CANCELLED BONDS VOL. I. NEW NOVELS AT ALL LIBRARIES. DALEFOLK. By Alice Rea. 8 vols. TANDEM. By W. B Woodgate, author of ' Boating,' (Badminton Library), 'O. V. H.' 'Ensemble,' &c. 2 vols. KITTY HOLDEN. By Adeline Sergeant, uutbor of ' Caspar Brooke's Daughter,' ' Sir Anthony,' &c. 3 vols. A BOOTLESS BENE. By M. E. Le Clerc, author of ' Mistress Beatrice Cope,' ' A Rainbow at Night,' &c. 2 vols. A MAID OF THE WEST. By Mrs. Grange. 2 vols. LONDON: HURST & BLACKETT, LIMITED. CANCELLED BONDS BY HENRY CRESSWELL AUTHOR OF **A MODERN GREEK HEROINE," "A WOMAN'S AMBITION, "A WILY WIDOW," "SLIDING SANDS," ETC. IN THREE VOLUMES. VOL. L LONDON : HURST AND BLACKETT, LIMITED, 13, GREAT MARLBOROUGH STREET. 1895. ^l II rights reserved. WORKS BY HENRY CRESSWELL. NOVELS. A MODERN GREEK HEROINE. FAIR AND FREE. INCOGNITA. THE SINS OF THE FATHERS. THE SURVIVORS. A WILY WIDOW. MY LORD OTHELLO. SLIDING SANDS. THE HERMITS OF CRIZEBECK. FAIREST OF THREE. A woman's ambition. DISINHERITED. BROKEN FORTUNES. A PRECIOUS SCAMP. DRAMA. THE CONVERSION OF ENGLAND. IN DANGER. (By Henry Cresswell cand W. Lestocq.) ^^3 ID o CO CANCELLED BONDS, LT) (D 00 ^ CHAPTER I. ^ The picture possessed a fascination that was irresistible. It huDO' on the line in the second gal- r^; lery, and all day long a crowd stood before it. The men who came in as soon as the v: doors were opened, to ' do the Academy' in a hurried half-hour on their way to business, paused before it, amongst the ^- little knot of early visitors, and lost in ^^ their admiration of it their scant oppor- tunity of seeing the other pictures of the VOL. I. B I^ CANCELLED BONDS. year. The people who strolled perfunc- torily through the galleries only ' because one must, you know,' became suddenly in- terested as their listless eyes fell upon the young girl in amber. Those who came not to see, but to be seen, and those w^ho came because others brought them — much against their will — found their attention arrested, and looked at their catalogues to read, ' 104. Keglected. Major Torres.'' The country cousins, who can never remember the names either of the pictures or of the artists, and the people who, grudging to pay an extra sixpence for a catalogue, do without knowing them, asked one another, * Have you seen the picture of the jealous girl?' and went away with all their other impressions more or less obliterated by the recollection of a tall, dark lass, in evening costume — whether she was really hand- some or not was disputed — whose jealous, CANCELLED BONDS. 6 black eyes haunted their memory. Years hence those people will still talk about her, when the Academy is mentioned in their hearing : ' I remember a picture which I saw at the Academy — I forget when — a long time ago— a dark girl, in an amber dress, who looked at you as if she would like to kill you. I think it was called " Jealousy." ' Because, after a few years, visitors of this class become fully convinced that the pictures are called by the names which they have themselves chosen for them. People who were leav- ing, fatigued by the multitude of impres- sions received during a tour of the whole exhibition, stopped at the turnstiles to say, 'We must take one more look at the neglected lady;' and those who, having seen her a score of times, agreed, ' We need not this time look at Major Torres's picture,' if their eyes caught but a side b2 4 CANCELLED BONDS. glimpse of it as they passed, j^aused like the rest, to regard the young patrician face, so gentle, and yet so passionate ; so fascinating with its eloquent expression of all the girl's sense of neglect, of all the jealousy that troubled her tortured soul. Meanwhile the artistic world asked, 'Who is Major Torres ?' The picture was not the picture of the year. The better critics found much fault with it ; and those who knew declared that it would not make the Major an A.R.A., as others, who did not know, opined that it certainly must. The exhibition con- tained many a work finer in motifs and by far more excellent in execution. But Major Torres's jealous young lady in amber hit the public hard. She made everyone look at her, and compelled a good many people to think who passed by more meritorious pictures with indiscreet expressions of sur- CANCELLED BONDS. 5 prise that they should have found a place ^ on the line,' or ' have got hung at all; The Major had portrayed a girl of about twenty-one or two, of gentle birth, leaning against an oak-panelled wall. Her hand- some evening dress of amber silk, simply trimmed in a manner that became her maidenhood, and her young beauty — in little need of artificial adornment — ac- corded with her simple jewelry, such as an unmarried girl might becomingly wear. Tall and slender, she was delicately fash- ioned, a low-bosomed, lissom-waisted lass, with shoulders daintily sloping, proud neck, and handsome head. Her low dress, fastened only with a knot on her shoul- ders, displayed the whole shapeliness of beautiful arms so far as her long gloves, one of which had partly slipped down, and left them uncovered ; whilst the folds of her b CANCELLED BONDS. drapery veiled only, without disguising them, the fine and lengthy lines of her l)ody and graceful limbs, full of a gentle strength, as well as of beauty of contour. Leaning against the richly-dark oak Avainscot, where it met the heavy ])ortiere of an open door on her right, she held her head high, a head crowned with crisp hair, black as a raven's wing, of which a few stray tendrils fell over her forehead, and curled about her temples. In the intensity of her passion her tender cheeks were a little hard, the sensitive nostrils of her finely-chiselled straight nose, just per- ceptibly compressed, and her fresh, crimson lips joined in an angry line. From beneath her eyebrows, that were but slightly arched, her widely-opened eyes, deep and limpid in their brilliant blackness, looked straight before her, full of a regard almost fierce in its intensity, and enigmatic in its CANCELLED BONDS. 7 combination of passionate energy and of girlish sensitiveness. Fully nine-tenths of the picture's power to rivet attention and to awaken pity — for it did awaken pity — was due to its direct and extreme simplicity ; to the girl's al- most artless pose, to her look straight into the spectator's eyes, to the absence of any- thing to support the passion in her face and lustrous pupils. Yet moments of inspiration must have attended her creation, for something inex- pressibly sad and tender characterised her expression. There was magic too in her handsomeness. That handsomeness was not merely of a common, perfectly evident sort, but such as grew upon the spectator,, so that she seemed to become momentarily handsomer and more handsome the longer she was regarded, until all the injured magnificence of her beauty, unappreciated 8 CANCELLED BONDS. at the first instant, dazzled the eyes and held them captive. Nor Avas art wanting; in the composition. If technically speaking the picture could l3e lightly set aside as a merely clever hig sketch, just saved by its extraordinary spirit, brilliance, fearlessness, and direct- ness from being flashy and commonplace, it was still undeniable that telling masses of light and shade and brilliant harmonies and contrasts had been managed in a masterly manner ; whilst the skill of the painter was equally exhibited in the note- worthy crispness and refinement of the more subtilely graded tints. The treatment of the background was happy. Against it, as a whole, the girl stood out as a beinsr of liofht set in a world of gloom — a circumstance that seemed to heighten the contrast between the attrac- tiveness of her person, and the passionate CANCELLED BONDS. 9 sense of neglect in her face. Through the open door on her right the spectator looked across a large, handsome, dimly- lighted, empty room, from which a second door, opposite the first, opened upon yet another beyond where a party were danc- ing. By the second door stood a group of men talking, prompting a speculation whether it was one of them that was the occasion of the girl's ferocious jealousy. For she was jealous ! How jealous ! In every line of the delicate face, so young and soft, was legible the terrible jealousy of an excitable nature, incapable of bear- ing slight or neglect, and in her dark eyes a look which suggested descent from some ■s race — perhaps more southern — wonted to find fatal methods of revenge in return for wrongs. On every woman who stopped before her, she seemed to fasten the re^rard 10 CANCELLED BONDS. of those darkly limpid eyes of hers with a passionate, ' It was you ! How dared you? You knew that he was mine !' On every man with a fierce, ' You know you are mine ! You shall not looh at her !' 