I7f 
 
 cJ^^iyu^ c^«^ 
 
 /?yy^' 
 
 LI E) RAR.Y 
 
 OF THE 
 
 U N IVLRSITY 
 
 Of ILLINOIS 
 
 62.3 
 R562n 
 
 v.i
 
 NO MAN'S FEIEND. 
 
 FEEDEEICK WILLIAM EOBINSON, 
 
 AUTHOR OF "grandmother's MOISTET;" " MILLT'S HERO;" "MR. STEWART'i 
 
 intentions:" etc., etc. 
 
 " I exist, 
 Within myself, not comfortless." 
 
 WOKDOT'OETH. 
 
 IN THREE VOLUMES. 
 Vol. I. , 
 
 LONDON: 
 CHAPMAN AND HALL, 193, PICCADILLY. 
 
 1867. 
 
 {_AU Eifjhts Reserved.}
 
 LOSDUN: I-KIXTF.D BY W. CLOAVFS AST) SONS. STAMrOBD STEB-LT, 
 AND CIUIUNG CROSS.
 
 
 CONTENTS OF YOL. I. 
 
 BOOK I. 
 
 WESTBOURXE-ON-SEA. 
 
 Chap. Page 
 
 I. The Ely Am Family 3 
 
 n. The Visitors' List 13 
 
 III. The Eegatta at Westbourxe-upon-Sea . . 34 
 
 IV, Mr. Eaxwick at Home 67 
 
 V. Mr. Searle 91 
 
 VI. Friendly, or Unfriendly 106 
 
 VII. Surveillance 127 
 
 Vin, Pa yes the Way for many Changes . , 142 
 
 IX. Mr. Harland's Ultimatum . , . .161 
 
 X. The Elyani Family is Broken Up for Ever . 174 
 
 BOOK IL 
 
 D A M A R I S. 
 
 I. Mr. Harland is Himself Again . . . 193 
 II. Mrs. Courtenay Tells the News . . .213
 
 IV CONTEiSTTS OF VOL. I. 
 
 Chap. Page 
 
 III. Damaris 230 
 
 IV. Two Homes 243 
 
 V. Inquisitive Philosophy 266 
 
 VI. Damaris's Character Develops Itself . . 294 
 
 VII. Courtenay's Love Sxht 312
 
 BOOK I. 
 
 WESTBOUKNE-ON-SEA. 
 
 VOL. I. Bf
 
 NO MAN'S FRIEND 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 THE ELVANI FAMILY. 
 
 They came into the old town of Westbourne 
 at eleven o'clock at night. The clocks in the 
 new town — that of Westbourne-upon-Sea, a 
 mile and a quarter distant — had already struck 
 eleven ; but then Westbourne-upon-Sea was a 
 modern, fast, go-a-head place, and not to be 
 relied upon. The bells began chiming the 
 hour in the old turret of Westbourne Church as 
 the Elvanis — father, mother, and daughters — 
 tramped into the town, slowly, erratically, and 
 with heads butting against the wind and rain 
 wdiicli had been in their faces all the way, like 
 adverse fates. 
 
 They had walked their two-and-twenty miles, 
 those four fragments of society ; and the rate at 
 
 b2
 
 '4 NO man's friend. 
 
 which they had walked, together with the jour- 
 ney and the stormy nature of the day, had told 
 upon them, and rendered them grateful for the 
 first siglit of the town, and the flecks of light, 
 here and there, in the windows of cottagers and 
 townsfolk who were up late that night. 
 
 The father of the family in a ragged great- 
 coat, too small for him, but a world too wide, 
 stalked on in advance, clutching a something 
 to his breast, that looked like a wooden baby in 
 a green baize bag; and glancing behind now 
 and then at her who came more slowly in his 
 wake, and whom he might be guiding by the 
 sparks which the wind blew across the dark- 
 ness from the short pipe he held between his 
 teeth. 
 
 Following him the mother of the family — 
 the Signora Elvani of public life— a woman who 
 seemed to have been made to match her hus- 
 band, so gaunt and angular was her outline in 
 the shadows. She too carried a rigid substance 
 in green baize, which she clutched with equal 
 tenacity to her breast, and even screened 
 with a portion of that scanty shawl which 
 might have more profitably covered her chest 
 from the cold. She looked behind occasionally
 
 THE ELYANI FAMILY. 5 
 
 at those who loitered in her rear, as her hus- 
 band looked at her. 
 
 Ten yards in the background at least, followed 
 the elder daughter, an attenuated child in a 
 squelched bonnet, a short ragged frock, black 
 stockings, and old boots down at heel, a girl 
 evidently lame and footsore, and over-weighted 
 with a bundle of " properties " which was slung 
 across her right shoulder, and to which she 
 clung with two thin, bony hands. 
 
 Five yards from her, the junior member of 
 the family, evident by her stature even in that 
 murkiness of atmosphere ; a child that had also 
 something in green baize to carry, and was also 
 spare of form, poorly clad, down at heel, and 
 lame. . 
 
 " I said that we'd do it by eleven, Caroline," 
 said the man in advance, without removing his 
 pipe from his mouth; "and there it strikes 
 from Westbourne Church, by jingo! Where 
 are the girls ? " 
 
 "They're coming on. Damaris," she said, 
 looking over her shoulder, " are you there ? " 
 
 " I'm here, safe enough. Is this Westbourne?" 
 
 « Yes." 
 
 " Thank God for it then, for I'm dead beat,"
 
 b NO MAX S FRIEND. 
 
 said tlie child ; '' here's Eunice with more life 
 than I have. Why, she's singing now ! " 
 
 " There's much to sing about just now, I must 
 say," said Mrs. Elvani, with emphasis. " Come 
 on, you two ! " 
 
 On into the old town accordingly, keeping 
 to the middle of the road in preference to a 
 footpath of flints, neatly laid enough, but not 
 choice w^alking for people with tender feet ; 
 turning suddenly to the left, away from the 
 broader thoroughfare, and into a narrow street 
 smelling of imperfect drainage, stopping for a 
 moment to collect their forces together, and 
 then toiling one after another up the steep 
 and time-worn steps that led into the ' Ship ' 
 inn. 
 
 Time was when the ' Ship ' had been a 
 respectable place and frequented by respectable 
 people ; many years ago that was, however, 
 before physicians talked too much about the 
 purity of air and mildness of climate i)eculiar 
 to Westbourne, and speculative gentlemen r(in 
 up their rows of terraces on the great cliffs 
 facing the sea, and hotels were found to 
 pay in the new town. Then the ' Ship ' had no 
 more visitors, and even fourth-rate commercial
 
 THE ELYANI FAMILY. 7 
 
 travellers took their samples of groceries and 
 patent- medicines to other quarters less saline 
 and low. Saline — for the Westbourne boatmen 
 lived in the old town still, which appeared to 
 have gone further inland and out of the way, 
 as tliouofh ashamed of its dashins: neio-hbour 
 and namesake ; and these boatmen clung to 
 the ' Ship,' and smoked long pipes in its grimy 
 parlour, and swore a good deal when times 
 were hard and fish were scarce. Low, very 
 low indeed for a quarter of the year — for it was 
 the only house-of-call for tramps, that had a 
 connection with tramps, and where tramps for 
 the nonce might consider themselves at home. 
 So the *Ship' had lost caste, and had it not 
 been for the antiquity of the thing, and the 
 tact of the landlord, would have lost its licence 
 with its former dignity. For they quarrelled 
 at the ' Ship ' not un frequently, and when rival 
 itinerants met in the tap-room in the season, 
 the place was resonant with altercation until 
 they turned into the stable-yard and settled 
 differences by force of arms. 
 
 There was no doubt that the place was full 
 enough on that particular night in August on 
 which our story opens. The door of the tap^
 
 8 NO MAX's FRTE^^). 
 
 room, and the windows of the tap-room were 
 open, the tobacco smoke was thick and dense 
 despite the thorough draught, and before one 
 grew accustomed to the atmosphere, it was 
 difficult to distinguish through the fog the 
 faces or figures of the people who talked so 
 loudly and volubly, and hammered so noisily 
 their beer-mugs on the table. 
 
 " What Elvani, and the old woman, and the 
 lot o' you ! " exclaimed the landlord, emerging 
 into the passage as the wayfarers came up the 
 steps, " blest if I can stow you anywhere, upon 
 my soul." 
 
 « Full ? " 
 
 " Chock full to busting — everybody's come 
 to Westbourne this E-egatta time, and you 
 won't get the pull like you did last year, my 
 boy." 
 
 "Perhaps not," said Elvani, nodding, "but 
 we've our connection, and it will stand by 
 us, I'll be bound ! We shan't go to the wall 
 without an effort of our own, for there's talent 
 in us, Jones, and principle, and style." 
 
 "Ah," replied Jones, "I will say that myself, 
 though I'm no judge of style, and likes the 
 comic business best, and b'iieves it pays best
 
 THE ELYANI FAMILY. 9 
 
 in the long run.- You'll find a corner, I 
 daresay, to stow yourselves in for an hour, but 
 there's no room to sleep you anywheres. A 
 wet night, Mrs. Elvani ; up to business the 
 night-afore, like a woman of business as you 
 are, my dear.'' 
 
 " Ah ! yes ! " said Mrs. Elvani, rather wearily, 
 and without paying any heed to the familiar 
 peroration of the landlord. " Let us come in 
 and sit down." 
 
 " We've walked forty miles if we've walked 
 a step to-day," said Mr. Elvani, "and the old 
 lady's tired." 
 
 " Two-and-twenty by the last milestone," 
 corrected his wife. 
 
 " Oh ! two-and-twenty was it ? " said he, 
 easily. "Ah! but then we missed our way 
 twenty times at least, and as misses are as 
 good as miles, why that makes forty-two, eh, 
 Jones?" 
 
 Jones condescended to laugh at this stale 
 joke. 
 
 " Dashed if you ain't allers in spirits, guv'nor. 
 Go in and cheer tliem up a bit, they're as 
 sulky as bears about the wet. They don't take 
 .things kindly, they don't do credit to the house;
 
 10 xo man's friexd. 
 
 they don't drink as they ought. They're as 
 scaly a lot," he added, behind his hand, "as ere 
 I seed come into a man's parlour." 
 
 "And you'll turn me and my family, old 
 customers and good ones, Jones," said Mr. 
 Elvani, with consummate tact, " you'll turn 
 us into the wet and windy streets for a lot of 
 new-fangled nondescripts that don't thank you 
 for your hospitality. Jones, it's unfriendly, to 
 say the least of it." 
 
 " Well, look a-here ; we're blazing full, but 
 you can keep the place you settles down in ; 
 there's the loft over the stables for the missus 
 and young uns if they like it better. And 
 it's not everybody that I'd let go into my 
 loft, with hens there, and new laid eofcrs seven 
 a shilling, strike me dead ! " 
 
 " Jones, you're a good fellow. A mug of 
 ale, a quartern of gin, a big loaf, some cheese, 
 a clean pipe, and a screw, old boy. Hollo ! you 
 girls. Why they've gone to sleep on the door- 
 step, both of them, side by side like a couple of 
 paroquets. Hi Eunice ! hi Damaris ! " 
 
 The girls, tired out by their father's loquacity, 
 had seated themselves on the top step, and 
 were fast asleep with their bundles in their laps.
 
 THE ELYANI FAMILY. 11 
 
 "Do you want to catch your death of cold, 
 and be no o'ood in the morninof, Daniaris ? " said 
 the father, when the eklest girl was awake 
 and standing by him ; " upon my word, girl, 
 you should be more careful of the conse- 
 quences." 
 
 "To catch cold, and die and be buried 
 somewhere near the place where the clock 
 strikes. I don't fancy, father, that I should 
 care, or that anybody else would," she added 
 with a short laugh, " for it's hard lines." 
 
 " Hard lines ! " repeated the father, " that is 
 a vulgar phrase ; who taught you that ? " 
 
 " You did." 
 
 "A slangy phrase which I have picked up 
 in low company somewhere, and which I should 
 not have repeated," remarked her father ; " don't 
 say it again, Damaris, — it jars 1 You're cold." 
 
 " As a stone." 
 
 " Come into the warm room and have a 
 little ale with some gin in it, you'll not talk of 
 beino' buried then." 
 
 Father and daughter passed into the tap- 
 room, whither Mrs. Elvani and the youngest 
 born had preceded them, after Eunice had 
 been also reprimanded in her turn for her
 
 12 NO man's friexd. 
 
 carelessness, — her wickedness in trying to kill 
 herself in that way ! 
 
 "Do you want to die and leave no one to 
 care for me? " the mother had said with a half- 
 jealous cry; "sitting on w^et stones, you foolish 
 thing, you." 
 
 " Die, mother ! I want to live to be sure. 
 
 To live with you, and Damaris, and , and 
 
 father, when he don't drink ! " 
 
 " Who says he drinks ? " 
 
 " They talk about him — wherever we go — 
 a little." 
 
 " Oh ! a little. And he only drinks a little, 
 mind you ! And that's when we have been in 
 luck's w^ay, and his spirits are good. How the 
 smoke makes one's eyes water, Eunice ; every- 
 thing right in the bag, girl ? " 
 
 " Quite right," had been the sharp answer 
 as they entered the tap-room or bar-parlour of 
 the * Ship,' and plunged into the cloud-land 
 wdiich met them there. 
 
 It was evident that Signor and Signora 
 Elvani had each a favourite dauditer.
 
 ( 13 ) 
 
 CHAPTER II 
 
 THE visitors' LIST. 
 
 It was a heterogeneous company assembled in 
 the tap-room of the 'Ship' that night. The 
 eve of the Regatta at Westbourne-on-Sea had 
 brought together all the strange nomadic 
 atoms peculiar to regattas, and to those festivi- 
 ties which lure a sight-seeing public towards 
 them. When the Elvani family had settled 
 down— which they did with considerable diffi- 
 culty — and had become accustomed to the 
 apartment and the smoke within it, they had 
 leisure to take stock of their companions, to 
 recognize, and to be recognized by, many wan- 
 derers like themselves. 
 
 There were the eternal Ethiopians, six in 
 number — men whom they had met at the races 
 last week, and at a fair the week before ; and 
 there were an opposition lot, who had turned 
 up unexpectedly at the ' Ship ' also, and were at
 
 14 NO MANS FKIEXD. 
 
 daggers drawn with the first comers. There 
 had been an effort, earlier in the evening, to 
 make things pleasant, and buy off the super- 
 fluous itinerants — but the effort had ended in 
 personalities and one fight in the skittle-ground; 
 and there were a dozen blackguards, with sooty 
 complexions, ready to overstock the market's 
 demand for blackguards in the morning. It 
 might have been a pleasant evening, if it had 
 not been for these opposing elements of dis- 
 cord, who sat glancing at each other like imps 
 of darkness, and ready at a word to make a 
 general melee of it. 
 
 The Italian with his monkey had come the 
 night before, having made a mistake in the day, 
 and the two were fast asleej) in the corner, 
 brothers-in-arms, the taller one with his head 
 on the organ. There were a couple of acro- 
 bats, haggard-looking beings, who had retired 
 into private life, and whose fleshings were dry- 
 ing before the kitchen-fire downstairs; and there 
 were four Germans, with three brass instru- 
 ments and a drum, and these had represented 
 all the " professional " class until the arrival of 
 the Elvanis, at whom three-fourths of the pro- 
 fession swore as at a fresh intrusion. But the
 
 THE TISITORS' LIST. 15 
 
 room, which was a "very long, barn-like place, 
 was crowded with the Westbourne boatmen, 
 and by boatmen who had come from yarious 
 places round the coast to compete with them, 
 and were waiting for their boats by the first early 
 train to-morrow, heavy-booted, bronze-faced 
 men, who regarded the " profession " curiously, 
 and smoked long clay-pipes, and talked of little 
 else but their crafts, the voyages made in them, 
 and the races won in past regattas. Throw in 
 a blind man and his dog — a man who was 
 really blind, or who thought it policy to keep 
 up the delusion even when off duty; and a 
 man and woman who intended to sell cards of 
 the Regatta in the morning, and the reader has 
 all the select company at the ' Ship ' before him. 
 
 " Well, there's enough on us ^now, at any 
 rate," grumbled one of the negro melodists, 
 " all in the musical line too, barring you 
 coves,'' nodding at the acrobats — " and I've 
 no doubt we shall have half-a-dozen more in 
 the morning. Who'd a thought of you lot 
 turning up with yer ting-tang stulf at this 
 out-of-the-way place." 
 
 "The more the merrier, Barnes/' said Mr. 
 Elvani, cheerfullv.
 
 16 NO man's friend. 
 
 Mr. Barnes did not see that. Mr. Barnes 
 d'd all the more that came to add to the 
 merriment and take their share in the super- 
 fluous cash that might be afloat next morning. 
 Mr. Barnes was argumentative also, and spoke 
 contemptuously of Westbourne-on-Sea, and 
 the second Regatta that ever the beggarly 
 (here he d'd again with considerable volubility) 
 watering place had been able to afford. 
 
 " Oh, but look here, Barnes, I spotted this 
 place first," said Elvani. "I was here last 
 year before you fellows thought of it. I've 
 been here ^we summers for a fortnight at a 
 time." 
 
 " More fool you," said Barnes. 
 
 Mr. Elvani .said complacently that he had 
 made it pay, and Mr. Barnes told him that 
 he was a liar. 
 
 " And if you make it pay to-morrow, blarm 
 me," cried Barnes ; " for if we don't drown you 
 with the row we make, I'm a Dutchman." 
 
 " If you don't make less row now, some of 
 you chaps '11 get shot out of winder," cried 
 an indignant boatman. " What do you keep 
 growling about, you quarrelsome beggar, you ? 
 Hasn't Mr. Elvarnish as much right as you
 
 THE visitors' LIST. > 17 
 
 to the town? Blessed if he don't behave 
 better in it, at any rate." 
 
 " Who's talking to you?" growled Barnes. 
 
 "Thank you, Mr. Wads. I drink your 
 health ; and here's a toast with it. Live and 
 let live ! " said Elvani. 
 
 " But, damn it, you won't let us live ! " cried 
 Barnes. 
 
 "In my line and after my fashion," con- 
 tinued Elvani, '* I try to be respectable and to 
 please respectable people. I shall not interfere 
 with your connection, Mr. Barnes." 
 
 " Why do you keep talking to the fellow ? " 
 said his wife at this juncture. '' Can't you let 
 him rail on and take no notice ? " 
 
 "My dear, we are not to be put down by 
 sham niggers and their Seven Dials vulgarisms. 
 On our own ground too, Westbourne-upon- 
 Sea." 
 
 "The girls are asleep. Will you let them 
 sleep or not ? " asked Mrs. Elvani, querulously. 
 
 *' My dear — by all means. Bat their sup- 
 per ? " 
 
 "Ah! better have their supper and go to 
 bed in earnest perhaps, in the loft," said Mrs. 
 Elvani; "we shall be poisoned with this 
 
 VOL. I. c
 
 18 NO man's friend. 
 
 tobacco else. Eunice — Damaris — don't sleep 
 there ! " 
 
 " Nice names them," said the incorrigible 
 Barnes to his neighbour, " almost swell names, 
 and suits swells who don't like vulgarity. 
 Seen better days, you lot o' course. Kept a 
 carridge and pair, p'raps, and did the nobby in 
 Rotten-row." 
 
 " At least, Mr. Barnes, we — " 
 "Hush!" cried Mrs. Elvani, pulling her 
 husband by the sleeve ; " is this a place to 
 bra«' of what we have been, or what we 
 might have been, if the drink had not got 
 hold of you ? " 
 
 " Got hold of me ! " cried Mr. Elvani, in 
 mild surprise. " Well, that's a good one ; and 
 I have known when to stop all my life. Caro- 
 line, you are severe." 
 
 "Bread and cheese, please," said Mrs. 
 Elvani. "It's late already; and these men 
 will sit here all night." 
 
 " Ah, bread and cheese — there, my dear, 
 your favourite crust." 
 
 The Elvanis declined further argument for 
 the present, and paid attention to their supper. 
 The customers began to thin ; those wlio had
 
 THE visitors' LIST. 19 
 
 been fortunate enaiigh to secure beds, to go 
 lumbering in their heavy boots upstairs, and 
 those less fortunate to drop off to sleep, one by 
 one, at their tables, leaving but a few restless 
 nomads talking and arguing still. 
 
 The smoke began to clear away somewhat, 
 and the Elvanis to become more prominent 
 characters ; to loom forth from the mist, as it 
 were, life-portraits for any who cared to study 
 human nature at that hour and in that wretched 
 place. Let us sketch them in outline as they 
 sit there, for they have their parts to play in 
 this story, and they influence many whose time 
 has not come to strut their brief hour before 
 the reader here. 
 
 Mr. Elvani, a tall man of forty years or 
 thereabouts, a sallow-faced man, with long hair 
 of an incipient grey, and a ratty moustache of 
 the same hue, to which his hand had a habit 
 of wandering, and of twitching at in a nervous 
 and characteristic fashion. A man very much 
 lined, who had evidently experienced much 
 privation, and did not look the strongest in 
 the world after his hard battle with life ; his 
 hard struggle mayhap for the life that w^as in 
 him still. A thin-faced man with downcast 
 
 c2
 
 20 NO man's friend. 
 
 grey eyes, that robbed his face of a shrewdness 
 that had been natural to it once, and was 
 evident at times still when he looked straight 
 before him, which was not often. A man 
 whose hand shook as he cut his bread and 
 cheese, and who assumed a nonchalant air, 
 as though to hide that little trait of nervous- 
 ness. For he had been disturbed by Mr. 
 Barnes's comments upon his family's appear- 
 ance, and was even at that moment cogitating 
 some severe reflections upon Barnes, should 
 that ill-tempered individual annoy him further 
 before the night was out. 
 
 His wife was of a more reticent disposition, 
 probably of a character more strong, judging by 
 the upper hand Avhich she had assumed that 
 evening, although we will not judge by ap- 
 pearances yet a while. A tall woman, her 
 husband's junior by eight years we may say, 
 though looking as old as he, as tired, as care- 
 Avorn, or timeworn, or both, and as grey. A 
 woman who had fretted more at her position, 
 it was just possible — if the Elvanis had really 
 fallen from a higher estate — one who had re- 
 sisted every step downward, clinging to the 
 rocks on either side, and setting? her back
 
 TOE YISITOES' LIST. 21 
 
 against the moral "impetus which forced her 
 slowly but surely to the lower ground. A 
 woman terribly worn, terribly soured by mis- 
 fortune, but with strength in her yet to do 
 her day's work with the rest. 
 
 And the children? drifting on with father 
 and mother along the same road, parts of the 
 machinery by which money was earned, and 
 the fleeting interest of the lounger awakened. 
 We need draw but little attention to them in 
 this place, they are lay figures for the nonce, and 
 do not live in this chapter. Dark-faced, dark- 
 haired children, both of them, with features so 
 sharpened by poverty, that it was difficult to 
 determine what they might have been under 
 circumstances apart from these. Children with 
 a strong resemblance to each other, albeit the 
 brow of the elder one with the outlandish 
 name, as Mr. Barnes had observed, was more 
 prominent, and seemed to send the eyes further 
 back into the head. 
 
 When supper was over it was twelve o'clock. 
 The numbers had considerably thinned in the 
 bar-parlour of the 'Ship,' and there were not 
 more than six wide awake and watchful. 
 Amongst the latter was Barnes, a man great
 
 22 NO man's friend. 
 
 in the comic line when facing the public with 
 his gang, but brutal and acrimonious at the 
 side scenes of life, as are many of his betters, 
 and with less excuse perhaps. Barnes was 
 still suffering from the appearance of the 
 Elvani family; he had not grown accustomed 
 to their intrusion; he had not expected them 
 at Westbourne, and he felt the disappointment 
 acutely. By his side a companion, also one 
 of the wakeful few, smoking a short pipe after 
 the usual fashion, and regarding the Elvanis 
 with attention as they proceeded to collect 
 their properties together. 
 
 "Better all in the loft along with the chil- 
 dren and me," said ]Mrs. Elvani to her husband 
 in a whisper, which did not escape the op- 
 position, however. 
 
 " We shan't take anything, mum," said 
 Barnes, ironically ; " we're not genteel, but we 
 shan't take any of yer traps." 
 
 " I don't know that we're compelled to trust 
 you," replied Mrs. Elvani, shortly. " Come, 
 girls." 
 
 "Well, I've heard of imperence and cheek,'' 
 said the man by Barnes's side, who had not 
 hitherto spoken ; " but I think that we've had
 
 THE visitors' LIST. 23 
 
 enuf of it for one night. Hitalians ain't 
 generally so fast in their langwidge, though 
 people who purtend to be air, o' course." 
 
 " We don't want to argue any more with 
 you, my friend," said Elvani. *' I'm only sorry 
 that our coming here has put you out so 
 much." 
 
 " Ah ! I daresay you are. Sorry, too, that 
 we know all about you, and that you're about 
 as much a furriner as I'm a black man, Mr. 
 Wooster." 
 
 Mr. and Mrs. Elvani did not appear greatly 
 discomfited by the discovery; they were sur- 
 prised for an instant, then they continued 
 loading their children and themselves with 
 the chattels that they had carried two-and- 
 twenty miles that day. 
 
 "Ain't I right about it?" asked Barnes's 
 friend. 
 
 "Quite right, my good fellow," said Elvani, 
 cheerfully. " Worcester it is, though how the 
 deuce you found me out puzzles my compre- 
 hension. Elvani is a better public name, but 
 Worcester might draw a little more, even now," 
 he added, with a sigh. 
 
 " Ah ! you was in the sterrups once, and no
 
 24 NO man's friend. 
 
 mistake. I was a super in the chorus when 
 you were coming the bounce as tenor. Too 
 proud to look upon a feller like me then." 
 
 " Proud enuf now, Jack," growled Barnes. 
 
 " Too proud of that name to hawk it about 
 the streets, at all events," said Mr. AVorcester, 
 whom we will call by his right name from this 
 time. 
 
 " And so you were one of the chorus at the 
 Theatre Royal George? I'll be back in a 
 minute, and we'll have a glass together for the 
 sake of auld lang syne." 
 
 " That's more sociable," said Jack, " by a 
 long sight. Eh, Barnes ? " 
 
 " I don't want his glass — I don't want 
 nothing more to do with nobody to-night." 
 
 And Barnes, aggrieved at the turn which 
 affairs had taken, curled himself into the hard 
 corner of the wooden settee on which he was 
 ensconced, and proceeded to make an effort to 
 slumber with the rest. 
 
 Meanwhile the Worcesters passed from the 
 house to the stable-yard, preceded by the land- 
 lord with a lantern, Mrs. Worcester scolding 
 her lord and husband all the way. 
 
 "You'll go back and drink with those men
 
 THE visitors' LIST. 25 
 
 who have insulted us all the evening — you'll 
 let yourself be talked over by them, and make 
 yourself their butt." 
 
 " Upon my soul, Caroline, no ! " 
 
 " Why should we mix with them ? We can 
 keep ourselves apart from them, if we like ? " 
 
 " Certainly we can." 
 
 " We're low enough ; but we can go lower 
 still." 
 
 "Ah! yes— that's true." 
 
 " You'll not want any more money to-night?" 
 
 " Why, no — that is, we're expected to help 
 the house a little — and if I can't sleep, and we 
 get talking, why we become thirsty, eh ! land- 
 lord ? Ah, ah ! the landlord sees the joke." 
 
 " You must give your orders afore half-arter 
 twelve, as I locks up the bar, and goes to-bed." 
 
 " Exactly. Caroline, my dear, I think six- 
 pence, or a shilling will be sufficient." 
 
 " There is sixpence." 
 
 " Ahem ! thank you," said the recipient. 
 " Now you go first, and I'll pass up the property. 
 You'll dress first thing to-morrow, all of you." 
 
 *'Yes." 
 
 "The guitars are quite right, and none the 
 worse for the wet. It's dark, but dry now," he
 
 26 NO man's friend. 
 
 said, looking up at the black sky ; " please God, 
 we shall have it fine to-morrow." 
 
 " Please God we shall ! " murmured the 
 woman, reaching out her hand for the lantern, 
 with which the landlord backed, however. 
 
 " Why you'll set the blessed place a fire," 
 said he ; "I can't have a light up there." 
 
 " I'll put it out directly I've done the child- 
 ren's hair," said Mrs. Worcester, " but I must 
 make them look nice for to-morrow." 
 
 " Why didn't you do their 'airs up in the 
 parlour." 
 
 " With those wretches to laugh at me and 
 them. Those vile, gin-soddened wretches!" 
 she cried passionately ; " not I. Give me the 
 light, and take my word that your stables shall 
 be safe." 
 
 "Mrs. Elvani may be trusted with sheet 
 lightning, Jones," observed Mr. Worcester, 
 proudly. 
 
 "Well, there's the light," said Jones re- 
 luctantly, " and it's ony you lot that would ever 
 get it out of me. But you've been allers on 
 the square, and that suits the ' Ship.' And 
 here's the * Westbourne Times ' of yesterday to 
 curl the young 'uns' hair with."
 
 THE visitors' LIST. 27 
 
 "Thank you, Mr. Jones," said Mrs. Wor- 
 cester with more gentleness. *^ You're kind 
 to us ; you know that we haven't been always 
 like this, and you feel for our position." 
 
 " That's it, p'raps." 
 
 Jones departed, and Mrs. Worcester and the 
 children ascended to the loft by means of a 
 rickety ladder that had been placed there for 
 the purpose. The properties were passed up 
 one and one, Mr. Worcester following promptly 
 with the bundle which the elder girl had 
 carried. 
 
 " It's roomy, and the hay smells sweet," said 
 Mr. Worcester, looking round him with his 
 head craned forward to avoid contact with the 
 roof; "upon my honour many worse places 
 than this might be found for honest folk." 
 
 *' A loft over a stable ! " muttered Mrs. Wor- 
 cester. 
 
 " A lodging we can pay for, Caroline," said 
 her husband gently. 
 
 "I don't complain. You never hear me 
 complain of my life, Worcester." 
 
 " Well, no." 
 
 *' Only of you sometimes ; and you will not 
 get drunk to-night?"
 
 28 xo man's friexd. 
 
 " Drunk ! what on sixpence. Certainly 
 not." 
 
 " Bid the children good night then." 
 
 "Good night, Damaris my dear," he said, 
 stooping and kissing his eldest daughter. " We 
 settle down here for a week, in the old 
 country place that you like so much. Good 
 night, Eunice." 
 
 " Eunice, kiss your father," said Mrs. Wor- 
 cester, 
 
 Eunice raised her thin face at this appeal, 
 and Mr. Worcester kissed her also, and then 
 with a final embrace to his wife, this affec- 
 tionate father and husband went down the 
 ladder, pushed the ladder after his descent 
 upwards into the loft, and walked across the 
 yard towards the house again. 
 
 " Now, if he keeps steady to-night, we may 
 make money in the morning," the wife said, 
 looking after him. She closed the loft door, 
 and sat down on a bundle of hay by the side 
 of her children. 
 
 " How quiet you both are to-night," she said, 
 " is anything the matter ? " 
 
 " Nothing, mother," said Eunice, instantly ; 
 '' and I'm very tired," sighed the elder sister.
 
 THE visitors' LIST. 29 
 
 " Eunice doesn't complain," said Mrs. Wor- 
 cester reproachfully to the latter ; " you bigger 
 than she should know better." 
 
 "I know that the sooner we all break up 
 and try our luck separately the better, mother," 
 said Damaris ; " this doesn't answ^er." 
 
 " Don't talk like that ; you were always a 
 dissatisfied girl that nothing contented. Toge- 
 ther we can live ; we work together, and almost 
 save money at times. You are only trying to 
 make Eunice as dissatisfied as yourself." 
 
 *' I'm doing nothing of the sort." 
 
 " Oh, to-morrow we shall all be as bright as 
 the day," cried Eunice ; " we're tired now, and 
 cross." 
 
 " There, get to sleep both of you, as soon 
 after your hair is done as you can. Perhaps 
 to-morrow we shall grumble less, all of us. 
 Damaris, curl Eunice's hair whilst I do 
 yours." 
 
 This double operation, having been success- 
 fully performed, and in a short space of time, 
 the children of the strollers were lying with 
 closed eyes upon the hay, and the mother sat 
 a little apart from them and regarded them 
 intentlv.
 
 30 NO man's friend. 
 
 " Ah, well," she said at last, " Damaris 
 may be right enough." 
 
 She took off her bonnet, placed it at her 
 feet, and proceeded to curl her own hair for 
 the morning, tearing off long strips of the 
 ' Westbourne Times ' wherewith to screw up 
 hair that had been black and glossy in her 
 youth, and that trouble had grizzled at two-and- 
 thirty years of age. This was an operation 
 that took longer than her daughter's, for she 
 paused between whiles for several minutes, and 
 more than once drew from a deep side-pocket 
 a medicine phial that she uncorked and sipped 
 at the liquid within, which was of a white 
 colour, and had a potent aromatic odour not 
 unlike the gin which had been drunk with the 
 beer at supper-time. But then Mrs. Wor- 
 cester had appeared to have a horror of gin- 
 drinking, and of people who gave way to that 
 enervating habit. Surely JNIrs. Worcester did 
 not preach what she did not perform ; and let 
 us hope set a better example than this to him 
 whom she so frequently warned against the 
 evils of intoxicating fluids ? 
 
 The medicine in the phial had considerably 
 diminished, the candle in the lantern was
 
 THE visitors' LIST. 31 
 
 burning low, and Mrs. Worcester's hair was 
 not yet thoroughly twisted into curls for the 
 morning. She had paused with one long strip 
 of the ' Westbourne Times ' before her, and 
 was looking at it with distended eyes — eyes 
 that, heavy with sleep or with the medicine she 
 had imbibed, had now gathered fresh brightness 
 at the torn list of visitors' names before her, 
 
 " This can't be ; this is not hkely ! " she 
 exclaimed, seizing the lantern and holding it 
 and the paper close to her. " He can't have 
 got on in the world like this, while I've been 
 going dow^n. It's a similarity of name — and 
 I'm a fool." 
 
 Her hand shook as she dived for her medicine 
 phial again, loosened the cork, and tipped off 
 the rest of the contents. The woman was 
 nervous and excited, and required support in 
 this emergency. 
 
 " I've a good mind to go out — to talk to 
 Worcester. I'm — " 
 
 The voice of some one singing in the tap- 
 room across the yard cut short her soliloquy, 
 and she listened till the song was finished. 
 
 "Ah ! that's his voice. He's drinking hard. 
 He has got more money than I fancied ; he
 
 32 NO MAX'S FRIEND. 
 
 shan't collect any more, if I know it. Not to 
 be trusted. God help him and us — not to be 
 trusted ! " 
 
 She fell asleep after this, and forgot all about 
 her promise to the landlord to extinguish the 
 lantern, with which his generosity had supplied 
 her. She fell asleep with her hands clutching 
 her temples, and pushing her grey hair back, 
 her elbows on her knees, and her whole figure 
 bent forward in a witch-like attitude only a 
 trifle less weird than the distorted shadow flung 
 upon the tiled roof above her. She breathed 
 hard, and muttered in her sleep — even stamped 
 her foot as though in anger against a dream 
 figure that had stolen upon her slumbers to 
 annoy her. 
 
 And whilst she slept, the girl Damaris shook 
 herself from the hay, writhed silently to- 
 wards her and reached out one long thin arm 
 towards that strip of paper which had disturbed 
 her mother's equanimity half-an-hour ago. 
 
 She lay with her face close to the lantern, 
 the light within it flickering its last ray, and 
 turned the paper in her hands from one side 
 to another, trying in vain to discover a clue to 
 her mother's past excitement. On one side
 
 THE visitors' LIST. 33 
 
 news of the day, local news of cricket-matches 
 and boating news, torn down the centre, and 
 with only half the words to guess at ; on the 
 other, a long list of the names of people who 
 had arrived during the last week at West- 
 bourne-upon-Sea, together with their addresses, 
 the latter torn in parts like last week's details. 
 
 Damaris the inquisitive could not learn any- 
 thing from the scrap of paper, but she was 
 still studying the mystery when the light went 
 out and baffled her. Then she crept back to 
 her sisters side, put her arms round her, and 
 lay and looked up at the roof, through which 
 the white stars were shining now; fair augury 
 for the later morning. 
 
 YOL. I.
 
 ( 34 ) 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 THE KEGATTA AT WESTBOURXE-UPOX-SEA. 
 
 A BRIGHT sunshiny day, to Avhich hardly the 
 most sanguine had looked forward, and which 
 utterly baffled last night's predictions of " dirty 
 weather " from the most lugubrious. A breeze 
 certainly at sea, curling the waves into crisp 
 white heads in the offing, and making the 
 sailing-boats and luggers dance again, but 
 taken altogether, nothing to complain of and 
 the day's amusements likely to be a great 
 sr.ccess. For people were curious concerning 
 Westbourne Eegattas, which were caviare to the 
 multitude as yet ; and Westbourne having a 
 name to earn, and the " shine," vulgarly speak- 
 ing, to take out of neighbouring watering- 
 places, was working its hardest and using its 
 best endeavours to make a triumph of the 
 \\hole afiair.
 
 A real lord, and "ground-landlord of three- 
 fourths of Old Westbourne and seven -eighths 
 of Westbourne-upon-Sea had pledged his name 
 to the Regatta's success, and subscribed liberally 
 to the expenses, and the resident gentry had 
 not been slow with their contributions for the 
 good of the new town, and the pleasure of the 
 visitors who came more thickly every season to 
 this pleasant watering-place. 
 
 The flags were flying across the High Street 
 by eight in the morning; the boatmen were 
 already on the beach, preparing, arguing, and 
 gesticulating ; the cards of the Regatta were in 
 the hands of the peripatetics who had slept at 
 the * Ship' last night; men with baskets of 
 fruit and trays of cake seemed to have cropped 
 up in the night, so early were they on the field 
 of action ; the German band was already 
 braying before terraces and crescents, working- 
 its way, or rather blowing its way, profitably, 
 towards the scene of action ; at ten in the 
 morning two excursion trains had brought a 
 fair quota of people from the villages and towns 
 adjacent, and two men in white hats from 
 London ; at a quarter past ten all the West- 
 bourne folk who could afford a holiday, and 
 
 D 2
 
 36 NO man's frfexd. 
 
 many who. could not, were lining the lower 
 parade — for there were two parades, an upper 
 and a lower, as we shall have occasion to 
 mention presently — and all the dirty little boys 
 and girls in Westbourne were on the beach, 
 riotous and triumphant as youthful natives at 
 such places always are. At half-past ten 
 Westbourne-upon-Sea in all its glory, and the 
 parades crowded with visitors and aborigines; 
 the beach a scene of bustle and confusion, with 
 boats being run down towards the bright water 
 by boatmen in smart guernsies ; all the 
 itinerant amusements of the day in full force ; 
 two bands of negro melodists, a couple of acro- 
 bats, an orofan-mnder with a monkev that 
 clashed cymbals and held forth his cap for 
 halfpence, the brass band playing the last 
 sensation song in a variety of keys, and an 
 Italian family, smartly dressed, all hats and 
 feathers, bugles, ribbons, and black cotton 
 velvet, the father and mother playing guitars, 
 the sisters busy with concertina and tam- 
 bourine, quite a nodding, smiling, and happy 
 family, showing their teeth — they all had good 
 teeth — very much when they sang, which they 
 did with considerable taste and no small
 
 THE REGATTA AT WESTBOURNE-UPON-SEA. 37 
 
 harmony. At a quarter to eleven the umpire 
 — a gentleman connected with the town-council, 
 one of the county magistrates, and a something 
 in the militia — was rowed off to the shaky 
 platform erected twenty yards out at sea, and 
 certainly cast a little ridicule on the whole 
 proceedings by letting the first wave catch him 
 before he could spring into the boat, and cover 
 his boots and trousei-s to the knees. At eleven 
 o'clock the umpire with several friends upon the 
 platform, the boats in line, or about as much in 
 line as men eager for the first start would allow, 
 the first bang of the little cannon, and the first 
 race commenced. At ten minutes past eleven, 
 on the upper parade, a strange cavalcade 
 making its way toward the scene of gaiety by 
 the gravel path that crossed the lawn in front 
 of an imposing hotel on the cliff. 
 
 Two invalids, side by side in Bath chairs, 
 attended by two servants in livery, with wrap- 
 pers, greatcoats, and telescopes, drawn by a stout 
 old man in a blouse and with a brass ticket 
 on his chest, and by a round-headed, rosy-faced 
 boy in corduroys and big boots; — a cavalcade 
 that attracted general attention, and seemed to 
 be generally recognized as the object of a certain
 
 38 NO man's feiend. 
 
 amount of pit}% as it might well be, considering 
 its principal features. The invalids were 
 father and son : tlie father, a dark-skinned, 
 sloe-eyed man of forty years of age or there- 
 abouts, WMth a grim expression of countenance 
 that intense pain or a saturnine disposition 
 might have long since made natural to it ; the 
 son, a youth of thirteen or fourteen years of 
 age, of a ghastly sallowness, with a leaden 
 shadow underneath the eyes, and white thin 
 hands which, as they lay ungloved upon his 
 lap, looked dead already. A youth of handsome 
 features for all this sickness, or for all the 
 accident that had thus reduced him, but one 
 whose life no insurance company would have 
 bid for, and every wise man of medicine have 
 despaired of. Death in his face, in the strange 
 look-out at sea, even in the very attitude that 
 he had assumed that morning, it was evident. 
 
 The Bath chairs were drawn somewhat apart 
 from the general body of sightseers, and twisted 
 and twirled, pulled forward and backed until 
 they were side bv side, and fronted the sea. 
 There was a distribution of wra])pcrs round 
 the legs of the sick youth and the throat of 
 the sick man, an adjustment of cushions for
 
 THE REGATTA AT WESTBOURXE-rPOX-SEA. 39 
 
 the feet of the latter, the telescope passed from 
 the servant to the hand of the old man in the 
 blouse, who stood ready to pass it to his fare 
 when ordered to do so, and then the hotel 
 menials, taking their way across the parade to 
 the hotel ao-ain ; leavino: father and son to the 
 man and boy hired for the occasion. 
 
 " The breeze doesn't feel too strong to-day, 
 Matthew?" asked the sick father of his son. 
 
 " No, pa— not at all." 
 
 " And you — you don't feel any weaker ? " 
 
 " I don't know that I do — oh ! no." 
 
 " A little stronger, perhaps," suggested the 
 father, " change of air w^orks w^onders. I walked 
 twelve times across the room myself to-day — 
 twelve times, Matthew." 
 
 " I'm very glad to hear it, papa," said the boy, 
 v\ith a sigh. " I wish that I could have given 
 you the same good news ; I tried once, and fell." 
 
 " Ha ! that was imprudent — very foolish — 
 very unwise/ said the fither, rapidly; "why 
 didn't you wait — make sure — take some one's 
 arm i 
 
 " You might have waited for me, sir," sud- 
 denly broke in here the boy in corduroys, " we 
 almost did it last time we tried, sir. I'm just
 
 40 NO man's friend. 
 
 your height, and we make a tidy match 
 together." 
 
 " Mat," ca-led out the old man in the blouse 
 across the width of the two sedans, " don't be 
 too fast with your tongue, my lad, — and just 
 talk to the young gentleman when you're talked 
 to, not afore, young feller. He's much too 
 ready with his gabble, sir," — this to his own 
 particular charge, the sallow-looking man to 
 whom he played attendant. 
 
 *' Let him talk. It pleases my son." 
 " Worry well, sir, — if so be you don't mind, 
 and the young gentleman don't mind, it's not 
 for the likes o' me to interfere. But my Mat's 
 allers extremely howdacious when he's given 
 any liberties. He's as bold a young rascal as 
 ever lived, upon my word, he is." 
 
 " Oh ! Mat and I get on very well together, 
 Mr. Ran wick," said the mild voice of the 
 youth for whom the old man had evinced so 
 much consideration ; " my own age, my own 
 height, — why my own namesake even ! I like 
 Mat — why, pa, it always makes me better to 
 hear him laugh." 
 
