carelessly, as the door opened, 
 and Mrs. Reginald walked in. 
 
 CHAPTER XXXIV. 
 
 Autumn had set in that year with the severity of winter. 
 The end of October was chill and overcast, and November 
 had borrowed the icy mantle of December, and Avore it 
 trimmed with a fringe of snow. To Antoinette, fresh from 
 the south, where the roses blossom in the garden, and the 
 17
 
 386 JOHN DORR1EN. 
 
 oranges ripen on the tree through all the winter months, 
 the change was mournful and depressing. She looked de- 
 spondingly at the dull and cloudy sky, shivered when she 
 was asked to go out, and watched the fall of sleet and 
 rain, intermingled with snow, with looks full of dreary 
 wonder. 
 
 " There never was such a climate," she said to Mrs. 
 Reginald ; " it is all cold, or wet, or frost, or snow, and 
 not a bit of sun." 
 
 Mrs. Reginald's only reply to this lament was the ques- 
 tion : 
 
 " What had you in La Ruya?" 
 
 " Blue skies, sun, flowers — " 
 
 " I do not mean that," interrupted the elder lady ; " I 
 mean, what had you in La Ruya besides the climate ? — 
 not books, not museums, not picture-galleries, palaces, or 
 fine churches — nothing, my dear, nothing to feed the mind. 
 I would give all the blue skies, and all the flowers, for 
 civilization." 
 
 Antoinette, who was sitting in the window of Mrs. 
 Reginald's little salon, with her cheek resting on the palm 
 of her hand, and her eyes fastened on the gray sky, dull, 
 cloudless, and low, smiled and shook her head. 
 
 "You don't know La Ruya, Mrs. Reginald," said she, 
 " or you would not speak so. I had a hundred pleasures 
 there. You can't think how delightful it is to climb the 
 mountain-side ! There is a little torrent that has not even 
 got a name, it is so little, and which has been made to flow 
 in a narrow bed, like a canal, with a path on one side, and 
 a green bank, covered with the loveliest flowers, on the 
 other. I could just stretch out my hand across and gather 
 such a heap of them ! — lavender, thyme, mint, jasmine, 
 poppies, scabious, wild-pinks, marjoram— and ferns, Mrs. 
 Reginald ; such ferns in the little rocky nooks ! — hart's- 
 tongue, maiden's-hair, asplenium, and others of which I 
 don't know the names. And then to go there of an even- 
 ing when the sun is set, and sec the little moths flitting 
 about in the gray lights, to look at the beautiful gauzy flies 
 and splendid butterflies asleep on tufts of lavender in bloom. 
 Bees, too, are very fond of lavender, and will buzz over it 
 by the hour. And ants — do you like ants, Mrs. Reginald ? 
 I did so like to go to a narrow place where the water flowed
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 387 
 
 through some big trees, and watch the ants crossing over. 
 What a mighty bridge it must have appeared to them ! and 
 how little the silly tilings seemed to guess that a wave not 
 too big to fit in the hollow of my hand might have swamped 
 thorn ! And then the wild-strawberries, Mrs. Reginald — 
 think of them, and of hunting for them, and seeing them 
 shine, red as coral, from among the green leaves ! And the 
 storms — oh! the splendid storms we had in LaRuya, when 
 the thunder rolled in the mountains, and one heard the 
 stones falling down into the torrents ! and then to see the 
 mists come and go, and the loveliest white clouds lie asleep 
 on the green mountain-side! O, Mrs. Reginald! it was 
 all so delightful ! " 
 
 "And all in the winter-time, too," pointedly said Mrs. 
 Reginald, who had listened to this tirade very patiently — 
 " poppies, ferns, bees, butterflies, and strawberries, from 
 December to April ? " 
 
 " Well, no," reluctantly acknowledged Antoinette, cool- 
 ing down from her enthusiasm, " it was not in winter-time 
 that La Ruya was so pleasant ; but it was always pleasant 
 — indeed it was." 
 
 " Of course it was," said Mrs. Reginald, rocking: herself 
 in her American chair — a habit to which she was prone — 
 and looking up at the ceiling. " And is it not the old story, 
 my dear — when we remember a face that we have loved, 
 do we not always remember it at its best ? — fresh, young, 
 and blooming ? When we remember a spot that has been 
 dear to us, is it not always spring or summer there ? There 
 is no cheat like memory — none, and it is the only revenue 
 which the poor dead Past can take against its insolent 
 young rival, the living Present. Indeed, I look upon that 
 hallucination, to which we are all subject, as the only way 
 to solve many a mystery. For instance, it is the only ra- 
 tional explanation 1 can find for John's infatuation about 
 Mr. Black. They were boys together, and John, so shrewd, 
 so penetrating, sees his old playmate through the false, de- 
 lusive prism of Memory. Poor John!" musingly added 
 Mrs. Reginald, " to think that he should be so absurd ! " 
 
 On hearing Oliver Black's name, Antoinette had changed 
 color, but, when Mrs. Reginald came to this melancholy 
 conclusion concerning John's absurdity, she started ner- 
 vously to her feet, and said, with a sort of hurry :
 
 388 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 " Mrs. John has asked me for the pattern of a knitted 
 scarf; I must go and give it to her while I think of it." 
 
 " Do," dryly replied Mrs. Reginald ; and, keeping her 
 eye fastened on the ceiling while Antoinette was leaving 
 the room, she said to her own thoughts, "I do wonder what 
 is on that girl's mind? " 
 
 Alas ! there was a weiarht of care on the mind of Mr. 
 Dorrien's granddaughter, and it was because she coidd not 
 raise it that the Paris sky seemed so gloomy, and that La 
 Ruya became as a lost paradise. " Oh ! that I had never 
 left it — that I had never come here ! " she thought ten 
 times a day. The net she had so foolishly entered was 
 closing round her more and more, and while her freedom 
 was inextricably caught in its meshes, love, alas ! was slip- 
 ping out through every loop-hole. She did not know it yet, 
 for, when the heart is true, such knowledge is slow to come ; 
 but she did know that she dreaded the chance of seeing 
 Oliver alone — that she shunned it as we shun what is dan- 
 gerous and baleful, and that, when they met in the presence 
 of others, his eye, however smiling his countenance might 
 be, watched her with cold mistrust. And most justly was 
 it so. The love that rests on falsehood and deceit carries 
 within it the poison that dooms it to a death which may 
 be sudden or lingering, but which is sure. 
 
 Careful though Antoinette had been to avoid any thing 
 resembling a private interview with her lover, she had 
 neither shunned all intercourse with him, nor wished to do 
 so. She had written to her aunt a few lines, half penitent 
 and half afraid, in which she explained that Oliver was not 
 to be angry if she could not do as he wished. And once, 
 on the staircase of La Maison Dorrien, and another time in 
 the drawing-room, when Mr. Dorrien gave a formal dinner, 
 to which Oliver was asked, they had exchanged a few hur- 
 ried words, which had filled Antoinette with terror, for the 
 first time, Mrs. Reginald, suddenly coming out of her own 
 apartment, had given the pair a sharp, inquiring look, and, 
 the second time, she had met John's earnest eyes fastened 
 on her with a long, reproachful gaze, or one, at least, which 
 her conscience so construed. Ever since then the mere 
 mention of Oliver's name by cither Mrs. Reginald or John 
 Dorrien had been to Antoinette a cause of alarm which she 
 could not conquer, even though nothing had ever occurred
 
 JOHN DOBRIEN. 389 
 
 to justify its existence. It was therefore quite enough that 
 Mrs. Reginald introduced this unwelcome topicon this No- 
 vember afternoon for Antoinette to hasten out of her pres- 
 ence in sudden fear, and to feel that she could not be too 
 far out of the reach of her searching brown eye, or of her 
 sharp, probing speech. 
 
 The trite wisdom which the ancients embodied in their 
 celebrated saying, "From Charybdis to Scylla," never 
 grows stale in the experience of daily life. That imaginary 
 peril which Antoinette had left Mrs. Reginald's presence 
 to shun met her at Mrs. Dorrien's door. Scarcely had she 
 reached it, when Oliver Black appeared by her side. She 
 looked at him mute and frightened. He gave a quick 
 glance round, then whispered, "John is below," and aloud 
 he added, " Such glorious news about Mr. Brown's Mor- 
 ghens, Miss Dorrien ! You will be glad to hear them 1 
 know." 
 
 "Oh, yes,'' answered Antoinette, faintly, " but not now 
 — I am in a hurry." 
 
 She hastily entered Mrs. Dorrien's apartment as she 
 spoke, and was laughingly followed by Oliver. 
 
 " If you want to shun the Morghens news, Miss Dor- 
 rien," he coolly remarked, " you are, as it were, rushing 
 into their very jaws. I am bringing them to Mrs. John." 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien rose to receive her visitors, and looked 
 with some surprise at Antoinette's pale, alarmed face, and 
 Oliver's half-defiant, half-amused countenance. She had 
 no suspicion, and yet she saw in these two something which 
 perplexed her. 
 
 " What is it ? " she asked, almost sharpl) — " what has 
 happened ? " 
 
 But in a moment Oliver had charmed away her dawning 
 mistrust. "With his most winning smiles, in his most de- 
 lightful manner, he had entered on the theme of Mr. Brown's 
 Morghens, and made the pleasantest little romance out of 
 them. Mrs. Dorrien heard him, and was enchanted. It was 
 all so nice, and Mr. Brown would be so pleased, and Mr. 
 Black had been so kind; but John — where was John ? and 
 why had he not come up with Mr. Black? 
 
 "John was busy," answered Oliver, covertly watching 
 Antoinette, who all this time had been moving about the 
 room, looking for worsteds, sorting the various colors, and
 
 390 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 seeming intent upon the selection. Yet she had not missed 
 a word that Oliver had spoken. What did it mean, or did 
 it mean any thing ? The girl's heart sank within her as she 
 listened to him. His speech had a ring of triumph in it, 
 but then she apprehended almost equally the success or 
 the failure of the schemes in which he had involved her. 
 For did not success imply the ruin of John Dorrien, who 
 had been so generous and so true, and was not failure the 
 death-blow to all she had hoped in ? 
 
 At length Oliver left, and she was released from the 
 suspense in which his presence kept her. 
 
 " Such an amiable young man," murmured Mrs. Dor- 
 rien, " and so attached to my dear boy. It is to please 
 John, you know, that he has taken all that trouble about 
 Mr. Brown's Morghens. It is so nice -to see two young 
 men such fast friends as these are ; but, then, John lias 
 been so kind to Mr. Black, and he knows it." 
 
 Not one word could Antoinette answer, but, turning 
 
 7 7 (^ 
 
 almost deathly pale, she went up to the fireplace, and, 
 standing on the hearth, looked down at the blazing losrs. 
 "He burned his verses here," she thought, "and that is 
 his reward, treason — treason ! Is it always so in life, I 
 wonder ? Are there some who sow, and others who reap ? " 
 
 She pondered over the question, while Mrs. Dorrien 
 went on with her small talk. It haunted her while she was 
 knitting Mrs. Dorrien's scarf, and it was with her still as 
 she sat at dinner next to John, and heard him laugh gayly 
 — Mr. Dorrien and Mr. Brown were not present — at Mrs. 
 Reginald's comments on the Morghens. 
 
 " Poor Mr. Brown," she said, pathetically. " I suppose 
 he would have petrified if it were not for these Morghens. 
 I suppose all men want something to keep them alive. 
 With the young it is love or pleasure, or that sort of thing ; 
 and with the old it is Morghens, or medals, or autographs, 
 or any other hobby." 
 
 " And the ladies, Mrs. Reginald," said John, " what 
 have the ladies got to prevent them from petrifying ? " 
 
 " Needlework, to be sure. Oh ! you may laugh ; it is a 
 wonderful invention, for are there not stitching, back-stitch- 
 ing, felling, hemming, herring-boning, darning, and all the 
 rest of it ? There is nothing like needlework, John." 
 
 John laughed. How light-hearted and happy he seemed,
 
 JOHN DORRIKN. 391 
 
 while she, miserable Antoinette, felt oppressed with care ! 
 The mere mention of the Morpheus made her heart ache, 
 and when, after dinner, Mrs. Reginald wanted her to join 
 them in her .sitting-room, she excused herself. 
 
 " My head aches," she answered, and on that plea she 
 went up to her room. The weight of life was upon her, 
 and it seemed more than she could hear. Depressed and 
 weary, she sat down on a chair, and, clasping' her hauls 
 above her head, she looked before ber with sad eyes thai 
 saw not. Then, little by little, outward objects stole on 
 her inward sense. The cold, waxed floor, the white bed, 
 the toilet-table, with its oval mirror, in which the flicker- 
 ing light of her candle was reflected, grew upon her one by 
 one, till she started to her feet in a sudden tremor: a little 
 white note was lying on her table. She ran to it, and took 
 it up with a beating heart. What evil, what sorrow were 
 at hand, that he had written to her, and taken such means 
 to convey the news which she had learned to dread ? 
 
 She opened the letter of her lover with a trembling 
 hand, read it, then colored violently with the suddenness 
 of a great relief, and a great joy, for all Oliver Black had 
 written was : " All's well, Good-by, darling, for a week." 
 
 A week's reprieve, a week's free, fearless life ! Antoi- 
 nette could have laughed aloud. Her dark ej'es sparkled, 
 she ran to her glass, she smoothed her hair, she settled the 
 crimson knot in it, she smiled at herself; she felt light, 
 buoyant, happy, and she never asked herself why she fit 
 so. She took one or two turns round the room, came back 
 to the glass, frowned to see that the crimson knot had got 
 all wrong, made it all right again, then, gay and light as a 
 bird, she slipped out of her room, and skipped down-stairs 
 to Mrs. Reginald's door. There she paused, and even stand- 
 ing thus alone on the dark landing she hung her head, and 
 felt shy and bashful, as she knocked softly and doubtfully, 
 and heard John's voice reading aloud. 
 
 "Come in," said Mrs. Reginald's deep tones. Antoi- 
 nette opened the door, and, with a coy look at the fired it 
 group before her, said : 
 
 " Will }^ou have me now, Mrs. Reginald." 
 
 She looked very pretty thus framed by the dark door- 
 way, with the crimson ribbon in her hair, and the crimson 
 knot on her breast. She half bent forward in the timid,
 
 392 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 beseeching attitude of one who doubted her welcome, one 
 hand holding the door open, the other 'half hidden in the 
 folds of her dark silk dress. That soft, dainty grace which 
 was her charm, was in her bearing and her aspect, and se- 
 cured at once Mrs. Reginald's cordial greeting. 
 
 " Don't look so much like a little shy mouse, but come 
 in," she said, kindly ; " we'll not eat you." 
 
 " I hope not," replied Antoinette, with a low laugh. 
 She closed the door and came forward, and John Dorrien 
 met her half-way, and asked about her headache. Oh ! it 
 was gone, replied Antoinette, with her eyes averted, quite 
 gone. She was quite well again. She took the low chair 
 he gave her, and placed it nigh his mother, who greeted 
 her kindly, and thence she looked up at Mrs. Reginald. 
 
 " My dear child," said that lady, tartly, " you need not 
 look so frightened. I tell you we are not pussies going to 
 devour you." 
 
 " I am not frightened — no, indeed I am not," said An- 
 toinette ; " and I came because I felt sure it was so nice 
 here with you — and it is nice." 
 
 Her shy, dark eyes went round the room, so warm, so 
 glowing, so pleasant with the wind and rain without, and 
 within the wood-fire burning merrily on the hearth. Invol- 
 untarily, perhaps, she ended that brief survey with John 
 Dorrien as he sat on the other side of the fireplace, leaning 
 against the white-marble mantel-piece and looking down 
 at her. He smiled as their eyes met. 
 
 " You do not know how snug we are here," he said, 
 " or you would come oftener and join us." 
 
 " Yes, dear," put in Mrs. Dorrien, " I wonder you so 
 often stay in your room of an evening. It must be so 
 dull." 
 
 " She does not come because she is a perverse mouse," 
 answered Mrs. Reginald ; " don't contradict," she added, 
 lifting up a bony forefinger and fastening her brown eye 
 on the young girl's blushing face. " You are a fanciful, 
 capricious mouse ; deny if it you can ! " 
 
 Antoinette neither denied nor got angry. She felt too 
 happy for displeasure. She only bestowed one of her most 
 winning smiles on Mrs. Reginald, and said softly : 
 
 " Well, am I not right to stay away if I feel naughty, 
 Mrs. Reginald ? "
 
 JOnN DORRIEN. 393 
 
 " Then when you come you feel good," was the prompt 
 rejoinder. " Well, my dear, all I can say is this : Good- 
 ness is very becoming to you, or it is the red ribbon in 
 your hair." 
 
 " Oh ! the red ribbon, by all means," said Antoinette, 
 becoming very rosy at the little compliment Mrs. Reginald 
 chose to pay her looks. 
 
 But Mrs. Reginald thought it was the goodness, and 
 said so. She also thought she would put that goodness to 
 the proof by making Antoinette useful. She accordingly 
 gave her a tangled skein of thread to unravel, and Lade 
 John resume his book — a popular novel. John Dorcien 
 had a musical voice, and read welL Antoinette felt in a 
 delightfully dreamy mood as she divided her attention be- 
 tween her skein and his reading. Sometimes a subtile 
 knot claimed all her mind and skill ; and sometimes, let- 
 ting the tangled threads lie on her lap, she looked at the 
 fire, and listened to the reader, and felt that she might let 
 life go by for a while, and allow the perplexities of her lot 
 to drop out of her memory. 
 
 "Your mother has gone to sleep, John," said Mrs. Regi- 
 nald, " you may put down the book. It is no great thing." 
 
 "Say you don't like novels, Mrs. Reginald," said John, 
 as he put down the volume. 
 
 "I do like novels," answered Mrs. Reginald, decisively ; 
 " but they must be good, and there are one or two people 
 in this story that I meet everywhere, and am tired of. I 
 hate the mercenary young lady, and the loving one is a 
 bore. As to the unattractive young man, so self-denj ing 
 and so good, who falls in love with the beauty, and is 
 trampled upon by her, he is my particular aversion. I 
 prefer the villain, for, at least, no one expects me to like 
 7tim. n 
 
 " What, not like that good, unattractive young man, 
 Mrs. Reginald ? " said John. 
 
 "No," answered the lady, almost grimly; "I want to 
 know what unfascinating people mean by falling in love 
 with the fascinating ones, and why a man expects a girl to 
 look over in his own case the want of those qualities 
 which charm him in hers? The beauty is silly and heart- 
 less, and he loves her, and he actually wants her to love 
 him, because he has both heart and sense ! Why does he
 
 394 J0HN DORRIEN. 
 
 not like a dull, plain girl," asked Mrs. Reginald, with a 
 short, scornful laugh, " so good, so sensible, eh ? " 
 
 " The best thing would be a story without love, Mrs. 
 Reginald." 
 
 " A story without love ! I would not give a farthing — 
 no, nor half a farthing — for a story without love," answered 
 the lad}'', warmly. 
 
 " And yet life has many thrilling and pathetic histories," 
 began John. 
 
 " Pathetic nonsense," interrupted Mrs. Reginald ; " there 
 is no pathos without love. Don't interrupt me. I know 
 what you are going to say. Is there only one kind of 
 love ? Rut shall I tell you why that love is always the 
 love chosen ? " 
 
 " Do, if you please." 
 
 " Because it is the most perfect of all loves, to be sure. 
 Friends, brothers and sisters, parents and children, all part, 
 or may part ; but man and woman, once bound by love, 
 must cleave to one another until death divides them. My 
 dear boy, love is the only ideal here below, the only bless- 
 ing, says the marriage-service, which original sin could not 
 take away." 
 
 " But you are talking of marriage." 
 
 " Of course I am ; and what is love but marriage ? — 
 and what is marriage but love? Do you young things 
 think," said Mrs. Reginald, glancing from John Dorrien, 
 on his side of the fireplace, to Antoinette, on her low chair 
 by her side — " do you think, I say, that an old woman such 
 as I am gives up love when her hair turns gray ? Do you 
 think even that, if she happens to have been wrecked in 
 her day, she sits on the shore and rails at that sea which 
 once looked so beautiful and so tempting ? No, no," con- 
 tinued Mrs. Reginald, rocking herself in her chair, and 
 looking at the fire, perhaps because her brown eye was 
 dim, " one's outside and one's own hard lot have nothing 
 to do with the truth, and if the story be not a love-story, 
 why, it is no story at all," added Mrs. Reginald, in her 
 coolest and most matter-of-fact tone. 
 
 John Dorrien laughed gayly ; his mother woke with a 
 little start, and Antoinette thought, "I wonder what he 
 thinks about love ! " 
 
 "And is that the fashion after which you untangle a
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 395 
 
 skein?" cried Mrs. Reginald, a little indignantly, as she 
 saw Antoinette toying with the thread on her lap. 
 
 The young girl started and blushed and stammered a 
 little apology, and John Dorrien interfered. 
 
 " Allow me," said he ; "I have a skill in unraveling.*' 
 
 " So 3'ou have," said Mrs. Reginald, shrewdly. " That 
 boy would unravel any thing, my dear." 
 
 John Dorrien was taking the skein from Antoinette's 
 hands. She quickly raised her eyes to his face, with a 
 soft, inquiring look. Yes, she could believe that those 
 brilliant gray eyes, so searching though so kind, could un- 
 ravel the web of many a mystery. 
 
 "He knows all about me," she thought. " How little, 
 how worthless I am ! And he pities and forgives me, and 
 cares no more about me than about the skein his hand is 
 now taking from mine." 
 
 She was turning away with a throb of pain when he 
 arrested her. 
 
 " Oh, but you must help me," he said. " I never could 
 unravel alone so tangled a skein as is this." 
 
 " Then put your chair near hers, John," said Mrs. Regi- 
 nald, a little impatienthy, " and do not pull my skein about 
 so, will you ? " 
 
 " Let me hold it, dear," said Mrs. Dorrien, addressing 
 Antoinette ; " you look tired." 
 
 " I protest against your interfering, Mrs. John," per- 
 emptorily said Mrs. Reginald. " You look tired." 
 
 Well, Mrs. John thought she was tired, and rising, 
 bade them good-night. 
 
 "And now, while you two work, I'll play," said Mis. 
 Reginald, leaning back in her chair and covering her face 
 with her handkerchief. 
 
 She was soon fast asleep, and, save for her sound 
 breathing and the crackling of the wood on the hearth, the 
 room became silent. Antoinette held one end of the skein, 
 while John Dorrien was unraveling the other end, and 
 neither spoke. 
 
 " Antoinette," he said at length, " is there a new trou- 
 ble on your mind — any thing 1 could help you in ? " 
 
 He spoke low. She shook her head, and did not answer. 
 
 "Confide in me," he urged; and this time he spoke in 
 a whisper.
 
 396 J0HN DORRIEN. 
 
 Antoinette looked at the fire. 
 
 " I have nothing to say," she answered, with sad apathy. 
 " I wish to forget, John. I came here this evening to be 
 happy. Why will you not let me be so a little while ? " 
 
 She looked up at him. Her eyes were dim, her lips 
 quivered; there was a pitiful, appealing meaning in her 
 face which would have moved a harder heart than that of 
 John Dorrien. He stooped nearer to her and looked at 
 her earnestly. 
 
 "Antoinette," he said, "I told you from the first that 
 I was your friend — your only friend. Why would you not 
 have faith in me ? " 
 
 " Where is the use of faith, when one's life is as tan- 
 gled as that skein ?" she answered, with impatient bitter- 
 ness. 
 
 " You could not unravel that skein alone," he said, qui- 
 etly ; " but I can do it for you." 
 
 She hung her head, and made him no reply. 
 
 '• You are very dear to me," he continued, " and I 
 should like to do for you what you do not seem as if you 
 im mid do for yourself. How could you, when it is with mine 
 that the skein of your life is so inextricably tangled ! 
 Have you never felt it ? Have you never understood that, 
 to cut asunder the threads which bind our two destinies, 
 might be death to either, or to both ? " 
 
 " What death ? " she asked, under her breath. 
 
 " The death of faith, of hope — of more, Antoinette." 
 
 She could not help raising her eyes to his. Her heart 
 was pierced with sorrow, and yet it throbbed with joy. 
 
 " I am his enemy," she thought — " his mortal enemy, 
 and he sees it ; and yet he is my friend — my dear, true 
 friend, and I see it. Our fates are mingled, as he says — 
 tangled together, so that it is death to divide them ; and I 
 would give the world that this had never been ; and yet — 
 yet I am glad that it is so." 
 
 Something of the passionate tumult in her heart ap- 
 peared in her upraised face. She leaned back in her chair, 
 forgetting the skein on her lap. John, too, let it lie there, 
 and read her troubled countenance very intently. 
 
 " Trust in me," he said ; and again his voice sank so 
 low it was almost a whisper ; " trust in me, and I will make 
 it all right."
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 397 
 
 Antoinette did not answer ; she felt bewitched and 
 dreaming. 
 
 " Do not fear," he continued, soothingly ; " fear nothing 
 and no one, but when every thing looks black and threaten- 
 ing, remember that I am by." 
 
 She roused herself to say : 
 
 " But what if I am against you — against myself — what 
 can you do to serve me, John ? " 
 
 She spoke with sorrowful defiance, but he only smiled. 
 
 " I am a good swimmer," he said, " and if you capsize 
 the boat, why, I must bear you to the shore." 
 
 "Do not," she replied, turning away with a great rush 
 of grief coming up to her dark eyes ; "if 1 feel myself 
 sinking I shall cling to you as drowning people always do, 
 and we shall both go down to the bottom, John," she added, 
 trying to laugh. 
 
 "No, we shall not," he answered, almost sharply. 
 
 "Yes, Ave shall," said she; "therefore, when you feel 
 tossed into the waves think of yourself, and let me sink or 
 swim — whatever my lot may be, I shall have deserved it 
 richly." 
 
 " Though vou had deserved it ten times," said he, ve- 
 hemently, " I would perish with you rather than forsake 
 you." 
 
 She did not love him, nor did she think that he loved 
 her, kind though was his language, kind though were bis 
 looks, but his generous friendship touched her heart to the 
 quick. She longed to cling to him as to a brother, and to 
 call out from the depths of her sorrowful heart, " O my 
 friend, my friend, why did we not meet a year ago — when 
 not a shadow need have come between our friendship ? " 
 
 But she was mute ; shame, pride, honor, another love 
 kept her silent. He did not seem to require her language. 
 
 " You cannot get rid of me," said he ; " we are in the 
 same boat, you know, and sink or swim together. As to 
 letting you go, or forsaking you in any fashion, do not 
 think that I ever will." 
 
 She did not know how to construe his meaning. Was 
 it that he would never forego his claim to her, or simply 
 that, spite the mire of treachery and falsehood into which 
 she had floundered, he would be true to her ? " It must be 
 that," thought Antoinette ; " he would never steal another
 
 398 JOHN DOKRIEN. 
 
 man's love, nor take the second place when he should have 
 the first. He knows I am getting myself into dreadful 
 trouble, and he will be true to me, and he will marry Made- 
 moiselle Basnage." 
 
 They sat thus in the faded fire-light glow, with its flicker- 
 ing light playing on their two faces ; and the lamp stood 
 behind them, and Mrs. Reginald, whom they had forgotten, 
 was snoring in her chair. Antoinette felt languidly happy. 
 It was pleasant to sit thus with John Dorrien,to know him 
 so kind and true, and to be away for a little while from 
 her trouble. That trouble would come back spite all his 
 goodness — it would come back, oh ! how well she knew 
 it, but it was gone for the time being, and she knew that 
 too. 
 
 " O John," she could not help saying, " you are so 
 good, and your goodness does seem so to take care and 
 trouble away ! " 
 
 The light of the fervor with which she had spoken was 
 still in her eyes, the smile her words had called up was still 
 on his lips, her hand, which he had taken and pressed, was 
 still clasped in his, when the door opened, and, without a 
 word of warning, Oliver Black entered. He paused one 
 moment, saw Antoinette's frightened eyes, and vain attempt 
 to withdraw her hand which John forcibly detained, Saw 
 John Dorrien's undisturbed face looking round at him over 
 his shoulder; then came forward with a smile on his lips, to 
 which no gleam of light in his eyes answered. 
 
 " I beg your pardon, Mrs. Reginald," said he, as that 
 lady woke up with a start at the sound of the closing door, 
 "I feel this is a terrible piece of impertinence in me, but I 
 have not one moment to spare ; if I miss the 11.50 train," 
 he drew out his w r atch and looked at it, " I am undone." 
 
 "And what have I to do with the 11.50 train?" tartly 
 asked Mrs. Reginald, sitting up. 
 
 " Why, nothing ; but this John Dorricn, wdiom I want 
 urgently, is in your possession. It is a case of habeas cor- 
 pus, if t may so say, and I want him. Lend him to me for 
 five minutes only, and I promise to return him safe and 
 sound." 
 
 lie laid his hand on John Dorrien's shoulder as he spoke 
 thus, never once looking at Antoinette, who, pale and 
 scared, sat staring at him in mute appeal for mercy. John
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 399 
 
 Dorrien rose, his pleasant genial face unclouded, and he fol- 
 lowed Oliver Black out of the room. 
 
 " I am afraid I interrupted you," said Oliver, coolly, as 
 soon as the door had closed upon them, " for I believe you 
 were actually making love to Miss Dorrien." 
 
 " Oh, no," quietly answered John ; " we are good friends, 
 but there is no love-making between us." 
 
 "And you were assuring her of your friendship when I 
 came in ? " 
 
 " My dear fellow, did you come back to catechise me 
 about Miss Dorrien ? " 
 
 Oliver Black tried to laugh, but he was ill at ease. He 
 spoke no more of Antoinette ; he talked, and at some length, 
 of the business that had brought him back, but he could 
 not do so with his usual careless manner. He was jealous, 
 and Iago himself, had he been suffering from jealousy when 
 he betrayed the Moor, could not have been self-possessed. 
 At leugth he left. The two friends shook hands and parted 
 at the head of the perron. 
 
 "The little traitress!" angrily thought Oliver, as he 
 jumped into the cab that had brought him. " I know what 
 to think of her now." 
 
 And John Dorrien, turning back into the library, thought, 
 with a weary sigh, "Is that the skein I am to unravel?" 
 
 And Antoinette, in her room, thought, with a sort of 
 dull despair, " I suppose it is all over now, and that I am 
 really undone." 
 
 And Mrs. Reginald, putting on her nightcap, paused as 
 she tied the strings, and thought : " There is something 
 going all wrong — I know it; but, though I don't know a 
 bit what it is, one thing I am sure of — that nasty little Mr. 
 Black is at the bottom of it." 
 
 CHAPTER XXXV. 
 
