b^Nsgsi ^^ 1^3^ ^3J5lZ3^''';, "Z3^" ^> ~^* >'3^ - 3m* >~2* >** r-^2> ■"- »>__ ^:g» ;, ES> _ :^»' ~15fc. - 2>- - ^2^ r ~2 ~^^^ "£*»-£ _-->£* IsM^m^*''- 1 IBRAHY OF THE UNIVERSITY Of ILLINOIS V.I p, // ^ CENTRAL CIRCUIATIOM AMD BOOKSTACKS The person borrowing this material is responsible for its renewal or return before the Latest Date stamped I below. You may be charged a minimum fee ol $75.00 for each non-returned or lost item. Thlft mutilation, or defacement of library ™Jenatecan be causes for shtdent disciplinary action. All materials A hV the University of Illinois Library are the r^fty of he Stl Illinois and are protected by Artfcbl 6B of Illinois Criminal Law and Procedure. TO RENEW, CALL (217) 333-8400. University of Illinois Library at Urbana-Champaign o a ,, When renewing by phone, write new due tote below previous due date. BROKEN BONDS. BY HAWLEY SMART, AUTHOR OF " BREEZIE LANGTON," " FALSE CARDS, &c. &c. • fair green girdled mother of mine, Sea, that art clothed with the sun and the rain, Thy sweet hard kisses are strong like wine, Thy large embraces are keen like pain. Save me and hide me with all thy waves. Find me one grave of thy thousand graves, Those pure cold populous graves of thine, Wrought without hand in a world without stain." IN THREE VOLUMES. VOL. I. LONDON: BURST AND BLACKETT, PUBLISHERS, 13, GREAT MARLBOROUGH STREET. 1874. All rights reserved. LONDON : PRINTED BY MACDONALD AND TUGWELL, BLENHEIM HOUSE. f<2 3 V. BROKEN BONDS. CHAPTER I m CD THE WISHING-WELL AT UPWAY. A DELICIOUS June afternoon— one of -*--*- those first balmy days that give ear- nest of the summer that is yet to come. Below the crest of a grassy knoll above the little village of Up way, recline a youthful couple, lazily feasting their eyes on the panorama that lies unrolled before them. They look over some miles of sparsely- timbered, undulating grass country, which merges at length into the lovely bay of Weymouth. The sun flashes fiercely down VOL. I. B 2 BROKEN BONDS. on the glittering waters, sprinkled with trim, gaily-decorated little yachts ; while ever and anon, leaving a trail of dense black smoke in her wake, comes some steamer from across the channel, with steady, reso- lute intention, round the eastern extremity of the breakwater. Business-like fellows these steamers, holding a stern, uncompro- mising course for the harbour, as they wend their way disdainfully through the little sailing-boats that flutter here and there, like swallows o'er a pond. The faint low line of the outer break- water is just visible, but the inner and the anchorage of the harbour of refuge are shut out by the promontory that terminates in the No the Fort. RedclifFe Point stands boldly out in the sunshine, and the eye stretches away to the eastward, till the land fades hazily away behind the shallow waters of Ringsted Ledge. To the south-west the BROKEN BONDS. 6 picture is closed by the iron-bound rock of Portland, which glowers o'er the smiling waters of Weymouth Roads, like some old- world monster. Island, yet no island — a caprice of nature, this singular headland. Made an island, probably, at the time of that great upheaval which separated Great Britain from the con- tinent, the waters have ever since endea- voured to repair the havoc of the volcanic fires, and by their ceaseless wash have piled up that marvellous natural breakwater called Chesil Beach, which connects the rock with the mainland. There is something very singular to a shrewd observer in walking through the isle. He cannot but recognise that the four or five miles w T hich he has traversed since leaving Weymouth have placed him, in some sense, in a foreign country. The villages of the interior re- mind one — I am speaking of Reforne, South- b2 4 BROKEN BONDS. well, &c. — strongly of those of the west of Ireland. A curious race, these Portlanders — heredi- tary fishers and smugglers — only now awaken- ing to the march of civilization, and to the knowledge that this latter branch of industry is obsolete, vanished from the earth as a profession, like many other employments of eighty years ago. Only a generation since, and it was no uncommon thing to find a Port- lander who knew no other land than his na- tive rock. A thrifty, hardy breed, with loose ideas regarding flo tson jetson and contraband dealing — especially this last, holding that shipwrecks generally were favours vouch- safed of Providence to the people on whose shores they might occur, and drily remark- ing that they took pattern by their own " Race," which disgorges with much reluct- ance what comes within its maw. The immediate left of the hill of which I BROKEN BONDS. 5 first spoke is clothed with a belt of wood, which runs down to a brawling shallow trout-stream, deepening here and there, and notably at the base of this hill, where it has been artificially dammed into a cool, deli- cious tank, known for miles round that neighbourhood as the " Wishing Well." The straggling little village of Upway lies scattered along the east bank of the brook, the main body of the hamlet lying, indeed, upon the rising ground on the opposite slope of the valley, and standing on either side of the high road between Dorchester and Weymouth. But there are many snug creeper-covered cottages and farm-houses nestling on the margin of the streamlet, and a quaint water-mill, showing signs of ripe old age, proves that the inhabitants have been awake to the utilizing of their water- power for generations back. The pair that sat tranquilly enjoying this 6 BROKEN BONDS. summer afternoon are worth looking at. The man, a slight, almost boyish -looking figure of medium height, with short chestnut hair and soft silky moustache of the same hue, clear-cut features and sleepy blue eyes — eyes which you could fancy with a light in them, nevertheless, should their owner be roused — feet and hands of almost femi- nine smallness. He is attired in rough shooting-jacket and knickerbockers, but the strong laced boots fit with remarkable neat- ness, and his hands are cased in well-fitting dog-skin gloves. A couple of fishing-rods and a basket lie beside him, while with wide-awake tilted over his eyes, he lies dreamily watching the smoke- wreaths of his cigar, and drinking in the gorgeous panorama at his feet. Such is Frank Eller- ton, more popularly known as Dainty Eller- ton, in the — th Hussars and about town generally — a sobriquet he had attained from BROKEN BONDS. 