 " Indeed," said the father, somewhat ab- 
 sently.
 
 THE REGATTA AT WESTBOURNE-UPON-SEA. 41 
 
 *' Mat, you rascal- — laugh directly, sir," cried 
 Mr. Ran wick, 
 
 " I can't just this minute, grandfather," 
 answered Mat ; *' I'll try presently." 
 
 *'' Look out for something funny somewhere, 
 
 > j> 
 sir. 
 
 " All right, sir." 
 
 " H I hadn't asked him to laugh, he'd a 
 done it in a minute or less," said his grand- 
 father, in a low soliloquy. 
 
 " Your son, I think you said, Mr. — Mr. Ran- 
 wick?" 
 
 " My grandson, as I've said twenty times at 
 least, Mr. Harland," replied the old man, 
 almost techily, " but you don't remember — 
 which is bad. His father was one of those 
 big-chested, big-hearted sailor chaps, and he 
 was drowned at sea when Mat was a babby in 
 arms." 
 
 " Ah ! yes — I remember something of the 
 story — drowned at sea, eh? very disagreeable 
 indeed — poor man ! What's the time, Ran- 
 wick ? " 
 
 Mr. Ranwick consulted his watch — a large 
 brass one, to discover which required hitching 
 up his blouse, a struggle with a secret receptacle
 
 42 so iman's friend. 
 
 under his coat and waistcoat, and a general 
 disarrangement of Mr. Ranwick's attire — and 
 informed Mr. Harland that it wanted exactly 
 nine and twenty minutes to twelve. 
 
 " Thank you, Ranwick," said Mr. Harland, 
 " and what's on now at sea. Have you a card 
 of the Regatta that you can lend me for a 
 minute ? " 
 
 " No, I ain't, sir." 
 
 "I wonder whether they have one at the 
 hotel," mused Mr. Plarland, biting the tip of 
 a black kid finger in his perplexity; "ask your 
 son to go and see for me. And oh ! — if they 
 haven't one to spare — he'd better buy one, I 
 suppose ; how much, Ranwick, are they likely 
 to be?" 
 
 **They ask sixpence and take fourpence, sir," 
 said Master Ranwick, not waiting for his grand- 
 father's more measured reply. 
 
 " Pay fourpence then. Here's the money." 
 
 But the money was not forthcoming readily. 
 ]\Ir. Harland was slow and methodical in his 
 movements, and took time to find his purse and 
 to disinter therefrom the small silver coin neces- 
 sary for the purchase of a programme of that 
 day's entertainments.
 
 THE REGATTA AT WESTBOURXE-rPOX-SEA. 43 
 
 "There's fonrpence; take care of it, boy; 
 and go to the hotel first, mincl, and give them 
 
 Mr. Harland's compliments and curse his 
 
 impudence, he's gone." 
 
 This was the first little sign of irritability 
 evinced by the invalid, and he seemed sorry for 
 it, or for the consequence of it, the instant 
 afterwards, and made an attempt to feel his 
 own pulse in a nervous and surreptitious 
 manner. 
 
 "Do I look flushecl, Ranwick?" he asked 
 shortly afterwards. 
 
 "Not a mite, sir. Waxy as ever." 
 
 Mr. Harland looked hard at the wooden, 
 Punch-like features of his guide, who did not 
 appear • to think that the remark might be 
 regarded in a personal light. 
 
 "1 felt a little excited at vour son's im- 
 pulsiveness. Why can't he wait till he has 
 beard a messao-e out ? I remember somethinfj 
 of this before." 
 
 " Oh 1 Mat's only sharp, papa," said his son, 
 apologetically, *' sharp as a needle, is he not, 
 Mr. Ranwick?" 
 
 " Sharp as lightning ; and now he's gone, 
 Mr. Harland, I will say as good-hearted a lad as
 
 44 NO man's friexd. 
 
 ever breathed — as noble a boy as you'll find 
 'twixt this and Lunnon." 
 
 *'He's a good fellow," said Master Harland, 
 looking after Mat, who was running across the 
 grass plot, and taking a flying leap over the 
 iron hurdles by way of finale. " I wish that I 
 were only half as quick ! " 
 
 " I wish, Matthew, that we could put you in 
 his place, and him in yours, and give this man 
 here a thousand pounds for the exchange." 
 
 '^Good Gord, Mr. Harland !" ejaculated the 
 old chairman, "I wouldn't take twenty thou- 
 sand down on the nail now, here on this 
 blessed cliff. I don't think — I don't think," he 
 said, shaking with excitement, " that you ought 
 to wish my grandson, poor man's child as he is, 
 so near his grave as that !" 
 
 " His grave !" screamed Mr. Harland, " hush, 
 sir 1 How dare you! you forget yourself; it 
 isn't true, a thought of it. How^ dare you 
 forget your place, and talk to me like this ! 
 Matthew," turning to his son with anxiety, 
 " you did not hear what this foolish old man 
 said — did you ?" 
 
 " Yes. He's right, papa ; and I daresay he 
 thinks as much of Mat, as you of Matthew.
 
 THE REGATTA AT WESTBOURNE-IJPON-SEA. 45 
 
 He only said near his grave, joii know, and it 
 has been a narrow escape for me." 
 
 "Ah! an escape, yes — away from itV said 
 Mr. Harland, subsiding into quiescence. "What's 
 the time, Ran wick, now ?" 
 
 Mr. Ranwick again struggled with his attire, 
 hitched up his blouse, unbuttoned his coat and 
 waistcoat, and hauled his watch up from the 
 depths. 
 
 " It wants nigh on a quarter to twelve, 
 sir." 
 
 " I thought that it was later. What a time it 
 will be before luncheon, to be sure. Hollo !' 
 with a little start, "what's that for?" 
 
 " That's a gun ; the Saucy Jane has won the 
 race, sir ! Dashed if I didn't think it would ! I 
 backed it with Joe Stubbs for half-a-crown. 
 It's the blue flag, and blue's in fust ! " 
 
 " You're an old man to risk so much money 
 in that fashion," said Mr. Harland, coldly ; 
 " you should know better at your age. Do you 
 bring your son up to betting too ? " 
 
 " Lor' bless you — he knows nothink of this, 
 o' course. I keeps all my bad examples from 
 that boy, sir." 
 
 "That's sensible. No, my good man, I've
 
 46 NO man's friexd. 
 
 nothing to give away. I never give a penny 
 to people in the streets." 
 
 The applicant for charity was a negro melo- 
 dist with a tambourine before him, half filled 
 with coppers from a generous public. 
 
 '*No objection to silver, your honour, and 
 will bring the change correct next Regatta 
 time." 
 
 Mr. Harland shook his head ; his grim 
 features did not relax a muscle at this weak 
 effort of pleasantry. 
 
 " I hope you won't object to a trifle, your 
 honour," the man persisted. 
 
 " I've not heard anything of your music, and 
 I don't want to hear any.'* 
 
 " We've been singing loud enough to stun 
 yer, too," said the man, " and if you'd only 
 said so afore, we'd a gone somewhere else, 
 guv'nor." 
 
 " Ranwick, see if there's a policeman bandy. 
 I can't bear this fellow^ bellowing in my ears. 
 I haven't come here to be insulted by such 
 mountebanks as these." 
 
 " S'pose you come here to be looked at, yer 
 half-baked old skin-flint," cried the man ; 
 "s'pose you'd like a little forrin' music from
 
 THE REGATTA AT WESTBOURNE-UPOX-SEA. 47 
 
 them people tlere, who only take sixpences ; 
 s'pose you'd — " 
 
 The nigger melodist passed behind the chairs, 
 doubled, came back again, and slipped from the 
 upper parade to the lower before a member of 
 the Westbourne constabulary had reached the 
 scene of altercation and was able to recognize 
 the disputatious Barnes. 
 
 " It's always the way on such vulgar days 
 as these," said Mr. Harland, peevishly ; " why 
 cannot these wretches be stopped coming into 
 the town at all ? " 
 
 '' It's an odd living, but 1 s'pose they must 
 get it, if they can," said Mr. Ranwick, drily. 
 
 "They need not get it here; there are 
 plenty of places about. And at all events 
 they need not come to me. That's their 
 artfulness, for they see how ill I am. Here's 
 another, by God ! " 
 
 Mr. Harland had evidently been a passionate 
 man in his day, for one thin hand closed upon 
 a stick that was in the Bath chair with him, 
 as though to inflict summary chastisement upon 
 the next supplicant approaching him. 
 
 Mr. Ranwick intercepted the progress of 
 the man with the organ and monkey, and thus
 
 48 NO man's friexd. 
 
 allowed Mr. Ilarlaiid to subside again. By 
 this time Master Ranwick, almost breathless 
 with running in search of the Regatta card, 
 reappeared upon the scene. 
 
 " There's the card, sir. Well, Master 
 Harland, how have you been since I saw you 
 last ? " he asked familiarly. 
 
 The sick lad smiled. 
 
 " Oh, very well. What a time you have 
 been away though ! " 
 
 " Well, I've been having a bit of a brush 
 with Joe Edwards, who has been chaffing me 
 about this Bath-chair business, and I can't 
 stand chaff. I don't think he'll come any of 
 his nonsense again though." 
 
 "Tell me all about it," said young Harland ; 
 *' a regular fight was it — and you won ? " 
 
 ** Yes, I always win," was the conceited 
 answer. "I knew that I should soon settle 
 him I This is how it all began." 
 
 Mr. Harland listened also for awhile, thinking 
 it strange that his delicate son should take an 
 interest in the boy's prowess, and be amused 
 by a recapitulation of the details of a street 
 skirmish. Still his son had been a bold boy 
 himself before the illness came, and then the
 
 THE REGATTA AT WESTEOURNE-UPOX-SEA. 49 
 
 accident ; he was glad in his heart that his son 
 could find an interest in the story ; it was a 
 good sign, and had the idea suggested itself 
 to him — which it did not, for he was not a 
 prayerful man — he would have thanked God 
 for it. 
 
 Old Mr. Ran wick was struck with the 
 inconsistency of the whole thing, however. 
 
 "Can't you talk — if you must talk — about 
 something else, Mat ? " 
 
 "Let them be," said IMr. Plarland, "it 
 amuses my son." 
 
 Meanwhile the Regatta continued ; the 
 crowd grew denser on the lower parade and 
 beach, and the numbers thickened on the 
 upper ground. Those who were interested in 
 boat-racing, sailing matches, and sculling were 
 in a great state of excitement below, for the 
 struggles for the prizes were keen ones, and 
 dead heats and victory by half-a-boat's length 
 were the consequence. A famous Regatta 
 which put all spectators into the best of 
 tempers, especially those w^ho stood by West- 
 bourne and had Westbourne credit to sustain. 
 Between the races, the negro melodists, the 
 Elvani family, the brass brand out of tune, the 
 
 VOL. I. E
 
 50 "NO man's friend. 
 
 acrobats, and organ-grinder were gathering in 
 their harvest ; not even the military band that 
 had lately made its appearance upon the cliff 
 lured away many of the elite, or interfered too 
 seriously with the harmony below. 
 
 Mr. Harland was trying to feel an interest 
 in passing things ; and his son was listening 
 to — and once was discovered to be actually 
 laughing at — the remarks of Master Ranwick, 
 when the old chairman gave a sharp, sudden 
 interjection — 
 
 " HURM ! " 
 
 " Eh ? " exclaimed Mr. Harland, " which way 
 is she coming ? " 
 
 "In sight, on the left — blue feather in her 
 hat." 
 
 " Can't we pull off before she sees us ? " 
 
 " We'll try, sir, if you like." 
 
 Mr. Harland looked round cautiously, and 
 then gave up in despair. 
 
 "No matter. It will only agitata me to 
 move, and I cannot be too quiet to-day. I 
 have been already excited too much. Suppose 
 I pretend to be asleep, Ranwick ? " 
 
 " Very well, sir." 
 
 " You can manage the rest."
 
 THE REGATTA AT WESTBOURXE-UPOX-SEA. 51 
 
 "I'll try, at all events." 
 
 "Thank you, Ranwick. If you could only 
 manage it, I should be so much obliged. Tell 
 her," he said, closing his eyes, " that I have 
 had a very bad night — so I have for the matter 
 of that — and have gone to sleep here, tired 
 out. Tell her," he added, opening his eyes 
 again, "that I left word that I was not to be 
 disturbed on any account, before I dozed off 
 like this. I do leave word, you understand, 
 so there is no falsehood in the matter." 
 
 " Exactly, sir — that makes it all straight and 
 proper, and no lies told. Mat," to the grand- 
 son ; " don't you take no notice, but keep on a 
 talking to the young gentleman just the same." 
 
 " Is it Aunt Courtenay, Ranwick ? " asked 
 Matthew Harland, who seemed to comprehend 
 the position of affairs at once. 
 
 " Yes, it be she, sir." 
 
 " Oh ! dear, I am very sorry. And the 
 other one ? " 
 
 " Yes, the little one." 
 
 " Then they've come back again to West- 
 bourne," said the boy, wearily. " Go on, Mat, 
 about that smuggling story. Wherever did 
 you learn so many stories ? " 
 
 E 2 
 
 \;S>Tvontuuoi3
 
 52 NO man's friexd. 
 
 " From sailors, my dad's old pals, my old 
 dad's friends, most of 'em. Let me see, where 
 was I, sir ? " 
 
 "They were landing the tubs in Owen's 
 Bay." 
 
 " Ah ! to be sure they were, the artful 
 beggars ! " 
 
 They were landing the tubs still, and Mr. 
 Harland was reclining placidly in his Bath 
 chair, with his hand crossed on his stick and 
 his eyes closed, when a little lady, neatly, even 
 extravagantly dressed, accompanied by a flaxen- 
 haired boy in a purple velvet suit and dazzling 
 glass buttons, made their way to the position 
 occupied by the invalid. 
 
 The lady, not more than three-and-thirty 
 years of age, somewhat pretty and />t'^/^^, 
 weighed down by a top-heavy hat and feathers, 
 and beneath which a fair display of flaxen 
 ringlets was visible, even predominant ; a lady 
 who had married early in life, to have that 
 boy of fourteen for a son, and who had 
 worn well, considering domestic troubles, and 
 a husband's loss. Youth, a pale-faced, fine- 
 featured child, a stand-oflSsh child, with a habit 
 of looking askance over his shoulder to see
 
 THE REGATTA AT WESTBOURNE-UPON-SEA. 53 
 
 if his tout ensemble had attracted a just show 
 of attention from the community at large that 
 day. 
 
 "Ah! good morning, Reuben;" the lady 
 paused, and looked from the passive figure to 
 the wooden-visaged sentinel, who touched his 
 hat. " Not asleep ! " 
 
 "He's had an orful night, mum, he tells me, 
 and he left word that he'd rather not be dis- 
 turbed." 
 
 "Oh! nonsense," said the lady, with a sur- 
 prising volubility of utterance ; " sleeping in 
 the open air can't do any one good, I'm certain, 
 and he'd much better keep awake than do that. 
 A delicate man like him, — why he looks like a 
 corpse, poor fellow, lying there ! " 
 
 The man who looked like a corpse gave a 
 perceptible shudder, and the grimness of ex- 
 pression peculiar to his countenance appeared 
 to deepen as they watched him. 
 
 " I'll take the responsibility of waking Mr. 
 Harland, for I don't think that this is a safe 
 proceeding. Reuben," reaching out a cream- 
 coloured kid glove, and suddenly shaking him 
 by the collar of his coat, " how can you trifle 
 so recklessly with your health as this ? "
 
 54 NO man's friend. 
 
 Reuben Harland opened his eyes slowly, 
 and rewarded his awakener with far from an 
 amiable glance. 
 
 " I hope that I may sleep when I like," he 
 said, curtly. 
 
 " Not in your state of health, and whilst I 
 am near to warn you of the consequences. 
 You have no one interested in you, no one to 
 take care of you in Westbourne but me, and 
 I'll see after you at any sacrifice. Considering 
 our relationship, our past relationship, if you 
 like it better, you will allow that I have a 
 claim upon your interest, and a right to study 
 your welfare ? " 
 
 "Well, well," said Mr. Harland, "I daresay 
 you have. You are kind, Mrs. Courtenay, and 
 you give yourself a deal of trouble. I should 
 be grateful." 
 
 He stared hard at the grass edge of the cliff, 
 as if in doubt whether he were orateful or not 
 
 o 
 
 for all past consideration. 
 
 " A half-sister of your wife, no one nearer to 
 you than that." 
 
 " No one that I know of. I hope not," he 
 added, in a dry aside. 
 
 " You're not looking well this morning,"
 
 THE REGATTA AT WESTBOURNE-UPON'-SEA. 55 
 
 said Mrs. Courtenay, who was a Avoman who 
 dealt in plain truths, and evidently studied 
 not fine feelings. 
 
 " I feel very well. I have been a little put 
 out by the crowd here, perhaps. I can't bear 
 crowds." 
 
 " Why did you not stop in your hotel, then ? 
 I had no idea that you were out with this 
 mob," — a disparaging elevation of a straight 
 nose at this, — " and was coming to sit with you, 
 to bring my work and talk of your poor dear 
 Emily. Then my Edwin could amuse Mat- 
 thew all day so nicely, I thought, and when we 
 reached your hotel we found, to our amazement 
 that you had ventured out this common day." 
 
 " Doctor Spinks thought the blow from the 
 sea would do us both good, if we were well 
 wrapped up," argued Mr. Harland. " I presume 
 that he knows, I pay him to know what is 
 best, and it's an imposition if he tells me any- 
 thing that is likely to do me or Matthew 
 harm." 
 
 " Well, he may be right," said Mrs. Cour- 
 tenay. " I never had much opinion of Doctor 
 Spinks myself. I am sure that no one can 
 look worse than Matthew does this morning."
 
 56 -^0 man's friend. 
 
 " He's better this morning ; he says so ; he 
 knows best," jerked forth Mr. Harland, after 
 another glance at his son ; " he shows more ani- 
 mation in passing things, and is altogether very 
 different, I think." 
 
 " I wouldn't build too much upon him, Mr. 
 Plarland. The shock is always greater when it 
 falls upon one unprej^ared. When my dear 
 husband died, it was just as though he had 
 done it on purpose to surprise me ! " 
 
 Mr. Harland writhed uneasily. 
 
 "And that vulgar red-faced boy who draws 
 his chair, really I wonder you allow it. What 
 can Matthew see in that boy ? " 
 
 '^ I don't know," said Mr. Harland, "the boy 
 is clever in his way, and amusing, and has a 
 good trick of telling anecdotes, and is — a some- 
 thing like Matthew used to be before the 
 accident." 
 
 " I don't like the look of him at all." 
 
 Mr. Ranwick, senior, stared out at sea 
 with an immovable countenance. Had his 
 face really been carved in wood, it could not 
 have been less sympathetic then. 
 
 " Matthew, dear," said Mrs. Courtenay, ad- 
 dressing her nephew for the first time, " are you
 
 THE REGATTA AT WESTBOURNE-UPOX-SEA . 57 
 
 not going to speak to me this morning? Here is 
 your cousin, too, waiting to ask you you are." 
 
 ^' Ah ! aunt," he said, betraying no parti- 
 cular delight at the propinquity of his relations, 
 " Mat Ranwick was in the middle of a story, 
 and I did not like to interrupt him. How are 
 you, Edwin ; don't come too near my trap, or 
 you'll shake me up too much ! " 
 
 Edwin stretched forth a gloved hand, inquired 
 after his cousin's health, showed no particular 
 interest in the answer that he received, and 
 then walked back to the side of his mamma. 
 
 At the same instant the twanging of guitar 
 strings and the jingling of a tambourine were 
 heard immediately behind the invalid's chair, 
 and Mr. Harland looked dismayed. 
 
 " Send them away, Ranwick. I know what's 
 coming, and my nerves can't stand it." 
 
 "It's not the niggers, sir; it's the Elvanis. 
 They came into the town last night ; they come 
 here every year, and rare good uns they air." 
 
 " Send them away. I don't want to hear 
 them." 
 
 " But the people do," said Mr. Ranwick, 
 sententiously. 
 
 " Can't they be made to move on ? " said Mr.
 
 58 NO man's friend. 
 
 Harlan d, appealing to his sister-in-law, or his 
 half sister-in-law, for Mrs. Courtenay had been 
 only related to the late Mrs. Harlan d on the 
 father's side, we may say here by way of 
 explanation. 
 
 "I am afraid not," said Mrs; Courtenay; 
 " the laws are not half severe enough upon 
 these people." 
 
 " I can draw you furder away, Mr. Harland, 
 if you like," said Ran wick. 
 
 " No. I'll not be moved any more till one 
 o'clock." 
 
 " I daresay they'd go for half-a-crown." 
 
 Mr. Ran wick made all these suggestions to 
 the sea, standing with his toes turned out, and 
 his hands clasped underneath his brass badge. 
 Mr. Harland looked at JNIrs. Courtenay for an 
 instant, as though the idea conveyed by ]\Ir. 
 Ranwick might be seized by that lady, but 
 Mrs. Courtenay was not to be moved to any 
 exertion in that direction. 
 
 "Oh, let them sing," said Mr. Harland, 
 giving himself a twist in his chair ; " I must 
 get used to being annoyed in this way." 
 
 "Mat tells me they're stunning, father. 
 Didn't you say stunning, ]\Iat?'*
 
 THE REGATTA AT WESTBOURNE-UPOX-SEA. 59 
 
 " Good gracious !" ejaculated Mrs. Court enay. 
 " Real Italians, sir," said Master Harland ; 
 " I think that I should like to hear them." 
 
 "Don't let them go, then — don't let them 
 go, Ranwick," said the father with alacrity ; 
 " that's the first time, Mrs. Courtenay, that he 
 has ever expressed a wish to hear or see any- 
 thing since that infernal accident." 
 
 The performance began in the rear, and Mr. 
 Ranwick condescended to turn round and face 
 them — even to nod towards them gravely and 
 stoically, as befitted a Bath chairman on duty, 
 and with his fare on his mind. 
 
 "Smart they is this year and no mistake," 
 he muttered to himself. 
 
 The Elvani family dashed into a chorus from 
 ' Masaniello,' playing and singing, if not with 
 considerable skill, at least with a skill far 
 beyond the average of street players. There 
 were taste and expression — tact even in making 
 the best of a superfluity of female voices — in 
 these people ; the tenor voice was worn, had 
 evidently been once rich and powerful, and 
 was too good for the streets even yet, and the 
 instrumentation was altogether noticeable. 
 Mr. Harland, who had closed his eyes again.
 
 60 NO MAX'S FRIEXD. 
 
 opened them, and listened witli an amount 
 of intentness that he tried to disguise ; 
 "whilst his sick son insisted upon his chair 
 being moved more to the left that he might 
 obtain a side view of the performers. Mrs. 
 Courtenay and son even condescended to 
 exhibit a passing interest in the players. The 
 former appeared to recognize them too, for 
 she said — 
 
 " Oh ! I remember these creatures now. 
 They were here last season, I think ? " address- 
 ing Mr. Ranwick. 
 
 " Here every season, mum — ^just said so." 
 
 " Oh ! " 
 
 Mrs. Courtenay looked daggers at the old 
 man for his abruptness, but he was staring far 
 ahead of him again. After ' Masaniello,' a solo 
 by the tenor with a guitar accompaniment, 
 during which the youngest of the singers, a 
 dark-faced, light-footed child who tripped rapidly 
 from place to place, went round with a shell for 
 voluntary contributions. A sharp child too, 
 who seemed a favourite with the visitors, and 
 was quick in her replies — replies given in a 
 foreign accent befitting the country from which 
 she had migrated. She was in front of the Bath
 
 THE REGATTA AT WESTBOURNE-UPOX-SEA. 61 
 
 cliair at last, and looking wistfully from two 
 large dark eyes at the senior invalid. 
 
 " A trifle for the poor Elvanis, signer." 
 
 The signer shook his head. It was a 
 practice of his not to encourage itinerants — 
 musical or otherwise — and he was a firm man 
 still, for all the shake-up that he had in the 
 railway train. 
 
 " A trifle, signer ; dat will make us joyful, 
 and dat you will never miss," she urged ; a set 
 phrase that had been practised for some years 
 now, and was impressive at times upon those 
 who had never heard it before. "The poor 
 Elvanis ! " 
 
 " I have nothing to give away," was Mr. 
 Harland's stern assertion. 
 
 " Poor gentleman ! " was the quick answer, 
 taken in a satirical sense by the people around 
 them, who laughed a little. 
 
 " A trifle, signora — the poor Elvanis ! " 
 and the pinkshell was raised towards Mrs. 
 Courtenay. 
 
 Mrs. Courtenay shook her head, but did 
 not look down at the applicant. 
 
 " No, here too ! Oh ! dis is very dreadful ! 
 Ah ! Mr. Ranwick," and the eyes brightened
 
 62 NO man's friend. 
 
 at the sight of the ohl man in the blouse, 
 "a clear old customer of ours, who can afford 
 a penny, and whose pennies I love more than 
 other people's sixpences, because he is not 
 sorry, ladies and gentlemen," turning to the 
 visitors about her, "after he has parted with 
 his money." 
 
 " Well, no, young Sarcy ! " 
 And Mr. Ranwick began to hitch up his 
 blouse and unfasten his coat in search of the 
 penny which she had solicited. 
 
 " Papa, I should like to give that little girl 
 a sixpence," said the weak voice of IMaster 
 Harland at this juncture. 
 
 "It's extravagant. They're earning lots of 
 money, these people. Ranwick," to his porter, 
 " you're a fool." 
 
 "My own earnings, Mr. Harland, and I 
 knows the child, and allers liked her, cos she's 
 brisk, and odd, and lively. She was a lodger 
 of ours — she and her" lot." 
 
 " There, there, Mr. Ranwick, the gentleman 
 doesn't wont to know anything about us, and 
 the young gentleman has found his sixpence 
 for the poor Italians. I tank you, young 
 signor — better health to you — Merci.''
 
 \ 
 
 THE REGATTA AT WESTBOURNE-UPON-SEA. 63 
 
 "Ah! Eunice," cried the younger Ranwick, 
 " here again then." 
 
 A shake of the hands between the boy and 
 girl, a laughing glance between them, and then 
 the juvenile Elvani in search of silver and 
 copper in fresh fields and pastures new. 
 
 "A bold child," affirmed Mrs. Courtenay. 
 " I never saw such impudence in my life." 
 
 "All spirits," said Mr. Ranwick. " I knowed 
 her when — " 
 
 " I am not addressing you 1 " exclaimed 
 Mrs. Courtenay, losing all patience at this last 
 interruption. 
 
 Mr. Ranwick shut his mouth, touched his 
 hat, reversed his position, and looked out at 
 the sea once more. 
 
 "Really," said Mrs. Courtenay, somewhat 
 disturbed still, " it seems as if no one knew 
 how to behave in these parts." 
 
 " I have come here for health, not for 
 civilization," said Mr. Harland, wearily. " What 
 is the time, Ranwick, now ? " 
 
 After a long pause, Mr. Ranwick said : 
 
 " Hard on one o'clock, sir." 
 
 "Another half-hour. Spinks said a good 
 long blow — did he not, Matthew ? "
 
 64 NO man's friend. 
 
 " Yes, papa." 
 
 " We need not keep yon, Mrs. Courtenay ; 
 are you going on the beach this morning ? " 
 
 "The beach! Reuben. Merciful heavens, 
 no ! 
 
 " The Elvanis, ladies and gentlemen — a 
 trifle for the poor Italians." 
 
 " Confound it — what again ! " cried Mr. 
 Harland. 
 
 '' Oh ! your pardon ; I have been working 
 round the other way, and was not aware that 
 my little daughter had been here before me. 
 I ask your pardon, signor." 
 
 But the woman in the Italian dress still 
 stood before Mr. Harland and looked intently 
 at him. She was a swarthy-faced woman in 
 the sunlight, with dark eyes and hair that had 
 been luxuriant and black before time or care 
 had streaked it with grey. 
 
 "You hear that we have paid you once, 
 woman ! " said Mrs. Courtenay, sharply ; " why 
 don't you go ? " 
 
 " Woman ! " cried the singer, turnxig round 
 almost fiercely upon the last speaker; "how 
 dare — oh! your pardon, too, signora, I am not 
 waiting for further alms. I — I am only struck
 
 THE REGATTA AT WESTBOURT^E-UPON-SEA. 65 
 
 by the likeness that the sick gentleman bears 
 to a friend whom I have known — who was 
 poor enough, too, when he knew me. You, 
 signor, do7i''t know me ? " she asked, anxiously, 
 as she turned to Mr. Harlan d. 
 
 " Know you ! certainly not. Ranwick, I am 
 ready to go home." 
 • "It is not quite one yet, Mr. Harland." 
 
 " No matter. The wind blows cold from the 
 water, and we have been here long enough. 
 Matthew, we are going now." 
 
 ^' I am quite ready, papa." 
 
 " Stand back, Mrs. Elvani, while I turn the 
 chair," said Mr. Ranwick, politely. " Thankee 
 marm. Lor ! how the woman stares ! " 
 
 And Mrs. Worcester, abas Elvani, continued 
 to stare, standing with her guitar slung at her 
 back, her hands clasped, the scallop-shell in- 
 verted, and a sixpence and a fourpenny-piece 
 that had been placed therein lying at her feet. 
 She maintained her position long after the 
 cortege had gone upon its way. It was not 
 till the remaining members of the Elvani 
 family had struck up a new piece, that she 
 seemed to wake up to the business of the day 
 She was by the side of her husband again when 
 
 YOL. I. F
 
 66 NO MAx's FRIEND. 
 
 Mr. Eeuben Harland was approaching the 
 lotel, and holding the following dialogue with 
 Ran wick. 
 
 " A strange woman, Ranwick ; what is her 
 name f 
 
 "Elvani." 
 
 " Italian ? " 
 
 " Real Italian. I have heerd her go on for 
 an hour." 
 
 " Is she following us ? " 
 
 " Lor bless you — no, sir," said Ranwick, 
 looking round. " I can see her playing away 
 there with her husband." 
 
 "Ah! indeed. Ranwick." 
 
 " Yes, sir." 
 
 " What is the exact time now?"
 
 ( 67 ) 
 
 CHAPTER lY. 
 
 MR. RANWICK AT HOME. 
 
 It was ten o'clock on tlie "evening of the 
 Regatta \Yhen Mr. Ranwick went bumping 
 home with his Bath chair. He had had a hard 
 day's work, and was wending his way back, 
 somewhat tired with his onerous duties, and 
 somewhat pleased with the day's result. He 
 had done his regular morning's job with the 
 Harlands ; he had taken an old lady for an 
 afternoon's ride into the country, out of the 
 way of the noise and bustle of the coast that 
 day ; he had gone back to his stand, wdiere 
 " Space for two Bath chairs " was written up 
 by the side of the garden wall facing Pleasant 
 Terrace where the green verandahs and sun- 
 blinds were, and had not been in his place two 
 minutes before a maid-servant fetched him to 
 trot out a gentleman with the gout. Then, 
 
 F 2
 
 68 NO MAN'S FRIEND. 
 
 after that there was a lady to be wheeled to the 
 railway station, and two night-jobs connected 
 with the fireworks on the Marine Parade, and 
 lastly, there was home. 
 
 Mr. Ranwick lived in Old Westbourne, 
 along with the rest of the working-classes — 
 not a stone's-throw from the ' Ship,' where 
 there had been much noise last night. Quite 
 an independent old gentleman was Mr. Ran- 
 wick, living in a little cottage of his own, with 
 garden-ground in front and rear, and a shed at 
 the side for two Bath chairs, both his own 
 property, one of which he let out to a trust- 
 worthy person when business was brisk. Mr. 
 Ranwick also took in lodgers in the summer 
 months, and, altogether, it was rumoured that, 
 thanks to industry and thrift, the old man had 
 saved money in his day, and might have 
 a hundred pounds at least in Westbourne 
 Bank : a man who had been born in West- 
 bourne, and knew the place when there were 
 but a boat-house and a coastguard station 
 within a mile of the sea-cliff, who had seen 
 the place rise and prosper, and deserved to 
 prosper with it for holding by its skirts so 
 long.
 
 MR. RANWICK AT HOME. 69 
 
 As he turned into the front garden, unlocked 
 the shed, and stowed away his Bath cliair, the 
 door of the cottage was opened for him by 
 Master Ran wick, who stood in the doorway 
 waiting his approach. 
 
 " Ah ! Mat, home afore your granddad, then. 
 That's like a good boy, all over." 
 
 " I have been home an hour, granddad," re- 
 plied the boy. " I saw the fireworks — wasn't 
 that last one a screamer ! — and have been pitch- 
 ing into my lessons right and left, though when 
 I shall have a chance of going to school again 
 whilst those Harlands work a chap like this, I 
 don't see." 
 
 " You must make up for lost time after they 
 have gone, Mat," said Mr. Ranwick, as he 
 passed into the little sitting-room, into which 
 the street-door opened, thus dispensing with 
 the superfluity of a passage; "you mustn't 
 grow up as hignerent as me, and pull Bath 
 chairs about all your life. The schoolmaster 
 tells me you're mighty sharp for a young un, 
 and though I oughtn't say it agin, and spile 
 you, why I think you air, JNIat." 
 
 " I'm not last boy, that's all that I can say. 
 I'm rather a cut under Stubbs, too, and he's
 
 TO NO man's friend, 
 
 had it all bis own way whilst I have been 
 dragging about young Harland." 
 
 " Never mind. We'll fetch up. I've got 
 such an idea for one year, just one year's 
 finishing of you, Mat, after the Harlands have 
 gone, and if them Harlands don't — " 
 
 " Don't what ? " 
 
 Mr. Ranwick set aside his hat, hung up his 
 brass badge on a nail over the mantel-piece, 
 and subsided into a wooden arm-chair, all rails 
 like a bird-cage. 
 
 " Don't what ? " repeated his grandson, \erj 
 attentive and very eager for a boy of fourteen. 
 
 " Don't take it out of my hands, by giving 
 you a lift themselves." 
 
 " Oh ! that's all bosh, dad," said the boy, 
 colouring, and roughing his curly hair up with 
 both hands ; " what can they see in me ? " 
 
 " Well, lookee, here now," said the old man, 
 his wooden-features relaxing, and a shrewdness 
 of expression taking its place thereon ; " I 
 put this and that together, and I thinks, and 
 watches, and comes to a conclusion like a man 
 of the Avorld, boy. Get the tea ready while I 
 give you my conclusion, which you mustn't 
 build on, Mat, because buikling up like this
 
 ME. RANWICK AT HOME. 71 
 
 brings all the blessed bricks upon your head 
 afore you know it. You and I old pals, witli 
 no one atwixt us, and this a secret 'tween you 
 and me." 
 
 " All right," said the boy, busying himself 
 with the tea-things, and the cupboard in the 
 corner from which he extracted them. 
 
 "In the first place. Mat," said old Ranwick, 
 "the boy has taken a fancy to you. I don't 
 say No to it ; I ain't surprised. For you're a 
 boy above the common ! " 
 
 " Oh ! get out, dad. Well ? " 
 
 " You please the boy ; you ain't afeard of 
 him, and he takes to you. You don't put on 
 your Sunday clothes, and go and sit with him 
 when the weather's wet for nuffin. You 
 haven't done it for nuffin all this time." 
 
 " I have done it because you wished it ; 
 because I thought it thundering hard for a boy 
 like him, who had been as strong as I am and 
 as lively-like, to be moped up there alone, or 
 with his milksop dandy cousin. I did not 
 think of getting anything for my trouble, 
 grandfather, upon my soul I didn't." 
 
 A bold speaking boy, loud-voiced, as befitted 
 his robustness, and one who spoke very indig-
 
 T2 NO man's friend. 
 
 nantly now, as though his grandfather liad 
 imputed motives to him that were mercenary 
 and unjust. 
 
 " Exactly, that's you all over. Don't drop 
 the cup and sarcer, flourishing about like that. 
 You was independent in the matter ; you allers 
 was for the matter of that. With my busi- 
 ness on my hands you've been left a good deal 
 to yourself, and have had yourself to manage.'* 
 
 " Well, I hope I haven't managed badly, 
 dad," said the boy, with a laugh. 
 
 " Thank goodness, no, Mat. You needn't 
 have gone because Mr. Harland axed you ; 
 you went because the boy liked you." 
 
 " And I liked the boy, poor chap." 
 
 " Right. That was genewin, and the fidgety 
 old cove saw it, and didn't object. Now, he's 
 as close a file as ever lived, is Harland, and 
 with as close a fist, but I fancy that he ain't an 
 ungrateful man. And 1 have been telling him 
 what I thought of doing with your last year's 
 edication, and I shouldn't much wonder if he 
 does it hisself, and with his own money. And 
 arter that I shouldn't wonder, Mat, if you play 
 your cards well, — and you must look out for 
 yourself, as your grandiather did afore you, — if
 
 ME. RANWICK AT HOME. 73 
 
 he don't find you a berth in London in his 
 business; and arter that, and when he knows 
 what a h upright, good young man you air, I 
 shouldn't wonder worry much if he don't take 
 you into partnership and make your fortune 
 slap off — there ! " 
 
 Young Mat Ranwick laughed very heartily 
 at this. 
 
 " Steady, granny, steady. I don't expect as 
 much as that. I don't expect anything from 
 him. This is going it too strong, you know." 
 
 "Well, it may be," said the old man less 
 enthusiastically ; " it's an odd thought, and I 
 don't want you to build on it, — for anyhow, and 
 W'hoever lives to see it, up you'll go, Mat." 
 
 " There are the Courtenays." 
 
 " He hates them like pison, and the Cour- 
 tenay boy don't like young Harland. That's a 
 settler for him, Mat. Now old Harland don't 
 think much of you just now p'raps, though I 
 give him a jog now and then in a quiet w^ay, 
 and he's getting interested a bit ; but I think 
 that he won't forget you when the boy dies." 
 
 " But the boy, grandfather — " 
 
 "Will go off all in a puff-like — it's as plain 
 as can be, that," said iMr. Ranwick com-
 
 74 NO MAx's FRIEND. 
 
 poseclly ; " why a babby could tell that that is a 
 coming to pass — everybody knows it, and is 
 waiting for it except Jiim, And then, jNIat — 
 lucky you was christened Matthew too ! — he 
 won't have a single relation in all the world 
 that he cares one rap about," he concluded with 
 an exultant chuckle. 
 
 " I don't think that you would talk like this 
 — tell me so much as this — without there was 
 something else behind," said the boy, shrewdly. 
 "Why not?" 
 
 " Because it is not like you ; it's not your 
 way. 
 
 "Ah ! yes ; well you are sharp, Mat, and 
 I'm glad to see it— very glad. Well then, he 
 lias promised me the expenses of your last 
 year's schooling. It was a bargain atween us, 
 and we're to keep it quiet for the present ; and 
 it's the beginning of all the good things that is 
 coming up to you — hooray !" And the old 
 man, so impassive in society, so excitable at 
 home, thumped half-a-dozen times upon the 
 table, and set the cups and saucers rattling on 
 the board and against each other. 
 
 Young Ranwick was still bewildered. He 
 had not given his grandfather credit for so
 
 MR. EAJs^WTCK AT HOME. 75 
 
 much acuteness; he had not thought of his 
 own position, or had any ambitious dreams, 
 because a sick boy of his own age had taken 
 a strange fancy to him. He had only wished 
 the boy to live, and he wished that now with 
 all his heart, despite the foolish day-dreaming 
 of his companion. He became very thoughtful 
 after the old man's strange avowal, and drank 
 his tea in silence, paying but little heed to the 
 further rhapsodies of his companion. 
 
 " I hope I ain't put too many notions in your 
 head. Mat," the grandfather said half-an-hour 
 later, " for after the schooling everythink is 
 fancy, naterally. But somehow I think I see 
 it all wery plain ahead of me." 
 
 " I see nothing but a push for a place after 
 the schooling has been given me," said Mat, 
 " and for the schooling, I'll be grateful." 
 
 " I see more, because the guv'nor's ax-entric, 
 and ax-entric people do all manner of odd 
 things. And arter all, if you only get the 
 schooling, ]\Iat, and you lose sight o' him — which 
 must be your fault or mine at any rate, — why 
 there'll be that much more to leave you when 
 I've done wheeling about the rickety uns, and 
 am wheeled off myself round the corner here."
 
 7 b NO MAN S FRIEND. 
 
 "And that a long day hence, granddad — " 
 and the hand of the boy fell on that of the old 
 man's, gnarled and knotted like the trunk of a 
 tree, as it rested on the arm of the chair. 
 
 "Amen, for there's life in me yet, and I 
 want to see my fortune-telling come out like 
 gospel." 
 
 '' Oh ! we won't say anything more about 
 your fortune-telling," said Mat, impatiently ; 
 " it unsettles me ; it makes me feel odd and 
 strange, and not like myself. We'll drop it if 
 you please, dad." 
 
 " I've said my say. I don't suppose that T 
 shall ever talk of it agin." 
 
 He was talking of it five minutes afterwards, 
 and was interrupted in his ramblings by a low 
 tapping at the front door. 
 
 " That's late for visitors. Are the lodgers 
 m i 
 
 " Yes ; and in bed." 
 
 " A border for the morning ; some one from 
 the hotel, I daresay." 
 
 JMat had already opened the door, and there 
 came into the room, or rather dragged herself 
 into the room, for the woman was weak and 
 tired, the Italian singer of the morning — the
 
 MR. EANWICK AT HOME. 77 
 
 English vroman of the night before. She was 
 dressed in her fancy costume still, and her 
 voice was hoarse and low with sino^ino- all that 
 day and night, as she bade Mr. Eanwick good 
 evening. 
 
 " Glad to see you agin in Westbourne, Mrs. 
 Elvani," said Ran wick, ** though you didn't 
 coSie to us for lodgings this year. Take a 
 seat, marm." 
 
 *' We couldn't afford them ; we heard that 
 they were let at the last village," she said, some- 
 what irrelevantly. " What a day it has been ! " 
 
 " Ah ! tiring for you." 
 
 " I Vv'ould rather be eternally on the tramp, I 
 think. And yet when I am on the tramp, I 
 think that I would prefer to drop down in the 
 road stone-dead. You see that I am an un- 
 settled woman." 
 
 "A little so. Only a little," said Mr. 
 Ranwick, soothingly, " yours is a tidy business, 
 too, in summer time, for. Lord, how the silver 
 drops into that shell ! " 
 
 "At times — on days like these — when people 
 are about who know something of music, and 
 can see we're rather different in our style from 
 other — vagabonds ! "
 
 78 NO man's friexd. 
 
 *' And how's Mr. Elvani ? " 
 
 *' Pretty well — as well as ever, tliank you, 
 Mr. Ran wick," 
 
 " Does he — ," here he went through a pan- 
 tomimic action, symholical of raising something 
 to his mouth — " as well as ever, marm." 
 
 Mrs. Elvani looked hard at the speaker, but 
 his wooden expression had returned, and it 
 was difficult to make anything out of him as 
 he sat there w4th his bad habit of staring 
 straight ahead, turned on full. 
 
 " Ah ! yes ; if it wasn't for that," sighed 
 Mrs, Worcester. 
 
 " Can we offer you a cup of tea, IMrs. 
 Elvani ? " inquired young Mat, from the other 
 side of the table. 
 
 " No, thank you, bo}^" was the answer ; " I 
 heg your pardon — I should have noticed you 
 before. What a big fellow you have grown ! " 
 
 " So everybody tells me." 
 
 ** Are you earning your own living yet? " 
 
 " Not at present. Presently, I suppose, I 
 shall be twanging a guitar on the Marine 
 Parade in dead opposition." 
 
 " Why you — ," Mrs. Worcester paused and 
 curbed an expression that hovered on her thin
 
 MR. EANWICK AT HOME. 79 
 
 lips. "Ah ! JNIat — I wish you may do nothing 
 worse for a living all your life, and do some- 
 thing better, if you can. Now, Mr. Ranwick^ 
 where does this Mr, Harland come from. I 
 want to know all about him." 
 
 "Do you. Why?" 
 