 Forgetfulness is the happy gift of youth. Antoinette 
 spent a sleepless night, and was depressed the next morn- 
 ing, but little by little she rallied, and in the afternoon she
 
 400 J HN DORRIEN. 
 
 was herself again ; for, after all, what had she done that 
 Oliver should be angry with her ? Her conscience ac- 
 quitted her of all save the feeling of relief at his absence, 
 and how could she help that ? Whatever he might think, 
 Antoinette knew that she did not prefer John to him. 
 She might lament that untowardness in her fate which had 
 put her in the position of being false to so true and so sin- 
 cere a friend as her cousin, but that regret was not liking 
 — not the liking she had given, and still gave, to Oliver. 
 And he, Oliver, was jealous ; she had read it in his eyes, 
 in his smile, in his whole aspect. Jealous of her ! — poor 
 Oliver, how little he knew her ! Oh, if she could only tell 
 him ! — if she could only explain, and make all right ! — if 
 she could only assure him that, though she did not always 
 obey him, she always loved him dearly, and never for a 
 moment cared — in that way, at least — for any one else. 
 But surely he must know that much, and if he did not — if 
 he kept any bitter, painful doubt on his mind — surely, too, 
 she would find it easy to set him right when he came back. 
 And in the mean while Antoinette, with her conscience at 
 rest, and her mind undisturbed by any apprehension for 
 that present which is so much to the young, with her heart 
 softened toward Oliver by the thought of his secret pain, 
 Antoinette, we say, felt at ease again, and forgot that the 
 sky of Paris was like lead, and that the November days 
 were short and dull ; indeed, as if to justify her oblivion of 
 the latter fact, the day which followed Oliver's departure 
 might have been borrowed from September, it was so bright, 
 so clear, so mellow. The baleful fog had melted away, the 
 heavy gray clouds had vanished, and a bright, warm sun- 
 shine shone in a sky of azure. The trees in the garden had 
 not yet lost all their foliage, and their red and yellow leaves 
 looked gorgeous in the golden light of early noon. Antoi- 
 nette, looking at them from her window, felt light as a 
 bird, and went to seek Mrs. Reginald in that lady's sitting- 
 room. 
 
 "O Mrs. Reginald," said she, breaking in upon her, 
 "the sun's shining, and the garden is so delightful ! Will 
 you not come down a bit ? " 
 
 " Thank you, my dear, my store of rheumatism is already 
 in. I am not like you, under the happy necessity of pro- 
 viding any for the future."
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 401 
 
 Antoinette was nettled. "I am sure I shall never have 
 rheumatism,'" she said, almost indignantly. 
 
 " Now, I like that, it is such nonsense," exclaimed Mrs. 
 Reginald, with emphatic approval. " Don't look cross, 
 dear; I do like nonsense. I do consider it one of the ne- 
 cessities of existence. Nonsense — why, it is the most de- 
 lightful thing in this world. Children, young people, lovers, 
 and clever men and women, are full of it. Wise children 
 are not to be endured. Wise young people and lovers, 
 ditto, ditto. As to wise clever men and women, they are 
 simply absurd. There never yet was genius without a grain 
 of folly. Take my word for it, dear, we all wear the cap 
 at the best of times, and wo like, or ought to like, the 
 music of our jingling bells. 'Tis only fools — because they 
 are born to it — that never know what sort of head-gear 
 adorns them, and they look so solemn and so grave under it 
 that half the time the world docs not find them out." 
 
 "Then don't be too wise, Mrs. Reginald," gaylv said 
 Antoinette, " and come down to the garden with me." 
 
 But, spite her love of paradox, Mrs. Reginald was not 
 inclined to perpetrate this particular piece of folly, and An- 
 toinette had to go down and get in her store of rheumatism 
 alone. There was a quiet charm about this little bit of 
 green, of sunshine and blue sky, set in the stonv heart of 
 the great city, and Antoinette stood still to enjoy it and 
 look around her. 
 
 The early frosts had nipped the last flowers, but a hardy 
 green plant still spread its wide leaves round the edge anil 
 down the sides of a gray stone-vase, and the river-god 
 looked warm and benignant in the pale, yellow r sunlight. 
 A brown sparrow hopped fearlessly in the path before An- 
 toinette, and picked up the crumbs which she had brought 
 down to feed it, Withered leaves, which had fallen since 
 the gardener had raked the alleys, were lying on the ground 
 and crackled beneath the young girl's feet as she walked on. 
 One lighted on her dark head, rested in the plaits of her 
 hair — for she had recklessly gone down bareheaded — and, 
 lying there, seemed the memento mori of Nature's sad 
 autumn to her youth's joyous spring. 
 
 For she felt happy, very happy. Nothing could cherk 
 the feeling just then. It rose buoyant in her heart, as the 
 waters in that fountain which the old navigators sought
 
 402 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 may have welled in the island lying in unknown seas, and 
 never discovered yet by man. That November sunbeam 
 which had pierced the autumn sky was as potent as an en- 
 chanter's wand over the southern girl. Fear and doubt 
 fled, and even conscience was silenced, and she was so glad 
 that she felt really good. 
 
 So she walked on, feeding not one sparrow, but a whole 
 bevy by this, and softly singing to herself the refrain of an 
 old Provencal song, a far-away echo from the days of the 
 troubadours. 
 
 "My dear," said a voice behind her, "how can you 
 be so imprudent '? Remember that this is November. 
 You w r ill take cold, or have toothache. John would be 
 so vexed." 
 
 So spoke Mrs. Dorrien, in a tone of maternal solicitude. 
 She had seen Antoinette walking bareheaded in the gar- 
 den, and had come down to remonstrate. The young girl 
 turned round, and, laughing, showed two rows of white 
 teeth that feared nothing as yet from that ache against which 
 we have the authority of Shakespeare himself for saying 
 that no philosopher's patience is proof. 
 
 " Thank you, Mrs. John," said she ; " but I am so used 
 to go about bareheaded that — " 
 
 " Not in this climate," authoritatively interrupted Mrs. 
 Dorrien, producing a dainty white woolen hood and cape, 
 and putting it on Antoinette's head, and tying it under 
 her chin. 
 
 Miss Dorrien submitted with a resigned air, and the 
 operation was not over when an " O little mother, how can 
 you ? " most reproachfully uttered, made them both look 
 round. 
 
 John Dorrien stood by them with a look of concern on 
 his pleasant face. 
 
 " How can you be so imprudent ?" he said. " Antoinette, 
 who is j^oung and strong, may venture out on this treach- 
 erous sunny day, but that you, who are so susceptible, 
 should do such a thing, is really too bad." 
 
 Antoinette laughed gayly at seeing the tables thus 
 turned on Mrs. Dorrien, while that lady proceeded to ex- 
 plain how she had been drawn down by the sight of An- 
 toinette's delinquency ; but, before she had gone through 
 halt her justification, she broke off, saying:
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 403 
 
 " My dear boy, you have had some annoyance this 
 morning." 
 
 Antoinette looked quickly up into John's face, and saw 
 that it was grave and clouded. 
 
 "It is only a vexation, mother," he answered, with a 
 wearied sigh, for Vexation had been a daily visitor of late, 
 and John was getting tired of looking in her peevish face. 
 
 " Only a vexation," repeated his mother, still anxious, 
 while Antoinette's heart beat at the thought that Oliver 
 might have something 1 to do with this. " What kind of a 
 vexation, my dear boy? Is it something you may talk 
 of?" she added, trying to smile. "Tell us about it, dear, 
 if you can." 
 
 "There is not much to tell, little mother. • You have 
 heard me talk of Verney ? " 
 
 " Oh ! yes, that clever fellow — that genius ! " exclaimed 
 Mrs. John Dorrien, suddenly interested. 
 
 " Well, then, be has just left us, without a word of 
 warning." 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien's face fell. 
 
 " And that is a vexation ! " she said. 
 
 "Worse — it is a real trouble. We have large and 
 pressing orders for New York. Even with him to work 
 lor us, we had no time to lose, not a day, not an hour. 
 Without him, we may consider our orders as good as 
 lost." 
 
 "But how did he come to do such a thing ?" asked 
 Mrs. Dorrien, with a face 1 full of concern. " Had he no en- 
 gagement with you ? Can you not make him keep to it, 
 or get him punished ? " 
 
 " When we know where he is, we can certainly inflict 
 some punishment upon him," answered John ; " but by that 
 time, little mother, where will our orders be ?" 
 
 " Oh dear ! oh dear ! " she said, with a sigh, " what a 
 worry all this must be to you, my dear boy ! I suppose 
 some one must have tempted him away?" 
 
 " Oh ! yes," carelessly answered John, " there are plen- 
 ty of people ready to take this thing up. I never thought 
 we could keep it long to ourselves; but, while it was ours 
 only, it was all clear gain — now avc have got a check,- for 
 we lose time, and others will try to step into our shoes." 
 
 " But who can have done it ? " said Mrs. Dorrien.
 
 404 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 " I fancy Monsieur Basnage had a hand in it," replied 
 John. "He may have other customers who would like 
 Verney." 
 
 " Monsieur Basnage ! " exclaimed Mrs. Dorrien, in a 
 voice full of dismay. " How shameful ! But I thought he 
 was a friend of the firm. How or why did he do such a 
 thing, John ? " 
 
 "Oh ! because we are not in his good graces just now," 
 answered John, laughing. " I believe the fault is mine. 
 You must not be so amazed, little mother, it is all in the 
 way of business, and we cannot tax him with it, and it 
 may not be true, either; but I must go and give Mr. Dor- 
 rien this piece of news, so good-morning, little mother." 
 
 Antoinette's gladness was all gone. She looked after 
 him with troubled eyes. Had she an} 7 share in this mis- 
 hap ? "Was it because Monsieur Basnage had found out 
 any thing about the paper-mill, or because John had re- 
 fused to see his daughter, that he had played such an un- 
 kindly trick on his old business friends ? 
 
 " Mrs. John," said she, suddenly addressing her com- 
 panion, " what was it this wonderful and wicked Verney 
 did for John ? " 
 
 " My dear, he did all the vignettes," answered Mrs. 
 John, dolefully, " those pretty devices and emblems that 
 you have seen on our note-paper. Oh ! it is a very sad 
 affair, and it all falls on my poor boy." 
 
 " And is that all ? " exclaimed Antoinette, opening her 
 eyes very wide. " Is it no more than that ? " 
 
 " No more ! " echoed Mrs. Dorrien, almost offended ; 
 "and is it not plenty? Did you not hear John saying 
 that the firm will lose the orders for New York ? — and do 
 you know what loss means for such a firm as ours ? Why, 
 thousands upon thousands, my dear," added Mrs. Dorrien, 
 straightening herself up. 
 
 " But surely some one else could be found to do that 
 work in his stead," ejaculated Antoinette. 
 
 " Oh ! of course, with time ; but don't you sec, dear, 
 that it must be good work, well done, and at once — at 
 once — and this is a branch peculiar to us. Dear John 
 started it. No one else has taken it up, and the men who 
 could fill that horrid Verney's place are not ready yet. It 
 is a great trouble to my dear boy, I am sure."
 
 JOHN DORRIEX. 405 
 
 Antoinette was silent, and looked very thoughtful. She 
 said not a word as they entered the house, and went up- 
 stairs; and when she spoke at Mrs. Dorrien's door, it was 
 to excuse herself from entering 1 that lady's apartment. Mrs. 
 Dorrien put on a resigned air, her victim air, but Antoinette 
 did not relent, and repaired to her own room. All she did 
 there was to take a little Russia-leather pocket-book from 
 the drawer of her work-table. She did not venture to look 
 at its contents, lest her heart should fail her, but, slipping 
 it into her pocket, she stole down-stairs as stealthily as if 
 she were bent on some guilty errand, and, pausing at the 
 door of the library, knocked so softly, that no one, it seemed 
 to her, could hear that timid petition for admittance. But 
 she had been heard, for John's voice at once said, " Come 
 in," and Antoinette, obeying the summons, found herself 
 in the presence not merely of John, but of Mr. Dorrien. A 
 smile of welcome broke over her cousin's face as he saw 
 her, but her grandfather put on an air so remote, that An- 
 toinette stood mute and abashed before the two. 
 
 " I am very sorry," she stammered, " but I thought J >lm 
 was disengaged, and could spare a few moments." 
 
 " Certainly," replied John, " as soon as — " 
 
 But Mr. Dorrien, waving his hand, said, a little dry- 
 
 " This evening, when he is disengaged, John will be 
 very happy to attend to you, my dear." 
 
 "I came upon business," said Antoinette, gravely, for 
 opposition at once rendered her fearless. 
 
 Mr. Dorrien stared as much as a courteous man can stare 
 at a lady, even though she should happen to be his grand- 
 daughter, then more dryly than before : 
 
 "Indeed! I hope I do not interfere." 
 
 " Oh, no," said Antoinette, blushing at his pointed tone, 
 bul casting a rather imploring look at John, who immediately 
 said, in his kindest voice: 
 
 " What business is it ? What can I do for you ? " 
 
 "Oh, nothing," she quickly replied, " but I hoped I could 
 do something for you, John. When you showed me the 
 designs for the papers the other day, I amused myself with 
 thawing some ; if they could be of any use, I should be so 
 glad," she added, hesitatingly. 
 
 Mr. Dorrien raised bis eyebrows.
 
 406 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 " You mean well, my dear," he began, "but you had 
 better wait till another day, when John is more at lei- 
 sure." 
 
 "Oh, but I have them in my pocket-book," persisted 
 Antoinette, taking the Russia-leather-bound book from her 
 pocket. 
 
 John said nothing, but held out his hand. Antoinette 
 showed him the page on which she had sketched her de- 
 signs, and watched his face anxiously. John uttered not a 
 word, but handed the book to Mr. Dorrien, who, taking out 
 his eye-glass, surveyed his granddaughter's drawings with 
 a slow, critical gaze. 
 
 They were very finely and very skillfully drawn, some in 
 Indian-ink, and some in water-colors. The first that met 
 his eye was the demure face of his gray Angora cat, with 
 a pink ribbon tied round her neck, and falling in a graceful 
 bow on her milk-white breast. This little oval portrait of 
 feline loveliness appeared as if framed in an elegant gold 
 locket, and was an excellent likeness. Minette's furry 
 ears, whiskers, and little white nose and forehead, were 
 true to the life, and elicited a murmur of admiration from 
 Mr. Dorrien. 
 
 "Very good — very clever, really," he could not help 
 saying. 
 
 " And original," put in John. 
 
 "Decidedly original. And so is this." 
 
 The drawing which Mr. Dorrien commended was on 
 the same small scale as the first. It represented a dragon- 
 fly, with gauze-like wings of blue and silver, and long, thin 
 body, hovering over some tall reeds. Mr. Dorrien liked 
 this, but preferred Minette. "And what is this? A par- 
 rot ! On my word, very clever, very clever ! " 
 
 Polly stood on her perch, her red head turned on one 
 side, parrot-fashion. Her black eye seemed to be looking 
 at 3'ou curiously, and there Avas a meaning in her black 
 hooked bill and tenacious black claws. Antoinette had 
 lavished the richest colors in her palette on this tropical 
 bird, her breast was of the brightest green and gold, crim- 
 son and azure, mingled on her wings and long tail. 
 
 " A handsome bird decidedly ! " said Mr. Dorrien, smil- 
 ing. " Ah ! Minette again." 
 
 Yes, this was Minette again, but in another attitude.
 
 JOHN DORRIEN'. 41,; 
 
 Minette lying at languid length on her red-velvet cushion, 
 her outstretched paw toying gracefully with a letter. 
 
 " Why, you little satirist," remarked Mr. Dorrien, di- 
 recting his eye-glass on Antoinette's laughing and blush- 
 ing face, " j-ou do not mean to say that such is the fashion 
 after which Minette serves my papers ! Well, I suppose 
 she does. But why have you not given us Carlo ? " 
 
 Antoinette informed him that he would find Carlo on 
 the next page ; and so he did, and there was Carlo with a 
 coat on ; and a J. D. in scarlet upon it, and carrying a letter 
 with a red seal in his mouth. A beehive, one of those 
 pretty little lady-birds which the French call btte d boa 
 Dieu, and a butterfly, completed the collection of Antoi- 
 nette's drawings. 
 
 "On my word I am surprised," said Mr. Dorrien, put- 
 ting down the book and removing his eye-glasses; " why, 
 my dear, when' did you learn drawing? " 
 
 "I studied it with Isabella Clarke at La Ruva," an- 
 swered Antoinette. 
 
 " And to some purpose, really. I am surprised, and 
 I'm sure so are you, John." 
 
 " Indeed I am, sir ; I had no suspicion that Miss Dor- 
 rien drew so well, and could adapt her talent so ingeniously 
 to our special purpose." 
 
 " But are these drawings really available ?" asked Mr. 
 Dorrien, doubtfully. 
 
 He looked at John evidently quite ready to welcome or 
 discard Antoinette's efforts at her cousin's bidding. She 
 felt this, and looked at the young man with anxious eyes. 
 
 " Verney never did any thing half so original and ele- 
 gant," very decisively answered John. Antoinette's face 
 brightened. "Only," he paused to give Carlo's image 
 another look, and Antoinette's face fell — " only there are 
 not enough of them for our purpose." 
 
 " Oh ! but I can do more — plenty ! " cried Antoinette, 
 clapping her hands and her dark eyes sparkling. "How 
 many do you want, John ? " 
 
 " A dozen more by the end of the week," he answered, 
 unhesitatingly. "You see we want all our time for en- 
 gravers and printers : besides, some of these must be col- 
 ored by hand — " 
 
 "Oh ! but I can do them," interrupted Antoinette, still
 
 408 J0HN DORRIEN. 
 
 eager and enthusiastic — " I mean the dozen ; only I had 
 better lose no time, I suppose." 
 
 She looked from one to the other, and Mr. Dorrien 
 again looked at John, as if referring the matter to him. 
 
 " Well, if you will try," said he, " I can set these going. 
 Even though you should not succeed for this particular 
 purpose, the drawings are too pretty not to be useful to us." 
 
 " And is there really nothing to mend or alter in them ? " 
 inquired Mr. Dorrien. 
 
 "It would be a pity to touch them," answered John. 
 " May I have them ? " he asked, looking at Antoinette. 
 
 Her only answer was to take up a paper-knife, cut out 
 the pages on which she had drawn her little sketches, and 
 hand them to him with a happy, blushing face. 
 
 Mr. Dorrien, smiling at the pair with the look of a stage 
 father rather bored with his part, supposed they might 
 like to consult together, and having himself other matters 
 to attend to, so left them. 
 
 "O John ! " cried Antoinette, as soon as the door had 
 fairly closed upon her grandfather, " what shall the next be ? " 
 
 " Don't ask me ; I have no genius that way — and 
 excuse me if I leave you awhile ; I must go to the store- 
 rooms." 
 
 She remained alone in that grave sanctuary, once de- 
 voted to books, study, and calm ease, and now consecrated 
 to dry business letters, to heavy cares and feverish anxiety. 
 She looked at the papers scattered on the table, some of 
 them covered with columns of figures; from these she 
 glanced up to the bronze figure of Polymnia, with her clear 
 Greek face and meditative gaze. Poor John ! This was 
 what he had once aspired to, and had given up — the love- 
 liness and delightful variety of poesy ; this was what he had 
 got in exchange, and was tied down to — a task both arid 
 and uncongenial, and, as it seemed to Antoinette, full of 
 terrible sameness. 
 
 " Well," said John, coming in and breaking in upon 
 her meditations, " what brilliant idea has come to you, 
 Miss Dorrien ? " 
 
 " O John ! I was not thinking of that ; I was thinking of 
 vou, and what a hard, hard life you lead." 
 
 There was a moment's silence. Her eyes were fastened 
 on his face, which became suddenly grave. John rarely
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 409 
 
 spoke of himself; his feelings, his opinions, he guarded 
 with quiet reticence. He seldom complained of life or its 
 accidents ; he never alluded, even remotely, to the past 
 which he had forsaken, he did not deplore the future which 
 lay before him. If " Miriam " ever rose from her ashes, 
 she was visible to no eyes save his. What he thought now 
 of the poem he had ruthlessly burned, or if he ever thought 
 about it, even his own mother knew not ; and, though that 
 subject was in Antoinette's thoughts just then, she did not 
 dare to allude to it — for, after all, John had never taken 
 her into his confidence ; he had never even attempted to con- 
 vert her from her skepticism by expounding to her his own 
 religious hopes and belief. He had been reserved, though 
 not unkindly so. 
 
 "What makes } T ou think that mine is a hard life?" he 
 asked, after a pause, 
 
 " You have so many cares, John." 
 
 " Every one has cares, and I have mine — but I have my 
 reward, too. A firm like this is like a good ship, of which 
 it is dangerous and honorable to be the captain. It is a 
 hard life— yes ; but your true sailor does not care for the 
 shore — and now -what of the drawings ? " 
 
 He was quite the man of business, and Antoinette could 
 not help perceiving that, though John in the library was 
 kind, he was not like John in Mrs. Reginald's sitting-room. 
 She felt a little abashed, and as if she had taken a freedom ; 
 but, rallying, she said — 
 
 " Would you like a windmill, John ? " 
 
 John's eyes sparkled at the suggestion. 
 
 " A windmill ! Splendid ! How could you think of 
 such a thing ? " 
 
 Antoinette smiled demurely. 
 
 "I have been reading Hon Quixote," she said, " and 
 there is a print of a windmill in the book which 1 can use 
 — for, you know, John, I could not draw r a windmill from 
 memory or imagination." 
 
 " Of course not. Any thing else ? " 
 
 Antoinette, who was rubbing the paper-knife thought- 
 fully along her smooth cheek, was silent awhile, then re- 
 marked gravely : 
 
 "John, I should like a lobster — a red, boiled one, you 
 know." 
 
 18
 
 410 JOHN DOKRIEN. 
 
 John could not help laughing, but accepted the lobster, 
 though not holding it equal to the windmill. 
 
 " Then I shall go and ask Mrs. Reginald to get me a 
 model, " said Antoinette, much pleased at her success ; 
 " and when I have other ideas, may I come and tell them 
 to you, John ? " 
 
 She spoke hesitatingly, as if doubtful of her welcome. 
 
 " Surely you know you may," he answered a little re- 
 proachfully. 
 
 A bright smile thanked him, and with a nod Antoi- 
 nette opened the door, and was gone. She ran up at 
 once to Mrs. Reginald's room, and entered it breath- 
 lessly. 
 
 " O Mrs. Reginald, I want a lobster," she cried — " I 
 mean at once — pray do send out for one immediately. I 
 have no time to lose." 
 
 " So hungry as all that ? " exclaimed Mrs. Reginald, 
 raising her eyebrows. 
 
 " O Mrs. Reginald, how could you think I wanted to eat 
 it ? I hate lobster ! It is for a drawing." And forthwith 
 followed the explanation, which amused and interested Mrs. 
 Reginald greatly. She entered into the spirit of the thing 
 with her usual freshness and vigor. She sent out, not for 
 one lobster, but for three, that Antoinette might be sure 
 of a suitable model. She would make her draw in her sit- 
 ring-room, because hers, she maintained, was the best light 
 in the house. She brought out a portfolio, in which she 
 kept woodcuts, prints, and other scraps, in the hope of as- 
 sisting Antoinette's conceptions : and, in short, she was so 
 much charmed with this new hobby, and so wrapped up 
 in it, that she forgot her customary afternoon visit to dear 
 Mrs. John. 
 
 Dear Mrs. John, surprised at her solitude, came down to 
 see what had caused it, and found Antoinette looking med- 
 itatively at three lobsters in different positions, and Mrs. 
 Reginald looking at Antoinette with her head on one 
 side, a smile on her brown face, and her hands behind her 
 back. 
 
 " My dear creature," she cried, enthusiastically, " I .have 
 such a piece of news for you ! Only think — don't touch 
 one of these lobsters, for goodness' sake ; they are as sacred 
 as if they were Egyptian divinities — only think, this brown-
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 411 
 
 headed little girl is a genius, and John has found it out, 
 like a clever boy as he is ; and don't tell me that Made- 
 moiselle Basnage ever could have made any thing- out of ;i 
 lobster." 
 
 Antoinette could not help laughing, partly at Mrs. Dor- 
 rien's amazed face, partly at Mrs. Reginald's tone of tri- 
 umph ; but she had no time to spare, and left the task of 
 explanation to her zealous adherent. 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien was pleased, but she was a little affronted 
 too. She had been vexing herself with John's trouble 
 ever since, and no one had come to tell her that the trouble 
 was over; and so, though she praised Antoinette, and ex- 
 pressed herself delighted, she could not help taking the all- 
 sent Mademoiselle Basn age's part. How could Mrs. Regi- 
 nald know that Mademoiselle Basnage, who was said to be 
 so clever and accomplished, could have made nothing out 
 of a lobster in such an emergency as this ? 
 
 "Don't tell me that she could or would," persisted Mrs. 
 Reginald, in her most obstinate tone. " Don't I know 
 what girls reared after a pattern turn out? — never an idea 
 of their own. When you see one you see twenty, all dolls 
 — and what can dolls be but dollish ?" 
 
 Nothing could be clearer than this, and Mrs. Dorrien, 
 having uttered her little protest, submitted, and, leaning 
 back in her chair, thence looked at Antoinette's bending and 
 intent face, and supposed that, now that she and John 
 were making such progress in their intimacy, the real 
 courtship would soon begin, and then the wedding would 
 come, and preliminary — most important in Mrs. Dorrien's 
 opinion — the partnership. 
 
 CHAPTER XXXVI. 
 
 The three days that followed were very delightful days 
 to Antoinette. For the first time in her life, she tasted 
 the sweetness of toil and usefulness. Up to the present 
 her labors had been desultory and fitful, and whatever 
 pleasure she might find in her tasks had been tempered
 
 412 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 by the feeling that the world would be none the worse off 
 if she left them unaccomplished. But now, what a differ- 
 ence ! Now John, now Mr. Dorrien, now La Maison Dor- 
 rien actually wanted her, and were all the better for the 
 fancy which she possessed, and the culture she had given 
 it. That the form of art to which she now devoted her 
 thoughts sleeping and waking, for she dreamed about her 
 vignettes, was a very little form of art indeed, luckily did 
 not trouble Antoinette. She did her best, and nothing for 
 which the best is done can be really poor or mean. And 
 so she worked on, and her work was useful and prized, and 
 Mrs. Reginald petted, and John praised, and even Mr. Dor- 
 rien admired her, and eleven designs — not of equal merit 
 or originality, John was obliged to admit that, but all avail- 
 able — had been produced by Antoinette, and were being 
 engraved, printed, and colored, and only the twelfth was 
 wanting, when she came down early one morning, and en- 
 tered the library, where John had been working long before 
 daylight had filled the gray court. 
 
 " Well," said he, quickly reading the perplexed mean- 
 ing of her face, " what is it now ? " 
 
 " I have had a dream," said Antoinette, sitting down 
 and looking earnestly at him — "avervodd dream, John. 
 May I tell it to you ? " 
 
 " Certainly." 
 
 " It was about the vignettes — I dream about them every 
 night," added Antoinette, with so much seriousness that 
 John bit his lip not to laugh. " Well, I dreamed about 
 them last night. I thought I was in my room in La Ruya, 
 not here, sitting by the open window, and listening to the 
 young swallows twittering in their nest above my head 
 under the eaves of the roof, and as I listened I thought ' Oh, 
 what shall I do for a twelfth design ? I must have another, 
 you know, and I can't get one.' Then I thought of all sorts 
 of things — a fern — but I have done it— a sprig of sea-weed 
 — but we have that too — in short, I could find nothing new, 
 when the sw T allow, leaving her nest, flew down and lighted 
 on the bar of my little wooden balcony, and began to sing. 
 It was a very pretty little song, and she looked at me all 
 the time, and clapped her long wings every now and then, 
 and turned up her bright eye, and opened her bill, and all 
 as if she were a nightingale, till I lost patience, and told
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 413 
 
 her to be quiet. 'Nonsense,' she answered, nodding at 
 me, 'I sing beautifully, to begin witb ; and then 1 am the 
 vi iv person you want, for you are thinking 1 of America, and 
 I am going there this moment with a message of good-will, 
 and lam to bring back another message from the presid< 
 of our friends, tlie birds, over the water, and look,' said she. 
 So she opened her wings and Hew away, and all at once it 
 flashed upon me, as I saw her living with her pretty, dark 
 wings outspread, and her silvery breast shining in the morn- 
 ing sun, that she was indeed the very person I wanted, and 
 that I could never get a prettier design to head a letter 
 than a swallow flying." 
 
 "Never, never, indeed !" cried John, delighted. " O 
 Antoinette, 1 am much mistaken if your swallow does not 
 go from one world's end to the other with her message of 
 good-will." 
 
 But Antoinette, who ought to have looked charmed at 
 his warm approval, only hung her head, and said, despond- 
 ently : 
 
 " I am so sorry, John. I can't draw a swallow. I tried 
 ever so often, as soon as I woke, and I can't draw the pretty 
 bird flying ; and a stuffed one would not do for a model." 
 
 " But I can get some one to draw it," promptly an- 
 swered John; "any thing, every thing can be had for 
 money in this wonderful Paris; and men who can draw 
 swallows Hying are as plentiful as cherries." 
 
 " Then you could have got plenty of people to do my 
 vignettes," said Antoinette, coloring up. 
 
 " No, no," he promptly responded ; " I can get plenty 
 of clever hands to execute, but the fanciful minds to con- 
 ceive, though they are to be had, are not so easily and so 
 quickly found." With this Antoinette had to be satisfied. 
 It would have been more gratifying, to be sure, if she could 
 have drawn her swallow on the wing; but, as this was a 
 feat beyond her power of accomplishment, she allowed her- 
 self to be comforted by John's smiling reminder that it was 
 not every one who could dream to such good purpose as 
 she did. 
 
 This swallow, which Bent Mrs. Reginald into ecstasies, 
 was the end of Antoinette's labors for some time. 
 
 "Don't draw too much on your fancy, my dear," said 
 the shrewd lady. " Fancy is simply the most capricious
 
 414 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 and wayward of will-of-the-wisps. It is amenable to no 
 rule, and obeys no law. So don't frighten yours away by 
 making it work too bard, or you will find that in the hour 
 of need it will forsake you utterly. Improv T e yourself in 
 drawing — that is work ; and let Fancy take a nod till you 
 want her." 
 
 As John echoed this wise advice, Antoinette had noth- 
 ing to do but to obey. She did so with all the more do- 
 cility that she took the deepest interest in the bringing 
 forth of her designs under that form of note-paper and en- 
 velopes to match, which was to render them available for 
 the purposes of La Maison Dorrien. Nothing, indeed, could 
 exceed her pleasure when John Dorrien placed in her hand 
 a little packet, containing samples, printed, colored, glossy, 
 highly pressed, and, to Antoinette's eyes, miracles of art, 
 of her twelve vignettes. 
 