7 his extreme fastidiousness — a popular man with those who understood him, but at times pronounced supercilious by those only slightly acquainted with him. These latter speak in their ignorance ; there is really no superciliousness about Dainty, but he shrinks intuitively from coarseness or boisterous manner. His boyish look and somewhat studied dress contribute often to this delusion. In the regiment, albeit he was a prime favourite, they laughingly vowed nobody ever caught Dainty ungloved, except at mess — that he had a fatigue-party expressly to lace those dandy shooting- boots ; but those who had walked with him on a hill-side knew well what work that slight girlish figure could compass, and how deadly was the breechloader in those kid- gloved hands. You might smile at the coxcombry of his hunting get-up, and put him down as a mere coffee-room sportsman ; 8 BROKEN BONDS. but those who had seen Dainty "go " in the shires held him in high esteem, and declared no more unflinching horseman ever crossed the Vale of Belvoir. Despite his youthful appearance, Frank Ellerton has numbered five-and-twenty summers. His companion is a girl of some twenty years — a bright, sparkling, vivacious bru- nette, although now her mobile features are still enough. You might have doubts about Jennie Holdershed's beauty, if you first saw her as she is at present ; but if you once saw her animated, with her brilliant grey eyes flashing, and her pearly teeth gleaming behind their coral prison, you would quick- ly recant such heresy, and even then you would have scarcely recognised the great charm of Jennie Holdershed — her frank, free, honest nature. She sits there toying with the ribbon in her hat, and all regard- less of the afternoon sun, which glistens BROKEN BONDS. V through her dusky uncovered tresses. .Jen- nie's brows are knit in somewhat unpleasant thought. " So this is the last I shall see of you ?" she said softly at length. " Yes, for the present. Leave's up, and England, or, at all events, the Horse Guards — same thing, but more practical — expects every man to do his duty," returned Dainty lazily. " When shall you be down here again ?" " I'm sure I don't know — we never do know what will become of us in twelve months time in the Army." " But I suppose you can come here again before long, if you want to," returned the girl, a little sharply. " No chance of getting leave, unless an elderly relative selects this place to die in. You wouldn't expect me to come down here in the winter, would you ? — and I 10 BROKEN BONDS. can't get away again before that, except under peculiar circumstances." " But why not for a few days in the winter ?" "Why not!" exclaimed Dainty, raising himself on his elbow, and regarding his companion with naive astonishment — "why not ! Why, because it's the hunting season, and nobody ever came down here to hunt who could accomplish it anywhere else." The girl bit her lips with vexation as she replied, " I hope something may compel you to come here, whether you will or not." " Maybe," returned Dainty, " I might be relegated there ;" and as he spoke, he pointed laughingly to Portland. u No knowing, Jennie ; there's a vein of crime lies dormant in all of us, and my speciality may be developed in due course." " Nonsense !" she replied, pettishly. " You BROKEN BONDS. 11 won't understand me, though you know well enough what I mean." " You don't mean that you and I are to whip for trout all the year long?" said Dainty, gravely. "Of course not. Never mind what I mean. Come away now. It's getting late, and you have four miles to walk, you know." And as she spoke the girl rose to her feet. " Quite true, you practical Jennie," replied Dainty, as he leisurely picked up himself and the fishing-rods. " You're improved a good bit lately, but you strike a little too quick still. Pity I hadn't another week to drill you. Been a pleasant fortnight, too, hasn't it ?" " I have enjoyed it," said the girl, quietly, as she led the way to the before-mentioned belt of woodland. Crossing a low stile, they entered a nar- 12 BROKEN BONDS. row path beneath the trees, which, in gradual zig-zag fashion, descended the hill until it arrived at the margin of "The Wishing Well." As they appeared there, a saucy, ragged girl of fifteen emerged from an adjacent cottage, bearing a common tray, on which were a couple of small tumblers. "Wish, wish, sir!" she cried, with laugh- ing eyes, " whether it be for success with the trout, or success with your sweetheart — for love or for riches, for wealth or for hap- piness. Drain a bumper to the winning of what lies nearest your heart. Give me six- pence, Captain, and I'll drink a glass my- self, to wish that your wish may be granted." Dainty laughed as he took a tumbler, and, having dipped it in the cool water at his feet, exclaimed, "A prosperous fishing-season; and may BROKEN BONDS. 13 you score five brace your next afternoon !" Jennie acknowledged his wish with a somewhat contemptuous gesture ; then, turning sharply upon the attendant Hebe, exclaimed, " Give me a glass, Nance. Fill it for me, please," she continued, handing it to her companion. Mutely he complied with her request. Jennie raised the glass steadily to her lips, then pausing, extended her hand and ex- claimed, " I'll say good-bye first, Frank." " Good-bye," he replied, as their hands met, with no little astonishment visible in his countenance. " And now mark you my toast. May you want my help sorely, or may I never see you more. Adieu !" and, tossing her tumbler lightly into the well, the girl sped swiftly away. 14 BROKEN BONDS. " And there goes your sixpence after the glass, my bonny man !" cried Nancy, fiercely, suiting the action to the word ; " and I'd send you after the two if I could, for cross- ing her, and she the best friend ever a poor body had in Upway. What led you to thraw her to-night?" "Upon my soul, I don't know what's annoyed her, you little she-devil !" retorted Dainty, angrily, as he strode away. The girl stood glowering as she watched him disappear round a turn of the road. " She-devil !" she muttered, as a malig- nant scowl overran her elfish face. " I reck little what they call me, but let those who'd do wrong to Miss Jennie look out while Nance is abroad. She's the only one ever cared for me. Who nursed me through the fever two years ago ? Not mother, for she's hard enough work to nurse herself; not father, for he's mostly drunk. I'd Ve BROKEN BONDS. 15 died then but for Miss Jennie, and I'd put a knife into anybody who wronged her, if I died for it next day !" Much want of education prevalent in these parts; school-boards or similar in- stitutions not yet got to bear upon the minds of the inhabitants thereof. This young Pagan had constituted Jennie Hol- dershed her Divinity, and was prepared to institute human sacrifice as a rite of pro- pitiation. Dainty Ellerton, meanwhile, tramping steadily back to Weymouth, is oppressed with grievous misgivings. He is, despite some little affectations, by no means a cox- comb ; still no man, other than an imbecile, could have misunderstood Jennie Holder- shed's last speech. Now Dainty, albeit more than one pair of bright eyes have shone kindly upon him during his journey through life, happens to be of a peculiarly 16 BROKEN BONDS. unsusceptible temperament. His soft, lazy manner, and utter oblivion of their agaceries, made him extremely popular among women, who, from the days of Eve downwards, have ever had a hankering for the fruit that seems out of reach. But no woman yet could say that she had ever held Frank Ellerton within the toils. What whim had brought him to Wey- mouth, is scarce worth inquiry. He had been quartered at Dorchester some two or three years back, and perchance it was curiosity to look upon the old scenes once more — sadder mistake, after long absence, the writer wots not of. The re-visiting of such places, under those circumstances, is usually attended with sadness and disap- pointment ; our fancy conjures up the beaux moments of the past ; we would fain revive all the old loves and friendships, recall the rosy hours of bygone times. Alas ! the BROKEN BONDS. 