 " I'll tell you presently. I'm going to tell 
 him — I'm not likely to make a secret of it. 
 His shame, not mine, that I should be like 
 this ! " 
 
 " Not a relation, I hope ? " with a scared 
 glance towards the woman in the stagy dress. 
 " If you're real Italian, why that can't be. 
 But he's real Brazilian," with a sudden start, 
 "both furrin! ]Mat, boy, w^hat's the difference 
 atw^een a Hitalian and a Brazilian." 
 
 " The Brazils ! — then there's not much doubt 
 of it. But how he has altered, good God ! " 
 
 " Altered from when ? " 
 
 " From the time I saw^ him last, when he 
 went away a poor clerk, a poor agent of a 
 Brazilian house in London ; when he quarrelled 
 with my father, who was living then, and went 
 away from us. I quarrelled with father after- 
 wards — we all quarrelled with Itim —that," with 
 a short laugh, " was natural enough. We were
 
 80 NO MAx's FRIEND. 
 
 all very poor — we have been always poor — but 
 this man here is rich." 
 
 '' Who told you ? " 
 
 " Everybody knows him, I find. He lives in 
 grand style at the hotel here, tlie Royal Hotel, 
 on the cliff, where the great people go. Now 
 tell me all about him. He comes from the 
 Brazils ? " 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 " Plis Christian name is Reuben — have you 
 heard it mentioned ? " 
 
 " Well," said Mr. Ranwick, reluctantly ; 
 " Reuben it is. I never tell a lie about any- 
 thing, and that's his name." 
 
 " Why should you tell a lie to me ? " 
 
 "Ah ! why should I indeed? " muttered the 
 old man. 
 
 " You may do me a service, and I some day, 
 ■ — or my children some day," she corrected, 
 " may do you one. There, he is my brother, — 
 now, you'll tell me all that you know ? " 
 
 " Your own brother ! " gasped jNIr. Ranwick. 
 " God bless my soul ! youi" brother ? " 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 ''And you a singing and guitariug for a living." 
 
 " As likely to have happened to him as to
 
 MR. RANWICK AT HOME. 81 
 
 me, for we both started with ill luck at our 
 backs, and bad luck in our faces, — poor, 
 penniless desperates." 
 
 " Then you ain't Hitalian." 
 
 " No — my husband's name is Worcester — 
 my name was Harland." 
 
 " What a pack of lies you have been telling, 
 all your life." 
 
 " JNlr. Ran wick," said the woman, impatiently, 
 "you have been kind to us in one way — you 
 once lent us money, w^hen we w^ere hard 
 pressed. It may happen that luck is about to 
 turn, and I may put something in your way, or 
 in that boy's. For I shall plead hard to him, 
 and remind him of much that he has perhaps 
 forgotten. I shall not be afraid to say too 
 much, or to tell him what, in his place and he 
 in mine, I would have done for my sister, and 
 for my sister's children." 
 
 " I can't tell you very much," said the old 
 man slowly, and deliberately, " I don't see what 
 to tell you. I take him out once a day — Mat 
 here trots out his son." 
 
 "That was his son then? And he's dying?" 
 
 " So they say. But people allers say more 
 than they know." 
 
 VOL. I. G
 
 82 NO man's friend. 
 
 "I don't want him to die," said Mrs. Worcester 
 spasmodically ; " I have not become so bad and 
 hard-hearted as to wish any one dead that stands 
 in my way. With such a wish as tliat, I should 
 hope to b3 cast back into the streets, and to 
 hear the rich man say, ' I don't remember you, 
 and yon can go.' " 
 
 Mr. Ran wick a;^peared to strive for an 
 instant, then he said — 
 
 ** He may be rich — he mayn't be. He don't 
 let me into his affairs; he pays his way, I 
 believe — and he don't like paying that without 
 grunting. A man as hard as nails for all the 
 accident." 
 
 "His wife?" 
 
 " Oh 1 dead these six years." 
 
 ^' And this accident? " 
 
 " A railway accident, w^hilst he was bringing 
 his son into the country for sea-air. Six 
 months ago — a reg'lar smash up and both 
 damaged a good deal by it, as you see." 
 
 " And there's an action against the railway 
 company which Mr. Harland is sure to get," 
 began the grandson, " and — " 
 
 " Don't keep a hinterrupting, Mat — it ain't 
 to the purpose, and I daresay Mrs. Harland —
 
 MR. PvANWICK AT HOME. 83 
 
 Mrs. Elvani, I mean, for I have forgot the 
 tother name — will be glad to get home and 
 go to bed." 
 
 " I'm going now to the hotel." 
 
 "The devil you are, marm," gasped forth 
 Mr. Ran wick. 
 
 " Yes, I'm going when I have changed my 
 dress, for this would scare him," with a forced 
 smile; "only as there's much at stake, I called 
 on you to give me a hint as to his character. 
 I've forgotten what it was almost, even if 
 riches had not changed it, which it must have 
 done, for they always harden people and make 
 them indifferent and harsh to things^ like us! 
 He is hard, you tell me that already." 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 " Is he hasty, passionate like ? He used to 
 be." 
 
 " He's uncommon hot, if he's surprised. I 
 wouldn't go to him to-night, if I was you, 
 for all the Ingies." 
 
 "Why not?" 
 
 " At night the boy gets worse, and he's 
 wrapped up in the boy, and then anythink puts 
 him out — anythink and everythink. Besides, 
 he's an early man for bed, and it's eleven now, 
 
 g2
 
 84 NO man's friend. 
 
 at least. Ten arter eleven, by George," he 
 said, after the old struggle to find his watch 
 again. 
 
 "Thank you. Ran wick — thank you," said 
 Mrs. Worcester, rising; "that puts me on my 
 guard — I'll go to-morrow morning. I don't 
 know," she added, pausing, " whether I would 
 have ever gone for myself, to a man who has 
 never taken any trouble to find me. But for 
 Eunice and Damaris, I must bear the shame of 
 asking." 
 
 " You was allers lofty in your notions, marm. 
 I don't know that they ever did you any harm 
 — more likely good." 
 
 " Yes, I'll go to-morrow, Ranwick." 
 " I should like to know how it ended, Mrs. 
 Elvani, or whatever you said your name was. 
 I am interested in old friends, o'course." 
 
 " I will let you know. I should be ungrate- 
 ful else. And if he meets me as he ought, as I 
 would have met him, however poor and vile — 
 why I shall remember you with all old friends. 
 Oh! you cannot imagine, JNTr. Ranwick, what 
 a liberal woman I should be, if I only had the 
 chance." 
 
 " Wery creditable o'you to say so," muttered
 
 MR. RAX WICK AT HOME. 85 
 
 Mr. Ranwick; "and hard on twenty arter 
 eleven ! " 
 
 "So late— and the children and Worcester 
 waiting supper for me. I'm afraid that I have 
 kept you up over your usual time." 
 
 " Well— just a little." 
 
 " Good night, then, old friend." 
 
 *' Good night." 
 
 Mrs. Worcester hurried back to the ' Ship,' 
 and Mr. Ranwick turned to the grate, put his 
 feet on the fender and his hands on his knees, 
 and stared very hard at the fancy paperwork 
 with which some one had embellished his fire- 
 place. Then he sat and thought, becoming 
 more hard and wooden and angular under the 
 process, until his grandson touched him on the 
 arm. 
 
 " Ah, ha ! dad ; this has been a good joke, 
 after all. The real relations turn up, and down 
 comes the castle which we were to live in 
 together." 
 
 '* Ay, ay ! down it comes ! " 
 
 " And nobody the worse." 
 
 *' I ain't. I never thought of myself all 
 along. But, like an old fool, I did fancy — " 
 " I wouldn't fancy anything more to-night,
 
 86 NO man's friend. 
 
 dad," said the boy ; " it has been stuff and 
 nonsense from beginning to end, and in the 
 morning we'll have a good laugh at it." 
 
 " You go to bed, and laugh your hardest," 
 said the old man, savagely ; " I don't want to 
 be talked to any more. I don't want to sit 
 here all night." 
 
 " Good night, then, grandfather. What time 
 is it to-morrow at the ' Royal,' if fine ? " 
 
 "Eleven." 
 
 " I'll go to school for an hour-and-a-half, 
 then." 
 
 '' Ah ! larn as much as you can, for you'll 
 want all your laming to get up much higher 
 than I've got myself." 
 
 " If I'm liked as much by those about me, 
 — why, I don't think that I shall fret." 
 
 " Well said, Mat. There, be off with you ; 
 and God bless you, and bring you lots of good 
 luck, when the time comes for you to work in 
 arnest." 
 
 The boy went upstairs, and was shortly after- 
 wards heard whistling in his room. The dis- 
 appointment, — if it could be called one, if it 
 had been anything but the idle speculation of 
 an old man in his dotasre — had not affected him
 
 MR. RAiS^WICK AT HOME. 87 
 
 in any great degree, and the ancient dreamer 
 paused to listen. 
 
 " He don't feel it, o' course — because he 
 never saw it like I did," thought Mr. Ran- 
 wick, as he resumed his steady scrutiny of 
 the stove embellishments. "I had a hinstinct 
 that I was going the right road. It wasn't, I 
 thought, as if Mr. Harland had had relations ; 
 as if liis boy was going to live ; as if Mr. 
 Harland cared for anythink or anybody ; as if 
 he would be anythink else than a poor critter 
 that would M^ant wheeling about all his life. 
 I havn't worked so long at my business, but 
 what I know my customers — if I ain't better 
 nor a doctor in guessing who will get well, 
 and who will be reg'lars, my name ain't Mat 
 Ranwick. And that man so full of fancies 
 — is a reg'lar ! I thanked Gord yesterday that 
 he wasn't rm% getting a bit better — though 
 it's two months since he first came here — and 
 now his blessed sister turns up to-day in that 
 Elvani woman 1 " 
 
 He looked at his watch again, and then got 
 up and walked across the room once or twice 
 with his hands behind him, as though dragging 
 at his Bath chair still. It was his constant
 
 88 NO man's friend. 
 
 habit ; and he went clown the middle aisle at 
 church, to his corner in the free seat underneath 
 the pulpit, every Sunday morning in the same 
 fashion. 
 
 " Mat will get the schooling, though," he 
 ruminated further ; " and Harland mayn't take 
 to the Elvanis — dash their t'other name, 
 what is it? — for the father drinks, and the 
 mother tipples, and the girls are mad enuf, and 
 contrairy, especially that eldest one. I used to 
 think I liked 'em pretty well until to-night, 
 and if it wasn't wicked, I should hate 'em now 
 for coming here ! I wonder whether I ajn 
 a going mad now ; an awful thing to happen at 
 my time o' life, with two Bath chairs to mind, 
 and Mat a growing up and wanting my advice 
 — or whether, it was a hinstinct." 
 
 He sat down again ; he got up and paced the 
 room — the spirit of unrest was on him that 
 night, and he could not sit still or take himself 
 to bed. The face shadowed more and more, and 
 the shaggy grey eyebrows hung over his eyes 
 with intensity of thought. 
 
 ** Supposing now " 
 
 Then he sat down again, and spoke very 
 rapidly to himself, muttering something about
 
 MR. RANWICK AT HOME. 89 
 
 his old assertion "that he allers spoke the 
 truth and hated lying — that he wasn't thinking 
 of telling a lie then — not he." 
 
 He went to the foot of the stairs and 
 called softly, '* Mat, jMat, boy," and waited for 
 the answer that never came. The answer not 
 following, he stole softly up the stairs to make 
 sure, and went into the little room which his 
 grandson occupied at the back of the house. 
 Mat had extinguished the light, but there was a 
 full moon that night ; it was shining behind 
 the window blind, and the room was far from 
 dark. 
 
 He could see Mat in his bed, peacefully 
 sleeping — undisturbed even by dreams of 
 coming greatness — his face turned to the 
 moonlight, and looking a handsome boy enough 
 as he lay there. One arm hung out of bed, 
 and there was something strangely tender and 
 loving in the way which the old man raised it, 
 put it by the sleeper's side, and tucked in the 
 bed-clothes afterwards. 
 
 " He'll sleep till six," said Mr. Ranwick, 
 as he crept downstairs again. In the little 
 parlour he once more hunted for his watch 
 and referred to it. "Hard on twelve and he
 
 90 NO man's friend. 
 
 goes to his room at eleven, which was not a 
 lie, though he doesn't go to bed, but tries to 
 read hisself asleep in his chair. His son told 
 Mat so, and Mat told me, and so the new^s goes 
 romid and round. Blest if I ain't going round 
 and round myself! " And Mr. Ran wick disturbed 
 by this new phenomenon, put his hand to his 
 temples and paused awhile. 
 
 " Yes, I'll go," he said at last, and snatching 
 up his hat, he pulled it over his forehead till it 
 met the shaggy brows before referred to, and 
 then he w^ent quickly but noiselessly out of the 
 house, double-locking the door after him. 
 
 " I'm his sarvant, and he may be imposed on. 
 Who has a right to put him on his guard 
 against people who want his money, if I hasn't ? 
 I don't w^ant nothing for myself! " 
 
 He said this again at the corner of the 
 street, then he made a short cut across a 
 turnip-field and a field lying fallow after a 
 good wheat harvest, and made for the upper 
 ground and the cliff on which was built the 
 principal terrace of Westbourne-upon-Sea.
 
 ( 91 ) 
 
 CHAPTER y. 
 
 MK. SEARLE. 
 
 Early on the following morning, a dull morn- 
 ing with a sea-fog on that hid the curve of 
 the white cliffs which made so pleasant a bay 
 of Westbourne, a woman, poorly clad, passed 
 through the swing-glass doors of the ' Royal ' 
 hotel, and startled the porter in the hall by 
 her appearance there. 
 
 " Is Mr. Harland up yet ? " 
 
 " Mr. Harland ? " said the porter, " what's 
 your business with him ? " 
 
 The porter had seen her costume at a glance; 
 he had not sat in a corner of that hall for years 
 without becoming a judge of human nature. 
 This was one of the old lot; one who had 
 picked out a name from the visitors' list, — as 
 she had done, certainly, poor woman, — and then 
 had come, as bold as brass, with a demand to
 
 92 NO man's friend. 
 
 see the owner, being ready upon seeing him 
 to beg, borrow, or steal anything that was in 
 her w^ay, or he was likely in his weakness to 
 allow her. Therefore — like a man who knew 
 his subject by heart, he did not say that he 
 would see, or ask for the lady's card, or 
 show her into a waiting-room — he simply, and 
 even a little peremptorily, inquired the nature 
 of the business that had brought her to the 
 ' Royai; 
 
 " My business will be explained to Mr* 
 Harland himself," said the woman. " I wish 
 to see him on a matter of importance." 
 
 " What's your name ? " 
 
 " Worcester." 
 
 " I don't think Mr. Harland is likely to be 
 bothered by you at this time of the morning," 
 said the porter. " Here, Jones," to a domestic 
 flitting towards the coffee-room with a break- 
 fast-tray glittering with many covers, beneath 
 which were things substantial for the inner 
 man ; " when you come back, I want you." 
 
 The porter crossed his legs, folded his hands 
 together, and assumed a placid attitude ; the 
 tall woman stood on the great hall-mat, wait- 
 ing the pleasure of the lackeys. The servants
 
 MR. SEARLE. 93 
 
 hurried to and fro across the hall, up and 
 down stairs, and into the coifee-room, after 
 Jones ; one or two gentlemen, in sea-side 
 costumes and sand slippers, sauntered past 
 her and went upon parade, in search of an 
 appetite, or a bath, or both before breakfast; 
 an imposing-looking individual, with a beard 
 and moustache, whom Mrs. Worcester took 
 for a foreign count, but who was only the 
 butler, came and looked at her, and went 
 away again, after a significant nod to the por- 
 ter, wliich implied, " Keep your eye upon 
 her — spoons about ; " finally Jones appeared 
 again. 
 
 " Go to Mr. Harland's room, and say that 
 a woman wants to see him. Her name's 
 Worcester, and she won't state her business." 
 
 " And that the business is of importance," 
 added ^Irs. \^^orcester. 
 
 " Mind, if it isn't, if it's a dodge," said the 
 porter, meaningly, " you'll get yourself into 
 trouble, for Mr. Harland's a gentlemun who 
 won't stand any nonsense. Come, is it any- 
 thing to sell ? " 
 
 " No, sir," cried Mrs. Worcester, impatiently; 
 "it is not."
 
 94 xo man's friend. 
 
 *' Jones," said the porter, in an affected tone, 
 as he subsided back into his chair again, " take 
 up the lady's message." 
 
 Jones departed, and INIrs. Worcester waited 
 patiently for his reappearance. He returned 
 before he was expected, for Jones w^as a youth 
 exceedingly rapid in his movements, and there- 
 fore of inestimable value at the * Royal,' and 
 said that Mr. Harland would be obliged by 
 Mrs. Worcester walking upstairs. 
 
 The porter w^as surprised, but felt that it 
 was beneath his dignity to look so, and JNIrs. 
 Worcester, with a strangely-beating heart for a 
 woman who had endured much and kept strong, 
 followed the servant up the stairs. 
 
 " This way, JMrs. Elvani — I mean, Wor- 
 cester." 
 
 " You know me, then ? " 
 " Why I've been four years here, and I ought 
 by this time. You won't get anything out of 
 him, unless — why, it ain't music-lessons for the 
 little chap, surely ? " 
 
 " No, no. This room ? " 
 "This is the room. This way, Mrs. Wor- 
 cester." 
 
 Mrs. Worcester was shown into a large
 
 MR. SEARLE. 95 
 
 drawing-room looking upon the sea, with French 
 windows open, and white muslin curtains 
 before them swaying with the breeze. Break- 
 fast was not yet laid upon the table, and 
 three or four unopened letters were awaiting 
 Mr. Ha^land's attention. As she entered, a 
 gentleman came in by another door, and bowed 
 to her. 
 
 " Reuben," she gasped forth, and approached 
 the gentleman, who became less and less like 
 Mr. Harland as she advanced. 
 
 A gentleman considerably above Mr. Har- 
 land's height, but not unlike him in figure, 
 being somewhat thin and spare. Dark-faced, 
 too, as he was — or as she was — but with 
 hair very black, instead of shot with grey. 
 Not Mr. Harland's age either, probably not 
 more than nine-and-twenty for all that pon- 
 derous forehead, on Avhich were already a 
 few incipient wrinkles. He looked very hard 
 at Mrs. Worcester as she advanced, takinfj 
 her in, as it were, on the instant, with a 
 pair of keen-flashing brown eyes which nothing 
 seemed to escape. 
 
 " No, not Reuben Harland," she said, " I — I 
 hope that I have not mistaken the room, sir."
 
 96 NO man's friexd. 
 
 "No, ma'am. This is Mr. Harland's room, 
 and I am deputed by Mr. Harland to see you." 
 
 "But you — " 
 
 " But I am simply Mr. Harland's servant. 
 An upper servant, perhaps," he added drily, 
 " and one taken more into his confidence than 
 servants generally are. Mrs. Worcester, you may 
 trust me with your business. Pray be seated." 
 
 There was more of the gentleman than the 
 servant in the manner in which he placed a 
 chair for her — in the studied courtesy with 
 which he waited till she w^as seated, before he 
 took a chair himself. 
 
 " Where, where is Mr. Harland ? " 
 
 " He is in bed at present, he has had a bad 
 night, and I was telegraphed for at half-past 
 twelve. His son is worse too, and as jMr. 
 Harland is recommended to abstain from all 
 excitement, I have been advised to see you." 
 
 " How does he know that my business will 
 excite him?" Mrs. Worcester' asked, suspici- 
 ously." 
 
 " Your name is Worcester? " 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "And a sister whom he has not seen for 
 many years, I believe? "
 
 MR. SEARLE. 97 
 
 "You know all then. Who told you? how 
 dared any one — " 
 
 " Excuse me, one moment, but I am a 
 business man, and it is as well to clear the 
 ground to begin with," he said, " it saves time 
 too, and unless Mr. Harland particularly wishes 
 me to stay, I start for London by the eleven 
 o'clock train. Mr. Harland came back from 
 the Brazils. I came with him — but that is no 
 business of yours, is it ? — sixteen months since, 
 and with him made several inquiries concerning 
 you. We heard then that you had married a 
 conceit singer of the name of Worcester — 
 hence it is natural to suppose that you are 
 Mr. Harland's sister." 
 
 " I thought that Ran wick had been here," 
 she murmured. 
 
 The gentleman did not answer. He sat 
 regarding her very intently, not a movement 
 of hers escaped him. Had she been under a 
 microscope, he could not have more closely 
 subjected her to analysis. She felt this, and 
 made an effort to resist it. 
 
 " May I ask what your name is ? " she said 
 suddenly. 
 
 " My name is Searle." 
 
 VOL. I, H
 
 98 NO MAX's FRIEND. 
 
 " I thought that you were a foreigner." 
 
 "Burned black in the Brazils, like your 
 brother, Reuben, that is all. / could pass for 
 a foreigner very well, I daresay." 
 
 Mrs. Worcester shrank at this, and then 
 looked appealingly at him. 
 
 ** Ah ! sir — and if you could not earn your 
 living in any other fashion ! " 
 
 " Then — thenr he added thoughtfully, " there 
 might be an excuse for a disguise." 
 
 "Do you think, Mr. Searle, that I should 
 alarm my brother very much by seeing him ? It 
 is not fair to keep meat arm's length, like this." 
 
 "Presently — you shall see him. On a 
 future occasion, when we have established your 
 identity, and thought of what is best to be done." 
 
 " He will not throve me off then ? " 
 
 "Mr. Harland, madam, is a just man." 
 
 "Thank God," said Mrs. Worcester, "for 
 oh ! sir, I was afraid that he had grown too rich 
 — too hard — to take pity upon me and mine." 
 
 " Understand me," said Mr. Searle, quickly. 
 " T do not say that Mr. Harland is not a proud 
 man — he is very proud. Or that he is a 
 very generous man — for he is quite the contrary 
 — but he is just."
 
 MK, SEARLE. 99 
 
 " If he will act -justly by his own sister — I 
 will ask no more from him." 
 
 "Thank you." 
 
 Mrs. Worcester looked hard at him in her 
 turn, after this dry rejoinder, but the man's 
 face, swarthy as it was, was not unpleasant, 
 and there was a wondrous kindness or sympathy 
 in his brown eyes. In the streets, with him as 
 listener and she plying her vocation, she 
 would have been sure of a sixpence from 
 him — unless her knowledge of human nature 
 was at fault here. 
 
 "What do you want to know, sir? What 
 does Mr. Harland require of me ? " 
 
 " \^^hat is fair. Your position, present and 
 past, will be looked into closely ; the character 
 of your husband will be also inquired into ; the 
 habits of yourself and family. Have I your 
 permission for Mr. Harland to do that ? " 
 
 " Ye — es," was the slow answer. 
 
 How many children have you, — Mr. Har- 
 land asks?" Mr. Searle added here, as she 
 betrayed a little impatience at the cross-ques- 
 tioning. 
 
 "Two." 
 
 " Girls or boys ? " 
 
 h2
 
 100 NO man's friend. 
 
 " Both girls." 
 
 '^ What are you doing now, Mr. Ilarland 
 inquires?" 
 
 " I think that you know already." 
 
 "That is jumping at a conclusion, for upon 
 my honour, I do not." 
 
 " We are," she said, looking down, " street 
 musicians. Out of the common way, and 
 passing ourselves off as Italians to attract 
 attention — street musicians who have done our 
 best to live honestly, sir, since w^e found that 
 the streets w^ere the proper sphere for us'' 
 
 "The girls and all?" asked xMr. Searle. 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 " Poor girls ! " he said gravely. 
 
 " My brother may know this, if you do not. 
 I fancied that he recognized me yesterday." 
 
 " It is possible. Well, I need not detain 
 you any longer, Mrs. W^orcester. Every in- 
 quiry shall be made; and if there is nothing 
 against you and yours, save the objectionable 
 life which you have adopted — of course it is 
 very objectionable and galling to a man in Mr. 
 Harland's position, — why, Mr. Harland will have 
 a proposition to make in the course of a few 
 weeks. JNIeanwhile — "
 
 MR. SEARLE. lOl 
 
 Mrs. Worcester waited, wondering why he 
 paused so long. 
 
 " Meanwhile you must leave Westbourne- 
 upon-Sea. Go twenty miles aw^ay from here 
 at least, send Mr. Harland your address, and 
 then wait for his communication." 
 
 " Who will make inquiries about us ? " 
 
 " Several persons. Amongst them, in all 
 probability, myself." 
 
 " Do you understand the poor ? " 
 
 " I hope so. I am poor enough myself," he 
 added. 
 
 " Then you will make allowances, of course, 
 for what you hear about us ; you must not 
 believe everything that is said — and you will 
 remember that we have been very poor, hard 
 driven, and much troubled. You may tell 
 Mr. Harland, too, that it is not for myself and 
 husband that I think so much of what may be 
 the result of this." 
 
 " For the girls you spoke of just now ?" 
 
 " Yes, sir ; for Eunice and Damaris." 
 
 " Odd names," said Mr. Searle ; '* not family 
 names, I believe." 
 
 '' No, a stage name and a Bible one, sir ; the 
 first my husband's choosing — the last, mine."
 
 102 NO man's friend. 
 
 " A strange selection. Good morning." 
 
 " Good morning, sir. You will give my 
 love to Reu — " 
 
 "No — I would rather not," said Mr. Searle 
 quickly ; " it will do no good, and I do not think 
 that under any circumstances he would care for 
 the message; certainly not under these. I 
 shall tell him that you will follow his advice, 
 and have confidence in his judgment ? " 
 
 " Very well, sir." 
 
 She was going out at the door when he 
 called her back again. 
 
 " Stay a moment. One fair trait of cha- 
 racter already, and I did not expect to find it. 
 You have forgotten something." 
 
 " No, sir." 
 
 " Think again." 
 
 Mrs. Worcester tried to think, but the man's 
 manner perplexed her, and she thought more 
 about him, his self-possession, his business way 
 of arranging " the humanities." 
 
 " I have not forgotten myself I hope, in any 
 way," said Mrs. Worcester, doubtfully; "is it 
 that of which you remind me ? If so, I cannot 
 help it — I have not been used lately to play 
 the lady, sir."
 
 ME, SEARLE. 103 
 
 " Oh ! no, I did not mean that. I said that 
 your forgetfulness showed a fair trait of cha- 
 racter — I am of the same opinion still." 
 
 " What have I forgotten ? " 
 
 " To ask for money." 
 
 The woman coloured very much. She looked 
 at him, then down at the carpet, then at him 
 again — very proudly this time. 
 
 '* I said that I thought more of my children 
 than myself. I don't want money. We were 
 lucky yesterday!" 
 
 "You are going twenty miles away from 
 here, and it may be expected that till you hear 
 from him you will not prosecute your objec- 
 tionable calling. I say that it mo.y be expected, 
 for I am not in Mr. Harland's secrets, and 
 this may be considered, if you wish it, purely 
 my advice, for you to follow or not, according 
 to your inclination." 
 
 " God knows that we do not want to pursue 
 our calling. But — " 
 
 "But you cannot live on air. Can you live 
 upon two pounds a week ? " 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 " Here are ten pounds then. In five weeks' 
 time you will hear from Mr. Harland or me."
 
 104 NO man's friend. 
 
 " I will write to you to-morrow." 
 
 "I shall be in London." 
 
 " I will write to Mr. Harland at the Hotel, 
 — 
 
 " Not a long letter," interrupted J\lr. Searle ; 
 ''simply your address." 
 
 " Very well. Thank you, sir, for your 
 interest in us. I fancy that you ^^ill stand 
 our friend with Mr. Harland." 
 
 " Oh ! I am no man's friend, I am purely 
 mechanical." 
 
 With this strans^e assertion rindnix in her 
 ears, Mrs. Worcester took her way from the 
 hotel. It was an assertion, too, that puzzled 
 her and set her thinking of him who had uttered 
 it somewhat carelessly, and yet with a method 
 in his carelessness. She was a suspicious woman 
 naturally, and for all her gratitude to Mr. 
 JSearle, she liad her doubts of his disinterested- 
 ness. She doubted him, for she could not 
 account for his presence there, or why he had 
 been telegraphed late last night to Westbourne- 
 upon-Sea. Had not Mr. Harland a will of his 
 own now, and w\as this man his presiding 
 genius? And if so, would a stranger like him 
 care for the misfortunes of her and hers and do
 
 MR. SEA RLE. 105 
 
 his best to alleviate them for his master's sake ? 
 On the contrary, might he not take advantage 
 of their absence to work out a scheme which 
 should redound to his credit rather than to 
 hers? He had said that he was a poor man — 
 and if her rich brother were under his thumb, 
 what might not be done in five weeks? And yet 
 he could have done everything that he wished 
 without giving her ten pounds ; the interview 
 might have been refused her, or he might have 
 set Mr, Harland against her at once with a 
 story that no doubt her brother would have 
 readily believed. Well' — she would wait five 
 weeks ; she Avould go away as advised ; it 
 would never be difficult to find jMr. Harland, 
 for she had friends in Westbourne, and they 
 would apprise her of any intention of Mr. 
 Harland to depart ; there could be no harm 
 in waiting. 
 
 But who^was this Mr. Searle — and why did 
 Mr. Harland put implicit trust in him ?
 
 ( 106 ) 
 
 CHAPTER XL 
 
 FRIENDLY, OR UXFRIEXDLY ? 
 
 Mr. Searle passed at once from the drawing- 
 room through the door by which he had 
 entered to a lobby, and from the lobby to 
 the bed-room of his master, situated on the 
 same floor. 
 
 He found Mr. Harland sitting up in bed 
 looking very cadaverous, and somewhat like 
 a Guy Fawkes, with a high-crowned nightcap 
 on his head, and a dressing-gown flung like a 
 shawl round his shoulders. 
 
 " There's no mistake about it, I suppose, 
 Searle ? " he said, as he entered. 
 
 " Not any." 
 
 "It's devilish hard," he almost whimpered, 
 " that I am to have my nerves still further dis- 
 turbed by these relations. Did you tell her 
 that I had a family of my ow^n ; that I might
 
 FRIENDLY, OE UNFRIENDLY ? 107 
 
 marry again ; that it was no good worrying me 
 about her affairs ? " " 
 
 " No ; I did not. You told me, Mr. Har- 
 land, to say that you were a just man, and 
 would act justly by her." 
 
 " I did say something about it," replied Mr. 
 Harland ; " but I have been thinking since 
 of M'hat that Ranwick said, and wliich I 
 haven't told you yet." 
 
 '' I will see Mr. Ranwick presently." 
 " Ah ! that will save me a long story, but he 
 gave them all an awful character. They drink 
 like fish, and quarrel, and fight." 
 " Children too ? " 
 
 "I did not ask about the children," said 
 Harland ; " what are the children to do with 
 me^ 
 
 " We will talk it all over in five weeks' time," 
 said Mr. Searle, who seemed very anxious to 
 avoid the subject now ; " I have persuaded 
 them to leave the place for five weeks." 
 " Good — Searle." 
 
 " And hinted that if they dropped their 
 business for that period it would be all the 
 better." 
 
 " Good. But I don't see that, for—"
 
 108 xo man's friend. 
 
 "And she agrees for herself, her husband, 
 and two daughters." 
 
 " Good." 
 
 "And I gave her in your name ten pounds." 
 
 " Bad, Searle — damned bad ! " 
 
 " I thought that it was worth ten pounds 
 to keep these poor folk from twanging: their 
 horrible guitars about the country, and per- 
 haps telling eveybody that they are the blood- 
 relations of the rich Mr. Harland at the 
 ' Royal' " 
 
 " Perhaps it was, then. I haven't had time 
 to think of it; it's a new trouble, and un- 
 settles me. I would keep it, Searle, at arm's 
 length." 
 
 He extended two long and skinny arms as 
 he spoke from his extemporary shawl, and 
 spoke with considerable energy. 
 
 " If it be a trouble, certainly. But that 
 remains to be proved." 
 
 " You were always infernally argumentative," 
 he said, more quietly, " and I'm not going to 
 argue with you. It looks like a trouble at 
 present, and I will keep cool and hard and firm 
 till 1 am strong again," 
 
 " It does not look like a trouble," asserted
 
 FRIEXDLY, OR UNFRIENDLY? 109 
 
 Searle ; " but enough of that for the present. 
 Meanwhile, whilst you are growing strong, they 
 must not starve, or go on in that itinerant 
 fashion." 
 
 " I try all that I can to be just," said Mr. 
 Harlanfl, with a sudden assumption of dignity. 
 " There is not a man in the world who can say 
 that I have wronged him ; or if he has had 
 business with me, that I have not treated him 
 well. That is my pride, Searle." 
 
 " And something to be proud of, too." 
 
 " If they have not already disgraced them- 
 selves, and me, I will be just to them, and we 
 will too^ether consider what I can allow them. 
 But if they are thieves and drunkards (which T 
 believe they are), it strikes me, Mr. Scale, that 
 they will not get much out of me. How's 
 Matthew now ? " 
 
 " He fancies that he feels a little better this 
 morning." 
 
 "Fancies! he would not say that he felt 
 better if he did not." 
 
 "But he says that he fancies he feels better." 
 
 " Ah ! then he does feel better." 
 
 " I hope so." 
 
 "You're a miserable beggar, Searle, and will
 
 110 NO man's friend. 
 
 have the last word. I did not telegraph to you 
 for comfort's sake, you may be sure." 
 
 " Shall we talk of business? " 
 
 " That's more in your style," said ]\lr. 
 Harland, quaintly ; " all right, I suppose ? " 
 
 "All right." 
 
 " Nothing to trouble me there?" 
 
 " Nothing." 
 
 "All the remittances right from Brazil by 
 the last mail ?" 
 
 " Quite right." 
 
 " Then why should I worry myself about 
 business ? I do not know why I should not 
 give it up altogether. I have saved enough." 
 
 " You must save now for your son, your 
 sister, your nieces." 
 
 " I thought that we had dropped the sub- 
 ject." 
 
 " Right enough. But a family man should 
 never leave off saving." 
 
 " Not whilst his health is strong," added j\Ir. 
 Harland. 
 
 " Do you think that yours has utterly failed 
 you? 
 
 "God forbid," said Mr. Harland, with a 
 shudder. " What a horrible way you have of
 
 FRIENDLY, OR UNFRIENDLY? Ill 
 
 suggesting things, to be sure ! Mj health 
 improves, though I must make the worst of it 
 in the lawsuit coming on." 
 
 - Ah." 
 
 " Daniels says that he will be able to get 
 fourteen to sixteen thousand pounds out of 
 that blackguard railway company." 
 
 " By making the worst of it ? " 
 
 " By making the best of it for me." 
 
 " Daniels is a good counsel, and a great 
 bully. I should not wonder." 
 
 " I would ruin that company, if it was in my 
 power," said Mr. Harland, vindictively. "I 
 would sell every yard of iron on their roads and 
 every brick in their arches, if I could, Searle." 
 
 " They pitched you about nicely, and deserve 
 to pay for it." 
 
 " V/hat can pay me for the anxiety that I 
 have had ? " 
 
 "Sixteen thousand pounds." 
 
 "No; nor sixty times sixteen. Would you 
 be pitched about, as ^^latthew and I were 
 pitched, for sixteen thousand ? " 
 
 " It depends upon circumstances," said j\Ir. 
 Searle, coolly ; " in my present position, No. 
 But in some cases, with a family on my hands.
 
 112 NO man's friend. 
 
 and with but little to leave them, I should 
 think the matter over twice." 
 
 " I don't believe it." 
 
 " I am not quite certain that I would not be 
 pitched about twice over," added Mr. Searle, 
 not heeding this contradiction ; " but tliis is 
 not business. Are there any commands for 
 me i 
 
 " Where are you going now^? " 
 
 " To have my breakfast, call uj)on Mr. 
 Ran wick, and then catch the eleven o'clock 
 train." 
 
 "Cannot the business wait for one day? 
 Any one would think that it w^as your own, by 
 your anxiety concerning it." 
 
 This was not a very polite speech, and Mr. 
 Searle appeared to reflect upon it for several 
 minutes. If a man so self-possessed could 
 have been weak enouofh to blush, it misfht 
 have been imagined that his dark face assumed 
 a shade degree more colour — mahogany colour 
 — for an instant. 
 
 " I remember the time when you were as 
 anxious, Mr. Ilarland. Here in London — out 
 there at Rio Janeiro." 
 
 " But it was my own business."
 
 FKIENDLY, OR UIS^FRIENDLY ? 113 
 
 " Still the responsibility was not greater. I 
 feel as if it was my own, at times." 
 
 "The deuce you do." 
 
 "The lieutenant has supreme command 
 when the captain is aw^ay, and gets arrogant 
 and overbearing, and tyrannizes over the 
 subordinates. That is my way. you know." 
 
 " I don't know much about your way." 
 
 " I go to town at once on business ; to- 
 morrow or the next day, I shall, at your 
 request, search for facts concerning the 
 Elvanis, and set others searching, and so 
 forth." 
 
 '' Now don't talk about those people again. 
 And, Searle — " 
 
 " Mr. Harland." 
 
 " Do you know^ of a good finishing school ? " 
 
 " For girls ? " 
 
 " For a boy." 
 
 " Not for Matthew ? Surely you are not 
 thinking of that ? " 
 
 " No. But I have been fool enough to make 
 a promise about giving a boy — rather a clever 
 boy — a year's finishing education. I don*t 
 know that I need begrudge the expense, for 
 the boy will be grateful and do justice to his 
 
 VOL. I. I
 
 114 NO man's friend. 
 
 teachers, and it was a promise. But it was an 
 unnecessary expense to run into." 
 
 " What boy is this ? " 
 
 " The boy whom Matthew always takes with 
 him ; the son of Ranwick who drags me 
 about. It's an odd freak," he said, " but I was 
 let in for it, somehow." 
 
 '-One good turn deserves another. I do not 
 know that you can in a more effectual way 
 show your gratitude." 
 
 " Ah ! " said Mr. Harland phlegmatically, " I 
 should like to get up now, if you will ring for 
 my man. Good day." 
 
 *' Good day. No commands ? " 
 
 " No commands, Searle. You will give a 
 look in at the boyibefore you go ? " 
 
 " To be sure." 
 
 " And — you might come back again and give 
 me your candid opinion as to his improvement," 
 said the father ; " though we do not always 
 agree, I rather res]>ect your opinion, Searle." 
 
 '' I will come back." 
 
 Mr. Searle walked at a brisk pace from the 
 room, shut the door quickly, went at a brisker 
 pace along the corridor till he reached a second 
 door, at which he knocked. No answer beino*
 
 FRIENDLY, OR UNFRIENDLY? 115 
 
 returned, he knocked again, when a weak voice 
 from within said, " Come in, Mr. Searle." 
 
 " You knew that it was I who knocked then?*' 
 said Mr. Searle as he entered the room, and 
 approached the bedside of the younger Harland. 
 
 " Yes, it's a sharp, quick knock, like yourself, 
 Sir. 
 
 "Oh! then I'm sharp and quick?" said Mr. 
 Searle with a pleasant laugh. " Why, Matthew, 
 if I had been a sharp and quick man, I should 
 have made my fortune long ago." 
 
 " And have you not ? " 
 
 " Not quite," was the dry rejoinder, as he sat 
 down by the vacant chair at the head of the bed 
 and looked attentively at the invalid before him. 
 
 "I am glad to see you, Mr. Searle," said 
 young Harland, reaching out a thin hand towards 
 his father's manager. " I hope that you are 
 going to make a long stay here." 
 
 " On the contrary, I must catch the eleven 
 o'clock train back to town." 
 
 " Why — when did you arrive ? " 
 
 " Very early this morning." 
 
 *' On business ? " 
 
 "Yes — on business," he added, after a 
 moment's pause. 
 
 I 2
 
 116 NO man's friend. 
 
 *' I wish that you could persuade father to 
 give up the business," said Matthew, with a 
 little sigh. 
 
 " Why — it does not trouble him ? " 
 
 "I don't know — but I think that he would 
 be a very different man wdthout it." 
 
 "I don't." 
 
 "He would have less upon his mind — he 
 would not worry himself with the idea that it 
 was not ^oinor on well without him." 
 
 '' He has that idea then, Matthew ? " 
 
 " At times. Not that," said the boy quickly, 
 " he thinks that it is your fault — for of course 
 lie is sure that you would do your best." 
 
 "Of course," Mr. Searle replied. 
 
 " I asked him — you'll not mind me, Mr. 
 Searle — I asked him to make a partner of you, 
 last week." 
 
 Mr. Searle started perceptibly. 
 
 "That was .a very foolish request," he said 
 sharply ; " whatever put such an idea as that 
 into a boy's head, like yours ? " 
 
 " I was thinking about it." 
 
 " You think too much." 
 
 " I have not much else to do. Mat Ran wick 
 cannot always come here — father sleeps a great
 
 FRIENDLY, OR UNFRIENDLY? 117 
 
 deal — and when I try to read, the letters swim 
 about the paper." 
 
 " So you think in self-defence. Well, Mat- 
 thew," touching him lightly on the shoulder, 
 " don t think of me, my man — I think for my- 
 self." 
 
 " But you are so old a friend of father's — " 
 
 " No — " he corrected, more sharply than 
 ever, " an old servant — pray don't revive the 
 subject, boy, — I object to it. As for a partner- 
 ship in the firm — I w^ould sooner sweep out 
 the office. When your father is well and 
 strong, I shall in all probability go back to 
 Brazil, where I w^as brought up, Matthew." 
 
 " To the branch firm there ? " 
 
 "Yes; but this is very foolish talk of 
 ours. And I have not asked if you feel 
 better ? " 
 
 "Not quite so strong, to-day. It's the weather, 
 I suppose. I ought to be getting strong now." 
 
 He looked wistfully at the dark face of his 
 companion, as though for an assurance of 
 coming strength from his lips ; and Mr. Searle 
 nodded after a minute's consideration, and 
 said absently — 
 
 " Getting strong — yes."
 
 118 NO man's friend. 
 
 " Young Ranwick lias not come yet, I sup- 
 
 " Not yet. I bad hoped to see him before 
 I left, but shall not have the time now. You 
 like this boy ? " 
 
 *' He's an odd lad, Mr. Searle. He makes 
 me laugh — he has so many things to talk about, 
 and I forget all my complaints in listening to 
 him." 
 
 " A poor man's grandson — is he not ? " 
 
 " Yes ; but none the worse for that." 
 
 " All the better, perhaps. Not very refined, 
 of course— strong and rough and to the point — 
 in fact, the boy you would like to be yourself? " 
 
 "Yes, sir. And yet a boy that would be 
 sorry if — I mean, a boy that will be very glad 
 when I get stronger. Upon my word, I do like 
 him, sir. For he don't mind trouble; and it's 
 strange how well he understands me. I hope one 
 day to be of service to Mat, for I shall never 
 forget what a good fellow he has been to me." 
 
 "Your cousin Courtenay, I should have 
 thought — 
 
 " Oh ! he's a milksop, sir — a great girl," 
 interrupted Matthew. 
 
 " And you hate milksops — well, so do I.'*
 
 FRIENDLY, OR UNFRIENDLY? 119 
 
 Matthew continued to talk of young Ran- 
 wick ; it was evident that between the boys — 
 standing at opposite ends of the social scale as 
 they did — an affection such as boys have at 
 times was existent here. Mr. Searle listened 
 for awhile, then his thoughts wandered away 
 from a consideration of Mat Ranwick's virtues, 
 and once he seemed about to break upon 
 the subject with a new question that had 
 occurred to him, and which he dismissed with 
 difficulty. 
 
 With difficulty, for when he had risen to go, 
 and had bidden his master's son good-bye, he 
 stood at the door deliberating again. 
 
 '* Has your father made any .acquaintances at 
 Westbourne, Matthew? " he asked, suddenly; 
 " Aunt Courtenay set apart from the question, 
 of course." 
 
 " Not any, Mr. Searle." 
 
 ''I should have thought that the doctor had 
 become friendly with him, or the minister of 
 this place ? '' 
 
 "The minister 1" said Matthew, in surprise. 
 " Why father never sees a minister ! " 
 
 " Do you ? " 
 
 " Why, of course not."
 
