V-- ^ m^i- ill ■ '^1 i^V^ »vv: :-^>?f \v«>,*s. ■•■W:- fMsamHi «P ; . /•^#:v ^ \ • ^ ' ^. • V'i?# ', "> 'v^;^^? NT ^■>^\''^wk Om5 ft. \ > ■■'?,; y.JWjdj ^i' ^i^^v^u r, v'^i^'^j'j^ mJtV'^ i.i.^r ' .^ . -H A TOURIST IDYL AND OTHEB STOBIES. IN TWO VOLUMES. VOL. I. LONDON: SAMPSON LOW, MARSTON,,SEAKLE & rJVTNGTON, CROWN BUILDINGS, 188, FLI^ET STREET. 1883. {AU rights reserved.) LONDON' : PKINTKK KY Wri.LIAM TLoWKS AND SONS, LIMITED, STAMFOIU' STKF.F.T ANI> I'HARING CROSS. g^ 3 ^ V, I CO A DEAE MEMORY. N ^ ^ PREFATORY NOTE. Of these six sketches, one only, " Bice," has appeared before. It is here reprinted by kind permission of the Editor of Temple Bar. CONTENTS OF YOL. I. A TOURIST IDYL 1 MILLY AND THE Q.O. HI , THKEE FRAGMENTS OF AUTOBIOGRAPPIY. I.— KING MINOK -24:; A TOIJRIST IDYL. VOL. L A TOUEIST IDYL Eustace, younger son of Chester, younger son of the eighth Baron St. Quentin, was to meet liis father at Baden-Baden early in August. He was himself on his way home from India, where, after some ten years in the Civil Service, his health had given way, and he had fur- nished one more instance of the perfection of our present method of supplying our Indian executive with the sound mind in the sound body. " Thank heaven, it is not my mind," was poor Eustace's one consoling reflection in the grief — the anguish — for, in his peculiar circum- stances, it was anguish — of being compelled, after months of suffering and endurance, and manful battling with his fate, to finally abandon his Indian career. He had chosen it, not only 4 A TOURIST IDYL. because exceptional abilities marked him out for tbe distinguished success in it which was almost within his grasp when he broke down, but because it afforded him effectual opportunity of escape from an uncongenial home. There was no real necessity for his adopting any pro- fession, his father being a wealthy man, with only two sons and a daughter to provide for ; but apart from his desire to break loose from his early associations, Eustace was not the man to be content with the idle life he had been allowed, nay, encouraged, to look forward to. As a boy, he had been thoughtful, intellectual, ardent, ambitious. He had been bred in the country, but he had early perceived that the slaughter of animals, as a calling in life, had its shortcomings ; he loved exercise and open air, but, as a boy, he had made the discovery that a considerable expenditure of muscular force and a large consumption of oxygen were quite com- patible with going out and — killing nothing. In these circumstances his raison d'etre as a country gentleman was gone. What was to be done ? The other alternative of being a man about town, and mere club-idler or carpet- knight, had even less attraction for him. Politics and diplomacy were indeed open to him ; and his father, wlio was himself a member A TOURIST IDYL. 5 of Parliament, would have done his best to help him on in either, though with some cynical astonishment that a yoimg man, who was not compelled to do anything but enjoy himself, should care about a career at all. But, then, politics would have kept him at home — even had he seen any possibility of deciding with which party to cast in his lot — and he did not care about diplomacy, which he called mere inter- national hide-and-seek and mendacity on a grand scale. If it had tended to avert war — which was murder on a grand scale — he would have tolerated it as the lesser evil of the two ; but since he could not perceive that the principle of arbitration or any other first principle of international morality was likely to be much furthered by it, he preferred the less equivocal if more humdrum occupation of helping to govern our principal dependency. This he had striven to do equitably — too equitably — in theory at least, said certain people, who could detect in him a dangerous tendency to regard Indian affairs from the point of view of the people of India. But all his dreams and pro- jects, and all the healthy delight which a vigorous mind brings to even the routine tasks of every day, were shattered now. He was back in Europe a social wreck, a failure, a disap- 6 A TOURIST IDYL. pointed man — all the more disappointed because the voyage had ah^eady so far benefited his health as to cast grave doubts upon the infalli- bility of the doctors' fiat. He had fallen in readily enough with his father's request that he would meet him in Germany. It mattered little to him, in his depressed and heart-sick mood, where he went, or what he did ; only, upon the whole, he knew that he wished to postpone his return to England as long as he decently could. But something had delayed Mr. Chester St. Quentin's movements, something which was not fully explained by his letters, and which puzzled his son as he waited, kicking his heels, so to speak, at Baden-Baden. At length, having exhausted the nearer excursions round that picturesque " slop-basin," as it has been irre- verently but not untruly called, Eustace pro- posed to himself a trip of a day or two to Heidelberg, of whose fame as the most beautiful spot in all Germany he had frequently heard. The weather favoured him. The only fine warm days in a summer of cold and wet that drove tourists to despair, that froze them in Switzerland, drowned them in Italy, and de- pressed them everywhere, were the days he spent at Heidelberg. He was beginning to find A TOURIST IDYL. 7 some content, even some joy in life again, when a forwarded letter from the Englischerhof at Baden recalled him, somewhat against his will, to the " slop-basin." It was towards midday when he found him- self at the Heidelberg railway station, amid the stir and bustle of the arrival of the train which was to take him to Baden. The platform was crowded with hungry travellers, in search of the refreshment afforded by a German station. This refreshment, it may be observed by tlie way, always takes the same form — that of a very large fossil breakfast-roll, cut in half, and enclosing what appears to be part of the sole of a shoe. A sort of thin broth is occasionally, but very rarely, to be had on application at the buffet^ but this passengers are largely de- barred from enjoying by a certain want of unanimity on the 23art of German railway officials on the question of " Aufenthalt.'" A nervous apprehension, lest the man who said ^' Drei Minuten' may turn out to be better in- formed than the man who said " Zehn Mmuteii,'" tends to the renunciation of broth, and perhaps to a rash supplementing of the fossil sandwich by the hasty purchase of some of the grapes of commerce, and a few curiously solid plums. Eustace, pitying those doomed bewildeied 8 A TOUPvIST IDYL. travellers, looked out for an empty carriage, and had ensconced himself in the corner of what looked like one, when his eye fell on a small heap of alpaca on the seat beside him — a woman's light dust-cloak, with a knot or two of brown ribbon about it. On the seat opposite lay a Baedeker, and overhead, as he discovered, on proceeding to look about him, were stowed a hat-box, a lady's hand-bag, and a bundle of umbrellas and wraps. His first impulse was to change compartments. He had grown a little misanthropic in his trouble, and especially he avoided the species tourist whenever he could. He wanted to meditate, and these people would be sure to address him ; he wanted to read, and these people would be certain to chatter. But he had not risen to his feet when a bell rang loudly, and an increased racing and scuffling on the platform, together with emphatic bellowings on the part of the officials, announced the immediate departure of the train. It was all but in motion, aud Eustace was beginning to wonder what had happened to his tourists, when the door was flung open, and a stolid guard, with a heavy- blonde moustache, pink cheeks, and an imperturbable expression of countenance, half thrust, half lifted three breath- less, excited, and terrified persons into the A TOURIST IDYL. 9 carriage. He seemed nowise disconcerted by the vehement expostulation addressed to him, in English, by the middle-aged gentleman who headed the little party, and who clearly failed to see the point of the Dreiundzehnminutenspass (it is permissible to coin a German wqrd for the distinctively Grerman amusement). Nor did he move a muscle for the pathetic remonstrances, murmured under her breath in literary German, by the elder of the two young ladies who accompanied the indignant gentleman. Nor did the terrified face of the younger one, who was on the verge of crying, melt his Teutonic features to the semblance of pity, much less extort from him anything approaching to an apology. He merely slammed the door and vanished, leaving the victims of his practical joke to recover themselves as best they might. '^ It's disgraceful ! It's abominable ! Did you say that was the very scoundrel who said ten minutes ? Impudent rascal 1 He ought to be cashiered. Are we in our own carriage ? " The indignant gentleman glanced anxiously round him till his eye fell on his hat-box, the sight of which appeared to mollify him a good deal. He even began to chuckle, in his relief, over the practical