11 CHAPTER 11. Towards the end of the afternoon of a day late in June, two young men stood on the outside of the crowd gathered before 'No. 104,' awaiting their turn to get a sight of the painting. It was easy to detect in one of them the weakness of a man accustomed to bestow a good deal of attention upon his dress. Only, in this case, the weakness was so far pardonable that the result was a good- looking young fellow, of six or seven-and- twenty, attired with a taste that forbade any charge of dandyism. He had also all 12 CANCELLED BONDS. the air of being perfectly well able to afford to wear garments which, in every particular of exact cut and shade, accord- ed with the strictest masculine fashion of the moment — the most approved pro- portions of collar, cuiF, and silk necktie, and the correctest accessories of cane and watch-chain — so that it might perhaps be said that he was simply setting an excel- lent example of how a gentleman of means should display in his dress a regard for his own personal appearance, and for the gratification of the eyes of his fellow- citizens. He stood five feet eleven ; a fair man, with light-brown hair that curled a little over his high temples, and a small moustache, a shade darker than his hair ; with well-proportioned features drawn in firm lines, bright brown eyes with a spark- ling light, a nose inclining to be aquiline, and a mouth of some determination. His CANCELLED BONDS. 13 face wore the easy, light-hearted expres- sion of a man accustomed to take life gaily. His companion was of an entirely dif- ferent stamp. Also tall, indeed of about the same height, he was several years younger, very young for a man — because a man is very young at two-and-tAventy — - dark, with hair of jet, and impressive dark eyes. He came near being handsome, but was not so. His features showed the in- delible traces of degeneracy of outline that are so common a consequence of ill-health — from which he had suffered at times during his boyhood. His lips had the dull outlines of a much older man, and each cheek presented a deep, hollow fold sharply cut. For all that he was not ill- favoured. Much of the plainness of his face was atoned for by his really fine eyes — deep, and almost as darkly lustrous a& 14 CANCELLED BONDS. those of the gh4 in the picture. Closely shaven — so that he might have passed either for an actor or an ascetic — his face was intellectual, with a grave cast, that of a thinker never quite unconscious of the hundredfold variety of sombre-tinted scenes which life invariably presents to men of imperfect health and sensitive tempera- ment. He had come to the Academy this after- noon against his will. The man who ac- companied him had quite unexpectedly run up against him in Piccadilly — some months had elapsed since their last meet- ing — and had insisted upon his coming with him to the picture-galleries. ' I am afraid I cannot, Torres,' he had pleaded. ' I must go to Bond Street — a commission for my sister — and I have a dozen other things to do before dinner.' He began an enumeration. CANCELLED BONDS. 15 ' You cannot possibly do half those things before dinner, Peyton,' interrupted Marmaduke Torres. ' Come along with me — do : there's a good fellow. I icish you would. I shall not be long. I am going only to look at that picture by Major Torres about which everyone is talking. The Major is some sort of cousin of mine, or of my cousin Mrs. Dromere; — I am not quite clear which. You know there are such a lot of Torres of one kind and another. Do come ! I'll walk on to Bond Street with you afterwards. You know a lot more about art and all that than I do : and I should like to have you with me. It is twenty to one that I shall not see in the picture something I ought to see, and shall make an ass of myself by saying something about it that I ought not to say. We need not stop in the place five minutes : and you can tell me something about Magdalen and 16 CANCELLED BONDS. the men. You are just clown, are you not ? Do come ; there's a good fellow.' Lennox Peyton yielded. The invitation was too warmly expressed for him to be able to persist in a refusal. Torres and he had been schoolfellows, and chums at Mag- dalen, though Torres was by a good deal his senior, having commenced his university career (which was accidentally interrupted) some vears earlier, and havino; taken his degree at the end of Peyton's first year of residence. They proceeded together to Burlington House, Torres on the way asking questions about this man and that, who now had his old rooms, who was now captain of the cricket-club, and how it had come to pass that the boat had been bumped, until they found themselves standing in front of the painting which they had come to see. The crowd before it moved slowly, the CANCELLED BONDS. 17 spectators dropping away one or two at a time, and only gradually leaving room for others to approach. At last, however, they found themselves facing it. A sudden movement of surprise passed over Lennox Peyton's pensive features. Then he looked at his friend. The latter was fully occupied wdth the picture, and did not observe the questioning regard. Saying nothing, Lennox Peyton again turned his eyes to the canvas. ' I had no idea that Major Torres could do anything so good as that,' observed Torres, sotto voce^ after some minutes. The other offered no reply. He was wondering who this Major Torres might be. The burning passion in the dark eyes of the jealous girl cast some spell of stillness around her ; and, all about them, the air was full of hushed remarks, of impressive VOL. I. c 18 CANCELLED BONDS. silences and whispered impressions — ' Ex- quisite !' ' Wonderful !' ' What eyes !' Two men in the front row of spectators moved to leave. One of them stopped in- voluntarily, to look back at the picture over his shoulder. ' That girl seems to follow us with her eyes,' he remarked. 'Yes. She won't let you go,' said another. The power of the painted maiden's eyes was really fascinating. ' One could look at her for an hour, Peyton,' observed Torres, dropping his voice as everyone else did. ' She grows handsomer every moment. I wonder how the Major managed that ? Do you notice it?' Lennox Peyton did not reply. He was still wondering who this Major Torres, CANCELLED BONDS. 19 who was some sort of cousin of Marma- duke Torres, might be, and listening to the various remarks which were beino- made around him. But his friend spoke again. ' My cousin Florence Dromere told my mother that there is some mystery con- nected with the picture. It is said that the Major's model was a young lady : •only no one can make out who she is. Florence insists that the Major is over head and ears in love with her without knowing it — and certain to marry her, al- though he is a confirmed bachelor. It is no wonder if he is in love with her : for she is certainly awfully handsome.' The quick ears of more than one by- stander had been listening to what he said ; and a moment later Lennox Peyton heard a voice remark, c2 20 CANCELLED BONDS. ' I should not care to be the man wha married her. There is a fatality of some sort hanging about that girl.' And Lennox Peyton, scarcely conscious of the things his friend was saying at his side, thought, '- A fatality of some sort ! — Mysteries, and still more mysteries ; and a fatality, perceptible even to strangers in her paint- ed portrait ! Only—" Neglected." That is an aptly chosen name for the picture. But how came the artist to know?' Marmaduke Torres was again speaking. ' She reminds me of some one, Peyton.' Lennox Peyton was in an instant all attention. ' Some girl whom I have seen some- where.' ' Where ?' asked Peyton. ' I cannot remember. But I seem to recollect having seen a girl — something CANCELLED BONDS. 21 like that — somewhere. Only girls are all so much alike.' Lemiox was again silent. Marmadiike Torres had always had, ever since Peyton had first made his acquaintance, so many recollections of ' girls whom he had seen somewhere.' It was another peculiarity of his that he invariably discovered all these girls whom he remembered ' so much alike.' At last they moved away from the picture. ' Tell me what you think of it, Peyton ; something artistic, you know. I am not good at that sort of thing,' said Torres, as they left the lady in amber behind them. ' A striking bit of work, with a clever adjustment of lights and shades.' ' Is that all ?' ' Oh, I would not say that.' 22 CANCELLED BONDS. It struck Torres that his friend did not seem to have come to any very distinct conclusions about the artistic qualities of the painting. He regretted it, for he had been relying a little upon hearing some remarks from Lennox Peyton that should suggest what he might himself becomingly say when called upon to talk about Major Torres's much discussed picture. He could conclude only that, like himself, Lennox Peyton had been too much impressed to be able, at the moment, to exercise his critical faculties. ' Now we are here, shall we look at some of the other pictures ?' he suggested. ' If you like.' The impression made upon Peyton by the picture appeared to have obliterated for the moment any recollections of his errand to Bond Street. CANCELLED BONDS. 2^ When they had looked at one or two other paintings, in a very perfunctory fashion, Torres suggested, ' This does not seem very amusing, does it? Let us just have another look at " Neglected," and then go.' They came back to the picture ; again waited their turn to look at it ; again stood for some minutes before it. ' I must come and look at that again,' remarked Torres, as they turned away. ' That is a girl not like all the other pictures of girls that one sees.' On the way to the turnstile he suddenly stopped. ' I remember !' he said. ' Of course it was on the river — six or seven years ago.' 'What?' 'That I saw a girl just like that — or rather like that — only she was younger.' 