 120 
 
 " Ah ! of course not — if your father keep no 
 company, how can you ? Good-bye, Matthew." 
 
 He was making a hasty retreat through the 
 door when the boy called him back almost 
 entreatingly. 
 
 '' Mr.— Mr. Searle." 
 
 The clerk came back with a hesitative step, 
 and the boy beckoned him close to the bedside 
 again. 
 
 " Will you tell me, sir," he said, his great dark 
 eyes looking into the eyes of the man facing 
 him, " what you think about my getting well ? " 
 
 " What I think ? " replied Mr. Searle, con- 
 fusedly, " why — what should I think ? " 
 
 " That w^as a strange question about the 
 minister, though you did not believe, perhaps, 
 that I should see through it, JNIr. Searle. 
 People have the minister when they are likely 
 —to die, sir." 
 
 The boy's lip quivered, and Searle suddenly 
 sat down again by his side. 
 
 " They do not die any the sooner, my lad, for 
 seeing him," he said, in a voice strangely 
 changed from the abrupt, quick manner of a 
 few minutes since ; " life and death are not in 
 his hands."
 
 FRIENDLY, OR UNFRIENDLY? 121 
 
 " You think that I am going to die ! " 
 
 " I have not a right to think so." 
 
 "But they tell me that I shall live — the 
 doctor is hopeful — looks so hopefully at me 
 when he comes in here ! Mat Ran wick thinks 
 so — father — everybody. I feel, Mr. Searle, that 
 I should not like to die yet awhile." 
 
 " I hope that you will live many years, Mat- 
 thew ; but I think that every one, even a boy 
 like you, should be — ready." 
 
 " Is it possible ? " 
 
 "Ah! not quite, perhaps. Prepared is a 
 better word, and there is a difference between 
 them." 
 
 " Are you prepared ? " asked Matthew, sud- 
 denly. 
 
 Mr. Searle shook his head. 
 
 " No ; I am not." 
 
 "Then—" 
 
 " Then, why preach to you ? " he concluded. 
 "I don't preach — I hate preaching. I am a 
 stubborn man, but you are a boy whom one 
 thought would place nearer to heaven, and in 
 your position, Matthew, whether to get well or 
 to grow more weak, I would have that 
 thought."
 
 122 NO man's friend. 
 
 " Still you think that I shall die, Mr. Searle ? 
 I wish that you would say so." 
 
 "Why?" 
 
 " My father always believes what you say. 
 I would think less of getting better then — 
 think more of leaving him all by himself in 
 the world — try and reconcile him to living on 
 without me." 
 
 "I have said too much already, Matthew," 
 said Mr. Searle, "and I have a hope after all 
 that you will recover." 
 
 " The doctor says that I may be out of danger 
 soon." 
 
 " He should know," replied Searle, hastily ; 
 " but till I was out of danger, I should not 
 think too much of life." 
 
 "Yes, sir; you are right," said the boy. "I 
 see now what you mean. Well, Mr. Searle, if 
 the worst — " 
 
 " Or the best — it may be for the best, lad." 
 
 " Or the best, then, should come, don't yoxi 
 go away from him ! " 
 
 " From whom ? " 
 
 " My father. No one will ever understand 
 him in the least, or know how to humour him 
 if you go away."
 
 FRIENDLY, OR UNFRIENDLY? 123 
 
 " Friends may come round him — new friends," 
 said Searle, thinking of the relatives that had 
 suddenly sprung up. 
 
 " Not any. You must be his friend, sir." 
 
 " My boy, I have not a friend in the world 
 — I would not for all the world make one. 
 Strange," he muttered, " that for the second time 
 this day I should say that I am no man's friend ! " 
 
 "But—" 
 
 " I will see that he is not misled — I will put 
 everything in his way that may conduce to hap- 
 piness ; I will bring his best friends round him 
 if they are to be discovered. There, there, I 
 do not say dwell too much upon the future, boy 
 — only feel strong enough to say good-bye, if God 
 wills that it should be so — I am going now." 
 
 " Good-hye, sir." 
 
 Mr. Searle went from the room, and at a 
 rapid rate back to the chamber of Mr. Harland, 
 who was in the hands of his valet, and being 
 slowly decorated for the day. 
 
 " Well, what is your opinion, Searle ? " cried 
 Mr. Harland, eagerly. 
 
 " May I speak the truth ? " 
 
 " Yes — why not ? " with a scared look 
 upwards.
 
 124 so man's frie^t). 
 
 " My opinion is that the doctor is a fool, or 
 is wilfully deceiving you. I don't think, Air. 
 Harland, that that boy can live — you should be 
 resigned to losing him." 
 
 " To losing him — my God ! " 
 
 "A heavy blow. The heaviest blow that 
 could fall on you, but which you should not 
 think so utterly unlikely to descend. Best for 
 the boy — best possibly for you." 
 
 " For the boy, it might be, but for me, no, no ! 
 But," he said, with excitement, " what do you 
 know about it — w^hat business is it of yours — 
 how dare you come here, and try to frighten me 
 like this ? I have paid for the best advice — 
 handfuls of money I have paid away — and the 
 boy is getting stronger. You know nothing of 
 medicine — of the human system ; this is your 
 old unpleasant way, highly aggravated by the 
 choice of subject. Mr. Searle, I do not 
 respect you as I used." 
 
 Mr. Searle bowed slightly, but did not reply. 
 
 " You have seen the boy ? " 
 
 "Yes" 
 
 " Man ! " with a shriek, " you have never dared 
 to tell him your suspicions ? That would kill him, 
 andyou would beanswerable tome for his death."
 
 FRIEXDLY, OR UNFRIENDLY? 125 
 
 '' I have told him that in his place I would 
 be prepared for everything." 
 
 " Then, sir," said Harland, shaking in every 
 limb, "you have killed him, and I — I — I curse 
 you for your officious intermeddling ! " 
 
 " Sir, he should be prepared." 
 
 " Searle, Searle — for God's sake then, if you 
 are sure — don't go home. Don't leave me 
 just yet ; don't mind what I have said. Let 
 the business go anywhere — anyhow — it matters 
 not. I can't be left in this house full of people, 
 alone, with a dead son." 
 
 "There is nothing immediate — he will sink 
 slowly away; nay, he may recover, Harland, 
 after all." 
 
 "As surely as you are here, he will die. 
 You said it. Don't evade the question." 
 
 " I said so," replied Mr. Searle ; " but that 
 is my opinion simply. I hope that I am in the 
 wrong." 
 
 "Then you will not stop — you see no occa- 
 sion to stop, Searle ? " 
 
 "Not any," was the repl};^ "I shall be back 
 again in the course of a few days." 
 
 "Yes, yes — you have promised to see after 
 those people yourself; and to make every in-
 
 126 NO man's friend. 
 
 quiry, lest I should be imposed upon. I have 
 been the victim of imposition, all my life." 
 
 Mr. Searle did not see any necessity to 
 respond to that remark. He had become his 
 usual self again, and was anxious to be gone. 
 
 " Are there any commands for London, sir ? " 
 he asked once more after a long pause. 
 
 « Not any." 
 
 "I will wish you a good morning then. I 
 shall," looking at his watch, " catch this train, 
 after all." 
 
 " You will not stay then ? " 
 
 " I think, possibly, that we esteem each other 
 the more, the less we are thrown together," said 
 Mr. Searle, curtly. " Good morning." 
 
 " Good morning."
 
 ( 127 ) 
 
 CHAPTER YII. 
 
 SURVEILLANCE. 
 
 Twenty miles from Westbourne-on-Sea, and 
 nineteen miles by the old coach-road from 
 Westbourne proper, stood — and probably stands, 
 for inland villages lying apart from railway 
 stations experience but little change — an old, 
 out-of-the way hamlet, which we will call 
 Stackford. 
 
 A picturesque place, lying amongst the 
 Sussex hills, and looking dark and full of 
 shadow to the stranger advancing up its quiet 
 main street two hours after sun-down. The 
 village was almost asleep at that hour, although 
 the church-clock had not sounded ten yet; 
 only the Inn looked lifelike, with a light behind 
 its red blinds in the parlour-windows ; the 
 streets were empty, and with one exception, 
 judging by the lattice- windows, all Stackford 
 had gone to roost that night.
 
 128 NO man's friend. 
 
 To that one exception, the last two-roomed 
 cottage in the row, repaired the stranger, as 
 though familiar with the place, or with the 
 habits of its occupants, and rapped lightly with 
 his stick on the panels of the door to which no 
 knocker was attached. 
 
 " Come in," said a small voice from within, 
 and the gentleman touched the latch, found the 
 door unfastened, and stepped at once into a 
 little parlour lighted by a candle placed on a 
 deal table in the centre of the room, and at 
 which deal table a thin, dark-baired girl was 
 reading, holding her head between her hands, 
 and resting her elbows on each side of the 
 book before her — her whole attitude indcative 
 of intense interest in her studies. 
 
 " Back again at last, sir," said the child, 
 without looking up ; "I wonder what mother 
 would say if she knew it. It's too bad ! " 
 
 The new comer did not reply, but closed 
 the door behind him, and regarded the speaker 
 attentively. 
 
 " As for Damaris, why she has gone all the 
 way to Endle across the hills after you, be- 
 cause she thought why, who are you 
 
 now (
 
 SURYEILLANCE. 129 
 
 The girl looked up for the first time, and 
 failed to recognize the person whom she had 
 addressed, — as well she might fail, considering 
 that she had never seen him before in her life. 
 
 " I am sorry to intrude," said the stranger ; 
 " I had expected to find your father or mother 
 here. Are you entirely alone ? " 
 
 " For a minute or two, sir. My sister has 
 gone shopping — father will not be long — 
 mother has gone to London. Who shall I say 
 has called ? " 
 
 " A gentleman on business." 
 
 " Will you come to-morrow ? " said the child, 
 in quite a business-like tone of voice. 
 
 " If vour father will not be lonof, I think that 
 with your permission I will wait for him. That 
 is," noticing the girl's hesitation, " if you are 
 not afraid of me." 
 
 " Is your — name — Searle? " asked the child, 
 slowly. 
 
 The stranger stared at the questioner, hesi- 
 tated in his turn, and then said — 
 
 " Yes, it is." 
 
 " They have been expecting to hear from 
 you, sir. They will be sorry that you called, 
 and found them out." 
 
 VOL. I. K
 
 130 NO MAX'S FRIEXD. 
 
 " I had hoped that at an hour so late as this, 
 I should have been sure of seeing one of your 
 parents." 
 
 " You will be quite sure oT that in the 
 morning, Mr. Searle. Oh ! at any time in 
 the morning, for father is an early riser here. 
 Or can he call on you ? " 
 
 " No — as he will not be long, I think that I 
 will wait." 
 
 " He may be very late, sir. He may be at 
 Endle." 
 
 " Where is that ? " 
 
 ''That is the market-town, six miles from 
 here." 
 
 " Four, or rather less, over the Downs, is it 
 not," said Mr. Searle, " the way your sister has 
 gone to meet him ? " 
 
 Eunice lowered her eyes and looked at her 
 book attentively for several moments. The 
 little white brow was furrowed with thought 
 or perplexity, and she was evidently considering 
 the best course of action. 
 
 " The way my father has gone to meet 
 Damaris, you mean," she said suddenly ; " for 
 Damaris is fond of long walks, and when it gets 
 on to twilight, father thinks that it is time to
 
 SURVEILLAXCE. 131 
 
 see after her, lest she should lose her way about 
 the place — which is' new to us at present. You 
 are sure that you will not call in the morning, 
 sir? It will be so much the better plan." 
 
 " I will stay," he said, like a man who had 
 suddenly made up his mind to a certain course 
 of procedure, "but if you wish it, or are 
 frightened of me, I will take my seat on that 
 little perch outside your door, and enjoy my 
 cigar under the creepers until Papa Wor- 
 cester comes home. What do you think of 
 that suggestion ? " 
 
 " Oh, no, sir, you must not do that," said 
 Eunice, rising with alacrity. "I am not afraid 
 of anything ; will you take a seat whilst I light 
 a fire ? The room strikes rather cold, perhaps," 
 she added, rubbing her thin hands up and down 
 her bare arms. 
 
 " Pray do not light a fire for me." 
 
 " You need not mind smoking your cigar in 
 here, sir, if you're fond of smoking," said 
 Eunice. " I like smoke myself." 
 
 " You are used to it ? " 
 
 "Yes — father smokes his pipe after supper 
 when he has done reading to us. lie's a rare 
 stay-at-home, is father. You see," with an odd 
 
 K 2
 
 132 NO man's friend. 
 
 glance at Mr. Searle, "it's market-day at 
 Endle ! " 
 
 *' Ah ! " said Mr. Searle, phlegmatically. 
 
 "And lie may have gone almost as far as 
 Endle after Damaris, who does the shopping 
 when mother is away." 
 
 " And being fond of long walks prefers to go 
 to Endle for her groceries and butcher's meat 
 to making her purchases in the village. Is 
 that it?" 
 
 " Yes ; that's it, sir," with another wistful 
 look towards him. 
 
 Mr. Searle sat down, placed his hat, which 
 he had removed on entering the room, upon 
 the window-sill, and took up the book that 
 Eunice had been perusing. 
 
 " * Pilgrim's Progress ! ' " he said, in his sur- 
 prise, " is that a book that interests you ? " 
 
 " Yes, sir. It w^as lent me by Mrs. Wotter, 
 next door ; it's a funny book, sir ; almost like 
 the fairytales." 
 
 " Very funny, indeed," assented Mr. Searle ; 
 " have you tried to understand it ? " 
 
 " I was trying to make it out when you came 
 in, sir." 
 
 " A favourite book of your father's ? "
 
 SURYEILL AXCE . 166 
 
 ** I borrowed it to-day from next door. I 
 told- you so just now." 
 
 " What books does your father read to you, 
 then ? " 
 
 "Oh! anything that he can borrow, sir," said 
 the girl, with alacrity ; " poetry chiefly — he's 
 very fond of poetry, indeed." 
 
 *' How old are you ? " 
 
 " Twelve last May, sir." 
 
 " You are the girl they call Eunice, then ? ' 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 " Who taught you to read ? " 
 
 " Mother and father. They could not 
 afford to pay for regular schooling, so they 
 taught me in off-times like. I was very quick 
 at my books from a chikl, sir." 
 
 "A very quick child, altogether, I fancy," 
 said Mr. Searle ; " quick at excuses, if any were 
 necessary — eh, Eunice ? " 
 
 " I don't know, sir," said the girl, suddenly 
 colouring, and then looking down at the red 
 tiles at her feet ; " what — what makes you 
 fancy that ? " 
 
 " I am a man full of fancies, at times," 
 was the reply. " I take odd fancies — am alto- 
 gether an odd, inquisitive marplot, fussing about
 
 134 NO man's friend. 
 
 business, wbicli, after all, does not concern me. 
 Now, why could I not have let this whole affair 
 proceed its own course, and without any inter- 
 ference on my part? It is no business of mine, 
 and yet I come here to spy upon a child of 
 twelve years old. Eunice, you feel that I am 
 a spy here, and are on your guard. Why don't 
 you say so ? " 
 "Sir!— I—" 
 
 " There, there, don't tell any more lies to- 
 night. I know where your mother is — where 
 Damaris and your father are. Your mother 
 is at Ranwick's, at Westbourne-on-Sea ; your 
 father is drunk at Endle, and Damaris will 
 bring him home presently across the Downs, to 
 make sure that he does not break his neck by 
 the way, which would be about the best thing 
 that could happen for you all. But I wish 
 that you had not lied so fluently, girl. Come 
 here." 
 
 Eunice, very shame-faced, with the red blush 
 burnt into her face now, advanced slowly to- 
 wards him, with gaze averted. When she was 
 near Mr. Harland's spy — we call that gentle- 
 man by the title which he has bestowed upon 
 himself — he laid a gloved hand on each shoulder
 
 SURVEILLAXCE. 135 
 
 and asked her to look him full in the face. The 
 girl trembled somewhat, raised her great dark 
 eyes at his request, and looked into two brown 
 eyes, more piercing — perhaps, more — restless 
 than her own. 
 
 " Only twelve years of age, and so — acute," 
 he said. " Well, the life has been a hard one, 
 and a hard life makes people sharp. I am not 
 your judge. I don't see why I should preach 
 to you, cross-examine you, try to deceive you 
 more than you can deceive me. I leave the 
 rest to the master." 
 
 He rose suddenly, walked across the room, 
 took his hat from the window-sill, and rammed 
 it upon his head, tugging at the rim afterwards, 
 in order to draw it more completely over his 
 forehead. 
 
 " Are you going, sir ? " 
 
 " Yes, I am going." 
 
 "What — what have you found out?" asked 
 Eunice, in an alarmed tone. 
 
 " I have found that it is dl true, child," he 
 said, severely ; "all true that has been told your 
 uncle Harland and me. I did not expect any- 
 thing else ; therefore I am not disappointed. I 
 don't know what else could have been expected
 
 136 XO MAX's FPJEXD. 
 
 considering what your lives have been. Good 
 night." 
 
 "Stay a moment," said Eunice, running to 
 the door and standing in the way of his depar- 
 ture. " You Avon't go yet, after all this, when I 
 ask you to stop, sir ? " 
 
 "What do you want with me? " 
 
 " To tell me just the worst that you have 
 heard about us — found out about us ! " 
 
 "What is the good of my telling you ? " 
 
 "I may show you that it isn't so bad as 
 people think." 
 
 " Shall I be able to believe what you say ? " 
 
 " Please, yes," said the girl, entreatingly, " for 
 I was trying to make more than the best of it, 
 then ; and wdien one tries to do that, why — one 
 tells stories." 
 
 "True. Well, your father drinks hard — very 
 hard, girl. He has not the moral courage 
 to keep from drink, when his self-restraint 
 for a few weeks might alter his whole life — 
 the lives of his wife and children. I cannot 
 say to Mr. Harland that he is a man to be 
 trusted." 
 
 " No, you can't say that," said the girl, 
 thoughtfully.
 
 SURYEILLAXCE. 137 
 
 *'You know why Mr. Harland is making 
 these inquiries ; you have been told. You 
 have been warned against such a visit as I 
 have made this evening." 
 
 "Yes, mother has told me that you might 
 come here." 
 
 " Now, that mother — " 
 
 " Stay a moment, sir, we have not done with 
 father yet ; you have only heard the worst of 
 him, and found out the worst. He is a very 
 patient man. So patient when the bad luck 
 comes; for he is a good father, and very 
 thoughtful for all of us, making the best of it 
 in his way. It's only when he's very lucky 
 that he — he gets drunk; for he's always 
 good-tempered, and likes other people to be 
 as happy as himself. There, that's all true, 
 Mr. Searle." 
 
 "What a pity that good luck should ever 
 come in his way." 
 
 " Oh ! sir, he would get used to that in 
 timel" 
 
 A smile flickered on features that were 
 somewhat severe and harsh for a man not 
 yet thirty years of age, and the girl seemed 
 to detect a difference in his looks, for she went
 
 138 NO MAX's FRIEXD. 
 
 on witli more energy, as tbongli encouraged 
 by it. 
 
 " It is only the first day or two that seems to 
 unsettle him, upon my word. You would like 
 my father very much indeed, if you knew as 
 much about him as I did. I wish Damaris was 
 here to speak up for him, for she's a regular 
 father's girl, sir." 
 
 ^'I wish that I had seen Damaris," said Mr. 
 Searle, musingly. 
 
 " And as for mother, sir," she said, con- 
 tinuing her panegyrics, and without waiting for 
 Mr. Searle's verdict in the first instance, *'wh\' 
 she works for all of us, and tries all she can to 
 make us think of something more respectable 
 than the life that we are obhged to follow. 
 Why she works herself almost to death for us, 
 at|times ! " 
 
 " There, there, I will say nothing against your 
 mother ; God forbid ! " said Mr. Searle. " I have 
 been too hard upon you already, and have no 
 right to try and shake your faith in those who 
 have given you birth, and — in their way, per- 
 haps — have not neglected you." 
 
 "You think better of them now, sir," said 
 Eunice, her eyes lighting up with satisfaction.
 
 SUKYEILLANCE. 139 
 
 " Better of some of the family, at all events, 
 and not inclined to judge any of you too harshly. 
 I am going now." 
 
 "Very well, sir." 
 
 " You would prefer me seeing your father in 
 the morning to waiting here for him ?" 
 
 " Yes, sir. Oh ! if you would only see him 
 in the morning." 
 
 " Good night, Eunice, then." 
 
 " Good night, sir." 
 
 He extended his hand, and shook the little 
 thin one that was placed timidly within it, then 
 he went away down the road, and left Eunice 
 Worcester watching him, till the shadowy 
 night shut him out from her gaze. At the 
 end of the street he paused, turned to the left 
 and passed through a swing gate and along 
 a narrow lane, which opened suddenly upon 
 rising ground, where the wind blew more 
 fresh that night. 
 
 " I think a walk to Endle will do me good. 
 I need not stay any longer in this place," he 
 said, " and I need not wait for Worcester's sober 
 moods. My mission is to see these people at 
 their worst, and a very uncomfortable mission 
 it is. Now, I have done with it."
 
 140 NO man's friend. 
 
 He lighted bis cigar as he proceeded, and 
 went briskly forward on the uphill path before 
 him, fearing and caring for no one whom he 
 might meet by the way. 
 
 Half-way to Endle, he came upon a man 
 and child, walking with difficulty down the 
 slope, the man's arm drawn through the girl's, 
 and the taller and stronger of the two evidently 
 relying for assistance on the weaker. 
 
 " Hold hard, Damaris, wench ! " he heard the 
 man say as they approached each other. "A 
 gen'elman witli a cigar — the gen'elman will 
 'blige another gen'elman with a light, am 
 sure. Shir," addressing Mr. Searle, " will you 
 'blige a gen'elman with a light ? " 
 
 " With pleasure." 
 
 Mr. Searle took the cigar from his mouth, 
 and Mr. Worcester made several attempts to 
 light his pipe, by holding the fiery end to the 
 bowl, swinging from his heels to the tips of his 
 toes meanwhile. 
 
 " It's very strange, 'deed, but can t manage 
 light," he said, returning the cigar at last com- 
 pletely extinguished. " Much 'bliged to you, 
 all same, shir, and wish you pleasant journey 
 — good evening, shir."
 
 SURVEILLANCE. 141 
 
 "Good evening." 
 
 " Come, Damaris — what, snivelling again ? 
 What on earth is there to grizzle about, now, 
 I wonder ? You ain't like anybody else at all, 
 Damaris. Steady here — keep step, my lass — 
 keep step, please, or you'll throw me out." 
 
 " So, I have seen the whole of them, in spite 
 of myself," said Mr. Searle, as he marched up 
 the dark hill-side airain.
 
 ( M2 ) 
 
 CHAPTER YIIL 
 
 PAYES THE WAY FOR MAXY CHAXGES. 
 
 The visitors are thinning at Westbourne-upon- 
 Sea, although the weather remains fine and 
 the air is pure and warm there. It is the end 
 of September, and many pleasure-seekers have 
 gone home — those who seek health and 
 strength remaining to the last, grateful for less 
 noise upon parade and the absence of the 
 promenade band, which has migrated back to 
 Germany contented with its season. The 
 fishermen are on the move for Kamsgate, Ply- 
 mouth, Penzance, and praying for 'good luck 
 with the herrings ; the Royal Hotel remains no 
 longer full, and supplementary waiters are 
 discharged ; rents are coming down in terraces 
 and crescents; flymen remain longer on the 
 ranks, and are more obtrusively eager for fares 
 amongst the visitors still left there; the first
 
 PAVES THE WAT FOR MAXY CHAXGES. 143 
 
 volumes of the novels are to be found at last 
 upon the shelves of the Marine Library, which 
 is great in novels, children's toys, and prayer- 
 books ; half the bathing-machines are in rank 
 and file in a field three hundred yards away, 
 and beggars, organ-grinders, and diverting 
 vagabonds have gone farther west and south. 
 
 A wooden-visaged man, who lets Bath chairs 
 on hire and acts himself as guide, has not felt 
 the slackness of the times much ; for morning 
 after morning, at 'the usual hour of twelve, he 
 drags along the upper parade, slowly and care- 
 fully, a dark-skinned, small-eyed man, wheels 
 him to the old spot on the cliff, turns him with 
 his face to the sea, and stands beside him a grim 
 sentinel. 
 
 The smaller Bath chair with the smaller in- 
 valid, drawn by the wooden-faced man's son, is no 
 longer there. The one left is in the deepest mourn- 
 ing ; steeped in black as it were, to within half- 
 an-inch of his hat. The hgure of a man who has 
 suffered much grief as well as pain is Mr. Har- 
 land's now ; the one expression of the face is 
 utter misery. They wJio are left in Westbourne- 
 upon-Sea yet, regard him curiously and not 
 without sympathy. Many of them know his
 
 144 NO man's friend. 
 
 story, — have made it their business to know 
 it, and regard with pitying eyes the man who 
 has lost his last hope. 
 
 The servants who wait upon hira with cushions 
 before he is finally settled in his place, are steeped 
 in black to match their master, and though Mr. 
 Harland has not noticed it, the Bath chair man 
 wears black trousers, and has a rusty band, by 
 way of complimentary mourning, round his 
 rustier hat. 
 
 Mr. Harland, ever in his place facing the sea, 
 takes no heed of passing things, enters into no 
 conversation with the man at his side, but sits 
 heaped within the chair, with his hat tilted for- 
 ward on his eyebrows, and his cloak drawn very 
 closely round him. The man intrudes not with 
 any observations; he has given up offering re- 
 marks for the last three weeks, for they disturb 
 his fare and elicit no reply. When it is close on 
 two o'clock, Mr, Harland exhibits slight signs of 
 restlessness and looks inquiringly at the man, 
 who tries to find his watch and finally gives out 
 the time in a sepulchral voice. At two precisely, 
 Mr. Harland nods his head, and Ranwick backs 
 and twists the chair and then drags its occupant 
 to the 'Royal,' where the servants, steeped in
 
 PAVES THE WAT FOR MANY CHANGES. 145 
 
 black, are ready for him. The next day at 
 twelve o'clock precisely, Mr. Harlan d steps into 
 his Bath chair again, Mr. Ranwick moves on, 
 the servants follow, and the business of the day 
 recommences. What becomes of Mr. Harland 
 apart from this time, shut up in the large room 
 of the * Royal,' only the valet knows. The doctor 
 calls once a day, feels his patient's pulse, and 
 changes the medicine occasionally, and then Mr. 
 Harland is left to his own resources. 
 
 The valet, who says he is hipped to death 
 and must give warning or take to brandy and 
 water, tells the landlord of the 'Royal' what 
 becomes of Mr. Harland all day, and the land- 
 lord is naturally curious concerning a man who, 
 though he gives but little trouble and pays hand- 
 somely for the accommodation granted him, has 
 damaged business by his son's death on the 
 premises. So we learn the news. 
 
 " He is put in his chair before the open win- 
 dow," says the valet, "or he creeps into it if 
 he is strong enough, and there he sits between 
 the meals staring out at sea, till it makes me sick 
 to see him at it. He wont talk, and he wont 
 answer if anybody talks to him. He has a lot 
 of letters during the week ; the ones with the 
 
 VOL. I. L
 
 146 NO man's friend. 
 
 city address on the seal he just glances at and 
 then locks up in his desk ; the little ones from 
 Mrs. Courtenay — Mrs. Courtenay has the sin- 
 gular crest of a lion with something in its paw, 
 and therefore I know her notes by heart — he 
 drops into the fire, if there's one handy, or tears 
 slowly to pieces if there isn't, without looking 
 at a line of them. Now and then, when he is 
 very lively, which occurs about twelve o'clock 
 at night, he'll take it into his head to wTite a 
 letter or two before going to bed, — writing very 
 slowly, and thinking very carefully of what he 
 shall say next, between every word. Those 
 letters are all addressed to Mr. Searle, — that's 
 his business man, and a rare fine thing he must 
 be getting out of the business with everything 
 in his own hands as it is. For my part " — the 
 valet had evidently no faith in human nature — 
 " I would rather have that man's berth than the 
 master's." 
 
 " Don't you think ihat the master will go out 
 of his mind if he keeps on long at this ? " 
 
 " I don't think myself that he has been ever 
 in it," replied the valet. *' He's as odd a fish as 
 ever lived." 
 
 " A stock fish," says the landlord, w ho is a bit
 
 PAVES THE WAY FOR MANY CHANGES. 147 
 
 of a wag, and the valet and the landlord laugh 
 at the little joke which they have had between 
 them. 
 
 It is the end of September when Mr. Har- 
 land is compelled to find his voice. Ranwick is 
 at the side of the Bath chair, and Mr. Harland's 
 face is towards the sea as usual, when a youth 
 dressed in black suddenly appears before the 
 invalid. 
 
 " I couldn't leave here, Mr. Harland, without 
 a word," the youth says, fearlessly. " Grandfather 
 thought that I had better go away to school 
 without seeing you ; but I didn't think that it was 
 quite fair, and so I have chanced it, sir. I hope 
 that you will excuse the liberty of my coming 
 to thank you for your kindness, — to say, too, 
 that I will do my best in all ways to deserve it." 
 
 "Now make your bow and go, Matthew,'' 
 remarks Mr. Ranwick, with an emphasis on 
 young Ranwick's Christian name. " Mr. Harland 
 is not inclined for conwersation this morning." 
 
 "Stay a moment," says Mr. Harland, lan- 
 guidly. 
 
 The boy remains ten minutes or more, and 
 Mr. Harland looks out at sea all that time, 
 ruminating. 
 
 l2
 
 148 NO man's friend. 
 
 '' You will learn all that you can ? " Mr. 
 Harland says at last. 
 
 " Depend upon that, sir." 
 
 A self-sufficient answer ; but uttered heartily, 
 as by one who has made up his mind to study 
 hard. 
 
 " If you get on well at school I may do some- 
 thing more for you, for Matthew's sake. I 
 wonder," he adds, looking at the boy for the first 
 time, " what he saw in you to like." 
 
 "His old self, in some respects, /know," cries 
 Mr. Ran wick, suddenly. 
 
 " Be silent, please. I have asked you as a 
 favour not to talk to me till I am stronger. You," 
 to young Ranwick, " can go now." 
 
 Young Ranwick departs, and his grandfather 
 puts his hands behind his back and looks out at 
 sea along with the gentleman at his side. 
 
 But the spell of a long silence has been broken, 
 and Mr. Harland, half-an-hour afterwards, mut- 
 ters, to Mr. Ran wick's surprise, — 
 
 "I don't look for any gratitude. I don't 
 believe any more in human gratitude than Searle 
 does." 
 
 " Sir ? " says Mr. Ranwick, interrogatively. 
 " I did not speak," is the reply.
 
 PAVES THE WAT FOR MANY CHANGES. 149 
 
 Mr. Ranwick casts up the whites of his eyes, 
 as though asking pardon above for Mr. Har- 
 land's falsehoods, but hazards no contradiction, 
 although he ventures to prove his gratitude soon 
 afterwards. 
 
 " I hope, Mr. Harland," he bursts forth with, 
 *' you'll let me thank you, just this once, for your 
 interest in my grandson." 
 
 " I have no interest," replies Mr. Harland. 
 
 " For your kindness to him, sir, I mean, — a 
 great kindness which neither of us is likely to 
 forget, — him especially." 
 
 "It will cost me a hundred pounds, books 
 and all," soliloquizes Mr. Harland again. 
 
 " It's handsum, sir, and he'll live to pay every 
 farden of it back, for he only wants the chance. 
 Your son saw that, young as he was, and — " 
 
 " Home, Ranwick," sternly orders Mr. Har- 
 land. 
 
 "Yes, sir." 
 
 Mr. Harland is drawn homewards, and at the 
 door of the hotel Ranwick is startled out of his 
 usual equanimity by his fare saying : — 
 
 " I shall want you again this afternoon." 
 
 " This afternoon, sir ? With the chair, do you 
 mean ?
 
 150 NO man's friend. 
 
 " Yes ; at four." 
 
 At four o'clock Mr. Ran wick is in attendance, 
 and Mr. Harland is led from the hotel by his 
 valet, who is also equipped for walking on this 
 occasion. 
 
 "To the parade again, sir?" asks Mr. Ran- 
 wick. 
 
 Mr. Harland motions him to the valet for 
 further information. 
 
 " To the cemetery," explains the valet, "I'm 
 to help you if it's necessary. The governor," in 
 a subdued whisper, " is a cheering up a bit, at 
 last ! " 
 
 A long, long journey in the hot sunshine to 
 the cemetery, with Mr. Ranwick tugging his 
 fare along the dusty country road and the valet 
 pushing up behind at times when the ground is 
 rough or hilly. 
 
 " It's a mussy that he gets lighter every day," 
 thinks Mr. Ranwick. ''But if he gets much 
 lighter I shall think he's going off arter his son, 
 and then with nuffin binding in black or white, 
 dashed if I shan't be let in to pay for Mat's 
 grand schooling all myself! " 
 
 At the cemetery at last, — a new burial-place 
 for Westbourne and many towns adjacent, lying
 
 PAVES THE WAY FOR MANY CHANGES. 151 
 
 on high ground and in the heart of the hills ; a 
 pleasant spot to rest in away from the stir 
 and business of life. Here the new-made 
 grave of Matthew Harland, who departed this 
 life on August 31st, 18 — , aged fourteen years, 
 as duly recorded on statuary marble in the 
 splendid testimonial to the dead that has been 
 already placed there. 
 
 " Searle has been quick, — I thank him," Mr. 
 Harland is heard to mutter by his attendants, 
 before he motions them away. To a long way 
 distant from him he directs old Ranwick and the 
 valet, his gloomy face looking round the chair 
 from time to time, and the black gloved hand 
 still indicating " further back." When he is 
 satisfied with the distance between him and his 
 attendants, he relapses into his old attitude 
 and draws his cloak tightly round him as though 
 facing the sea-breeze on the cliffs at Westbourne. 
 But the proud man's face shadows more and 
 more and is not of the statuesque expression of 
 the morning, — he has found courage to come, 
 but he cannot bring his characteristic stolidity 
 to his son's grave yet awhile ; his head bows 
 more and more forwards, and at last the heavy 
 sobs of a man in grief are heard there.
 
 152 NO man's friend. 
 
 A great grief, but the hot tears may have 
 saved his reason, who can tell ? He cries like a 
 child now, — as he has not cried since he was a 
 child himself. People say that he turned to 
 stone when his son died ; they would have been 
 glad, those interested in him, to have seen him 
 more impressionable and human on that Sep- 
 tember afternoon. 
 
 One man we believe is glad, though he is not 
 Mr. Harland's friend, — though it is his boast 
 that he has not, and cares not for, one friend in 
 the world. He comes upon Mr. Harland in his 
 grief and says : — 
 
 " This is a good sign, sir. I am glad to meet 
 you here." 
 
 "A good sign! Why?" 
 
 " I will explain another time, Mr. Harland." 
 
 He is about to withdraw again, when the 
 master says : — 
 
 " Don't leave me, or I shall die. I have given 
 way, and it was foolish and suicidal perhaps. 
 Oh! Searle, every hope that I had in my life 
 lies buried in the boy's grave — every ambition 
 — every atom of happiness. " 
 
 He beats his gloved hand on the front of the 
 Bath chair, he shakes them at the Heaven which
 
 PAVES THE WAT FOR MANY CHANGES. 153 
 
 has been so hard upon him, as he thinks ; he 
 clashes himself back in his seat and cries and 
 sobs, whilst Mr. Searle looks at him in asto- 
 nishment. Searle has only known this man as 
 hard as granite ; in business life and life domestic, 
 before his fortune was made and when it was 
 made by him, when his wife was living, and 
 afterwards, when but the boy was left him, 
 always strange, impenetrable, and callous. He 
 may know him in the future days as the same 
 odd man who has been so long his master ; but 
 he will remember the father at his son's grave 
 from this day, and think the better of him. 
 
 "Every hope, ambition, happiness," quotes 
 ]Mr. Searle ; *' and you but forty years of age. 
 This is the shock of the first grief, and you are 
 not yourself yet." 
 
 " And never shall be." 
 
 "You must try to step back to yourself; 
 take again that interest in your business, study 
 again with that interest to become rich, which 
 has raised you to so great a height." 
 
 There is a faint ring of scorn evident in the 
 consolation offered by the manager; but Mr. 
 llarland detects it not. 
 
 It is the best consolation which Mr. Searle
 
 154 NO man's friend. 
 
 thinks that he can offer — that fresh pursuit of 
 wealth in the world wherein his master has 
 been fortunate. 
 
 "I have no one to strive for now — no one 
 to get rich for, Searle. Caring nothing for my- 
 self, why should I struggle more than you do?" 
 
 " You remember my creed then ; you have 
 not forgotten it ? " 
 
 " No." 
 
 " Ah ! but we stand on very different ground. 
 You have duties to fulfil which your conscience 
 will not permit you to neglect — you are not, 
 and can never feel alone. , You have no right 
 to be unsympathetic with your kind, and to 
 distrust the faces round you. Mr. Harland, I 
 have come to talk about your duties to your 
 kinsfolk." 
 
 " I leave the matter to you." 
 
 " I have done my share of work ; and it is 
 your turn." 
 
 " Do anything that is just ; that you consider 
 is just on my part towards my sister and her 
 children." 
 
 " Will you not see them ? " 
 
 '* Not yet. I have not the strength to face 
 them, Searle," he says, nervously ; " you must
 
 PAVES THE WiY FOR MANY CHANGES. 155 
 
 write to them, call upon them ; arrange every- 
 thing for the education of the children, and the 
 maintenance of Worcester and his wife, if they 
 must be maintained," he adds, with his huck- 
 ster's spirit predominating ; " tell them that I 
 will see them presently." 
 
 *' I would prefer talking the matter over with 
 you this evening, before I commit myself in 
 your name to anything." 
 
 ** Very well," Mr. Harland answers, wearily ; 
 " I suppose it must be." 
 
 " Perhaps in these children " 
 
 " There, there ; don't prophesy to me, Searle, 
 about them," he interrupts almost angrily ; " I 
 am not interested in them in the least — I never 
 shall be. Point out to me what you consider my 
 duty in this matter, and I will follow it not il- 
 liberally, but I must not be troubled by them. 
 I give my money to them, to be saved from 
 trouble ! Call those two men yonder and let us 
 get home." 
 
 Then the four men proceed down the hilly land 
 together towards Westbourne-upon-Sea, and 
 Mr. Ranwick listens to all that is said by the 
 way, and learns, amongst other things of less 
 importance, that the action for damages against
 
 156 NO man's friend. 
 
 the London and Great Southern Railway is to 
 come on in a week's time, if Mr. Harland 
 has strength to enter an appearance in the 
 court. 
 
 "I'll be there," exclaims Mr. Harland, with 
 an energy that he has not shown since the day 
 he lost his son. " I'll be carried feet foremost 
 into court, but what I will show the jury the 
 wreck the devils have made of me ! Searle, 
 on your honour, am I looking so well as 
 I was ? " 
 
 *' No," answers the gentleman addressed. 
 
 " I'm glad of that for once," he cries, exult- 
 ingly ; " it will tell in my favour and increase 
 the damages. Totally incapacitated from the 
 management of a business which requires my 
 direct supervision — that will tell in court 1 " 
 
 " Not a doubt of it." 
 
 "The whole concern left to hirelings," he 
 adds, without much respect for the feelings of 
 his listener. 
 
 " Who may be robbing you at every turn, and 
 you not a whit the wiser," adds his listener, 
 coolly. 
 
 " Exactly. That is the true rendering of the 
 case, and that will bring in sixteen thousand
 
 PAVES THE WAT FOR MANY CHANGES. 157 
 
 pounds, and costs. Sixteen oh ! my God !" 
 
 he wails forth piteously, breaking down again; 
 " and no one to share it with me, or rejoice in 
 my increasing wealth ! " 
 
 '* Your nieces, — in the future, when they are 
 grown up, and you are proud of them." 
 
 Mr. Ranwick jolts the chaise more than is 
 necessary at this ; Mr. Harland shakes his head. 
 
 '' No ; not my nieces. They must not build 
 on any chance of my money, Searle ; they shall 
 not have it." 
 
 " In the evening, we will talk of this." 
 
 " Oh ! I have talked enough now ; the excite- 
 ment seems like a relapse, and who knows if 
 I may not be found dead in the morning myself. 
 I should like to live the trial over." 
 
 " Then there is something to live for yet, Mr. 
 Harland ! " says his head-clerk. 
 
 " Yes ; you're right after all. I shall be strong 
 presently, I trust. Quite my old self again, 
 please God," he adds, feebly. 
 
 " Please God — no," is the quick answer here ; 
 " a something better after this affliction, at all 
 events." 
 
 "What was I before this trouble then — 
 before my accident ? " asks Mr. Harland, almost
 
 158 NO man's friend. 
 
 savagely ; " speak out. You were never afraid 
 of hard truths, or personalities." 
 
 " Mr. Harland, I have not come to West- 
 bourne to argue with you on any topic under the 
 sun," replied the other ; " in argument we do not 
 agree, and you excite yourself, which is bad for 
 you and dangerous. I said, * not your old self ; ' 
 because your new self is a something better, — if 
 far from perfect." 
 
 '* You said a little while ago that I must step 
 back to myself." 
 
 " Not your old self." 
 
 " If I step back at all, it will be to what I 
 was." 
 
 " Tlien — but," corrects Mr. Searle, quickly ; 
 " we have spoken enough of this, and you must 
 not lead me into argument." 
 
 "I don't want to argue with you," and the 
 principal screws himself into the furthermost 
 corner of his chair, away from the subordinate, 
 and says no more. He is fast asleep when they 
 reach the * Royal,' the fatigue of the new day, 
 the sudden beginning of the new life has been 
 too much for him, and the valet and jMr. Searle 
 have a difficulty in waking him. 
 
 He dines with Mr. Searle, and is drowsy over
 
 PAVES THE WAY FOR MANY CHAXGES. 159 
 
 his meals; so dull and drowsy after dinner, 
 that Mr. Searle, with evident reluctance, post- 
 pones the great subject of the poor relations till 
 the morning. 
 
 " He must take all the responsibility of this 
 new step," Mr. Searle asserts to himself, at a 
 late hour of the evening ; " and something of 
 the blame, whatever happens. His relations, 
 not mine ; his business, not my own. I take no 
 interest in the rise or fall of these Worcesters. 
 Lewis Searle is purely a machine that sets the 
 wheels in motion, and grinds out his placid life 
 disturbed by no one's troubles. Upon my 
 honour I begin to admire the situation very 
 much ! " 
 
 He sits cross-legged upon the chair that he 
 has taken into the balcony, with his arms folded 
 on the back, and his face not looking quite so 
 swarthy in the moonlight. He smokes half-a- 
 dozen cigars, at least, in a quick, excitable manner, 
 first learned in the Brazils, flinging away stumps 
 of large proportion, which sailor-boys will pick 
 up in the morning and smoke out for him, and 
 lighting up again with renewed vigour at every 
 fresh Havannah ; smokes the night away on the 
 balcony, and looks at the sea dreamily, follows
 
 160 NO man's friend. 
 
 the moonlit path struck on it, as though it led 
 his own way, and he could see to the end; 
 and takes no heed of the master sleeping soundly 
 in his chair within, oblivious to the coming 
 events that are stealing on towards him.
 
 ( 161 ) 
 
 CHi\PTER IX. 
 
 MR. HARLAND's ultimatum. 
 
 The Worcester, alias the Elvani, family are all 
 at home in the cottage at Stackford whea Mr. 
 Searle at last appears there. The Worcesters 
 have received notice of his coming, for Mr. 
 Searle has written, fixing, time and place, 
 evidently preferring for a change to see these 
 nomads at their best. 
 
 They are in their best and looking their 
 best, when Mr. Searle knocks at the cottage 
 door ; they are on their best behaviour, when 
 he walks into the little room and suggests that 
 it is a fine day, but somewhat cold. 
 
 "We catch the first sign of coming winter, 
 in this north-easter," he adds. 
 