joke. " The third time it has happened in three 10 A TOURIST IDYL. days," he remarked. " But that was the narrowest shave of all. I hope you wigged the fellow that time, Eachel, though you didn't seem to make much impression." The elder of the two girls laughed softly. " I told him we had been misinformed," she said, in a voice singularly gentle, yet with bright tones in it that revealed much sunshine in her soul ; " but I'm not quite sure that he understood me." " How like Rachel ! " exclaimed the younger girl, who was leaning back in the carriage, flushed and panting, and fanning herself with a folded newspaper. She was a beautiful girl, but very young, scarcely out of the hoydenish stage, when a certain abandon of attitude and of conversation is still maintained — with intimates, that is to say. In society, the maiden of seven- teen, prematurely snatched from the school- room, will often display a curiously exact imitation of the grande dame imperturbable manner. She will sit very upright ; will freeze at the proper times, just as her mother does ; will smile a very little — not laugh — when she ought. The only difference between her and a veteran — if she is as passionate as a girl of seventeen should be — will be a certain scared look in the eyes, quite perceptible to the A TOUEIST IDYL. 11 sympathetic observer. It was evident that the scared look often came into this girl's eyes when she was on her best behaviour. Now, when she was at her ease, they were quick and restless, betokening a fair share of the paternal excitability. " How like Eachel ! " she repeated, in a loud clear voice, ignoring the presence of a stranger with the audacity of seventeen. " Told him we had been misinformed ! That is Eachers idea of a scolding. I wish I knew German. He wouldn't have been let off so easily then." While she was speaking, her father, who up to that moment had scarcely noticed that there was another person in the carriage, threw a critical glance at Eustace. He was not long in perceiving, with the shrewdness of an experienced observer, that, certain short- comings of dress notwithstanding, this new fellow-traveller might safely be appealed to for a little of that masculine sympathy which is always so desirable in the case of grievances of a public nature. The wrath of one's women folk is grateful, but they are not trained to the intelligent indignation of a man and a voter. "Cool hands, these German fellows ! " he remarked, addressing Eustace. " Do you mind both windows down ? It's hot to-day. Yery cool 12 A TOUEIST IDYL. hands. I am inclined to think that State control is not an unmixed boon." " No doubt it tends to apathy on the part of the public," said Eustace, — " of the German public, at least. But they are used to a con- dition of pupilage. It is astonishing what they will submit to." " Ah ! an English gentleman, I thought so," said the other to himself complacently. Said Eustace to himself critically, " An English gentleman of a sociable turn, and rather excitable temperament. I am in for it now." But as the conversation proceeded, meander- ing from the Grerman to the English railway system, and thence to politics, and thence to public men, and thence to half a hundred general topics of the day, Eustace began to conceive a liking for his loquacious fellow- traveller. He was a good-looking man of fifty- five or thereabouts, with grey hair and beard, kindly blue eyes, and the girlish complexion of the country-loving, open-air loving English- man. Presently he began to talk of Ireland as though he were familiar with it ; and Eustace immediately decided that he had maternal relations there, and that it was some strain of Irish blood in him that accounted for his genial A TOURIST IDYL. 13 manners, his warmth of temper, and a certain grace and charm which could draw mere strangers to him, and even fascinate an un- happy, surly Diogenes like himself. Meantime the two young ladies had taken up their books, and seemed quite undisturbed by the lively conversation that was being carried on by the gentlemen. The elder one, especially, seemed absorbed in hers. She started, when her father addressed her suddenly. " Where was it they made that infamous charge for bougies^ Rachel — Antwerp, or Brussels ? " " It was Brussels, at the Belle Yue," she said, colouring slightly in her surprise, and letting her book fall on to her lap. '' We were only there one night," she went on, turning to Eustace, beside whom she was sitting ; " but they gave us three large gloomy bedrooms, so that we were tempted to light both our candles. We were all very tired, and I am sure we did not burn half an inch of them, but the next day we were charged six francs for hougiesr She smiled, the very sweetest, frankest smile Eustace thought he had ever seen. If he had liked the father after five minutes' conversation with him, he liked the daughter the first moment she opened her lips. He had scon a 14 A TOUKIST IDYL. number of young ladies in England and in India, but he did not recollect to liave met with one before whose manners to a stranger were so prepossessing. His impression was, that most girls in her position would have replied briefly to the question addressed to them, and become immersed in their book again. He liked this girl for seeming aware that there was another person besides her father in the carriage ; he liked her for looking at him, Eustace, when she replied ; for behaving quite as if they had been introduced at a friend's house (only rather more kindly than most people behave on such occasions) ; for not regarding him as an interloper, a possible ogre, or an escaped Fenian. He looked at her with quite a new sensation of mingled curiosity and interest. He found that she was not pretty, but pre-eminently, superlatively sweet, and that her face was one of the most mobile and expressive faces that he had ever met with. He omitted to note the colour of her eyes ; but he observed that they were full of brightness, and had a kind of transparent candour,, which was a new thing to him. It was not the transparency of a child's eyes, which is sometimes thought the most beautiful thing in women ; it was — though A TOURIST IDYL. 15 Eustace did not know it then — the yet more beautiful candour which is born of coura- geous thought and of a reasoned loyalty to goodness. He answered her with an eagerness that con- trasted rather strangely with his recent soliloquy about noisy tourists. *' That is often the only really serious im- position in one's hotel charges," he said. '' I wonder what led to the fashion of ' taking it out ' in candles. Do you think it can be a prejudice on the part of the pampered tourist in favour of brand-new unused candles ? For my own part, I would rather pay my franc to any person who would burn the first inch or so for me. The girl laughed gently, and even the seven- teen-year-old sister, who had been freezing for some time, suddenly discovered something highly amusing in her novel, and laughed, too, ostensibly at that. " Yes, indeed," said the elder one. '' The long straggling wicks take one five minutes to light." " And five minutes more are gone before they begin to illuminate the gloomy halls you speak of," went on Eustace. " Oh, I can hardly suppose that even a Russian prince would 16 A TOURIST IDYL. knowingly pay a couple of francs for sucli a privilege as that ! I am afraid it must be sheer extortion. I think in these co-operative days one might get up a Tourist's International Anti- Bougie-Imposition Union." " Yes ; and all go to second and third rate hotels, till the first class ones are reduced to beggary and a proper state of penitence." '' Fancy that gorgeous gentleman, the pro- prietor, and that still more magnificent person, tYiQ portier^ prowling about their deserted halls, beguiling their leisure with the Anti-Bougie- Imposition Union Journal ! Imagine them read- ing how H.B.H. the Duke of So-and-So, how Princess X , how the Marquis of Blank- shire, and the Grand-duchess of Hohenstauffen- Stielen-Schlangenbad and goo'dness knows what besides — all patrons of long standing — had joined the Union." " I should feel sorry for the iDortier^' said Rachel. '' He is very grand, but he is generally very obliging, and he knows everything, and he is such a good linguist." " He is a person whose rare accomplishments and whose lofty status are apt to be under- estimated by the inexperienced traveller," said Eustace. " There was an old gentleman at Heidelberg, where I have just been staying, A TOUEIST IDYL. 17 who certainly had not a due appreciation of them. I happened to be close by when he was tipping the portier, after a stay of a week or so ; and what do you think he gave him ? One mark and the nickel coin which in this country represents the value of one penny farthing ! He did not seem at all offended. He is too much of a gentleman for that ; but as soon as the donor's back was turned, I saw him exhibit the two coins to a friend in his out-stretched palm with an expression of infinite glee on his face." " I must say I sympathize with the poor old gentleman. We find the nickel coins most