17 links are broken ; you can no more gal- vanize the dead memories of the past into life than you can the dead bodies of the actors in that faint, far-awav drama. If Dainty had not experienced this alto- gether, yet he had in some measure. Wey- mouth is not a very stirring place. The poor little watering-place, with one of the most beautiful bays in England, still lies paralysed under the ponderous memories of George the Third. He is like an incubus on the town. They cannot divest them- selves of those heavy reminiscences. He permeates the whole neighbourhood, even to defacing an entire down with his gigantic effigy cut out on the soft green turf. You can't escape from that old obstinate Conser- vative monarch ; you are always tumbling upon his statue, his house, his hotel, or something of that sort — research might pro- bably discover his sedan-chair. Despite all vol. i. c 18 BROKEN BONDS. his descendants have tried to do for Wey- mouth, Weymouth still remains enveloped in the mantle of George the Third. Dainty Ellerton perhaps got a little over- done with George the Third and Weymouth, so he betook himself vigorously to trout- fishing ; and it was on his second expedition of the kind that he discovered Jennie Hol- dershed on the banks of the stream between Upway and Dorchester, endeavouring to fill her basket by the aid of — a worm. To you who fish, no need to describe with what horror a fisherman would view such proceeding. It approximates in some mea- sure to killing foxes with a gun. Dainty didn't weep — hussars don't, except under infinite pressure — but he did, in round- about gentlemanly language, give Miss Hol- dershed to understand that he regarded her in the light of a malignant and pestilent poacher. BROKEN BONDS. 19 Jennie's blushing penitence for her un- witting offending so far moved him that he sent for a light trout-rod from London, and commenced to instruct her in the art of fly- fishing. He listened gravely to her pro- testations that she wanted trout, and knew no other manner of catching them, much as the owner of a breech-loader might give ear to a benighted man who took pheasants with a snare. From that time they met daily, and fished in company, Dainty being by no means complimentary to his fair assistant on her efforts, though she ■ was welcome always to the joint produce of the basket. This partnership had endured rather more than a fortnight previous to the above scene at the " Wishing Well." "Deuced odd!" mused Dainty, still tramp- ing steadily home to Weymouth. " I've never said anything spoony to her — never said more than that she really would throw c2 20 BROKEN BONDS. a good fly with a little more practice, and here she expects me, at the finish, to be downright sentimental. It's very awkward, very. I'm sure I never meant anything of that sort. But when you see a pretty girl catching trout with a worm, it becomes a duty to talk to her seriously about her mis- conduct ; and when you find it is all ignor- ance, what's a man to do but teach her how to fish ? How was I to guess she would con- found fishing with flirtation ? I am really sorry about it, too, for she's much too nice a girl to make a fool of, but, on my honour, I never meant this to come of it. Catch me helping a young woman out of a scrape again ! How I shall go if I happen to see a riding-habit in difficulties next season !" 21 CHAPTER II. CAPTAIN HOLDERSHED. TTERY angry with herself was Jennie * Holdershed as she sped rapidly home. She had not meant that her tongue should so much get the better of her, and could have bitten out the offending member as she thought of her '* wish." You must not think that frank, warm-hearted, practical Jennie had fallen over head and ears in love with this graceless hussar. Far from it. But she had got rather to like him, much as she often laughed at what she called his "jessamy ways," and she could not help feeling a little piqued at the coolness with 22 BROKEN BONDS. which he took their separation, and the quiet indifference he displayed with regard to their meeting again. " What a fool I made of myself!" thought Jennie, as she arrived at the door of her uncle's cottage. " But he knew his dragoon impertinence always did ' rise me,' as he calls it, and he might have refrained from putting it on the last day. He might have said he hoped we should meet again ere long. He might have suggested in some shape when that was likely to be, instead of saying good-bye, as if we were to meet out fishing in a day or two. I hate people who say good-bye as if they never cared whether they were to see you again or not. My word," she continued, laughing, as a deep bass voice met her ear, storming in some- what unorthodox language, "the barome- ter's down to heavy wet and squally." Captain Holdershed was a retired mer- BROKEN BONDS. 23 chant skipper, who, bred a Portland fisher- man, had by dint of sheer hard work ar- rived in due course at the dignity of com- manding a trader. A very lumbering affair was the old tub of a brig first committed to his charge ; but when, some six or seven years ago, having amassed a competency, he told the firm he served that "he would go to sea no more," he resigned the command of one of the handsomest clippers in the China trade. Retirement, I regret to say, had not been conducive to the old sailor's respectability. While at sea he had been justly esteemed as a remarkably sober, steady, and trustworthy officer ; on shore, sad to tell, he was a most boisterous, bibulous old gentleman. He held, with the toper mentioned in the old Greek poet, " the rule I think is right, Not absolutely drunk, nor sober quite," 24 BROKEN BONDS. and spent his days in this very doubtful con- dition. He roamed about clad in a suit of pilot cloth, and, as Mr. Carlyle says of the old Brandenburg barons, ' mind also cased in ill habits of long continuance.' He never varied this costume, but in the heats of summer carried his coat over his shoulder, and confronted Upway genially in his shirt- sleeves. That such a man would always have a telescope under his arm, I need scarcely observe ; and marvellous were the sights that, inspired by the stimulants he so copiously resorted to, the ancient mariner saw through that glass. He swore, and in strong, strange, sea-faring oaths too, that the fellow of that glass had never been seen. Very intimate friends, to whom he occasion- ally accorded the privilege of putting it to their eyes, had been heard to remark that its fellow would not command a very high price, as telescopes went, if it were. But BROKEN BONDS. 