 '* Not the winter of our discontent, sir?" 
 says Mr. Worcester quickly, and then the two 
 men regard each other attentively. 
 
 VOL. I. M
 
 162 XO MAX's FRIEND. 
 
 Mr. Worcester looks his best, certainly — he is 
 clad ill a decent suit of black, and is well brushed, 
 well washed, and spruce. There is a dapper air 
 about him which may be taken for ease of 
 manner or elegance of style, but which is 
 somewhat new to his children, who regard him 
 furtively and wonderingly. Those children 
 have been thoroughly scrubbed and cleaned till 
 they shine again, and their dark hair is more 
 glossy and smooth than they have ever known 
 it. They wear brown merino skirts and velvet 
 spencers — the velvet spencers having been 
 ingeniously constructed from their property 
 jackets, from which the tags and tassels have 
 been stripped, the mother hopes, for ever. 
 The mother is neatly, if poorly clad also, but 
 looks more thin and worn — as thouoh tlie lonof 
 suspense had told upon her since she came one 
 morning to the Royal Hotel to see her brother 
 Reuben. 
 
 Mrs. Worcester has risen and bowed respect- 
 fully to the man who holds her future in his 
 hands ; Mr. Worcester has already placed a 
 chair for him ; Damaris and Eunice have 
 dropped their curtsies and subsided into the 
 background, standing by the window, where the
 
 MR. harland's ultimatum. 163 
 
 light falls upon them — just as Mr. Searle could 
 have desired it. 
 
 "No — not the winter of your discontent," 
 says Mr. Searle, in reply to his host's question ; 
 " if I have not brought you glorious summer, 
 at least I am not the representative of a hard 
 frost." 
 
 " A hard frost at the heart of Mr. Harlan d — 
 well," says Worcester, rubbing his hands com- 
 placently, " thank God for the thaw ! " 
 
 " We received your letter by yesterday 
 afternoon's post, Mr. Searle," the wife breaks 
 in here, "and are glad to have an end put to 
 our anxiety — we have been, of course, naturally 
 anxious." 
 
 " Naturally ? " 
 
 " We should have been prepared for bad 
 news, had there not been," she adds thought- 
 fully, " a something of promise in your letter. 
 Prepared for bad news, because my brother 
 holds aloof from us, and will not see us even now.'* 
 
 " Better for you all," is the answer. 
 
 " I don't know that," asserts Mr. Worcester, 
 '' at present his idea is that we are vagrants — 
 street musicians with all the vulgarity of the 
 streets attached to us. We should have dis- 
 
 M 2
 
 164 NO man's friend. 
 
 abused his mind of that impression, I take it, 
 on the instant." 
 
 " Mr. Harland is not well enough to see any 
 one ; this meeting would have excited him, and 
 in excited moments, he is not so generous and 
 considerate as you might suppose." 
 
 " You know best, Mr. Searle," replies 
 Worcester. '' I concede the fact. Shall we 
 to business ? I pray you to be seated." 
 
 Mr. Searle takes the chair to which his atten- 
 tion is again directed in a high-flown manner ; 
 Mr. and Mrs, Worcester seat themselves facing 
 him ; the dark-eyed children stand in the back- 
 ground, listening. 
 
 " I hope, Mrs. Worcester," Mr. Searle says, 
 " that you agree with your husband on this last 
 point." 
 
 "I don't see," she utters somewhat petu- 
 lantly, '' why he could not have seen his sister 
 — why he hides from his own flesh and blood 
 like this." 
 
 " Ahem ! Caroline, my dear," delicately hints 
 her husband, " Mr. Searle has already explained 
 that. Your brother is unwell." 
 
 " Then who has a greater right to see him 
 than T ? "
 
 MR. harland's ultimatum. 165 
 
 " He will see you all in good time when he 
 is stronger," replies the manager. 
 
 "And you will allow us?" adds Mrs. Worcester, 
 " for he is in your hands, and is guided solely 
 by your advice." 
 
 " I wish he were," says Mr. Searle. " I would 
 advise him very strangely, and not always to his 
 interest. Advise him while the chance was 
 oiFered me, for I am going back to the Brazils 
 next month. You remember your brother, 
 before he went abroad ? " 
 
 "To be sure, sir; I was twelve years of 
 age. 
 
 " Was he a man easily led then ? " 
 " No ; he was a very stubborn young man." 
 " If you will believe that he was wax at that 
 time and to be moulded into any shape or cha- 
 racter in comparison with what he is now, you 
 will be able to judge of the influence I exercise 
 over Mr. Harland." 
 
 Mrs. Worcester colours and looks somewhat 
 abashed at the tiled flooring. She even wrings 
 her hands together, as though the reply might 
 be taken as a rebuke to her suspicions, and says 
 slowly : 
 
 " Pardon me, Mr. Searle, I am a hasty
 
 166 NO man's friend. 
 
 woman, and naturally suspicious. Such a life 
 as mine has not tended to improve my charac- 
 ter. You are in my brother's confidence, and 
 I am not — hence 1 am to a certain extent 
 jealous of your power." 
 
 " Bravo, Caroline ! " applauds Mr. Worcester, 
 " the amende honorable, and no mistake. In 
 good society, Mr. Searle, you perceive what a 
 woman this would have been." 
 
 " Be silent," Mrs. Worcester answers, techily. 
 
 " I am sorry that you think I have power 
 over Mr. Harlan d," Mr. Searle says, thought- 
 fully, "for you will make me answerable for 
 Mr. Harland's ultimatum." 
 
 " You must have some power." 
 
 *^ Not any." 
 
 " He relies upon you as his friend ? " 
 
 " He relies upon me as his business manager. 
 He is distrustful — it may be a family fail- 
 ing for what I know," he adds caustically, 
 " but he favours me by believing that I am an 
 honest servant ; and as that is a great deal for 
 Mr. Harland to believe in any man, I am proud 
 of his opinion. When that opinion changes — I 
 shall not be surprised for one, or care a great 
 deal for the transformation."
 
 MR. HAE,LAm)'s ULTIMATUM. 167 
 
 *' Ah ! you are a philosopher — a man ^vho is 
 always ready to face the worst," cries Mr. 
 Worcester; "^ such men I always admire^ for I 
 take after them/' 
 
 " They deal in sham contentment, after all,'* 
 replies Mr. Searle ; " but let us change the sub- 
 ject — we are wasting valuable time." 
 
 " My fault, I fear," says Mrs. Worcester, 
 humbly enough now. 
 
 " Yes ; your fault — you began it," replies 
 Searle. " Now then." 
 
 He settles himself more comfortably in his 
 chair, and then looks round at the children for 
 the first time. 
 
 " You girls are interested in this story — will 
 you come and hear it ? " he asks, and Damaris 
 and Eunice, with their arms linked together? 
 slowly approach the speaker. Mr. Searle looks 
 close into their faces; they are thoughtful 
 faces now, and the wide and more massive 
 brow of the elder girl suggests a more self- 
 reliant character to the observer. The face is 
 more of a woman's face, and there is a less 
 happy expression thereon than Eunice vrears ; 
 the favourite of the father has, strangely 
 enough, more of the mother's looks than the
 
 168 NO man's friend. 
 
 younger sister has. Eunice appears as if a word, 
 or a glance, would light her up with smiles, and 
 Searle perceives that as he makes known Mr. 
 Harland's wishes, it is she w^ho first seizes the 
 position in its entirety, and considers the new 
 life which it opens out to all. He finds himself 
 after awhile addressing this child of twelve 
 rather than the rest of the community, as 
 though he doubted her decision, and would en- 
 deavour to change it, if adverse to her uncle 
 Reuben's wishes. 
 
 Mr. Searle does not make a long story of all 
 this. He has a habit of speaking very rapidly 
 and to the purpose when uninterrupted by his 
 listeners, and in less than five minutes the 
 Worcesters know what is to be expected — pos- 
 sibly for good — from the rich relation. 
 
 " Mr. HarJand trusts under any circumstances 
 to be free from importunity," begins Mr. Searle ; 
 "that you will all leave him to himself, and 
 never attempt to thrust yourselves upon him 
 until his permission be first granted. To do so 
 will be for him to withdraw his support from 
 your children." 
 
 "The children ! " says Eunice to this. 
 
 " I do not think that he acts illiberally for a
 
 MR. harland's ultimatum. 169 
 
 brother whose connection with you was sundered 
 years ago, when he proposes to save these girls 
 from the streets — to pay for their education, for 
 such an education as shall make them fit for 
 any position in life; and to see, after it is 
 completed, that they are put in a way to gain 
 a fair livelihood for themselves. But he pro- 
 mises, understand, no more than that educa- 
 tion, on which no money shall be spared, and a 
 choice in lif^, somewhere and somehow, after it." 
 
 " He does not adopt them entirely ? " asks 
 Mrs. ^yorcester. 
 
 " He will neither adopt them, nor leave them 
 any money in his will." 
 
 " Why are you so sure of this ? " 
 
 " I am not sure," answers Searle, " but they 
 are his words, and his mind at the present 
 moment is made up to that. Nothing under 
 heaven could change it." 
 
 " But when these drls chancre — " 
 
 " Then we shall be able to hope for better 
 prospects," concludes Mr. Searle, "and when 
 you have quite done interrupting me, I will 
 finish my task." 
 
 " There's something else then." 
 
 '* There are a few more conditions, which you
 
 170 . NO man's friend. 
 
 will think hard at first, but which show that 
 Mr. Harland has possibly a something in view 
 for your daughters at the end of their schooling. 
 In the first place, Eunice and Damaris are to be 
 placed at separate schools, and are not to see 
 each other again for four years." 
 
 " What is that for ? " 
 
 " They enter new worlds, and must be free 
 entirely from past associations," says Mr. 
 Searle ; " my master thinks that one might 
 possibly spoil the other." 
 
 " You will excuse me," begins Mr. Worcester, 
 "but—" 
 
 " You will excuse me finishing my state- 
 ment before any further remarks are thrust 
 upon me," says Mr. Searle ; " the girls are 
 to be separated from each other, and from 
 their parents, until those four years have ex- 
 pired. As for yourselves, why, Mr. Harland 
 will allow you a hundred a-year as long as you 
 live," looking at Mrs. Worcester whilst he spoke, 
 " and so long as the old musical profession is 
 abandoned." 
 
 " Will he allow us that, if we do not agree to 
 the children being taken from us ? " asks Mr. 
 Worcester, eagerly.
 
 MR. haelaxd's ultimatum. 171 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 " Then curse his education scheme — we can 
 educate our children for ourselves. Why, Dama- 
 ris," turning to his elder daughter, " what do you 
 think of all this plotting to part the lot of us ? " 
 " I — I don't know, yet." 
 *' And to show that he is not devoid of 
 brotherly affection," continues Mr. Searle, " Mr. 
 Harland is willing in a few weeks' time to offer 
 you the shelter of his home, Mrs. Worcester, 
 providing that your husband can agree to a 
 separation, and is willing to leave England upon 
 the income already mentioned. Living is much 
 cheaper abroad, you, know," turning to Mr. 
 Worcester. 
 
 " Ye — es," replies Worcester, biting his 
 nails and looking on the ground. 
 
 " That is all ? " asks the wife, as Mr. Searle 
 pauses. 
 
 " That is all ! " echoes Searle. 
 " I see that I am rather in the way in all this," 
 says Mr. Worcester, ** that I am the rock-a-head 
 to Mr. Harland — not to the family exactly — and 
 a man, perhaps, whose bad habits are known to 
 you. You do not require an answer directly to 
 all these propositions ? "
 
 172 NO man's friend. 
 
 " No." 
 
 " Will you give us a week to make up our 
 minds ? " 
 
 " Longer if you wish." 
 
 '*A week will do, thank you, Mr. Searle," 
 replied Worcester ; " in a week we shall have 
 decided for good or for bad," he drily adds; 
 " meanwhile be kind enough to deliver our 
 thanks to Mr. Harland — and accept the same 
 for yourself." 
 
 " Don't thank me," is the quick reply ; " you 
 have nothing to thank me for. I am not in- 
 terested in you, in the least. I shall be very 
 glad when it is all finished, and I can shake 
 you from my mind again." 
 
 "I hope we haven't troubled it," says Mr. 
 Worcester. 
 
 " But you have — the lot of you have been a 
 nuisance to me. I like the management of my 
 own affairs, and not of other people's. I fall in 
 for the worry without taking any interest in the 
 matter." 
 
 " That's singular." 
 
 " I don't think so." 
 
 "We poor strollers," says Mr. Worcester, 
 " have aroused no interest in you, then ? "
 
 MR. harland's ultimatum. 173 
 
 " Not the slightest in the world." 
 
 "Why you are a harder man than my 
 brother-in-law." 
 
 " I hope so." 
 
 " Perhaps Mr. Searle has seen trouble like 
 us ? " says a childish voice at his side ; and he 
 looks down and sees Eunice. He starts, and 
 answers in a different voice — 
 
 " I have seen trouble, child. I should have 
 been a very different man if I had not." 
 
 He rises and passes at once out of the house, 
 and the Worcesters see no more of him for 
 seven years.
 
 ( 174 ) 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 THE ELVAXI FAMILY IS BROKEX UP FOR EVER. 
 
 As the door closes, Eunice rans into her 
 mother's arms. 
 
 " Oh ! we had better keep together — that 
 will be the best for all of us ! " 
 
 "No — no, you are too young to know what 
 is best ; and yet," pausing, " you should be 
 old and wise enough to see the advantages for 
 yourself which your uncle's offer holds out." 
 
 " Yes ; but you and father without us ! " 
 
 "Ah! you think of that. That's well, 
 Eunice — that sounds well for the future." 
 
 Damaris remains very thoughtful. Once she 
 looks wistfully towards her father, and is about 
 to speak, when he checks her. 
 
 " We shall have plenty of time to talk of 
 this within the week. I fancy that we have 
 had quite enough of it at present," he says, with a
 
 THE ELVANI FAMILY BROKEN UP. 175 
 
 forced lightness of demeanour ; " you two girls 
 go upstairs and talk of it together if you like, 
 but for God's sake don't begin again now ! " 
 
 He stoops and kisses them both, to the sur- 
 prise of them and their mother. 
 
 When the daughters have left the room, Mr. 
 Worcester moves with a quick step towards the 
 door, taking down his hat from a peg in the 
 wall as he proceeds. 
 
 " Where are you going ? " peremptorily asks 
 his wife. 
 
 " Not far — only a little way." 
 
 " Only as far as the gin-shop ! " 
 
 " No ; up the hill for a breeze, to think of 
 this for myself — to think, Caroline, of what is 
 best for the lot of us. I — I shan't drink 
 to-day ! " 
 
 " Shall I tell you, Worcester, what is best ? " 
 
 **Well," he answers, irresolutely, " I don't 
 care a great deal about it just now." 
 
 *' You know what is best already for us all," 
 she says moodily •, " can vve shut our eyes to so 
 plain a truth ? " 
 
 " No, we can't," replies her husband, with a 
 spasmodic laugh ; " you're right enough, old 
 girl, you always are. I have thought it over
 
 176 • NO MAx's FRIEXD. 
 
 already. I knew what was coming, and had 
 made up my mind to it when that man gave us 
 Mr. Harland's programme. It's a breaking up of 
 the musical and classical entertainment of the 
 Elvani Family, as exhibited before the crowned 
 heads of Europe with immense success ! " 
 
 Mr. Worcester's light demeanour only adds 
 a shade more gravity to the worn features of 
 his wife. 
 
 "It's a breaking up for their good and 
 yours," he continues ; " therefore, so much the 
 better. As for me, I shall do the magnanimous, 
 decline the hundred pounds, and earn my own 
 living in the way that suits me best. Bob 
 Worcester never had a difficulty to live, and I 
 suit my vagabond life, as my vagabond life suits 
 me. Upon my soul, it would be impossible to 
 rest. I'm very much in the way of you all. 
 I shall like the novelty of being my own master, 
 vastly ! " 
 
 "Worcester, the children must not lose 
 their chances in life, whatever the sacrifice to 
 us. With us, a terrible future, perhaps — with 
 him, prosperity." 
 
 " You will go to your brother's ? " 
 
 " No. Together, both of us, to the end. I
 
 THE ELVANI FAMILY BROKEIS- UP. 177 
 
 don't see, Worcester, what you would do with- 
 out me, except kill yourself with drink." 
 
 " Oh ! trust me in that. But — you — you — are 
 not silly enough to keep with me, when you 
 and your daughters might all live together. 
 Why, I never dreamt of such a thing. You 
 ought to have tired of me long ago. Upon 
 my soul," with his old, easy, awful pledge again, 
 " I'm not worth a moment's thought ! " 
 
 "You were going away just now." 
 
 « Well, I was." 
 
 " For good ? " 
 
 "Yes. I thought that the easiest way to 
 settle it, by never coming back ! " 
 
 " Presently we will go together, you and I. 
 We are both in the way here, and we will give 
 Eunice and Damaris room to forget us," says 
 the wife. 
 
 "Well, well, they will be taught that with 
 their other accomplishments, I daresay." 
 
 *'They will become ladies — think of that, 
 Worcester ; — ladies, perhaps." 
 
 "Instead of street singers. Yes, Carry, 
 that Harland has done us a good turn." 
 
 " And the hundred a-year — " 
 
 " Ha ! let us do without that. Independence, 
 
 VOL. I. N
 
 178 NO man's friend. 
 
 girl — a proper pride that scorns all advantages 
 for ourselves." 
 
 "A fine sentiment that might do for the 
 stage," says Mrs. Worcester; *' think again — a 
 hundred a-year to two poor starvelings like us." 
 
 " It's a lift, certainly," he answers irresolutely, 
 " but I don't like to be paid to keep away from 
 the girls. Still, a hundred a-year is a hundred 
 a-year. What the devil shall we do ? " 
 
 " Take it. We sell our daughters for it." 
 
 "And Harland has the best of the bargain," 
 replies her husband ; "he will find that out some 
 day." 
 
 " If he should marry again, and cast them 
 off, Worcester?" 
 
 " Why, we will come back to them, if we 
 are respectable enough." 
 
 " We might try to live respectably and 
 soberly," with a sigh that shows what a hard 
 trial it will be, *' so as not to be a disgrace to 
 them when they are young women." 
 
 " Yes, that's a good idea. And with you to 
 mind me— why not ?" 
 
 He confesses his own weakness without a 
 blush, and she nods her head, and says — 
 
 " Why not, indeed ! "
 
 THE ELVANI FAMILY BROKEN UP. 179 
 
 " And if — if Harland likes them, and makes 
 them his heiresses," adds Worcester, " for I 
 fancy that is the story of their lives, why — " 
 
 " Why, we will keep away for ever from 
 their greatness," says Mrs. Worcester, sternly. 
 
 "Amen — I think we see our way ahead, 
 then." 
 
 Sp this strange couple — these odd philoso- 
 phers — appear to settle the matter, and seem 
 prepared for every change, for all the contin- 
 gencies which so great a change will bring to 
 them. 
 
 But as the days decrease, there is a restless- 
 ness, and excitability hidden from each other, 
 which their daughters see and share with them. 
 
 Eunice and Damaris have thought of their 
 future also, have consulted father and mother, 
 have declined, accepted, proposed a compromise, 
 and finally have agreed at their parents' wish 
 to go. 
 
 They are old enough to know what is best 
 for themselves ; they have a dream or two in 
 their minds concerning the future also, and 
 those with whom they are about to part ; they 
 are to a certain extent philosophers, like their 
 parents. They have lived the life of the vagrants, 
 
 N 2
 
 180 NO man's friend. 
 
 and are in advance of their years ; thev are 
 thoughtful women at times, and to the thoughts 
 of bettering their condition they are resigned at 
 last. Not without a struggle, for there has 
 been love in the midst of this family, and its 
 members have worked side by side, borne 
 privations, sickness, hunger together, shared the 
 applause of the crowd, the scorn of not a^few, 
 seen the world, and suffered from contact with 
 its hard corners. 
 
 Mrs. Worcester, all philosophy to her hus- 
 band, becomes the reckless, dissatisfied woman 
 to her children as the days grow less between 
 them. The decision has been made known to 
 Mr. Harland at last, and the news comes back 
 that in the evening the children will be fetched 
 away ! 
 
 Mrs. Worcester, albeit a woman with some 
 virtues, is at her worst then. She has made 
 up her mind to see no more of her girls 
 — she has promised not to see them again, 
 without Mr. Harland's permission, which will 
 not be granted whilst they remain children ; 
 when they are young woman she will not be 
 able to face them, and facing them, she will 
 find them proud, cold, and repellent. They will
 
 THE ELVAXI FAMILY BROKE^S^ UP. 181 
 
 have been taught to look down upon her by 
 that time! 
 
 " You are glad to go, Damaris ? " she says, 
 fretfully ; " you never did care for us and our 
 way of living. This is an escape ! " 
 
 Damaris is not demonstrative. She makes 
 no indignant denial of her mother's assertion 
 she .is self-possessed in her way, and is very 
 thoughtful to the end. 
 
 " We shall be able to help you better, when 
 there are better chances for us." 
 
 " You don't think that you are losing us for 
 good — you don't fret about that ! " 
 
 " Oh ! it is not for good," answers Damaris ; 
 " I don't see that I am of much use to you — I 
 have never been of any use." 
 
 "Why, your voice w^as everything to us, 
 Damaris," says her father here ; " we should not 
 have got on without your voice, or turned in so 
 many fourpenny pieces. Take care of it — it 
 may be of help to you when other things fail, 
 after all." 
 
 " Ah ! talk to her about the profession," Mrs. 
 W^orcester says, ironically ; " we all know how 
 your voice got you on in the world, when you 
 wanted to live by it."
 
 182 NO man's friend. 
 
 *' My clear — I think, under present circum- 
 stances, we'll drop that subject." 
 
 " We have enough to think about, without it. 
 Now, you girls." She beckons them to her 
 again, and begins to talk rapidly and with no 
 small excitement. She has a long, bony throat, 
 and a something runs up and down within it as 
 she speaks, and is perceptible to her observers. 
 
 " Now, you girls," she says, with much ges- 
 ticulation, " whether you're sorry or glad, does 
 not matter much. I hope you're sorry for us, 
 Eunice — glad for yourself. Damaris I never 
 could make out ; she's not like other children. 
 I don't believe she'll be like other women. But 
 you mustn't go away without advice, wiiatever 
 I think, or whatever both of us, father and 
 mother, may feel. Don't forget — " 
 
 "Mother, we are not likely to forget you," 
 cries Eunice, as Mrs. Worcester pauses; "we 
 are not babies — we shall always remember — we 
 shall come back." 
 
 " God forbid !" cries the mother; "that's all 
 nonsense — don't think of that, whatever I may 
 have said. We don't want you back — back to 
 poverty, with fine notions in your head ; why you 
 had better not go away at all."
 
 THE ELVANI FAMILY BROKEN UP. 183 
 
 "Well, we will make our fortunes, and you 
 shall come to us, mother," is the quick consola- 
 tion. 
 
 " Ah ! that's better, Eunice ; think of that — 
 try for that ! " says the mother, with excitement. 
 " I was going to advise you about that, when 
 you interrupted me, as you always do. I never, 
 in all my life, was allowed to speak my mind, 
 without interruption! You, girls, will see Mr. 
 Harland in time ; don't forget that he is your 
 uncle, and that he is very rich and can make 
 you so. There, there, never mind about me or 
 your father, either of you. You must find your 
 father in the man who is about to give you a 
 a chance. He's not a very hard man, after all ; 
 he can't be. I mind the time wdien he was a 
 generous and kind body, if a little odd in his 
 way always. You two pay him every respect — 
 follow his wishes in everything ; learn all that 
 you can at school ; try all that you can to forget 
 the past and us, and become ladies — real ladies, 
 worthy of the man who takes you from us, and 
 pushes us back like a — like a wise man, of 
 course ! He's quite right — I don't say a word 
 against him, mind — he's been very kind to think 
 of us at all, to save you two at least. Worcester,
 
 184 NO man's friend. 
 
 you fool ! why don't you say something, instead 
 of sitting on that table swinging your legs 
 about ? " 
 
 Mr. Worcester looks piteously towards her. 
 
 " Don't ask me to do anything," he says, 
 '' I'm not in the humour — I'm knocked over, 
 clean. I didn't think it would be quite so hard 
 a job to part with them for their good ; it's 
 only thinking what they are, and what they 
 would have grown up with us, that satisfies me ; 
 or, by God ! we would all four make a bolt of 
 it at once ! " 
 
 " You can't expect our feelings to be studied 
 very much," his wife remarks. 
 
 ^' Well— no." 
 
 "Then hold your tongue, and don't try to 
 unsettle these two children. You don't find 
 me grumbling, Worcester; I'm made of 
 granite." 
 
 " It has often struck me so. You never 
 made proper allowances for human weakness — 
 you understand, but don't sympathize with hu- 
 man nature — a curious woman rather. And 
 Damaris is going, who used to take my part 
 when you were a trifle too hard ; and Eunice, 
 who was clever at creating a diversion and
 
 THE ELVANI FAMILY BROKEN UP. 185 
 
 changing the old subject to a new one ; both 
 whisked away at once, and we two left to fight 
 it out together." 
 
 His under-lip quivers, and Mrs. Worcester 
 says sharply : 
 
 " To fight on together now, Worcester, proud 
 of the sacrifice we make for the good of these 
 outcasts." 
 
 Damaris suddenly touches her mother's arm, 
 and whispers : 
 
 " You will take care of him ? " 
 
 " Why — what do you mean by that ? Haven't 
 I always ? " 
 
 " Yes ; but in a different way now, you 
 know." 
 
 " I stop behind to take care of him, Damaris. 
 Worcester," to her husband, "you hear what 
 this girl is talking about ? " 
 
 " No ; I don't hear." 
 
 Mrs. Worcester tells him ; and he suddenly 
 puts the worn sleeve of his coat before his eyes, 
 and sobs so hard, that Damaris runs to him, no 
 longer cold and passive. 
 
 *' Ask me to stay, father, and I will ! I don't 
 care for myself in this any more tlian Eunice 
 does ; and if you can't bear that I shall go, why
 
 186' NO man's friexd. 
 
 let me stay behind. Eunice will grow up a 
 lady for all our sakes, and be our friend in time, 
 when she can be, and when we want her/' 
 
 " No, no ; let me be. It's all right, we'll all 
 try it. When it don't suit, or I can't get on 
 with your — without you," he corrects, " we can 
 fall back to our old positions on the instant. 
 It is worth a trial, and I am all right enough." 
 
 *' And here's the carriage," says Mrs. Worces- 
 ter, " two carriages, surely ! He said they were 
 to be parted, these two girls, and they're going 
 away at once to separate schools." 
 
 " That's what the boxes on the roof mean, 
 mother," says Eunice. " Oh ! I think we might 
 have been trusted together, Damaris and I." 
 
 " That's that man Searle's doings, — he's as 
 suspicious as his master, and as cold-hearted in 
 his experiments. I don't like him," mutters 
 Mrs. Worcester. 
 
 " I fancy he thinks that Damaris will get on 
 better without me. Damaris is his favourite 
 already ! " says Eunice, thoughtfully. 
 
 " Why he has never said a word to me ; and, 
 like mother, I don't like him," Damaris 
 replies. 
 
 " Hush, hush, don't repeat that ! " cries the
 
 THE ELVAXI FAMILY BEOKEN UP. 187 
 
 mother, ** he is the man who has the ear of Mr. 
 Harland, and can thwart us at every turn. You 
 must try and like him too. He means well, I 
 daresay." 
 
 "He don't like me," explains Eunice, "be- 
 cause I told him stories when he first came here, 
 and I wanted to make the best of it ; but — " 
 
 A knock at the door, and a head peering 
 into the room, after the summons from within 
 to enter. 
 
 "Are the young ladies ready?" asks the 
 head. 
 
 " Yes ; just ready," says Mrs. Worcester ; 
 " have you any message for us ? " 
 " Yes ; a letter from Mr. Harland." 
 Mrs. Worcester opens the letter, glances at 
 its contents, and then crumples it in her hand 
 and consigns it to the depths of her pocket. 
 
 " A hundred instructions from Mr. Searle, — 
 the rules by which we have promised to abide, 
 and which he has drawn up in black and white 
 at Mr. Harland's dictation, and has kept a copy 
 of, he tells us," she explains, looking at her 
 husband, who nods his head over the shoulder 
 of Damaris whom he holds in his arms. 
 
 " There, go now, girls," says Mrs. Worcester,
 
 ]88- NO man's friend. 
 
 hysterically, " and do the best for yourselves that 
 you can. We can have your addresses when 
 we like and we feel discontented, they say ; so 
 if we're, we're very unhappy, we can fetch you 
 back and begin the singing at the fairs and 
 races again. Eunice," she cries in a higher key 
 as her arms close round the younger daughter, 
 "you will be stronger, wiser than Damaris, — 
 keep her strong, and keep her pride down, — see 
 after her ; love her for ever when you are sisters 
 again, and those cruel people will let you meet. 
 I said forget us if you could; but don't do that, 
 girl ! Don't grow too proud to think of us, and 
 what we have given up for both your sakes. 
 After all, we haven't been so very unhappy, con- 
 sidering, and we may be all together again, years 
 hence. I'll pray to God so, to-night, — will 
 you?" 
 
 " Yes, yes ; with all my heart." 
 
 " Not together as we have been ; not like that, 
 of course. In any way but that. Oh! if we 
 should never see each other again, — but we 
 shall, we must! It isn't natural to give up 
 everything for the sake of a better position ; 
 and, thank God, we shall hear of you, know 
 how you are, and where you are. Why don't
 
 THE ELYANI FAMILY BROKEIS' UP. 189 
 
 you go away now ! " she cries, impatiently. 
 " Where's Damaris ? Has she so much to say 
 to the father, and nothing to me ! " 
 
 Damaris is in her arms at this appeal, and 
 Eunice passes to her father. 
 
 " You never loved me as Eunice did," says 
 the mother, wiping her eyes with the back of 
 her hand. 
 
 " Yes, yes ; but you loved Eunice best," 
 explains Damaris, " and he wanted love and 
 pity very much, and so I turned to him. Poor 
 father, what will he do ? " 
 
 " Leave him to me, Damaris. I will do my 
 best. I have always been the best of wives." 
 
 " Heigh o ! — yes." 
 
 " Good-bye. God bless you both in your new 
 lives, and keep you good," sobs forth the mother; 
 " this is a hard parting, but for the best, — the 
 very best. In the future, not a word of the 
 past life to any one. Mr. Harland's nieces — • 
 not our children any — any more ! Worcester, 
 you're like a baby, and I'm — I'm heartily 
 ashamed of you." 
 
 So the parting comes at last — is over ; and 
 the children of the Worcesters, — the support 
 of the Elvani family — have passed away to
 
 190 . NO man's friend. 
 
 their new lives, leaving husband and wife alone 
 in the world. 
 
 Is the parting for a few years, or for all 
 time? 
 
 Mr. Worcester thinks the latter. 
 
 " I don't believe," he says, as he steps from 
 the high road into the hoase again, " that we 
 shall ever set eyes on them again."
 
 BOOK II. 
 
 D A M A E I S .
 
 ( 193 ) 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 MR. HARLAND IS HIMSELF AGAIN. 
 
 Seven years in a book is a longer stride than 
 seven years in a life. In the life we look back 
 and sigh, "Can it be so long ago?" Over the 
 book we shake our heads and say, " This is too 
 great a lapse of time, and this is beginning 
 again, just as we have settled down to our 
 scenes and our characters." And yet both 
 but the turning of a page: yesterday, but chil- 
 dren; to-day, in the front of life, looking out for 
 life's prizes, ah ! and with children of our own 
 to think about. And this not the beginning 
 again of our story, reader, but the first chapter 
 of our story proper. 
 
 Seven years, then, since the Elvani family 
 were broken up for good, and our characters 
 drifted separate ways — since Damaris and 
 Eunice were offered their chances of better- 
 
 VOL. I.
 
 194 NO man's friend. 
 
 ing themselves, and accepted not unwillingly 
 those offers — since young Mat Ranwick was 
 sent to a finishing school at the expense of a 
 man somewhat grateful for past attention to his 
 son — since Mr. Harland gained sixteen thou- 
 sand pounds for damages in a railway accident 
 — since Mr. Searle left for the Brazils, and 
 the Worcesters, jjere et mere, for the outer 
 darkness into which Mr. Harland's ultimatum 
 had consigned them — since all these and more 
 of our characters sniffed the sea-breeze from 
 the tall cliffs at Westbourne. 
 
 Seven years afterwards, — almost to the 
 day, for it was the end of September — when 
 Mr. Harland gave his dinner-party in Eaton 
 Square. It was rather a grand dinner-party, 
 with some style about it, though simply the 
 dinner of a city man who had waxed fat with 
 profit and migrated west. 
 
 There were no celebrities at this dinner — 
 Mr. Harland knew no celebrities, and detested 
 people w^ho were popular and poor. He did 
 not want rank, science, or art, poetry, paint- 
 ing, or belles lettres represented at his feasts ; 
 he had no sympathy with anything but com- 
 merce, and they w^ere men of commerce whom
 
 MR. HARLAXD IS HIMSELF AGAIN. 195 
 
 he had summoned to bis table that night, — that 
 dark, dreary night -in September, when the 
 winter seemed to have come before its time 
 into the square, to nip at the calves of the 
 coachmen and footmen waiting their masters' 
 pleasure to leave the good wines of Reuben 
 Harland, or the good wives and daughters of 
 city men in that drawing-room above stairs. 
 
 A grand dinner-party it had been — for we 
 come in at the dessert, after the ladies have 
 retired — but purely a business affair, under the 
 rose. Therefore, to a certain extent, an odd 
 assemblage of men who dealt largely with 
 the house of Harland, and who might, perhaps, 
 be tempted to make rash bargains, after drink- 
 ing deeply of Mr. Harland's wine. Not asked 
 to trade in any way, however — asked out of 
 friendship for the matter of that, and to bring 
 their wives, sons, and daughters — but business 
 not tabooed if any individual pleased to start 
 the topic. They were talking of business 
 everywhere over the . dessert, bright- eyed, 
 eager-faced men, who always went out with 
 their "shop" to dinner, and loved to talk 
 of shop at all times and seasons, and were 
 but happy huckstering. 
 
 o2
 
 196 NO man's friend. 1 
 
 Mr. Harland had probably made his dinner- 
 party pay, for the gentleman on his right was 
 talking of tens of thousands, and Mr. Harland 
 was entering something in his note-book. Mr. 
 Harland dealt in everything Brazilian, was 
 great in Brazilian diamonds, was a large holder 
 of Brazilian bonds and Brazilian stock of all 
 kinds, discounted bills for out-of-the-way people 
 at Brazil, and was rumoured to have a great 
 deal to do with Brazilian banks, mines, and 
 railways. 
 
 Mr. Harland had altered for the better since 
 the old days at Westbourne. Mr. Harland 
 was himself again ; almost the man whom city 
 folk and Mr. Searle knew, but whom our 
 readers do not, before the accident crushed 
 him and killed his son. A man with rather 
 a saturnine expression of countenance still as 
 he sat at the head of the table, but with quick, 
 bead-like eyes, that were wonderful in their 
 powers of observance. Quick eyes, allied 
 to hands that were never still, but which 
 drummed upon the table, took up nutcrackers, 
 dessert knives, and wine glasses, strayed through 
 his scanty black hair — Mr. Harland had grown 
 "thin on the top" — went frequently to his under-
 
 ^MR. HARLAND IS HIMSELF AGAIN. 197 
 
 lip and chin, where on one or another they 
 hovered nervously until a fresh attraction pre- 
 sented itself. He had been a very quick and bust- 
 ling man at forty years of age and till the time 
 of his accident — and that rapidity was now con- 
 fined to the upper extremities, for he had never 
 gained the free use of his legs, and there was 
 an unpleasant drag about them when he rose 
 and made his way with difficulty across a room. 
 Still he had changed vastly for the better since 
 the Westbourne days, and that apathy which 
 had marked his character at the time, and 
 which, warned by his doctor, he had fought 
 hard to assume, was no longer part and parcel 
 of his new existence. He was the long-headed, 
 keen-sio'hted Mr. Harland attain in business life 
 — and iiis life was nearly all business now ; he 
 had nothing else to live for, he told people 
 caustically sometimes, although people of late 
 years did not implicitly believe him. He was 
 careful of his money still, proud of himself 
 and his position, sceptical of human good, and 
 rather more suspicious than ever of human 
 motives, and there, with a few eccentricities 
 to be hereafter recorded, hangs our portrait of 
 Reuben Harland at the age of forty-seven.
 
 198 NO man's friend. 
 
 It was not till the wines were low in the 
 decanters for the third time, and even business 
 talk was flagging, that Mr. Harland suggested 
 that they should join the ladies. All healths 
 had been drunk — nearly every guest had had an 
 especial toast to his credit, and there was nothing 
 more to stop for. One or two of the guests were 
 red about the eyelids, but still went steadily 
 enough upstairs. Mr. Harland walked un- 
 steadily and painfully, although he had imbibed 
 nothing but claret since the cloth had been 
 removed — but he had walked thus for six 
 years and a half, and had been grateful for that 
 privilege after nine months' Bath chairs, and 
 footmen carrying him up and down stairs like 
 a Guy Fawkes. Not quite so grateful now, 
 perhaps, for he had become used to his better 
 estate, and even inclined to consider it hard 
 that he could not walk about as freely as 
 other men, and enjoy life like the rest of his 
 species. 
 
 A tall young man, singularly handsome and 
 singularly well-dressed, though he wore but the 
 full-dress livery that the age required, stepped 
 towards him before he had made many paces 
 to the door, and offered him his arm.
 
 ME. HARLAND IS HIMSELF AGAIN. 199 
 
 " Thank you, Matthew, I can manage for 
 myself," he said, with a less degree of harshness 
 in his voice than usual. "I shall be in the 
 drawing-room in good time — quite time enough 
 for me. Where's my nephew? " 
 
 " A little way ahead, sir." 
 
 ^' He is more of a lady's man than you are, 
 Matthew." 
 
 " I don't know, sir," answered the other with 
 a laugh. " I am rather fond of ladies after 
 business hours." 
 
 . "Ay — after business hours — not before. I 
 don't think that I need blame either Edwin 
 or yourself for neglecting business for the 
 women. That's a good sign too. Matthew." 
 
 ^*Mr. Harland." 
 
 " I think I'll take your arm — the cursed 
 stairs are tiresome after all, and I've been down 
 them to-day once more than usual," he said, 
 laying a thin kite's-claw of a hand upon the 
 young man's arm; "now then, and don't take 
 such infernal strides." 
 
 Upstairs the rich man and the rich man's 
 clerk — for that is their degree of business 
 relationship — proceeded together, the visitors 
 flowing on in front towards the lighted room*
 
 200 NO man's friend. 
 
 whence tlie music of a piano welled forth 
 melodiously. 
 
 " I expected Mr. Searle to dinner to-night, 
 but he hasn't come, Matthew," said Mr. Har- 
 land, as they continued their slow way. " The 
 ship was sighted yesterday." 
 
 " I hope that he has left everything satis- 
 factory at Rio Janeiro," said Matthew. 
 
 " He would not have left without, you may 
 be sure," replied the employer. 
 
 '' I suppose not." 
 
 " I haven't seen that fellow for nearly seven 
 years," mused Mr. Harland ; " for seven years 
 has he been making money for us in Brazil, 
 and working our branch in good fashion. I 
 don't know a business man whose example I can 
 better recommend you to follow than Lewis 
 Searle's, take it all together." 
 
 "I will do my best to imitate him, Mr. 
 Harland. With a fair copy before me, I dare- 
 say that I shall succeed in life." 
 
 " Be steady, persevering, quiet, and you are 
 sure to succeed in our business. I will see, 
 Matthew, that you do succeed." 
 
 "Ah! sir — you are more than good, or just 
 to me."
 
 MR. HARLAND IS HIMSELF AGAIN. 201 
 
 " Yes — that's very likely," was the dry 
 response. 
 
 " I do not suppose that I should know Mr. 
 Searle again," said young Matthew Ranwick — 
 for it was that gentleman who was a guest in 
 Mr. Harland's grand house. " I have a faint 
 remembrance of a wiry, dark- faced man, with 
 piercing eyes." 
 
 "Eyes that pierce like fate — I never liked 
 them," muttered Mr. Harland ; " still, a good 
 servant and worth copying. Not in his manners, 
 ^for they are abominably abrupt ; not in his tem- 
 per, for I consider it upon the whole a bad one 
 and an aggravating one ; but simply and purely 
 in his business habits. You will see him very 
 frequently at the office after this; he will be 
 your master, for the present, Matthew, and you 
 must be humble and obedient." 
 
 "Trust me." 
 
 " Searle likes obedience — I wonder whether 
 seven years have altered him very much ! An 
 odd, unpleasant beggar after business, and there- 
 fore I'm not particularly sorry that he has not 
 come to dinner ; but in business, remember, 
 Matthew Ranwick, the model that I recommend 
 
 you.
 
 202 NO man's friend. 
 
 Matthew Ran wick bowed. Any recom- 
 mendation of Mr. Harland's it would be the 
 young man's greatest pleasure to follow, was 
 implied by that reverent inclination of the 
 head. 
 
 Certainly a striking couple as they passed 
 into the drawing-room together, their contiguity 
 the cause of much whispering as they advanced. 
 The thin, spare, sallow man, creeping slowly, and 
 by the aid of a stick and his clerk's arm to his 
 place, a contrast in everything to the tall, well- 
 shapen youth of one-and-twenty at his side. 
 
 The room was full of light and life ; the 
 dresses of the ladies were rich and costly, as 
 befitted the better halves of city merchants, 
 and there were diamonds enough for all Brazil 
 in head-dresses, necklaces, and ear-rings. If 
 Mr. Harland did not mix in " good society," at 
 least he mixed in society that could buy up 
 half the estates of those " stuck-ups " who 
 sneered at wholesale bargainers. 
 
 Matthew Ranwick saw his principal to an 
 easy chair that had been placed for him near the 
 fire burning in its grate of ormolu and steel, 
 and then seemed to stand on tiptoe for an 
 instant, as if by elevating himself above the
 
 MR. HARLAND IS HIMSELF AGAIX. 203 
 
 heads of the assembled company, he might per- 
 ceive more clearly the proper course to follow, 
 or the proper person to whom his inclination 
 might direct him. 
 
 Yes, a handsome man enough — bright in his 
 youth and strength, and with a face that envious 
 men might covet. Not a face so strictly hand- 
 some, that its features would bear that uncom- 
 fortable process of " picking to pieces," in which 
 lady critics are wont to indulge as they sit at 
 the side-scenes of society, with their friends 
 -parading before them, but a face that struck 
 people with its expression as well as its good 
 looks. It was a keen face — the nose was straight 
 and thin, the eyes were somewhat deep set, but 
 were earnest, large grey eyes that observed a 
 great deal, and were indicative of a great amount 
 of penetration ; the forehead was broad and 
 massive, and surmounted by a mass of waving 
 brown hair, which might have been more 
 fashionable had it been cut more short, and 
 would have become a poet's head better than 
 a merchant's clerk. The lips were too thin 
 perhaps, for perfection, and the chin too sharp, 
 but the complexion of the man was so radiant, 
 and the whole face seemed lit up with so much
 
 204 NO man's friend. 
 
 intelligence, that few were the strangers there 
 who did not whisper at first sight of him, 
 "Who's that? Who is he?" 
 
 He was perfectly at home in Eaton Square ; 
 . he was a man who made himself at home any- 
 where, it might have been perceived ; probably 
 a man who, with a very good opinion of him- 
 self and his abilities, considered himself a match 
 for most men whom he encountered. He w^as 
 a young man, too, who had begun life early for 
 himself, and was at his office desk at seventeen 
 years of age ; he had succeeded in pleasing his 
 master and superiors by his energy and general 
 aptitude for business, and he wore that peculiar 
 look of general confidence, which early beginners 
 who have faith in themselves habitually wear. 
 Certainly, no nervousness, no reserve, no awk- 
 wardness in the face of society were to be seen 
 in Matthew Ranwick. 
 