confusing," said Eachel, with a merry look at her father, who had taken up the Times, and took no notice of the innuendo. It was a four- days'-old Times, to be sure, but what of that ? It was still the Times. " I heard afterwards that this gentleman's financial operations were renowned in the hotel," continued Eustace. " It was his habit, when any small payment was required, to produce a handful of coins of mixed English, French, and German origin, and to select from them the one that looked most like what would have been ajDpropriate on a similar occasion in his native land. His eye- sight not being quite what it was, such a trifling VOL. 1. C 18 A TOURIST IDYL. distinction as that between marks and francs, or between silver and nickel quite escaped his notice. On the very day of the episode with the jjortier^ the chambermaid was seen em- bracing his knees and kissing his hands in a transport of gratitude. It appeared she was a country girl fresh from the fields, and had been so overwhelmed with his munificent donation of eight marks that — she showed it ! " " Perhaps her people were very poor, and she was so very glad to have something to send them," said tlie young lady, quite forgetting to laugh at the eccentric Englishman. Eustace gave a little start, then he smiled. " Have you the second sight ? " he said. *' You are quite right. I found it was so from the girl herself." After that there was a pause of a few moments. Rachel took up her book again ; and Eustace, finding that his three companions were all reading, pulled out his book — a pocket volume of Emerson. But he did not read a word of it. He presently put up his eje-glass, a weapon upon which he had been miserably dependent ever since those terrible examina- tions, and proceeded to look about him a little. The result of his survey was to the effect that a combination of soft greys and browns makes A TOUKIST IDYL. 19 a very pretty and becoming travelling-dress, and goes well with softly-tinted cheeks, and soft hair, un stiffened into anything beyond its waves of natural beauty ; but that sweet eyes were better meeting your own in frank and cheery converse than glued with too much ardour to a printed page. This was the young man who had so strong an objection to chattering tourists. II. At Oos, the junction for Baden-Baden, pas- sengers for that place are required to change trains, and it is here that you encounter the first symptom of the Sybaritic luxury, which still characterizes the ex-queen of European gambling resorts. Apparently the same tender care which made roads as smooth and trim as garden-walks, planted the common wayside with exotic shrubs, and clothed the flymen in the resplendent liveries that awed Mark Twain, provided the little Oosthal railway with roomy saloon-carriages, filled with velvet-covered armchairs and sofas. Into one of these Eustace helped his fellow-travellers, carrying some of 20 A TOUPJST IDYL. their tiling's for tliem, in the absence of any Gefolge^ as the German visitors'-lists grandly denominate a bewildered lady's maid or helpless valet. He was about to follow them himself, when he noticed that the saloon was almost full, and this and a certain diffidence, which was one of the characteristics of his complex nature, and which usually seized him when another man would be gaily and justifiably pursuing his ad- vantage, caused him to lift his hat and retire. The instant he was gone, the younger of the two girls nestled up to the other and whispered excitedly in her ear, " Oh, Rachel ! What shall I do ? I am so ashamed of myself ! I did behave so badly at Heidelberg ! I thought at first he was a stupid old Grerman, or — or — a stupid American, and I fidgeted so, and talked such nonsense ! Do you think it mattered ? He is very badly dressed, though he is so nice and gentleman-like. I like him awfully ; don't you ? Oh, dear, I wish I wasn't always so silly. Don't you wish he'd got in with us ? -I do." " Yes ; I wish he had," said Rachel, with composure. She would have scorned any affec- tation on the subject. " Well, perhaps he's going to our hotel.'* Then, with a great sigh, " What a great idiot he must think me ! When shall I get nice A TOURIST IDYL. 21 manners like you, and talk to people, instead of being shy and glaring like an owl ? " " Don't despair of yourself just yet, Margery,' said the other, with gentle satire. " It's early days. I'm sorry you couldn't have another year in the schoolroom as you wished, but, you see, it was lonely for me." " Of course, you dear old thing. If only you would teach me not to be an owl," said the beautiful child, with the quaintest, disconsolate expression on her dainty face. So Rachel had to spend the remainder of the little journey in reassuring her charge — she had mothered Mar- gery since the two were left motherless in the nursery — and soothing the over- vivid self- consciousness which at present made poor Mar- gery's newly emancipated life a burden to her. Eustace, meanwhile, was gnashing his teeth in a neighbouring compartment over his own folly in gratuitously parting company with his new friends. They had certainly shown no signs of being weary of his society ; on the contrary, the " genial Celt," as he now men- tally denominated the head of the party, had looked quite vexed when he took his leave of them. He had evidently wished to take up the thread of a dialogue that had been cut short by the stoppage at Oos. They had got upon 22 A TOURIST IDYL. India, and Eustace had begun to wax eloquent on a theme that touched him nearly, the more so that he found his Celt fairly well-informed about Indian affairs, and not crammed with prejudice and insular bias like the large majority of Englishmen. He regretted his agreeable and intelligent interlocutor ; he also regretted Eustace did not formulate the remainder of his regret, but it was sufficiently pungent for all that. With a vehemence quite disproportionate to the occasion, he cursed in general terms his own singular constitution — the shyness, or the self-distrust, or the misanthropy, or whatever it was, that always caused him to draw back when the sense of enjoyment was at its keenest, and made him, as it were, the executioner of his own happiness. It was always the same, whether it was a question of the passing plea- santness of a summer's day, as in this instance; or of a turning-point in life, as when, a couple of years before, in India, he had abstained from asking a girl he liked to be his wife from some foolish scruple about unworthiness, and found out afterwards, accidentally, that she had liked him better than the man she subsequently married. To divert his thoughts, Eustace pulled out his father's letter, which he had read badly at A TOURIST IDYL. 23 Heidelberg, and re-perused it. It began with, apologies for having kept him waiting so long. " I may as well be frank with yon, my dear boy," wrote the Honourable Chester. " I had reason to suspect that the atmosphere of Baden was vitiated by the presence of a certain family which I need not name. I ouly heard this since proposing to go there myself, and it took me some time to ascertain whether the rumour was well-founded. I am told now, on good authority, that the Yiper and his party have really elected to honour Homburg with their salutary pre- sence. This decides me to join you immediately. But I shall be grateful to you to scan the visitors' list minutely, in case of accidents. If I am obliged to spend a night in the same town with him, take care, at all events, that I am not quartered in the same hotel. As you know, I would rather sit down to table with the devil himself." Then followed some details as to route and probable date of arrival, and then the signature. Turning the page, Eustace discovered for the first time the following postscript, "Your mother and sister desire their love." That was the first greeting that he had had from either since he set foot in Europe. ^' I suspected something of the kind," he said 24 A TOURIST IDYL. to himself, pocketing tlie letter with a sigh. " I saw it was something he wouldn't have men- tioned if he could help it ; but he could not refrain at the last moment. The bare possibility of any mistake about the Yiberts going to Hom- burg put him into a fever, and he resolved to take me into his confidence, the better to guard against remote contingencies. What a curious craze it is ! To think that after thirty years he should hate poor Yibert as heartily as the first day ! Well, they say it is a merit to be a good hater. But for a man of the world ! A man who is pledged by his social creed to feel nothing strongly, not even dislike. It is the oddest anomaly — a most unaccountable kink in an otherwise sufficiently harmonious character." If Eustace's musings over his father's cha- racter were more just than filial, he was to be excused, in a measure, on the score of the singular disparity between the two men, a dis- parity that had made itself felt when Eustace was in the nursery, and often caused his father jestingly to announce his belief that his second son was a changeling. It was certainly not from him or his mother