25 then, as Captain Holdershed observed, " There's a great deal in a man knowing his own glass." To which one of his cronie's, with similar convivial tendencies, replied, " And so there is. It stamps a man a gen- tleman late in the evening !" However, you can't always shoot with another man's gun, the same spectacles don't suit all short- sighted people, and it may be that that telescope was adapted only to the vision of Captain Holdershed ; certain it is that no one ever saw the sights he did through it, or, indeed, for the matter of that, through any other glass. Jennie Holdershed was the daughter of a tolerably well-to-do farmer in Portland. Farmers there are very different from their more wealthy brethren in England's great agricultural districts. The holdings are much smaller, scientific culture of the land unknown, and those who practise the craft 26 BROKEN BONDS. on that, one may say, rocky isle, wring their living from the sterile soil in somewhat primitive fashion. Portland mutton is celebrated, but the yeomen of Hampshire, or the stalwart breeders of the long-wooled sheep of Lincolnshire and Norfolk, would turn their noses contemptuously up at the wild, goat-like-looking flocks of Portland. A hard-working, close-fisted man was John Holdershed ; and when his brother, the Captain, some time after his settling down at Upway, complained bitterly that he had no one to keep house for him, John Holder- shed, with a keen eye to the ultimate dis- position of Uncle Robert's savings, suggested that his second daughter, Jennie, should fill that situation. Uncle Robert was very fond of his niece, and jumped eagerly at the idea. And so it came about that, some three years ago, Jennie was installed as housekeeper at the Upway cottage. BROKEN BONDS. 27 Bright bonny Jennie had led a life wild as a searaew nearly up to that. She could steer, trim a sail, catch mackerel by the score, or, at need, handle an oar very decently. From her earliest girlhood she had been accustomed to accompany her brothers on their fishing excursions, and brothers are somewhat intolerant of little sisters on such occasions, unless they make themselves useful. But Willie and Launce vowed that, unless it came to real hard row- ing, Jennie was as good in the boat as them- selves. Willie and the eldest girl, Mary, still remained at home, and helped their parents with the farm, while Launce held a situa- tion as gamekeeper some fifteen miles away. Such, briefly, is the history of the Holder- sheds. There is nothing further to mention concerning them than that they had been set- tled at Portland for generations, and that the 28 BROKEN BONDS. farm had been transmitted steadily from father to son. Jennie had great influence with her uncle, and had she been old enough to have taken her place at Upway some three or four years sooner, might have controlled that gallant veteran's bibulous propensities. But when she assumed the reins there the habit was too pronounced, and Jennie knew now that, whatever she might manage on other points, the regulation of her uncle's " nor'- westers," as he termed them, was in great measure beyond her. Jennie paused at the door a moment to listen to her uncle's fine racy vituperation of the maid on the subject of hot water. Ap- parently that essential to the old gentleman's comfoit was not forthcoming. " Goodness !" muttered Jennie to herself, " he can't want hot nor'-westers on a June evening like this !" BROKEN BONDS. 29 But it seemed he not only could, but did, and was raging like a cyclone because they were unattainable. " Uncle, uncle !" she cried, " what is the matter? Pray don't make such a noise. They'll hear you all over the village." "And what do I care if they do, you hussy?" replied the Captain, though in con- siderably modulated tones. " It's enough to make a man angry not to be able to get a glass of hot grog in his own house before sundown." " You've no business to want one before sundown," retorted Jennie, sharply. " Don't argue, girl. I know best what suits my constitution. I've got a chill to- day." If he had, the Captain had been rather fortunate, inasmuch as that desiderated coolness had been scarcely achieved by any- one else in those parts ; and if he did under- 30 BROKEN BONDS. stand his own constitution, he was most assuredly constituted somewhat differently from his fellows. "Well, don't storm, and you shall have what you want directly. What kettle do you think would boil with you raving at it like that? Kettles, like fish, my uncle, won't stand being sworn at. The kettle that's cursed never sings." "Well, I won't. It's all right, Jennie, now you've come home, but that" (vivid Anglo-Saxon expletive here) " maid never does do anything she ought to do." " She's a very good girl, uncle, only you frighten her with your shocking language, and little blame to her. I'm sure, though I know you don't mean half what you say, you terrify me at times." "Well, I don't mean it; it's only my way. Don't be snappish, Jennie, and never mind the kettle till after supper," BROKEN BONDS. 31 replied the Captain, somewhat sheepishly. His niece kept him in very tolerable order, although not altogether able to suppress the " nor'-westers." When he waxed very mutinous, she threatened to resign the keys and return home. That menace invariably brought the old gentleman to his bearings. He was quite aware that his niece's presence contributed in no small measure to his do- mestic comforts ; add to which he was hon- estly and genuinely attached to her " Fish for supper, uncle !" cried the girl, gaily tapping her basket. " It was a very bad day, but we did get a few — more Mr. Ellerton's doings than mine, though. I only killed one the whole afternoon." " Ah !" said the Captain, sententiously, " you should have been after mackerel. I walked up to the top of the hill, and through my glass saw some chaps pulling 'em in by dozens at the opening of the breakwater." 32 BROKEN BONDS. There was no impossibility about this simple statement ; still what the Captain really had seen was some people fishing, apparently, at the place mentioned, but with what success he was too far off to as- certain. But the Captain was not one of those who allow their narratives to flag in interest from want of colour or incident. He possessed considerable power of embel- lishment, and having ascertained, with the aid of that invaluable glass, as much as pos- sible of his neighbours' affairs, never scrupled to fill in the details from the stores of his imagination. There was no harm in sup- posing that those mackerel-fishers had a good day; but the bibulous old mariner quite believed that he had seen what he narrated. "It was Mr. Ellerton's last day," said Jennie, as she flitted about, making prepara- tions for their evening meal. BROKEN BONDS. 