 " And now, John, how are } r ou going to settle accounts 
 with that child ? " asked Mrs. Reginald, when this little 
 ceremony took place in her sitting-room on the evening 
 that saw the swallow depart for the journey across the 
 Atlantic, "for you will surely not be so shabby as to take 
 her labor for nothing." 
 
 " Certainly not," promptly answered John. " I am au- 
 thorized by Mr. Dorrien himself to place at Miss Dorrien's 
 disposal a check for the full amount which would have been 
 due to the faithless Verney." 
 
 " You don't mean it ! " cried Antoinette, coloring up with 
 delight and surprise. 
 
 A check, which John Dorrien put into her hand, was 
 his only answer. She laughed joyously, looking from John 
 to Mrs. Reginald. 
 
 " And have I really earned all that money ? " she said ; 
 " and can I really do what I like with it?" 
 
 " To be sure you can," he answered, smiling at the 
 childish earnestness with which she put the question. But 
 even as he spoke her face fell. The happy pride vanished 
 from her smile, the gladness left her eyes. Her first thought 
 had been to make a present to Mademoiselle Melanie of 
 her earnings ; but, when she remembered how her aunt 
 hated John Dorrien, how Oliver and she were plotting 
 against him, and doing their best to make her, Antoinette, 
 abet them, she hated with all the might of an honest heart
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 415 
 
 to apply thus the money which, after all, she owed, and she 
 knew it, to John's kindness. 
 
 " No," said she, looking- np into his face with a sudden 
 dimness in her bright eyes — "no, John. If I can have 
 obliged yon, I shall be glad; but there shall be no moncv 
 between us — none. Money," she added, in a tone full of 
 sorrow — " I hate it — it is the cause of every misery, of 
 every trouble. I wish there had never been any — never ! 
 never ! " 
 
 And, so saying, she let the check drop from her hand. 
 It fluttered into the fireplace near which she was standing, 
 a flame caught it, and in a moment it had shriveled up 
 into a little thin, transparent scroll. 
 
 John was silent. He had heard the remorseful ring 1 in 
 Antoinette's tone, and he half guessed its meaning. Mrs. 
 Reginald, however, raised her eyebrows, and lost no time 
 in uttering an indignant protest against Antoinette's phi- 
 losophy. 
 
 '• Was there ever such a little sentimental puss ! " she 
 cried. " No money ! Why, you ninny, if there were no 
 money, what would there be? — no grand cathedrals, no 
 palaces, no museums, no pictures, no poems, no books, no 
 expeditions to the arctic pole, no African missionaries, 
 nothing worth living for. No money ! — was there ever any 
 thing like it? We might as well be savages at once, and 
 take to beads and shells by way of specie." 
 
 " Of course I am wrong," said Antoinette, a little 
 abashed, though she still spoke sadly ; " but only think, 
 Mrs. Reginald, of all the mischief money does." 
 
 " In the first place, is it money?" asked Mrs. Reginald, 
 shrewdly; "and in the second, don't you know, my dear, 
 that But is the wicked fairy who was not asked to the 
 christening when this social world of ours was born, and 
 who always comes in to spoil every thing ? This house 
 would be delightful, But the chimneys smoke; that girl 
 would be all a man's heart could wish for, But her family 
 is not to be endured; that man is the best fellow in the 
 world, But he has not a grain of sense ; and so on. lint 
 where's the use of arguing ? You have burned the check, 
 and set your heart against money — something else must 
 be found. — John, I move that you take us all to the opera. 
 Ninette has not been there yet, you know."
 
 416 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 " Hear ! hear ! " said John. 
 
 " Oh ! " cried Antoinette, with sparkling eyes, " that 
 will be delightful ! When shall we go ? — to-morrow ? " 
 
 " Why not this evening ? " he asked, smiling. " It is 
 not too late ; and you will soon be ready." 
 
 "In five minutes," she said breathlessly ; and, without 
 waiting for another word, she was out of the room and was 
 up-stairs in a moment. 
 
 Oh ! the light heart of youth, that bounds so quickly in 
 answer to the call of pleasure ! The joyous spirits which 
 cannot be depressed, but must soar upward like airy bubbles 
 on the summer breeze. Antoinette forgot remorse, money, 
 Oliver, Mademoiselle Melanie, her own past, present, arid 
 future — she forgot all save that she was going to hear 
 divine music, and enter a world of enchantment. 
 
 The same magic made Antoinette, who was very neat 
 in her person, but who took plenty of time to be so, dress 
 in the unusually small space of a quarter of an hour. Not- 
 withstanding this celerity, she looked " charming," as Mrs. 
 Reginald declared ; and Mrs. Dorrien, whom her son had 
 induced to join them, ratified the verdict. 
 
 _ " That pale-green silk becomes you so well, dear," she 
 said. " John said you would look well in pale green. He 
 has a very correct eye for color." 
 
 Antoinette blushed a little, and was glad that John, 
 who was seeing to some business in the library, was not 
 present, Mrs. Dorrien's well-meant but too significant re- 
 marks always marred the pleasure Antoinette took in the 
 society and friendship of her cousin. 
 
 " It would be so nice if they would only let us alone," 
 she now thought with a half sigh. 
 
 The grievance was soon forgotten, and there was no 
 trace of it in Antoinette's mind when she sat in a box with 
 Mrs. Reginald by her side, and John and Mrs. Dorrien, 
 who preferred a back-seat, behind them. The opera was 
 "Lucia," and what with the music, the thrilling voices, 
 and the pathetic story, Antoinette felt in a dream, till she 
 awoke somewhat abruptly during one of the entr'actes. 
 John had left them, and Airs. Dorrien and Mrs. Reginald 
 were talking 1 in subdued tones. 
 
 to 
 
 "My dear Mrs. Reginald, I wish you would look at 
 her."
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 417 
 
 "My dear Mrs. John, I have seen her," answered Mrs. 
 Reginald, whose gaze was obstinately riveted on the or- 
 chestra. 
 
 " She is lovely," persisted Mrs. Dorrien. 
 
 " On the dollish pattern," was the reply. 
 
 " Now, you are prejudiced, and if she turns out to be 
 some one else, you will alter your opinion." 
 
 " My dear, I never alter my opinions, for the excellent 
 reason that one's second opinion is generally only the small 
 change of the first. Where's John ? " 
 
 " Yes, I wish he Avould come," murmured Mrs. Dorrien ; 
 " it would be such a good opportunity to see her without 
 any fuss." 
 
 Antoinette looked at the two ladies. Mrs. Reginald, 
 after contemplating the orchestra, was now rapt in tin? pit, 
 and Mrs. Dorrien's gaze was quietly fastened on a box op- 
 posite to their own. In that box sat a portly, middle-aged 
 man, and a fair, slender girl in white. Antoinette's heart 
 beat. Were these Monsieur Basnage and his daughter? 
 Whoever she might be she was exceedingly pretty — a 
 smiling, blue-eyed beauty, with a wreath of forget-me-nots 
 in her golden hair. It must be she, for the portly gentle- 
 man, turning to some one behind his daughter's chair — a 
 dark shadow, as it seemed to Antoinette — appeared to put 
 a question, and immediately afterward bowed to Mrs. Regi- 
 nald, who formally returned tin? salutation. 
 
 "I wish John would come," said Mis. Dorrien, fretfully. 
 " Oh, there he is ! John, is not that Monsieur Basnage ? " 
 
 " Yes, little mother — with his daughter, I suppose — a 
 very pretty girl." 
 
 " Dollish, John," said Mrs. Reginald, compassionating 
 his ignorance; "but I never yet knew a man who was not 
 taken in by dollishness," she kindly added. 
 
 John laughed. No more was said. The curtain rose, 
 and the Bride of Lammermoor once more unfolded her sor- 
 rows. But that tale, so pathetic, so old and so new, could 
 no longer rule Antoinette Dorrien's heart and master her at- 
 tention. Her eyes kept wandering from the stage to the box 
 opposite, from the hapless Lucia to that pretty, smiling girl, 
 who had no faith to betray, and whose future still lay so 
 fair and so stainless before her. Happy girl ! she was evi- 
 dently the pride of her father's heart ; and who could doubt
 
 418 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 that lie had guarded her til] that hour from all harm, from 
 every temptation and every ill ? 
 
 " Will she marry John, I wonder ? " thought Antoinette. 
 " Why not ? " and she looked somewhat sadly from one to 
 the other. 
 
 John had become very grave ; his brow was slightly 
 knit, his lips were compressed, and his look was fastened 
 on Monsieur Basnage's box with a fixedness which did not 
 denote a pleased contemplation of its inmates ; then he 
 turned away, leaned back in his seat, looked at the stage, 
 and listened to the performance with marked attention. 
 The Basnages left before the play was over. 
 
 " I wonder who is with them ? " whispered Mrs. Dorrieu 
 in her son's ear. 
 
 She spoke low, but Antoinette heard the question, also 
 his reply : 
 
 " Oliver Black. Did you not see him ? He bowed a 
 while ago." 
 
 Antoinette turned a scared look toward the Basnages ; 
 she saw Monsieur Basnage's broad black coat, the blue 
 forget-me-nots wreathed in his daughter's golden tresses, 
 and, vanishing almost as soon as seen, the pale, handsome 
 face of Oliver — then the box was black and empty. 
 
 This, then, was the dark shadow which she had seen 
 nigh Mademoiselle Basnage. Oliver was come back, and 
 it was thus they met — she sitting by John Dorrien's side, 
 and he standing behind the girl whom John Dorrien might 
 have married, might marry, still ! It was thus they met, 
 and she thought him far away. Her heart sank. She 
 felt full of trouble, shame, and sorrow. Was this to love ? 
 He was again jealous and angry, she was sure ; but was the 
 fault hers or his ? — were they both to blame, or might 
 they ask untoward circumstances and perverse fortune to 
 bear the brunt of their sin ? Wearisome questions, with 
 which all the misery, all the darkness of her life had come 
 back. 
 
 " Why, this Lucy has been too much for the child," kind- 
 ly said Mrs. Reginald, as the curtain dropped, and they all 
 rose. " She was as gay as a lark when we came out, 
 and now she is as white as if she had seen a ghost." 
 
 Alas ! poor Antoinette had seen a ghost indeed ; but 
 she wished tint Mrs. Reginald were not so clear-sighted,
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 410 
 
 and would let her looks alone. John, however, took no no- 
 tice of the lady's speech, and Mrs. Dorrien was too lull of 
 wonder at the presence of Oliver Black in Monsieur Bas- 
 nage's box, to think of any thing else. She had no idea 
 that Mr. Black and Monsieur Basnage were so intimate — 
 Oliver actually at the opera with Monsieur Basnage and 
 his daughter ! 
 
 " Oh, Oliver dined with them some time ago,"- carelessly 
 said John. " Take care, little mother ; we had better wait 
 here awhile for the carriage." 
 
 "So he knows that!" thought Antoinette, with a 
 throb at her heart. "But how does he know it? Did 
 Oliver tell him?" 
 
 She half hoped that his mother would put the question, 
 but she did not, and Antoinette was left to her surmises 
 during the drive home. Nothing then, or later, occurred to 
 enlighten her. She did not see Oliver for several days, 
 though she heard about him every now and then. When 
 they met Mrs. Dorrien was present, and they could not ex- 
 change one word. Antoinette feared, and yet expected 
 that he would again write to her, but he did not. The 
 only letter she received was from Mademoiselle Melanie, 
 upbraiding her with her abandonment, informing her that. 
 she was going back to La Kuya, and hinting obscurely that 
 she, Antoinette, would yet rue her ingratitude. 
 
 "I suppose I am behaving very badly to them all," de- 
 spondently thought Antoinette. " I am deceiving John 
 and Mr. Dorrien. I am ungrateful to aunt and Oliver. 
 Why, I should be blind if I did not see that Oliver is vexed 
 with me." 
 
 And with a wearied sigh she put away Mademoiselle 
 Melanie's letter, and sat down to the task which its arrival 
 had interrupted, a vignette representing a palm-tree. 
 
 That, John had said, would be popular in the south, for 
 people writing home to their friends would like a palm-tree 
 at the head of their letters. 
 
 "And you know, Antoinette," he added kindly, "that 
 your swallow has been, and is still, our greatest hit, and is 
 making quite a little fortune for us. It has been imitated, 
 pirated, and copied, and is to be seen everywhere — on fans, 
 on brooches, on bracelets. In short, it is quite the rage." 
 
 Antoinette's eyes had danced with delight as she heard
 
 420 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 him. Success is so sweet to all of us, and fame has a cup 
 and a draught for every one, whatever the great people may 
 think, and however they may fancy that it is to be all their 
 own. And now the joy of her task was gone, her pride 
 was humbled, and her little cup was spilled. The old sad, 
 weary life had begun anew. 
 
 By the end of November Mr. Dorrien, who had looked 
 pale and unwell of late, discovered, after a conversation with 
 Dr. Parker, that a winter in the south would set him up 
 again. Mr. Dorrien's absence or presence Avas a matter of 
 indifference to Antoinette. She could feel no affection for 
 one who treated her with polite coldness. It also seemed 
 to her, since Mr. Dorrien took so little part in the business, 
 leaving it all to John, that he ought not to be missed, and 
 she was surprised to read an expression of vexation and an- 
 noyance on the young man's face when he mentioned Mr. 
 Dorrien's departure to his mother. Mrs. Dorrien looked at 
 him wistfully. 
 
 " Does it make much difference to you, dear ? " she asked. 
 
 " Yes, little mother, it does," he answered, " it puts off 
 some things for six months." 
 
 " He means the paper-mill," thought Antoinette, fur- 
 tively trying to read his clouded face ; and then she fell into 
 a dream, and wondered if Oliver had advised that jour- 
 ney to gain time, and, with time, his ends. But had he 
 any ends still ? — any, at least, so far as she was concerned ? 
 He was very pleasant when they met, and looked kindly at 
 her — more kindly than ever ; but he did not, as formerly, 
 make opportunities to exchange a few words with her. lie 
 never wrote, never even alluded to the Morghens ; he let 
 their secret understanding sleep. It was what Antoinette 
 had wished, and asked for, but his compliance mortified her. 
 
 The day of Mr. Dorrien's departure was a memorable one 
 in Antoinette's life. It rose with a promise of snow in its 
 gray sky, which the afternoon fulfilled. She sat in Mrs. Regi- 
 nald's room, drawing, and paused in her task (Antoinette's 
 last hit was a ship in full sail) to look at the white flakes as 
 they fell — pale, silent, and swift as death, thought she. 
 
 " Mrs. Reginald," she suddenly said, " are you afraid 
 to die ? " 
 
 " I really don't know," honestly replied Mrs. Reginald ; " I 
 have not tried it, you see. And you, dear — are you afraid ? "
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 421 
 
 "Sometimes it seems very dreadful," answered An- 
 toinette, " and at other times it seems as if I should not 
 mind it much." 
 
 "And perhaps you. would not," was the earnest answer; 
 "the young are braver than the old in that, and I am not 
 sure that it is not a good thing to die }'oung. Shall I tell 
 you why? My dear, it is always best to go off on a jour- 
 ney in the morning, before the heat of noon and the weari- 
 ness of evening." 
 
 " Ah ! but that is such a terrible journey, Mrs. Regi- 
 nald ! " said Antoinette, with a little shudder. 
 
 Here was an admirable opportunity to put in a bit of 
 preaching, but, for some reason or other, Mrs. Reginald had 
 of late left Antoinette in peace. Instead of speaking now 
 a word of warning, or comfort, or hope, she looked up at 
 the ceiling, and tightened her lips like one firmly resolved 
 not to open them. Antoinette looked at her almost wistful- 
 ly, but, seeing her persistent silence, she resumed her task. 
 After a while she said : 
 
 "Mr. Dorrien looked very unwell when he went away — 
 did he not, Mrs. Reginald ? " 
 
 " Yes, dear ; but he has looked unwell for the last fifteen 
 years." 
 
 "If — if any thing was to happen to him," hesitatingly 
 said Antoinette, " would it be a bad thing — I mean, a very 
 bad thing — for John ? " 
 
 " I cannot see why it should," coolly answered Mrs. 
 Reginald ; " the firm is to be John's to all intents and 
 purposes." 
 
 She gave Antoinette a sharp look, but Mr. Dorrien's 
 granddaughter breathed a relieved sigh, and said earnestly : 
 
 " I am glad to hear it, Mrs. Reginald, — oh, so glad 1 " 
 
 " Why, you silly little chick ! " said the lady, good-hu- 
 moredly, " don't you know that, at all events, the matter 
 would rest between you two? — for between you and him 
 there is no one ; you are the last of the Dorriens — for the 
 time being," she prudently added. 
 
 "We are the last of the Dorriens — he and I," thought 
 Antoinette. "O John ! my true, my faithful friend, there 
 would never be contention between us, but — but what shall 
 I do if Mr. Dorrien dies, and Oliver and aunt get hold of 
 me ? "
 
 422 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 A great sickening fear came over the girl's heart. She 
 could not bear it ; she could not go on with her task. She 
 pushed her paper away. She rose, went up to the window, 
 and there stood, looking at the snow. The garden was al- 
 ready white with it. With an impatient sigh Antoinette 
 turned from the dreaiy prospect, came back to the table, 
 gave her drawing a dissatisfied look, and said : 
 
 " Mrs. Reginald, do you think John has come back from 
 seeing Mr. Dorrien off ? " 
 
 " My dear, he never went," answered Mrs. Reginald, a 
 little dryly ; " Mr. Dorrien said he had better stay and at- 
 tend to some pressing matters, so it was little Mr. Black 
 who saw Mr. Dorrien off." 
 
 Antoinette looked a little startled. Did that mean any 
 thing ? — did Mrs. Reginald mean any thing ? — for to con- 
 strue every incident that occurred, every word that was 
 spoken, according to her secret fears, was her lot now. 
 But Mrs. Reginald's brown face, on which the light from 
 the fire played, told her no other tale than the plain one 
 which her words conveyed : Mr. Black, and not John Dor- 
 rien, had gone with her grandfather to the station. 
 
 " Then, since John is at home," resumed Antoinette, 
 taking up her drawing, "I shall go down and show him 
 this ; I do not half like it." 
 
 " Do, dear. John has a very correct ej'e."" 
 
 Antoinette left the room, and slowly went down-stairs 
 with her drawing in her hand. The gas was not yet lit, 
 and only the pale reflection of the snow from the court filled 
 the hall below her. In that light she caught a glimpse of 
 John entering the library. 
 
 " O John," she said, but the door had already closed 
 upon him. She hurried down, and followed him in. The 
 room was lit, and she found him bending over his desk, 
 searching among the papers upon it. " Oh ! pray," she 
 said, eagerly, " give my drawing a look before you do any 
 thing else." 
 
 He turned round slowly, with his hand still among the 
 papers, and he showed her the face, not of John, but of 
 ( )livcr Black. Why he was there, and what he was doing 
 near the desk of his friend, she knew, and by the smile on 
 his face she saw that he was aware of her knowledge. They 
 stood so one moment — she filled with fear, horror, and
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 423 
 
 shame; he cool, with an unchanging marble face and au- 
 dacious bearing. 
 
 " John is not here," he said; "you will find him in the 
 store-room, if you want him." 
 
 She did not answer. She seemed rooted to the spot on 
 which her feet rested. He had asked her to do this thing, 
 and she had refused to obey him with indignation; but yel 
 the abyss which there is between a deed suggested and a 
 deed done had divided his proposal from his action. She 
 had not felt, she could not feel, of the one the horror she 
 felt of the other. 
 
 "Dearest," said Oliver, perceiving that she did not 
 move, " ought you to stay here ? John might come back, 
 and it would be awkward." 
 
 She did not stir. 
 
 " ( )liver," she said, in a low tone, " do not do it." 
 
 " Do not do what ? " he asked, smiling coolly. 
 
 "Do not do it," she repeated, and her face was ashy 
 white, and tears of anguish flowed down her checks. 
 
 "But do not do what?" he insisted. "If you mean 
 that I ought not to stay here — why, it was John who sent 
 me." 
 
 "He sent you!" she said, almost with a cry, "and von 
 can do it ? " 
 
 "My dear child," he remonstrated, with his look of 
 candor, "what can you mean, and what did you want with 
 John ? Ah ! to show him your drawing," said he, taking 
 it from her hand. "Why, you little witch," he added, 
 laughing, "is that ship for me? Did some bird whisper 
 in your ear that I am going off again? By-tbe-bv, we 
 must make the most of the present time. John is safe in 
 the store-room for ten minutes, if not more. Dearest, I am 
 going to New York, not to-night or to-morrow, of course, 
 but some days hence. The news is not official yet. It 
 is Mr. Dorrien who sends me, and John does not know a 
 word of it, so don't let it out. Every thing is going on 
 swimmingly; while Mr. Dorrien is away I cannot do much, 
 but the moment he comes back you may rely upon it that 
 I shall bring matters to a crisis." 
 
 He did not see, or, seeing it, he ignored Antoinette's 
 dismayed face as he uttered these words, and he did not 
 feel, or, feeling it, he again ignored the shrinking with
 
 424 JOHN DOKRIEN. 
 
 which, as he drew her toward him, and said fondly, " Good- 
 by, darling," she avoided the embrace, and in a moment, 
 as if afraid of discovery, had escaped out of the room. 
 
 She flew up-stairs like one pursued. She entered her 
 room, filled with gray twilight, and, bolting^ the door be- 
 hind her, she stood breathless on the middle of the floor. 
 She raised her arms, she clasped her hands above her head, 
 and she said aloud, in the bitterness of her anguish, " Oh ! 
 I love him no more — no more ! I love him no more ! " 
 
 Antoinette was dull and pale when she came down to 
 dinner that evening. She was also very silent, but, when 
 Mrs. Reginald asked what ailed her, she opened her dark 
 eyes wide, and said, almost eagerly : 
 
 " Oh, I am very well, Mrs. Reginald — very well, I as- 
 sure you." 
 
 " I see that you brought me this," said John, handing 
 her the little drawing of the ship. " I found it on the floor 
 of the library with another paper. I suspect Mr. Dorrien's 
 cat must have come in while I was out." 
 
 " And so you leave your papers about, you negligent 
 boy ! " said Mrs. Reginald, tartly. " How do you know 
 who might pry into them ? " 
 
 " No, Mrs. Reginald, I do not," answered John, smiling 
 — " none, at least, that I care for. My papers are always 
 under lock and key, save those which the whole world may 
 look it." 
 
 Antoinette, who had held her breath while he spoke, 
 allowed a sigh of relief to escape her as she heard this. 
 Oliver's attempted treason had availed him nothing. 
 
 " But I love him no more — no more ! " she repeated to 
 her own heart in dreary wonder. 
 
 CHAPTER XXXVII. 
 
 The winter had gone by, spring had returned, and with 
 spring Mr. Dorrien, as pale and languid as ever, and with 
 a touch of impatience bordering upon fretfulness, to tem- 
 per the cool politeness of his manners.
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 425 
 
 He had been home about a week, when Antoinette en- 
 tered Mrs. Reginald's sitting-room half an hour before din- 
 ner-time, to put a question to that lady. 
 
 " .Mrs. Reginald," she asked, uneasily, "is there any one 
 coming to dine with Mr. Dorrien this evening ? 1 hear 
 voices below." 
 
 " And you are surprised. Of course you are. Who 
 ever heard of leading the life we lead here ? We might 
 as well be in China, my dear. No one comes near us, and 
 we go near no one. I don't call that civilization," emphati- 
 cally added Mrs. Reginald. 
 
 " And who is our guest this evening ? " eagerly asked 
 Antoinette. 
 
 " Only little Mr. Black, dear." 
 
 The girl's color faded, and she stared before her. 
 
 " I did not know he had come back from America," she 
 said, in a low tone. 
 
 " Oh, yes, he came back two or three days ago. I re- 
 member now you were not in the room when John said so. 
 Well, my dear, the pleasure you must feel at his return 
 was only deferred. You are not going to change your dress 
 for Mr. Black!" added Mrs. Reginald, raising her voice as 
 she saw Antoinette turning to the door. 
 
 " Oh, no," said Antoinette, " I shall stay as I am, but I 
 must go up to my room for a few minutes." 
 
 I j> to her room she went, shivering all the way, and 
 when she was there she sat down, and, looking at the 
 spring sun, which shone on the cold, waxed lloor, she 
 brooded dreamily on what lay before her. 
 
 It is very hard to cease to love, to sit by the spent fire 
 and see the white and dead ashes of that which was once 
 so living and so bright. The extinguished hearth is the lit 
 t vpe of all desolation. 
 
 Antoinette felt sorrow inexpressible at the change in 
 herself. She had been battling against, it ever since her 
 arrival in Paris, but it had prevailed over her, and now she 
 conquered. She had ceased to love. 
 
 Oliver Black had committed a fatal mistake with this 
 young girl. She had plenty of faults, winch be might 
 easily have turned to his own ends. She was rash, impru- 
 dent, willful, and self-reliant. She could be obstinate in 
 good or in evil, and she could feel strong aversions, even as
 
 426 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 she could feel strong loves. But she had one quality on 
 which he had not reckoned. Some people are naturally 
 amiable, others are high-minded, and others again are very 
 patient, and they are so almost without effort, because they 
 cannot help it. Antoinette's attribute was that she was 
 true. It was not in her power to be otherwise. She had 
 never practised the ways of deceit, and, though she had 
 been taught no regard for truth, she could not swerve from 
 it with impunity. She ever committed some blunder through 
 which trouble came, or success whenever she succeeded only 
 gave her shame and distress. She had struggled against 
 the feeling which seemed a treason to love. She had in- 
 vented excuses -for Oliver, but it had been in vain. His 
 plausible cynicism could not convince her against the irre- 
 sistible arguments of her conscience, which told her daily 
 how base it is to lie. She despised herself for the life of 
 falsehood which she led ; and, just retribution, she also de- 
 spised him who made her lead it. 
 
 Oliver was too keen not to see the change in her, but 
 his nature was too low to fathom its motive. " She thinks 
 John the better match of the two, and she throws me by 
 for him," thought Mr. Black, angrily. "Well, let her! 
 the game is not played out. They will laugh who win. 
 In the mean while, I will not let her free till my purpose 
 is served." 
 
 He was so far right that the contrast between John 
 Dorrien and himself had quickened his young mistress's 
 sense of his unworthiness. Antoinette had begun by al- 
 most hating her cousin. He was very kind to her, she 
 could not deny it, and she was grateful for it too, after a 
 fashion ; but it irritated her to see the worship he received 
 from his mother and Mrs. Reginald, and her pride was stung 
 at the frank and open position he could assume, while she 
 must needs stoop daily to mean arts. Most willingly, if 
 she could, would she have thrown the burden of Oliver's 
 sin, and of her own, upon him, and sent him, a scape-goat, 
 into the desert; but she could not. The same honesty 
 which made her hate the wrong in herself forbade her to 
 hale the right in John. She did her best not to compare 
 him with Oliver, but that too was not in her power. Oli- 
 ver himself, by entering into competition with her cousin, 
 had rendered comparison inevitable. Day after day Antoi-
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 427 
 
 nettc was obliged to look at these two men and to judge 
 them. She tried to turn from the contemplation, for it 
 filled her with bitterness and sorrow ; but something or 
 other ever forced it on her, till her heart grew faint and 
 weary with the pain. Alas ! that love which is born so 
 quickly, which a look, a word, may kindle into sudden and 
 burning life, should expire so slowly, and through such bit- 
 ter throes ! 
 
 But, though Antoinette's love was sickening of a most 
 grievous disease, it was living still when she entered the 
 library on the evening of the day of Mr. Dorrien's depart- 
 ure. It was living, and while there is life there is hope; 
 but, when she saw Oliver's treacherous hand in the papers 
 of his friend, her love died in one moment. It died of a 
 death for which there is no resurrection — it died killed by 
 shame, contempt, and a sort of horror which left nothing 
 behind, not one soft or tender memory, nothing but the 
 stin ffin": recollection of a n-reat error. 
 
 And now Oliver was come back, and they must meet 
 again. She delayed going down till she dare delay no 
 longer. Her heart nearly failed her as she stood in the 
 hall; for Oliver was behind that closed door, and what if 
 he were there alone ! At length she took heart, and opened 
 it. At once she saw Oliver ; but, oh ! relief inexpressible, 
 Mrs. John Dorricn was with him. Her pale cheeks resumed 
 their glow, and in her gladness she almost smiled. 
 
 Oliver sat on the sofa, and the moment the door opened 
 he saw her. Antoinette wore a dress of pale yellow lawn, 
 of simple yet becoming make; a crimson knot fastened her 
 white collar, and another knot of the same bright hue nes- 
 tled in her dark hair. Oliver Black had a keen, artistic 
 feeling for the picturesque, and, as she paused for a mo- 
 ment on the threshold, and he saw her, fresh, bright, and 
 young, he smiled, remembering a gay landscape which he 
 had seen once or twice — a landscape of yellow, waving 
 corn, with two bright poppies dancing in the sun. Whal 
 else there was in it he had foro-otten, but the vellow corn 
 and the two red poppies had remained in his mind, and 
 suddenly came back to him now. 
 
 "A nice little thing, if she would only be amenable," 
 he thought, casting a critical look on Antoinette. 
 
 But that she would not be so he knew even before she
 
 42S JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 closed the door. She might smile ; but cold revolt was in 
 her look, in her bearing, in the very turn of her slender 
 neck. He felt it in her passive hand when they exchanged 
 the calm greeting of acquaintances who meet again after a 
 long but unimportant separation. 
 
 "Only think, dear !" exclaimed Mrs. Dorrien, smiling 
 and looking delighted, " your pretty swallow is all the rage 
 in America. Mr. Black saw nothing else." 
 
 " I am sorry for America," coolly answered Antoinette ; 
 " I thought there was so much to be seen there." 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien looked baffled, and Oliver changed the 
 subject, and entertained John's mother after his own pleas- 
 ant fashion ; but all the time he looked at Antoinette from 
 where he leaned back among the sofa-cushions, with his 
 handsome head framed by the red-velvet drapery of the 
 window behind him. Antoinette did not see that look, and 
 Mrs. Dorrien did not understand its meaning. It was a 
 peculiar look, calm, ironical, and withal dispassionate — the 
 look of an amateur who studies a pretty picture at a sale 
 from a point of view which he feels to be final, who admits 
 its merits, but also sees its blemishes and general unsuit- 
 ableness, and decides not to bid for it. After all, be it 
 remembered that he had never really loved her : he had 
 sought her not by any means for her own sake, but because 
 he wished to make a stepping-stone of her. If he had found 
 her to be plain or repelling, he would certainly have let 
 her go by as a chance not worth his purchase ; but, being 
 as she was, pleasing and attractive, he had been glad to 
 win her as well as the position which such gain he thought 
 must needs bring ; but, now that she was a clog, and not 
 a help, all that he had once liked in her seemed to fade 
 away. She was useless' — worse than useless ; she was dan- 
 gerous, and a feeling very much akin to hate — for Oliver 
 Black was not, and never could be, a real hater — rose with- 
 in him as he now looked at her. He felt, and had felt even 
 before he went away, that Antoinette had been turning 
 from him and his teaching, and looking up more and more 
 to John Dorrien. 
 