 The ladies whispered concerning him as he 
 made his way through the crowded drawing- 
 room : a few old ones were satirical, and a few 
 more full of wonder at Mr. Harland's fancy. One 
 young lady, tall, stately, and beautiful, — a bril- 
 liant brunette as the phrase runs, — seemed glad 
 to see him again as he advanced and addressed
 
 MR. HAELAND IS HIMSELF AGAIX. 205 
 
 a few words to her, cutting in, somewhat uncere- 
 moniously perhaps, • upon a conversation that 
 she had been holding with a very thin, middle- 
 sized, flaxen-haired young man, who was great 
 in diamond studs and who evidently had the re- 
 sponsibility of his shirt front upon his mind. 
 Meanwhile a tall man, swarthy enough for an 
 Indian, and with hair, eyebrows, and thin 
 moustache as black as night, had suddenly ap- 
 peared in evening dress at the door of the 
 drawing-room, had looked round for an instant 
 as though taking stock of the guests, and then 
 had dropped into a seat near the door, and 
 commenced a series of the most alarming 
 yawns, hidden from general observation by the 
 voluminous skirts of a lady in blue silk, above 
 which rose a fair, fat, white back and a head- 
 dress of Valenciennes. 
 
 He yawned perceptibly at last, and gave 
 vent to a low, long kind of wail, that startled 
 the blue silk in advance. 
 
 "Oh! dear, what's .that," ejaculated the 
 wearer, and veering gracefully round, a well- 
 preserved lady of forty looked down upon the 
 tall man in the chair before her. 
 
 '' Bless me ! is it — is it, Mr.Searle?" she asked
 
 206 NO man's friend. 
 
 and then, sure of her identity, she extended one 
 gloved hand towards him. Mr. Searle rose and 
 bowed over it like a gentleman of the old 
 school, smiling very faintly at the recognition. 
 
 " Welcome back again to England, Mr. 
 Searle." 
 
 " Thank you, Mrs. Courtenay." 
 
 " What a traveller you are, to be sure ! — to- 
 day in England, yesterday in an out-of-the-way 
 quarter of the world amongst savages and man- 
 eaters. I often wish that I was a man, that I 
 might travel from pole to pole, Mr. Searle." 
 
 " And see the man-eaters ? Well, they are 
 pretty sights." 
 
 "Have you spoken to my brother-in-law 
 yet?" 
 
 " Not yet. I w^as resting after a long journey, 
 Mrs. Courtenay, and I thought Mr. Harland's 
 greeting would keep for awhile. I don't know 
 why I have come to-night. I'm not fond of 
 a soiree fantastiquer 
 
 "A what?" inquired Mrs. Courtenay. 
 
 " Mr. Harland mentioned the affair in a flying 
 note to me, yesterday," he said in a dreamy 
 manner, and without replying to her question ; 
 " and here I am."
 
 MR. HARLAND IS HIMSELF AGAIN. 207 
 
 ^ " How long have you been in England ? " 
 
 " We touched at an English seaport yesterday 
 evening." 
 
 " And you have been away seven years ? How 
 pleased you must be to come back to your 
 native land ! " 
 
 " I was born in the Brazils," he said quietly. 
 
 " Ah ! yes. I had forgotten. But this is like 
 your native land, of course. This is the home 
 of your adoption — of the brave and the free." 
 
 " It's a decent kind of place ; but I am more 
 used to the Brazils, though it's very doubtful if 
 I return there ever again. Will you take this 
 seat?" 
 
 ''Thank you, no." 
 
 " Well, with your permission, I will," he 
 said, reseating himself " Now if I could get 
 forty winks quietly here, just to sleep off the 
 rattle, rattle of the train, I should be as bright 
 as day again." 
 
 "You don't want to sleep here, Mr. Searle?" 
 inquired the lady. 
 
 "Well, to compose myself, then. Travel 
 upsets one's ideas." 
 
 " I used to fancy that you were always com- 
 posed," said Mrs. Courtenay.
 
 208 NO man's friend. 
 
 " I was vain of beinor thouo^ht cool and 
 collected, that was all. Now, less disturbs me 
 than it used; but then, I am getting grey and 
 old fashioned." 
 
 Mrs. Courtenay glanced at his black hair, and 
 he laughed for the first time. 
 
 " Upon my word, the grey lines are streaking 
 me, though I have artfully disposed of them this 
 evening, as Rachel might have done for me had 
 I left home before coming here." 
 
 " Who's Rachel ? " suddenly asked Mrs. 
 Courtenay, in evident surprise. 
 
 " And so the ravages that the enemy makes 
 upon us are hidden with consummate tact," 
 continued Mr. Searle, without paying any heed 
 to her interrogative again ; " we both wear 
 pretty well for middle-aged people, perhaps." 
 
 *' My gracious ! what a remark." 
 
 "In you, I don't see that difference which 
 seven years have made in me; but you don't 
 smoke hard, and you haven't been worried by 
 business or dried up by suns that blaze un- 
 mercifully over the other side. Only the natural 
 thickness of my head has saved me from a sun- 
 stroke, I believe." 
 
 " You don't look more than your age, Mr.
 
 MR. HARLAND IS HTMSELF AGAIN. 209 
 
 Searle," said Mrs. Courtenay, suddenly taking a 
 seat that had been vacated by his side, " for all 
 your travels and anxieties." 
 
 " Not anxieties," he corrected, " for I make a 
 point never to have any." 
 
 " How can you help them ? " 
 
 " I can't have them," he reiterated, " the 
 whole thing is an impossibility." 
 
 "Can't have troubles!" exclaimed Mrs. 
 Courtenay, wonderingly ; " my dear sir, it is 
 very profane to talk like that ! " 
 
 *' None the less true, despite the profanity," 
 said Mr. Searle ; " who's that little swell with 
 the diamonds, bobbing about on tiptoe like a 
 ballet-master ? " 
 
 " That's my son Edwin," said Mrs. Courtenay, 
 with emphasis and dignity. 
 
 " Oh ! I beg pardon," answered Mr. Searle. 
 "I was not aware of that, or I should not 
 have put so rude a question to you. Shall I 
 turn it into a compliment ? " 
 
 " How can you ? " 
 
 " Why, to be a swell, implies a high position 
 in society, — a position that impresses observers ; 
 and ballet-masters are the perfection of grace, 
 and so we come round to the sublime." 
 
 VOL. I. p
 
 210 xo :max's friend. 
 
 '*Ah," said Mrs. Courtenay, fluttering her fan, 
 " I don't understand you, quite. You were 
 always fond of riddles, and I never could make 
 out when you were in jest or earnest." 
 
 " Life's a jest, — I'm a funny man, or," he 
 corrected, "perhaps I am used up, like Sir 
 Charles Coldstream." 
 
 " Or been cruelly treated in your youth, like 
 Byron's Lara ? " 
 
 Mr. Searle flinched. That was the one 
 home-thrust which he seemed to feel that 
 evening, although he answered very coolly the 
 next instant, — 
 
 " Or have cruelly treated other people, like 
 Byron's Manfred, — or have had a wife that 
 would not behave herself, like Kotzebue's 
 Stranger ; but pray don't think me a man with 
 a mystery, Mrs. Courtenay. I object to indi- 
 viduals in cloaks, on the stage or off" it. To 
 think that I should have come all these miles 
 to tell you that, this evening ! To walk into 
 Mr. Ilarland's house in Eaton Square for the 
 news of the day and to gain a comprehen- 
 sive view of things in general, and then to sit 
 down in a corner with you, of all women in the 
 world, and talk about myself ! "
 
 MR. HARLA^D IS HIMSELF AGAIN". 211 
 
 " It is strange," said Mrs. Courtenay, " why 
 don't you go to Mr. Harland and hear the news 
 then ? " 
 
 " Want of inclination, I suppose. I shall 
 have enough of Mr. Harland presently. Tell 
 me all the news yourself, please, whilst these 
 people are standing about and hiding me from 
 the master." 
 
 " The news of the last seven years ? " 
 
 "The saints forbid," cried Mr. Searle, "no; 
 the news of the day — give me the general 
 position of affairs here, and then let me slip out 
 at the door and go home. I am not disposed 
 for company to-night." 
 
 "Only for the company of a middle-aged 
 woman like me," said ^Mrs. Courtenay. 
 
 "Ah! you speak bitterly," answered this 
 strange man ; " you are not repining at middle 
 age — looking back regretfully at the youth that 
 has left you ?^" 
 
 " Why should I ? " said she. " It was not a 
 happy youth — it was full of disappointments." 
 
 " Still, you might regret it ; if mis-spent, for 
 nstance." 
 
 "Was your youth spent wisely?" was the 
 quick retort here. 
 
 p2
 
 212 NO man's friend. 
 
 " Yes ; T think it was," replied Mr. Searle. 
 " Now, will you oblige me with the news ? " 
 
 " Oh ! certainly." 
 
 Mrs. Courtenay tossed her luxuriant ringlets, 
 and began.
 
 ( 213 ) 
 
 CHAPTER 11. 
 
 MRS. COURTENAY TELLS THE NEWS. 
 
 " I DARESAY you know the news as well as I 
 do," she commences ; " you have not been em- 
 ployed all these years in Mr. Harland's service — 
 at home and abroad — without knowing all that 
 appertains to the business." 
 
 "I have tried to know all." 
 
 " You know that Mr. Harland has serious 
 thoughts of taking my Edwin into partner- 
 ship ? " 
 
 "Yes," he answered slowly, "the news has 
 reached me even in Brazil — when will the affair 
 come off?" 
 
 " When Edwin is twenty-two, or there- 
 abouts." 
 
 " He will step into a splendid position with 
 ease and grace," remarked Mr. Searle. " I hope 
 that he will do justice to the house."
 
 214 NO man's friend. 
 
 " He is clever, don't you think ? " 
 
 " I can't say ; I have had no business con- 
 nection with your son ; he entered the house 
 after I had left England. That is your son 
 with the studs, you say ? " 
 
 " Yes ; that is he," said Mrs. Courtenay, 
 crossly; "why do you keep alluding to his 
 studs ? " 
 
 "What is his salary?" 
 
 " Four hundred a-year." 
 
 " Mr. Harland is extremely liberal with his 
 relations. Four hundred a-year — well, I hope 
 he's worth it." 
 
 " Sir ! " 
 
 " And which is Mr. Ranwick — is that gentle- 
 man here this evening ? " 
 
 *' Yes; that is Mr. Ranwick, talking to Mr. 
 Harland's niece." 
 
 " And which is the niece ? " 
 
 " The tall, dark-eyed girl by the piano." 
 
 " Oh ! indeed ; and that is Mr. Ranwick ? 
 well, he has a fine head of his own." 
 
 **It was a very lucky day for him when his 
 godfathers and godmothers christened him 
 Matthew," said Mrs. Courtenay, between her 
 teeth.
 
 MRS. COURTEXAY TELLS THE NEWS. 215 
 
 " Yes ; I daresay. Ranwick — Matthew Ran- 
 wick. Ah ! I remember now the beginning 
 of the storj. I used to wonder in Brazil where 
 I had heard the name." 
 
 " Mr. Harland took him into the office when 
 he had finished his schooling, and pushed him 
 forward — actually put him over the head of my 
 Edwin, till I remonstrated, and Edwin remon- 
 strated. The notice that Mr. Harland takes of 
 Mr. Ranwick is absurd and ludicrous. I cannot 
 understand it." 
 
 " A shrewd, clever young fellow, certainly." 
 
 " How do you know ? " 
 
 '' He conducts the correspondence department 
 — I have had many letters from him — short, 
 crisp, and to the purpose, without any circumlo- 
 cution-; a regular business man, young Ranwick." 
 
 Mrs. Courtenay did not like to hear this 
 praise. It was evident that the name of Ran- 
 wick was already distasteful to her, and she 
 writhed perceptibly beneath Louis Searle's 
 encomiums. 
 
 " I don't know much about business," she 
 said ; " we do not come of a business family. 
 His manners are obtrusive — painfully obtrusive 
 in society."
 
 216 xo man's friend. 
 
 " Poor society ! " moaned Mr. Serale. 
 
 Mrs. Courtenay half rose to leave Mr. Searle 
 to himself after this ; altered her intention, and 
 sat down again. 
 
 " You are aware that he will probably be 
 taken into partnership at the same time ? " she 
 said, spitefully. " Mr. Harland is not slow to 
 reward faithful servants." 
 
 " No ; a little too quick, possibly," replied 
 Mr. Searle, swinging one of his kid gloves by 
 the tips of its fingers, and looking steadily at 
 the carpet, "but the firm wants new blood in 
 it, and Harland, Ran wick, and Courtenay is not 
 a bad sounding name." 
 
 " Courtenay last, of course ! " 
 
 " Courtenay and Ran wick can toss up for 
 precedence ; and Ranwick being in luck's way, 
 will win. Now for Mr. Harland's niece ? " 
 
 "You kno^v all about her, as well as about 
 the business, I daresay. What is the good of 
 asking me for news ? " 
 
 "News domestic is never imparted to me. 
 Everything concerning Miss Worcester will be 
 genuine news indeed." 
 
 " Miss Harland she is called here." 
 
 '*Miss Harland — ah! proceed, please."
 
 MRS. COURTENAY TELLS THE NEWS. 217 
 
 " My brother-in-law went a long way out of 
 his road to find this niece." 
 
 "How long has she been here?" 
 
 " Three years now. Why, would you believe 
 it, she has been at school for several years before 
 that, — finishing at his expense ? " 
 
 Mr. Searle tried to look astonished. 
 
 "And there's another one, but Mr. Harland 
 don't like her at all, and seldom asks her to his 
 house." 
 
 " Where is she ? " 
 
 " Oh ! I don't know now — I have not in- 
 quired," answered Mrs. Courtenay. "One of 
 the nieces is quite enough to be interested in. 
 The mother, you must know, made a low 
 marriage, and is not recognized by her brother, 
 who is proud enough when he likes — and this 
 girl will probably become my brother's heiress, 
 if she play her cards as well to the end as she 
 has done from the beginning. I detest time- 
 serving, even in relations." 
 
 " It is a bad sign of. the hollowness of the 
 age, and yet you wonder why I dislike the 
 world. So Damaris plays her cards well." 
 
 "How did you know her name was Damaris? " 
 
 " It is familiar to me in some way. What
 
 218 NO man's friend. 
 
 an annoyance this sudden appearance of the 
 next of kin must have caused you ? " 
 
 " It would have done so, had I been building 
 on Mr. Harland's money,'' said Mrs. Courtenay. 
 " Thank God I have money enough of my own, 
 and to spare." 
 
 " That's something to be grateful for in these 
 days." 
 
 " Ah ! it is, — my poor husband died a wealthy 
 man and placed me above the necessity of covet- 
 ing my neighbours' goods," said Mrs. Courtenay, 
 placidly. 
 
 " Damaris is likely to be Mr. Harland's 
 heiress then ? " 
 
 "Damaris is her uncle's companion, friend, 
 and favourite ; she is at the head of affairs here. 
 Judging by appearances she may come in for 
 his money, but Mr. Harland is eccentric." 
 
 "Very." 
 
 " I don't know what all these people see in 
 her, unless it is her expectations. She's not 
 pretty ; she's too big." 
 
 Mrs. Courtenay was below the middle height 
 of women. 
 
 "Pretty is scarcely the word for a girl so 
 majestic and beautiful."
 
 MRS. COURTENAY TELLS THE NEWS. 219 
 
 '' Beautiful ! — why you are like all the men. 
 Some one has told you that she is a beautiful 
 girl, and you believe it." 
 
 " I generally disbelieve what I am told." 
 
 " Or you are influenced, like the men again, 
 by Damaris Harland's own ojDinion of herself ; 
 she is the proudest minx in England, I believe. 
 Proud, ill-tempered, and fickle, and yet run 
 after like this." 
 
 Mrs. Courtenay opened her fan with a sudden- 
 ness that startled Mr. Searle, and commenced 
 fluttering it rapidly to and fro. Mr. Harland's 
 niece was a long way from the good graces Oi 
 Mr. Harland's sister-in-law. The gentleman 
 at her side coolly remarked the fact. 
 
 "You dislike Miss Harland?" 
 
 " I am a woman of strong likes and dislikes," 
 was the reply. " I dislike any one who treats 
 me with incivility, and whom I cannot under- 
 stand." 
 
 "And you do not understand me, despite my 
 ingenuousness," exclaimed Mr. Searle. " And 
 here I have been monopolizing your attention 
 all this while. It is too bad of me ! " 
 
 He rose with alacrity, and before she could 
 reply, if she had had an intention of replying,
 
 220 NO man's friend. 
 
 he was making his way through the crowd to 
 Mr. Harland*s side. He had forgotten his 
 intention of leaving the party after hearing 
 all the news, or he was not satisfied with that 
 modicum of news which the fates had allowed 
 his late companion to afford him. He had 
 come from Brazil, and was longing for further 
 information. 
 
 " Now I wonder whether I like or dislike 
 you," muttered Mrs. Courtenay, as she looked 
 after her late companion. " Edwin," she called 
 to the young man who had already been a 
 subject for conversation that evening. Edwin, 
 who was passing, stopped at her appeal. 
 
 "I am going as soon as the carriage is 
 ordered." 
 
 " The guests are not thinning yet, mamma." 
 " These people never know when to go^" said 
 Mrs. Courtenay, peevishly. Meanwhile Mr. 
 Searle had appeared before his employer at 
 last. 
 
 " Good evening, Mr. Harland." 
 " Ah ! Searle, good evening to you." 
 This was the greeting of two men who had 
 not met for seven years. The taller man with 
 the swarthy face stood with his hands clasped
 
 MRS. COURTENAY TELLS THE NEWS. 221 
 
 before him looking down at the principal, and 
 the principal heaped in the chair, and with his 
 head sunk between his shoulders as though he 
 was a hunchback, looked at him askance from 
 beneath his eyebrows. 
 
 " I expected you to dinner, Searle." 
 
 " I have hardly found time to pay my re- 
 spects to you at all." 
 
 ^' Have you just arrived ? " 
 
 ^' Half-an-hour ago or so. I have been 
 hearing all the news from your sister." 
 
 *' Sister ; what sister ? " asked Mr. Harland, 
 peremptorily. 
 
 " Mrs. Courtenay." 
 
 '' Oh ! " he replied. *' Yes, she is a good 
 hand at news. Insufferably communicative, in 
 fact." • 
 
 " You can put up with her now ? " 
 
 " Yes. I am a different man, Searle." 
 
 " I congratulate you." 
 
 '• I used to think that I should never get 
 over my accident ; and then the loss of my son 
 to follow that, but I have battled through it 
 somehow." 
 
 "You should be grateful for your better 
 estate."
 
 222 NO man's friend. 
 
 " I am, 
 
 '' That's well." 
 
 " About the railway at Brazil, Searle ? " said 
 Mr. Harland, looking up at him more intently ; 
 " safe and sound, and progressive ? " 
 
 ''Yes. Shall we talk of business to-morrow ? 
 There are a great many people with long ears 
 about to-night." 
 
 " Do you mean that they are asses ? " asked 
 Harland quickly, " or spies upon us ? " 
 
 " A few of both species, I daresay. Shall 
 you be at the office to-morrow ? " 
 
 " I am there every day." 
 
 " Every day ! — why you are the vigorous, 
 persevering, business man again, then, in all 
 respects ? " 
 
 " In all respects." 
 
 " The same man whom I met in Brazil, with 
 whom I came to London years ago, before a rail- 
 way accident nearly shook the life from him ? " 
 
 " I have gone back to my old self completely." 
 
 " I thought once that you would have become 
 a different man. I left you somewhat different 
 at Westbourne." 
 
 "I wish that you would not talk of West- 
 bourne ; I hate the very name of the place."
 
 MRS. COURTENAY TELLS THE NEWS. 223 
 
 " It restored you to health." 
 
 " Such health as it is," said Mr. Harland, 
 ungratefully. 
 
 "Ah, such as it is," echoed Mr. Searle, 
 almost contemptuously, in his turn. 
 
 " Have you seen young Ranwick ? " asked 
 Harland. " He's very clever — -just the fellow 
 we wanted in our business. I do not remember 
 any one getting on so rapidly as he has." 
 
 " A genius for finance ? " 
 
 " I think he is. Shall I introduce — " 
 
 " I will introduce myself — I would prefer it," 
 interrupted his manager. " We have corre- 
 sponded on business affairs for two years, and 
 there need be no formality between two old 
 servants of a famous house. He is talking to 
 your niece, I think ? " 
 
 " Yes, that is Mr. Ranwick." 
 
 " Your niece Damaris," added Searle. " T 
 never asked the question, but it struck me that 
 I should find both nieces here." 
 
 " One is quite enough/' said Mr. Harland, 
 drily. "The other is provided for. This one 
 understands me better — much better, Searle. 
 She reahzes her position, and is intensely grate- 
 ful for the salvation that I have been to her.
 
 224 NO man's friend. 
 
 Her teachers have made a lady of her — a 
 perfect lady, and it is pleasant to see her in the 
 house. I like the girl — she does credit to me.'* 
 He rubbed one thin hand over the other, and 
 chuckled softly to himself, more like an old 
 man in his dotage, than the sharp Mr. Harland 
 whom the City of London respected. 
 
 "I did my duty by my relatives," he said 
 slowly. "Ninety-nine out of every hundred 
 would have let them go their way ; but I acted 
 generously to the lot of them, and I have not 
 had much cause to regret it. Thank Heaven, 
 Searle — they may thank Heaven too, for the 
 matter of that — that I'm a just man." 
 
 " ' And not as other men are,' " quoted Mr. 
 Searle. 
 
 " Exactly," answered the rich man, who did 
 not see the force of the quotation, or guess that 
 Mr. Searle had offered a text to his notice. 
 
 Mr. Searle stood for some time longer by the 
 side of his master, listening to Mr. Harland's 
 self-gratulations, and starting no topic of his 
 own. Once or twice he seemed to pay more 
 than extra attention, or be attracted by some- 
 thing in the manner of the speaker, for he 
 looked down at him very steadily — with a
 
 MRS. COURTEXAY TELLS THE NETTS. 225 
 
 concentrative gaze almost — when JNIr. Harland 
 was looking at the carpet. Despite this study, 
 as it might be, of the principal, Mr. Searle 
 was an observer of things around him. Very 
 little seemed to escape him within his range of 
 vision. No one passed, but this man, who 
 cared not for the world or anybody in it — this 
 polite Tinion of a new society — glanced for an 
 instant at the passer-by, occasionally bowing as 
 he recognized an old business face, to which he 
 brought a look of wonderment, as a rule, for 
 his attention — for seven years test short memo- 
 ries; and Mr. Searle, despite ^Irs. Courtenay's 
 past assertion, had changed a great deal, even 
 looked older than the six-and-thirty years to 
 which he owned. 
 
 The numbers had begun to thin perceptibly 
 in Mr. Harland's drawing-room, when Mr. 
 Searle left his employer's side, and went straight 
 as an arrow to the side of Matthew Ran wick. 
 What they said, or in what way Mr. Searle 
 introduced himself, matters not to the progress 
 of our story. Their talk was purely business 
 talk, upon which the manager from Brazil had 
 set an interdict in Mr, Harland's case — a free 
 and easy interchange of business ideas between 
 
 YOL. I. Q
 
 226 Ko man's friend. 
 
 two men serving one master, both looking 
 fearlessly into each other's faces, and possibly 
 studying each other. They were men who had 
 corresponded a great deal together on matters 
 of finance, and they were to meet daily in the 
 great office and work together for the common 
 weal; much depended upon their understand- 
 ing each other, and working with amity together. 
 Mr. Harland, from his easy chair, watched them 
 attentively — even smiled to see them shake 
 hands as they separated, Mr. Searle making 
 for the door. 
 
 Mr. Harland beckoned to young Ranwick as 
 Searle passed through the doorway. 
 
 "What do you think of him, Matthew?" 
 he asked. 
 
 " That we shall agree very well together. A 
 sensible, straightforward gentleman." 
 
 " Hum ! A thorough man of business, at 
 least," replied Mr. Harland. " I am very glad 
 you like him. You will gain some valuable 
 hints in business from that man." 
 
 " No doubt, sir." 
 
 " You — why, he has come back again ! " 
 
 " Forgotten something, probably." 
 
 "Oh, no!" said Mr. Harland, with a per-
 
 MRS. COURTEXAY TELLS THE XEWS. 227 
 
 ceptible shudder. " That man never for- 
 gets." 
 
 " What a man for a business like ours, sir," 
 said Ranwick. 
 
 " Yes — the very man." 
 
 Mr. Searle had returned. A second thought, 
 not connected with the business, had arrested 
 him at the top of the broad stairs, and taken 
 him back, with rapid strides, into the drawing- 
 room. A quick glance around him, as though 
 to make sure that everything was in the 
 position that he had left it, and tben a sudden 
 halt again. 
 
 Miss Harland had burst into song. To the 
 few favoured guests remaining she had conde- 
 scended to sing an Italian piece — the finale to 
 Bellini's opera of Sonnamhula. The guests 
 clustered round the piano, Mr. Harland's face 
 assumed an expression of satisfaction, Mr. 
 Ranwick looked on admiringly — looked across 
 at Searle even, for his admiration, who nodded 
 towards him as though in assent to the general 
 opinion. 
 
 Well, there was but one opinion to be enter- 
 tained — Mr. Harland's niece was an accom- 
 plished soprano. Her voice rang out in clear, 
 
 q2
 
 228 NO MAX'S FPJEXD. 
 
 melodious, nightingale fashion, as we hear now 
 and then at the opera — never in private life, save 
 by a miracle. A voice that would have made the 
 fortune of Damaris in another and more exciting 
 sphere, perhaps — wonderful in its flexibility, its 
 range, its quality — more wonderful still in its 
 execution. 
 
 Searle walked on tiptoe across the room to 
 ]\Ir. Harlan d again. 
 
 " Almost a genius," he said. 
 
 " Quite," was the reply. 
 
 " She must have studied hard, and had good 
 masters." 
 
 " She is always studying ; she studies too 
 much for any earthly purpose, I tell her," 
 answered Mr. Harlan d. 
 
 " She should have gone to Italy with that 
 voice." 
 
 " She has been." 
 
 " A voice that is worth preserving," said 
 Mr. Searle, as he walked back again. 
 
 When the song was completed, and the 
 guests had thanked Miss •Harland, and still 
 further thinned — when Mr. Harland was con- 
 versing with his future partner, Mr. Ran wick, 
 once more, and four old gentlemen, who would
 
 MES. COURTEXAY TELLS THE NEWS. 229 
 
 not go home, had sat down to a rubber of whist 
 with four or five more stubborn ones to look on 
 and put the players out with irrelevant remarks 
 — when Miss Harland was for an instant alone, 
 standing by the piano arranging some loose 
 pieces of music together, Mr. Searle, swinging 
 his crush hat in his hand, startled her a little by 
 his propinquity. 
 
 A stare of well-bred surprise, haughty enough 
 in its way for a duchess, and then Miss Harland 
 was arranfi^ino: her music aofain. This was a 
 gentleman who had not been introduced to 
 her, and whom she had never seen before, — 
 her uncle's guest, probably — a late comer — but 
 no one whom she knew. 
 
 *' Good evening, Miss Worcester," Mr. Searle 
 said, gravely bowing. " I thought it scarcely 
 polite of me to go away without wishing you 
 good evening."
 
 ( 230 ) 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 DAMARIS. 
 
 Yes, Damaris had grown a beautiful woman. 
 Far above the middle height of her sex, and 
 carrying her stature with a queenly grace. She 
 was the queen of Mr. Harland's mansion at all 
 events, and one of whom Mr. Harland had fair 
 cause to be proud ; one of those young women 
 who look well everywhere and in everything, 
 adding grace to the adornments, rather than 
 the adornments enhancing the attractions. A 
 brunette with a dazzling complexion, that 
 daylight even had no power to affect, a black- 
 haired and large-eyed woman, who carried her 
 head high in the world, and on whose face 
 rested almost a natural haughtiness, that only 
 vanished when a few favourites were near 
 her. The face of a woman who thought — who 
 thought of herself a great deal, no doubt, as
 
 DAMARIS. 231 
 
 beauties will think, but who also thought of 
 matters foreign to "herself, or the expression 
 would have been less lofty, less uncommon. 
 Tall, graceful, beautiful, and richly dressed, and 
 proud of all four advantages, it seemed to need 
 some courage for a stranger to approach her; 
 and Damaris gazed at Mr. Searle as though 
 she thought it required a little explanation, 
 even in her uncle's house and from a welcome 
 guest there. Damaris evidently stood upon 
 ceremony, and had not had years of *' finishing " 
 for nothing ; — she almost looked down the in- 
 truder to begin with, though her colour varied 
 as the old name met her ears. 
 
 "I have not the pleasure," she said, coldly 
 regarding the gentleman who had addressed 
 her thus unceremoniously. 
 
 " Pardon me, but you have," responded Mr. 
 Searle. 
 
 A pair of delicately pencilled eyebrows were 
 elevated at this contradiction, and Damaris for 
 an instant seemed perplexed. She looked more 
 intently at the speaker, and said — 
 
 " I really have not the honour, sir, at pre- 
 sent." 
 
 This was a concession, implying that the
 
 232 NO man's friend. 
 
 honour niiglit follow in due course, if Mr. 
 Searle attended to his P's and Q's, those valu- 
 able letters of the alphabet which he had 
 neglected all his life. 
 
 "I take advantage of an introduction that is 
 seven years old, at least," said Mr. Searle. " I 
 will excuse Miss Worcester foroettin": me and 
 Stackford' — me the messenger who brought 
 good tidings to her." 
 
 MissWorcester — despite Mr. Harland's wishes 
 we shall call her by her own name when Damaris 
 is not on the cards — changed colour at this. 
 The red blood mounted to her neck and face, 
 and stopped there for a time ; the eyes were 
 veiled bv the \or\o- lashes : the hand that had 
 been trifling with the music trembled very 
 much ; she had not been prepared for the 
 past, or for so cruel an allusion thereto. 
 
 " Yes — I think that I know you now/' she 
 said in a low voice, and looking up at last with 
 a w^omanly shyness that Mr. Harland's guests 
 had never seen ; " you are Mr. Searle ? " 
 
 " The same. Are you sorry to see me ? " 
 
 " I don't know why I should be sorry ? " 
 
 " Or glad ? " he added. 
 
 " Or glad," she repeated, with a slight smile
 
 DAMARIS. 233 
 
 hovering on her lips as she took up his question ; 
 "and yet I am more -glad than sorry." 
 
 " Well, / am glad to hear that, although at a 
 loss for your reason." 
 
 "I cannot give you one, Mr. Searle," she 
 said more abruptly, " unless it is that one more 
 tried follower of my uncle's house is back in 
 England." 
 
 " Shall we say that is the reason ? " he asked, 
 doubtfully. 
 
 " If you like." 
 
 " You are in your uncle's service, studying 
 his interests with the rest of us. I thought 
 that it would come to this, although I did not 
 hold out any hopes, lest you and your sister, 
 your father and your mother, should be dis- 
 appointed." 
 
 " You thought so, then ? " 
 
 " Yes. For Mr. Harland was a lonely man. 
 But your sister ? " 
 
 " Oh ! she," colouring again strongly, " is in 
 disgrace at present." 
 
 "What for?" 
 
 " I can't tell you exactly," she said ; " it is 
 not a story that would interest you. Have you 
 left Brazil for good ? "
 
 234 NO man's friend. 
 
 The question was made so suddenly, and 
 with so unmistakable an intention of turning 
 the conversation, that Mr. Searle paused to con- 
 sider it before making his reply. 
 
 " Yes," he answered at last ; " and your father 
 and mother, are they well ? " 
 
 " I believe so," she said, hastily. " This branch 
 house at Brazil, how will it get on without your 
 supervision ? " 
 
 " There's a clever fellow to take my place. 
 Have you seen Mr. or Mrs. Worcester since 
 that day at Stackford when the carriage w^hirled 
 you away to greatness ? " 
 
 " No, I have not," she said, driven to bay at 
 last, and vexed a;t Mr. Searle's persistency ; 
 " why do you speak of the past to me ? My 
 uncle dislikes all mention of it — so do I." 
 
 " Why should you forget the past, Miss 
 Worcester?" 
 
 " It is a disgraceful reminiscence, and I would 
 live it down. I am under orders to forget it, 
 and you are not Mr. Harland's friend, or mine, 
 to put these questions to me." 
 
 " Miss Worcester, I am no man's friend," he 
 answered. 
 
 It was the old assertion with which he
 
 DAMARIS. 235 
 
 repelled all claims of friendship on him — which 
 he always made irritably, as though the idea of 
 himself and friendship were an insult that he 
 could not brook. He spoke, too, as if he were 
 proud of utter isolation — of standing apart from 
 sympathy with his kind ; a man above the weak- 
 ness of aifection, who had lived without faith for 
 six-and-thirty years, and was going on fast to 
 the end without any intention of swerving from 
 his first hard purpose. 
 
 Damaris took no heed of his protest, though 
 startled for an instant by the tone in which it 
 had been uttered. She was excited by her own 
 particular grievances — the slight that had been 
 proffered her by thrusting this old objectionable 
 past upon her in her bright estate. Erect and 
 stately, with her head thrown back, and her 
 face far less amiable than when he had looked 
 into it a moment since, Damaris Worcester 
 seemed the lady who was disposed to assert her 
 dignity just then. 
 
 " Friend or enemy, you must not speak to me 
 of my past, for it is interdicted here. I have 
 outlived it ; and you have no right to take ad- 
 vantage of your bitter knowledge to remind me 
 of what I have been. I know it, sir, too well 1 "
 
 236 so man's friexd. 
 
 "And yet so proud." 
 
 '' I have a right to be proud," she said, with 
 excitement ; " pride keeps me strong." 
 
 " You are proud of having risen in the world 
 — that is an honest pride in its way," murmured 
 Mr. Searle. 
 
 " I don't know that I am proud of that," she 
 answered, shortly ; " at all events, do not give 
 me credit for it." 
 
 " An honest pride, when one's own exertions 
 have been the ladder to one's own position," 
 added Mr. Searle ; " otherwise it may be a sin, 
 — at least, I think so," he added. 
 
 " The evening is getting late," murmured 
 Damaris. 
 
 '' I am keeping you, too," he replied, thought- 
 fully regarding her for an instant. " I will bid 
 you good night at once." 
 
 '^ Good night," said Damaris. 
 
 He had half extended his hand, but she had 
 not noticed the movement, or had intentionally 
 disregarded it. She was very cold and grave 
 now in her demeanour; but the man before 
 her was the last man in the world to be kept at 
 a distance, when his inclination disposed him 
 to be familiar. He was a man who took
 
 DAMARIS. 237 
 
 no hints, and was dead to delicate impres- 
 sions. 
 
 As he turned to go, he said in a low voice — 
 
 " I am sorry that you are trying hard to 
 forget the past, and those connected with it. 
 I think that you might have acted more wisely, 
 and been all the better for the recollection." 
 
 " I do not think that it is your place to school 
 me, Mr. Searle," she said coldly. " I know what 
 is best. I have planned my actions out, and 
 no one must interfere with them — you, least 
 of all, for you have no claim upon me, and no 
 right to speak." 
 
 " Certainly not ; I will ask you, Miss Wor- 
 cester, to accept my apologies." 
 
 He bowed very low — it was almost an 
 ironical bow, she thought, or else she was 
 strangely susceptible that night, and saw a hid- 
 den meaning in everything that he said and did. 
 For an instant she was inclined to remind him 
 that she had taken her uncle's name with her 
 new position in her uncle's house ; and then she 
 turned away, and felt glad to escape him and 
 his rude questioning, leaving to her uncle the 
 task of reprimanding him when he stepped over 
 the proprieties again.
 
 238 NO MAXS FRIEND. 
 
 He was the last guest but one that went out 
 of the drawing-room door ; the last held out his 
 hand to her, and said — 
 
 " Good night, Miss Damaris — not fatigued, 
 I trust, with all the arduous duties of the 
 hostess ? " 
 
 " No, Mr. Matthew ; not fatigued at all. 
 Very wakeful ; very much inclined for an 
 hour's hard practice at the piano after every- 
 body has gone to bed to-night." 
 
 " For heaven's sake, don't think of such a 
 thinof!" exclaimed her uncle. 
 
 Matthew Ranwick laughed pleasantly at Mr. 
 Harland's fears, and then reiterating his good 
 nights, he went his way with the rest. On the 
 top step he found Mr. Searle busily employed 
 in lighting his cigar. 
 
 " Ah, Ranwick," he said, " in which direction 
 lies your home ?" 
 
 " Fulham way," answered the young man. 
 
 " We will go a little way together then, if 
 you have no objection." 
 
 " Objection," cried young Ranwick, frankly ; 
 " not in the least. Only too glad to find a 
 companion on my homeward route." 
 
 *'Then we'll step out. You smoke?"
 
 DAMARIS. 239 
 
 " No," said Matthew. 
 
 *' Lucky fellow, that has escaped a bad 
 habit," said Searle, as he passed his arm 
 through that of his fellow-clerk, and marched 
 off side by side with him down the square. 
 
 Damai'is was arranging her music again by 
 this time ; its proper order still perplexed her, 
 or she was not anxious to relinquish a search 
 for somethino^ amonost her collection. 
 
 " Damaris," said her uncle at last. 
 
 "Mr. Harland," she answered at his call. 
 
 " You were not serious about singing any 
 more to-night, girl?" 
 
 " Scarcely serious," she said, lightly. 
 
 " One can have too much of a good thing," 
 he remarked, " and I never liked singing ; 
 never eared too much about it." 
 
 Damaris did not answer. She had fallen 
 into thoujxht ao'ain — mio^ht have been thinkinor 
 of the time when she had had too much of this 
 good gift too, and tramped about the streets 
 in velvet and feathers, . the Signorina Elvani. 
 A stranger had risen from the dead — from the 
 dead past, — and talked strangely, therefore it 
 was possible that she w^as nearer to the past 
 that night, despite all the efforts that she might
 
 240 NO man's friend. 
 
 be making to escape it. Had she had the idea, 
 that an hour's practice would drive it out of 
 her head, we wonder ! 
 
 " I saw Mr. Searle speaking to you," said 
 her uncle so suddenly, that she started at the 
 name, " what do you think of him ? " 
 
 " Think of him. Oh ! he is abrupt. I don't 
 like him much." 
 
 " No ; I suppose not. Searle is not liked 
 very much out of business hours. Far from 
 a lady's man, Damaris?" 
 
 " Yes — very far." 
 
 " What did he talk about ? He came back 
 on purpose to say something, I noticed." 
 
 " He asked me if — if I had forgotten Stack- 
 ford — seen my father and mother — remembered 
 the past, and my place in it." 
 
 She compressed her lips as she spoke; she 
 turned very white whilst speaking. Mr. Har- 
 land, on the contrary, appeared to turn green 
 in his easy chair, and his shoulders to rise more 
 about his ears, as though, like a cat, he was 
 setting his back up at the thoughts suggested 
 to him. 
 
 " I'm da — I'm amazed, girl. I can't imagine 
 that even he could have been guilty of such
 
 DAMARIS. 241 
 
 insolence as that. It must have been done 
 purposely to humiliate you — you, under my pro- 
 tection, and in the house to which he had been 
 invited. What the devil is it to do with him ! 
 What did you say to him, Damaris ? " 
 
 " I told him that it was not his business, and 
 that he w^as rude in his inquiries." 
 
 "That's right, girl. He will not annoy you 
 again, if you pluck up a spirit at the outset. I 
 will take care, Damaris, that he never has a 
 chance in this house." 
 
 " Thank you, sir." 
 
 Mr. Harland shortly afterwards rang for his 
 valet, and was assisted out of the room towards 
 his bedchamber. He was tired with party 
 giving, and in need of rest. He said, " Good 
 night, Damaris," without any show of affec- 
 tion, but then he was not a demonstrative 
 man, and Damaris had not looked for caresses 
 from her eccentric uncle, when she had taken 
 her place as an ornament in his household. 
 When the door had closed on Mr. Harland, she 
 flung herself into the chair that he had vacated, 
 and two white hands, glittering with jewelled 
 rings, were pressed quickly, almost spasmodically 
 before her face, as though to shut her in with 
 
 VOL. I. R
 
 242 NO man's friend. 
 
 herself from the garish room in which she sat, 
 and whence her uncle's guests had sallied. 
 A deep thinker this Damaris Worcester, for 
 the servants, imagining that the room \vas 
 empty, came lumbering in ten minutes after- 
 wards, stared at the silent figure in the chair, 
 and then went out again, without arousing for 
 an instant the attention of the dreamer. 
 
 It was an hour later by the gilt time-piece 
 on the mantel-shelf when she suddenly leaped 
 to her feet, and stood upon the hearth-rug, 
 with her hands pressed to her temples, and her 
 raven hair pushed back, a fair subject for a 
 picture. 
 
 " How I have been thinking ! " she said to 
 herself; "thinking so hard, that I feel quite 
 giddy. How I hate this Mr. Searle already. 
 I wish that he had never come back from the 
 Brazils — that the ship which brought him had 
 
 sunk to the no, no ; not so bad as that, 
 
 either ! "
 
 ( 243 ) 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 TWO HOMES. 
 
 Mr. Searle parted with Matthew Ran wick at 
 the top of Sloane Street, hailed a Hansom cab, 
 and gave directions to be driven towards Lon- 
 don Bridge railway as rapidly as possible. 
 
 At the railway terminus, after a slight dispute 
 about the cab-fare, — Mr. Searle having trade 
 notions concerning not paying too much for 
 anything, — he found that the last train was 
 saved by a few minutes, and therefore took a 
 second-class ticket for Caterham. 
 
 A roundabout route it had been for London 
 Bridge, but Mr. Searle had had his reasons 
 for accompanying young Ranwick, and had 
 not been disposed to study fatigue in the 
 matter. He was a man who bore fatigue 
 well, for he had been travelling that day some 
 hundreds of miles, had dressed hurriedly at an 
 
 r2
 
 244 NO man's friend. 
 
 hotel, attended an evening party, walked to 
 Sloane Street, had been driven in a cab to the 
 foot of London Bridge, and now was winding up 
 the day's proceedings by another forty minutes' 
 ride in a Brighton and South Coast railway 
 train as far as the pleasant hills of Caterham. 
 
 For an instant he seemed disposed to sleep in 
 a corner of the hard compartment into which 
 he had been put ; but he or his mind was not 
 at rest, for after a few minutes ])Ose^ he lowered 
 the window of the carriage and looked out, 
 drew it up again and surveyed his travelling 
 companions, entered into conversation with an 
 old gentleman opposite concerning railway neg- 
 ligence in general, and the selfishness of one 
 railway passenger in particular, who had been 
 compelled to leave off smoking at the request 
 of an asthmatical lady in the opposite corner, 
 and who had become personal in his remarks in 
 consequence. Mr. Searle agreed that smoking 
 was a selfish habit, — an acquired habit of which 
 every sensible man should break himself, — and 
 then, to the amazement of his fellow-men, 
 began to get ready his own cigar as the train 
 slackened in speed at Caterham Junction. 
 
 ** Good evening, gentlemen," he said politely,
 
 TWO HOMES. 245 
 
 closing the carriage door after him, and striding 
 along the platform at a rapid pace, like a man 
 who scented his home, or his supper in it. 
 
 '' Good night, John Rigby," he said to the 
 railway porter who received his pass, — a grey- 
 whiskered, grey-haired man, with a lantern 
 tucked under his arm for a better light upon 
 the tickets put into his hand. John Rigby 
 stared hard at Mr. Searle, but could make 
 nothing of him, and had not time to study the 
 matter just then, and Mr. Searle, who had not 
 seen John Rigby for seven years, went out into 
 the country and marched along between the 
 hills and hedge-rows at a sharper pace than 
 ever. 
 