33 A bystander could hardly have failed to have been struck with the girl's ways. She was peculiarly rapid and graceful in her movements, very quick of gesticulation, and had a quaint, positive nod of her head, both in negation, and assertion, and even in ex- postulation, that was all her own. Her rich, dusky hair lay coiled close round her well- turned head, and in its wealth scorned the adventitious assistance of chignon or locks of perjury. That, after all, was her charm — she was so genuine. You couldn't have lied to Jennie Holdershed, if you had any manhood left in you. Every feeling of pleasure, pain, scorn, or anger was so plainly visible in that frank, honest face that I pity the man who could have dared run the chance of seeing those grey eyes flash with contempt at his meanness or lack of veracity. If you had asked Jennie, she would have told you that cowardice was the root of all VOL. I. D 34 BROKEN BONDS. evil — that it was cowardice made people for the most part liars, impostors, or low- minded. She ranked the virtue of courage very highly, but then she took a very com- prehensive view of courage. She looked upon it as not merely a contempt of physical danger, but equally as the despising of social and moral weaknesses. Bold and fearless herself, she held in little esteem those who shrank from confronting public opinion, and would have faced her own little world on a question of social polity as unflinchingly as she would have braved a heavy gale off " The Bill " in her brother's boat. That a man could lack physical courage altogether would scarcely enter into Jennie's under- standing ; but she did know that some men were cooler, prompter, and apter to meet the exigencies of danger than others, and Jennie held them in high regard. Dainty Ellerton had been a great problem BROKEN BONDS. 35 to Jenny on their first meeting. He was of a species she had not yet encountered in life. He had made acquaintance with her, as before narrated, in cool, easy, courteous fashion, and Jennie was certainly much im- pressed with the way he killed trout. His unconcealed contempt for her way of angling, mixed with the most respectful recognition of her bonnie self, had puzzled Jennie, to start with. During their fishing camaraderie he never vouchsafed her a compliment — in- deed, in the latter stage of their intimacy, upon the occasion of a good trout proving too much for her skill, he, in the excite- ment of the moment, stigmatized her as "a little duffer." True, he rendered prompt apology for the opprobrious epithet, and Jennie had only laughed merrily at it, and exclaimed " she feared she was." Still Jennie had owned to herself that there was d2 36 BROKEN BONDS. something very pleasant in Dainty's easy, polished talk. He had seen a good deal of the world, and, further, was a man of more than average ability and education. The refine- ment of his manner had a charm for the girl, who, though unconscious of that attri- bute herself, had been endowed with it by nature. That common mother of us all does so sometimes fashion the clay she moulds regardless of its surroundings. You meet at times refinement in the cottage, that, like the straws imbedded in the amber, puzzles you. You meet also occasionally vulgarity in the salon, which does not astonish you so much. " The things, we know, are neither rich nor rare, But wonder how the devil they got there." But Jennie, whose ideal of man was based considerably upon " great physique," who dreamt that a man, to realise her con- BROKEN BONDS. 37 ception of the heroic, must be of thews and inches, had conceived a sort of womanly pity for her smooth-faced, almost girlish- looking companion. She liked him ; she recognised his skill with a rod ; she laughed at his jessamy ways, and taunted him about his gloved hands. Had she been called upon to fancy herself in danger or difficulty with him, she would have felt that it be- hoved her to think and do for the two of them. Yet only two days before the open- ing of this story, Jennie had been compelled to change her opinion. The incident was slight — no manhood, perhaps, wanted to confront the danger ; and yet there are plenty of men who don't much care about facing a really savage dog. They were making a short cut towards home from the river, and their way led them through a farmyard, when suddenly, with fierce angry bark, a gaunt half-bred sheep-dog barred 38 BROKEN BONDS. their progress. There was small doubt of his evident intent. With gleaming teeth, erect bristles, and fell glittering eyes, he stood growling in their path. " For God's sake stand back, Jennie ! ,r exclaimed Dainty sharply ; " this brute's vicious. Let me talk to him," and he ad- vanced boldly on his adversary. For a second or two the beast seemed undecided, and then flew at his assailant. It all took place so quickly, that Jennie never quite made out what did happen ; but it seemed to her that a ready foot and quick sweep of the butt of a fishing-rod met the dog's charge, and rolled him over. Ere he recovered himself, a kid-gloved hand gripped him by the throat, and the butt of the fish- ing-rod rained down a shower of heavy blows. A few seconds more, and with a well-directed kick to start him, the brute limped howling away. BROKEN BONDS. 39 Nothing much in this, and yet Jennie Holclershed viewed Dainty in quite another light from that moment. If she had thought Frank Ellerton a somewhat effemi- nate coxcomb before, she never held him in that light again. As I have already said, she was by no means in love with him, but she did now both like and esteem him — foundation, I take it, of most love worth the winning. " Going away, that Ellerton lad, is he?" said the Captain. " Well, Jennie, he taught you to fish, there's no denying — that is, as far as this gim-crack fresh-water business goes ; but it must be fiddling work, girl, for one who has pulled up her mackerel off ' The Shambles,' and seen ' The Race ' boil and bubble in its wrath. I don't think much of him myself; I don't hold a chap a man who is so afraid of getting his hands sunburnt." 