24 CANCELLED BONDS. •Whereabouts on the river?' inquired Peyton, as they walked on. He appeared to be interested. ' Between Goring and Pangbourne. Did I never tell you ? That was a bit of an iidventurc. Between ourselves I behaved rather well on the occasion. Look here, Peyton, come and dine with me: and I will tell you all about that. Don't say you cannot come. You can just as well dine with me as by yourself, you know, and I am all alone. Besides, you will be amused to see my quarters. I am not at home. Mother is having the house done up from basement to attic whilst she is away, and it is all painters, paper-hangers, upholsterers, and all the rest of it: not a place in which to stand upright anywhere — don't you know?' Lennox did know. He had the distinct- est recollection of Mrs. Torres as an ami- CANCELLED BONDS. 25 able, rather Aveak old lady, accustomad to spoil her only son Marmaduke. and de- lighting in turning her house upside do^vn ^ for cleaning' as frequently as possible. Meanwhile his friend continued, ' I am putting up for a day or two at the Majt>r's rooms. He is out of town. You will see his studio, and all the rest of his quarters. And we will have a jolly evening. Do come. I am going to take a hansom. We will drive round together to the places where you want to go. That will save your time. You will come, won't you?' Again Lennox Peyton assented. But this time the opportunity of seeing the rooms occupied by the unknown Major Torres did more to decide his consent than the warmth of his friend's invitation. Thougli it was seldom that he could per- suade himself to disappoint the friendliness 26 CANCELLED BONDS. with which Marmaduke Torres pressed him to give him the pleasure of his society. ' Only I must send a wire to the people with whom I am staying to tell them I shall not be in to dinner,' he said. CHAPTER III. Dinner was over, and Marmaduke Torres^ and his guest had adjourned to a small room attached to the Major's studio ; a picturesque little snuggery that had in one corner a long, low Avindow of small greenish and blueish glass, with a deep window-seat beneath it. An egg-shaped Venetian lamp, hanging from the ceiling, shed through the coloured sides an im- perfect light that mingled with the last rays of the summer evening stealing in at the window, to illumine faintly the sha- dowy room's darkly-tinted walls, panelled 28 CANCELLED BONDS. partly, and ]}artly hung with draperies of bizarre patterns. Fitfully discernible in the background were, in a corner, a piano, in another a heavy cabinet of wood with brass knobs and hinges, and sombre, quaintly-bound books, and above it the tarnished frame of a dark oil-painting, and elsewhere, in confusion, pictures and bronzes, engravings, ' studies,' and quaint pottery ; on the polished floor Persian car- pets and skins of wild beasts, and a couple of small palms ; and over the heartli (tiled and furnished with old brass dogs) some dark construction of oak with dim mirrors and Bohemian glass. The room contained but little furniture, all of it quaint and uncommon. ' This sort of thing does not look as if the Major was a poor man, does it ?' re- marked Torres, offering his guest a light. ^You would not expect to hear him ever- CANCELLED BONDS, 29 lastingly saying that he cannot aiForcl this and cannot afford that : cannot afford to marry and cannot afford to do anything else that he likes.' ' Unless his expensive tastes keep him poor,' suggested Peyton. 'Ah, you might well say that. You should see the little dinners he gives here — or the way in which he lives him- self. He keeps the table of an epicurean.' ' Still he has also some of an epicurean's higher tastes,' remarked Peyton. ' This is a rare Rembrandt, and must have cost him a lot of money.' He had taken up a framed etching that stood on a little easel on one of the tables. Marmaduke Torres came to his side and looked at it with him. ' That is really valuable ?' he asked. 'Very. 'Ah, then I suppose that is how he 30 CANCELLED BONDS. spends his money. I had fancied it was mostly in victuals and drink,' observed Marmaduke Torres, in the tone of a man whose acquaintance with the value of objects of art was limited. ' However, I suppose that now his pictures will begin to bring him in something handsome.' ' Have you known him long ?' asked Peyton. ' I have heard of him — in a vague way ; but never met him till a week or two since. Won't you sit down?' Placing himself in the window-seat, and lio^htino; a cio-ar, he recommenced : 'All this time I have never inquired after your people, Peyton. All well, I hope ?' ' All, thank you, except my mother. You know she is a great invalid.' ' Where are they all now. Not with you in town ?' ■' No : I am staying with friends. The CANCELLED BONDS. 31 fact is there are one or two things that I wish to read up at the Museum, and these good folks were liind enough to invite me to stay with them whilst I did so. I do not join my own people until the end of next month.' ' Then you are as hard at work as ever. I wish I was like you, Peyton; able to grind away at books and all that. You are a wonderful fellow, Peyton.' His admiration for his friend's studious habits was as old as the school-days, and rather increased with time than di- minished. ' I am afraid I am nothing of the kind,' replied Lennox Peyton, with a little smile ; and continued, ' My people are all in Devonshire at Belmont, this new^ place which father has taken. The medical men have advised a complete change of scene for mother, and a rather milder climate.' 32 CANCELLED BONDS. ' Your mother has not become con- sumptive, I hope ?' ' No. It is not that. But nobody seems to know exactly what ails her. Some of the doctors say one thin^^, and some another; nervous debility, general atony — I cannot tell you what else. We never arrive at anything definite, and, on the whole, I am afraid she grows weaker. This is the last sus^f^restion that she should try a southern English climate and com- plete change of scene. Then father heard of this place, and took it. All the arrange- ments have been made very hurriedly, and I have not yet been down there.' ' Do they like the place?' ' Very much. From what my sister writes I imagine that it must be exceed- ingly pretty, and the house is just what father wished. You knoAv I seldom hear from him. It was built some fifty or sixty CANCELLED BONDS. 33 years ago, by a man who had been advised to take his wife to this same part of England, and seems to be very comfortable. The neighbourhood is charming, they say. In fact, father is so pleased that since he has been down there he has been even thinking of purchasing.' ' Indeed ! Where is the place ?' ' It is a rather out-of-the-way locality, between Totnes and the moor.' ' It must be somewhere near where my father was killed,' said Torres, pensively. ' I have never been in that part of the country.' A short silence ensued. Lennox Pey- ton hesitated to make any observation re- specting the death of his friend's father. Mr. Torres had been murdered. The whole history of the crime, com- mitted some twenty-three years before^ VOL. I. D 34 CANCELLED BONDS. Avas of a hideous atrocity. Happily its details are by no means essential to the present history. The murderer was a gentleman of moderate wealth, and an intimate friend of Mr. Torres, and the occasion of their quarrel — in the back- ground of which, of course, was a woman — was almost equally discreditable to both sides. Mr. Torres, not suspecting treach- ery, was induced to visit a sequestered country-house, disappeared, and after some ten days was discovered to have been mur- dered. The murderer, his name was Chevalier, all but escaped detection, and was suddenly arrested when despair of any light being ever thrown upon ' The Wold Mystery' had become universal. But Chevalier having been once arraigned the whole of the horrible story was at once unravelled, and a confession made — almost in bravado, it seemed — on the eve CANCELLED BONDS. 35 of execution, completed what had been previously wanting in its ghastly details. When Chevalier Avas executed, the sense of being rid of a monster appeared to be shared by all. Or by all but two — if two are worth mentioning as an exception among so many millions. That morning two miser- able women sat by a low fire in a semi- detached house, weeping, poor souls, and wringing their hands. One was a widow, the mother of the condemned man, her only son. The other was his wife, so soon also to become a widow, and about after- wards to be a mother. The elder woman wept in silence. The sun of her hopes had utterly set. She sat, merely wiping away the tears as they chased each other down her cheeks, and thinking how she once had nursed a little d2 86 CANCELLED BONDS. "baby at her breast. The other could not contain her sorrow, and wailed amid her tears, ' What shall I do for my poor baby ? Where will there be in the whole world a place for my baby — his child? What shall I do when I see people looking at the child?' There was a clock in the room that ticked as its hands hurried on to an hour. The elder woman never once raised her regard to it, but the eyes of the younger questioned it every few seconds amidst her tears and wails. Only ten minutes — and then ! Only eight minutes — and then ! Suddenly she rose, and going to the clock stopped it. The elder woman looked up, hearing the ticking cease, but said nothing. And the younger woman sat down again with a CANCELLED BONDS. 