 A pretty Gothic villa, moderate in its dimen- 
 sions and pretensions, stood in his way after ten 
 minutes' brisk walk ; this was evidently home, 
 for he flung away his cigar, opened the swing 
 gate, and went along the path humming a tune 
 to himself, in a light-hearted fashion, very un- 
 like a man who had not found in thirty-six 
 years of life anything in the world worth living 
 for. 
 
 A rattling at the brass knocker underneath 
 the panel, and then the door open, and the
 
 246 NO man's friend. 
 
 lady of the house herself to welcome him upon 
 the threshold, with the servant in the rear, 
 open-mouthed and light in hand. 
 
 " Mv dear Lewis ! " 
 
 " My dear Eachel ! " 
 
 '' To think that I have you back again, my 
 dear boy," cried the lady, embracing him, 
 "after all these years, just as if nothing had 
 happened." 
 
 "Nothing has happened, my dear girl, I 
 hope," he said, returning her embrace. 
 
 "Well, not much, certainly." 
 
 " The summers have come and gone, the 
 world has gone round tlie sun seven times, and 
 we are not seven years younger, Rachel, — that's 
 all, I think." 
 
 " That's all 1 " 
 
 They passed into the room where Rachel had 
 been sitting up for him, — a prettily furnished 
 room, with a certain pretension to elegance 
 of style in its surroundings, — and then whilst 
 Lewis Searle stripped himself of his greatcoat, 
 he took a survey of her who had greeted him so 
 heartily. 
 
 A tall lady, spare and somewhat angular, 
 ten or twelve years his senior, pale-faced, high
 
 TWO HOMES. 247 
 
 cheek-boned, with a nose so very straight that a 
 j)air of gold-rimmed spectacles had considerable 
 difficulty in keeping a place thereon, — a lady in 
 black silk, with black silk mittens on her hands 
 to match her dress perhaps, and with black hair 
 to match her brother's. 
 
 For brother and sister constituted the degree 
 of relationship between them, and despite the 
 swarthy countenance of the one and the pale 
 face of the other, the likeness was very apparent. 
 The man's was the face of one who had travelled 
 a great deal ; and the woman's, of one who had 
 suffered a little, — the latter, also the refined, 
 speaking face of the gentlewoman. 
 
 " You must be tired, Lewis," said his sister, 
 as she passed the greatcoat to the servant, who 
 shut the door upon them. 
 
 " Not particularly. It takes something more 
 than riding in trains and paying visits to fatigue 
 me, Rachel. My powers of endurance are im- 
 mense still." 
 
 '* I am very glad to hear it." 
 
 "Now tell me," he said, dropping into a 
 chair before the fire, and at a little distance from 
 the arm-chair in which Rachel Searle ensconced
 
 248 NO man's friend. 
 
 herself, " now tell me whether I have altered 
 very much in seven years ? " 
 
 "I don't think that you have, Lewis," she 
 answered, steadily surveying him, "but then I see 
 with my heart, — with almost a mother's eyes." 
 " And the heart is always young/' said Lewis, 
 letting his hand drop lightly on his sister's for a 
 moment. " Well, and you ? " 
 
 " Have seven years more anxiety upon my 
 face, — don't you see their marks ? " 
 
 "^What have you to be anxious about, 
 Rachel ? — independent, aloof from scandal, apart 
 from society, the tenant of the very home we 
 used to sketch in our minds' eye, my dear." 
 
 " The old anxiety about — you ! Nothing 
 else. I am happy in myself. ' Not comfort- 
 less,' as the poet says." 
 
 " Ah ! not comfortless," repeated Searle, 
 slowly, " and only anxious about one more con- 
 tented — shall I say more happy — than you are." 
 " Then you have given up your old idea, — 
 that wretched theory which has made you 
 miserable. I am so pleased to hear it." 
 
 Searle laughed as he stooped forward to warm 
 his hands at the fire.
 
 TTVO HOMES. 249 
 
 " What a girl you are, to be sure ! " he said. 
 
 '* Oh ! Lewis, — you are brooding on our past 
 misfortunes still, on the troubles that we long 
 ago surmounted." 
 
 '' I never brood." 
 
 " You regard tlie w^orld and your fellow- 
 creatures with the same distrust. Oh 1 " with a 
 low wail that she was not able to repress^ 
 " what a noble character it has spoiled ! It 
 would have been a perfect one without it." 
 
 " Wisely ordained then that I should not be 
 perfection," he replied, laughing again ; " there, 
 don't let us talk about this. You are a reli- 
 gious woman, and see good in everything — I 
 don't ; but we are both happy." 
 
 " How is it possible for you to be happy ? " 
 
 " Both content then," he corrected, " for I 
 am home for good." 
 
 " Yes, for good, at last," she answered, her 
 face brightening very much, " I thank God for 
 jt every night — I don't know how to be grateful 
 enough, Lewis." 
 
 '' You were always a warm-hearted woman, 
 grateful for small benefits, and this is of the 
 smallest. How have my flowers prospered in 
 my absence?"
 
 250 NO man's friexd. 
 
 "Well." 
 
 " And my greenhouse plants — my ferns — mes 
 enfansf They have increased and multiplied, 
 I hope." 
 
 "Yes — yes; but about yourself? In seven 
 years have you not met with a single specimen 
 of human kind of whom you have felt that you 
 could make a friend — or a wife? " 
 
 " Good God ! a wife ! " exclaimed Lewis 
 Searle, in genuine horror ; " has your imagina- 
 tion stretched itself so far as that, then ? " 
 
 " You have not answered my question." 
 
 " My dear Rachel," said Searle, " a man who 
 has lived thirty-six years without a wife, can do 
 without that luxury for the remainder of his 
 existence." 
 
 " A friend then — some one for whom you 
 could feel a brotherly affection, and who would 
 return it, and love you ? " 
 
 Mr. Searle's brow darkened a little. 
 
 " How many real friends does a man make 
 after thirty-six?" he asked; ^*his tastes are 
 formed then, and his friends are round him then 
 — or never. In my case, never ! " He took up 
 the poker and rapped the great Wallsend that 
 had been set upon the fire for him hours ago,
 
 TWO HOMES. 251 
 
 slowly and persistently, till it split into pieces 
 and brightened up the room with flame, whilst 
 his sister repressed a housewifely desire to take 
 the poker from his hands, and save her coals. 
 He was fairly in for an explanation, and she 
 would not disturb him. 
 
 " I did not go away in search of friends ; I 
 have not found them. During the last seven 
 years I have not met with one man or woman 
 who has even reached my standard of what a 
 man or woman should be." 
 
 " Ah ! that's very likely," said his sister. 
 
 **I don't believe that I have met with an 
 honest, unselfish, truthful man or woman. I 
 don't think that I have even met with those 
 capable of disguising their love of self and greed 
 of gain ; in this world, Rachel, it's a rough 
 scramble for the good things in it, and no 
 quarter to the weak ones thrust aside in the 
 melee y 
 
 " In the weak ones you might find — " 
 
 " Weak principles, . to match their want of 
 physique, and much boasting of their greater 
 virtues. I still maintain that it is a good sys- 
 tem which keeps us at arm's length of such 
 folk. We were both terribly deceived when we
 
 252 NO man's friend. 
 
 were young — deceived at all points. You found 
 comfort and peace in religion — I became a 
 little soured for awhile ; but I emerged from 
 my furnace of affliction a trifle harder for the 
 process, perhaps — nothing more." 
 
 " Quite hard enough, Lewis." 
 
 " I think that I must have been very soft 
 before," he said, laughing, as at a good joke, 
 whilst his sister looked at him with tears behind 
 her glasses. " I played Pythias to Damon, my 
 partner in the Brazils, till Damon forged my 
 name and ran off with my money. You and I 
 turned to our guardian for further support ; — 
 the trustee wdio had been my father's friend, 
 and whom my father had not found out as 
 wholly untrustworthy — and he had to confess 
 on his villanous knees that he had spent our 
 birthright, and deserved not the mercy which he 
 craved of us, and that we conceded to him. In 
 our poverty we found, as that old man of 
 Athens did, the world despising us ; you lost 
 your lover — I think I can talk of him now 
 without wounding you, Rachel — and I lost the 
 moral support of every man who had called 
 himself my friend. Lucky for us that we were 
 strong-minded beings, who did not easily give
 
 T\YO HOMES. 253 
 
 up. We lost our money, and we lost our faith 
 in everything but ourselves." 
 
 " That kept us strong till Mr. Harland came 
 to the Brazils, and you became his clerk." 
 
 " Yes ; and Harland put the finishing touch 
 to my opinion of what humanity consisted. 
 Poor wretch ! " he said contemptuously, " I 
 suppose he" was born so ! " 
 
 "Still—" 
 
 "An odd catalogue of misfortunes made of 
 me an odd man, you think? " he interrupted. 
 " You may judge me better than I do my- 
 self; but I give myself credit for much pru- 
 dence ; I know no excitement, I mind my 
 own business ; and I foil all the duplicity I can 
 out of ao-oravation's sake — I assist a few in 
 life when it is possible, or when I think justice 
 or mercy require it ; but I will have no one 
 to assist 7ne, and I will go on my own way to 
 the end." 
 
 " Lewis, you boast too much. You cannot 
 regulate your own future in this manner, without 
 a thought to the Higher Power that rules you." 
 
 " Owning the Higher Power," he said almost 
 reverently ; " shall I say, God willing ? " 
 
 " God willing that you should think always
 
 254 NO man's friend. 
 
 so badly of your fellow-creatures ! " she added, 
 with a sigh. 
 
 '* One left to hope in," he said, with his hand 
 upon her shoulder ; ^' not one I call a friend, 
 but something nearer and dearer than any friend 
 can be to me." 
 
 " God bless you, Lewis, for that faith in me 
 denied to all the rest ! Now tell me of your 
 travels and adventures." 
 
 " Ah ! that's a fairer subject to grow elo- 
 quent upon." 
 
 # # * * 
 
 On a second home it behoves us to take 
 a glimpse that night for the reader's better un- 
 derstanding of the position of our characters. 
 We have followed Mr. Searle to his home, 
 learning more of him and his motives from the 
 journey; let us look in upon the young man 
 with whom he parted at the top of Sloane 
 Street. 
 
 Matthew Ran wick's home was situated in the 
 Fulham Road, not an unpleasant ride on the 
 top of an omnibus to business in the City, if the 
 weather was fine and one was not too particular. 
 A small house in the Fulham Road, where a 
 w^atcher sat up for him as anxiously as Rachel
 
 TWO HOMES. 255 
 
 Searle had sat up for her brother, and where the 
 greeting was almost as cordial. 
 
 " Come in, boy, and rest yourself after all 
 this gallivanting — lots of business and lots of 
 pleasure, and no sleep atweenwhiles. I wonder 
 how you can stand so much on it !" 
 
 The speaker was a man whom the reader has 
 met at Westbourne-upon-Sea — a day-dreamer 
 who has lived to witness much of his dreaming 
 realized, which is not the luck of enthusiasts in 
 general. Old Matthew Ranwick was in town 
 to take care of his grandson, and the Bath-chair 
 business had long since been sold off to much 
 advantage, less to please the hale old man than 
 the proud young fellow for whose interests he 
 had striven. Seven years to old Ranwick had 
 not made a great deal of difference — he was of 
 the tough material that wears well to the last. 
 Stooping a little more, his hair more white if 
 that be possible, his features more prominent 
 and Punch-like, this was the same being who 
 had done much business at Westbourne in 
 dragging along incapables. 
 
 " Now sit down, boy, and tell us all about 
 it," said the grandfather, when they were in the 
 first floor of their apartments; "you have stopped
 
 256 NO man's friexd. 
 
 up long enough to oblige yourself — now tliink 
 of the old man." 
 
 " To be sure I will," said Matthew, heartily ; 
 " do I ever cut you short when there's news 
 wortli the hearing to relate ? " 
 
 " I can't say as how you do. Altogether, 
 Mat," said the old man, " you've been the best 
 of grandsons — you've stuck to me, and haven't 
 grown too proud of the grandfather, or too 
 anxious like to stow him out of the way as you 
 got rich." 
 
 " When I was a poor lad you stuck to me — 
 and I shan't give you up. Rich ! Oh ! we 
 will not talk of riches yet awhile, dad," said 
 Matthew, hastily ; " we may be climbing up- 
 wards to the top, but we haven't reached there 
 
 , yet." 
 
 " No — but we shall." ' 
 
 " I don't like to build too much upon it," 
 Matthew answered, thoughtfully. 
 
 '^ Let me build for you, then," said his grand- 
 father, "and give me all the blame when I 
 build wrong, and all the praise when right." 
 
 " Why— that's not fair." 
 
 "I knowed that it would come true — in 
 my heart I knowed it, boy, seven years ago —
 
 TWO HOMES. 257 
 
 unpossible as it all looked, especially when the 
 Elvanis turned up in that aggerwating manner. 
 He took a fancy to you for his boy's sake, just 
 as I should have fancied any boy who had been 
 fond of you, if that boy had been left and you — 
 tooked." 
 
 He shuddered at the last suggestion, but 
 went on with his reminiscence. 
 
 '*It was only the first move, and then all 
 straight, Mat," said the old man ; " the good 
 eddication made you fit for a clerk — my stars, 
 how you did learn, too ! — and he couldn't do 
 less than find you a berth, with so many berths 
 to spare about him. Then your nat'ral talents 
 began to shine, for you didn't jib at anythink, 
 as other people did — and all was plain-sailing 
 arterwards. Why, 1 can sit still here and see 
 you skim along — with your genus never at fault, 
 and see the end of it all as clear as clear. Don't 
 you see the end yourself ? " 
 
 "I really think that I do," said Matthew 
 Ranwick, with his handsome face aglow at 
 the prospect; "if you press me hard with 
 questions. 111 say, — yesl" 
 
 Bravo — bravo — it's like a play ! " 
 
 " I have been almost too lucky to begin with. 
 
 VOL. I. S
 
 258 NO man's friend. 
 
 The man who wins first, loses afterwards, they 
 say." 
 
 "At silly cards — not in life, Mat. The one 
 with the first start goes on ahead." 
 
 " I'll believe it now, for Mr. Harland takes 
 me into his confidence, and I have done my 
 best to deserve that. Done too much, at times, I 
 think," he added, shaking his head as though in 
 protest against his previous conduct, " schemed 
 myself into the good graces of the rich man ; 
 occasionally done violence to my feelings, for in 
 all moods and on all occasions, Mr. Harland is 
 not to be admired." 
 
 " But you must study the master, INIat," 
 suggested the old man ; " fine feelings, inde- 
 pendence, bounce, must not stand in the way of 
 that." 
 
 " No, no," said Mat, almost sadly ; " that's 
 the worst of it. I don't like to say what I 
 don't mean — to pretend an interest when I have 
 it not — to show that energy in his service, 
 which is not always there. But I am growing 
 a fine humbug by degrees, dad!" 
 
 *' Nonsense." 
 
 " I am not, old man," he said, becoming 
 more grave for an instant, ^' quite so good as I
 
 TWO HOMES. 259 
 
 used to be. I feel always on the look-out for 
 spies, usurpers, men who will thwart me or see 
 through me. I should have liked these chances 
 to have come in a different fashion — as rewards 
 of merit, not as temptations." 
 
 " Why, Mat — why Mat," said the less sus- 
 ceptible Ranwick ; " this is putting it fine, my 
 lad. You've done nothing wrong, I know." 
 
 *' I'm only a schemer, seeking to cut young 
 Courtenay out — descending at times to some of 
 Courtenay's little subterfuges. I'm getting on 
 in the world, uncle, but I'm ashamed of myself, 
 for all that. I'm not the kind of fellow," he 
 added, quaintly, " that I should like to have 
 been!" 
 
 " Why, what are you, Mat ? " 
 
 " I*m none the better for being in Mr. Har- 
 land's service," he said, bluntly ; '' and I'm 
 getting worse by degrees. I'm almost as sus- 
 picious as my master. I covet his goods, or a 
 share of them — I long for riches as a thirsty 
 man longs for water. I have to say what I 
 don't mean twenty times a-day, and my rise in 
 life has turned my head, and made me as proud 
 as the devil." 
 
 " I don't know who has a greater right to 
 
 S2
 
 260 NO man's friend. 
 
 be proud than you have," said Mr. Ran wick, 
 senior, consolingly; "you have got a good 
 place, a handsome salary, a handsome pros- 
 pect, and if there's a handsomer fellow in 
 hisself between this and Westbourne I'll — " 
 
 " Hold hard, there ! " cried Matthew, burst- 
 ing into a laugh again ; " I'm vain enough of 
 my bumpkin's face, without your flattery. 
 Dad, I think you must have helped to spoil 
 me first with all your praises, and then I 
 followed suit myself. Suppose we drop it ; 
 it's not exactly the thing for you to talk about 
 or me to listen to." 
 
 "Tell me about to-night, Mat," said the 
 old man; '*it was a grand party o' course?" 
 
 " Yes ; it was a grand affair, as usual, and 
 rather slower than usual," answered Mat ; " it 
 did not suit me, but I looked as if it did. 
 I'm always looking as if it did, you know," 
 he added, with a shrug of his shoulders; 
 " and as it's too late to look any different 
 now^jwh y — on we go to greatness." 
 
 " What did — w^hat did the guv'nor say, now, 
 to begin with ? " 
 
 *' He dropped good solid hints of increasing 
 my salary from four hundred to five hundred
 
 TWO HOMES. 261 
 
 pounds a-year at once. I think, young as I 
 am," he said, conceitedly, " that I deserve as 
 much. I do plenty of work for the money, 
 and that's more than Courtenay can say." 
 
 " Courtenay is a stuck-up young monkey, 
 and I don't like him at all." 
 
 " He was a nuisance once, but we under- 
 stand each other better now, and are more 
 than civil, in office hours or out of them. 
 He will be Mr. Harland's partner." 
 
 '^ The deuce he will ! " gasped forth the 
 grandfather. 
 
 "And I shall be, a year hence, a partner 
 also. There ! " clapping his hand on the 
 knee of his listener, "it's promised at last, 
 and Harland is a man who keeps his word. 
 There's your prophecy, from beginning to end, 
 complete, grand-dad, and the Ranwick family 
 will rise to all the old magnificence." 
 
 " Your mother's grandfather kept his ' car- 
 riage," said Mr. Ranwick. 
 
 " So did my grandfather, but he drew it 
 behind him," cried Matthew, now in the best 
 of spirits, for he had shaken off his first impres- 
 sions ; " and, in due course, so will I keep mine, 
 after the great-grandfather's style. I have high
 
 262 NO man's friend. 
 
 notions in my head, and I want a high position 
 in life to match them. The drudgery of the 
 desk won't suit me. I have tasted blood, or 
 blood-money, or something, and am " — here 
 his brow lowered again — " terribly ambitious." 
 
 "All the better." 
 
 " A partner in the house of Harland ! " he 
 said, musingly ; " mind you, it's very much 
 like a dream. I am the lucky object of an 
 eccentric man's fancy. It was the toss-up 
 of a sixpence whether I should not be a 
 sailor, like my father ; sometimes I wish that I 
 had been." 
 
 " Miss Harland, — she was at the party, 
 nat 'rally ? " 
 
 " Oh, yes ; looking as bright and beautiful 
 as ever. I always feel a blackguard when 
 I am in her sight; for it seems as if I had 
 stepped between her family and her uncle to 
 rob them of their rights, — as if I were even 
 trying to oust her from Mr. Harland's love 
 and favour. I hope she does not think 
 that." 
 
 " That might be easily arranged atween 
 you two," said the old man, " she's young 
 and handsum, and with lots o' chaps about
 
 TWO HOMES. 263 
 
 her. Arn't you losing a bit of chance in that 
 quarter, through being so plaguej slow?" 
 
 Matthew Ranwick reddened very much at 
 this. He had fine feelings in his way: a 
 careful teaching in the last years of his 
 schooltime had given them him, business and 
 scheming for advancement in that business 
 had not robbed him of them yet, and those 
 feelings were seriously disturbed by his grand- 
 father's practical suggestions. This was not 
 the first hint of the kind that had been 
 conveyed to him lately, if not quite so 
 plainly. 
 
 '' That will do," he said, slowly. 
 
 The old man hesitated at this command ; 
 but it was for a moment only. 
 
 " To see you and that girl make a match 
 of it is just the end of the story that we all 
 want and wait for." 
 
 " I can't scheme for Damaris," he said, 
 sharply ; " her love must come of her own 
 free will to me." 
 
 "You like the gal. I know it. Mat." 
 
 "I like her! yes: but I feel a long way 
 from her always," he said, dreamily; "she 
 treats me as her father's friend, but let me
 
 264 NO man's friend. 
 
 step by a hairs breadth over that mark, and 
 she is ice itself. A proud, incomprehensible 
 enigma is Damaris. We will not speak of her 
 again." 
 
 " She ain't a great deal to be proud on, 
 either. You'r too shame-faced in that quarter, 
 boy. I'm sure that you have ony — " 
 
 "We will not speak of her again. She 
 may love me one day, or she may hate me 
 altogether; one is as likely as the other. 
 But," — holding his grandfather by the arm — 
 " she is a subject on which we will not 
 speak, under any circumstances." 
 
 " Wery well," said the old man, submis- 
 sively. 
 
 Matthew Ranwick relapsed into a brown 
 study after this, and his grandfather made no 
 effort to dislodge him therefrom. Let the 
 boy have his own way ! He always let the 
 boy have it, for that matter; and the boy 
 had become a man, and grown up self-willed 
 and strong-willed. 
 
 Old Ranwick looked furtively at his grand- 
 son from under his shaggy eyebrows, once 
 or twice, but a something told him that he 
 had asked enough questions that night, and
 
 TWO HOMES. 265 
 
 that more would be resisted. He was con- 
 tent to watch hini, and to think with doting 
 fondness of his boy's good looks, his great 
 abilities, his luck ! 
 
 It did not strike him that, with all three, 
 the young man was terribly discontented, or 
 the good looks belied him, sitting there.
 
 ( 266 ) 
 
 CHAPTER Y. 
 
 INQUISITIVE PHILOSOPHY. 
 
 Lewis Searle appeared at business the fol- 
 lowing day, — settled down to business at 
 once. Those old in office like himself, — 
 grey-haired men who were clerks in the great 
 house before Lewis Searle's time — rubbed 
 their glasses, and looked at the new comer, 
 wondering if seven years had really passed 
 since they had seen him last. He came into 
 the office with a brisk "good morning" to 
 every one whom he encountered, calling every 
 one whom he had known in old days by his 
 right name, too, and then passed into the 
 inner room, adjacent to Mr. Harland's sanc- 
 tum, opened the desk, and began to write. 
 It had been a room occupied lately by Mr. 
 Ranwick and Mr. Edwin Courtenay, two young 
 fellows who had gone over the heads of the
 
 INQUISITIVE PHILOSOPHY. 267 
 
 general body, and risen from the ranks with 
 precipitancy; and those two young fellows 
 aforesaid were in doubt what to do after the 
 interloper had taken his seat. 
 
 Mr. Harland arriving at a quarter-past ten 
 A.M., settled that question at once. He was 
 a man of few words, and he realized the 
 position very quickly. 
 
 " Must have Searle close at hand ; and 
 you, Matthew, had better be near Mr. 
 Searle." 
 
 " You don't intend that I should go back 
 to the outer office, along with the clerks ? " 
 exclaimed Mr. Courtenay, with an expression 
 of disgust on his countenance. 
 
 " For a day or two, until we can arrange 
 matters," said Mr. Harland. " What does it 
 matter where a man is, if he does his work 
 properly ? " 
 
 "No; but it looks like a drop in the 
 office," muttered Courtenay, who was not 
 inclined to give way very gracefully. 
 
 "But it isn't a drop." 
 
 *' I don't see — " 
 
 " The necessity for arguing — no more do I," 
 concluded Mr, Harland, as he passed into his
 
 268 NO man's friend. 
 
 private room, and began hammering away at 
 his spring bell with an impatient hand. 
 
 The office messenger made his appearance, 
 and Mr. Harland bade him inform Mr. Searle 
 that Mr. Harland was ready to see him. After 
 that business began in earnest, in those great 
 dusky offices in Mincing Lane ; that business 
 with which we have little to do as story tellers, 
 and the details of which would not interest our 
 readers much. 
 
 Those friendly readers of ours will believe 
 that Mr. Searle was a good man of business — a 
 first-rate hand, hard to match, impossible to 
 excel amongst a world of business people. A 
 genius for commerce in fact, hence his power 
 over Mr. Harland and his value to that gentle- 
 man in matters of delicate negotiation ; a man 
 who was of too great value at home, to be 
 spared any longer from the head house. Mr. 
 Harland had struggled against his loss and tried 
 to put up with it for seven years ; had taken 
 much work upon his own frail shoulders and 
 acute brain in his anxiety to prove that he was 
 his old self again, and as good as other people. 
 But he felt Searle's coming back as a relief to 
 him, and that there would ensue once more
 
 INQUISITIVE PHILOSOPHY. 269 
 
 days and weeks when he could be spared from 
 work. And there were times when, with 
 all his business aptitude, his love of business, 
 his concentrative powers of turning money, he 
 yearned for a greater peace of mind, and was 
 certain that more rest would do him good. He 
 scarcely owned it to himself, perhaps ; he would 
 not have confessed to Lewis Searle for the world, 
 that he could not do without him, supported 
 as he had been of late years by his nephew, 
 who was shrewd in his way, and by Matthew 
 Ranwick, who was as shrewd perhaps, and who 
 did more work and pleased more the people 
 who came to buy and sell at Harland's. 
 
 For Edward Courtenay did not please every- 
 one in business, any more than he did away 
 from it. Take him for all in all, he was not an 
 amiable young man. We say this at once, as 
 there may not be time for his character to 
 develop itself in these pages, and as he takes 
 his place here more for the sake of the influence 
 he exerted over the actions of some of our 
 characters, than for any merits or demerits of 
 his own that call for especial remark. He is a 
 minor character — one of the supernumeraries 
 with whom we cannot dispense, hovering at
 
 270 NO man's friend. 
 
 the side-scenes of our drama, and with no 
 arduous part to sustain from the first scene to 
 the last. 
 
 Not an amiable young man then^— proud of 
 his ancestors who had not been business people, 
 and rather too proud for the wholesale business 
 into which his mother had persuaded him to 
 enter. A young cub of expensive tastes, which 
 outran the annual salary allowed him by his 
 mother, and necessitated a berth somewhere ; 
 a youth far from a fool or blind to his o\\ti 
 interest, anxious to secure independence in 
 the easiest way that might present itself, and 
 envious of luckier folk than he who had already 
 obtained it. Watchful of his chances, cautious 
 in his steps, extravagant in his tastes, and not 
 too rigid a moralist after sundown, it was 
 rumoured. This is all we need say at present 
 concerning Edwin Courtenay, save that he did 
 not take kindly to Mr. Searle's re-appearance, 
 and showed that he did not, which at all events 
 was not good policy in a youth looking out for 
 the main chance. He had not taken kindly to 
 young Ran wick in the first instance the reader 
 is aware, and had fought hard for superiority 
 over him^ but without success. Matthew
 
 INQUISITIVE PHILOSOPHY. 271 
 
 Ranwick knew his own power, his mental 
 superiority, and went ahead in the office 
 quietly but steadily. He had not been afraid 
 of Edwin Courtenay, or of Edwin Courtenay's 
 interest, and it came to pass that young 
 Courtenay began to see that Matthew was a 
 favourite of his uncle's, and a clerk of more 
 than a common degree of perspicacity, and to 
 drop his dislike, even perhaps to entertain, 
 after a fashion, a liking for Ranwick, which 
 occasionally extended to invitations to dinner 
 at the Star and Garter, and to evening strolls, 
 which had been more frequent a year ago than 
 at the time we look in upon them all at 
 Mincing Lane. Courtenay did not like Mr. 
 Searle, or take any pains, or make any sacrifice 
 to like him ; he should be a partner in twelve 
 months, and above this general manager ; and 
 the general manager, who was aware of the fact, 
 did not pay him any more respect for it, or 
 trouble himself at all about him. Mr. Harland 
 had told Edwin as well as Matthew Ranwick to 
 study Mr. Searle and that gentleman's business 
 ways, as though Mr. Searle was a paragon. If 
 he had had so much respect for Mr. Searle, why 
 had he not made him a partner long ago ?
 
 272 NO man's friend. 
 
 Surely the man who had helped Mr. Harland 
 to his fortune was worth a share in the 
 machinery by which that fortune was made? 
 Edwin saw after a few weeks that the man was 
 less respected than the method, and took his 
 cue accordingly. There was nothing to be 
 gained by endeavouring to ingratiate himself in 
 Mr. Searle's favour ; it would neither please his 
 uncle, himself, nor even Mr. Searle, so the new 
 comer became as indifferent to him as he was 
 indifferent — or thought himself indifferent — to 
 the new comer. 
 
 He did not even think a great deal of Mr. 
 Searle's business abilities, having a vast opinion 
 of his own, which was a set-off possibly against 
 the mild opinion entertained of them by other 
 people. He asserted his dignity by having a 
 third desk introduced into the inner office after 
 a time, and then the business flowed on 
 smoothly and swiftly, like a business in good 
 hands and well looked after. 
 
 Matthew Ran wick studied Lewis Searle more 
 intently. He was a young man who studied most 
 things, and who was quick to profit by a hint 
 from others, an example, or a well-meant piece 
 of advice. He was clever, but not too clever ;
 
 INQUISITIVE PHILOSOPHYe 273 
 
 he believed that it was possible for men to 
 exist who knew more than he did, and by those 
 men he would profit if possible. A long- 
 headed young man, this Matthew Ranwick — a 
 pushing man under whose feet no grass grew ; 
 Mr. Searle saw as Mr, Harland had already 
 seen, that here was an acquisition to the staff, 
 and one who was worth high wages to retain. 
 He was somewhat interested in Matthew, 
 although that young gentleman was not 
 aware of the fact. He thought Matthew a 
 character worth studying for a time ; and he 
 admired the courage and ability which had 
 taken him already a fair way on the road to 
 success. It struck him that Matthew was a 
 trifle too sanguine about everything in business, 
 one who made too sure of everything, and 
 that was the fault which might wreck his 
 ability, Searle thought. In good time, and 
 when there was a fitting opportunity, he might 
 hint as much to him, — for although he had no 
 sympathy with his species, he liked to see those 
 who most deserved success in life attain it. 
 There were fair traits of character in young 
 Ranwick, he thought, — a straightforwardness, 
 an earnestness, a quickness, that were iiote- 
 VOL. I. T
 
 274 xo man's fkiexd. 
 
 worthy ; but he fancied that he saw the ruling 
 faults in him already, and they were faults 
 which he expected, and were natural to the 
 gross humanity of which, in his own conceit, 
 he thought himself so immeasurably above. 
 
 An inquisitive man as well as a conceited one, 
 despite his unsympathetic nature. His curiosity 
 puzzled himself too — even aggravated him. 
 He wondered why Mr. Harland's nieces should 
 trouble his mind — why he should think of the 
 stately, repellent, highly objectionable beauty 
 whom he had encountered at her uncle's house 
 — whom he had helped to place there ; and why 
 he should think still more of the younger sister 
 who was " in disgrace," whom Mr. Harland dis- 
 liked and kept in the shadow. He could not 
 help wondering what had become of her, why 
 she had not been liked by Mr. Harland, and 
 into what kind of woman she had developed. 
 Comino: back to Endand had revived his 
 interest in an old story wherein he had played 
 the part of ruling agent, poor Harland having 
 been on the flat of his back at that period. It 
 was very odd — it was terribly vexatious — that 
 he should be troubled by these people again, 
 and be irritated by a paltry curiosity to know
 
 INQUISITIVE PHILOSOPHY. 275 
 
 what had happened to the Worcesters since he 
 had been away. He set it down at last to his 
 objection to mystery — and he fancied that there 
 was a mystery somewhere, everybody being so 
 quiet concerning these people. Mr. Harland 
 did not condescend to explain — did not thank 
 his manager for speaking of Damaris on one 
 occasion, but changed the subject to the one 
 everlasting topic of the Brazils. Mr. Searle 
 decided at last, however, that it was no business 
 of his ; there had been a diflSculty in arriving at 
 that decision, but his mind was made up to the 
 idea, he would probably have outlived it, had it 
 not been for young Ranwick, who started afresh 
 the old subject as they went out of the office 
 together one evening, and walked the length of 
 Mincing Lane before they separated. 
 
 " Well, it has been a hard day's work, 
 Mr. Searle, and I am glad that we are well 
 through it," he said, as they turned into the 
 street. 
 
 It had been a hard, day's work, the Brazilian 
 mail having come in, and entailing an immense 
 amount of correspondence as usual. 
 
 " You are not afraid of work, ]\Ir. Ranwick ? " 
 
 " Not I," he answered, half laughing ; " on
 
 276 NO MANS FRIEND. 
 
 the contrary, rather fond of it, because it suits 
 me, and my constitution. But the party last 
 night was a late one." 
 
 " Party — where ? " 
 
 "At Mr. Harland's. Oh! you knew nothing 
 of it/^ he said, colouring. "I beg pardon. I 
 believe it is not etiquette to talk of the parties 
 to which you have been invited, or which you 
 have attended, to third persons who may be 
 acquainted with the host, and yet not have 
 been asked." 
 
 " Awkward occasionally. There are people 
 in the world who would think themselves 
 slighted. I was not asked, but I'm not 
 offended." 
 
 " You are not fond of parties, possibly ? " 
 
 " Thev are interestino^ ; one meets character 
 there. An evening party to an observer is 
 almost as interesting as a book." 
 
 " I don't know that I observe at all, but I 
 find it very interesting." 
 
 " And meet with interesting people, I dare- 
 say. What time did you break up ? " 
 
 " Not till four this morning." 
 
 *' Mr. Harland keeps late hours. This could 
 not have been a dinner party ? "
 
 INQUISITIVE PHILOSOPHY. 277 
 
 " Oh, no ! — a dancing party." 
 
 "Was it, by George!" 
 
 Mr. Searle was evidently surprised ; he even 
 repressed a smile at his crippled master's odd 
 fancy, though the effort at repression was seen 
 by his companion, and replied to at once. 
 
 " Not a party to Mr. Harland's tastes, of 
 course," he said, " but got up to please Miss 
 Damaris, who is fond of dancing and society. 
 They are rather gay at Eaton Square." 
 
 " So it appears. And Miss Damaris looked 
 her best ? " 
 
 " I never saw her look more beautiful, 
 Mr. Searle." 
 
 *' She is an ornament to Mr. Harland's house ; 
 and one can scarcely believe in the old days to 
 think of her and her present position. She 
 has lived it down, or stamped it down, well. I 
 wonder whether the effort caused her much pain." 
 
 " You know the story, of course ? " 
 
 " Of course." 
 
 "In the secret, as it were,'' said Matthew; 
 then he added, very suddenly, " for it is a secret, 
 you understand." 
 
 " Mr. Harland has already cautioned me : 
 Mr. Harland has a very proper pride."
 
 278 NO man's friend. 
 
 '* I don't know whether it is proper, or not," 
 answered young Ran wick ; '' but the past is 
 objectionable at times. I think of my own 
 position years ago, and blush at it." 
 
 ^'Why?" 
 
 " I have left it so far behind, that it looks 
 like a disgrace," he said frankly ; " not that I 
 am ashamed of it exactly, for I worked my way 
 honestly upwards ; and not that I am ashamed 
 of the old man who first made me ambitious." 
 
 ''Ah! a deep old fellow in his way. What 
 has become of him ? " 
 
 " He lives with me, sir. I take care of 
 him, just as he once took care of me." 
 
 "A good return," answered Mr. Searle. 
 " And what has become of the Worcesters — the 
 father and mother, with whom Damaris lives 
 not ? " 
 
 "That's her uncle's fault." 
 
 " Very likely. Where are the Worcesters ? " 
 
 " I don't know. I don't think anyone 
 knows." 
 
 '* The younger sister — Eunice ? " 
 
 " Oh, she is mistress at a national school a 
 little way in the country — somewhere near 
 Caterham, I believe. Mr. Harlaud gave her a
 
 IN-QUISITIVE PHILOSOPHY. 279 
 
 good education, sent her to a training college, 
 and the training "college sent her to school 
 again, only this time as a principal/* 
 
 " Who told you this ? " 
 
 "That's no secret. Eunice Worcester used 
 to visit Eaton Square, until she offended her 
 uncle." 
 
 " A man rather prone to take offence." 
 
 '' She would not change her name to Harland, 
 or something. At one time I have heard Miss 
 Damaris say that she feared Eunice would 
 become the favourite." 
 
 *'Ah! she feared that, poor girl ! Well, fears 
 are over ; Eunice Worcester is under banish- 
 ment, and Damaris Harland is a lucky woman. 
 Good evening." 
 
 " Good evening." 
 
 The two men shook hands and departed, 
 A quarter of an hour afterwards Mr. Searle 
 was on his way to Caterham. At Caterham 
 he must have made a few inquiries as to 
 the national schools within a radius of five 
 miles, for the following evening he was five 
 miles from Caterham, approaching a red brick 
 edifice of a disjointed kind of Gothic exterior, 
 with a stone eruption of a belfry in the roof.
 
 280 NO man's feiend. 
 
 As he made his way along a gravel path, a 
 little to the right of the schoolroom, and 
 towards that part of the house which the school- 
 mistress evidently inhabited after school hours, 
 a hand drew the blind away from the window, 
 and a woman's face peered into the twilight 
 that had already brought its shadows to the 
 landscape. The face, that had looked out very 
 anxiously, quickly disappeared again at the sight 
 of Mr. Searle, and he approached the door of 
 the house without any further diversion to his 
 progress. 
 
 A small servant-maid, bright and brisk, and 
 one who had evidently been reared at the 
 school in former days, she looked so like part 
 of the establishment, responded to Mr. Searle's 
 summons at the door. 
 
 Yes, Miss Worcester was at home. Would 
 the gentleman send in his card, or state the 
 nature of his business? The nature of 
 his business being difficult to describe, JNIr. 
 Searle sent in his card, and stepped into the 
 hall. A few minutes afterwards he was ushered 
 into a neatlv furnished sittinsr-room, and was 
 making his best bow to a neatly dressed 
 young lady, petite in figure and features,
 
 ESTQIJISITIVE PHILOSOPHY. 281 
 
 as dark-eyed and dark-haired as himself, one 
 who had not changed so much as her sister 
 since he saw her seven years ago and advised 
 her as to her future course in life — rather a 
 plain girl, in fact. Eunice Worcester was still 
 Eunice Worcester; he fancied looking at her 
 then, that he should have recognized her any- 
 where. Dark-featured like himself also, with 
 that quickness of glance and crispness of accent 
 that had struck him as characteristic of the 
 child. 
 
 " This is an unexpected visit, indeed," she 
 said, returning Mr. Searle's bow ; " I hope that 
 nothing has happened at — Eaton Square?" 
 
 " I should be the last man to bring you the 
 news had anything occurred in that quarter," 
 replied Mr. Searle. " I was curious to see you, 
 and what seven years had made of you — and 
 here I am." 
 
 Miss Worcester, looking very steadily and 
 unflinchingly at her visitor, said, " Indeed ! " 
 motioned him to a vacant chair, and took one 
 herself. 
 
 " Well," she said, with a little twitch at the 
 corners of her mouth, " and what do you think 
 of me?"
 
 282 NO man's friend. 
 
 " I think," said Mr. Searle, after a pause, 
 " that you have grown a little." 
 
 " You have come a long way to express so 
 poor an opinion, Mr. Searle," she said, trying 
 hard to repress a smile. 
 
 " I am merely inquisitive," replied Searle. 
 " I met your sister Damaris a few weeks back 
 at her uncle's house, and saw a great change in 
 her. I, who am a student of human nature, you 
 must know, thought that I should like to see if 
 you had outgrown the past as effectually." 
 
 " Yes," she said, thoughtfully, " you are in- 
 quisitive." 
 
 She appeared puzzled by Mr. Searle's pro- 
 pinquity — on her guard, almost, against com- 
 mitting' herself, even to a certain extent, as he 
 continued to linger there, embarrassed by his 
 presence. 
 
 ** You do not accept curiosity, Miss Worces- 
 ter, as my real motive for intruding here ? " Mr. 
 Searle said, after a long pause. 
 
 " You would tell me the truth, I think? " 
 
 " What makes you think that ? " 
 
 " Ah ! " with almost a blush rising to her 
 face, " you do not remember." 
 
 Mr. Searle was at a loss to account for this
 
 INQUISITIVE PHILOSOPHY. 283 
 
 for an instant ; then his retentive memory 
 brought back his past conversation with her — 
 his past exordium to her to tell the truth; 
 his reproof at what he had considered a child's 
 duplicity. 
 
 *' He who could preach against deception — 
 white lies in fact" — thought Eunice, *' was 
 evidently a truthful man." 
 
 Another long pause, then Eunice broke the 
 silence by saying — 
 
 " You have seen my sister Damaris, Mr. 
 Searle. What do you think of her ? " 
 
 " She has- grown a great deal — grown out of 
 all knowledge, as the saying is — all knowledge 
 even of the past." 
 
 " Altered very much for the better — quite 
 the lady, sir ? " 
 
 " Quite the lady, and altered very much." 
 
 She noticed the difference in his quotation, 
 and was quick to add thereto, watching him 
 very closely now — 
 
 " And for the better, sir ? " 
 
 " Probably," he said at last ; " you must 
 remember that I have seen less of your sister 
 than of yourself; any alteration must have been 
 for the better in many respects."
 
 284 NO man's friend. 
 
 " Yes ; that is true." 
 
 ** But has slie grown up, Miss Worcester, the 
 woman whom you exactly fancied ? " 
 
 " I love Damaris with my whole heart, sir," 
 she cried, impetuously ; " there is much noble- 
 ness in her; she takes time to understand — 
 more time than I can even afford to a sister, — 
 but she is very, very dear to me." 
 
 " And very incomprehensible ? " 
 
 " No ; I don't say that," was the quick 
 answer. "I think I make her out in most 
 things. She has her faults, which are natural 
 enough — we all have faults ! She may be a 
 little proud, and that has set you against her." 
 
 " Against her ! " echoed Mr. Searle. " What- 
 ever has made you fancy that I am set against 
 her?" 
 
 Eunice paused before she committed herself 
 to a reply. 
 
 " You spoke with a reserve." 
 
 " And you speak with — an evasion." 
 
 " No — don't say that," said Eunice, per- 
 plexed. " I dislike evasion. I believe that I 
 have disliked it in any and every shape since 
 the day you lectured me for a falsehood that I 
 told you. I seem never to have forgotten that
 
 INQUISITIVE PHILOSOPHY. 285 
 
 day ; you read me a lesson which has outlasted 
 many that were set me at school. I have 
 believed, in my heart, that you were a good 
 man ; I believe it still, though you dislike 
 Damaris." 
 
 " Miss Worcester, some one has told you that 
 I dislike her." 
 
 " No." 
 
 " Then some one has told you that she dis- 
 likes me — your sister herself, perhaps?" 
 
 " Well — my sister herself — yes," was the 
 fearless answer; "but I don't believe her asser- 
 tion," continued Eunice very earnestly, "for 
 Damaris is only impetuous, suspicious, quick to 
 judge people, and as quick to reverse her judg- 
 ment. You came back from Brazil two or 
 three weeks ago, and said something to offend 
 her ; but then she is an impressionable girl, and 
 her uncle has spoiled her a little by letting her 
 have her own way too much." 
 
 " Strange that I should have been the sub- 
 ject of a conversation between your sister and 
 yourself," said Mr. Searle, musingly. "I don't 
 see matters very clearly here, or why I should 
 be liked or disliked in the case. Why you 
 should excuse her to me with this earnestness."
 
 286 ]S"0 man's friend. 
 
 " Am I earnest ? " asked Eunice ; " well, pro- 
 bably. I excuse her lest you should have 
 formed a bad impression at first sight of her in 
 her womanhood. Seen her perhaps at her 
 worst, which is in company, when she has put 
 on company manners that do not suit her. 
 But you must not judge Damaris too hastily — 
 it is not fair to her." 
 