that the boy inherited his ex- traordinary notions, his pious fads (he had been wont to hold frequent prayer-meetings with the babyj, his ridiculous radical ideas (he had A TOURIST IDYL. 25 had a " concern " from infancy about tlie poorer cottagers on the estate), his sentimental non- sense about trapping hares and shooting pigeons, and, indeed, inflicting pain of any sort on the lower animals. His brother took these things as matters of course, like a true-born English gentleman. Why should this little prig pre- tend to be wiser than his betters ? So it came to pass that the little prig had been snubbed, suppressed and repressed in every conceivable manner, but, having a strong nature, he had never been extinguished. The snubbing had given a very slight tinge of bitterness to a nature originally as sweet as it was strong and full of lovingkindness ; but that was all. The train had arrived at the Baden railway- station, and there was a rush and a clamour, a hot competition among rival hotel omnibuses, and a feverish identification of luggage. In the thick of the fray, Eustace caught sight of the grey dust-cloak, with knots of brown ribbon, and felt a strong desire to go and offer liis services. But again he held back. Was it not an impertinence to suppose that these people could not get on without the interference of a stranger ? The " Celt " was able-bodied, and the young ladies (one of them, at any rate) had heads on their shoulders. They would probably 26 A TOURIST IDYL. have brought a retinue if they had been averse to or incapable of sorting their own baggage. So, having rescued his own portmanteau, Eustace stepped into a half-full omnibus, and took his seat. He had scarcely done so when he became aware of an anxious pair of eyes glancing nervously at him from behind a barri- cade of bundles and bags. He smiled and bowed to the young lady called Margery ; but she responded with a terrified appeal. " Oh, do you think they will be in time ? They put me here, and went to see after the luggage. And people keep coming in so fast, their places will be gone." " We will try to keep two for them," said Eustace, soothingly, intending to surrender his own, for one, if necessary. But as he spoke a large party of British tourists, real tourists, the genuine species Eustace loved so well, poured into the omnibus, stormed it, so to speak, and speedily filled every available inch of space remaining. In vain did Eustace courteously inform them that "a gentleman had secured two more seats in it, and if they would be so kind — They -were dividing a party " " Ah, young man ! " interrupted a massive gentleman, with, a scarlet face and a magnificent diamond breastpin, shaking his head sagely, A TOURIST IDYL. 27 " It's a case of first come, first served, I take it. Parties that don't wish to be divided didn't ought to separate." " There's no reserved seats 'ere ! " said a loud woman who was worthy of being, if she was not, his spouse ; and they both began to laugh noisily over the situation, or their own wit. It was intolerably hot. The afternoon sun was beating fiercely on poor little Margery's back, and transforming the omnibus — already an oven on wheels — into an almost unbearable place of torture. Two large wasps had found their way into it, and seemed to have an especial leaning to her corner. Overhead a succession of thunderous knocks and bumps brought her heart into her mouth at least three times every minute. This kind of thing, when one is tired and deserted by one's natural guardian, is not so easy to bear with fortitude, and Margery had to bite her lip to keep the tears back. She was debating with herself whether she should get out, or wait a few minutes more for her father, when all of a sudden the door was slammed, and they were off at a pace only attainable by a heavily laden hotel omnibus. " Oh, what shall I do ? What shall I do ? " cried Margery, startled into a general exclama- tion of despair. "28 A TOURIST IDYL. Eustace hastened to respond, lest any one else should do so. " Don't be alarmed. They are sure to follow immediately, and will join you in the entrance to your hotel. Will you allow me to tell the man which hotel ? " " Thank you, very much ; the Hollande," said Margery, very gratefully ; but still she looked terrified, and Eustace resolved not to lose sight of her till she was safely under the parental care again. The omnibus was cleared by the time the Hotel de Hollande was reached, and Eustace was able to take his charge and her impedimenta out of it in comparative calm. "It is very surprising," he remarked as he did so, hy way of taking the situation lightly and composing her ruf&ed nerves still further, " how such people as our friend with the diamond pin have the opportunity, and still more the inclination, for travelling ! They give one the idea of being sufficiently moneyed for many happy days at Rosherville, but hardly for this sort of thing. And that they should care for it is so odd ! People without education, with- out culture of any sort, without the common courtesy, which makes intercourse with one's fellow-men endurable " A TOUEIST IDYL. 29 He paused to give directions as to his baggage, and then turned with his companion into the entrance of the hotel, where they stood and watched the omnibus disappear round the corner in the direction of the Angleterre. " I have been greatly struck," he went on, " by the change in this respect since I was last on the continent, ten years ago and more. A much larger proportion of the lower middle-class appear to travel and to find travelling enjoyable than in those days. I can't help thinking they do it merely to ape their betters, and that if they were honest with themselves they would go to Eamsgate or Southend. Perhaps they find compensations ; but it is piteous to think of what they must go through. Their sufferings from the heat alone are sad to contemplate." " No," said Margery, sweetly, not with intent to negative his proposition, but because she was too preoccupied to hear a word of what he said. Then, turning to him suddenly, " Is this your hotel, too ? " she asked. " I am at the Englischerhof. I have sent my traps on." " Oh, I am so afraid I am keeping you ! It is very good of you, but I am quite safe now. They will be here directly. Please don't let me keep you." 30 A TOURIST IDYL. But all tlie time her eyes were saying quite plainly, " I am as frightened as I can be. For goodness' sake don't leave me alone." " I am in no hurry, if you will allow me," he said, answering those anxious child-like eyes ; and he went on talking all the nonsense he could think of, to show her what a very natural thing it was for a young lady to be stranded on the doorstep of a strange hotel, in the sole keeping of a strange young man. At the same time he was beginning to wonder himself what had happened to that other laggard omnibus. The Sophien Strasse wore the drowsy, deserted aspect of a watering place on a sultry afternoon. The stir created by the arrival of the train had subsided ; a few of the gorgeous carriages be- fore mentioned, the drivers in scarlet waistcoats and silver buttons and hatbands, were to be seen taking visitors to and from the grateful shade of the Lichtenthaler AUee ; a very few foot passengers were strolling along the pave- ment ; two women, with large baskets full of Marshal Niel rosebuds, were languidly offering their wares on a bench close by. Margery's eye fell on the beautiful treasure, and she interrupted a remark of Eustace's with a little cry of delight. '' Oh, dear, that is like home ! How pleased A TOURIST IDYL. 31 my sister would be ! She is so fond of Marshal Niels ! " " Let us go and get some to make your room look home-like," said Eustace ; " it will pass the time." But before they had stepped out on to the pavement 2^ packdroschke turned the corner and drew up at the Hollande, and Margery's father and sister got out of it, with faces only less anxious than Margery's own. The girl flew out to meet them, and, in the midst of a torrent of talk, clearly found time to whisper how good and kind " he " had been. For her fathe]' immediately turned to Eustace, and thanked him effusively for looking after his daughter, adding that he was distressed to think he should have done so at some inconvenience to himself. "Not at all; my hotel is close by," said Eustace. '' I am most glad to have been of any service. These little contretemps are alarm- ing to all but hardened travellers." " And she has never crossed the channel before." "But what did happen to you?" said Margery. " We could not get attended to," her sister an- swered ; " and at last, when every one had gone off, yourself included, and we had got half way 32 A TOURIST IDYL. in a cab, we found my portmanteau had been left behind after all." " I thought it was on the omnibus, but Rachel assured me it was not," said her father. " Well, there it is safe," said Margery, looking affectionately at the pile of luggage that was being- transferred from the cab to the hotel. Eustace glanced at it too, as he bowed his farewells, and noted that the initials on the portmanteau