40 BROKEN BONDS. u If you'd seen him take that brute of a dog by the throat the other night, you'd not say that of him." " Well, well, I don't fancy either him or his dandy ways," growled the Captain. " Why, his impudence ! when I offered to mix him a nor'-wester myself the other day, he replied 'twas seldom he troubled brandy before dinner. He's a milk-and- water sort." Dainty could hardly have passed a greater affront on the bibulous old mariner. It was the refusal of bread and salt in the veteran's eyes. He had deemed himself conferring a mark of signal favour, and, behold ! it was curtly rejected. He had regarded Frank Ellerton with much distaste ever since. " It would be a good deal better if some other people never troubled brandy before dinner," laughed Jennie, emphasizing her remark with a quick little nod. " But come along — supper's ready now." 41 CHAPTER III. MR. LAROOM. pOLF LAROOM, of the well-known -L^ City firm, "Ellerton, Son, & Co.," lived in Manchester Square. The houses in that locality bear a generally dingy and mildewed appearance externally, but there is plenty of comfort connected with the in- terior of some of them. There was probably not a domicile in those parts more luxuri- ously fitted up than the home of Rolf Laroom. A quiet, decorous, steady-going business man was Laroom, in the eyes of most of his associates, rather given to a good dinner, and keenly appreciative of a good 42 BKOKEN BONDS. glass of wine, but still a mid die- aged, re- spectable bachelor, who attended morning service with undeviating punctiliousness, as the Sunday came round, subscribed hand- somely to many charities, dressed decently, and as befitted his age and calling. Bland of manner, and smooth of tongue, Mr. Laroom was a popular man in his circle. See him now, as he sits over his wine, all alone in his cosily-furnished dining-room. A rather portly man of five-and-forty, or thereabouts, dark in complexion, hair some- what thin at the top, large heavy eye, fleshy chin, and full, sensuous mouth. Ah ! what stories these mouths tell to the physiologist ! It is the feature of the face, the one that never lies. People lay great stress on the eye, but nervousness will some- times occasion most erroneous impressions based upon such foundation ; there are eyes, too, that you never see — no possibility of BROKEN BONDS. 43 getting a direct look into them. But the mouth — neither man nor woman can mask that. If it was ever your misfortune to see intelligence of great trouble told to anyone, it was in their lips you read their anguish. Some people there are who have tears always at command, but when you see the lips blanch, writhe, or quiver, then be as- sured that the iron has entered into the soul — that marks the first shivering of the nerves. There are those who cultivate lachrymation as one does languages or music. When the fountains be near the surface, de- pend upon it there is little sincerity or purity in the waters. One would scarce care to be wailed by eyes that moistened as readily at the misfortunes of a blackbird as at our own. Mr. Laroom's mouth told no falsehood. When you see an eminently respectable man, with sensuous lips like these, ostentatiously 44 BROKEN BONDS. proclaiming his charity and righteousness to the world, depend upon it that he is mask- ing, not stifling, the offending Adam — that he has a second history in the background. At all events, Rolf Laroom had. That specious hypocrite was proprietor of a small luxurious villa down by Teddington, of which the world wotted not, and concerning which it will be necessary to make no further allusion. There was need just to mention this fact, in order to arrive at a proper understanding of the mans character; for, as will be seen, he is the prominent motive power in the story I am about to narrate. That a man of this secret sensual disposition requires ever money for the prosecution of his vices is, of course, obvious, when we understand Rolf Laroom's second history. Junior partner in the wealthy firm of Ellerton & Son, to the uninitiated he would appear to be living well within his BROKEN BONDS. 45 income. But take into consideration this other side of his life, and it can be easily imagined that Laroom was a necessitous man. Yet it was not so. Laroom had many more irons in the fire than Ellerton and Son dreamed, and made money in ways they had little idea of. Moreover, the man was calculating even in his pleasures, and if he at times spent money freely, still did so far from recklessly — a quid pro quo invaria- bly governed him upon such occasions, and he would estimate whether the game was worth the candle as deliberately as if em- barking in a fresh speculation. Not a plea- sant disposition this ; moreover, it was a jealous, vindictive, unscrupulous one to boot — keen to take offence, untiring in ani- mosity when provoked, very sensitive to what he deemed a slight put upon him, wincing much at any allusion to his lowly 46 BROKEN BONDS. extraction. He is a Polish Jew by birth, and entered the firm as a clerk — risen from that to the position he now occupied by vir- tue of much talent for business, and the gift of foreign tongues ; a cruel, coarse, sensual brute when you got through the veneer of him. Ellerton and Son consisted in these days simply of Maurice Ellerton (elder brother to that hussar with whom we have already made acquaintance) and this Rolf Laroom. The Ellertons were of good faurily ; the grandfather of the present generation, founder of the house, had been a younger son, and, like most of that fraternity, had discovered upon entering life that it behoved him to find butter for his bread. His allowance might keep him in bread and cheese, but if he had a hankering for baked meats and other luxuries of this life, then it was neces- sary that his own brains should supply the requisite increase of income. He was no BROKEN BONDS. 47 fool, and recognising betimes a fact of which the higher ranks of British society are now thoroughly aware, he decided that money was more quickly attained in business than in what are termed the professions — felt, indeed, no speciality for any of these last, but much capability of money-making, did he once get a start. He succeeded, married also with a tolerable eye for the world's gear, and died leaving a prosperous and lucrative business to his son. He, in his turn, if not gifted quite with his father's aptitude in such matters, also did well ; and when Maurice, on attaining his majority, entered the house as junior partner, Eller- ton and Son was a thriving business. But some three or four years afterwards, the health of Ellerton senior be^an to fail, and he was compelled to Avithdraw gradually from all active participation in the affairs of the firm. 48 BROKEN BONDS. Then it was that Maurice, a naturally indolent man, and with a craving to enjoy some little of the poetry of life, of which, sad to say, there is little in the art of money-getting, essential as its possession is, nevertheless, to due enjoyment of that poetry, chafed at his collar, and by way of obtaining relief cast about for a partner. Rolf Laroom, then one of the senior clerks, attracted his attention by his energy and shrewdness, and so it came about that, seven years before this story commences, Laroom became the junior and working partner in Ellerton and Son. As he grew weaker and weaker, Mr. Ellerton interfered less and less in the busi- ness affairs of the firm, and for the last three years of his life never set foot in the counting-house, leaving matters entirely to the management of Maurice and Mr. Laroom, such papers as his signature was essential to BROKEN BONDS. 