 A better man than he was would have resented this, 
 and resented it all the more that he deserved it. " II n'y 
 a que la verite qui faehe," says the old French proverb. 
 To be read through, weighed, and found light, is hard to
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 429 
 
 bear; but Oliver was a philosopher, and he had let her 
 have her wav. Why should he not? If he wished to slip 
 his neck from that tie, so ill-advised, so dangerous even — 
 must he not let her slip out of it too ? 
 
 It was not pleasant ; the least jealous of men would dis- 
 like such a contingency; but there are many unpleasant 
 tilings in life, and Mr. Black, who had gone through some, 
 was prepared to go through plenty more, if need be. So 
 her altered manner did not surprise him much now, aor 
 grieve him much either, especially remembering as he did 
 their parting — but it did disturb him a little; for, after all, 
 he was mortal, and had his weaknesses, and, though he at 
 first entertained Mrs. Dorrien in his pleasantest strain, and 
 repeated all the old hackneyed jokes about the Yankees, 
 he flagged after a while, and John's mother began to think 
 her task of keeping company in Mrs. Reginald's stead very 
 wearisome. She felt quite tired, and was even provoked 
 with Antoinette, who, instead of helping her, sat there cold 
 and silent, as if Mr. Black were the greatest stranger, in- 
 stead of being John's friend. In her vexation she said and 
 did what she would not have said or done otherwise. The 
 conversation had fallen upon that inexhaustible topic, the 
 weather. 
 
 The spring was unusually warm and early, and a horse- 
 chestnut tree in Mr. Dorrien's garden had wellnigh vied 
 with the famous tree in the Tuileries garden. It had ex- 
 panded one broad leaf three days after that historical char- 
 acter. 
 
 " Only think, Mr. Black, three days ! — My dear," turn- 
 ing to Antoinette, " there is daylight enough yet to show 
 Mr. Black our horse-chestnut. Take him out and let him 
 see it, w r ill you ? " 
 
 Antoinette's color faded, but she met Oliver's mocking 
 look, and she started to her feet in a moment. 
 
 " With great pleasure," she said, not without a sort of 
 defiance. 
 
 "I cannot go, you know," apologetically remarked Mrs. 
 Dorrien to Oliver ; " the sun is out still, but the air is keen, 
 and I must not venture out at this hour." 
 
 Oliver politely begged that she would not mention it, 
 and followed Antoinette out of the room. 
 
 " What a relief! " murmured Mrs. Dorrien, sinking back
 
 430 JOHN. DORRIEN. 
 
 in her end of the sofa. " I don't know what possessed An- 
 toinette to be so disagreeable to the poor young man. 
 Now she must be civil to him, at least." 
 
 The sun bad not yet set when the pair, after crossing 
 the hall, and opening the glass door, stepped down into 
 the garden ; but its ruddy light had retreated to the high 
 walls and glittering windows of the neighboring houses ; 
 below all was cool, gray, and dim. 
 
 " You little witch ! " said Oliver, turning his laughing 
 face on Antoinette, almost as soon as the door closed upon 
 them ; " by what spell did you make the Dragon — John's 
 own Dragon, too — give us this chance ? " 
 
 Antoinette walked on without answering. 
 
 " Only think, dearest," whispered Oliver, walking by 
 her side — " your aunt is in Paris ! This time she has taken 
 up her abode in Mr. Brown's own house. I met her on the 
 stairs this morning, as I looked in at him about these eter- 
 nal Morghens. She says she must see j r ou." 
 
 Antoinette stood still. 
 
 " Mr. Dorrien will not allow it," she said. 
 
 " Oh ! perhaps he has changed his mind." 
 
 " Mr. Dorrien will not allow it. The first thing he did 
 on his return was to question me about her, and to Inform 
 me that, while I staid in his house, I must have no inter- 
 course with my aunt. He has heard about her misfortunes 
 at Monaco, and it seems she has been there again, and he is 
 quite inexorable." 
 
 Oliver raised his eyebrows, but was silent. 
 
 " Will you tell her so ? " she asked, after a pause. 
 
 " Oh ! certainly. I cannot say with pleasure, for I need 
 not tell 3^011 that Mademoiselle Melanie will be exasperated. 
 Are you quite sure that Mr. Dorrien is obdurate ? " 
 
 " Quite sure." 
 
 " Make John try. He can do a good deal with the gov- 
 ernor." 
 
 Antoinette looked up with a flash of pride. She knew 
 that Oliver only said this to ascertain whether she had asked 
 John or not, and she scorned to deny. 
 
 " John has failed," she answered, briefly. 
 
 "And cannot you do without Mr. Dorrien's consent?" 
 asked Oliver, with a curious smile. 
 
 She shook her head in impatient denial.
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 431 
 
 " This, then, is your final resolve." 
 
 "It is. I will never risk again what I risked once; 
 with what result vou know." 
 
 J 
 
 There was a pause, during which they exchanged looks. 
 Each felt that more was coming; that the great crisis Avas 
 at hand, and it was even more to vex her, than to delay 
 the evil day, that Oliver said : 
 
 " Let us forget Mademoiselle Melanie, and talk of our- 
 selves. What have you to tell me, dearest?" 
 
 " Nothing." 
 
 " Nothing, and we have not met for so long ? You might 
 ask how I have fared, how I am getting on with Mr. Dor- 
 rien, and what chance there is of that opening we both long 
 for so much." 
 
 It is hard to deceive a woman who has ceased to love. 
 Antoinette turned upon him with a sort of scorn. 
 
 " What opening?" she asked. 
 
 "My darling, you know what I mean. Some opening 
 that will allow me to say to Mr. Dorrien, ' Sir, I love your 
 granddaughter, and she ioves me, but we are both too poor 
 to enter upon house-keeping without your help. If you will 
 sink all your capital in that confounded mill — no, 1 should 
 not use that strong adjective, of course — or if John will not 
 marry Mademoiselle Basnage, whose money would be so 
 useful—'" 
 
 " And will he not marry her?" interrupted Antoinette. 
 
 " Well, I believe he will, in the end," candidly answered 
 Oliver ; " because, you see, he must. The firm wants her 
 money too much, and then John has not seen her to speak 
 of, and when he does see her he will find compliance easy, 
 for she is truly charming." 
 
 Antoinette was silent awhile, then she said : 
 
 " I hope she is worthy of him. John deserves to be 
 happy." 
 
 " Of course he does," answered Oliver ; " but surely so 
 do we. Is that the horse-chestnut tree ? " he added, criti- 
 cally examining a tree before him, on which a few frail green 
 leaves shivered in the chill April air. " A poor concern, I 
 must say." 
 
 " Oliver ! " 
 
 In a moment he knew what was coming, and turned 
 slowly round to look at her.
 
 432 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 " It is all over, and you know it," said Antoinette, whose 
 face was white. "You need not speak to Mr. Dorrien. 
 You are free, and so am I." 
 
 " I suppose you have been thinking this over," remarked 
 Oliver, coolly, though his dark eyes burned like fire. 
 
 " I have. You never liked me, Oliver, and I — I like you 
 no more." 
 
 " You are candid, Miss Dorrien," he said, with cool sar- 
 casm. " Have you any thing else to say ? " 
 
 Very quietly she answered : 
 
 " Nothing." 
 
 " What if I refuse to let you free ? What if I insist 
 that you keep your solemn promise to me ? " 
 
 She looked at him, and said, weariedly : 
 
 " Why do you try to cheat me, Oliver '? It is all over, 
 and you know it,- and do not wish it to be otherwise ; and 
 you have no desire to speak to Mr. Dorrien, for you never 
 liked me, and I — I like you no more." 
 
 She used the same words she had already used, with 
 sad iteration. She was very sorrowful, not for him, but for 
 the love that was dead within her. Heartless though he 
 was, Oliver felt a little pang of regret at losing her. She 
 had liked him, and he knew it, and, for the sake of that 
 liking, he was almost sorry to let her go. 
 
 " But I cannot lose you so — I cannot, indeed, " said he, 
 drawing near her, and half smiling. " You must tell me 
 what I have done — who has been poisoning your mind 
 against me. You must, in common justice." 
 
 He spoke in his tone of candor. A shudder ran through 
 Antoinette's whole frame, and he saw it. She remembered 
 the lies, she remembered the baseness and the treason. She 
 clasped her hands in amazement and indignation. And, as 
 if to bid him remember how and when her love had died, 
 her look rested for a moment on the windows of the library. 
 But she said no more; she walked on without looking back. 
 And Oliver did remember, and his eye followed her reced- 
 ing figure with no friendly look ; but he also smiled at her 
 folly in throwing down the glove so openly. "Poor little 
 thing ! " thought Mr. Black. 
 
 " And where is Miss Dorrien ? " asked Mrs. Dorrien, 
 surprised, as Oliver entered the drawing-room alone. 
 
 " Miss Dorrien's head aches," he answered, lowering
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 433 
 
 his voice in polite concern. "I have seen the tree — very 
 remarkable." 
 
 " How vexations ! " said Mrs. Dorrien, a little crossly, 
 for she thought that all the trouble of entertaining the vis- 
 itor would fall upon her again. But she was saved this in- 
 fliction. John came in, then Mrs. Reginald, who was civil 
 and dignified, then Mr. Dorrien ; and it was time for the 
 dinner, during which Oliver made himself very pleasant, 
 but at which Antoinette did not appear. 
 
 "Her head aches," said Mrs. Dorrien, on Oliver's au- 
 thority. 
 
 "Poor child!" exclaimed Mrs. Reginald, in a tone of 
 concern. 
 
 John was silent, but looked grave. 
 
 " Very distressing these headaches are," murmured Mr. 
 Dorrien. " And so you say, Mr. Black, that the Yankee 
 shrewdness has been overrated." 
 
 Oliver was sure of it, and he gave plenty of instances 
 in point, which proved at least that he had found some- 
 thing to take note of in America besides Antoinette's swal- 
 low. 
 
 CHAPTER XXXVIII. 
 
 " Mrs. John ! " 
 
 " Yes, dear." 
 
 " Mind what I tell you." Mrs. Dorrien on being thus 
 addressed by Mrs. Reginald, who had come as usual to 
 give her "a look" in her room, put down her work and 
 looked earnestly in the face of her friend. Mrs. Reginald, 
 having thus secured her attention, raised her forefinger, to 
 keep it fast, and emphatically observed, "There is some- 
 thing going on." 
 
 Trouble bordering on dismay appeared in the wistful 
 face of John's mother. She had become unfitted for anx- 
 iety of any kind, and could no longer, as once, battle with 
 life. 
 
 " Something going on ! " she faltered. " O Mrs. Regi- 
 nald, what can it be ? " 
 lit
 
 434 J0HN DORRIEN. 
 
 "That," calmly answered Mrs. Reginald, "I do not 
 know." 
 
 " Not at all ? " 
 
 " Not in the least." 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien's face fell. 
 
 "Perhaps there is nothing going on, dear," she re- 
 marked, trying to rally and look cheerful. 
 
 " Yes, there is," positively said her friend. " You must 
 have noticed how things look before a storm — air heavy, 
 sky dark, man and beast alike uneasy, the very insects 
 twice as troublesome as usual — in short, every thing telling 
 us — the storm is coming. Well, my dear, so it has been in 
 this house for the last week, and I am amazed, I am, that 
 you have not noticed it." 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien, who had taken up her work, put it down 
 
 again. 
 
 " What ! have you noticed it, dear ? " she asked. 
 
 "How do you* like John's looks?" said Mrs. Reginald, 
 by way of reply. 
 
 " Dear John is always grave," said John's mother, hesi- 
 tatingly; "he has so much on his mind." 
 
 "Well, then, I dare say he has a good deal on his 
 mind just now," dryly remarked Mrs. Reginald, " for he is 
 as grave as a judge, and as silent as a stick." 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien looked perplexed. 
 
 " And Miss Dorrien ? — what do you think of Miss Dor- 
 rien?" inquired Mrs. Reginald, nodding. " Does she look 
 happy with that white face of hers ? " 
 
 "She is out of health just now, dear." 
 
 " Out of health ! — she is simply miserable. But why 
 so?— ah! why?" 
 
 "I hope — I trust nothing is amiss between her and 
 John," ejaculated Mrs. Dorrien, plaintively. 
 
 " Who ever knows what ails these silly young things ? " 
 contemptuously said Mrs. Reginald. " They are either all 
 right or all wrong, without rhyme or reason; but some- 
 thing does ail her, that is sure." 
 
 " But Mr. Dorrien looks so well and cheerful ! " cried 
 Mrs. Dorrien, as if she had just made the discovery. " I 
 never saw him in better spirits." 
 
 " That is the greatest sign of all," exclaimed Mrs. Regi- 
 nald, triumphantly. " When a man looks so wholly unlike
 
 JOHN DOREIBN. 1;j0 
 
 his former self as our Mr. Dorrien looks just now, some- 
 thing must be going on. As to Mr. Brown," she added, 
 more soberly, " he is simply be}*ond any comprehension of 
 mine. He never comes near me, and, when we meet, he 
 skulks away, like a dog who has stolen a bone, and who 
 deserves a whipping-." 
 
 " Well, but what can be going on ? " argued Mrs. 
 Dorrien. 
 
 " My dear, I don't know, and don't even try to know," 
 coolly answered Mrs. Reginald. " Life is full of mysteries, 
 which neither you nor 1 can fathom. Who knows, for in- 
 stance, where the dogs go? Is it love ? — is it pleasure ? — 
 is it business ? How steadily they do trot along the streets, 
 through cars, legs, horses, rain, or mud ! They have a pur- 
 pose, only what is it ? I long wanted to find it out, but 
 was obliged to give it up, and since then I have taken the 
 lesson to heart, and don't worry myself because I can't un- 
 derstand what is going on before my eyes; only, dear, you 
 must not scold if I say that it is since lit t lo Mr. Black came 
 back from America that something has been groins: on." 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien uttered an exclamation. What could Mr. 
 Black have to do with what was going on? Mrs. Regi- 
 nald looked upward, and did not know, but was sure ilia; 
 something had been going on since that little Mr. Black 
 had come back. She did not wish to be uncharitable, but 
 of that she was quite sure. 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien, whose fears were roused, tried to elicit 
 something more definite out of her friend, but Mrs. Reginald 
 either would or could not say more than she had said. 
 Her conscience pricked her for her significant allusion- to 
 Mr. Black. Though she indulged in her unreasonable dis- 
 like of him, she knew well enough thai it was wrong, and 
 she was all the more pertinaciously silent because she fell 
 really uneasy. 
 
 The change in Mr. Dorrien was that which impressed 
 her most. It did not seem to her so much the change of 
 recruited health as that of languid spirits stimulate.! by 
 some secret motive into fictitious life. 
 
 "Look at him now," thought she to herself, as, after 
 leaving her friend (in no cheerful frame of mind), she went 
 down the stairs, and through the broad-landing window 
 saw him alighting at the perron — " is that our Mr. Dor-
 
 436 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 rien, so languid, so leisurely in all his movements ? Why, 
 that man is as jaunty and holds his head as high as if he 
 were twenty-five. And I declare there is little Mr. Black 
 coming up to him, and grinning up in his face. I dare 
 say Mr. Dorrien is asking him to dinner, and that we shall 
 have him again to-day. Pah ! I must not look — it makes 
 me sin, it does." 
 
 It certainly did Mrs. Reginald's moral being no good 
 to see the excellent understanding which prevailed be- 
 tween Mr. Dorrien and John's friend. It would have irri- 
 tated her still more could she have felt certain that her 
 surmise was a correct one, and that Mr. Dorrien had been 
 uttering one of those friendly invitations to dinner which, 
 by bringing her face to face with her discarded lover, had 
 become the torment of Antoinette's life. But Oliver, with 
 many thanks, had modestlv excused himself. He had an 
 engagement. He was afraid he could not come. He had 
 given the papers to Mr. Brown, who would explain, and 
 so forth. But Mr. Brown's explanations were not pleasing 
 to Mr. Dorrien. Mr. Brown had not the gay looks, the 
 agreeable voice, and the epigrammatic manner of Oliver 
 Black. Moreover, Mr. Brown had not fathomed this mat- 
 ter, and there might be mistakes ; so Mr. Dorrien again 
 pressed Mr. Black to stay ; and Mr. Black, after a show of 
 resistance, yielded, and agreed to go in and take the papers 
 from Mr. Brown, and bring them in to Mr. Dorrien in his 
 own room. 
 
 He found that gentleman leaning back on his dark but 
 luxurious couch, abstractedly stroking his gray Angora 
 cat and looking somewhat excited. 
 
 " Well, Mr. Black," he exclaimed, scarcely giving his 
 visitor time to sit down, " what does the architect say ? " 
 
 "Well, sir," answered Oliver, without a moment's hesi- 
 tation, ' : I find the matter even more serious than I antici- 
 pated — but I had better explain." 
 
 "Another time — after dinner," interrupted Mr. Dorrien. 
 " Will you kindly give me the result of your information 
 now?" 
 
 " Well, then, you must have been deceived in the esti- 
 mates — I mean," he added, correcting himself at once, 
 " that John must have committed some mistake ; the out- 
 lay will be enormous. It will require all the capital of the
 
 JOHN DORRIEX. 437 
 
 firm, or nearly so ; and, should war or revolution supervene, 
 La Maison Dorrien would be at the mercy of events — such, 
 .it Least, is the conclusion one must come to, after consult- 
 ing the estimates of Monsieur Landre. You will find the 
 figures here." 
 
 " Of course, of course," impatiently said Mr. Dorrien, 
 glancing over the papers which Oliver handed to him ; "I 
 always said so. It is folly ! Mr. John Dorrien must be in- 
 fatuated about that mill ; he always was. We cannot run 
 that fearful risk ; I always said so." 
 
 "John is imaginative," hesitatingly said Oliver, " and 
 imagination is a great dcluder. He was a poet, you know." 
 
 " A poet] " interrupted Mr. Dorrien, with a little start 
 of surprise ; " I never knew any thing about it. A poet ! 
 Are you sure, Mr. Black ? " 
 
 Yes, Mr. Black was quite sure; but, after all, wha't 
 John had been mattered little; the question was, what he 
 was now; and the only unfortunate result of his boyish 
 propensity for verse was that unlucky gift of imagination, 
 which, when carried into business, was so dangerous a fac- 
 ulty. 
 
 " Of course, of course," murmured Mr. Dorrien. " I 
 need not tell you, Mr. Black, that I have no illiberal preju- 
 dice against poets — of course not ; but they are not men 
 of business. And, though Mr. John Dorrien has great 
 talents, and has been most useful, it is no use denying 
 that, when he advocates a paper-mill, his imagination car- 
 ries him too far. I am sure Monsieur Basnage must have 
 got wind of it, and he is most useful — most useful. Ami 
 then I have other views. 1 want a change — a total change ; 
 the doctors say Paris air is fatal to me. I have a mind to 
 buy some house, or little chateau, or something of the 
 kind, on a railway-line, not far from the sea, and of course 
 I want money for that." 
 
 "Of course," answered Oliver in a low tone, while his 
 dark eyes burned with sudden fire. "The chateau which 
 belonged to Mr. Blackmore " (he never called him " my 
 fa i her"), "ami in which I was born, is still for sale," said 
 he. 
 
 " Indeed ! And do vou consider it a desirable purchase, 
 Mr. Black?" 
 
 "Decidedly so. The house has no great pretensions —
 
 438 J0HN DORRIEN. 
 
 a French chateau, you know — but it is commodious, and 
 well furnished. The grounds are delightful ; there is 
 plenty of fishing in the little river that runs through them ; 
 the railway-station is within a short drive, and the sea 
 beats against the cliffs that shelter it from the easterly 
 winds. To crown all, the heir-at-law, Mr. Blackmore, is 
 tired of having the place, which he does not use, on his 
 hands, and he will give it up for far less than its real value, 
 only" — Oliver paused, and smiled — "only he requires 
 ready money." 
 
 Mr. Dorrien made no comment. 
 
 " Have you seen the place lately ? " he asked. " Are 
 3' , ou sure it is still for sale ? " 
 
 " Quite sure, unless it was sold two days ago. It was 
 advertised in yesterday's Gfalignani." 
 
 He took the number out of his pocket, and showed it to 
 Mr. Dorrien, who there saw enunciated all the advantages 
 belonging to La Maison Rouge, concluding with a signifi- 
 cant hint of moderate terms, which made the man of busi- 
 ness smile. 
 
 " Strange if he should buy it," thought Oliver, watch- 
 ing Mr. Dorrien's pale face and gold eye-glass above the 
 edge of the newspaper : " strange if I should thus step back 
 into what should have been mine but for my poor dad's 
 dilatoriness ! Who knows but I may, and that La Maison 
 Rouge may not prove the surest of antidotes to John Dor- 
 rien's paper-mill?" 
 
 " La Chapelle is the name of the place, is it ? " said Mr. 
 Dorrien. " Can you leave me this, Mr. Black ? " he added, 
 putting the newspaper down. 
 
 " By all means. But I have been thinking again about 
 the mill! there may be exaggerations. Shall I consult 
 another architect, and — " 
 
 Mr. Dorrien interrupted him by impatiently inquiring 
 what the use of that would be. 
 
 " No," he added, in the tone of a man who has made 
 up his mind, " I must have some conversation with Mr. 
 John Dorrien, that is all. I am greatly obliged to you, Mr. 
 Black, for the trouble you have taken in all this. I wish 
 the matter had not gone so far, especially in what concerns 
 Monsieur Basnage, who has been growing decidedly cool 
 of late. Mr. John Dorrien is to blame in this too. I am
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 439 
 
 sorry for it. I liked the connection, but of course I cannot 
 seem to care about it, if Monsieur Basnage does not/' 
 
 Mr. Dorrien spoke in a vexed tone, and looked restless- 
 ly at ( Hiver, who, laughing gayly, sa id : 
 
 "I am nobody, and perhaps can mend mutters — at 
 least, 1 shall not commit either you, sir, or La Maison Dor- 
 rien, if 1 attempt what you or John certainly could not do 
 without making .Monsieur Basnage conceited. I can feel 
 the ground, and advance or draw back, according to Mon- 
 sieur Basnagfe's mood." 
 
 "Well, yes," said Mr. Dorrien, brightening at the sug- 
 gestion, which, indeed, he had both expeeted and wished 
 for; "you can do that, Mr. Black. I shall be obliged to 
 you. And will you also kindly see Mr. Brown before din- 
 ner, and make that matter clear to him ? " added .Mr. Dor- 
 rien, who was already tired of business, and who dreaded 
 entering upon the subject of the paper-mill with his precise 
 subordinate. 
 
 Oliver smiled good-humoredly, and was ready to do any 
 thing to please Mr. Dorrien. He took up his papers, and, 
 with the same smiling face, went at once to Mr. Brown's 
 room. 
 
 " Well, Mr. Brown," said he, airily, as he entered that 
 gentleman's presence, " I really think 1 have accomplished 
 two things. That matter of the Morghens is settled for 
 good. The little hitch we had is over, and, so far as they 
 are concerned, you need have no more trouble on your 
 mind." 
 
 Mr. Brown pushed up his spectacles, and smiled beam- 
 ingly on the young man. Mr. Black was too good, too 
 good, and he, Mr. Brown, had been thinking of frames for 
 the Morghens — black and gold. Did he, Mr. Black, think 
 they would suit ? " For engravings, you know, for engrav- 
 ings, black and geld," pursued Mr. Brown, slightlv excited. 
 
 " The poor old devil is actually going to pinch himself 
 for these hideous black-and-ffold things," he rrood-naturedlv 
 thought; so he, in the same lit of good-nature, suggested 
 that Mr. Brown need not trouble about frames at all. But 
 Mr. Brown thereupon looked. so blank that Oliver perceived 
 he wished to spend on his beloved Morghens, and, praising 
 the black-and-gold frames as chaste and suitable, he glided 
 into other matters.
 
 440 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 " You will be glad to learn, Mr. Brown," lie calmly re- 
 marked, " that the paper-mill is, as you foretold, really im- 
 practicable, and must be given up. I have all the figures 
 here." 
 
 "Excuse me, Mr. Black," cautiously remarked Mr. 
 Brown, " I did not foretell — I only expressed a doubt." 
 
 " Which proves your sagacity by becoming a fact," per- 
 sisted Oliver, determined on committing him to his side of 
 the question. 
 
 But Mr. Brown could not be committed. 
 
 " Excuse me, Mr. Black," said he, " but, if Mr. John 
 Dorrien's figures do not prove the truth of his views, other 
 figures cannot prove their falsehood." 
 
 " Well, well," good-humoredly replied Oliver, " I have 
 done what Mr. Dorrien wished me to do — set a clever 
 architect to work, and here is the result. It may be right, 
 or it may be wrong — you will find that out, Mr. Brown." 
 
 Mr. Brown softened, as usual, to that pleasant face and 
 good-tempered way of Oliver's. There never was any re- 
 sisting that agreeable young man, who always yielded to 
 you so gracefully. Now Mr. John Dorrien was an excel- 
 lent young gentleman, to be sure, but he was apt to be 
 arbitrary, and if he took up a notion, and thought it a 
 right one, neither heaven nor earth, viz., Mr. Brown, could 
 move him, or make him give it up ; and so, unconsciously, 
 no doubt, but still none the less surely, did Mr. Brown like 
 to find that infallible, dogmatic John in the wrong, and, 
 with that bias on his mind, set himself to study the papers 
 after Oliver was gone. 
 
 Mr. Black repaired to the drawing-room. " Curious if 
 I should find her there ! " he thought. 
 
 Yes, Antoinette was there, but she was not alone. 
 John and his mother were with her, and the three were 
 looking at the sketch of a new design for note-paper which 
 Antoinette was showing them. They stood in the win- 
 dow. The light from the west fell on their faces— Mrs. 
 Dorrien's so faded and so wan, Antoinette's with a flush of 
 pleasure upon it just now, and John's so frank and manly. 
 They all seemed pleased, and Antoinette was laughing, 
 and John was looking at Antoinette with a smile in his 
 gray eyes. 
 
 '" May I look too ? " asked Oliver, coming forward, and
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 441 
 
 approach i 112: Antoinette, who started and turned pale as 
 she heard his voice. 
 
 It was John who held the design, and he handed it to 
 liim, Baying : 
 
 " Look, and admire, if you please." 
 
 Antoinette's last production was quaint and pleasing. 
 A pretty girlish head, with a hat and feathers, white col- 
 lar and blue bow, and a pair of wings peeping out behind. 
 
 " We were asking Miss Dorrien if she too has wing's, 
 and means to fly away from us," said John. 
 
 " A pretty fancy," remarked Oliver, ignoring this 
 speech, and evidently referring to the drawing; "but a 
 head and wings and no body — will not that have an un- 
 finished look, Miss Dorrien?" 
 
 " And how would you have me finish it, Mr. Black ? " 
 she asked calmly. 
 
 " Oh ! there are so many ways of ending these fair sylph- 
 like creatures," he replied, smiling. "A wasp would do 
 for this one, I fancy. She looks as if she could not merely 
 fly away, but sting too." 
 
 That he meant to sting, Antoinette knew^ as she heard 
 him. As to that, so did John Dorrien know it, and his dark 
 eyebrows contracted slightly. Oliver Black had yielded to 
 temper, and he was sorry for it as soon as the words were 
 spoken ; but seeing Antoinette near John had proved too 
 much for his equanimity. He had just that sort of jealousy 
 which requires no love for its existence — the jealousy of 
 wounded vanity; but, as we said, he was sorry, and he did 
 his best to mend the blunder. The dinner-bell gave him 
 the best opportunity in the world of doing so. Oliver Black 
 at once devoted himself to Mrs. John Dorrien, and was so 
 sunny, so amiable, and so charming, that the lady could not 
 but be graciously pleased ; and even John was softened, 
 and sent his suspicion to sleep. Only Antoinette remained 
 sad and grave during all dinner-time, and for the whole of 
 the evening averted her looks from her discarded lover. 
 
 "Oh! it is to be war, is it?" thought Oliver, amused. 
 "Poor little thing, you little know what lies in store for 
 you." 
 
 Mr. Dorrien, whose good spirits contrasted with those 
 of his granddaughter, could not keep them up ; however, 
 he retired early, and Oliver, who had felt dreadfully bored
 
 442 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 at heart, left at the same time with the master of the house. 
 With a sio-h of relief he crossed the threshold of the old 
 
 O 
 
 gate, and found himself in the quiet street, with the stars 
 shining 1 above him, and a calm fair moon floating 1 in va- 
 pory clouds far away above the city roofs. The night was 
 balmy enough for summer, and Oliver thought how soft and 
 silvery it must be in the shady grounds of his dead father's 
 old abode. Yes, he would like to get the French chateau 
 back again. He was born there, the child of shame and un- 
 lawful love ; he had been politely, but none the less posi- 
 tively, told to leave it by the distant cousin who had claimed 
 and legally held what should have been his inheritance. 
 It had witnessed all that was cruel and bitter in his life. 
 He would like to make it the witness of his triumph too. 
 It would be pleasant to his smarting pride if he could cross 
 that threshold with the tread of a master, and defy those 
 old rooms to deny him any more their shelter — nay, what 
 should prevent him from resuming, by going through proper 
 legal forms, of course, his name of Blackmore. 
 
 "Well, Mr. Black," said a sharp voice at his elbow, 
 which, though it addressed him in English, was decidedly 
 foreign in aocent, " have you seen the young lady yet ? " 
 
 . " My dear Mademoiselle Melanie," blandly replied Oli- 
 ver, " you may believe me, not till this very evening could 
 I have that little conversation with her, carried on in sub- 
 dued tones, while John Dorrien, confound him ! was look- 
 ing on, by which I could ascertain her final resolve. I 
 grieve to say that, with many expressions of regret, she de- 
 clines seeing you — indeed, professes herself unable to do so, 
 while under Mr. Dorrien's care. Very unpleasant to all 
 parties ; but, poor little thing, what can she do?" 
 
 " You take her part ! — you are in league with her ! " 
 cried Mademoiselle Melanie, ready to turn all her wrath 
 upon him. 
 
 " I ! " and Oliver shrugged his shoulders significantly — 
 " why, she would very much like to get rid of me if she 
 could." 
 