in (Question were R. M. Y. " Can they be the Yiberts ? " he said to him- !self, laughing at himself before the notion had fairly flashed through his brain, for the absurdity of supposing that every English visitor to the continent whose name began with a Y. must be Mr. Austin Yibert, his father's hete-noire. Had Yernons and Yeres, Yerrekers and Yeseys no light to travel in Germany without being con- founded with a family which — according to Mr. Chester St. Quentin, that is to say — ought to have been, if it was not, placed without the pale of polite society ? The true history of the St. Quentin- Yibert feud, over which Eustace naturally pondered a good deal as he strolled towards the Englischerhof, iriouuted to the third storey, and alternately unpacked a few things and gazed at the glorious view from his ojDen window, was as follows. A TOUEIST IDYL. 33 Chester St. Quentin had, sorely against his will, been compelled to go into business, at a time when business was not, as it is now, the almost universal refuge of ex-officers of the army, younger sons of peers, and even con- nexions of royalty. He was the pioneer of the scores of youthful patricians who have since discovered in the wine trade, especially, a profit- able and not wholly unhappy career. His father was poor, and had insisted on his availing him- self of an opening which, after a very brief period of probation, was to make him a full- blown partner in a rising concern. The other partner, Austin Yibert, was under certain obli- gations to the St. Quentin family, which made him willing to take a more or less untrained hand, with only a modest capital, into the busi- ness. Moreover, he hoped great things from the connexion this young scion of nobility had it in his power to open up, if he did but choose to work it properly; and, after all, he had a cool head, a shrewdness and knowledge of mankind quite remarkable for his years, an appreciation of the value of money worthy of a city man (though he knew how to spend it, too) — in short, a business faculty which was not the less appa- rent to his friends because at present unsus- pected by himself. What he had to get over VOL. I. D 34 A TOURIST IDYL. was, the prejudice against trade inherent in his blood and intensified in himself by personal idiosyncrasies. The despotic will of his father having carried the day, Chester presently saw fit to keep this personal distaste in abeyance, and set himself to work, since trader he must be, to be as successful a trader as it was possible. The one cross that no power of earth or heaven could have compelled him to submit to patiently was failure, and he would no more have endured to be a mediocre man of business when he entered the city, than previously he would have endured to be the second-best dressed man in London. Expediency was his rule of life, and his end of life success ; and though the same thing may be said of a great number of persons, they are, generally speaking, more careful than was Mr. Chester St. Quentin to call their rule principle and their end duty. The god of his devotion favoured him, and he and his partner worked together happily for several years, rapidly getting together what is known as a West-End connexion of considerable magnitude, that is to say, furnishing the cellars of most of the leading- clubs, great mansions, and even royal residences of London. Yet the two men never really liked each other. Austin Yibert was the son of a wealthy A TOURIST IDYL. 35 merchant, and, in consequence, obtained his start in life at an early age. He was only a few years older than his partner, nearly as good- looking, and almost as proud of his success with women, though less cynical and less heartless in his behaviour to them. The result was a latent rivalry, not to say jealousy, between the two young partners, which burst into a flame when Yibert succeeded in securing the hand of an heiress to whom both were paying court. Here was failure — the first in a life of uninterrupted success, failure patent to the world, especially galling to amour-propre^ and never to be forgiven to Fate and Austin Vibert. Chester hinted foul play, and was meditating a challenge, when a totally unexpected contingency transferred the attention of both men for the time being from private to business matters. They discovered that their business premises had risen enormously in value owing to the erection of some public buildings in their imme- diate vicinity. They had received the offer of a very large sum for their freehold, and had agreed that it would be well worth their while to close with it, when Yibert's lawyer quietly announced that the whole of the money would legally accrue to his client, since there was nothing in the terms of the deed of partnership 36 A TOUEIST IDYL. to warrant tlie transfer of half, or indeed of any portion of it, to Mr. St. Quentin. The contin- gency, being unforeseen, had been unprovided for. Now, but for the unfortunate straining of personal relations, the matter might have been amicably settled. A due allowance would pro- bably have been made for Chester's moral claim, and the affair would somehow have been ad- justed, and on no account permitted to occasion the dissolution of a partnership advantageous to both claimants. But Chester, smarting under what he considered deadly personal injury, was aggressive, defiant, and coldly insolent. When he saw that he had no legal case, he demanded that the thing should be settled as between " men of honour, if indeed the term could be applied to a person who," etc., etc. The other, naturally incensed, would bate no jot of his legal claim ; and so it came to pass that instead of a coolness there was open war ; instead of a duel a threatened, and indeed, attemj^ted horse- whipping ; and, of course, an instant and final separation. Thirty years and more had passed, and the sting of that twofold defeat still rankled in the breast of the elderly capitalist and politician. He had soon married another heiress, and gone into another " good thing," had made money A TOUEIST IDYL. 37 with rapidity, and refrained from gambling it away; had bought an estate in one of the home counties ; and had got himself returned for Parliament. He had never failed again in any department of life. On the contrary, he was pointed to as one of the most successful men of his day, one of the shrewdest, cleverest, and, his enviers said, luckiest. But there was no one found to say that he was one of the best. III. After dinner that evening, Eustace found him- self strolling in the direction of the Sophien Strasse. The feeling of solitude that had deepened upon hira since he left, amid physical suffering and weakness, the cheery, kindly circle of acquaintances and friends in the Presi- dency town near which he had been stationed, had pressed upon him with greater force than ever during the noisy tedious table dliote. There seemed to be only Germans in the hotel. Certainly at the dinner-table there were Germans to left of him, Germans to right of him, Germans in front of him ; and though Eustace knew German, and had been an ardent student of Goethe in his time, it 38 A TOURIST IDYL. is one thing to sliecl tears over tlie prophetic insight and exquisite beauty of Faust, and quite another thing to embark in a discussion in idiomatic German of contemporary poUtics with your neighbours at table cVhute. So Eustace occupied himself all during dinner with turning over in his mind the events of the day and the chances of his delightful Celt turning out to be in very truth that social pariah, that Yiper, that Ishmael — Austin Yibert. By the time the acid grapes and green peaches that did duty for dessert were handed round, ho had discovered that it was his obvious duty to ascertain the truth without delay. His father would be arriving the next day, and, to say nothing of his annoyance, were Eustace to disregard his express injunctions, it would be most embarrassing for himself to be meeting these people everywhere, and to have to choose between gross rudeness to them and incurring his father's wrath by — however distantly — re- cognizing them. Of course it was prepos- terous to jump at the conclusion that they were the people Chester St. Quentin had come to Baden to avoid ; still the age of Eustace's fellow-traveller would correspond to that of Austin Yibert : both men had grown-up families, and though he had never seen Yibert, A TOUEIST IDYL. 39 Eustace had always heard of him as a "plausible, smooth-tongued scoundrel, who was the devil and all to pay when his blood was up." Now, this might very well be an enemy's description of the genial but impulsive person who had joined the train at Heidelberg. There was no question about it. Filial duty compelled a visit that very night to the Hotel de Hollande. No ; the portier knew of no such name in the hotel. There was no one there of the name of Yibert. A family of that name had not arrived there that afternoon? The sportier thought not, but he would see. Several English families had arrived in the afternoon. He dived into his office ; but before he came out again two other. persons, with urgency