87 sort of numbed easement that at least she did not know the hour. Till a clock strik- ing in the next house told it her. But the world never knew anything of those two women's agony ; and was only well satisfied that in one instance justice had been done. By this time only a few people here and there, now and then, re- membered the murder of Horace Torres by his friend Edmund Chevalier as ' a horri- ble story.' Because it was so horrible a story, Len- nox Peyton avoided a reply to his friend's remark ; and after a minute observed, to change the subject of their conversation, ' You were going to tell me something about a girl you met on the river, of whom Major Torres's picture reminded you.' ' So I was. I am glad you have mentioned it.' 38 CANCELLED BONDS. The speaker's tone suggested that the interruption of Ms thoughts was welcome. Knocking the ash oiF his cigar he moved, and, placing himself in the attitude of a man who has a tale to tell, began : ' I am afraid it is rather a long history : but if you would like to hear it ' ' I should very much like to hear it.' ' Well, then. This was in the autumn. It was — let me see — between six and seven years ago : during my first year at Oxford. You know that I resided one year, and was then abroad for two.' ' With your uncle who died in Italy. I know.' ' It was towards the end of the " long." Mother was in town, and I was amusing myself with paddling down from Oxford to Kingston in a desultory sort of way, generally putting ashore in the afternoon near the station, and, after dining, running CANCELLED BONDS. 39 up to town by one of the late trains. If I felt in the humour, I came back to my boat to continue my voyage the next day : or I let a day or two pass, just as I felt dis- posed. That afternoon I must have started from somewhere above Wallingford. I do not remember where. Very likely I did not get afloat till after luncheon. When I set out, I never had any definite plans about how far I would go. I left that to chance. One can easily get back to town from any place on the river. If I felt in- clined to exert myself, and had a favour- able wind, I did a good many miles in the day : and if I was lazy I merely drifted.' Lennox Peyton smiled. The plan on w^hich this voyage from Oxford to London was conducted accorded with the narrator's way of carrying out most of his enterprises. Seeing his smile, the other broke into a light laugh. 40 CANCELLED BONDS. ' That was like me, was it not, Peyton I You see, I was not intended by nature for ofoino; throuo^h thino-s all at one stretch like men of your serious, resolute sort. I pre- fer a little diversion to break the monotony. And I fancy most people agree with me. But this is not my story. There were few boats on the water because the sky looked nasty, though at times the sunshine was bright and j^leasant. Only, as the after- noon wore on, a lot of ugly, inky clouds gathered. The wind began to blow in queer little puifs, and several showers of rain came down, in big drops. I remem- ber that at Cleve Lock I told the lock- keeper that I should go on as far as Gor- ing. After that, the rain stopped again ; and then I took it into my head that I would paddle on steadily and get down to Pangbourne. At Goring they recom- mended me not to attempt it, but, you see, CAIS^CELLED BONDS. 41 Pangbourne is only about four miles further down. That was no great dis- tance ; so I paddled on. But by the time I reached the railway bridge the wind backed, and the rain came down steadily. I thought of returning to Goring, but gave that up ; because I should have had the stream against me, and the river was run- ning rather strongly. It seemed better, after all, to go on down stream. Accord- ingly I stuck to my sculls, working stea- dily. But the wind continued to freshen, until it became a sort of gale which howled amongst the rushes. The surface of the river was seething like a cauldron, and the rain came down in sheets, torrents, cata- racts. I soon had a nice little cargo of water in the bottom of the boat ; and then, to make everything pleasant, it began to grow dark. Still 1 was determined that I would reach Pangbourne somehow. I put 42 CANCELLED BONDS. the boat ashore, got the water out, and then paddled on again. By that time it was as nearly pitch dark as it can be on the water. You know one always seems to be able to see a little on the water, no matter how dark it may be.' He rose, and continued his story leaning against the old cabinet. ' Well, that was a nice sort of evening for boating, was it not? And, of course, I was crawling along at a snail's pace. Still, I stuck to it. I can stick to a thing when I choose, Peyton, as well as any man; and by that time I had vowed to myself that I would somehow get the boat down to Pangbourne : though after all I did not do it. That was because all of a sudden there occurred about the last thing anyone could anticipate. I had paddled but a very little farther, when I heard CANCELLED BONDS. 43 ahead of me a voice, a thin voice, like a boy's, singing out through the gloom, ' " Look ahead, sir." ' For an instant I wondered whether it was some one on the bank, warning me that I was sculling into the bushes, which I might easily enough have done : then, whether I was farther down the river than I supposed, and near some landing-stage : only I could see no lights. At last I descried a small boat coming towards me with some one in it who seemed unable to control the craft in the rain and wind. The next moment we collided, the bow of the other boat shooting under my scull and outrigger. ' I laid hold of the boat to steady us both, because I did not wish to add a cap- size to my other adventures. Then I 44 CANCELLED BONDS. looked over my shoulder, to ascertain the precise state of the case. ' In the other boat was a slight, smallish figure, struggling helplessly with an en- tangled scull, apparently some boy. ' " Hulloa, Tommy," I said, "cannot you get clear? What is it?" ' " My scull is jammed," answered the thin voice. ' " Try to back," I said, " and I'll back too. Can't manage it? The rain gets into your eyes, eh?" ' I could not help laughing at the urchin with the rain lashing his face, which he was trying to avert from it ; and I remarked, ' " Hold on to my boat whilst I give you back the scull." ' Tommy, as I had been caUing him, caught hold of the gunwale of my boat, and then I noticed on the wrist that lay CANCELLED BONDS. 45 across my outrigger — a couple of gold bangles. ' The occupant of the boat was not a boy, but a girl — a young lady ! ' I was a good deal surprised, and began an apology. ' All she answered was, ' " It does not matter. Can you give me my scull now?" ' I shipped her scull for her, and she let my boat go, saying, ' " Thanks. I am all right now. I beg your pardon for running into you. The wind was so strong I could not turn my boat." ' I still had hold of her boat, for I was wondering how she came to be out in such weather, and what I could do to help her. ' At last I fancied I understood what had happened, and said, 46 CANCELLED BONDS. ' " You have missed your landing-stage ^ and cannot get ashore?" ' •' I don't want to get ashore," she answered at once. " I am all rio^ht now. ' " But you can't go on in this weather. Only look at the water in your boat!" — She had a lot more water in her boat than I had. — " It is dangerous." ' " Yes, that is just it," she answered. ' " You don't want to be capsized?" ' To that she gave no answer. ' " Let me advise you to put your boat ashore," I said. " You can leave it on the bank. You need not be afraid of anyone's taking a scull in it to-night. And we can send some one to fetch it. — I'll come ashore with you, if you like, and help you to land your boat, and to find your way." ' At that she seemed to think; then, after a moment, looking at me, she said, CANCELLED BONDS. 47 ' "" I'll go ashore if you will promise to take care of me." ' " Certainly," I answered. " Let us look out for a place where we can land." 48 CHAPTER IV. ^ We had a little trouble to find a conveni- ent landing spot, but we discovered one at last, and together pulled up the boats on the towing-path. The wind was still blow- ing a hurricane, and the rain pouring in torrents. We were both as wet as if we had been capsized, and the girl, with her boating flannels clinging about her, looked piteous. When I had taken the sculls on my shoulders, she asked, ' '' Which way do we go ?" ' I told her Pangbourne was the nearest place, and proposed that we should go CANCELLED BONDS. 49 thither. Without making any remark, she turned at once in the direction I indicated. ' I oft'ered her my arm, and she accepted it, and trudged along at my side, bending her head to avoid the rain that beat in her face. Now and then I spoke to her, to keep up her courage, but she seldom an- swered. Only, once, when I apologised for the discomforts of our walk by saying, " I am afraid this is a miserable walk for you," she surprised me by replying, " I cannot be more miserable with you than I am at home." As a fact, we were having anything but an agreeable walk. The towing-path is at no time a pleasant promenade after dark, and had become a perfect misery of pasty mud, whose sticki- ness threatened to rob both of us of our boating-shoes. Here and there it was varied by big puddles, through which we splashed recklessly. It was impossible for VOL. I. E .50 CANCELLED BONDS. US to be wetter than we were. I was glad for both our sakes when we at last descried the lights of Pangbourne, and reached one of those little water-side hotels of the better sort that are so numerous near the river. I quite forget now what the house was called. I am not boring you, Peyton?' ' On the contrary, you are interesting me very much.' ' Then light another cigar : my story is not yet finished. Its really dramatic incidents remain yet to be told.' Lennox Peyton lighted a new cigar, and his friend a":ain sittino; down resumed : ' I took the girl into the hotel, persuaded her to have some negus, which she at first refused; ordered myself a stiff glass of grog ; and, having made arrangements for some one to see to the boats, rejoined my companion, whom I found sipping her CANCELLED BONDS. 