 " The little ungrateful serpent ! " exclaimed Mademoi- 
 selle Melanie, thinking not of his, but of her own wrongs. 
 
 " My dear Mademoiselle Melanie," he remarked in his 
 bland way, " what is the use of disguising the truth ? The 
 young lady wants us no more. You are not her real aunt,
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 443 
 
 and she prefers her real grandfather to you. I am a poor 
 devil, and she prefers John Dorrien to me. We must bear 
 it, my dear mademoiselle — we must bear it." 
 
 He spoke good-humoredly, but his bantering tone exas- 
 perated her all the more, and the light from the gas-lamp 
 near which they stood showed him her pale face, turning 
 white with rage. At first she said nothing. Then sudden- 
 ly turning upon him, " What will you give me if I help you 
 to be revenged upon her ? " she asked. 
 
 " Revenged I " he answered, coolly. "My dear Made- 
 moiselle Melanie, I have not the faintest wish for revenge. 
 I am a practical man, you see, and I think revenge a very 
 foolish, useless feeling — an expensive one too, sometimes." 
 
 He laughed in her face in evident enjoyment of his su- 
 periority. 
 
 "Do not go on with those grand, calm ways at me!" 
 she cried, her eyes sparkling. " I know you want to get 
 rid of her — I know you do ; I know she is in your way. 
 What will vou give me if I help you to put her out of it for 
 ever ? " 
 
 Her penetration startled him a little. 
 
 "Thank .you," he said, carelessly ; "but what can make 
 you think that T want to — actually to get rid of — I am 
 ashamed to use the words — of Miss Dorrien ? " 
 
 " Because she no longer cares about you, and that you 
 know it," she answered audaciously. 
 
 He said not a word. He looked at the cigar he was 
 holding delicately in his left forefinger and thumb, that its 
 fragrance might not annoy the lady in whose presence he 
 stood ; then suddenly raising his eyes, he fastened their gaze 
 full on her face. They exchanged a long look, such a look 
 as they had exchanged once when they sealed Antoinette's 
 fate ; and this look sealed it again, though for the present 
 not a word was spoken. 
 
 "All this is exciting you, mademoiselle," said he. "I 
 shall give your anger time to cool, and perhaps to-morrow 
 — yes, to-morrow morning I shall call upon you — with your 
 permission, of course." 
 
 "Yes, come and see me, now that you want me," she 
 answered sharply — u come, Mr. Black. 
 
 He laughed with perfect good-humor, raised his hat 
 with graceful courtesy, and so left her.
 
 444 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 Cool ! He knew well enough that reflection would not 
 cool, but rouse her wrath to fury, so that, like the waves of 
 an angry sea, it would rise higher and higher, until not a 
 stray gleam of reason would be left to pierce its gloom. 
 What he wanted was to give Mademoiselle Melanie time to 
 fashion her revenge into some practicable form or other, 
 which he might use in moderation ; for her cruel, savage 
 nature was wholly foreign to his. He could be pitiless 
 enough in his way, but he was not needlessly so, and, pro- 
 vided that he could get rid of Antoinette, what more did 
 he want ? 
 
 CHAPTER XXXIX. 
 
 Antoinette had borne up till then, but this evening 
 she broke down. To meet Oliver so frequently, and on 
 such terms of close intercourse, was more than she could 
 bear. Mrs. Reginald, passing by her door, after Oliver was 
 gone, heard her low sobs and moans, and, after listening 
 awhile with a face of much gravity, she retraced her steps 
 and went straight to the library, to which John had repaired 
 as soon as the party broke up. Mrs. Reginald never en- 
 tered the library, for, when John went there it was to work ; 
 but for once she broke through the rule, and if John was 
 surprised at her unexpected appearance, no less was she 
 surprised to find that John was not working, but sitting- 
 back in his chair, at some distance from his desk, and evi- 
 dently lost in thought. 
 
 " Don't be alarmed," said she, as he started at her ap- 
 pearance ; " your mother is all right. I only want to know 
 if you can tell me what ails that child. You have been 
 getting on pretty well with her this winter ; perhaps you 
 know why she is sobbing in her room as if her heart would 
 break." 
 
 John looked disturbed. 
 
 " I know of only one cause of trouble to her," he said, 
 after a pause. " Mr. Dorrien will not allow her to see her 
 aunt." 
 
 " Before I believe that any one can ever sob and moan
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 445 
 
 for that person — " indignantly began Mrs. Reginald ; thru 
 breaking off, "Say something else, John." 
 Bui John liad nothing else to say. 
 
 "You don't think," said Mrs. Reginald, knitting her 
 eyebrows — " yon can't think that she can be fretting about 
 that little Mr. Black ? " 
 
 A painful flush covered John's pale, intellectual face. 
 
 " If you mean that she cares about him," he replied, " I 
 feel almost sure that she does not." 
 
 " Then, John, take the advice of a friend," said Mrs. 
 Reginald, very earnestly. "No shilly-shallying, no time- 
 losing, John. She is a good child, though she has been so 
 badly reared, and the man whom she likes can turn and 
 lead her the right way. Besides, it is time," added Mrs. 
 Reginald, impressively, " that you did see about the part- 
 nership. Mr. Dorrien's health is uncertain," she continued, 
 as she rose, " and that alone ought to make you take care 
 of yourself." 
 
 "I believe you are right, Mrs. Reginald, thank you 
 kindly," said John, abstractedly; but, to say the truth, he 
 was thinking of Antoinette's sobs and tears, and not of 
 Mrs. Reginald's well-meant advice. 
 
 "John, if you will not think of yourself, think of your 
 mother," persisted Mrs. Reginald, raising a warning fore- 
 finger at him. 
 
 " You may be sure that I will," he replied, very ear- 
 nestly ; but when she was gone he relapsed into his com- 
 muning with his own thoughts, and they bore no rose- 
 colored hue just then. 
 
 " A good boy, but an obstinate one," thought Mrs. Regi- 
 nald, as she w r ent up-stairs. " I wonder how she is getting 
 on now ? '* 
 
 She paused again at Antoinette's door, but no sounds 
 of grief now came from her room. The passionate outbreak 
 was exhausted, not, however, without leaving traces of its 
 passage behind. 
 
 Antoinette looked very pale and ill the next day, and 
 with every day that passed she looked worse. John spoke 
 to Mr. Dorrien, who looked rather wearied at having to 
 think about Miss Dorrien's health, but who said : 
 
 " Let Dr. Parker be called in, by all means." 
 
 Dr. Parker came, spoke of debility, ordered quinine, and
 
 446 JOHN DORKIEN. 
 
 hinted, but cautiously, about the morale being affected. JVL . 
 Dorrien heard him coldly, but had no doubt, since Dr. Parker 
 said so, that Miss Dorrien wanted to be strengthened. 
 
 Quinine not having restored either Antoinette's color 
 or her spirits, John took an early opportunity of speaking 
 again to Mr. Dorrien, on that gentleman's return from a 
 short excursion to the northwest of France. 
 
 " Miss Dorrien is no better, sir," said he. 
 
 Mr. Dorrien was sorry to hear it. 
 
 " Dr. Parker came for my mother while you were awa}', 
 and saw Miss Dorrien again. He found her weaker than 
 before, and suggested that a change would do her good." 
 
 " And how can Miss Dorrien have a change ? " coldly 
 asked Mr. Dorrien. 
 
 It had become a fixed idea with him of late that he 
 wanted a change, and he thought it a piece of presumption 
 in a young thing like Antoinette to put herself on the same 
 footing with him. Undeterred by his cold looks, John per- 
 sisted. 
 
 " My mother could take her down to the sea-side," said 
 he. " Mr. Black went to Saint-Tves some time ago, and he 
 said something on his return which reminded me of a cot- 
 tage to be let near it. It belonged to a worthy old man 
 who has been dead some years, and his house is now let, 
 furnished, to sea-side visitors. It would be cheap enough 
 at this time of the year, and it is a quiet, pleasant place." 
 
 " And Mrs. John would stay with Miss Dorrien ? " said 
 Mr. Dorrien, who had heard him with a half-smile. " I sup- 
 pose you would take them down ? " 
 
 "I could go down with them, stay a day, and come 
 back the next." 
 
 " Just so. Well, I see no objection to j^our plan, John. 
 You can say so to Miss Dorrien." 
 
 It was close upon the dinner-hour, and John, guessing 
 that he should find Antoinette in the drawing-room, went 
 there at once. 
 
 She was sitting by the window, pale and listless, when 
 the door opened. She gave a look round, saw John, and 
 turned back again to her apathetic contemplation of the 
 garden. There was no welcome in her bearing; but, heed- 
 less of this, John Dorrien went up to her, and, taking a 
 chair, sat down by her side.
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 44? 
 
 " How do you feel to-day ? " he asked. 
 
 " Oh, very well," she answered, resignedly. "Thank 
 you," sin- .'idiled, after a pause. 
 
 " Would you like a drive with ray mother ? " he sug- 
 gested. 
 
 "I think I should prefer staying within, please," she 
 answered, languidly. 
 
 " Or shopping with Mrs. Reginald ? " he persisted. 
 
 " But I hate shopping ! " said Antoinette, almost crossly. 
 
 " Or there is a new great singer, shall we go and hear 
 her to-night ? " 
 
 A faint light shone in Antoinette's dark eyes, but died 
 away almost at once. If she went to the theatre, might 
 she not see Oliver there ? The mere thought sickened 
 her. 
 
 " Thank you, John," she said, relapsing into her languor, 
 " but I do not care about the play just now." 
 
 " What do you care for ? " 
 
 "Nothing." 
 
 She folded* her hands upon her lap, and uttered the 
 dreary word with sorrowful apathy. John Dorrien looked 
 at her attentively awhile, then said, quietly : 
 
 " I hope you follow the doctor's prescriptions ? " 
 
 " Yes," she impatiently answered ; " but what is the 
 use ? I tell you, John, that I am not ill." 
 
 She sighed weariedly, for she was not ill, indeed, and 
 she knew it. Her ailment was that of an unconquerable 
 sorrow. She had committed a great, a fatal mistake, and 
 she could not forgive herself for having done so. Her love 
 for Oliver Black, once her delight and her pride, was now 
 the humiliation of her daily life. She could forgive herself 
 for having taken a bad man to be a good one, but the sin 
 for which there was no remission, and of which she felt the 
 daily sting, was that of having abetted his treason. She 
 had not gone as far as he wished her to go, but she had al- 
 lowed him to make her daily life a lie. Cruel, intolerable 
 thought! And it was a lie of which the consequences 
 were full of mischief, not to herself merely — that she could 
 have endured — but to others. Slut had been to Oliver 
 lllack that tempting opportunity which even the wicked 
 need for sin. If she had scorned the concealment, without 
 which he was powerless, Oliver would have slipped out of
 
 448 J0 HN DORRIEN. 
 
 their engagement, and never attempted to take John Dor- 
 rien's place. That had been his object from the first — An- 
 toinette knew it now — that was his object still ; and, unless 
 by a treason lor which John himself would scorn her, she 
 could avert nothing. John suspected, but he did not know, 
 and she could not put the proof he needed in his hands. 
 She could not say : " Take care ; the friend you brought here 
 is a traitor. He robbed you of the bride that had been 
 promised you, and now he will rob you of Mademoiselle 
 Basnage, and your position here if he can." Not one word 
 of all this could she utter. Silence was her hard, hard lot, 
 and that silence and the remorse on which it fed was the 
 illness of Antoinette — the ailment for which no doctor could 
 find a cure. 
 
 " Antoinette," said John, after a while, " would you like 
 to leave Paris ? " 
 
 " How so ? " she asked, with a look of doubt, but also 
 of sudden animation. 
 
 " The doctor suggested that change of scene might do 
 you good, and Mr. Dorrien is willing that you should try 
 the experiment. There is a pleasant little village on the 
 Norman coast near Saint-Ives. I could take you down 
 there with my mother, leave you both for a fortnight or so, 
 and then go and fetch you." 
 
 A flush of joy rose to Antoinette's pale cheek. To leave 
 the city in which Oliver dwelt, the house where, do what 
 she would, she could not avoid seeing him ; to be far away 
 by the sea-side, on breezy downs, in green fields, far from 
 the hateful past and bitter present — all this, even though 
 it was only for a fortnight, seemed a heavenly relief from 
 misery. 
 
 " O John ! " she cried, her eyes filling with grateful 
 tears, " how good you are ! I shall like it so much — so 
 much ! " she could not help repeating, in the fervor of her 
 gratitude. 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien was pleased at the prospect of a change, 
 and expressed herself willing to take charge of Antoinette ; 
 her only regret, she said, was to leave Mrs. Reginald be- 
 hind. 
 
 " Never mind me, dear," cheerfully replied her friend, 
 as she helped her to pack up on the morning of the depart- 
 ure — for the journey thus quickly decided upon suffered no
 
 JOHN DORRIEX. 449 
 
 delay — " never mind me, I say. Enjoy yourself, and don't 
 keep John longer than you can help." 
 
 " But the dear boy will want a change too," answered 
 John's mother, in an injured tone. 
 
 "Yes, yes; but don't keep him, and don't let him lose 
 time philandering with Antoinette — that's all." 
 
 " Oh, there's nothing of that kind," said Mrs. Dorrien, 
 with a sigh. " He and Antoinette seem very friendly, but 
 yet— " 
 
 " Well ? " said Mrs. Reginald, looking up from the trunk, 
 and seeming interested. 
 
 "Yet they don't get on, and I wish they would, if it 
 were only for the sake of the partnership," added Mrs. Dor- 
 rien with a fresh sigh. 
 
 " Perhaps they get on better than you think," shrewdly 
 suggested Mrs. Reginald. "Young things are awfully de- 
 ceitful." 
 
 " But I asked John, dear, and he was obliged to confess 
 there was nothing yet between them — not a word." 
 
 " Bless you, dear ! they sometimes never get on better 
 than without talking. They are so 'cute." 
 
 " Yes, but it would be so much more comfortable if it 
 were all settled. I wonder Mr. Dorrien does not bring mat- 
 ters to an issue." 
 
 " Not in a hurry," dryly said Mrs. Reginald. " Never 
 was." 
 
 " And yet so kind as he has been, dear ; so willing that 
 Antoinette should go and John accompany her ! J thought 
 he would have made difficulties, whereas he did not raise 
 one objection." 
 
 Mrs. Reginald looked up at the ceiling, and tightened 
 her lips, as if firmly resolved not to contradict, nor yet to 
 assent. Still the temptation to utter a protest could not 
 be resisted, and she said, significantly: 
 
 " Very true, dear, but for all that don't keep John, and 
 don't let him stay either. Don't look uneasy, dear. Only 
 business is business, you know." 
 
 This incontrovertible proposition closed the discourse; 
 but, though the uneasiness which Mrs. Reginald's remarks 
 had vaguely roused passed away from Mrs. Dorrien's mind, 
 it remained under a very definite shape in the mind of Mrs. 
 Reginald herself. We know how that lady had discovered
 
 450 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 some time before this that "something was going on." 
 What that something was she began to suspect on the 
 very morning of the journey. 
 
 Before going out Mr. Dorrien had informed her that he 
 would not dine at home this evening. 
 
 " I understood that Mr. Brown was to stay to-day, Mon- 
 day," remarked Mrs. Reginald. " I believe it was on Fri- 
 day you told him that you ' wanted him to talk over some- 
 thing.' " 
 
 " Oh ! very likely," composedly answered Mr. Dorrien ; 
 " but we are both going to dine at Monsieur Basnage's, 
 and to talk over that very matter. Thank you for remind- 
 ing me, Mrs. Reginald. I am sorry you should be left alone, 
 but I did not anticipate that our friends would forsake us 
 so soon." 
 
 And, with his most courteous smile, Mr. Dorrien bade 
 her a good-morning. 
 
 " Both going to dine at Monsieur Basnage's ! " mentally 
 ejaculated Mrs. Reginald. " I thought there was a coolness 
 in that quarter." 
 
 " Well, Mr. Brown," she could not help saying, as she 
 met that gentleman in the hall a few minutes later, " every 
 one is forsaking me, it seems. I have a nice evening before 
 me alone in this great house." 
 
 " I am sorry I cannot keep you company, Mrs. Regi- 
 nald," answered Mr. Brown, cautiously, "but I have an 
 appointment — an appointment, Mrs. Reginald." 
 
 " Oh ! you have, have you ? With Mr. Black about the 
 Morghens?" suggested Mrs. Reginald, with cutting sar- 
 casm, for she had got to include Mr. Brown's engravings 
 in her dislike of Mr. Black. 
 
 A gleam of dry humor shot into Mr. Brown's dull eye. 
 
 " Well," he said, yielding in a weak moment to the 
 temptation of a joke, "} r ou know, Mrs. Reginald, that, 
 when Mr. Black and I meet, Ave must talk of the Morghcns." 
 
 Mrs. Reginald stood petrified. Mr. Brown, as she had 
 often told him to his face, had not as much imagination as 
 would invent a lie the size of a pin's-head. If he said or 
 implied that he was to meet Oliver this evening, the infer- 
 ence was clear — Oliver, too, dined at Monsieur Basnage's. 
 Just as John Dorrien might have dined, if he had not been 
 going to Normandy. And he, the stranger, the interloper,
 
 JOHN DORRIKX. 451 
 
 was actually going to meet Mademoiselle Basnage in John's 
 stead! Monsieur Basnage'a daughter might be a doll, as 
 .Mrs. Reginald had so often asserted ; but she was at least 
 a doll belonging to, or destined for, or proposed to, John 
 Dorrien, and that little Mr. Black should sit at the same 
 table with her was not to be endured. 
 
 "Mr. Brown, - " severely said the angry lady, "you are 
 acting a part unworthy of you, and, mark my words" — 
 here her forefinger was raised — "you will repent it." 
 
 "Mrs. Reginald!" 
 
 "You are helping out that little Mr. Black, and all be- 
 cause he got round you with those Morghens of yours, 
 which are no more Morghens than I am, Mr. Brown." 
 
 "Mrs. Reginald, they arc authentic," exclaimed Mr. 
 Brown, much offended. 
 
 "You are helping him out against that admirable, true, 
 upright John Dorrien, whom you have known from his boy- 
 hood; and, mark my words, you will repent it." 
 
 So saying, Mrs. Reginald left Mr. Brown, who was too 
 much displeased at the slight cast on his Morghens to in- 
 quire into the meaning of her warning. 
 
 But of this significant incident no one save Mrs. Regi- 
 nald herself was aware ; and, an hour later, John, his moth- 
 er, and Antoinette, were leaving the Hotel Dorrien, and 
 driving to the Saint-Lazare station. For many davs An- 
 toinette had not felt so light-hearted and happy as when 
 she stepped into the carriage that was waiting for them at 
 the foot of the perron. She could have sung in the glad- 
 ness of her heart; and, when they passed under the arched 
 gate-way, and got out into the gloomy street, she thrust 
 her head out of the carriage-window and nodded a trium- 
 phant adieu to the old house; but quickly the light died 
 from her eyes, the smile from her lips, and the gladness 
 from her heart, as in the street below, standing close to 
 the wall to let the carriage pass, she saw Oliver Black. 
 He threw away his cigar as he saw her, and raised his hat 
 to her with grave and ironical courtesy, and Antoinette 
 shrank in with a sad, dismayed look, the triumph of her 
 departure all gone. 
 
 "You seem quite faint, dear," said Mrs. Dorrien, in a 
 tone of concern. 
 
 " Oh ! no ; I am so well, thank you," answered Antoi-
 
 452 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 nette, trying to rally, and look bright, and failing signally 
 in the attempt. 
 
 But distance is a great enchanter, and, though her feel- 
 ing on seeing Oliver had been, " What is the use of going 
 away, since I must come back to where he is ? " — Antoi- 
 nette could not help putting her trouble by, as she leaned 
 back in a railway-carriage, and looked at the green land- 
 scape on either hand. Oh ! surely, surely in a world so 
 fair, where the sky was so serene, and earth was so lovely, 
 where a beautiful river flowed in the shade of silvery wil- 
 low-trees, and picturesque old towns rose on the slopes 
 with their cathedral towers glittering in the sun, in a world 
 where there were so many happy homes, pleasant villas 
 with lawns and gardens, quaint chateaux with high roofs, 
 weathercocks, and formal-clipped trees — in such a world as 
 this there was room for Antoinette and her little bit of 
 happiness ? 
 
 The sun was setting, a ridge of fire, behind the low 
 green cornfields, when John said : 
 
 " We get down here." 
 
 " Is this La Chapelle ? " asked Antoinette, looking 
 round her, and seeing only a little station in a lonely -look- 
 ing spot. 
 
 " This is Saint-Ives," answered John. 
 
 Antoinette saw Mrs. Dorrien look at her son, and she 
 saw John's grave face and earnest eyes. That name of 
 Saint-Ives had called up many a vision from the past which 
 she could not even guess at. She had heard, indeed, of the 
 Abbe Veran's famous school, but Mrs. Dorrien's obscure 
 and penurious widowhood, John's restricted childhood, his 
 ambitious youth, and its passionate hopes, had only been 
 partly revealed to Antoinette. 
 
 " My dear bo} r ," said Mrs. Dorrien, looking wistfully 
 up in her son's face, and pressing his arm. 
 
 John did not answer. He was not thinking of the 
 dream he had relinquished, he was not looking back and 
 pining for the days that might have been — but, as he gazed 
 on a vacant spot before him, he seemed to see a man with 
 a dark face and iron-gray hair, he seemed to hear a hearty 
 voice, with the warm Irish accent, Galling out : 
 
 " Good-by to you, John, my boy ! Good-by ! " Saddest 
 of sad words — sad even if they who speak it meet again ;
 
 JOHN DORKIEN. 453 
 
 for does not every parting take a link out of the chain 
 which hinds our lives here below? 
 
 A railway-omnibus conveyed the travelers along a 
 quiet, lonely road, to a- pleasant-looking little village, clus- 
 tering round an old gray church — and this was La Chapelle. 
 It was twilight when the car rolled into an inn-yard, and 
 they all alighted. 
 
 "I smell the sea," said Antoinette, with sparkling 
 eyes. " O John, may I go and see it presently ? " 
 
 "Yes, surely," he answered, pleased to see how much 
 better she was Looking already. 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien, however, Mas both cross and tired. She 
 liked Antoinette, but John had been far more attentive to 
 that young lady than she fancied. She wished him to 
 marry Mr. Dorrien's granddaughter — of course she did ; but 
 was that a reason why he should be so wrapped up in her? 
 In short, that jealousy which seems apart of maternal love, 
 was awakening in Mrs. Dorrien's breast, and exercising 
 some ravages there. 
 
 "Lean on my arm, little mother," said John; and the 
 kind, familiar tone, and the kind gray eyes, soothed the poor 
 lady at once ; but on recovering her good-humor she be- 
 came doleful. 
 
 " I wish we had dear Mrs. Reginald here!" she said, 
 with a sigh. " I shall be dull without her, I know. Dear 
 Mrs. Reginald ! I don't suppose there is another like her." 
 
 They were going up a steep path, with tall trees on 
 either side, a shady path, with here and there a hawthorn- 
 hedge, or a bramble-bush, with high ferns, and a wealth of 
 wild spring flowers — a path loveliest when the sun is out, 
 and when patches of blue sky look down at you through 
 the green boughs, but also beautiful, mysterious, and cool, 
 in the grayness of the fading day. Antoinette, who had 
 just seen a nest of primroses, uttered a cry of delight. 
 
 "O Mrs. John," she said, "look at them! they only 
 grow up in the mountains with us, and look at them here." 
 
 " I am talking and thinking of Mrs. Reginald, and not 
 of primroses," replied Mrs. John, aggrieved; and then, as 
 Antoinette looked penitent and sorry, she suddenly softened. 
 
 " Do not mind me, dear," she said, kindly ; " but no 
 one ever has had such a friend, I suppose ; and I think it 
 so hard that she should have been left behind."
 
 454 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 "Do you think she would have liked coming, little 
 mother?" asked John. 
 
 To which Mrs. Dorrien replied, with some asperity, 
 that it would have been no use for Mrs. Reginald to like 
 coming, since she had never been asked ; and that, of all 
 cruel things, the most cruel was that Mrs. Reginald should 
 never have a holiday. 
 
 " This is the house," said John. 
 
 Antoinette looked eagerlj r at their new home. She 
 saw a thatched building, long and low, surrounded by an 
 orchard of fruit-trees in blossom. Tall beeches hemmed it 
 in, and only a wooden palisade divided it from the path. 
 As John lifted the latch of a low gate, a door opened, and 
 a bright young woman came out to meet them. 
 
 " I am so glad you are come," she said, volubly. " I 
 dreamed last night that Nicholas was driving the car into 
 the sea, and it made me quite unhappy all day." 
 
 " Did 3'ou think he had driven us into the sea ? " asked 
 John, gravely. 
 
 The young woman raised her eyebrows in amazement 
 at the absurdity of the question. Why, Nicholas was the 
 best driver for leagues and leagues, she said, and as to driv- 
 ing into the sea, he must first go into the village. 
 
 " Then what meaning did you attach to your dream ? " 
 asked John, as he led his mother into the house. 
 
 " Why, none, of course," replied the young woman, im- 
 patiently. " But dreams are dreams, though Parisians will 
 laugh at them." 
 
 They had entered a pleasant dining-room, where the 
 cloth was laid, and everv thing spoke of dinner and wel- 
 come. Mrs. Dorrien's face cleared. 
 
 " How nice ! " she murmured, with a sigh. 
 
 No less pleasant did she find her bedroom. Antoinette 
 was simply charmed with hers. 
 
 "O John, only think," she said, when the) 7 " met again 
 in the dining-room, " I can touch the blossoms of one of 
 those beautiful trees when I open my window." 
 
 The dinner was plain, and soon over. As soon as the 
 meal ended, Mrs. Dorrien said, with a wearied sigh : 
 
 " I think I shall go to bed, John. You may take your 
 cousin to the sea. I mean that you need not mind leaving 
 me," she added, with a resigned sigh.
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 455 
 
 "O John, will you really ?" cried Antoinette, jumping 
 up quickly. 
 
 "Ay, that I will, and at once, too," was the ready an- 
 swer; "but wrap yourself well, for this sea is not the 
 Mediterranean, Miss Dorrien." 
 
 She ran to her room in joyous haste. She came out 
 again Hushed and eager; for, oh ! if they should be late — 
 if they should not be able to gaze at the sea before the 
 morrow ! 
 
 "Dreadful calamity," said John, laughing ; "and yet it 
 will keep, Antoinette! This way," he said, as they passed 
 out through the gate, and struck at once by a field of young 
 corn. 
 
 The air was keen but pure. Not a cloud dimmed the 
 evening sky, but a soft gray mist already floated over the 
 landscape. How beautiful, how fresh, how cool and green, 
 did this northern land look to the eyes of the southern 
 girl. As they went through the silent fields, and caught a 
 glimpse of a thatched cottage here and there, with its 
 twinkling light, and thread of smoke rising slowly in the 
 silent air, for this was supper-time, Antoinette broke into 
 fresh raptures, which it did John good to hear. But the 
 sea, where was the sea? she; asked, ever and anon. Bid- 
 ding her be patient, he led her down a steep path, dark 
 and uneven, and then all suddenly they came out at the 
 back of the village, and tl>e lonely beach and the wide, 
 calm sea were before them. 
 
 No one in France goes to the sea-side in spring, and, so 
 far as visitors went, La Chapelle was deserted. The na- 
 tives do not care for tin; sea, and only a few boys were 
 playing on the shingle. The Casino, a square stone build- 
 ing, was shut up, and the bathing-machines were not }-et 
 brought out. Only an old coast-guard was prowling about, 
 with a listless, lounging gait. 
 
 " And that is the ocean ! " exclaimed Antoinette. 
 
 " The ocean ! No, only the Channel ; but I see you are 
 not impressed. Come down here/' 
 
 A few boards thrown over the shingle made descent 
 easy till the sands were reached. The tide was out, but it 
 had left many a pool behind, and white bare rocks, like 
 giant bones, and brown rocks, all covered with green and 
 slippery sea-weed, stretched their desolate waste to the low
 
 456 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 horizon. The sun was set, but a deep crimson line showed 
 where the track of his fiery car had been. Above spread a 
 dark-blue arch, melting into a pale zenith, sprinkled here 
 and there with a white star. The gray cliffs rose on either 
 hand, looking faint and ghostly in the mist which came 
 floating toward them from the sea. This lay as quiet in its 
 distant bed as if it were lulled in the tideless cradle of the 
 Mediterranean, and its waves were to beat forever, day 
 after day, on an unchanging shore. 
 
 The glorious coloring, the lovely landscape, the moun- 
 tains, laden with verdure, and bending their green heads to 
 the sea ; the graceful palm-trees and fragrant myrtles of 
 Antoinette's old home, were not here, but, in their stead, a 
 low, moaning waste of waters, making their murmur in a 
 long edge of white foam to the barren and austere shores 
 of a northern land. 
 
 " O John ! it is very wild and very grand," said Antoi- 
 nette. " Can we sit down ? " 
 
 They rested on the edge of shingle, and the fresh salt 
 breath of the sea came to them in slow but steady increase 
 as the returning tide advanced. Antoinette watched its 
 progress, so slow, so sure, with almost breathless interest, 
 and not till it beat almost at their feet could she bear to 
 rise or go away. She was silent as they went home, and 
 when they reached the house she paused on the threshold 
 to say : 
 
 " How long are we to stay here, John ? " 
 
 " A fortnight — three weeks — a month, if you like. I 
 mean you and my mother — for, of course, I shall go, as 
 agreed, after to-morrow." 
 
 "Fifteen days — twenty-one — thirty, perhaps," thought 
 Antoinette. " Oh ! I shall be too happy ! — too happy 1 it 
 cannot be true." 
 
 CHAPTER XL. 
 
 A blackbird was singing very sweetly far away when 
 Antoinette woke the next morning. She had not closed 
 her shutters, and an apple-bough, laden with blossoms, was
 
 JOHN DORRIE.V. 457 
 
 bending toward her window, as if to bid lier good-morning'. 
 She quickly opened it, reckless of the cool sea-breeze, and 
 gazed with delight on the blooming orchard. It lay before 
 her in freshness, dew, and sunlight, a picture so pleasant 
 and so fair that it almost took her breath away to see it. 
 Antoinette dressed as quickly as she could, and very softly 
 — for it was early yet — she stole out of the silent house. 
 As she passed through the tall grasses, leaving a waving 
 trade behind her, a startled brown rabbit, who had been 
 used to take his breakfast there undisturbed, scudded away 
 in great haste, and vanished in a moment. A world of 
 daisies, buttercups, and orchids, lay at her feet; the tender 
 boughs of the blossoming trees met above her head, and here 
 and there streaks of the morning sunshine stole in, shedding 
 their pale gold on the green earth. Early as was the hour, 
 the bees were out at work already. Their low hum guided 
 Antoinette to a retired nook, where she saw their yellow 
 hive, and, standing still, she watched them at a distance. 
 