written on their countenances, dived in also, and Eustace was left waiting for some minutes in the passage. As he loitered there with a faint hope that he might catch a glimpse of some faces that he knew, yet with a most unreasonable dread lest he might be considered to have come to the Hotel de Hollande with the object of catching such a glimpse, he heard a loud clear voice on the staircase, saying, " Father will be tired of waiting for iis." There was no mistaking Margery's voice. No one but a girl fresh from an English 40 A TOURIST IDYL. country home would have talked so loud on a Hotel staircase. But Eustace had turned his back and retreated into the j^ortiers office before the two young ladies appeared in the hall. There w^ere times when this young man, who was not so very young, and who had had plenty of experience of the world and its ways, and who was the son of a father noted for " push " and the serene self-confidence which the world likes better than worth, had all the shyness of a girl. It was a horrible thought to him, the bare notion of thrusting himself upon these strangers, all the more horrible that they had attracted him so strongly, and that their simple friendliness had acted like a balm in his depression and solitude. The portier having dismissed the other two supplicants for his good offices, the one with a torrent of German, the other in voluble French, was turning to Eustace with an English address, when who should enter but the genial Celt himself, extending a couple of keys, and desirous to know whether a certain letter which he had expected to find at Baden could still arrive that day. He greeted Eustace with the warmth of an old friend. " I suppose you are going over to the band ? Come across with us." A TOURIST IDYL. 41 " You are very kind." Again the portier, brimming with informa- tion, sought to gain Eustace's ear, but he impHed with a hasty wave of the hand that his business could wait, and hurried after his new friend, lest the man should reveal his errand, or indeed say anything pointing to inquisitiveness on his part regarding any sojourners in the hotel. " I had a little business here," he muttered, rather inanely. " This seems a nice Hotel." He did not hear the other's rejoinder. The truth was, there were two faces in the hall so fresh and sweet, so fair and gracious, that it was impossible to listen at the moment to commonplaces about Hotels. There is a mysterious law of feminine etiquette which ordains, no doubt for very sapient and cogent reasons, that ladies shall don their soberest garments at foreign tables cVhote. But these two sisters were country lasses, untra veiled, and unversed in the arcana of the feminine social code ; and they were clad in white from top to toe — fresh white gowns, white hats, and white wraps over their arms — for the evenings were chilly, even when the days were hot. Their gowns were very gracefully and prettily, but not fashionably, made. There was 42 A TOUKIST IDYL. wanting about tlie dress of both certain touches, apparent to the experienced observer, which add nothing to the beauty and harmony of a woman's attire, but which indicate that all the mind she has has gone to the designing of it. " It has been most kindly proposed that I should accompany you to the Conversations- liaus^' Eustace said, addressing the elder of the two girls. Again he was almost startled by the sweetness of her smile, as she murmured the permission his manner, rather than his words, had asked of her. It was difficult to him to believe that she did not even know his name. He supposed that he had not the air of an adventurer ; but even people whose names were known and who were not adventurers were usually treated with more coldness until something was known of their incomes and — in a few cases — of their antecedents. He was over-diffident, no doubt, this poor Eustace. He did not know himself that he had " gentleman" written in every line of his thin^ bronzed face, and that no one could be five minutes in his company without recognizing in him. one of those chivalrous, fair souls who would have been Guyons and Galahads in days A TOUEIST IDYL. 43 of yore, and wlio do deeds of prowess still, only without the guerdon and without the glory. " Are you all alone here ? " Rachel said, as they strolled a little way behind her father and Margery, along towards the Conversa- tionshaus. " Quite alone at present. But — I am expect- ing my father to-morrow." " Oh, you will be glad ! " " We have not met for ten years. I have been away in India ten years." " So you were saying. You must miss all your Indian friends very much. I have always heard there is so much pleasant society in India." "It does make it seem very strange to be alone," said Eustace. " And yet I did not go out very much. Besides my work " He paused. It seemed priggish to tell her that he was a keen student of Sanscrit, and had spent most of his leisure trying to gain some know- ledge of the " elder sister " of Aryan languages and literatures. There is nothing more hateful to a man, at the same time clever and modest, than a parade of intellectual tastes in general society. No man, Eustace thought, could gain anything in a young lady's esteem, and he 44 A TOUEIST IDYL. miglit lose a good deal hj owning to a fondness for Sanscrit. So he substituted, " After hard work, one likes time to oneself." By this time that enchanting double row of shops was reached where trinkets, and gloves, and Black Forest clocks, and photographs, and fifty things besides, attract the loiterer to and from those deserted halls, where the voice of the crou^Dier and the chink of the fugitive coin resound no longer. Margery had put her arm through her father's, so as to prevent his walking on too fast, and enforced a long halt before each stall as she passed it. She was in ecstasies. There was nothing like this in West Norfolk. There was only one shop worth speaking of in all King's Lynn, and Margery's home was too far from Lynn to allow of her visiting even that shop very often. Eustace and Rachel stopped in like manner before the treasures displayed to view on the next booth. In order to see these beautiful things properly, the short-sigiited old Indian was obliged to have recourse very often to his eye-glass ; and now and again, when his companion bent over some toy or trinket, or quaint bit of bric-d-brac, he might have been observed stealing a furtive glance through it at her face. A TOUEIST IDYL. 45- It is curious how mncli people who siiifer from defective vision can take in during the brief moments when they really get a good sight of a person. These moments are precious ; they occur at rare intervals, and they cannot be protracted on pain of rudeness ; but they often seem to be turned to far better advantage than are the wider opportunities of ordinarily endowed mortals. In this case, at any rate, Eustace St. Quentin knew more about this girl from six peeps at her, so to speak, than all the long-sighted gentlemen she had met, who could see her nicely every time they happened to glance in her direction, had done before him. He began to feel an invincible desire to know something more about her, especially to find out whether she were in truth his hereditary enemy. If her name were Yibert, why, then, there would be nothing for it but instant flight. An odd smile flitted across his face as he thought of mediaeval feuds, and of the beautiful legend of Yerona. Ah, the days were past when Montagus and Capulets settled these things with swords and daggers, with potions and poisons, and delicious- death in one another's arms. To court one's Juliet to-day meant being civilly boycotted by one's relations, and being cut off with a shillings and bringing the most prosaic nineteenth-century 46 A TOURIST IDYL. misery and discomfort upon a dainty, delicately nurtured creature. " Do you know," began Eustace, craftily, peering at a photograph of some villa in the environs of Baden, " that is not at all unlike my home ? It is a style of architecture that is a good deal affected about us. I don't know whether you are familiar with it." '^ Oh, we are very old-fashioned in the part of Norfolk where I live," Rachel said, innocently falling into his trap. His heart sank. As far as he knew the Yiberts lived somewhere in the Eastern Counties. " There are nothing but old red-brick ' Halls,' dear quaint old houses, with more of the farm-house than anything else about them." " And you live in one ? " •^ Yes ; in one of the prettiest, we think. It lies in such a sweet little valley, and we can see the village with its thatched roofs nestling close to us — such a peaceful scene." " But you have plenty of neighbours ? " '' Oh no. We have none very near us. We are very quiet. My father, as you see " — here she smiled — " is very fond of society, so that we often have people with us, and he goes away a good deal." " And do you go away a good deal ? " A TOUEIST IDYL. 47 " Not mucli. I can always find plenty to do -at home." " There is always plenty to do in the country," said the wily Eustace, by way of a leading remark, " if people's tastes are not