51 iiegiis alone. I had felt a delicacy about asking lier questions, how she came to be on the water, where her home was, and all that. You see, that was not exactly my iDusiness. Besides, the circumstances of our walk had not favoured conversation. And I could, hardly say that I had properly seen her. Now that I at last got a good look at her in the gas-light, I was sur- prised to discover how handsome a girl she was. ' I need not attempt to describe her. You have only to recollect that picture of the Major's. I don't say that the girl was exactly like that. She was a good bit younger than that girl we were looking at this afternoon. She seemed to me not more than sixteen. And she was by no means so perfectly, so idealy handsome. You will say, " Of course not, if she was ' E 2 UBHART "^'VERsmroFauwois 52 CANCELLED BONDS. only a child." But women never are as- handsome as pictures, Peyton — unluckily. Still I should not be at all surprised if that girl had grown up into something very like the Major's ]3icture. In fact, I cannot help thinking that the Major must somehow have come across her. Anyhow, she was uncommonly like the jealous lady, and a remarkably handsome young girl. ' I asked her if she was feeling any warmer, to which she answered, "A little," and, whilst I was having my grog, I coaxed her into drinking the rest of her negus, which I was sure she wanted. Whilst doing so, she turned abruptly to me, and said, ' " I ought to tell you Avhy I was on the water. I came out because it was dan- gerous. I wanted to let my boat go over the lasher — whilst no one could see me in the dark : and to be drowned — because I CANCELLED BONDS. 53 can't bear the life I lead at home any longer. Only the wind blew me up the stream. It was so strong that I could not manage the boat." ' " You ought to feel very much obliged to the wind," I remarked. ' To that she replied, " I don't mind, if you will take care of me." ' She had said something like that before. And you will see presently that I had not understood her. I did not understand her this time either, and wondered a little what she meant. Only I imagined that she was so wet and wretched that she was not thinking much about what she was saying. ' But presently when I began to talk about what we should do, meaning that she should tell me where she lived, and how I should take her home, she surprised me by saying. 54 CANCELLED BONDS. ^ '' I don't care. Only don't treat me like they do at liome." ' There was something in the tone of the statement that made me look at her, and ask myself how this adventure was o:oino; to end. ' However, I explained myself; said that I was sorry that she was not happy; talked about a chill, and so on, you know ; and that I thought that, after all, at any rate to-night, she had better go home. ' She cut me short at once. ' '* I am not going home," she said, flatly. '"But what will you do, then?" I asked. ' She looked up at me, and said, as if it was the simplest thing in the world, ' " I am coming with you. You pro- mised to take care of me." ' " But I am going up to town," I answered. CANCELLED BONDS. 55 ' " I don't mind," she said. '' I will come to town with you." ' The speaker rose and took a turn up and down the room. Lennox Peyton, with his elbow rested on the arm of his deep arm-chair, followed him with his eyes. He had been smoking slowly,, w^hilst following every word of his friend's narrative with an attention that proved his interest to be intense. How he seemed to await what would follow in breathless suspense. The other droj^ped into the window- seat. ' I do not want to represent myself as better than other men, Peyton,' he ob- served, apologetically. ' I took a good look at her. She was watching me as if she was feeling not at all flattered by m}^ hesitation. She looked like an uncom- monly pretty morsel of perversity — there 56 CANCELLED BONDS. was no denying that. And, you see, she was rather throwing herself at me, wasn't she ? And I wondered what would hap- pen if I did take her to town with me. To help me along, she remarked just at that moment, ' " You can do what you like with me. I don't care. When you are tired of me you can shoot me ; or I'll kill myself. I don't care what becomes of me." ' If you were to ask me how it was that I did not say, '• All right, come along then. We will go to town together," I'm afraid I cannot tell you, Peyton. Only, somehow, I felt sorry for the poor little devih She was not so very little either ; a tall, well-made girl, though her figure was slight. And she was evidently a lady. I could not help fancying that she had been brought up in some careful home, and had not the faintest notion of what CANCELLED BONDS. 57 she was saying. Only, it was plain that I must use tact in dealing with her. This wild enterprise of putting her boat over the lasher in the dark had exalted her sensibilities beyond all possibility of control. ' " Let us think," I said. " There is no train for an hour or so. I am afraid you are worried. I don't like to hear you say that you don't care what becomes of you. Look here, I am going to light a pipe : have a cigarette, it will do you good.' ' She looked a little surprised, but almost at once held out her hand, saying, ' " I have never smoked. But I will if you wish it. I'll do anything you like, if you will only take me Avith you." ' I gave her a very mild cigarette, telling her to smoke it in little puffs, very slowly, and to put it doAvn as soon as she was tired of it. Then I lighted my pipe. 58 CANCELLED BONDS. ' Well, ray lady puffed away at her cig- arette, as I had bidden her. When she was half way through it, I asked her if it w^as nasty, and she replied, " ISTot at all." I could see that she was already more collected. The blessed weed was exerting its benign influence ! Presently she put it down, saying, very composedly, ' " I won't smoke any more, if you don't mind." ' I replied that I did not wish her to smoke any longer than she liked : and then, perceiving that she was evidently recovering her sober senses, began to talk reason to her. First I invented some excuses for our not starting at once for town ; and presently told her plainly that T wanted her to let me take her home. At iirst she did not like that at all. But she was a great deal calmer than she had been before she had smoked the cigarette, and CANCELLED BONDS. 59 Ly degress I persuaded her. Still she told me that I might just as well have let her be drowned : and said, with just such a flash in her eyes as that woman has in the picture, ' " I would not have come with you if I had known that you were not going to do anything to help me." ' Howbeit, at last she agreed to go home. She mentioned a point from which she knew her way, if I would take her thither, and having made some enquiries about the road, I set out with her. It was still rain- ing, but not so heavily, and the wind had dropped. That did not mend the road Avhich was dark and dirty; and the dis- tance proved a good deal longer than I anticipated. The girl would not again take my arm. When I offered it, she declined it saying, " No, thank you," in a tone that gave me pretty plainly to under- '60 CANCELLED BONDS. stand that she did not think veiy much of me. Also we did not seem to have a great deal to say to each other, and presently I discovered that she was crying, — after the fashion of all o;irls in o^eneral. It is a pity that none of them can manage to be different from the rest. ' By and by we reached cross-roads. There she stopped, and said, ' '' I know my way now. I need not trouble you to come any farther." ' I was wondering whether she would shake hands. Now that we were going to part, I was rather sorry to leave her, and ventured to ask, ' ''When I come down for my boat, may I come and see you?" ' To which she replied, '''What for?" ' " I should like to see you again." ' To that she answered on the spot, CANCELLED BONDS. 61 ' " If you wanted me, you should have taken me with you." ' " At least you will tell me your name," I proposed. ' She shook her head. ' " But I have only to find out whose the boat is," I remarked, " and I can easily discover your name." ' To which her ladyship replied, ' " If you do that, you will be a cad." ' That was pretty straight, was not it ? '' So I offered my hand, and wished her o'ood-nio'ht. She looked at the hand, said good -night curtly, with a little bow, and turned away. I stood watching her till she disappeared. I had some thoughts of following her, and seeing whither she- went. But I reflected upon that extreme- ly apposite remark of hers, " If you wanted me, you should have taken me with you," and abstained from pursuing her, return- 62 CANCELLED BONDS. ino; instead to the hotel. I have since ft sometimes wondered whether she, after all, let her boat go over the lasher on a dark evening. If she did, she certainly had not much for which to thank me. And, Pey- ton, to this hour I have never been able quite to make up my mind whether I on that evening behaved like a hero — or an ass.' Lennox Peyton, still seated in the same position, made no offer to give his opinion on the subject. ' It was a bit of an adventure, was it not ? Only the girl's crying at the conclusion, like they all do, rather spoiled it, I should have thought a lot more of her if she had not blubbered.' ' Have you seen her since ?' ' Never : nor heard a syllable about her. Only it seems that, at any rate, she has not drowned herself. Major Torres must have CANCELLED BONDS. 