 " I wonder at what o'clock they get up ? " said John's 
 voice behind her. 
 
 " Earlier than you, sir," she answered saucily, and turn- 
 ing her beaming face upon him. 
 
 She looked as well, or almost as well, as ever. It seemed 
 as if, by merely leaving Paris, and the chance of meeting 
 Oliver Black, behind, she had also left ill health and low 
 spirits. With the wonderful elasticity of the young, she 
 had got back in a few hours her blooming cheek and buoy- 
 ant spirits. The change was so great that John could not 
 but be struck with it ; but, because he was so struck, he 
 said nothing about it. 
 
 " Yes, bees are early risers," he answered, "and hard 
 workers, too; but we are here for a holiday, and have nothing 
 to do with earning our breakfast, or get t ing it ready ; let us 
 look-about us before we go in to it. Come this way, and I 
 will show you something worth seeing and remembering.*' 
 
 He took her to the other end of the orchard. A rustic 
 bench stood in the shade. There was a great gap in the 
 trees that inclosed the place,' and through that gap they 
 saw the valley below them. They sat down on the bench 
 and looked at the picture, trained in an arch of dark green : 
 a little pastoral picture, without one grand or striking feat- 
 ure in it, but cool, shady, and pleasing to the eye. Little 
 20
 
 458 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 thatched cottages, brown, and many of them like birds'- 
 nests, and, like them, half buried in bushes and young trees, 
 were scattered here and there on the slopes. One, white- 
 washed, and shining in the sun, stood on the very edge of 
 a narrow brook that ran along the valley, and was half-hid- 
 den by tall trees. The morning mists were rolling away 
 from the low hills, the dappled clouds were melting from the 
 sky, a crowing of cocks and cackling of hens rose from every 
 farm-yard, and the pleasant voices and merry laughter of 
 children mingled with all these sounds of awakening life. 
 
 " How charming; ! " cried Antoinette. " Oh, if there 
 were but a painter here ! " 
 
 "When I was here some years ago," remarked John, 
 quietly, " a painter was painting the very view before us." 
 
 " Then you have been here before, John ? " said Antoi- 
 nette, surprised. 
 
 "Oh, yes," he answered — "very often." 
 
 He said no more. He never willingly touched with her 
 on that part of his life in which there had been an Oliver 
 Blackmore. So Monsieur Latour, and his intended but 
 never-begun picture of Calypso on the sea-shore, and that 
 day, which John could not but remember, as he sat by Antoi- 
 nette, remained buried in the past — that silent past which 
 w r e will all carry about us, and tell to the ear of God alone. 
 Antoinette did not suspect that all she now gazed on was 
 darkened by the shadow which it was to her a relief so en- 
 tire to escape. Oliver had told her very little about him- 
 self, and had never dwelt willingly on his early friendship 
 and intimacy with John. It did not occur to her to connect 
 him with this place. She enjoyed that morning hour, and 
 laughed and talked freely with John, and ran out with him 
 in the fields outside the house, to catch a glimpse of the blue 
 horizon ; and came in again to meet Mrs. John Dorrien at 
 breakfast, and give her breathless and enthusiastic accounts 
 of the morning. It was all very delightful — oh ! so delight- 
 ful ! There was only one sad drawback — John was going 
 away to-morrow. 
 
 " Yes," sighed Mrs. Dorrieti, " that is a pity. Poor John 
 was always a victim to business." 
 
 But poor John only laughed, and would not be pitied, and 
 asked what he should do if he had not business to engross 
 him.
 
 JOHN DORRIEX. 459 
 
 "Ah! it is all very well," sighed Mrs. Dorrien again, 
 " but 1 have not forgot ten that you were first at Saint-lves, 
 and that tbere was nothing that you could not have 
 achieved, and now it is only note-paper and envelopes and 
 money that take up your mind." 
 
 " You cannot help regretting it sometimes ! " exclaimed 
 Antoinette, looking at him. 
 
 " I never look bark," said John. " I hold that to do so 
 is the merest folly of which a man can be guilty." 
 
 He spoke cheerfully, and spoke as he felt, and his brave 
 spirit did Antoinette good. 
 
 "Why should I look back?" she asked of herself; 
 " why should I not look forward, and do my best to mend 
 the past?" 
 
 But she did not ask herself how that fatal past was to 
 be mended, nor what that forward was to be. With the 
 happy shortsightedness and confidence of youth, she felt 
 sure that all would be right again, and she could not see 
 the breakers ahead. 
 
 John had some letters to write, but, when these were 
 dispatched, he was free once more, and went out with An- 
 toinette. The v wandered together in the pleasant green 
 country, through fields, along roads, by lanes ; and when 
 they turned homeward the path they -took brought them 
 within view of the chateau which had once belonged to Mr. 
 Blackmore. John wanted to pass on, but Antoinette de- 
 tained him. " Oh ! do let us look," she said. 
 
 The old red house rose before them in the warm sun- 
 light; the tall trees behind it waved their airy heads to 
 the western wind, and house, trees, and green surrounding 
 landscape, were set in the pale Norman sky. 
 
 "What a quaint old place!" said Antoinette, looking 
 at it curiously. "But who lives there, John?" 
 
 " Death," he thought ; but he only answered, " No one 
 I believe — it is for sale." And he pointed to the yellow 
 bill stuck on the stone framework of the iron gate. 
 
 " ' A vendre a I'amiable,' " read Antoinette. " 1 rather 
 like the look of it, John ; and I have a great mind to buy 
 it," she added, raising her eyebrows with a look of conse- 
 quence. 
 
 He laughed, and wanted to pass on, but Antoinette, 
 peeping in through the bars of the iron gate, detained him.
 
 460 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 " I do not like buying a house without seeing it first," 
 she said. " May I go in, John, the gate is not fastened ? " 
 
 " Let us go in if you wish it," he answered, willing as 
 ever to please her. 
 
 He pushed the gate open, and they entered. The 
 grass-grown carriage-drive led them to the house, of which 
 the door stood ajar. 
 
 " May I just look in ? " asked Antoinette, turning 
 round. 
 
 He smiled and nodded. She pushed that door open, 
 too, and stood in the hall for a moment. 
 
 " I suppose I had better not go up-stairs," she laugh- 
 ingly whispered; "but I may see that room, John, may I 
 not ? " 
 
 It was the dining-room — a low, broad room, with the 
 cool green light of the opposite trees upon the dark walls, 
 and here and there the gleam of a gold-framed picture upon 
 them. That room had undergone no change since Mr. 
 Blackmore's death ; and the chair which the old man had 
 last sat in stood in its usual place, as if still waiting for its 
 master. Antoinette, unconscious that she beheld what 
 had been Oliver Black's home so long, looked round with 
 the cai'eless curiosity of a stranger. In his history of his 
 wrongs, Oliver had not mentioned where lay the dwelling 
 of which he had been despoiled. Such particulars were 
 not needful, and might be awkward. Miss Dorrien had 
 wandered from John's side, and was examining a gloomy 
 bronze clock on the mantel-shelf, when suddenly she gave 
 a start, and looked round at John with a half- frightened 
 face. Steps were coming down the stairs, and a man's 
 voice was saying in French : 
 
 " I assure you, monsieur, that your presence, far from 
 inconveniencing us, will be a real pleasure to my wife and 
 myself; and allow me to assure you also that, at this time 
 of the year, the Hotel de Paris is simply impossible." 
 
 " You are too kind," replied a languid voice, which 
 both John and Antoinette knew well, " and I really think 
 T shall accept your hospitable invitation. I shall be able 
 thus to study this mansion again, and see how far it suits 
 my purpose. I should also like — " 
 
 Here the speaker pushed the door open, and Mr. Dor- 
 rien stood before the pair. Although he knew they were
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 4G1 
 
 in La ( foapelle, lie looked fully as much surprised as they 
 did, and something very like displeasure seemed to mingle 
 with his surprise, for his pale face Hushed, an unusual sign 
 of emotion, and his blue eyes lit. John Dorrien had col- 
 ored too, but he was the first to recover his composure, 
 though not the first to speak. For one minute he stood 
 before Mr. Dorrien, and with that rapid intuition of truth 
 which was one of his gifts, though it availed him so little 
 in life, he saw how and why his cousin was there. It was 
 not merely that he wanted to purchase the house — it was 
 that such purchase was a virtual abandonment of the 
 scheme nearest and dearest to John Dorrien's heart ; above 
 all, it was that such purchase could only have been advised 
 by one man, and that with only one object. If Oliver 
 Black wished to see his lost home in the hands of Mr. Dor- 
 rien, it was with the hope verging upon certainty that it 
 should ultimately pass into his. 
 
 Mr. Dorrien -was not the man to shrink from a revelation 
 which might have been delayed, but must have come soon- 
 er or later. With a quiet, but rather ironical smile, he 
 was the first to address his cousin, and to say, in his slow, 
 careless way : 
 
 " Well, John, are you, too, an amateur ? Are you 
 come to compete with or to bid against me ? " 
 
 "I believe I need not answer that question," replied 
 John, looking gravely at the speaker. " Are }~ou better 
 than when we left Paris, sir?" 
 
 "Scarcely," replied Mr. Dorrien, sinking down into 
 Mr. Blackmore's chair, and making an apologetic bow to 
 the agent, who stood looking and listening hard, though 
 not understanding one word. "My dear, I beg your par- 
 don," resumed Mr. Dorrien, addressing his granddaughter; 
 "but you are better already — I can see it. Yes, 1 feel 
 languid and ill at ease," he continued, fastening his eyes 
 on John's face. "The fact is, I want a change — a total 
 change — and 1 think I shall find it here." 
 
 " You think of buying this place?" said John. 
 
 "I do," was the brief reply. "I have all but bought 
 it," added Mr. Dorrien, in a somewhat defiant tone. 
 
 "I trust it may suit you," answered John, still grave. 
 " Will you dine with us this evening, sir ? My mother 
 will be glad to see you."
 
 462 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 " Thanks," was the dry, ungracious answer, " I am 
 tired — I shall spend the night here. Remember me to 
 Mrs. John. I shall do myself the pleasure of calling upon 
 her to-morrow," added Mr. Dorrien, in his old tone of cold 
 courtesy. 
 
 " Then we will leave you," said John, with a sigh, 
 which he did not check. " I am going back to Paris to- 
 morrow. Can I do any thing for you ? " 
 
 But no, Mr. Dorrien had no need to trouble his cousin. 
 Mr. Dorrien had left full instructions behind him, and he 
 was obliged to John all the same ; and Mr. Dorrien leaned 
 back in the old leather arm-chair with a wearied air, which 
 said so plainly, " What a dreadful bore is all this ! " that 
 Antoinette instinctively drew near to John, and slipped 
 her arm within his. There was no help for it. They must 
 bid Mr. Dorrien a good-afternoon, and leave him ; and so 
 they did, the agent still looking at the three with his head 
 on one side, and a perplexed meaning on his face. 
 
 They went down the steps in silence ; they walked out 
 at the gate without having spoken one word, and they 
 turned their backs on the old house, and left it far behind — 
 so far that neither its tall chimney-stacks nor its back- 
 ground of ancient trees was visible, and still that signifi- 
 cant silence was not broken by either. At length John 
 stood still, and he looked at Antoinette, and her heart 
 leaped, and, though she knew not why, she felt that her 
 doom was at hand. She looked around her in the vain 
 hope that some passer-by would delay the evil hour ; but 
 no one was coming — not a step was to be heard — not even 
 a bird was twittering on the boughs of the tree near whose 
 aged roots they stood, and whose wide-spreading branches 
 shadowed the lonely laue. 
 
 " Oh, have pity on me ! " she was tempted to cry — 
 " have pity, John ! " 
 
 But the words were not spoken, and she gazed resign- 
 edly and steadily at a patch of blue sky, and said to her- 
 self, " I must bear it." 
 
 "Antoinette," said John, after a long pause, "I have 
 something to say to you — or, rather, a question to put. 
 You remember the night when you were out in the garden, 
 and got so wet, and came into the library ? — I went to fetch 
 you some wine? — I met Mr. Dorrien, who came back with
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 463 
 
 me ; you had heard his voice, no doubt, for you were gone. 
 I ascertained, after he had left me, that you had made your 
 escape through the next room ; but before you left that 
 room, Antoinette, did you hear what passed between Mr. 
 Dorrien and me ? " 
 
 Antoinette turned pale as death. The dream of happy 
 rest she bad been indulging in fled on rapid wing as he 
 spoke, and all the grief, all the shame of her old life, came 
 back with the memory of that night. 
 
 "Yes," she answered, after a pause ; "I did hear part 
 of what ybu said ; but I left before Mr. Dorrien went away, 
 and so I did not hear all." 
 
 "Did you repeat to any one what you did hear?" he 
 asked, hesitatingly. "To Mademoiselle Melanie — or to 
 any one ? " 
 
 Antoinette looked at him with the keenest sorrow. 
 
 "O John," she said, "I cannot bear that! I know 
 what you mean. There has been some treason or other, 
 and you suspect me of it." 
 
 "No, no," he interrupted quickly; "you may have 
 abetted it unconsciously, Antoinette ; of any thing delib- 
 erate, I acquit you." 
 
 "Acquit me of nothing," she answered, bowing her 
 head, while tears streamed down her face. " You do not 
 know how 1 have wronged you — " 
 
 "I know all," he said, without looking at her. "I have 
 seen it all almost from the first day. It has been hard to 
 bear, for he was my friend, and I had some trust in him ; 
 but I have borne it, you see. Your share in that I freely 
 forgive. Forget it, Antoinette, forget it." 
 
 " Forget the humiliation and the shame?" she cried 
 passionately — " never — never ! " 
 
 " Forget it," he said again. " It was the error of inex- 
 perience and youth." 
 
 " No, no, it was worse — it was ten times worse," she 
 said, impetuously. " O John, I will tell you what it was. 
 I stood safe on the shore, but would not stay there. 1 
 would enter the worst lioal that ever bore human freight, 
 and now 1 am drifting down a sea of trouble and care, and 
 I cannot help it, and no one can help it. I may reach land 
 again and stand upon the shore; but when I do — when I 
 do — " she paused, and looked in John Dorrien's face — " it
 
 464 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 will be after such a wreck of all worth having, that life will 
 seem to be poor — for, John, I shall have ruined you." 
 She paused, then resumed, in a low, sad tone : 
 " I have been all wrong-, and yet — and yet, if I had had 
 a brother like you, John, I should never have done it — one 
 Avho would have shown me right, and warned me against 
 wrong. Oh, then I could not have done it ! " 
 
 She looked up at him with a girl's dangerous adoration 
 in her dark eyes ! Poor Antoinette ! she had not much of 
 her generation in her ; she was warm-hearted, she was ar- 
 dent and impassioned, and, though she could be guilt}', she 
 could never be mean or calculating. 
 
 " But you forgive me ? " she added, after a pause. 
 " Entirely," he said, gravely ; " but yet let me question 
 3'ou. Mr. Dorrien and I spoke of a business matter, which 
 was then, and is still, a secret. Did you hear us ? " 
 She was silent awhile. 
 
 " I believe I did," she answered, " but I am not sure — I 
 do not know. I am only sure that I repeated nothing, John 
 — pray do believe that I did not." 
 
 The pathos of her look and tone moved him to the very 
 heart. 
 
 " Do not wonder at nry questioning you so long, Antoi- 
 nette," he said, sadly ; " but I stand on the edge of a pit, and, 
 though I believe I know the hand that has led me to it, I 
 do not care to wrong even that treacherous hand by an un- 
 just doubt." 
 
 They were walking on. Antoinette stood still to give 
 him a scared look. 
 
 " Surely, John, it is not so bad as that with you ! " said 
 she. 
 
 " Surely, my little friend," he answered, in a tone of 
 half jest and half earnest, "you see how it is with Mr. 
 Dorrien and with me ? " 
 
 " O John, John, do not break my heart ! " she cried, full 
 of sorrow. "Let me not think that I have undone you." 
 
 He was silent. He could not say that she had not 
 helped to ruin him. lie forgave her, but the truth was 
 the truth, and he could not deny it. 
 
 " O John ! do not think me worse than I am. Let 
 me tell you all," she entreated. 
 
 " Not now," said he, with a sigh. " Whatever you tell
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 465 
 
 me, Antoinette, do not tell me from a passing impulse 
 which you would repent the next moment. Besides, do 
 not think that your telling me any thing can help me now; 
 it is too late." 
 
 She was silent. 
 
 " And yet," she thought, as they walked on, " I must 
 tell him ; not this moment, hut this evening, by the sea. 
 I will not betray Oliver, but I must tell him something; I 
 have been wicked, but he must not think me a traitor."' 
 
 CHAPTER XLI. 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien had seen her son and Antoinette depart 
 with very pleasing anticipations. They looked so cheerful 
 and so happy, and a walk in the country was the very thing 
 to bring matters to a crisis. Antoinette's face, as she turned 
 round to give Mrs. Dorrien a last nod, looked decidedly 
 pretty under her little hat ; and John's eyes, as John's 
 mother saw with involuntary jealousy, were certainly ad- 
 miring eyes. No doubt he would speak to his young cous- 
 in before returning to Paris, and Mrs. Dorrien did not fear 
 for the success of his suit. She had been watching Antoi- 
 nette for some time back, and was convinced that the 
 young girl liked her sen. There had come a shyness over 
 her in his presence, a certain timidity when he addressed 
 her, which Mrs. Reginald had not noticed, but which Mrs. 
 Dorrien had certainly perceived, and interpreted rightly. 
 Antoinette had not acknowledged it to herself, but it was 
 so. Involuntarily, but none the less surely, she had been 
 learning to give John that place in her thoughts which a 
 woman only gives to the man she prefers. He had become 
 her standard of excellence, her right and wrong, her friend 
 and protector. She mentally appealed to and relied upon 
 him — the worship was not spoken, but it was there; the 
 worship which she had once tried to give Oliver Black, 
 but which, even from the first, he had forced back to its 
 fountain-head. Mrs. Dorrien little suspected the sad obsta- 
 cle which Antoinette's own hand had placed between her-
 
 466 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 self and John Dorrien ; she thought that her son had 
 but to speak and win. She was vexed at his dilatori- 
 ness, especially at the delay the partnership thereby suf- 
 fered. 
 
 When the pair came in to dinner, grave, silent, and ab- 
 stracted, nothing could exceed Mrs. Dorrien's dismay. She 
 could put but one construction on a change so great and so 
 sudden ; John had spoken, and, incredible though it might 
 seem, he had been rejected. But was it possible ? She 
 watched her son and Mr. Dorrien's granddaughter, and, 
 though there was a change in both, she could trace no un- 
 friendliness ; far from it. There was something in Antoi- 
 nette's eyes, as they rested upon John, so mournful and so 
 deprecating that precluded the idea of rejection. And yet 
 if it were not that, what could it be ? Mrs. Dorrien was 
 perplexing herself with many useless surmises when, as they 
 sat down to dinner, John said, quietly : 
 
 " Mr. Dorrien is here. I wanted him to come and dine 
 with us, but I fancy he felt too tired. He will call upon 
 you to-morrow, little mother." 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien was overwhelmed with surprise, but John's 
 further explanations were so quietly given as to rouse no 
 alarm in his mother's mind. She had always wondered that 
 Mr. Dorrien did not indulge himself with a country-house ; 
 that he should think of doing so now was a tribute to her 
 judgment which she appreciated. 
 
 " Quite right, " she said, approvingly ; " La Chapelle, I 
 am sure, is a charming place. I am glad Mr. Dorrien has 
 chosen this part of France." 
 
 It was plain that she considered Mr. Dorrien's country- 
 house as the future resort of the whole family, and that 
 her approbation was given on that understanding. But as 
 the dinner progressed, and John remained grave, and An- 
 toinette continued to look sad, Mrs. Dorrien's mood under- 
 went a change. She wondered that Mr. Dorrien had kept 
 both his resolve and his journey a secret from her son, and 
 she began to fear that his having done so could bode no 
 good. So uneasy did she grow, that, when John and An- 
 toinette prepared to go out after dinner, in order to have 
 their look at the sea, Mrs. Dorrien, who had declined to 
 join them, suddenly called her son back, apologetically say- 
 ing to Antoinette —
 
 JOIIN DORRIEN. 4G7 
 
 " Only for a few moments, dear; he will soon overtake 
 you." 
 
 Antoinette went on alone. She felt utterly sad and de- 
 pressed, and walked with slow steps and downcast eyes to 
 the shore. The sky, so blue in the morning, had become 
 overcast, and heavy clouds were drifting above the sullen 
 green line of the horizon. Oh ! ye wild northern seas, with 
 the tempest ever brooding above you, how forcibly ye speak 
 to the heart of the tried and sorrowful ! 
 
 Antoinette sat down on the shingle, waiting for John, 
 and wondering what she should say to him. The tide was 
 coming in with a low, deep roar, and a long white ridge of 
 foam. 
 
 She looked at the moaninsf waves, and she thought over 
 her hard, hard lot. The grand sternness of the lonely shore 
 seemed to forbid all hope of a gentler fate. The sea beat 
 against the rocks, and they frowned back at the sea, wild 
 sea-mews flew past on silent wings, and the low clouds of 
 the stormy sky seemed bending down to the heaving bil- 
 lows, ami it was all so vast and so desolate that Antoinette 
 felt, "I am undone, whatever I do. If I tell him about 
 Oliver, he will despise me for a double treason ; and, if I 
 do not tell him, will he not think that I was the traitor?" 
 
 Either thought was very bitter. She buried her face in 
 her hands, and let her tears flow, till the sound of a step on 
 the shingle roused her suddenly, and she started to her feet, 
 flushed and ashamed to be so seen by him; but it was not 
 on John's pale, grave face that the waning light of that sul- 
 len day now fell. That light showed Antoinette the well- 
 known but unwelcome features of .Mademoiselle Melanie. 
 She was too much amazed to speak, and her surprise, and 
 its unpleasant nature, were both so plainly written on her 
 expressive face that Mademoiselle Melanie, stamping rock- 
 ier! y on the hard stones, uttered a shrill and defying — 
 Thank you!" 
 
 "Aunt, I could not help it," deprecatingly said Antoi- 
 nette, timidly, going up to the irritated lady, and attempt- 
 ing to take her hand. " I thought it was John, and the sur- 
 prise of seeing you took all my presence of mind away." 
 
 "You thought it was John ! " said Mademoiselle .MOia- 
 nie, mimicking her, yet speaking with something less of 
 anger. " Then it is John now, and not Oliver ! "
 
 468 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 " O aunt ! " cried Antoinette, turning her burning face 
 away, " never — never talk so. It is not John in the sense 
 you mean, and would that it had never been Oliver ! — 
 would that I had never, never seen him ! " she added, with 
 a great rush of tears. 
 
 Her aunt looked at her, and said, coolly : 
 
 " Sit down and listen to me." 
 
 Antoinette hesitated. 
 
 " Sit down, I say, " imperiously said Mademoiselle 
 Melanie. "Do you think I will bite you?" she angrily 
 added. 
 
 There was nothing for it but to obey. Antoinette sat 
 down again and, making a cushion of the shawl she carried 
 on her arm, Mademoiselle Melanie sat down by her. 
 
 " You did not expect me, " she began. " Of course you 
 did not; I did not know till yesterday that you were here, 
 and that I would come. And now tell me this, are you 
 really going to marry John ? " 
 
 " To marry him, aunt ? Why, he has never asked me." 
 
 " Rubbish ! Are you going to marry him ? " 
 
 " No," said Antoinette, in a low, sad tone. " He does 
 not want me, and I am too proud to want him. I have be- 
 haved too badly, aunt." 
 
 " Rubbish ! " said Mademoiselle Melanie again. " You 
 are not going to marry Oliver, are you ? " 
 
 " Never — never ! " cried Antoinette, her face all in a 
 flame with the passion of her denial. " That sea shall swal- 
 low me first ! Never ! — never ! " 
 
 Mademoiselle Melanie looked at her, and smiled and 
 nodded. 
 
 " Then marry John," she said ; " marry John Dorrieu." 
 
 " Aunt, do not speak so. You pain me, and it cannot 
 be." 
 
 " You are a fool," said her aunt, scornfully. " You have 
 a chance there. Take it, I say." 
 
 "You did not come to tell me to do that, aunt," said An- 
 toinette, looking at her, quietly. " You had some other 
 purpose in coming down here." 
 
 " Yes, you little ingratc, I had ! " cried Mademoiselle 
 Melanie, growing exasperated as Antoinette grew calm. 
 " And do you want to know what brought me ? T came to 
 ruin you ! As T can ! — as I can !" she added, tauntingly.
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 469 
 
 " Well, aunt, you need only tell them what a traitor I 
 have been ; and, oh !" she added, bowing her head with 
 shame, " how they will scorn me ! 
 
 "Oliver Black is a sneak," said Mademoiselle Melanin, 
 in a tone that showed the absent sinner should bear the 
 brunt of her wrath in his turn, " but I have an arrow in my 
 quiver for him. Marry John, you simpleton, and you can 
 laugh at Oliver. He dare not tell tales, for his own sake." 
 
 Antoinette looked at her. 
 
 "Aunt, what did you come here for?" she asked. 
 " You had some object. What was it ? " 
 
 " I came to ruin you," answered Mademoiselle Melanie, 
 coldly and deliberately — " I came to undo you, because you 
 are the basest ingrate that ever lived — because, the moment 
 you were happy and prosperous, you turned your back on 
 the woman who had reared you — I came for that." 
 
 Antoinette heard her calmly enough. She knew of old 
 the violence of Mademoiselle Melanie's temper, and she got 
 accustomed to every thing — to domestic tempests included. 
 She knew also that, though Mademoiselle Melanie was both 
 bitter and revengeful, she often left her threats unfulfilled; 
 and she knew best of all that, though Mr. Dorrien had much, 
 John had very little to learn, and so the shame in store for 
 her had not so entire and deep a sting as it might have 
 had if her great error had never been suspected by him. 
 
 "I came for that," resumed Mademoiselle Melanie; 
 " but, after all, why should I do it? Why should I help 
 that little sneak, Mr. Black, up the ladder, for him to laugh 
 down at me when he gets on the topmost rung? I have 
 let him think that I would," added Mademoiselle .Melanie, 
 nodding ; " but he let out a thing or two that made me 
 change my mind, as I thought over them coming along. 
 And so now your fate lies in your own hands, and — unless 
 you drive me to it — I will not tell." 
 
 Involuntary relief shone in Antoinette's fare. To tell 
 John herself, to open her heart and soul in voluntary con- 
 fession, was one thing, and to be taxed with her guilt, and 
 stand before him, unable to deny it, was another thing, far 
 harder than the first to bear. 
 
 " Aunt," she said, taking her aunt's hand, and looking 
 in her face with eyes full of entreaty, " do not, oh ! do not 
 tell it. 1 was wrong, but I knew no better, and — "
 
 470 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 " Nonsense ! " interrupted Mademoiselle Melanie, snatch- 
 ing her hand away with a frown — " what folly are you talk- 
 ing of?" 
 
 " What are you talking of, aunt ? " 
 
 " Then Oliver did not tell you — of course not — fore- 
 warned is forearmed. Mr. Black was too clever to tell, and 
 I — I was a fool to let it out to him." 
 
 A great unknown dread now fell on Antoinette. Some 
 calamity, of which she felt the coming, as we feel the com- 
 ing of the storm, was at hand ; but she had no conception 
 of its nature, and Mademoiselle Melanie seemed in no hurry 
 to enlighten her. 
 
 " Marry John," she said — " marry him as soon as you 
 can, or he will be too much for you both." 
 
 " I shall never marry John," replied Antoinette, in a 
 voice full of sorrow. " I believe he might have liked me, 
 I believe I might have had my chance, but 1 cast it by, and 
 it will not come back. John will marry Mademoiselle Bas- 
 n age, or some one else, and why should I complain? I 
 have behaved so badly that I cannot bear to look in his 
 face ; and what have I to recommend me, save that I am 
 Mr. Dorrien's granddaughter?" 
 
 Mademoiselle Melanie laughed a long, scornful laugh, 
 which echoed among the rocks and along the lonely 
 shore. 
 
 " And are you that ? " she asked, mockingly. " Why, 
 3 t ou simpleton, do you not know that you are my brother's 
 child, and that I came down here to give you a last chance ? 
 Marry John, I say, and do not forget again what you owe 
 to me, or I will make you repent it — 1 will make you re- 
 pent it ! " 
 
 She spoke coolly enough. And, indeed, living though 
 she did in a storm of contradictory passions, she had come 
 to the shrewd conclusion that to spare Antoinette and give 
 up both Oliver and her revenge was the wisest plan after 
 all. What hold would she have on Oliver Black, once he 
 had used her for his own purposes? — and what hold would 
 she not have on Antoinette by telling her this thing, and 
 making her live in perpetual fear of her power? But, 
 plainly though she had spoken, Antoinette seemed unable 
 to realize her meaning — she only looked in her aunt's face 
 and smiled.
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 471 
 
 "O aunt," she said, with strange tranquillity, "how 
 can you say any thing- so improbable and so wild ? " 
 
 "Oh, it is wild, is it?" cried Mademoiselle Melanie, 
 getting -into one of her sudden rages. " And Antoinette 
 Dorricn, the real one, did not die in Italy, and she was not 
 buried there under her own name, and I cannot prove it ; 
 and I am wild, and you are Mr. Dorrien's granddaughter, 
 are you ? " 
 
 " But why should you have done it?" argued Antoi- 
 nette, still smiling. " My sister was rich, and it was her 
 death that made us all so poor." 
 
 " She was rich, was she ? " echoed Mademoiselle Me- 
 la nie, looking amused. " Well, you would have been rich, 
 to be sure, if your uncle had not left it all to some one 
 else." 
 
 "But, aunt, there was a lawsuit when my sister died — 
 you know there was," persisted Antoinette. 
 
 " Moonshine ! " 
 
 " But surely — surely Mr. Dorrien would have known the 
 truth of all this ? " 
 
 " Of course he would, if he had asked." 
 
 Antoinette looked at her again, and, as she looked, the 
 smile died out of her face. Could this dreadful thing be 
 true ? Was she not merely a traitor to John Dorrien, but 
 a poor impostor, standing between him and all that should 
 one day be his? Was there not even between him and 
 her that remote tie of blood which had often made her think, 
 with fond regret, "He is my cousin, after all. We spring 
 from one stem, and are of one race. We arc of the old 
 Dorriens, John and I." 
 
 She clasped her hands above her head ; she cast a look 
 of passionate regret around her, as if appealing to sea, eart h, 
 and sky, against her hard lot, and, reckless of the shingle, 
 she laid her head upon the stones and sobbed aloud in her 
 sorrow. 
 