vitiated by artificial modes of life. It is the natural life, after all. If you care for trees and flowers^ for animals, for the open air " " I love them all ! " Eachel interrupted, with enthusiasm. " Besides, in the country you can always get plenty of time for " She paused. If a young man hesitates to announce to a young lady that he devotes his spare time to Sanscrit, how much more reluctant is a young lady to confess to a young man that she devotes hers to Greek ! It is, perhaps, no longer a positive drawback to a girl to know a little ; but there is still a certain flavour of forbidden fruit about it, and it will take a generation or two more to get the " prunes and prisms " theory of feminine education thoroughly out of the national system. Rachel had lost an admirer or two through her Greek already. Not because she was not entirely natural and womanly and sweet with it all, but because the mere knowledge that she was " learned " acted as a deterrent. She could not be at all sure that this new friend of hers, 48 A TOUEIST IDYL. whom she liked exceedingly, would not like her less for worshipping Euripides. So she, too, decided to substitute a vague generality. " In the country," she said, " you can always get plenty of time for indoor pursuits." But she was not to be permitted to escape so easily. " Is music or drawing your forte ? " inquired her companion, with an assumed carelessness, the conventional questions he was asking having a greater significance to himself than he wished her to guess, or indeed than he admitted to himself. " I draw a little ; but I think I read more than I draw. Listen ! " she exclaimed, blushing at the notion that after all she had branded herself " blue," and hastening to turn the conversation. " What a lovely waltz that is ! How I love a band out of doors in the evening ! " " Father says we may have some coffee ices," said Margery, turning round to her sister. Each el laughed. " She is such a baby," she said, in a merry aside to Eustace. It was no easy task to find a table. They were all crowded with Germans, who stared and made remarks under their breath at the little party of English people. The English are few and far between at Baden now, and A TOURIST IDYL. 49 these white-robed maidens and their father and friend found themselves actually conspicuous. '' Is there anything the matter with us ? " said Margery, in an anxious whisper to Rachel. Her acute self-consciousness was always on the alert. " They all stare very much. Do you think it can be because we are not dressed queerly as they are, and they think we ought to be ? " " Perhaps our white is a little conspicuous," said Rachel, simply. " I didn't think of that." " I don't like the Germans," said Margery, with dignity. " It ought not to surprise them to see an English lady." As soon as the ices were eaten, it was deemed advisable to walk about, for the evening had turned very cold. It threatened rain. Every one agreed that the brief spell of fine weather was at an end. Margery took her father's arm again. She seemed to think he had talked enough to Eustace, chatting uninterruptedly as the two men had done for half-an-hour about Indian politics and Indian public men, and a variety of kindred topics not specially congenial to seventeen. Rachel she considered stupid that evening. She had declined to converse with her in undertones while all this dull Indian talk was going on. So Rachel was consigned once VOL. I. E 50 A TOUKIST IDYL. more to Eustace's care, and once more tliey followed a little distance behind the other two, pacing all about the gardens and round and round the kiosk, where the band was playing. '' I did not know it could be so cold in Germany," said Rachel ; " and it is such a con- trast to the heat we experienced this very after- noon." " You must always allow ten degrees extra for the railway carriage," said Eustace. " There has been no real hot weather since I have been in Germany, and now, it seems, we are in for some more w^et. Baden was very unpleasant Avhen I first came, so showery and chilly and yet muggy. I fear you will not enjoy it very much if that sort of thing sets in again. You don't seem able to breathe shut in here among the hills, far less can you get up sufficient energy to cHmb them. Then the damp and even cold prevent anything like the dolce far niente — lying in the shade with one's book and dreaming of all the enterprising things you will do when it is cooler. But perhaps you are only passing through ? " " No ; I think we shall stay, if we like it," Rachel said. " We may, perhaps, go to Freiburg for a few days, and we shall try to see all we A TOURIST IDYL. 51 can of the Black Forest. Bat my father is nut foncl of too much moving about. He likes being where there are people ; and if he once finds a Hotel that suits him, with, perhaps, some friends in it " " I thoroughly agree with him," said Eustace, with inappropriate warmth. " Grive me any place where you meet your friends, be it Stepney or Sahara, and the rest signifies little. Scenery is all very well as an adjunct." Eachel smiled. If she had known Eustace better, she might have been suspected of saying to herself, *' How can this professed misanthrope reconcile such an assertion to his conscience ! " As it was, she was probably thinking chietly of her father's amiable weakness for the society of his fellow-men. " My remaining here, too," went on Eustace, " depends on how I like it, or rather on how my father likes it. I do not suppose that he will like it at all. He has rather a droll reason for coming here. He usually affects Homburg, and only decided for Baden this year to avoid some people between whom and ourselves there is a kind of family feud." He spoke lightly, and his companion laughed as she said, " How romantic ! Does it date back to the Middb Aires?" UNIVERSITY OF 52 A TOURIST IDYL. " Xo ; only to the days when he and the gentleman in question were young men together. They had a sort of most unfortunate double quarrel." Here Eustace put up his eye-glass and stared hard at the bandsman he was nearest to, glancing for the tenth part of a second at the girl's face before he dropped it again. But he could detect no change in her expression. If she were the daughter of the '' Yiper," she clearly knew nothing of that two-fold sting. "You have not experienced the romantic misfortune of that kind of feud ? " he ventured to ask. " I suppose it takes two to Jceep up a quarrel, as it does to make one," Rachel answered in the same light tone, "and I am afraid our side would not be maintained with proper spirit. ]\Iy father, as you probably noticed in the train to-day, is rather — impulsive ; but I don't think he could cherish a grudge against sluj one, whatever the provocation or injury." Eustace meditated for a few moments. Then he changed the conversation abruptly. A little later Margery stopped, and announced that she was cold and tired, and so the spell had to be broken and the pleasant evening stroll cut short ; and Eustace, for the second time that day, took leave on the steps of the Hollandischerhof of A TOUEIST IDYL. 53 the strangers, a cliance meeting with whom in the morning had — it was unaccountable, but it was true — transformed his life. The girls' father lingered a moment to ask him whether he would drive with them to the Alte Schloss next day. He was too anxious to secure an agreeable companion to reflect that by this time the Alte Schloss had probably lost the charm of novelty for Eustace. In point of fact, Eustace had been there twice. The first time he had been impressed ; the second time he had come back miserable, voting the whole thing hackneyed, a fraud, and a bore. When, how- ever, he was invited to make the expedition for the third time, he spoke very warmly in praise of the view, and said that he should be only too delighted to do the honours of it. " At two o'clock, then. Good night;" and the genial Celt, with a cordial shake of the hand, vanished in the direction of the smoking-room. Here he was presently so fortunate as to fall in with an old college friend, another man, all whose relations, though not he himself, were well known to him, and a Belgian count, who had married a connection of his wife's. His happiness was complete. He sat with them well into the small hours, gossiping to his heart's content, and finally went to his room, persuaded 54 A TOURIST IDYL. that Baden-Baden was the nicest watering-place in Germany. Eustace, meanwhile, had paused a moment in the entrance, with the intention of hearing from the portier the information that official had not been allowed to impart two hours before. He even went and looked into the office, but the j^ortier being momentarily absent, he decided that he could not wait, and that there would be plenty of time to ascertain the truth in the morning. Perhaps he was less anxious to ascertain it than he had been two hours, or even half an hour, ago. lY. The next morning, between seven and eight o'clock, a pale gleam of watery sunshine, and the strains of music, wafted through his open window from the gardens opposite, roused Eustace from his