63 run up against her somewhere. So close a resemblance could not be the result of mere accident.' ' Although all girls are so much alike ?' suggested Peyton. ' They are not all quite alike in every- thing : and he has hit off that girl's face, and figure, and expression line for line, and trait for trait : only she is a little older. And, of course, she Avould be older. I must find out from him where he saw her." 'When you do,' said Lennox Peyton, 'tell me. I should like to hear who she is; Lennox quitted his friend early in the evening, though the latter was urgent with him to remain a little longer. On his way back to his friends' house his step was slow, the loitering pace of 64 CANCELLED BONDS. a man deeply preoccupied with his own thoughts. For he also had recognised the lady in the picture entitled ' Neglected.' The jealous girl in amber was a portrait of his own sister. And Rosamond — that was her name — was neglected : if any girl was. Whilst as for the jealousy which the public had discovered in the features of the lady numbered 104 — though no mention of that passion was made in the Academy catalogue — he feared that it could scarce- ly surpass that of which he too well knew his sister to be capable. Only, how came this Major Torres, of whom he had never heard until to-day, to have painted so characteristic a portrait of her ? Rosamond had been in London during the spring, but her letters to himself, al- ways frequent, had contained no mention CANCELLED BONDS. 65 of any artist acquaintance, mucli less a hint of having sat to anyone. The affair was a mystery : one more mystery to add to all the others that con- stituted his own and his sister's strange lot. Was Rosamond also the heroine of Marmaduke Torres's history of the river ? He feared that it was possible she might be. She was at times so unhappy. She had none of his resources ; none of his ability to submit to circumstances. His reflections were interrupted by his beino; accosted bv some one whom, beino; lost in his own thoughts, he had not ob- served approaching him. This was a man of about seventy, of a medium height, plainly dressed in a pepper and salt walking suit, and wearing a soft, grey felt Homburg hat, and dark blue tie. He was stoutly built, and hale, with brown VOL. I. F €6 CANCELLED BONDS. hair that had not yet become entirely grey. About his wide temples he was bald. A thick moustache and beard, greyer than his hair, and not long, but bristly, and growing close against his cheeks, and also about his chin, covered all the lower part of his face. His nose approached the Socratic type — an undeniably ugly nose, turned up a little at the point, and broad at the base. Some very good-hearted men have noses like that. To atone for it, his grey eyes, well opened, and not yet sunk- en, had the soft, gay light of a happy and wise old man. But the charm of his face lay in his mouth, and when a man has a mouth of that sort, it is a patent of the nobility of the life which he has led, and of the soul which dwells in him. ' Did not know me, Lennox ?' asked the old man, in a cheery voice. CANCELLED BONDS. 67 ' Mr. Jaffray ! I beg your pardon.' * I should think so. Cutting your own godfather!' The old man enquired after Lennox's father, his sister, his mother. The mo- ther came last, and then Lennox Peyton asked, ' And what brings you to town, Mr. Jaffray ?' ' Destiny, Lennox. I am spending the night in town because I was going into Wiltshire, and missed the train.' ' That is always so annoying.' ' Annoying ! If people are so foolish as to allow themselves to be annoyed. And of what use is it if they do ? The Parcae^ you know, manage these things — or mis- manage them ; and the philosopher accepts their arrangements, as they come. What are you doing ?' f2 68 CANCELLED BONDS. Lennox explained his reasons for being in town, as he had done to Marmaduke Torres, adding, ' You see I must read hard now. After my first in moderations, the college will expect me to take a first in the final schools : besides, I hope T have a chance^ of a fellowship.' ' Good. You will get it — if it is your destiny. I hope you may get it. Work as hard as you can. And if you do not get either your first or your fellowship — it is all fate, my boy, so do not distress yourself One of these days, if the sisters three (old cats, Lennox,) permit, I shall look in to see you all in your temporary home, when I am in that part of the world. You will not be at home, you say, until July?' ' Not until the latter end of July.' ' I shall not forget.' CANCELLED BONDS. 69 Bidding Lennox, wHen lie next wrote, to send his kind regards to his father and mother, and his love to Rosamond, the old man shook hands, and Lennox proceeded on his way, soon dropping back into his previous train of thought. But the meeting with Mr. JafFray had given those thoughts of his a new turn. It was perhaps pardonable that he should not attach much weight to the old gentle- man's amiable fatalism. It never appeared to him that Mr. JafFray himself attached much weight to it. Only it was undeniable that fatality sometimes appeared to be the only possible explanation of the universal puzzle of existence. Was there, hidden somewhere, a thread of destiny determin- ing the lines upon which his life and his sister's had always moved; some doom which, if he could know it, would explain the mysteries that surrounded them? 70 CANCELLED BONDS. The speculation contained attractions for a mind like his, of a pensive and melan- choly turn. 71 CHAPTER V. The evening hour was a perfect example of summer's softest mood. The sun had dropped to the crown of the elms, and the level light swept across the lawns in glow- inor tides of lono^-shadowed enchantment* Against it the trees stood out in masses of brilliance and shade. In the air not a breath stirred. Only the occasional voice of the birds broke the leafy stillness of the woods. Through one of the tall windows of the drawing-room, opening on the long western verandah, a young girl stepped out. 72 CANCELLED BONDS. A slender figure, above the middle height, in a costume that becomes the long lines of her girlish gracefulness. Little, narrow feet that plant themselves firmly on the verandah's pavement of black and white marble diamonds. Lightly poised on her jet black hair a broad-leafed hat with a large feather that lends im- portance to her carriage of conscious dignity. Not so fascinating here in the wide, level evening lights as in her low dress of amber silk in Major Bob Torres's pic- ture on the walls of the Academy 1 Or is it the i^rivilege of art to ^x. for ever one consummate moment, reached in reality but for a single instant in a life- time ? Still a handsome girl, and at any rate possessed of one characteristic — probably the one which any girl would covet most CANCELLED BONDS. 73 of all those which the Major's picture pre- sented — that her beauty is of a kind to groAV upon anyone discerning enough to study it. A degree of discernment which no person of the opposite sex had hitherto evinced. There was no fire of jealous light in her large, darkly liquid eyes this evening, only a certain restlessness, as she looked a.bout the verandah on the right and left of her. In her hands she had two pairs of gloves. One pair she laid on a small iron table near her. She began to draw on the others. When they were buttoned, she again cast a regard around her, on the right and the left, over her shoulder, through the open windows of the drawing-room, and across the lawn. As she did so a petu- u CANCELLED BONDS. lant, aggressive ray lighted up beneath her long fringed lids. Unable to discover the person whom she sought, she descended the two steps from the verandah to the lawn, and, turning her face to the house, lifted her eyes to one of the upper windows, and called, 'Eleanor!' No one answered. The girl's eyes fell to the grassy carpet at her feet, and a minute, two minutes, passed whilst she seemed irresolute. Then, turning from the house, she strolled away with slow steps across the lawn. As she went she folded the second pair of gloves — a pair of antelope-skin driving-gloves — which she had taken up from the table, and slipped them into her pocket. Quitting the lawn, she chose one of the walks, still sauntering on with the same lingering steps. Where the path began to drop in a gentle incline she CANCELLED BONDS. 