 " Don't be a fool," said Mademoiselle Melanie, who was 
 qttite calm ; " no one need ever know it. .Mind he suspects 
 it, but has not an atom of proof, and he is too clever and 
 too keen to speak till he can prove it, which he never can ; 
 so just marry John while you have the chance, and behave 
 better to me than you have done." 
 
 There was a long pause. Antoinette was .still weeping
 
 472 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 as if her heart would break, but little by little the violence 
 of her grief expended itself, and, raising her head, she 
 looked up once more, and, turning to her aunt, said, pite- 
 ously : 
 
 " O aunt, say that it is not true ! Why should you 
 have done this ? " 
 ; " For the money, to be sure." 
 
 " But I cannot believe it — I cannot," said Antoinette. 
 " I should remember — I know I should." 
 
 " And don't you remember that you were called Marie 
 once — don't you remember that ? " 
 
 " But you said my mother called me so to try to bring 
 back my dead sister to her mind — you know you said 
 it." 
 
 Antoinette's eyes flashed with triumph as she spoke, 
 but her aunt looked at her with something like contempt. 
 
 " I know you always were the greatest simpleton," she 
 said. " I know you could always be made to believe a lie, 
 and that you never knew how to tell one — never knew how 
 to tell one," she repeated, scornfully. — " Who's that tall 
 fellow coming ? " she sharply added. " Is that John Dor- 
 rien ? " 
 
 Antoinette looked. Yes, that was John Dorrien — that 
 was the true owner of the name she had usurped, the real 
 heir of the old house ; and he was coming to them with 
 swift and steady strides. 
 
 " I have given you a last chance," said Mademoiselle 
 Melanie, rising. "As you behave to me, so will I behave 
 to you. Take care and do not provoke me, or I shall tell 
 it to those whom it most concerns — to Mr. Dorrien, to John 
 Dorrien — you understand." 
 
 " Yes, aunt," answered Antoinette, looking sadly at the 
 sea, " I understand." 
 
 Mademoiselle Melanie had risen, but she was too defi- 
 ant to stir from the spot till John had come up to them. 
 As she was moving away, after giving him a broad stare, 
 Antoinette rose too. She went up to John Dorrien, she 
 placed her hands on both his arms, she looked up in his 
 face, and, with tears streaming down her pale cheeks, and 
 the most pitiful look and accent, she said : 
 
 " O John, she says that I am not Antoinette Dorrien ! 
 O John, she says that I am nothing — nothing to you ! "
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 473 
 
 Her voice broke off in tears, and she turned ber head 
 away. Amazement kept John silent, and Mademoiselle 
 Melanie, who had heard every word, tinned back in speech- 
 less wrath. She had never expected this; she had never 
 thought that the weapon she meant to use would be broken 
 in hor hand by Antoinette's first words. 
 
 " I do not believe it ! " cried John, rallying, and his gra y 
 eyes flashing wrathfully on Mademoiselle Melanie. " It is 
 a mean invention to torment you." 
 
 "Oh, take her part — do!" exclaimed Mademoiselle Mt'- 
 lanie, turning upon him. " Do you know thai she has been 
 a traitor to you too — as great a traitor as to me ? Ask 
 her, and see if she will deny that ? " 
 
 John Dorrien scorned to reply. He looked down at An- 
 toinette, and, as their eyes met, she said with sorrowful 
 simplicity: 
 
 "Yes, that is true; you were my friend, John Dorrien, 
 and I have been your enemy all this time." 
 
 " Good-night," ironically said Mademoiselle Melanie, 
 walking away. " Good-night, Mr. John Dorrien ; and good- 
 night, Mademoiselle Marie d'Armaille." 
 
 'With a short, bitter laugh, in which the bitterness was 
 as much for her own disappointment as in mockery for their 
 trouble, she left them. Not one word did John speak till 
 she was out of sight, and then he said, very kindly : 
 
 " Sit down, Antoinette, and tell me all about it." 
 
 She sat down as he bade her, and, looking at the sea 
 with her hands clasped around her knees, she told him -what 
 Mademoiselle Melanie had said, but not all ; for not to save 
 her life, it seemed to her, could she have uttered to him 
 the name of Oliver Black. John heard her with many a 
 scornful and incredulous interruption. 
 
 "Take comfort," he said, warmly, "and do not believe 
 her, Antoinette. The woman is mad, and you have vexed 
 her, and no one — no sane man, woman, or child — could be- 
 lieve a tale so preposterous. You are a Dorrien, take my 
 *word for it," said he, taking one of her hands and clasping 
 it ; " you are one of us, Antoinette, and — and we will not 
 let you go." 
 
 •' How good you are, John ! " she answered, giving him 
 a wistful look — " how good you have always been to me ! " 
 
 "Tell me you do not believe her," he insisted.
 
 474 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 '•' Let us go home," said Antoinette, rising, with a wea- 
 ried sigh ; and, looking around her, she added, very sorrow- 
 fully ; " As long as I live, I shall never forget this spot — 
 never, never ! I was so happy here the other evening, and 
 to-day—" 
 
 She broke down. He took her arm and led her away. 
 
 "You must not and shall not believe her!" said he, 
 with that vehemence which every now and then broke out 
 from beneath the forced outward calmness of his life. " How 
 old were you when the supposed substitution is said to have 
 taken place ? " he argued, as they w T alked along. " Seven 
 or eight ! Well, then, it is impossible that you should not 
 remember it. And, if you do not, is it not the surest of 
 sure proofs that this is a poor invention of that crazy lady 
 to keep a hold upon you? Now, just listen," he added, 
 stopping in the steep path up which they were climbing, 
 on their way to the downs, " and see how absurd it all is. 
 Your sister was at least two or three years older than you 
 were ; you still wore mourning for her when you came to 
 us seven years ago at the Hotel Dorrien. How could Mr. 
 Dorrien, Mrs. Reginald, or any one, have taken a child of 
 thirteen for one of ten ? It is impossible — impossible ! " 
 he repeated, vehemently — " a thing to laugh at, if it were 
 not also a thing to hate for its abominable wickedness." 
 
 Antoinette said not a word, but looked at the grassy 
 earth. They walked on ; he resumed : 
 
 " Besides, do you not see her object ? Why, it is so 
 transparent that a child could read through it. Her hold 
 over you is loosening, as it must loosen, for she has no real 
 claim upon you. She is not your aunt ; you owe her noth- 
 ing but some bitter sorrows. The same blood does not 
 flow in your veins, and time and circumstance must hap- 
 pily divide you. By inventing this tie of relationship, sin; 
 maintains a hold on your affections; she also holds over 
 you a threat which will, as she hopes, keep you in her 
 power. Do you think she will ever go to Mr. Dorrien 
 with this wild story ? Never, never ! " And John Dorrien 
 laughed the thought to scorn. 
 
 Antoinette heard him silently. He thought he had con- 
 vinced her, but, lest he should not have done so, he was 
 seeking for new arguments when Antoinette, speaking for 
 the first time, said :
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 475 
 
 "John, is not tins the path that leads to the Maison 
 Rouge ? " 
 
 They stood at the head of a silent lane, shelving down 
 to the village between tall hawthorn-hedges. The fragrant 
 white blossoms filled the air with sweetness, and the cool 
 wind carried it out to the sea, beyond those green-capped 
 cliffs on which the two were now standing. A bird flew 
 past in the gray, dusky air, and far away the sound of a 
 church-bull came floating 1 toward them. 
 
 "Yes, that is the path which leads to it," said John, 
 looking at her in the twilight. 
 
 l ' Will you take me to it, John ? " 
 
 " Why so ? " 
 
 " I want to see Mr. Dorricn." 
 
 " What for ? " 
 
 " To tell him." 
 
 " For the love of heaven, think of what you are doing ! " 
 said John, much moved. 
 
 " Yes," she answered, with a heavy sigh, "I do." Then 
 she added, " Take me there, John." 
 
 "O Antoinette ! " he sorrowfully said, "you are undo- 
 ing us both." 
 
 " No, John, not you — not you," she replied, raising her 
 dark eyes to his face with a look of involuntary tenderness. 
 
 He was too much distressed to speak. His arguments 
 all failed him now that he saw they had not convinced her; 
 his conscience forbade him to influence her against the dic- 
 tates of her own. He made but one effort more. The lane 
 grew darker as they went down its rugged path, and the 
 gloomiest part — that where tall trees met and made per- 
 petual shade — was also that whence they could see the old 
 house rising in its hue of dusky red from among its mass 
 of dark foliage. 
 
 "Antoinette," he said," with much emotion, "do think 
 of what you are doing. Mr. Dorrien will wish to be just 
 to you, but — " 
 
 "John," she interrupted, "from the first day that I en- 
 tered his house to this, I have been a deceiver. I have not 
 told even you the whole truth — 1 could not, John — I could 
 not. I cannot tell it to him ; but in this thing at least I 
 can be true. O John, let me be true ! " 
 
 " Be true, then," he answered, with some passion ; " and
 
 476 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 whoever you are, and whatever you have done, may God 
 bless you, because you will be true ! " 
 
 He took her in his arms, and, for the first time since they 
 were children, he kissed her sad, pale face. If he loved her, 
 it was something beyond loye that he felt just then ; and, if 
 she loved him, it was something more than love that made 
 her yield to the caress. After many a wandering in the 
 land of care and error, they were meeting at last on the 
 threshold of a divine passion. They might part again — • 
 part forever, though each cast longing looks behind at the 
 other — but they never could forget that moment — never, 
 so long as each had a beating human heart ! 
 
 " Do not wait for me," she said, slipping away from 
 him ; " I shall know my way home." 
 
 She went away swiftly, leaving him there, looking after 
 her with eyes full of tenderness, pity, and sorrow. 
 
 CHAPTER XLII. 
 
 " Come in." 
 
 So spoke Mr. Dorrien's voice in surprised tones as, sit- 
 ting alone in the dining-room where John and Antoinette 
 had left him a few hours before, he heard a knock at the 
 door. The door opened at his summons, and the light of 
 the lamp, by which he was looking at some papers left by 
 the agent for his inspection, showed him the slender figure 
 and pale face of his young granddaughter. He recognized 
 her at once, and looked almost displeased. 
 
 " Excuse me," he said, dryly, " I had no conception it 
 was you ; I was looking at these papers. What pressing 
 business can bring you at this hour, my dear?" 
 
 She paused. His look, voice, and manner, were not en- 
 couraging. Mr. Dorrien had never liked her, and he was 
 not in the mood, perhaps, to reject Mademoiselle Melanie's 
 story. Antoinette's hand was still on the door-handle; she 
 had but to turn it and be out of the room again, and leave 
 it all for another and a better day. But she did not do so. 
 
 " I am sorry to intrude, sir," she said, in a low tone,
 
 JOIIX DORRIEN. 477 
 
 "but I shall not stay long. Mademoiselle Melanie lias just 
 been here," she added, hesitatingly, " oh ! I do not mean 
 in this house; I mean in La Chapelle. She found me by 
 the sea-shore, and talked to me there." 
 
 "I thoughl 1 had forbidden all intercourse between you 
 and that lady," sharply remarked Mr. Dorrien. 
 
 " Yes," said Antoinette, in a low, even voice, "you did, 
 sir ; but she came for all that, and spoke to me, as I sat by 
 the sea-shore." 
 
 " Was Mr. John Dorrien there?" asked Mr. Dorrien, in 
 the same sharp tone. 
 
 " She left me when he came." 
 
 There was a pause. 
 
 " Miss Dorrien," said Mr. Dorrien, slowly and deliber- 
 ately, " this thing must never happen again, never, or you 
 will have to abide by consequences which I do not wish to 
 allude to. Once for all, it must never happen again." 
 
 Antoinette looked wistfully in his face. 
 
 "Perhaps it will not happen again," said she, "for 
 she came to say that I am not your son's child, but my 
 mother's daughter by her first husband. Not Antoinette 
 Dorrien, but Marie d'Armaille." 
 
 Mr. Dorrien, who had risen, sat down again, and stared 
 at Antoinette for a moment in blank surprise. 
 
 " This is a most extraordinary tale," he said, rising again, 
 and confronting her. " Pray how does Mademoiselle Me- 
 lanie substantiate it ? " 
 
 " She says that Antoinette died in Italy, and that I was 
 substituted for her there." 
 
 " For what motive ? " 
 
 " For the money." 
 
 Antoinette spoke very low, and with shame on her down- 
 cast face. 
 
 " Yes, of course, for the money," said Mr. Dorrien, with 
 bitter emphasis. "That is to say, if this wild story be 
 true," he added, correcting himself, " which I much doubt 
 — which I much doubt, I assure you, my dear." 
 
 He said that he doubted it, but Antoinette, looking 
 in his face, seemed to read there something that was not 
 doubt, something that was more like the dawning of a hope. 
 
 "This is no sorry jest, I suppose?" he added, after a 
 pause.
 
 478 J0HN DORRIEN. 
 
 " My aunt was not jesting-, sir." 
 
 " It is absurd, quite absurd," said Mr. Dorrien, impa- 
 tiently. " I really wonder that you, Miss Dorrien, should 
 have come to repeat this mad story. Of course you know 
 nothing on the subject? " he added, looking keenly at her. 
 
 " No, I know nothing," answered Antoinette, sorrow- 
 fully. " I was ill when my sister died, and long after it, 
 and I remember nothing, only — " 
 
 She paused, and her voice broke down rather suddenly. 
 
 " Only ! " echoed Mr. Dorrien, with eager, watchful eyes 
 — eyes very unlike those cold blue eyes which he showed in 
 daily life — " only what ? " 
 
 " Only," said Antoinette, straightening her slender form, 
 as if to nerve herself against the blow her own hand was go- 
 ing to inflict — " only it is like a dream to me, that once, 
 long ago, I was called Marie." 
 
 " And that was the name of Count d'Armaille's daugh- 
 ter?" 
 
 " Yes," she answered, looking in his face, " it was her 
 name." 
 
 She did not, she could not mistake the flash of glad 
 surprise which came into his eyes, the meaning full of re- 
 lief that passed over his cold features as he heard her. 
 
 "A very wild, improbable story," said he, resuming his 
 usual manner, " but a matter that must be looked into, for 
 your sake. I trust, indeed I feel sure, that, when it is in- 
 vestigated, we shall find that the poor lady has invented or 
 dreamed all this. The mere fact of her coming here to tell 
 you this absurd story shows that she is not in her right 
 mind. Is she still in La Chapelle ? " 
 
 " I do not know, sir." 
 
 " Of course she is — down at the hotel. She cannot be 
 gone, since the coach does not leave till to-morrow ; but 
 she may have hired a private carriage. You have no idea 
 at what hotel she is stopping ? " 
 
 " No, sir, I have not." 
 
 " Well, there are but two, so she will be easily discov- 
 ered. And now, my dear, good-evening, and do not dis- 
 tress yourself. This foolish story will melt away. You 
 did not come here alone, of course ? " 
 
 " John came with me, and — " 
 
 " He is waiting outside, like a true knight, I suppose ? "
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 479 
 
 interrupted Mr. Dorrien, with unusual gayety. " Well, 
 good-night once more." 
 
 He held out his hand. Antoinette passively placed 
 hers within it, and said: 
 
 " If it be true, sir, I knew nothing about it." 
 
 " True ? Nonsense ! do not think of it." 
 
 " I knew nothing about it," she resumed, as if be had 
 not spoken, " but I thought it right to come and tell you at 
 once." 
 
 He was going to answer, but the sad gravity of her face 
 silenced him. She did not wait for this feeling to pass 
 away from him. She opened the door, and left the room, 
 without having passed the spot on which she had spoken 
 her doom with her own lips. Mr. Dorrien, though taken 
 by surprise, soon recovered. He followed her out. 
 
 " Miss Dorrien, is — is John there ? " he asked. " I trust 
 you are not alone ? " 
 
 But Antoinette did not answer. She was already gone. 
 Mr. Dorrien went in for his hat and came out again. He 
 had soon reached the gate. Antoinette was invisible, still 
 Mr. Dorrien went on, walking fast. He did not think of 
 overtaking her ; evidently it was not needful that he should 
 do so. John was with her, of course. Mr. Dorrien was 
 merely going to the village to hear what Mademoiselle 
 .Melanie had to say. 
 
 All the time Antoinette was speaking to Mr. Dorrien 
 she had felt like one in a dream, and like one in a dream 
 she walked out of the house, but, instead of going down the 
 steps that led to the avenue, she went out through another 
 door and found herself in a flower-garden. She did not 
 pause fortius. Where was she going ? She did not know, 
 she did not care, every thing seemed equal to her now. 
 She did not go far astray after all. The garden opened 
 into the grounds, and, from the spot where she entered 
 them, she saw in the pale light of a clouded sky the white 
 road that led to the village. She crossed over it, and had 
 soon reached the high-street of La Chapelle. The old gray 
 stone church stood before her, and she saw its little belfry 
 rise in dark outlines on the leaden sky and in the silent 
 air. The open space around the church was almost de- 
 serted, for this was the supper-time, and lights burned in 
 every happy little home. Antoinette stood and gave these
 
 480 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 poor dwellings a desolate, despairing look. This was her 
 bitter hour — that hour, scarcely less certain than death, 
 which comes to every human life. She felt like a solitary 
 outcast. She felt that, while every human being in these 
 houses of shingle and thatch was blessed in the sweetest 
 of home ties, she was as one having neither kith nor kin. 
 She stood sad, though tearless, looking straight before her 
 at one light brighter than the rest, unconscious at first that 
 the darkness she was facing was that of the church-porch, 
 unaware that the light which twinkled beyond that gloom 
 belonged to no human home, but was that which burned 
 in silent and solitary worship before the altar. When she 
 knew it, a great, passionate sob heaved her bosom, a great 
 longing for tears and relief came over her. She walked in 
 like a little child led by its father's hand, and how or why 
 she knew not, but she was on her knees weeping and 
 praying to that unknown God of whom the Apostle told 
 the Athenians, and whom she had found at last. 
 
 CHAPTER- XLIII. 
 
 " O my God, have I found thee ! " 
 
 In the midst of all her grief, that w T as the joyful cry 
 which rose from the stricken girl's heart. The soul that 
 has no God is like Mary Magdalen seeking her lost one, 
 and it utters the same pathetic lament: "They have taken 
 away nry Lord, and I know not where they have laid him." 
 And now she had found him, and she could weep and pray 
 at his feet. Faith had come to her at last. Mrs. Regi- 
 nald's dogmatism had not done much to convince her. 
 Mere reason which cannot define Time and Eternity never 
 bore us safely yet to the awful shores of the Infinite. It 
 ever leaves something untold, something which love alone 
 makes clear, and which it tells best to the heart pierced by 
 sorrow. And love had come to Antoinette. That love which 
 fired the hearts of saints and martyrs, and filled them with 
 raptures and a strange delight, had prevailed over her. In 
 one hour she had lost all and won all. Her earthly inherit-
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 481 
 
 ance, and with it every latent hope, had perished, but she 
 had got a glimpse of heaven, and, with that glimpse to greet 
 her upward gaze, she felt that she could walk bravely 
 thro u "rh the thorns and briers of earth. She staid a lon<r time 
 
 o o 
 
 thus weeping, yet happy; grieving, j 7 et without a care; 
 and when she rose at last, and walked out into the open 
 air, there was a calm so perfect in her whole being that she 
 asked herself if trouble or unquietness could ever come near 
 her again. The night had cleared, and the cloudless sky 
 was all bright with stars, and Antoinette smiled up at them 
 with a joyful boast in her heart. 
 
 " I am more than you are," thought she ; " you may 
 burn on when I am dead, but I am more than you are, and 
 I will not envy you now — oh ! never, never ! " 
 
 " Well," said John's voice at her side, as his arm was 
 passed through hers. 
 
 At once Antoinette came down from the heights to 
 which she was soaring. 
 
 " O John," she could not help saying, " where then were 
 you ? " 
 
 " Waiting for you in the church," he answered. " You 
 have seen Mr. Dorrien, I suppose ? " 
 " Yes, I have seen him." 
 " Well ? " he said, anxiously. 
 
 " Well," she answered, in a tranquil tone that struck 
 him, "Mr. Dorrien believes it." 
 " He believes it ! " 
 
 "Yes, and he wants to believe it, John ; and — and — I 
 feel that it is true." 
 
 John said not a word ; but, after walking on after her 
 awhile, he withdrew his arm from hers, though he still 
 walked by her side. Antoinette's heart sank Had she 
 really lost all for honor's sake ? Was she to be disowned 
 by Mr. Dorrien, betrayed by Oliver, and, hardest of all, 
 forsaken by John, for this sin of which she was guiltless ? 
 Perhaps— oh ! bitter, most bitter thought ! — perhaps he be- 
 lieved that she had been her aunt's accomplice, and thai 
 repentance had come with the certainty of discovery. S 
 could not bear the thought, and as they approached the 
 cottage she was going to address him, and utter a pitiful 
 protest, when he suddenly stood still, ami, speaking low, 
 said, as he took her hand : 
 21
 
 482 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 " There is nothing 1 to divide us now — nothing." 
 She did not understand at once, and, when she did, 
 her first impulse was to save him from his own undoing. 
 
 " O John," she cried, freeing her hand from his, " do 
 you think I am so mean as to let you ruin yourself for me ? 
 Mr. Dorrien would never forgive you." 
 
 " What matter," answered John, " so I have you ? " 
 
 His voice, though low, was even and deliberate. For 
 the first time, Antoinette felt that he loved her. She had 
 hoped it sometimes ; she was sure now, and joy and fear 
 divided her being. 
 
 "Do not — do not! "she entreated. " Say no more — 
 tell me nothing — do not tempt me ! " 
 
 ■ For her whole soul, her whole heart, went forth to him 
 as she spoke these words of denial. What ! He whom 
 she had so honored, so worshiped — he loved her ! He ! 
 the king of her thoughts, the hero of her young imagina- 
 tion — he loved her ! It was like being crowned queen, 
 raised up on dazzling heights, and having to sink back, 
 humiliated and discrowned, into unutterable depths of 
 darkness. 
 
 "You were promised to me when you were a little 
 child," he said, jealously. " I have held you to be mine all 
 these years. I wjdl risk any thing in this world before I 
 give you up." 
 
 Alas ! he was very mortal after all, and the girl he liked 
 was more to him just then than the firm of the Dorriens. 
 "The love which had slumbered in her breast wakened at the 
 call of his, as smouldering fire kindles into fresh life at the 
 touch of a new flame. But with love came sorrow, so 
 keen that it was spoken in words of much bitterness. 
 
 "What is there left of me?" she asked. "For six 
 months I have been steeped in wickedness. Tell me, then, 
 if you can, what there is left of me for a man like you to 
 take ? " 
 
 John Dorrien was deeply moved. 
 
 " Your poor little feet were caught in a cruel net," he 
 said, " but surely you did your best to be free. O Antoi- 
 nette, let us forget it all now, and be happy at last." 
 
 " Oh, I cannot have been all bad ! " she could not help 
 exclaiming, " or you would not care for me so much. And 
 yet, how I have sinned against you ! "
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 483 
 
 " What 'matter, if I forgive it?" he replied. 
 
 She knew she ought to resist him, but she did not know 
 how to do so. She knew that her love was a fatal gift, and 
 she could not keep it back, or say him nay. 
 
 " Perhaps I shall be better able to hold my own against 
 him to-morrow," she thought. "God will surely help me." 
 
 And help did come to her, sooner than she hoped — 
 sooner, perhaps, than, in the weakness of her heart, she 
 wished for it. As they reached the cottage-gate, she sud- 
 denly stood still, and with her hand on the latch, "John, 
 John," she said, passionately, " this must not be — never, 
 never ! " 
 
 Before he could reply, she had passed on and reached 
 the doorway, where Mrs. Dorrien stood anxiously waiting 
 for the belated pair, peering out into the chill spring night 
 with a shawl on her head. 
 
 " My dear, I have been so anxious," she began ; but An- 
 toinette only passed by her, with a pale, tear-stained face, 
 on which the light burning on the table shone as she went 
 through the room. 
 
 " O John, wdiat is the matter? " said the poor ladj T , look- 
 ing anxiously at her son. 
 
 He could not bear to trouble her, but, chiding her ten- 
 derly for exposing herself to the night air, he said, so quiet- 
 ly that her fears subsided at the sound of his voice : 
 
 " Were you uneasy, little mother ? I am sorry ; but 
 Antoinette went again to La Maison Rouge. She wanted 
 to speak to Mr. Dorrien, and — and I fear he was not kind," 
 said John, with a sigh. 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien could not help feeling relieved that Antoi- 
 nette, and not John, was in disgrace. Indeed, concluding, 
 as she did, that Antoinette's difficulties with Mr. Dorrien 
 must all come from some bad behavior of hers to John, 
 she felt little inclined to pity that young lady for her grand- 
 father's severity. 
 
 " My dear boy," she fondly said, " I fear that poor child 
 is a great worry to you." 
 
 "Perhaps I like 'her none the less for that," answered 
 John, trying to speak gavlv. 
 
 It was plain that he would say no more, and Mrs. Dor- 
 rien had got accustomed to his reserve, and she submitted 
 to it now, though she would dearly have liked to know what
 
 484 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 was going on. She would certainly have questioned An- 
 toinette, could she have had the opportunity of doing so, 
 but the young girl did not leave her room that evening, and 
 Mrs. Dorrien gazed wonderingly at her son, who sat in si- 
 lence for an hour, staring at a newspaper, and not reading 
 a line, looking by no means depressed, but evidently ab- 
 sorbed in thought. 
 
 " John," she could not help saying at length, " what is 
 it ? Has Antoinette rejected you '? " 
 
 "Yes, little mother, she has," he answered, gravely; 
 " but do not trouble about it." 
 
 "I am sure she likes you," indignantly interrupted his 
 mother. " I am sure it is all caprice." 
 
 " Oh, no, it is not caprice," he said, with a half-sigh ; 
 " but, little mother," he added, fastening his kind gray 
 eyes on her face, " she, and not I, must tell you her own 
 story to-morrow." 
 
 Mrs. Dorrien so far took the hint that, the moment she 
 heard Antoinette move in her room the next morning, she 
 tapped at her door and asked for admittance, which was at 
 once granted. Antoinette was combing out her long dark 
 hair, and looked as white as her morning-gown. Mrs. Dor- 
 rien gave her a furtive look, sat down like one who has 
 come to stay, and said, dolefully : 
 
 " My dear, why have you been so unkind to ray dear 
 boy ? I am sure you like him ; and really, when I see how 
 ill you look, and when, as I know, he had no sleep last 
 night, and looked quite worn out when he went out this 
 morning — " 
 
 " Whei'e is he gone to ? " asked Antoinette, breathlessly. 
 
 "To Mr. Dorrien's, of course, but you may be sure — " 
 
 " O Mrs. John, he is undone — undone!" cried Antoi- 
 nette, letting her arms fall down. " He is undone, and it 
 is all for me — for me ! " she moaned, throwing herself across 
 the bed in her despair. 
 
 With consternation in her looks Mrs. Dorrien now heard 
 Antoinette's story. 
 
 " I meant to see him again this morning," said Antoi- 
 nette, pitifully. " I meant to tell him again that it could 
 never be ; and now he is gone, and Mr. Dorrien will never 
 forgive him." 
 
 He was gone indeed, gone withoul seeing her again —
 
 JOHN DORRIKX. 4S5 
 
 gone resolved to have his way at every cost and every risk. 
 But John, though resolved, was not sanguine. He could 
 not but see that the tide of Mr. Dorrien's favor was setting 
 against him, and he knew well enough that to love Antoi- 
 nette was not the way to win back his master's favor. He 
 met the agent at the gate. 
 
 " Monsieur is not within. Monsieur is in the grounds," 
 said the man, smiling graciously. " If monsieur will take 
 that path it will lead him to the river, and he will probably 
 find monsieur there. This path, not that," he emphatically 
 added, pointing to a little alley, which John knew too well. 
 
 With an anxious brow he walked under the shade of 
 those trees which had seen some of the happy days of his 
 boyhood. Mr. Blackmore's genial, handsome face, and 
 portly figure seemed to rise before him, reminding him of 
 past kindness, and pleading for his boy. John Dorrien's 
 heart was bitter enough against the friend of his vouth. 
 The Christian virtue of forgiveness is not reached without 
 effort by the fallen Adam within us. To feel keenly pasl 
 benefits is also to feel keenly a great wrong, and to be be- 
 trayed in love, in trust, and in fortune, is more than the 
 most patient of men can bear. So John Dorricn felt strong 
 resentment rising within him at everv thing that recalled 
 Oliver, and with him his baseness. Only one thing could 
 lessen that bitter anger, the consciousness that the traitor 
 had never been able to deceive him entirely. From the 
 first he had suspected a secret understanding between ( )li- 
 ver and Antoinette. H,e had no proof to build upon, but 
 his intuitions of truth were quick and sure, and he was ac- 
 customed to trust them. If such was the case, if his friend 
 had robbed him of the girl promised to him, the conclusion 
 to be drawn i hence was easy to reach. How could Oliver 
 want Antoinette, if he did not want John's position? But 
 to see this danger had not also been to see the means of 
 averting it. Self-love, moreover, which misleads us all, had 
 led John Dorricn into straime error. He was conscious of 
 his superiority over his enemy, and he had not believed 
 that Mr. Donien could commit the mistake of preferring 
 Oliver Black to himself. What! set by not merely his 
 years of faithful service, but also his undoubted talent and 
 energy and past success? — the thing seemed too absurd for 
 a moment's thought ! For, after all, what had Oliver to
 
 486 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 recommend him ?■ — a pleasing person, a flattering tongue, 
 and doubtful birth, no means, and average talents. Were 
 these the gifts that could replace the name of Dorrien, and 
 the experience purchased by eight years of toil ? Was this 
 the dowry which could give a penniless adventurer the 
 hand of Mr. Dorrien's granddaughter? Surely not. So 
 John could look down on the ambitious hopes of his false 
 friend with the scornful amusement of a man whom treason 
 cannot reach. The only doubt he had was of Antoinette's 
 liking. For that he fought keenly ; man-like, he wished 
 for her none the less that another had stolen her from him. 
 She was his, doubly his. He had brought her to the house, 
 he had taken her from her poor home, conquered her grand- 
 father's reluctance to have her near him, and he would not 
 give her up. So he did his best ; not in words, nor even 
 much in actions, but in these hundred subtile waj'S by 
 which a man, young and pleasing, knows that he can reach 
 a girl's heart. And John was not so blind as not to see in 
 time that he had succeeded. He was not so modest that 
 he did not perceive the involuntary gladness in that girl's 
 face when she saw him, even as he detected, with secret 
 triumph, the cloud of trouble and care that came over it 
 when Oliver Black was by. This victory fully avenged him 
 as he thought against the schemer. John, being secure, 
 could feel very magnanimous, and contemptuous too, for 
 there is a good deal of scorn in your magnanimity. He 
 would not see that, though Antoinette might be won, her 
 grandfather might also be alienated ; and he forgot that 
 strange, sad story of the old Grecian days, which is true of 
 all times, the story of the Athenian who wearied of hear- 
 ing Aristides called the Just. 
 