 " My judgment is of very little consequence," 
 said Mr. Searle ; " why are you anxious that 
 I should think well of your sister ? " 
 
 Eunice hesitated. 
 
 " Because I am in Mr. Harland's confi- 
 dence? " he asked. 
 
 " Your influence raised us from poverty, Mr. 
 Searle," said Eunice ; " it might, exerted against 
 her, do Damaris considerable harm." 
 
 " I have business influence with Mr. Harland 
 — that is all." 
 
 " No — it is not all. It was not business 
 influence that changed all our lives." 
 
 " I was simply Mr. Harland's agent." 
 
 " I don't think that, now," answered Eunice ; 
 " the past has perplexed me very much ; the 
 Mr. Harland of the old days is not the Mr. 
 Harland who distrusts me and loves Damaris.
 
 INQUISITIVE PHILOSOPHY. 287 
 
 I have thought a great deal of this, and I have 
 fancied that when you saw my uncle more often 
 he was at his best." 
 
 " He was at his best probably when he was 
 an invalid, but he was far from a model charac- 
 ter then. He has been always a just man in 
 his way, and that is all that I can say for 
 Reuben Harland. You are very kind to attri- 
 bute his better impulses to my influence, but 
 you are very much mistaken." 
 
 " You were interested in our forlorn con- 
 dition." 
 
 " I was very glad to shake you from my 
 mind, I assure you," said Mr. Searle ; " the 
 position was an odd one, and I was interested 
 for awhile as in a new story-book." 
 
 "And you skip the intermediate chapters, 
 and come here to see how the story has ended." 
 
 " Exactly." 
 
 " It has ended in a way for which I am 
 grateful," said Eunice, with a heightened colour 
 — "grateful to you and to my uncle. At all 
 events, we were saved from the life of street 
 w^anderers, and given an education that will 
 always be of service to us. I think that my 
 place is secure here, and if the worst comes to
 
 288 NO man's friend. 
 
 the worst, why, here is a home for Damaris 
 till she is weary of me or finds a better one." 
 
 " What do you call the worst coming to the 
 worst. Miss Worcester ? " 
 
 " My uncle tiring of Damaris." 
 
 " As he tired of you ? " 
 
 " Yes. He tired of me when I would not 
 obey his every wish, which, for all his kindness, 
 he had no right to expect." 
 
 " Damaris is more obedient." 
 
 "Y — es," said Eunice, hesitatingly, "it ap- 
 pears so." 
 
 " And yet a prouder woman, I imagine," 
 added Mr. Searle, thoughtfully. " Upon my 
 word, your sister is somewhat of a paradox. I 
 wonder if the solution to the riddle lies in the 
 fact that she is less unselfish than her sister ? " 
 
 " You must not say a word against her," 
 exclaimed Eunice, warmly ; " you have owned 
 that you do not know her, and it is not fair to 
 judge her. Give my sister time." 
 
 " I am not your sister's enemy, Miss Worces- 
 ter," repeated Mr. Searle, feeling a strange 
 vexation at this idea having impressed itself 
 upon the two women with whom he was ac- 
 quainted, " I am no man's enemy."
 
 INQUISITIVE PHILOSOPHY. 289 
 
 It annoyed him as much then to be considered 
 an enemy as a friend to humanity. This was 
 an odd consistency or inconsistency in Lewis 
 Searle. 
 
 *' I am very glad to hear that," cried Eunice. 
 " I will tell Damaris, and set her mind at ease." 
 
 " Pray tell her nothing of the kind," said Mr. 
 Searle, rising to depart ; " she will find out — 
 if she has not found out already — that our 
 paths lie very wide apart, and are not likely to 
 cross each other again. I have satisfied my 
 curiosity, and seen what good fortune or a 
 good education has made of two women. 
 There's an end to it all ! It must be something 
 very uncommon to awaken my interest again. 
 I am a business man, with a soul in ledgers and 
 cash books. Good evening." 
 
 " Good evening, sir. For your present fleet- 
 ing interest in me, at least, let me thank you, 
 if I am not allowed to thank you for your past 
 agency!' 
 
 She laid stress on the last words of her 
 speech, — an ironical stress that was less severe 
 than pleasant. He was standing at the door, 
 hat in hand, when his curiosity got the better of 
 his cold philosophy. 
 
 VOL. I. U
 
 290 NO man's friend. 
 
 *^ May I ask what has become of your father 
 and mother, before I go, Miss Worcester ? '* 
 
 Eunice again exhibited that strange hesitation 
 which had already perplexed Lewis Searle. 
 
 " Two missing figures from the story you have 
 been reading," she said, archly ; " well, my father 
 and mother are — " . 
 
 " Hush ! Eunice," cried a voice at the room 
 door, which was suddenly opened and thrust 
 back; " don't tell him anything, — you have no 
 right to say a word about them or me ! " 
 
 Damaris "Worcester had passed the window 
 unobserved, startled the servant-maid who was 
 star-gazing at the open door, stepped into the 
 hall and then into the room to catch the last 
 words of Eunice, and to break them off ab- 
 ruptly by her passionate interdict. 
 
 It was a surprise to both Mr. Searle and 
 Eunice, and they stood gazing for a moment at 
 this unexpected intruder on their dialogue. 
 
 " My dear Damaris," cried Eunice, running 
 to her and kissing her, " I had given you up, — it 
 was getting so late, dear." 
 
 " I promised you that I would come. I have 
 just come in time, I think ! " she added. Then 
 turning to Mr. Searle, she asked almost peremp-
 
 INQUISJTIYE PHILOSOPHY. 291 
 
 torily, — " Why is Mr. Searle anxious to learn 
 the address of my parents? What possible 
 connection can there be between them and him ?" 
 
 " Not any," answered ]Mr. Searle, '' I miss 
 them from their daughters' sides, — the daughters 
 never speak of them, and I fancied that there 
 was a mystery somewhere. Pardon me ; it is of 
 no consequence." 
 
 Damaris became less impassioned. She 
 suddenly appeared to subside into her usual self, 
 — or into a new self that Mr. Searle had not 
 seen hitherto. Her face looked pale in the lamp- 
 light, — very pale, but very beautiful. 
 
 " Oh ! there is no mystery about them, Mr. 
 Searle," she said, in a low, almost a conciliatory 
 tone of voice ; " they are doing well, living in 
 the country somewhere, — Eunice knows better 
 than I. She corresponds with them, and they 
 think justly enough that it is better not to 
 trouble either of us." 
 
 " Damaris ! " ejaculated Eunice. 
 
 ** Mr. Ilarland thinks so," said Damaris, not 
 heeding her sister's exclamation, " and I have 
 but to follow Mr. Harland's wishes. You do 
 not blame me, JMr. Searle, for the choice that I 
 have made ? " 
 
 u2
 
 292 NO MAX's FRIEXD. 
 
 " Miss Harland, I have no right to blame 
 you. 
 
 " I have disobeyed orders, — orders tacitly im- 
 plied rather than delivered to me, — by coming 
 to see Eunice," said Damaris, with a forced 
 smile, " but she is my sister still, and I cannot 
 alvrays keep away. Mr. Harland will of course 
 know of this visit upon my return." 
 
 She looked hard at the tall man standing by 
 the door, who inclined his head gravely, and re- 
 peated almost mechanically, — 
 
 " Of course." 
 
 " I have no secrets from Mr. Harland. He 
 has been my benefactor ; I am indebted to him, 
 — and perhaps indirectly to you, — for my 
 position in society, and it would be unfair, un- 
 womanly, to disobey his wishes. He will forgive 
 me coming here, for he is not an intractable 
 man ; and Eunice is my sister who has made 
 her way in the world, and holds a respectable, 
 a very respectable position." 
 
 " I am glad to hear it," said Mr. Searle, as 
 Damaris paused for an answer ; " sisters should 
 not be strangers to each other whatever the 
 difference in position between them. Good 
 evening."
 
 INQUISITIVE PHILOSOPHY. 293 
 
 " Good evening," said Damaris, extending 
 her hand ; *' if I uttered a few hasty words upon 
 my entrance, you must attribute them to my 
 uncle's cause, — for my uncle objects to inquiries 
 concerning my relations. Eunice, however, is 
 independent of Mr. Harland, is under no bond 
 and seal, and can thank you for your kindness 
 in rememberinir them." 
 
 " No thanks are necessary," said JMr. Searle. 
 He repeated his good evenings, shook hands 
 with the ladies, and went away in deep thought. 
 He walked all the way to Caterham, and stood 
 with his hand on his own garden gate to reflect 
 for the last time before facing Rachel with his 
 every day face. 
 
 " At present, I don't make her out exactly," 
 he said to himself, as he opened the gate and 
 went up the gravel path.
 
 ( 294 ) 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 [ DAMARIS'S CHARACTER DEVELOPS ITSELF. 
 
 As the door closed on Lewis Searle, so the 
 mask dropped from Daman's Worcester. The 
 set smile vanished, the brow contracted, there 
 was lightning in the great dark eyes. 
 
 " What has that man been saying ? What 
 has he dared to ask you in his master's name, 
 Eunice ? " 
 
 " In his master's name — nothinof." 
 *' He is his master's spy, — he is as surely paid 
 to keep a watch upon us, as upon his master's 
 business. • Eunice, you have been a tool in his 
 hands, and have betrayed me ! " 
 
 " No, Damaris," answered her sister ; " I have 
 not betrayed you." 
 
 "A word is a clue to a man like him.'* 
 "I do not think — I cannot believe — that 
 he would do you harm, were it even in his
 
 DAMARIS'S CHARACTER. 295 
 
 power. Why, what harm have you ever done 
 him?" 
 
 " That matters not. We do not measure the 
 enmity against us by the antipathy we feel in 
 our hearts towards the enemy. How did he 
 find you out? " 
 "I know not." 
 
 " How did he know that I was coming here 
 to-night ? " 
 
 " That was a coincidence, I think." 
 "Ah ! you are a simpleton and think unwisely." 
 " And you are strong-minded, and distrustful 
 of all good in the world." 
 
 " Except the good that is here, my girl," she 
 cried. 
 
 She flung her arms round the younger sister, 
 clasped her to her bosom, and covered her face 
 with kisses. There were tears in the eyes of 
 Damaris to replace the lightning that had 
 glittered there. This was not the haughty 
 beauty whom we have seen in state at Mr. 
 Harland's banquet; not the lady, forced and 
 artificial, who had perplexed Lewis Searle just 
 now ; not the passionate and suspicious woman 
 of a few moments since ; but a something new, 
 soft, and womanly.
 
 296 NO man's friend. 
 
 " Oh ! Damaris, if you were less distrustful 
 of all good in the world," murmured Eunice. 
 
 " Only of all good in my world, sister," 
 answered Damaris, with a heavy sigh ; " the 
 lower or the higher, one might be content with, 
 and see many virtues in. People who have no 
 riches, no expectations, and people who are 
 rich by heritage, and must always be rich, 
 should he very happy." 
 
 " The former class is within your reach, at 
 least." 
 
 " Would you have me seek it ? " asked 
 Damaris, with a flash of her old impetuosity. 
 
 "If you are sure of happiness, there — why 
 not?" 
 
 " I am not sure," Damaris answered. " I am 
 the woman that has seen the world, and had 
 expectations held out to her. Besides, I can- 
 not let — " 
 
 "There, there, Damaris, not the old worldly 
 talk to-night ; the selfishness which warps your 
 true nature and is doing you — oh ! I am sure 
 of it — much mischief." 
 
 *' I am strong, and may be trusted," answered 
 Damaris. 
 
 " Self-confidence that will deceive vou."
 
 DAMARIS'S CHARACTER. 297 
 
 " Am I not doing my uncle a service also ; 
 am I not an invaluable friend to him ? " cried 
 Damaris ; " thouo^h I trust him not — thouo^h I 
 feel that his love for me is of a shallowness, 
 that may turn to hate at any moment — though 
 there are times when I forget my gratitude, my 
 duty, and distrust him in my turn. I see the 
 harpies round that weak, eccentric man, and I 
 bide my time to foil them, for his sake as much 
 as mine." 
 
 "Why all this scheming? — whence the ne- 
 cessity?" asked Eunice. 
 
 " Eunice, they shall not have his money — 
 these time-servers, if I can help it," she cried, 
 with her handsome face, dark and lowering 
 again ; " we are his next of kin, and are entitled 
 to it. I scheme for myself, and against them, 
 if you will ; but I have a right by birth, and 
 they are only robbers who would step between 
 him and our rights." 
 
 "And this, you — who were once so unselfish 
 and affectionate ! " 
 
 " Who was not unlike Eunice Worcester; and 
 thoudit of a life like hers until the rich uncle 
 found a place for her in his home. If he has
 
 298 NO man's friend. 
 
 made me worse than I was, why, that is his 
 fault, not mine." 
 
 " No — not bis," denied Eunice ; " you must 
 not change to a worldly woman, and lay the 
 fault to him who only wished to make a lady of 
 you. That is not fair." 
 
 " Well — -I will take all the blame myself; 
 see," she said, with a smile ; "how accommodating 
 I can be 1 " 
 
 Damaris strove hard to be agreeable — to win 
 the smiles back to her sister's face ; but Eunice 
 was still thoughtful. 
 
 "You will change, that is certain, Damaris — 
 nay, you are changed already; but will you be 
 successful in all the scheming that you think is 
 necessary ? " 
 
 " That is very uncertain, for water is not 
 more unstable than my uncle Harland," answered 
 Damaris, gloomily. "I will do my best; I will 
 fight my hardest, and with all a woman's 
 ingenuity, trusting for the right on my side to 
 turn the balance in our favour." 
 
 "Poor uncle!" said Eunice, "the pitiful 
 centre of all this wretched plotting." 
 
 " Yes — he is deserving of pity. I pity him
 
 DAMARIS'S CHARACTER. 299 
 
 sometimes until I love him, Eunice. And — 
 oh ! believe this — that I love him none the 
 less, for despising those who would oust me 
 from my place." 
 
 " And should they oust you from it ? " 
 "I am prepared for that," said Damaris, 
 quickly. " I have thought of everything." 
 
 " You think too much, and that destroys all 
 happiness," sighed the younger sister. 
 "Think too much of myself, you mean." 
 " Yes." 
 
 " Wrong, girl, wrong ; " cried Damaris, im- 
 petuous once more, " I think of you, and of 
 those who have claims upon us both. I strive 
 for the advancement of us all, and tiie defeat of 
 the strangers who have wormed their way into 
 my uncle's confidence. Why, if it depended 
 upon myself — " 
 
 " It depends upon yourself alone, Damaris," 
 said Eunice. " I have no ambition, and father 
 and mother — " 
 
 " Have in their hearts, let them say what 
 they will. They have a right to rise ; and if 
 Mr. Ilarland leaves me all his money, why we 
 shall rise together — unless — " 
 
 Sae stopped, and looked thoughtfully down
 
 300 NO man's friend. 
 
 at the carpet; a new thought had arisen to 
 perplex her, and to furrow that white brow. 
 Eunice looked into her face attentively. 
 
 " Unless — ? " she repeated interrogatively. 
 
 " Unless my uncle should couple with his 
 legacy some strange conditions that should 
 make me rich and keep you all poor. His is 
 a strange mind, full of petty chicaneries — a 
 mind that is not to be trusted in itself, and may 
 give way at any moment." 
 
 " Damaris, Damaris," whispered Eunice in 
 her ear, but Damaris was perplexed with this 
 new feature of the future, and took no heed. 
 She did not observe the horror in her sister's 
 face- — the horror at her selfish calculations. 
 
 *' You remember three years since, that he was 
 persuaded to see mother — that I less cautious 
 in my movements — more of a foolish girl and 
 full of hope in the result — persuaded him. After 
 all those years they met, and he was frightened 
 at her. Mother was not at her best, and he 
 was at his worst, and the whole plan was a 
 failure. I believe that he has hated her from 
 that day ; he expected tears of gratitude and a 
 thousand thanks for all his mercy towards us, 
 and she reproached him with his want of natural
 
 DAMARIS'S CHARACTER. 301 
 
 affection. After that, the interdict upon our 
 meeting — almost ui3on our correspondence ; 
 his distrust of mother, and his hatred of my 
 father, whom he has never seen. That distrust 
 and hatred may lead to a strange will." 
 
 " Damaris, I wish that you had not come," 
 cried Eunice, sharply. 
 
 Damaris looked up indignantly : she was of 
 a passionate nature, it was evident. 
 
 " What did you say ? " she asked. 
 
 "I wish that you had not come," repeated 
 Eunice, " you lower yourself by this eternal plot- 
 ting — this everlasting suspicion — this reckoning 
 on the chances for and against the life which you 
 begrudge your benefactor." 
 
 "No, no — God forbid that I should envy 
 him a moment's life ! " cried Damaris, wringing 
 her hands ; " it is not that ; you are mistaken in 
 me. 
 
 " It is coming to that ; for you are changing 
 for the worse, and hardening, Damaris — oh ! so 
 rapidly ! " 
 
 " No, no — only hardening slowly, and trying 
 with all my might to resist the process of 
 ossification," she said more lightly. "There, 
 I am distressing you, and I haven't travelled
 
 302 NO man's friend. 
 
 thus far to do that ; I fled from envy, hatred, 
 and uncharitableness, to meet with peace and 
 love here." 
 
 "And brought envy, hatred, and uncharitable- 
 ness from London with you." 
 
 " You must not say that. There, now I am 
 Damaris Worcester ! " 
 
 She thought herself at her worst when she 
 was Damaris Harland, it was evident. There 
 was a strange yearning to be at peace, to be 
 more natural and less ambitious in this per- 
 verted nature still, for she said an instant after- 
 ter wards — 
 
 "If he had not separated us, Eunice, when 
 we were children — if my trainers had been like 
 your own, and uncle Harland had kept me 
 at a distance too — keeping down at the same 
 time the evil that was in me ! There, there, 
 we will not think of this," she added, " we will 
 not talk any more of what is, or what might 
 have been. Tell me about yourself, my dear, 
 and make my heart more light." 
 
 Then Damaris Worcester became the sister, 
 fond and true, and it was a pleasant picture of 
 woman's affection, that might have even touched 
 the feelinofs of Lewis Searle could he have
 
 DAMARIS'S CHARACTER. 303 
 
 stepped back upon the scene. Uncle Hailand 
 was forgotten for the nonce, and the two girls 
 chattered like birds with a bird-like music in 
 their laughs, which were not unfrequent as the 
 time stole on. 
 
 It was Eunice who cut short this happiness 
 by pointing to the little clock upon her mantel- 
 piece. 
 
 " I am sorry to remind you that the last 
 train goes in half-an-hour, dear." 
 
 ''So late!" cried Damaris, starting up. 
 " How my uncle will wonder where I am ! " 
 
 " You will tell him that you have been to 
 see me { 
 
 " I must, now that Searle has found me 
 out ! " said the sister ; and the old look upon 
 the handsome face came back. 
 
 " I will see you to the station, dear." 
 
 '' Are you not afraid of these dark coun- 
 try lanes, coming back ? " 
 
 " Oh ! no one would harm me," cried Eu- 
 nice, confidently. 
 
 " No one would have the heart to do so, 
 or the want of heart. A conceited little minx, 
 and vain of her own amiability," said Da- 
 maris, laughing ; " an amiability which is
 
 304 NO MAx's FRIEXD. 
 
 catching, too, for I am always the better 
 and brighter for a glimpse of you." 
 "Then come more frequently." 
 '' Presently I will, — presently, Eunice, to- 
 gether for life ! " 
 
 "When uncle Harland dies," said Eunice, 
 gloomily. 
 
 " No ; before that time, possibly," said 
 Damaris ; " when I am the mistress of ray own 
 grand fortunes, and away from uncle Har- 
 land." 
 
 " When you are married ? " Eunice asked, 
 eagerly. 
 
 "Married!" cried Damaris, lightly. "I 
 shall never marry. I am a man hater." 
 
 Eunice laughed and shook her head, and 
 then the two went out of the house into the 
 lanes, walking briskly away together, arm-in- 
 arm, and talking of marriage and giving in 
 marriage like two romantic school-girls, each 
 sketching, after awhile, her beau-ideal of what 
 a lover should be, and laughing merrily over 
 the portrait, sprinkling even the beau-ideal 
 with pleasant satire. 
 
 "If ever I fall in love," said Eunice, *'my 
 hero shall be tall, and staid, and handsome;
 
 DAMARIS'S CHARACTER. 305 
 
 a religious man without cant, and a good- 
 looking fellow without affectation, — some one 
 to look up to." 
 
 '•' Young, of course." 
 
 "I don't know that I should care for one 
 so very young," said Eunice, demurely. " I'm 
 too old-fashioned for young men to run after ; 
 steady and respectable middle-age will do for 
 me, not being a beauty like this stuck-up 
 sister of mine." 
 
 Then followed the raillery of the two wo- 
 men, the dashing down of the picture that 
 had been set up, till the night seemed rip- 
 pling over with their musical laughter. 
 
 "And your beau, Damaris ? " 
 
 " Oh ! mine," answered the elder sister. 
 ''Well, a young man, of seven feet or there- 
 abouts, with an interesting narrow chest, a 
 pale face, and long hair, — an eccentric man 
 with a mystery — full of fervour and poetry, 
 and with a terrible and desperate hate of 
 all that is mean, and false, and money-lov- 
 ing." 
 
 She had begun lightly enough, but the 
 latter portion of her description she uttered 
 with an intensity of feeling that startled 
 
 VOL. I. X
 
 306 NO man's friend. 
 
 Eunice, and kept her silent and thoughtful 
 until Damaris spoke again. 
 
 "That is the hero who can never love me," 
 she cried, "for I am mean, and false, and 
 money-loving, — you see that. But, oh I how 
 I should love that man, — at a distance ! Con- 
 scious of my own inferiority, my utter un- 
 worthiness, loving him for his hate, and 
 never letting him know, by a word or a look, 
 what a big secret that affection was. There's 
 a position for a novel, Eunice ! Would 
 not the fashionable young ladies cry over 
 me, if the novel were well worked up ? Would 
 not the hero be voted impossible and mon- 
 strous ? " 
 
 " I dare say that he would." 
 
 " And serve him right, too, for such a hero 
 could not exist in this world. The unethe- 
 reality of the atmosphere would kill the duck! " 
 
 Then Eunice and Damaris laughed again ; 
 they were laughing when they passed into the 
 little station together. They were full of light 
 and life, with the platform all to themselves, 
 until within two minutes of the time of the 
 train, when a guard turned out of a signal- 
 house with a lantern in his hand, and a
 
 DAMARIS'S CHARACTER. 307 
 
 gentleman suddenly sauntered into existence, 
 glanced at the sisters as he passed them in 
 his promenade, started, raised his hat, and 
 exclaimed, in well-bred surprise, — 
 
 " Miss Damaris ! Miss Harland ! " 
 
 Damaris's first movement was to become 
 several inches higher, it seemed, she drew 
 herself up so stiffly and haughtily ; then she 
 subsided, almost as quickly, into graciousness, 
 recovered from her astonishment, and placed 
 her hand in that of the gentleman's, which 
 had been extended towards her with all the 
 familiarity of an old acquaintance. 
 
 '* This is an agreeable surprise, indeed," he 
 said. "I had no idea that you had friends 
 in this neighbourhood." 
 
 " Your mother has been aware of it some 
 time," Damaris answered. " Eunice," to her 
 sister, " this is Mr. Courtenay, of whom you 
 have heard me speak ; you will allow me to 
 introduce you ? " 
 
 Then she went formally through the in- 
 troduction, and ]\Ir. Courtenay raised his hat 
 again, whilst Eunice bowed. It was an odd 
 introduction, in the shadowy station ; and Eu- 
 nice wondered whether she should ever be 
 
 x2
 
 308 NO man's friend. 
 
 able to recognize the gentleman again. She 
 could see that he was a slim, slight young 
 man, of middle height, possessing an inci- 
 pient moustache by way of adornment to a 
 thin, pale, and somewhat angular face ; a 
 fashionably dressed man, whose name w^as very 
 familiar to her, though she had only met 
 him once before, and that years ago at West- 
 bourne-upon-Sea, when he had not condescended 
 to drop any money into her tambourine upon 
 solicitation. This was Mr. Harland's nephew 
 on the late Mrs. Harland's side, almost a 
 relation, one who had been at college when 
 Eunice was more a favourite with her uncle ; 
 Eunice doubted if it were accident that 
 had brought that young man to the small 
 railway station. This could not be Damaris's 
 beau-ideal of manly perfection, but he might 
 be a young man in love with Damaris. She 
 hoped that he was not; for even in the dim 
 light she did not like his looks. 
 
 " A very unexpected pleasure, this," he 
 said to Damaris again. 
 
 '' You have friends about here, Mr. Courtc- 
 nay?" said Damaris. 
 "Oh, yes."
 
 DAMARIS'S CHARACTER. 309 
 
 " May I inquire their names ? My sister is 
 au fait with the inhabitants." 
 
 " When I say about here," explained Mr. 
 Courtenay, "seven miles from here, at least, 
 and more in the Caterham direction. The 
 Warrens, of Grove House," he added, to 
 Eunice. 
 
 " Caterham station would have suited you 
 better, then," said Damaris, lightly. 
 
 " Yes ; but this train does not stop at 
 Caterham." 
 
 " Indeed ! " 
 
 They were standing with their backs to a 
 great time-table, hung against the wooden 
 partition of the station, and Damaris turned 
 instinctively towards the bill, as though to 
 convince herself of Mr. Courtenay's statement. 
 Then she altered her intention, if she had had 
 such an idea, and said, with a pleasant smile, 
 " What a long walk for you it has been ! " 
 
 " I am a first-rate walker, and devoted to 
 the country. If I had my will, I would live 
 amongst the Surrey hills, and abjure the City 
 and City life for ever." 
 
 " You would soon tire of a country life, 
 Mr. Courtenay,'' said Damaris.
 
 310 NO MANS FRIEXD. 
 
 Then she held out her hand to her sister 
 and said, ^' Good-bye. The train is coming. I 
 am very glad to hear that you are getting on 
 so well, and so respectably. You will excuse 
 the curiosity that led me to visit you, — it 
 was a friendly and a sisterly one, believe 
 me. 
 
 Eunice held her breath in amazement. She 
 mechanically shook her sister by the hand, and 
 made no attempt to kiss her. Damaris, she 
 saw, had her part to play again; the sister 
 had stepped back to her own false world, and 
 slipped on the mask that she wore so easily 
 and well. She felt that here had stepped 
 between them another being of v/hom Da- 
 maris was doubtful, and she accepted the 
 position^ though her heart throbbed unplea- 
 santly fast at this duplicity. 
 
 " Good-bye, Miss Harland," she even said, 
 and Damaris frowned at her as at one who 
 had rather overdone her part. The train 
 came up, there was a bustle on the plat- 
 form, a noise of doors opening and shutting, 
 a guard with a mouth plentifully stocked 
 with plums, shouting out an indistinguishable 
 name, a " Good night, Miss Worcester," from
 
 DAMARIS'S CHARACTER. 311 
 
 the gentleman, a shriek of the engine, and 
 Eunice left alone upon the platform, shivering 
 with the cold air to which autumn nights are 
 subject. 
 
 "Can this be right and honest," she mur- 
 mured, looking at the red lights of the 
 receding train ; " can it ever come right ? 
 Lucky for me," she added, heartily, "that 
 uncle Harland never made a lady of Eu- 
 nice I 
 
 She went out of the station, and walked 
 back briskly to her school.
 
 ( 312 ) 
 
 CHAPTEH YII. 
 
 courtenat's loye suit. 
 
 Damaris Worcester, as we shall call her to 
 the end of the story, despite her objections to 
 that appellative, entered a first-class carriage, 
 and was followed by Edwin Courtenay. It 
 might have been observed that Damaris had 
 glanced anxiously into each first-class compart- 
 ment as the train glided past the platform, and 
 had selected the only one containing company 
 in the shape of a white-haired old lady and a 
 little boy. 
 
 It would have been strange on the part of 
 Mr. Courtenay to have chosen another carriage, 
 but Damaris frowned again to herself as he 
 took his seat beside her, tossed his hat on the 
 rack above him, and composed himself for con- 
 versation. She frowned still more, and looked 
 evidently perplexed when the lady suddenly
 
 courten-ay's loye suit. 313 
 
 rose in nervous trepidation at suddenly dicover- 
 ing her whereabouts, and scuttled out of the 
 train with her small companion, muttering 
 something about the unintelligibility of railway 
 guards, as she retired. Mr. Courtenay passed 
 a lavender kid glove across his face for an 
 instant, and took that opportunity to smile be- 
 hind it ; Damaris was assured. Still, it was a 
 very grave face that confronted her the instant 
 afterwards. 
 
 " Shall we close the window, Miss Damaris ? " 
 he asked ; " the wind will be inconvenient to 
 you, I am afraid." 
 
 "The place is stifling — I like fresh air," 
 Damaris answered curtly. 
 
 Mr. Courtenay bowed. He had nothing to 
 urge in contradiction to that wish. 
 
 The train moved on, and both man and 
 maiden were silent for awhile. The maiden 
 looked thoughtfully at the opposite seat, and 
 the man glanced at Damaris as though to 
 read by her expression of features what she 
 thought of this unlooked-for meeting. 
 
 " A curious coincidence," he said at last, " an 
 unexpected pleasure." He had said that on the 
 platform of the station, but he thought it worth
 
 314 NO man's friend. 
 
 repeating, if only with the object of breaking in 
 upon an objectionable silence. 
 
 *' Yes, it is curious," answered Damaris. " I 
 question," she added very quickly, "if it be 
 gentlemanly to follow me like this — to track 
 my footsteps in this insidious manner. I ques- 
 tion if it be worthy of you, Mr. Courtenay ! " 
 
 " Miss Harland," he said with animation, '' I 
 pray you to believe that I have not intention- 
 ally followed you — that this is really a chance 
 meeting." 
 
 " Am I to believe that chance directs more 
 than one gentleman to this part of the world 
 to-night, then ? " 
 
 " You have not met Mr. Ranwick ? Surely 
 he has not — " 
 
 " I have met Mr. Searle," she said, interrupt- 
 ing him, " and he professes not to have been 
 aware of my visit here also." 
 
 " Searle! " exclaimed Courtenay; "yes, that 
 is very strange indeed. Whatever could he want 
 with you — whatever object has led him to spy 
 upon you ? " 
 
 " To spy upon me ! Yes, that is the right 
 phrase." 
 
 " But you must believe, Miss Damaris," he
 
 courtenay's love suit. 315 
 
 mentioned very nervously her Christian name 
 even with its formal prefix, as though doubtful 
 if he were justified in thus addressing her, 
 " that I had no intention — no object — in en- 
 countering you by surprise. Upon my honour, 
 no ! " 
 
 It was a glib lie of Mr. Edwin Courtenay's, 
 but still he lied like a gentleman, he thought, 
 and Damaris Worcester w^ould believe him. 
 She accepted his denial gracefully at least, and 
 said : 
 
 " You have no object in tracking a friend, 
 and I do not think that w^ere it even in your 
 power you would do me any harm." 
 
 " Miss Damaris," he said earnestly, " upon 
 my honour, I would rather cut my throat ! " 
 
 "Not that there is power in anyone to injure 
 me, or that I am doubtful of my own strength, 
 my own capability to fight my own battles," she 
 said proudly. " Mr. Harland, as you know, is 
 not attached to my family, but I shall tell him 
 to-night that I have been to see my sister. 
 Apart from her as I stand, he cannot expect 
 that I have not a little curiosity concerning her 
 and her w^ell-doing." 
 
 " He cannot expect you to be unsisterly. He
 
 316 NO man's friend. 
 
 is an exacting man ; but he will do you justice. 
 Shall I add that — " 
 
 "I want no assistance, Mr. Courtenay; if I 
 cannot plead my cause myself, I will not ask 
 you to second it." 
 
 She was conscious that she had spoken 
 rudely a moment afterwards, for she said in a 
 more mild tone, as though in her heart she 
 feared him: " I have satisfied my curiosity — I 
 have seen my sister, and there's an end of it 
 and her." 
 
 " Miss Damaris, I will be frank with you," 
 said Edwin Courtenay, with a sudden exhibi- 
 tion of frankness that made Damaris jump 
 again. " I do not see why we should fence the 
 question. You speak of your sister as an object 
 of curiosity ; but I came down the same coun- 
 try lane with yourselves, and though I had not 
 recognized you then, I could not help remark- 
 ing to myself, that there were two fond, loving, 
 and happy women a few paces ahead of me in 
 companionship together. I do not know why 
 you seek to present yourself to me as cold and 
 and unsympathetic, when you are all that is 
 good, affectionate, and true." 
 
 " True to the past, which Mr. Harland hates —
 
 cotjrtexay's love suit. 317 
 
 I do not acknowledge that. True to mj sister 
 Eunice — yes, I am ! " 
 
 " I knew it." 
 
 "There, there, make the worst of that to 
 your uncle, sir, if you wdll," said Damaris, 
 defiantly. " I am tired of this duplicity, and if 
 it please your mother and yourself, why I am in 
 your power. Who knows, if you may not set 
 Mr. Harland against me ! " 
 
 " Damaris," he said — he had dropped the cold 
 prefix to her Christian name at last, " you know 
 that I would not say a w^ord to Mr. Harland or 
 my mother — that I would not thwart your 
 lightest wish, but rather go to the end of the 
 world to serve it. Why taunt me like this ? — 
 me, who have confessed to you that your beauty 
 has made me your slave, and that I love you 
 with a desperation that drives me mad, whilst 
 you shut out all hope of heaven to me ! " 
 
 So earnest, then, was Edwin Courtenay — this 
 inflammable stripling whom Damaris had 
 ensnared. All the polite conventionalities of 
 society set aside then, and the lover, with his 
 heart on his sleeve, at Damaris's side, seeking 
 to secure Damaris's gloved hand. 
 
 " No, sir ; I have said that I can never return
 
 318 NO man's friend. 
 
 your love," cried Damaris ; " that I don't be 
 lieve in it. Why do you revive again the sub- 
 ject that is painful to us both ? " 
 
 "Because I am a desperate man," he cried, 
 almost furiously ; " because you are learning to 
 love another, and are duping me. Damaris, I 
 will not have that ! " 
 
 '' You have no right to dictate to me when I 
 shall love, or whom," said Damaris, still defiant; 
 " what do you mean ? " 
 
 " Pardon me," said Edwin Courteuay, very 
 humbly now. " I spoke hastily, but then I felt 
 deeply. You have given me hope." 
 
 " I have not," was the denial here. 
 
 " You have not completely refused me, and 
 that is hope, Damaris. You have told me that 
 there might come a time — a future time — when 
 you might think differently and better of 
 me." 
 
 "Did I say so much as that?" gasped 
 Damaris ; and her hands were clasped involun- 
 tarily together. " Is it possible ? " 
 
 " Yes, it is possible and — true ! You remem- 
 ber twelve months since, when you were with 
 my mother in Milan, that — " 
 
 "Ah! I remember. But you are unkind
 
 courtenay's love suit. 319 
 
 to seize an advantage and to persecute me 
 when I am defenceless like this. Mr. Courte- 
 nay, you are not generous to women." 
 
 '*! would not have uttered a word to- 
 night, but that I am tortured with jealousy." 
 "Of whom?" 
 
 " Of Ranwick, — my fellow-clerk, my uncle's 
 favourite, — the man who has stepped in so 
 strangely to weaken my chances, as well as 
 yours. He loves you, Damaris." 
 "'Tis false." 
 
 ''And it is duping me — pardon the phrase 
 again — to let him love you, or to love him 
 in return, and not apprise me of the state 
 of your feelings towards him." 
 
 " Let me tell you now, that I can never 
 marry you," said Damaris; ''that I will 
 regard you as a friend for ever, the best 
 of friends, if jou will not persecute me 
 thus." 
 
 She looked at him entreatingly, but he 
 was not a merciful man. He had been told 
 once that there might come a time when she 
 could love him ; he had been led on to this, 
 or he had led her on to confess as much, in 
 order to escape his importunity, and he held
 
 320 NO man's friend. 
 
 her fast to that promise so long as she con- 
 fessed that she was heart-free. 
 
 " I will not persecute you, Damaris," he said 
 slowlj. " I only ask you, at all times, for your 
 confidence. Tell me that you love another : 
 give me his name, and confess that it will be 
 yours some day, and I will crush every hope of 
 you that I have in my heart." 
 
 Damaris turned towards him, then paused ; 
 and Edwin Courtenay glanced nervously towards 
 her. Was she about to confess an attachment 
 to some one — to take him at his word, and end 
 the love and ambition with which his mind was 
 full ? He changed colour as he gazed at her. 
 
 " Well," he said, "you love, then ? " 
 
 " No ; I do not," was the deliberate reply. 
 
 " Thank God ! " he ejaculated. " I am free 
 for awhile to build my castle in the air. 
 Damaris, I must hope still, until the castle 
 falls.'" 
 
 *' Did you not promise never to speak of love 
 to me again ? " 
 
 " Until you changed towards me ; and I have 
 fancied that there is a chanofe." 
 
 " Shall I swear to you that I will never 
 marry ? "
 
 courtexay's love suit. 321 
 
 " No — don't say that," he answered quickly. 
 
 They were silent for awhile again ; then 
 Edwin Courtenay, exulting in the advantage 
 that he had gained that evening — in his prisoner, 
 as it were, that accompanied him to London, 
 and could not fly away — went on mercilessly. 
 A deep young fellow in many things was Mr. 
 Courtenay, but in matters of courtship some- 
 what of a bungler. He had great faith in a 
 constant persistence of his suit ; he had a hun- 
 dred examples of antiquity and history to 
 endorse his plan as a good and blameless one, 
 but he was no great judge of character, and he 
 could not believe that Damaris was different to 
 other women. 
 
 He went on, then ; and there was a strange 
 pleading in his love suit, and strange arguments 
 to back it. He was vain of his own powers and 
 of himself, and he thought that the prize would 
 be his in good time. 
 
 " To think that a match that would make 
 everyone happy depends solely upon you — that 
 with you rests all the opposition," he said ; 
 " even my proud aristocratic mother wishes it." 
 
 " Not for the sake of the new daughter that 
 she would secure," said Damaris, scornfully. 
 
 VOL. I. Y
 
 322 NO MAX'S FRIEXD. 
 
 " Granted for the sake of the heiress that my 
 uncle may make of you," he sair], with his old 
 false frankness predominant again, " for she is 
 a woman of the world, and sees the advantaofe 
 of our union. It would draw me nearer to my 
 uncle — it would draw you closer to my mother 
 — and there would be no doubts and anxieties 
 as to the brightness of our future. I am sure 
 that uncle Harland wishes it." 
 
 '' I will have no more of this," said Damaris, 
 irritably. " You cannot overcome me with your 
 talk of the worldly advantages that are before 
 me — that but disgusts me, sir." 
 
 '' Ah ! you are not a worldly woman like my 
 mother — and it was my mother pleading for me 
 then. Pardon me — I have otFended you." 
 
 " You set my heart against you — it hardens 
 whilst you speak. Why have you not the 
 common sense to be silent ? " she demanded. 
 
 '' I may hope on, then ? " he said, persuasively; 
 " hope till I feel assured, or you assure me, that 
 all hope is over ? " 
 
 *' Hope is over." 
 
 " Not whilst you are disengaged," he said. 
 
 " And you will never speak like thjs to me 
 again? Tliere, I promise that I will confess
 
 courtejstay's love suit. 323 
 
 when my heart pleads for you, Courtenay, if 
 you will promise not to talk to me like this ; 
 that I will tell you when every chance is over for 
 you — when the last chance dies away. Is that 
 fair?" 
 
 He might have seen that every chance was 
 over with him then, had he been not blinded by 
 his passion, but he would not see it. He might 
 have read the eagerness of the woman to evade 
 his attentions, and let his love die out for ever 
 in that railway carriage ; but he was a vain man, 
 and looked forward sanguinely. 
 
 " Yes ; it is fair. It is a compact." 
 The train stopped at the next station, and 
 Damaris was glad to see a stranger enter, 
 although Edwin Courtenay cursed the intruder 
 with all the natural bitterness of his disposition. 
 He attempted to discourse. of indifferent topics 
 for the remainder of the journey, but Damaris 
 did not second his endeavours, and was inclined 
 to subside into herself, and away from him. He 
 became more personal and friendly, and aroused 
 a fleeting interest. He warned her of her 
 uncle's head-man — of that ]\Ir. Searle whom 
 she had met that night ; he told her of his owii 
 distrust, and strengthened hers ; albeit whom
 
 324 NO man's friend. 
 
 he distrusted was a matter of little consequence, 
 for she knew that he had no faith in any living 
 thing, except a wild faith in her future love for 
 him. He spoke of his uncle, and of his eccen- 
 tricities ; would have even offered her advice 
 concerning the way to humour the latter — he, 
 who had never won a high place in his uncle's 
 favour, despite the future partnership promised 
 him! — had she not sharply set her interdict 
 upon that counsel. Lastly, he spoke of jNIat- 
 thew Ranwick, and here Damaris listened again 
 attentively, and hazarded a few comments, al- 
 though he sketched his friend in colours that 
 were black enouo^h. He confessed to an attach- 
 ment for young Ranwick, and to a knowledge 
 of his many faults, patent enough to all who 
 knew the man. Ranwick was anxious to rise 
 in the world — by honest means, if possible, but 
 by any means if honesty of conduct were in the 
 way of his advancement, he implied. A great 
 schemer, Matthew Ranwick — pushing his way 
 upwards with a force that cleared the road for 
 him, and winning upon many by his specious 
 ways, his fair, false smiles, his skin-deep 
 amiability. 
 
 "That is the man of whom vou should be
 
 courtenay's love suit. 325 
 
 most careful," he said, '* for he will rob you of 
 our uncle's love — your uncle's money, perhaps 
 — before you are aware." 
 
 " Yes, he is dangerous," assented Damaris, 
 " and must not be made an enemy of, if we can 
 help it." 
 
 He liked that plural " we ; " his face bright- 
 ened at it ; but Damaris was not aware that she 
 had uttered it. 
 
 " If we could but — " he began, then stopped. 
 
 Damaris was coldly, steadily surveying him, 
 and the searching glance of those dark eyes he 
 could not meet. He was about to imply too 
 much — to imply that he was capable of sug- 
 gesting a dishonourable course of action in 
 order to defeat Matthew Ranwick — to lower 
 himself for ever in the estimation of her who 
 might love him in good time. He went on 
 with easy grace. 
 
 " If we could but learn what he thinks of 
 you and me, and whether he envies us that 
 share in Mr. Harland's fortune to which by 
 birth we are entitled." 
 
 *' Yes — by birth," murmured Damaris. 
 
 They were silent the rest of the way to the
 
 326 NO man's friend. 
 
 London Bridge terminus ; and on the platform, 
 and in the crowd there, Damaris extended her 
 hand towards him. 
 
 ''Good night," she said. 
 
 " But you are going — " 
 
 " Home alone, and in the first cab that I can 
 find," she said decisively, and Mr. Edwin Cour- 
 tenay urged no further protest against this 
 determination. 
 
 He wished her good night, placed her in the 
 cab by the side of the platform, directed the 
 cabman where to drive his fare, and even 
 defrayed the expenses of the journey before- 
 hand, to Damaris's annoyance, although she 
 smiled spasmodically, and said " Thank you " as 
 she was driven away. 
 
 Mr. Courtenay would have been considerably 
 startled could he have perceived the expression 
 on the face of the woman he loved the instant 
 after the cab had left the terminus. 
 
 *' If I were only a man," cried Damaris, with 
 her hands clenched, and the lightning flashing in 
 her eyes again, " to cope with all these — to 
 meet them on their own ground, with the 
 strength and courage of a man to face them
 
 courtenay's love suit. 327 
 
 all ! Shall I fight through it, or shall I go 
 mad ! " 
 
 One might have fancied that the latter 
 alternative was the more probable, to have seen 
 Damaris Worcester on that homeward journey. 
 
 END OF YOL. I. 
 
 Ix)ndon : Printed by W. Clowes &; Sons, Stamford Street and Charing Cross.
 
 1