75 paused for a moment to look at the purple petunias, and again, further on, to pluck from a rose-bush, with many precautions to elude the thorns, a tea-rose which she fastened in the bosom of her dress. Then she fared on again beneath the trees to a more deserted part of the grounds, where her path began to ascend a steep slope, winding in random zig-zags beneath scat- tered beeches on the skirts of the wood. On the crown of the hill she had climbed the beeches grew closer together. No longer following the path she strayed on- ward beneath them, shaping her course in no direct line — her walk had plainly no aim, save that of the pleasure of breathing the summer evening air — onl}^ always farther and farther from the house. Here and there in her walk over the soil of fallen leaves she came upon little clusters of fungi, here a smart bevy with tall, thin 76 CANCELLED BONDS. stems, and sharp-pointed, oily-looking caps, there a lowlier brotherhood, thick-set, and of dowdily greyish brown, from whose flat heads an ugly scent rose to the nostrils. Pausing a moment, she swept them down with the side of her little foot, uprooting them all, and leaving them scattered and broken on the ground, as if she performed ii congenial action in destroying their noisome life. Then she walked on again with her light, elastic tread, carrying her slender form proudly, with eyes wander- ing carelessly amidst the beauties of the wood, or, where a ray of clear sunlight found its way to her beneath the boughs of the trees, noting the disproportionate length of her shadow going on before her. Suddenly she turned to her left, crossed the path she had quitted, and, reaching another, followed it until it led her to the edge of the wood at a spot where a semi- CANCELLED BONDS. 77 circular wall crowned a tall projecting crag — it bore tlie name of ' The Eagles' Nest ' — and commanded a wdde view of the valley. Resting her arms on the granite coping of the wall, she scanned the view. Below her a wooded hollow. The top- most boughs of the trees in it were many- feet below the wall on which she leaned. A Avide burn threaded the valley, and the water was plainly audible, tumbling noisily over a weir at the foot of the rocks above which she stood. Lower down the stream flowed more leisurely, chattering over brown stones, loitering about the roots of trees, watering low meads, and stealing a level, devious course to one of the Devon- shire rivers. In that direction the valley (which higher up narrowed abruptly as it receded towards the moors) opened slowly and un- certainly, the sloping hills falling back 78 CAXCELLED BONDS. irregularly with many undulations and projecting spurs. Here and there were «hort inland cliffs, where the busy stream that laved their feet had eaten into the sides of the hills. None of them approach- ed the height of this almost perpendicular crag, upon whose summit she stood. The greater part of the hill sides were under cultivation, for the land was rich ; and at this time of the year the fields waved with the ripening grain. But the trees held the hill tops, and here and there, Vvdiere the primeval forest had not even now been cleared, came down to the water's edge. In the valley, on one of the projecting spurs of slightly higher ground, a softly rounded knoll, the house she had quitted stood in its miniature park. From here two sides of it were visible, the western front with its wide verandah that looked CANCELLED BONDS. 7^ almost directly up the valley, and the southern front, seen in long perspective, that commanded a more open prospect where the lower valley turned to the left. The house belonged to an unlucky period of domestic architecture, and would have been no doubt pleasanter to the eyes had it been built either fifty years earlier or fifty years later, either before the age of stucco or after it. But it stood well on the crown of its little eminence, nestling among shrubs, a building neither too long nor too high. The fine trees about it lent it a peaceful homely look, and made it no ungrateful feature in the landscape. As the girl scanned it, and the scene around it, the noble trees, the widening valley unfolding itself in varied pictur- esqueness, the leafy gorge, the ripening harvest of grain, a straggling village that gave life to the middle distance, and, in 80 CANCELLED BONDS. the opposite direction, wooded or cultivated hills that folded over one another for miles and miles until they were closed by the violet-hued, high grounds of distant moors, she felt herself compelled to admit, ' The place is pretty, a secluded, pictur- esque corner of the world.' Then she mused, ' Possibly that is why papa is purchasing it ; because it is so pretty and secluded. Yet what strange things have happened near here !' Her face grew thoughtful, and a shade of discontent crossed her eyes. ' Unless Eleanor has something to do with it; A long time she stood motionless scan- ning the panorama before her, absorbed with her own thoughts, whilst she dreamily measured the distances ; pensively regard- ed the play of the sinking light on the CANCELLED BONDS. 81 hill-sides, on the standing grain, on the deep summer green of the trees ; wondered^ in her ignorance, of the relative values of money and acres, what was the price her father would pay ; and then, raising her eyes, noticed the effects of the movements of the upper air, dispersing the woolly masses of clouds that began to take lines of crimson and gold. Below her, the rushing water made soothing music, around the still air was broken by the chirp of humble songsters, or a beating of rapid wings. Only something rankled in her breast, shutting out the spell of the place and hour, and making her features hard and the light in her eyes cold. ' If I could only see how Eleanor is as- sociated with this last scheme of papa's !' ' Why,' so ran on her reflections, ' should Eleanor be connected with papa's purchase VOL. I. G 82 CANCELLED BONDS. of Belmont ? The place is pretty. That is undeniable. And papa is pleased with it. He can well afford to buy things that please him. The doctors say that mamma will be better here — though I see no signs of it. Reason enough for papa purchasing the estate, without Eleanor's being con- sidered.' ' Only Eleanor is always considered,' she replied to herself, immediately. ' She is the source of all our anxieties. Nothing- happens here in which Eleanor has no part. I did not suspect that she had had anything to do with papa's startling generosity in giving me those driving- gloves — or I should not have thanked him quite so effusively. I made a pretty goose of myself that time ! And she was stand- ing by. How she must have been laugh- ing at me ! Oh, how I hate that girl !' CANCELLED BONDS. 83 Her little hands clenched, and her eyes narrowed passionately. ' And now, what is papa doing to gratify Eleanor by purchasing Belmont?' Again her brain became busy with the riddle she had set herself, whilst her eyes watched the shadows lengthening, and the clouds gathering sunset hues. ' Ah !' she said aloud, at last. The riddle was guessed. ' Of course,' she reflected, ' of course ! That is it. Papa will buy the place to make a present of it to Eleanor. When Julia Poynter was with us, and talked about the place her uncle had left her in Sussex, Eleanor was always saying, "How delightful it must be for a girl to have a place of her own ; all for her very own." Eleanor has a pretty art of giving 'gentle hints ! That is why papa will buy Bel- g2 84 CANCELLED BONDS. iiioiit. And presently we shall all be staying with Eleanor, instead of her stay- ing with ns. And she will talk about " My house ; my place ; my flowers ; my trees !" Awful.' And again she mused, ' How I hate that girl ! And have always hated her.' Hatred is presumably never excus- able ; but it is certainly sometimes ex- plicable. Leaning on the stone parapet, Rosamond Peyton carried her thoughts back to the time when her cousin Eleanor had first come to live under her uncle's roof. Rosamond was at that date a child. ^ Your cousin Miss Eleanor is coming to live with your papa, Miss Rosamond,' said nurse, magisterially ; ' and it's to be hoped that you will take an example from her. CANCELLED BONDS. 85 She is a little lady, Miss Eleanor ; not a rude girl like you.' ' Your cousin Eleanor Kirby is coming to live with us, Rosamond,' said Mrs. Peyton, taking Rosamond on her knees, and stroking her black hair whilst she spoke to her with a sort of weary serious- ness. ' I hope you will try to copy her, and to leave off being a naughty girl. It would make mother hapjDy to see her dear little girl like Cousin Eleanor.' Two days later the example arrived ; a gentle, little, fair girl, a year or so younger than Rosamond, who, unbidden, put her small arms around her aunt's neck when she kissed her ; and then around Rosa- mond's, and held out her tiny, neatly- gloved hand to her Cousin Lennox with the dignity of a little queen. ' You may kiss Cousin Lennox, too, Eleanor,' said Mrs. Peyton. 86 CANCELLED BONDS. Eleanor held up her lips on the spot,, but made no offer to put her arms about the lad's neck. ' And won't you give me a kiss T asked Mr. Peyton, who had fetched her from the railway- station. Instantly the child turned to him and lifted her little arms to kiss him as she had kissed her aunt. Rosamond stood on one side, already mistrustful, watching with her dark, quick- ly-darting eyes all that was taking place. ' See, Rosamond,' said her mother to her, ' how prettily Eleanor gives a kiss when she is asked.' These were days when Rosamond would neither kiss nor be kissed : and from that moment she hated her cousin. She was not a good little girl — Rosa- mond. Her mother's appeal to her to observT- CANCELLED BONDS. 