slumbers. He was fond of going out early, though he was not undergoing any " cure." He dressed in haste, lest the band should finish playing before he reached the seat in front of the Conversationshaus, where he was wont to sit with his book and listen. He liked to have A TOURIST IDYL. 55 music going on while lie read. It acted as a pleasant stimulus to his brain. Enveloped in an old ulster, with a soft wide- awake pulled well over his brows for shade, he sat him down, unconscious that he was an object of some interest to the orthodox frequenters of the Trinkhalle, mostly Grermans, who were taking their orthodox walk up and down and scoffing at diesen Englander. The literature which found easier access to his brain by means of Strauss and Waldteufel was this morning- contained in a Sanscrit journal, the Pandit^ published at Delhi, which Eustace read regularly. He soon became so absorbed that he did not notice that the music had ceased, the kiosk emptied, and the water-drinkers thinned down to a mere sprinkling. When he did look up, there were but a very few still pacing to and fro, or scattered about on the benches. On a line with Eustace, not more than a dozen yards off, there sat a young lady, also reading. Her umbrella, which she had put up to shade her book, concealed her face, but there was something in her figure that was familiar. Eustace started and half rose from his seat, then sat down again and waited. But he did not continue reading the Pandit ; he only played with its pages, as he watched the outline of the 56 A TOURIST IDYL. girlish figure near him, noting the same dress that Rachel had worn the day before, and the strong country boots, which he had also observed with the keenness of eye those who know what they portend have for such matters, as well as a chatelaine of antique silver ornaments and implements, by which alone it would have been easy to identify his fellow-traveller of yesterday. The book upon her knee was a slender one, in a paper cover. " A novel, no doubt," thought Eustace, " but I imagine of the better sort. I don't think she would read trash." Yet the book did not look like a Tauchnitz. It had a dark grey cover, and it was too thin. Why this young man should have jumped to the conclusion that it was a work of fiction, it is difficult to say. Perhaps his notion of women's taste in literature was too much based on that of the young lady before spoken of, whom he had once fancied himself in love with. He haJ commenced his courtship by lending her books. His motto from very early manhood had -been, *' Where the heart lies, let the brain lie also,'* and he had wished to justify his tenderness for her by the discovery of ideas and tastes in com- mon. She returned his Tyndalls and J. S. Mills, his Ruskins and Brownings, unread, manifesting A TOUEIST IDYL. 57 a marked predileetion for the more frivolous kinds of fiction. Strange to say, he found that he did not care for her less or feel less unworthy to tell her that he cared for her; but, while he hesitated, a bolder man carried off the prize. Now, after several years, he felt as keenly as ever, with all the visionary fervour which is supposed only to belong to one's teens, with all the boyish beautiful enthusiasm which coarser souls lose so quickly in the world's hurly-burly and in the din of sordid voices — the need of loving and of being- loved. And he still dreamed of sympathy and mutual comprehension, of a walking together in the higher paths, a striving together for truth, a following together after righteousness. In this girl whom he had heard called Hachel, and in whose company he had been but for a day, he felt that a man might find such a helpmeet. He saw in her a simpleness, a sweetness, a truthfulness, that passed anything he had known before, even in that old love of his ; and if like the old love, like almost all the ladies he had known in India, she did not care to go very much below the surface of things, preferred chocolate soufflet and strawberry cream to solid food, and read only novels of the lighter sort, still his heart, at least, he believed that she would understand. The rest might follow ; he 58 A TOURIST IDYL. could train her, educate her — though she read only novels. In everything that was noble and good she would assuredly confirm and strengthen him, and it might be that with such culture as her intellect had not yet received But his self-communing was very vain and futile, for, however all this might be, he knew that it was too late — that he loved her. Presently, as he sat watching her, she moved her umbrella a little, and began looking about her. Their eyes met, and she coloured slightly as she bowed to him. Then he got up, and ventured to wish her " Good morning," and to hope that she and her sister had recovered the fatigues of yesterday. He intended to pass on almost instantly, lest his presence should annoy or embarrass her in any manner. He liked her for coming out alone in that simple unconventional way. He saw she had come out just as she would have gone out early into the garden at home, taking her book into the shade on the lawn, where thrushes and blackbirds would be her orchestra, and there would be no one to see her but the flowers. With the woman- like delicacy of feeling which characterized this gentle scholar, he felt that her privacy sliould be respected here as there, and that her maiden meditation should be undisturbed, A TOURIST IDYL. 59 except by the passing salutation that courtesy demanded. But she seemed so pleased to meet him, and began talking to him so frankly ; she took the rencontre so naturally, and appeared so far from supposing that there was anything about it that could embarrass either of them, that Eustace, before he knew what he was doing, found himself seated on the bench beside her, chatting as sociably and unconstrainedly as he had ever done in his life. Rachel told him that she was the early riser of the family ; that she was always up a couple of hours before breakfast ; and that as, when at home, she had a good deal of housekeeping, entertaining, and so forth, to do after breakfast, she was very glad of the quiet time to herself. Yes ; she quite agreed with Eustace. She liked music, or any sound that was not actual noise, while she was reading. At home she liked the early twitter of the birds ; and though the mow- ing-machine was a more prosaic implement than the scythe, still the whirr of it on the lawn, early, when the dew was thick and the fresh-cut grass scented the air, was nearly as good as this beautiful band to her. " I confess," said Eustace, " that there is one thing I cannot do well when there is any descrip- 60 A TOURIST IDYL. tion of sound whatever to be heard, and that is, write. The least thing distracts me when I am writing ; and it is in vain that I call to mind such heroic examples as that, for instance, of Jane Austin, plodding away at her novels in a corner of the family ' keeping-room.' " " Did she do that ? " asked Rachel, with interest. " So they say ; but it is difficult to believe it, is it not ? Can you imagine writing your letters, notes of invitation, and so forth, in the midst of such a Babel of sound : one sister playing on the " instrument," as they called it in those days; another reading a charade of her own composition for her brother to guess ; a third, perhaps, relating the last piece of village gossip ? " " I think I am a pretty good hand at that ; I have so much practice," Rachel said. She did not add that, however it might be with letters, she needed to be alone and in absolute quiet for writing proper ; for composing poems, or certain short but very graceful and thought- ful essays, chiefly on literary subjects, which she was just now- contributing to a maga- zine. " Your correspondence is large ? " *' We have a very large family circle, and, as A TOURIST IDYL 61 I was saying, always a good many going and coming." " And so the notes have to be written more or less in public." The subject of writing lasted for some time longer without a hint being dropped that this young lady ever put pen to paper for other than epistolary purposes. Then a glance at the pam- phlet or magazine, or whatever it was upon her knee, again suggested her reading to Eustace. " You say that you were out before seven. You must have got on nicely with your book." " Except that I am a very, very slow reader." " Ah, you like to linger over the heroine's delicious pain and trials long drawn out, which you know the third volume will set right, so that there need be no hurry and no drawback to the enjoyment." This was the kind of thing Eustace had been wont to say to the old love, after he discovered that she only pretended to read Max Miiller and ^latthew Arnold. Rachel smiled. As it happened, the book in her hand was a brochure by a German Jew, set- ting forth with equal discernment, truth, and grace, a Eeform movement, to most Jews a stum- bling-block, which took its rise near upon twenty centuries ago in Galilee. It had caught Rachel's 62 A TOURIST IDYL. eye on a railway bookstall, and since Grerman theology in Grerman did not appal her, she ha