 Even now, when every object he looked at recalled the 
 traitor, John Dorrien had no actual fear for himself. The 
 cloud on his open face, the weight of care at his heart, were 
 for Antoinette, and the resentment he felt was against the 
 man who had thus avenged himself for the young girl's in- 
 constancy. To him, and to him chiefly, did John attribute 
 Mademoiselle Mdlanie's sudden revelation ; and against 
 him, for that motive chiefly, did he cherish anger as he 
 went to seek Mr. Dorrien. He hoped, faintly, it must be 
 confessed, to influence him and keep her birthright for An- 
 toinette ; but, as we said, his hopes were faint, and if they
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 487 
 
 failed, as he feared that fail they would, lie saw much 
 trouble before him. lb' walked ou, calling up every proof 
 he could muster on her side, strengthening his case as best 
 he might, and finding most forcible arguments, if they 
 would but convince Mr. Dorrien, until, at length, he reached 
 that gentleman's presence. 
 
 Mr. Dorrien was walking leisurely in the sun, smoking a 
 cigar. He was not fond of smoking, but he had taken to it 
 of late, for a restlessness and a love of change, and of all he 
 had shunned till then, had grown upon him, and altered all 
 his old habits. He took out his cigar, and held out his 
 hand to John in friendly and easy welcome, and he said, 
 with unusual lightness and airiness of manner : 
 
 " Well, John, I am perfectly smitten with this place. I 
 never saw any thing so prettily pastoral ; you know," with 
 a sigh, " that circumstances, and no choice of mine, made a 
 man of business of me, and all my old tastes are gratified 
 in this little bit of Normandy. That glimpse of water there 
 beyond in shade and sunshine, those old trees and that pah- 
 sky, are like a perpetual Gainsborough to look at. I like it 
 exceedingly. Do you ? " 
 
 "Very much so, sir. I always did like this place, I 
 mean in Mr. Blackmore's time. 
 
 "Then I hope you will like it too in Mr. Dorrien's 
 time," cheerfully replied Mr. Dorrien, "for I have made up 
 my mind." 
 
 " You mean to purchase it ? " 
 
 " I do — indeed, my word is passed." 
 
 There was a pause. John Dorrien flushed painfully. 
 
 "What becomes of the paper-mill, then?" he asked. 
 The question was a useless one, but not for worlds could he 
 have helped putting it. Mr. Dorrien raised his eyebrows, 
 and looked as if he thought that John's paper-mill was in a 
 a very remote landscape indeed. Evidently that Gains- 
 borough was not one he cared to possess. 
 
 " I suppose the paper-mill remains where we found it?" 
 he answered at length. "My dear John," he added, wav- 
 ing his cigar, and speaking more airily than ever, " you 
 meant well, of course ; but you went wild about that paper- 
 mill — perfectly wild. You always do carry, or want to 
 carry out, your ideas to excess. You are too imaginative. 
 I believe you began as a poet: well, the faculty, a bcauti-
 
 488 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 ful but unsafe one, of looking at things ideally, clings to 
 you still." 
 
 " Excuse me, sir — I brought figures and facts — " 
 
 " And I went into both," interrupted Mr. Dorrien, with 
 a touch of impatience, as if the mere recollection bored him 
 exceedingly. " I went into both and found them all wrong. 
 I also examined the matter myself from another point of 
 view, and I found that your estimates would not stand the 
 test of plain common-sense." 
 
 "May I ask who found you the facts and figures that 
 led you to that conclusion ? " said John, with some indigna- 
 tion. 
 
 " Mr. Black. 1 requested him to do so." 
 
 Mr. Dorrien answered John's questions without the least 
 hesitation — in the tone of a master who will admit of no 
 contradiction, and John felt that his position at La Maison 
 Dorrien was an altered one indeed. Still he was too man- 
 ly and too spirited to give in without a struggle, and he 
 said, in a tone as cool as that of Mr. Dorrien : 
 
 " If you will go into the matter again, sir, you will find 
 that Mr. Black, and not I, was mistaken." 
 
 Mr. Dorrien looked amazed. 
 
 " I tell you, John," he said, fretfully, but much more in 
 his old manner of arguing against his young cousin's views 
 than in that new manner of putting him down — " I tell you 
 that I am tired of extending this business more and more, 
 and that I think it time for me to enjoy some of the fruits 
 of a long life of labor and self-denial. Your paper-mill is 
 an awful risk, and little profit, even if it should prove suc- 
 cessful." 
 
 " It would put the house out of the power of Monsieur 
 Basnage, and on another footing than that which it has 
 now," warmly said John. 
 
 " We will not argue the case out, John," he said, " my 
 mind is made up. Any news from Paris ? " 
 
 " None. I mean to go this afternoon. I shall leave my 
 mother and Miss Dorrien here, of course." 
 
 "Miss Dorrien," echoed Mr. Dorrien, dryly ; " you mean 
 Mademoiselle d'Armaille." 
 
 "Arc you sure that is so?" asked John, much down- 
 cast. 
 
 " Quite sure," coolly answered Mr. Dorrien. " I saw
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 489 
 
 Mademoiselle Melanie last night, and slie quite satisfied me 
 — indeed, gave me a written acknowledgment." 
 
 "Is she a person to be trusted, sir?" asked John, 
 rather indignantly. , 
 
 " Of course not ; but there are ways of discovering the 
 truth, and I feel certain — I always had a strange, vague 
 doubt — I feel certain that this poor girl is not my son's 
 child. I have not yet decided what I shall do for her ; but 
 of course, having received her in my house as Miss Dorricn, 
 I shall not cut her off, and send her adrift." 
 
 "But this may be the merest falsehood," urged John, 
 warmly. " Allow me to ask what proofs Mademoiselle 
 M6lanie brought forward?" 
 
 "Allow me not to discuss that matter," interrupted 
 Mr. Dorrien. " I believe I am quite capable of settling my 
 family affairs without any assistance." 
 
 His tone, look, and manner, were aggressive ; but John 
 took up the glove without a second's hesitation. 
 
 " Excuse me, Mr. Dorrien, but does not this matter 
 concern me ? " 
 
 Mr. Dorrien raised his eyebrows, and was at a loss to 
 understand Mr. John Dorrien's meaning. 
 
 " My meaning, sir, is one which you first urged upon me, 
 which you have long known, which the last eight months 
 have rendered dearer to me every day ; my meaning is that 
 I love her very much, and hope to marry her. 
 
 " Indeed !" said Mr. Dorrien, showing no surprise what- 
 ever. " You really hope to marry a penniless girl, the 
 daughter of an adventurer, the niece of Mademoiselle Me- 
 lanie? Allow me to wonder at such a hope coming from 
 you, and especially at your choice of a family connection." 
 
 "It was your granddaughter whom I chose, sir," an- 
 swered John, coloring deeply. "That she should not be 
 what we both thought her, is her misfortune, not her fault. 
 As your granddaughter I learned to love her, and I cannot 
 learn to unlove her now." 
 
 "Well, you must please yourself," coldly answered Mr. 
 Dorrien; "hut, as I always found something that repelled 
 me in this young girl, so would it bo positively disagreeable 
 for me to see her in my house ; and if you will marry her, 
 why, you must excuse mo if I say that La Mais m Dorrien 
 cannot be your home. L have no doubt that, with your
 
 490 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 talents and industry, you will make your way in the world 
 — but henceforth our paths must lie apart." 
 
 From the moment that Mr. Dorrien began to speak, 
 John Dorrien's face took a peculiar and rather sad expres- 
 sion. Attack was coming, and he felt it, as the tree is said 
 to feel the coming of the storm, and he stood erect, silent, 
 and firm to meet it. Yet when the expected blow fell it 
 was so crushing and so heavy that he could scarcely bear 
 it. Scarcely, too, could he believe what his ears now told 
 him. What ! he had toiled years, he had given all his 
 youth, mind, and energy, to raise a falling house ; and now 
 that it was raised, and he could grasp a fair, well-earned re- 
 ward, he was laid by, as the tool is laid by when its work 
 is done ! He grasped the whole bitter truth in a moment ; 
 Mr. Dorrien wanted him no longer, and he took this pre- 
 tense of Antoinette to get rid of him. He remembered his 
 mother's plaintive, " Why are you not a partner ? " He 
 recalled Mrs. Reginald's grave look and warning forefinger, 
 and Mr. Brown's cough, whenever the partnership had been 
 mentioned, and even Oliver's significant advice ; and re- 
 membering also how, in his generous trust, he had scorned 
 them all, anger, shame, and sorrow, filled his heart. Alas! 
 he had been too much of a poet, after all. He had forgotten 
 that black and white and stamped papers are the man of 
 business's gospel. He had also thought himself indis- 
 pensable, and, in the confidence and pardonable vanity of 
 youth, he had held his position too secure for the safe- 
 guards of common prudence. It was useless to remonstrate 
 with Mr. Dorrien ; he knew it, and yet, in his indignation, 
 he could not help doing so. 
 
 " Do you mean to say that the partnership which you 
 promised me so long is not to be ? " he asked. "Do you 
 mean that, Mr. Dorrien ? " 
 
 " The partnership ! " echoed Mr. Dorrien, very coldly. 
 " The partnership ? Yes, of course I do mean that that 
 view is at an end between us. Even if you gave up your 
 intended marriage, it would be at an end. This matter of 
 the paper-mill has shown you to be too young and too ven- 
 turesome for the responsibility. It would be the merest 
 folly in me to give you, with your recklessness, a share in 
 my authority. I beg that, whatever course you take, you 
 will discard that view altogether."
 
 JOnN DORRIEN. 491 
 
 And now John understood, once for all, the man before 
 him. He was indolent, but by no means generous. He 
 had given much power to his young cousin because he liked 
 his ease, but in his heart he had grudged lam that dearly- 
 bought authority. He had made himself a cipher in his 
 own house, and he had resented it, though it was his own 
 doing. Oliver Black had not created within him that f< cl- 
 ing of discontent — he had only brought it to the surface, 
 and helped it into active life. 
 
 " You mean that ? " cried John, passionate tears rising 
 to his eves. " You mean that, after using me all these 
 years, you are going to repay rny trust in your honor after 
 that fashion?" 
 
 Mr. Dorrien raised his e}-ebrows, and looked quite at a 
 loss to understand his young relative's meaning. 
 
 " This is too absurd ! " he said, at length. " You have 
 been very useful — I do not deny it — but for that usefulness 
 you have been amply paid. You were a mere lad, and not 
 a rich one, I fancy, when I took you in hand, gave you a 
 position, and your mother a home. Pray, what more could 
 you expect? I now choose to say that our paths must lie 
 apart, having strong reason so to say — and you assume the 
 tone of an injured man, on the strength of a promise which 
 was never more than conditional." 
 
 John was too manly and too proud to contend any 
 longer against his ungrateful master. 
 
 " Mr. Dorrien," he said, irt a low tone, " I shall thank 
 God if, as you say, Antoinette is not your granddaughter." 
 
 An angry flush rose to Mr. Dorrien's pale face, but J< >lm 
 was gone before an answer could pass his lips. 
 
 The young man had not walked ten steps out of the 
 house, when he found himself face to Eace with Mademoi- 
 selle Melanie. 
 
 " Well," said she, standing still before him, so as not to 
 let him take a step, " what is she ? — a Dorrien, of course." 
 
 "She is my future wife," said John, whose gray eyes 
 flashed; "and I am sorry to say, madarne, that the wife of 
 John Dorrien musl be a stranger to you." 
 
 Mademoiselle Melanie laughed, and, taking out her 
 pocket-book, she opened it and showed him a little bundle 
 of bank-notes, which she flourished mockingly in his face. 
 
 "Do you see that? " said she. "I got it fur telling the
 
 492 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 truth at last. The truth is a fine thing. It can bring in 
 money — hundreds — and a few hundreds," continued Made- 
 moiselle Melanie, whose eyes sparkled as she thought of 
 Monaco, " can bring in thousands and thousands," she con- 
 tinued, looking at him — " could brinor in hundreds of thou- 
 sands, if one had only a little luck." 
 
 Here her voice took a regretful ring, and she sighed 
 deeply. John, to whom every word she spoke was a mys- 
 tery, bowed coldly and passed on. 
 
 " My love to Mrs. John Dorrien," said Mademoiselle 
 Melanie, raising her voice. 
 
 He did not answer, and she entered La Maison Rouge 
 in the hope — a futile one, as it proved — of getting a few 
 hundreds more from Mr. Dorrien. 
 
 CHAPTER XLIV. 
 
 " My poor little mother," thought John, as he entered 
 the cottage, " how will you bear this ? " 
 
 Alas ! Mrs. Dorrien bore it very ill indeed. 
 
 " O John," she said, forgetting that Antoinette was 
 there, sitting in a window, with the light falling on her 
 face of deathly paleness — " O John, my dear boy, you have 
 been too precipitate. You should have spoken to Antoi- 
 nette before you left, and — " 
 
 " Little mother," said John, interrupting her, and look- 
 ing sadly in her face, " Antoinette has nothing to do with 
 all this. She is the pretense, not the cause. Mr. Dorrien 
 wanted to get rid of me." 
 
 " If Mrs. Reginald were only here ! " exclaimed- Mrs. 
 Dorrien, clinging to impossible hope. 
 
 " And if she were, mother, she "would bid me bear 
 it like a man. — ■ Antoinette," said he, turning to her 
 with a bright, hopeful smile, " will you be a poor man's 
 ^ife ? " 
 
 " Surely," she replied, with a quivering lip, " I have 
 <)ured you enough as it is, without doing you that 
 wrong."
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 493 
 
 "And will you not understand," persisted John, "that 
 you arc only the pretense ? " 
 
 " I am the cause, too, John," was her sad reply. " Mon- 
 sieur Basnage could no more forgive you for his daughter, 
 than he could for the mill; and it has all turned against 
 you. I was sacrificed because I would not help to ruin you, 
 and now I must drag you down in my fall." 
 
 He heard her with strange sweetness. It was a bitter 
 hour, but she had been true to him longer than he thought. 
 
 " Will you be a poor man's wife ? " he asked again. 
 
 " O Mrs. John," said Antoinette, looking at his mother, 
 and speaking in sore distress, " will you ever be able to for- 
 give me if I say ' Yes ? ' " 
 
 "My dear," answered Mrs. Dorrien, " I think this is a 
 terrible blow ; but I know that my dear boy will rise above 
 it yet." 
 
 She spoke more bravely than she felt. Some years of 
 ease had unfitted her for the cares of life, and her heart 
 sank at the thought of facing them again. Especially did 
 she grow faint-hearted after John had left them that after- 
 noon. 
 
 " I shall soon come back," he said, quietly — " come back 
 and fetch you both. But I have a few matters to settle 
 first. Good-by. God bless you ! " 
 
 A few matters to settle first ! Mrs. Dorrien could have 
 groaned aloud at the meaning these words, so cheerfully 
 uttered, conveyed. John was going to look out for a home 
 for them, and what home could it be ? Some dreadful little 
 place on a fourth floor in a house in Paris, shabby furniture, 
 and a femme de menage ; and then he would insist on 
 marrying Antoinette at once, she was sure, and a vision of 
 their poor domestic life, with all its trials and miseries, 
 overwhelmed her. 
 
 John's own thoughts were hard enough. He knew life 
 too well to indulge in many illusions. He could earn a 
 living, but nothing like the position Ik 1 had lost could he 
 ever hope for again. It was with a grave face, not gloomy, 
 but full of thought and care, that he crossed the threshold 
 of that old house where he had so Ions: ruled as a master. 
 
 The first person he saw as he crossed the court was Mr. 
 Brown. Even in the gray light of evening, he was aware 
 that Mr. Brown's face was troubled and care-worn. Mr.
 
 494 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 Brown, indeed, had that morning received, under the shape 
 of a telegram, such a shock as he had never felt before since 
 he had entered La Maison Dorrien. Twice he had headed 
 a letter, " Mr. Oliver Black," and once he had taken off his 
 spectacles, and kept them five minutes in his hand, staring 
 blankly before him. 
 
 " How are you, Mr. Brown ! " asked John, quietly — 
 " well, I hope ? And how is Mrs. Reginald ? " 
 
 "Mrs. Reginald is very well, sir," answered Mr. Brown 
 — " very well ; but she is out, sir." 
 
 John made no reply, but went up the steps of the 
 perron. Mr. Brown, with something like flurry in his as- 
 pect, turned back, and walked up with him. 
 
 " Excuse me, Mr. John," he said, " but I have got a 
 telegram — a telegram," and he placed it in John's hands 
 as he spoke. 
 
 It was thus worded : 
 
 "Mr. John Dorrien no longer member of the firm; re- 
 ceive no orders from him. Mr. Oliver Black has full in- 
 structions how to act in J. D.'s stead.'' 
 
 The telegram was dated La Chapelle, and had been 
 sent by George Dorrien to Samuel Brown. 
 
 " Well, Mr. Brown," quietly said John, " Mr. Dorrien's 
 orders do not apply, I suppose, to the possession of my 
 private papers in the library ? " 
 
 " I hope not — I trust not," said Mr. Brown, sorely dis- 
 tressed, and all the more distressed that he knew his al- 
 legiance to John had grown weak indeed of late. 
 
 " Then I shall go and take them at once," said John. 
 "I shall not sleep here to-night," he added, with his hand 
 on the door ; " but my task may be a tedious one ; I shall 
 stay late, and I should prefer, Mr. Brown, if you were to 
 remain and take the key of my desk from me, if you 
 please." 
 
 " Yes, sir, by all means," readily answered Mr. Brown. 
 
 John entered the library. The gray evening light filled 
 the place. He rang and asked for the lamp, and when the 
 servant brought it, Carlo rushed in at the same time, whin- 
 ing with delight. 
 
 "I suppose I may take you aw T ay, poor little fellow," 
 said John, patting him kindly ; " and now lie there — I am 
 busy."
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 495 
 
 The lamp had boon placed on the broad table. Its 
 clear light revealed to John Dorricn that long-silent room, 
 where he had spent many weary hours, and known many 
 heavy cares. He unlocked his desk, and began sorting his 
 p.ipers. Soon the table was strewed with letters, bills, 
 pamphlets, plans for the paper-mill, designs for note-paper, 
 and with all the other tokens of his past life. The task of 
 looking through these papers was a tedious one. Many 
 he kept, some he destroyed; others, with which he had no 
 concern, he put up for the use of his successor. After a 
 while, feeling rather wearied, he leaned back in his chair 
 and rested. The sight of these papers called up some bit- 
 ter thoughts. He gazed at them as a conquereil general 
 may look at the brave dead on the battle-field. The world 
 which hurrahs for the victorious, and laughs at the van- 
 quished, will care little for them. What matter? He 
 who led them on, and who knows how they gave their 
 hearts' blood at his bidding, will think kindly of those 
 poor dead hopes, plans, and schemes, which success might 
 have made so great, which failure has laid in the dust. 
 " And that is the end," thought John, with a sigh — " that 
 is the end." 
 
 Yes, that was the end of more than seven years of very 
 hard work. That was the end of a bitter sacrifice, of fervid 
 dreams abandoned, of bright hopes voluntarily extinguished 
 in a proud boy's heart. Had be done well, after all? Uo 
 we not often mistake the voice of Duty, and think she calls, 
 when we only hear the echo of worldly Avisdom ? Had he 
 done well ? That, perhaps, was the hardest thought of all 
 in the many hard thoughts which John Dorrien had as he 
 sat alone that night brooding over the irreparable past, 
 and comparing it with what might have been. He looked 
 at the little bronze figure of Polymnia, and half smiled at 
 the cold and serene grace of the young muse. 
 
 " If I did wrong to forsake your sisters and you," 
 thought John Dorrien, "I confess that I am punished now, 
 and that Business has been a hard master to me. Oh ! if 
 I could go back to you ! But no ; it is too late — too late 
 forever! The fervor has been wasted, and the faith is 
 gone." 
 
 He sighed and resumed his task. He packed up his 
 books. Some had belonged to his father, and had long
 
 496 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 stood on the book-shelves of his mother's poor home. 
 How they recalled his childhood and its solitary hours, 
 and that memorable day when he had told his mother that 
 he would rub Aladdin's lamp for her ! Others had been 
 bequeathed to him by Mr. Ryan, and with the aspect of 
 their worn and shabby covers came back the studious life 
 at Saint-Ives, and the dangerous worship of his ardent 
 friend. And so time passed ; and, when ten struck, the 
 great gate rolled on its hinges, and a carriage entered the 
 yard. John paused, and listened. He guessed that only 
 the master of the house had come in thus. It was Mr. 
 Dorrien, and Mr. Brown had gone forth to receive him 
 — for John heard their two voices as thev entered the 
 hall. 
 
 " Is Mr. Black in the library ? " said Mr. Dorrien — " I 
 see a light there." 
 
 " No, sir ; it is Mr. John who is there, looking over his 
 papers. Mr. Black came at eight, and left word that he 
 would come back at nine; he has not been yet." 
 
 " Send him in to me," said Mr. Dorrien ; " but first let 
 me have a few words with you, Mr. Brown." 
 
 A door opened, and closed again, the voices ceased, 
 and all was once more silent in the great house. Self- 
 possessed though he was, John felt his brow flush with 
 a stern pain as he heard them. He had not yet left the 
 house, and his place was already filled ; and, lest he should 
 not leave it quickly enough, Mr. Dorrien had hurried his 
 return, and was calling Oliver Black to him with indecent 
 haste. 
 
 "Let him!" thought John; and his eyes flashed, 
 though he was there alone — "Jet him ! This day still is 
 mine ; Mr. Black will not dare to enter this room till I am 
 gone." 
 
 He resumed his task composedly enough ; by eleven 
 o'clock it was over. He locked his desk, and took out the 
 key. It was still in his hand when the door opened ab- 
 ruptly, and Mrs. Reginald walked in. 
 
 "John," she said, excitedly, "you don't mean it ! It's 
 all wrong, my dear boy ; Mr. Brown lias been upsetting 
 me. You can't do it. Think of your mother, you know." 
 
 She sat down as she spoke, and looked at John in such 
 evident distress that he did not know how to tell her the
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 497 
 
 truth. But it had to be told, and his friend heard him out 
 with ;i downcast look and unusual silence. 
 
 " What a villain that little .Air. Black must be!" she 
 said at. length. 
 
 v " And what a fool John Dorrien has been ! " said John, 
 coolly. 
 
 k- My dear boy, you trusted," said she, soothingly. 
 
 "And what right had I to trust one who had always 
 been faithless ? " 
 
 "Ay, there's the rub," confessed Mis. Reginald, "but 
 young people will be conceited. And so it is all over, and 
 1 shall see my dear boy here no more," she added, very 
 sadly. 
 
 Yes, it was all over; and John rang, and asked for Mr. 
 Brown, who came, looking much crestfallen, and also much 
 afraid of Mrs. Reginald, by whom he was eyed askance; 
 and he took the key humbly enough, and listened to John's 
 explanations in deferential silence; and, when this was 
 over, John went up to his room, and Mrs. Reginald went 
 up with him, to help him there. 
 
 "I shall see to your mother's things," said she, with a 
 sigh. " Poor dear Mrs. John ! I shall miss attending to her 
 jellies and chickens and burgundy. I don't know why I 
 should not leave Mr. Dorrien and join you," she added an- 
 grily. "I never can sit at the table with that little Mr. 
 Black, you know, John; don't tell me that I can. I shall 
 certainly affront him. Besides, if you marry Antoinct te, 
 Mrs. John will want some one for herself — for lovers, as 
 every one knows, are the most odious creatures breathing — 
 John, you don't understand packing, my dear boy. Lii.cn 
 always goes at the bottom, and — who's there?" 
 
 "If you please, Mrs. Reginald," said Mr. Brown's voice 
 outside, "will you come down to Mr. Dorrien, if you 
 please?" 
 
 "And what docs h< want witli me?" asked Mrs. Regi- 
 nald, with much asperity. "I can tell von, Mr. Brown, 
 that I am not in the best of tempers with Mr. Dorrien just 
 
 now. " 
 
 She obeyed the summons, nevertheless, turning back 
 with her hand on the door to say to John : 
 
 "Linen at the bottom, John — but I shall be back di- 
 rectlv."
 
 498 J0nN DORRIEN. 
 
 "Mrs. Reginald," said Mr. Brown, in a low tone, as they 
 stood together at the head of the stairs, "I think that Mr. 
 Dorrien — Mr. Dorrien, you know, is in a fit, and have you 
 got some smelling-salts ? " 
 
 "What?" asked Mrs. Reginald, staring. 
 
 " I think that Mr. Dorrien is in a fit — a fit," repeated 
 Mr. Brown, with unusual agitation. " I have sent for Doc- 
 tor Parker, Mrs. Reginald." 
 
 Mrs. Reginald strode past him, and was down-stairs in 
 a moment. She opened the door of Mr. Dorrien's sitting- 
 room without knocking, and at once walked to the sofa on 
 which the master of the house half lay, motionless and pale, 
 with fixed eyes and parted lips, and something of his 
 weary, languid look still on his face. She took up his - 
 hand — it was inert ; she let it drop, and it fell down life- 
 less. 
 
 " Mr. Brown," said she, " Doctor Parker ma}' come and 
 go ; some one has been here before him. Mr. Dorrien is 
 dead." 
 
 " The signs of death are deceitful, Mrs. Reginald," said 
 the cool voice of Oliver Black. 
 
 Mrs. Reginald gave a start of angry surprise as she saw 
 him; she had not perceived him till then, standing by her 
 side with an audacious, defying smile on his handsome face. 
 Her brown cheek flushed, her dark eye sparkled, but she 
 did not lose her self-control. 
 
 " Mr. Brown," she said, " go for Mr. John. He is up- 
 stairs in his room. His place is here." 
 
 She said no more, but, if there be language in a look, 
 hers said very plainly, " Go, I shall stay here and watch." 
 And after a moment's hesitation Mr. Brown obeyed her be- 
 hest, for he did think that Mr. Dorrien was dead — his father 
 had died suddenly, before the glass his hand was raising 
 could reach his lips ; his son had died with an unfinished 
 letter before him ; and Mr. Dorrien had sunk back where he 
 lay while he was talking to Mr. Brown, and giving him or- 
 ders for the morrow. 
 
 So Mrs. Reginald and Oliver Black were left face to 
 face — she at the head of the sofa and he at the foot, with 
 the pale and silent Mr. Dorrien between them: she trying, 
 though she knew how vain it all was, the effect of salts, vin- 
 egar, and cold water ; Oliver looking on with quiet compos-
 
 JOHN DORRIEN. 499 
 
 lire. The game might be lost, but he would not give it up 
 till his last card had been played out. 
 
 Doctor Parker, who lived close by, entered the room at 
 the same time with John Dorrien. One look at the still 
 face, one touch at the hand already turning cold, one breath- 
 less pause to listen for the beatings of a heart that had 
 ceased, then an impressive glance at John Dorrien. 
 
 " Sir," said he, " Mr. Dorrien is dead." 
 
 "Can nothing be tried? — is there no hope?" asked 
 John, looking down sadly and gravely at the face that had 
 sent him forth in such unkindness that very morning, but 
 which had been kind in days gone by. 
 
 " There is no hope," replied Doctor Parker. " Mr. Dor- 
 rien is dead. You may remember that I foretold this result 
 some months ago, and warned you of it." 
 
 John nodded. The room was silent. Doctor Parker 
 was drawing on his gloves. Oliver Black addressed him 
 suddenly. 
 
 " I suppose you have no doubt, doctor ? " he asked. 
 
 " No, sir," replied Doctor Parker, with a stare at this 
 stranger, for he happened never to have met him before, " I 
 have no doubt." 
 
 "Then it's all up," said Oliver ; and taking his hat he 
 walked out. 
 
 Mr. Brown was very much shaken by his master's death ; 
 but he was a man of business, and he felt perplexed, lie 
 beckoned John out of the room. 
 
 " Mr. John," he said, under his breath, "I have a great 
 regard for you, as you know ; but Mr. Dorrien's orders were 
 clear, and — and I should not like to disobey them." 
 
 " Miss Dorrien is not of age, and cannot take possession 
 in her own person," calmly answered John ; " but — " 
 
 " Miss Dorrien," interrupted .Mr. Brown, looking bewil- 
 dered — "and is she a Dorrien, Mr. John?" 
 
 For Mr. Dorrien had lost no time in telling that story. 
 
 "I really do not know," replied John ; "but I know 
 that I am the only one wdio has a right to dispute her title, 
 and that I shall not do so." 
 
 " But if she be not really Miss Dorrien," argued Mr. 
 Brown, still perplexed. 
 
 "lam one," interrupted John, in his turn; "forget that 
 I was ever any thing in this house, and only remember that
 
 500 JOHN DORRIEN. 
 
 I am the great-grandson of Mr. John Dorrien ; and if it be 
 Mr. Black that troubles you, Mr. Brown — if }'ou think that 
 he will claim any authority in this house over the business 
 — refer him to me." 
 
 But, to Mr. Brown's great relief, Mr. Black never came, 
 and never claimed the key of John's desk, or the fulfillment 
 of Mr. Dorrien's promise. From that day forth he vanished, 
 not only from La Maison Dorrien, but also from the lives 
 of the inmates, and was known to them no more. 
 
 The funeral was over, and John and Antoinette stood 
 together in the garden nigh the river -god, who, careless 
 of death, was bending over his urn, and pouring forth its 
 bright waters into the basin below. 
 
 " Then, John," said she, looking wistfully up in his face, 
 " you are master once more ? " 
 
 " I — oh, I am nothing, and no one. I gave up the key 
 of my desk to Mr. Brown. You are mistress, Antoinette." 
 
 "I! O John, was I his granddaughter? You cannpt 
 say that you think I was ? " 
 
 John was silent. 
 
 " Then how can I be mistress ? 
 
 "Who is to dispute your claim, Antoinette? Do you 
 think I will ? " he asked tenderly. " Mr. Dorrien made no 
 will. I sa} r it again — you are mistress here." 
 
 A great gush of tears came to her eyes ; she laid her 
 two hands on his arms. 
 
 "Then, if I am mistress," she said, "you are master, 
 John — you are master." 
 
 And that was how it ended, and how John was master 
 in the old house once more, and how Antoinette, if she 
 was not a Dorrien, became in time a Dorrien's wife. 
 
 THE END.
 
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