87 how prettily Cousin Eleanor gave a kiss when she was asked, was not destined to be the only occasion on which her atten- tion was directed to the unfavourable manner in which her conduct contrasted with Eleanor's. Soon she was hearing every day, all day, 'Why do you not try to be like Eleanor ?' ' See how neat Eleanor al- ways keeps herself; her hands are never dirty ; nor her frock torn : nor her hair untidy.' ' Look how nicely Eleanor writes her copy !' ' Listen how prettily Eleanor answers people who speak to her!' 'See how well Eleanor learns her lessons !' 'People love Eleanor because she is good.' 'Eleanor never has to be punished.' 'Look at Eleanor ! she is quite shocked to see you stamping, and screaming, and putting yourself into your wicked passions !' If anything more was wanted, and it 88 CANCELLED BONDS. was not wanted, to rouse all the rebel in Rosamond, Eleanor herself unconsciously supplied it, by declining to share in Rosa- mond's escapades, or to take part in the strange games that entertained the elder girl's imagination. Eleanor would not hide in the garden at lesson-time ; nor pick fruit and flowers without leave ; nor pretend that brushes and combs and soap could not be found, when Rosamond wished to have an excuse for neglecting her toilet. ' I don't like playing at that game,' she said, when Rosamond wished to enact the beheading of Charles the First with the bill-hook in the stick-house, and an old doll for victim ; and gravely remarked, when asked to climb the apple-tree, ' Ladies do not climb trees.' With all which sentiments nurse heart- ily agreed. It was, somehow, always Eleanor's way to be always, in the pret- CANCELLED BONDS. 89 tiest manner possible, just what people wished to have her. In fact, the children were ill-assorted companions, and, probably, would never have understood each other under the most favourable circumstances ; and the perseverance of the whole household in quoting Eleanor's gentle manner to point a moral for Rosamond's guidance, and the universal chorus of ' Eleanor is good and Rosamond naughty,' — that was pain- fully true — naturally drove the elder girl into permanent rebellion. If it had been permitted her, she would have shunned her cousin and have amused herself alone, as she had done before Eleanor's arrival. That, however; being forbidden, she sub- mitted to the inevitable, hated her cousin, was bitterly jealous of her, and sulked. On one occasion, when informed — as she so often was informed — that evervone 90 CANCELLED BONDS, loved Eleanor on account of her exem- plary behaviour, she replied defiantly, ' No, they don't. I don't love her. I detest her.' For which she was sent to bed in dis- grace. The punishment did not alter her sentiments. 91 CHAPTER YL It may, perhaps, be asked, 'Where were Mrs. Peyton's maternal instincts, that she should pursue with her OAvn child a course that could only exasperate her irritable nature, and aggravate the grave defects in her character, which kindness and careful attention alone could alter?' But, if any- one in the house asked that question, it was Mr. Peyton alone, who was as fully persuaded as anyone else that ' Eleanor was good and Rosamond naughty.' That was the beginning of the neglect which had made Lennox reflect that Major "92 CANCELLED BONDS. Torres's portrait of his sister Avas at least appropriately named ; the first shadow of the mystery which, as he and his sister grew up, overshadowed their lives. Eleanor, for her part, at no time evinced the smallest aversion for Rosamond. She was a gentle little thing. It is possible, too, that she felt her position of a morally superior being — even the ndivest children have a consciousness of approbation — and found it easy to behave forbearingly to ' 2)oor Rosamond,' always more or less in disgrace. Only at times her soft, blue- grey eyes would rest on her cousin with a terribly shocked and scandalised regard; which alwavs made Rosamond furious. If Rosamond had not been quite so young, the case might have turned out differently. Though she was a naughty little wretch, her character was not without generous traits. That she should hate her CANCELLED BONDS. 93^ orphan cousin was unfeeling. But she was too young to understand how deeply poor, little, fatherless and "motherless Eleanor was to be pitied ; or to see how touchingly winning were the pretty manners, the instincts of a little gentle- woman, and the yielding gentleness of the solitary child, who henceforth had to look to the compassion of strangers to replace all the parental tenderness of which death had relentlessly robbed her helplessness. Such considerations are too recondite to have weight with a bread-and-butter nursery miss of eleven who sees a play- fellow preferred by everyone before her- self. Rosamond's recollections of those earliest years of companionship with her cousin were the recollections of a little pariah. ' If one is always to be called naughty, one may as well be naughty,' is indisputa- •94 CANCELLED BONDS. bly a perverted philosophy ; one, neverthe- less, that plays a larger part in human con- duct than is always suspected ; and also appeals with greater force to the imagina- tions of women than to those of the sterner sex. For some years it was the first article of Rosamond's creed ; and if there be any readers of this tale who feel dis- posed to take Rosamond's part, or to pity her, they may perhaps consider it an evidence of some good traits in the child's nature that the treatment to which she was subjected did not fatally warp her character. The years stole on, and the girls were both in their teens. Eleanor continued to be 'good,' and Rosamond 'naughty.' Eleanor was still always winning, always obedient and tractable, always what people wished her to be, and invariably bright and happy. But everyone else changed. CANCELLED BONDS. 95 Rosamond herself became different. By degrees she was given up as hopelessly in- corrigible, and people took less and less notice of her. Yet all the time she was learning a lesson from Eleanor. She learned to exercise a sort of external con- trol over herself — to let her sense of wrongs and injustices rankle in her own breast only : at least not to proclaim it to all the deaf ears about her, and not to lose all her self-control in her fearful rages un- less she was more than ordinarily provoked. Also she discovered that to conform her conduct in externals to something like Eleanor's, conduced to her personal comfort ; and she acted upon that discovery. Only Eleanor had a knack of doing exactly what she ought to do, which it was impossible to acquire. "With the best possible intention of escaping from being perpetually scolded and disparaged, she, Rosamond, could 96 CANCELLED BONDS. never help speaking and acting and thinking after a fashion of her own, which lacked that hall-mark of universal approval which stamped all Eleanor's proceedings. But though, in a fashion, she was thus doing her best, she still found herself ever less and less regarded, and more and more estranged from her father and mother. Mrs. Peyton, always an invalid, had never bestowed much attention upon her children. She seemed to regard them with some secret disappointment. But when Rosamond and her brother were little their father had noticed them a good deal, particularly Lennox. After- wards the attention he bestowed upon them perpetually diminished. He no longer took them out with him. He had no inter- est in their j^rattle. He ceased to chide herself when she was naughty. Eleanor became his companion, and Lennox and CANCELLED BONDS. 97 herself merely two cliilclren who lived in the house. He was never unkind ; never unjust, except in his preference for Eleanor. He seemed even at times to realise her own and Lennox's forlorn lot, but his affection for them vanished, and was replaced by a mere fulfilment of paternal obligations, a cold justice such as not unnaturally 'appeared to the sensitiveness of a young girl more cruel even than neglect. All because Eleanor had come to live with them ! After both Eleanor and she had become great girls, another change ensued. Elea- nor had come to them penniless, as desti- tute, poor little thing, of means as of love. But when Rosamond was sixteen, an aunt who had declined to do anything for Eleanor at the date when she had lost her parents, died intestate. The old woman VOL. I. H ■■98 CANCELLED BONDS. had some iinpression that making a will amounted to informing Providence of her readiness to receive notice to quit this vale of tears. In consequence, Eleanor came into about eight-hundred a-year. The good dame, thus inconsiderately called for by ' gossip Death,' before she had given any intimation of readiness for his visit, had always announced her in- tention of leaving all her property to a hospital. So no girl was ever made an heiress more unexpectedly. Eleanor's in- heritance of a fortune nearly proved the last straw for Rosamond. Already pretty Eleanor Kirby — it was by this time plain that Eleanor would be very pretty — had become a universal favourite, a ' sweet girl,' who won the goodwill and warm affection of all who knew her ; and now Eleanor — Miss Kirby everyone began to CANCELLED BONDS. 99 call her at once, as if instinctively — was a wealthy girl who could afford to indulge her personal tastes, a future beauty, of whom men talked, an heiress regarded with respect by all the world. All that made no difference to Eleanor. Her gentle nature adapted itself with equal