49 being brought to him at his private resi- dence. Barely two years back, and death had relieved him of his infirmities, and leav- ing a well-secured jointure to his wife, a comfortable younger son's position to Dainty, and the business to Maurice, Francis Eller- ton was borne to the sepulchre of his fathers. Glance once more at this Laroom, as he sits in that well-curtained, brilliantly-lighted dining-room sipping his Burgundy — strong, vigorous wine, such as men of his tempera- ment love dearly while their constitutions admit of it — one who by innate disposition could never prefer "The lilies and languors of virtue To the raptures and roses of vice." There are men born constitutionally wicked, and this was one. He is looking at a small carte-de-visite — an ordinary shilling photograph — the like- ness of a bright, sunny young face, with a VOL. I. E 50 BROKEN BONDS. great touch of sauciness and petulance in the expression. What may be the complexion that carte says not. The sun, if he be a good portrait- painter, tells us nothing upon that point. Whether the hair be blue-black or golden, whether the eyes are blue as heaven or dusk as night, he leaves to our wild imaginings. But in this case, whether blonde or brunette, you would say the original was a sweet, pretty girl. "Yes," he muttered at length, "our day of reckoning draws near. A little while longer and you will shed salt tears that ever you laughed at Rolf Laroom. The tables are turned, my mistress, and, next time I whisper love to you, you'll deem me no fit butt for a girl's petulant scorn. I shall be spared jeers at my origin then, I fancy, nor have my kiss so fiercely resented. Yes, I would give much to have you on your knees, and to hear you falter forth your consent to BROKEN BONDS. 51 be Rolf Laroom's wife. And that is the price you must pay for my forbearance. Ah ! well, a little longer, and we shall see." And he rose and tossed the photograph into an open despatch-box that stood near at hand. He stood for some moments gazing into the fireplace, then, facing about, thrust his hands into his pockets and continued his meditations. He looks back upon a sum- mer's day, and a bright garden scene full of gay colouring ; the flower-beds all on fire, if one may use the expression, with every hue of the rainbow. A trim, fairy-like figure, with chestnut tresses, and deep blue eyes, dancing with fun, flits before him in light, delicate muslin robe and coquettish straw hat. She always treats him with much courtesy, as the esteemed friend of her guardian. She is young enough to be his daughter — a capricious, saucy, petted child, e 2 *■ * 52 BROKEN BONDS. verging on seventeen ; but she flirts with him in a jesting way, and he contracts such passion for her as his earthy, sensual clay is capable of. It is not his first visit, nor the first time she has flirted with him in light sportive fash- ion — putting a flower in his coat, ordering him about in dainty, authoritative manner ; giving him, with a saucy smile and monitory forefinger, her hat, parasol, or what not, to take care of. The subtle intoxication steals into his veins. We know what views men of this lower organization take of love ; such love as this man was capable of he had con- tracted for his fairy-like guide. She took him to the strawberry-beds, and made him foray therein for her delectation. Then she said he deserved some reward for his la- bours. She selected a very large strawberry from the leaf-full he had gathered for her, and offered to put it into his mouth. He re- BKOKEN BONDS. 53 rnernbered now how his head whirled, and snatching the little hand within his own, he covered it with kisses. A fierce cry of indignation, a short, very short struggle and her hand is extricated, and she regards him with flushed cheeks and flashing eyes. " How dare you !" she cried, drawing her petite figure up to its full height, and ostenta- tiously wiping her hand with her handkerchief. "Dainty's right — one should never trust an underbred one. When one knows a man is not born a gentleman, one should be more cautious. I have committed a great mistake, sir !" But the fierce, sullen blood was surging in his veins ; all his brutal instinct was roused by her scorn. " You have," he cried, "if you think to treat me as a love-sick boy !" And ere she comprehended his intent, he clasped her in 54 BROKEN BONDS. his arms and pressed some half-dozen pas- sionate kisses on her cheeks. When he released her, she stood flushed and shaking literally from head to foot — with fright, as he imagined. He was wrong — it was with anger. Her next movement was sudden as his own had been. " Coward !" she hissed between her little white teeth ; and, gliding like lightning to his side, she smote him with clenched fist in the face with all her force. " There's a receipt for your kisses. I must away home to cleanse my cheeks now." And she sped back to the house. She had struck to some purpose, for his lip was bleeding, and in lieu of every drop that trickled from the wound he im- bibed a fierce drop of rancorous hatred to- wards the girl he professed to love. He swore that she should pay dearly for her scorn, and that he strove hard to keep BKOKEN BONDS. 55 his oath we shall see. Should she ever be at this man's mercy it is like to go hard with her. And she, too, it is scarce probable will forget that afternoon. One of her many- rings is broken, and two of her delicate fingers sorely cut she finds, as, trembling all over with indignation and excitement, she regains her own room. She will not tell her guardian, she thinks, of the insult that has been passed upon her. It might be awkward and troublesome for him. She has a gallant spirit of her own, this child of seventeen, and she fancies, not without warrant, that Rolf Laroom will trouble her no more. She is so far right that he rarely crosses her path afterwards, and then only with distant and respectful bow, which she as distantly and most haughtily acknow- ledges. Such was the love-passage upon which Mr. 56 BROKEN BONDS. Laroom brooded this night so sullenly — not quite one of those golden hours that the most cynical of us can but look regretfully back upon. Men of Laroora's stamp, in- deed, can have few love-dreams to recall with satisfaction. Such earthy passions as they contract are best buried in oblivion. Mr. Laroom, standing with his back to the empty grate, thinks that he is rapidly approaching the fructification of certain schemes that have occupied him these four years past — the date that of his fatuous strawberry-picking, and subsequent loss of command. He smiles as he pictures that delicate little figure kneeling to him, and, while the tears roll down her fresh, fair cheeks, imploring him to save all she loves from ruin. He pictures in his own mind that sweet face, turned up flushed and tear- stained to his own, pleading to him for for- bearance. He sees, with unctuous, vindic- BROKEN BONDS. 57 tive chuckle, the shiver that runs through her frame as he names triumphantly the price at which he will stay his hand. What will she, who so scornfully rejected his kiss once, say then? He sees her cowering in the dust, as she entreats that her eternal gratitude may be his recompence. He pictures her, with a flash of the old spirit, demanding fiercely whether he is base enough to take to wife a hand that has spurned him, a heart that bears no love for him. He conjures up all this scene with intense satisfaction. He has toiled for it, plotted for it, lied for it these four years, and the coarse, sensual lips wreathe with satisfaction at the idea of the vengeance he is about to take upon a girl for her righteous indignation at his unwarranted presumption. But the play is not played out yet, and perhance that final scene Mr. Larooni so glories over is not destined to be enacted. 58 BROKEN BONDS. The original of that photograph may prove of tougher material than he deems her. Quite possible, too, that her friends may scorn to accept safety at such a sacrifice ; that, albeit they know not the hidden side of Mr. Laroom's character, they may have more manhood than to purchase their salva- tion by pressing an unwilling girl to the altar. This view of the case was infinitely above Mr. Laroom's comprehension. He could not call to mind the man, or woman either, that he would hesitate to sacrifice, should his interests require it. 59 CHAPTER IV. THE ORIGINAL OF THE PHOTOGRAPH. T~l TE are proud of our homes, we English. ™ * We are wont, and with some justice, to glorify the Englishman's fireside. It is a pretty, if poetical, idea, that sweet sanctity of the domestic hearth, that even if never achieved is, at all events, believed in by quite four-fifths of the women of England ; and those that do not believe in it, although doubtless most estimable women, with ten- dencies towards the amelioration of their sex, political reform, dress, rouge-et-noir, and interchangeable flirtation (pardon the word, but the kind I mean are really all of 60 BROKEN BONDS. one pattern), are not the fraction that the best wives are won from, be their station what it may. I am afraid this laudation of our Lares and Penates is somewhat overdone. I am cognizant of firesides where they yawn ; I have been a favoured guest at a hearth where they quarrelled continuously ; and there are houses in which, when the head of the family should snore, you are expected to speak with bated breath, or turn your newspaper as if in the reading-room of the Amalgamated Veterans' Club — an institution in which, as we all know, it is treason to make any but bronchial or sternutatory noises. Still there are bright firesides in this England of ours all the same, and very pleasant to look back upon are the hours that we have sauntered through by such. We are about to look in upon as bright a family circle as can be well pictured. Scene of this picture, a handsome, well-furnished BROKEN RONDS. 61 house in Portland Place ; the windows of the drawing-room are open, to admit as much as possible of the warm summer air. On the sofa is seated a handsome elderly lady, who has reckoned at least half a cen- tury. Such a sweet face, too, with a deli- cate bloom on the cheeks even yet, although the hair is shot with silver — soft grey hair, almost as luxuriant as when she stood a blushing bride at the altar, a little more than thirty years ago, and she retains still the figure of her youth. As one looks at the clean-chiselled features and tender blue eyes, one realizes where Dainty Ellerton derived his girlish face and somewhat femi- nine manner. For this is his mother we are looking at, and, like many another younger son, Dainty is still, and has ever been, that mother's darling. One of those sweet, sympathizing faces that are, thank heaven ! not so rare quite as some people 62 BROKEN BONDS. deem them — a woman, if you knew her, to whom you would turn irresistibly in time of trouble — a woman, too, who would have listened to your story with tears standing in her still luminous eyes, and then poured such balm into your bleeding wounds as only women of her type are capable of. Little wonder this woman was adored by her sons. They were but two ; no better men, perchance, than hundreds you will meet with in your journey through life — one of them, indeed, as we shall see, sad to say, infinitely worse. But on one point they did agree — very sacred to them both was the name of mother. No great charge to be preferred against either of them as yet. Dainty, 'twas true, after the manner of hussars, had succeeded in " going " what he termed " a mucker," but his offending was of no greater magni- tude than the falling into that old-established BROKEN BONDS. 63 military error, peculiarly noticeable in the Brigade and Light Cavalry — to wit, " the spending half-a-crown out of sixpence a day." But Maurice Ellerton had come gal- lantly to the rescue. If they made little parade of it, strong were the bonds of love and amity that knit those brothers. Maurice Ellerton lounges in an easy-chair opposite his mother, lazily skimming the leaves of a periodical. He is taller than Dainty, with a frank, honest face, but, to a keen observer, marked with a slight want of decision ; the mouth in particular shows signs of infirmity of purpose. A well-look- ing man, just the wrong side of thirty, neat in his dress, but by no means the dandy that his hussar brother is. The tea is as yet not poured out, and stands upon the table, while from the inner drawing-room rings out a clear, fresh con- 64 BROKEN BONDS. tralto voice, and some of Auber's delicious music floods the room. Mrs. Ellerton drops the embroidery work she is engaged upon, Maurice lets the maga- zine fall unheeded to the floor, and still through the room floats the plaintive melody. A pause, a crash on the keys, and the sweet, but now defiant tones, change into the trum- pet-voiced "Marseillaise." Another crash of the keys, and the singer is warbling the "Land of the Leal," as if her heart was breaking. " Come away, child," cries Mrs. Ellerton, " come away. Do you want to send us to bed with tears in our eyes, and no tea? Rosie, you little democrat, come here and attend to the tea-table." " Ah ! my mother, I know you well. It is requisite to melt you after I have develop- ed my innate Republicanism. I get scolded otherwise." The speaker paused, laughing, in the fold- BROKEN BONDS. 65 ing doors that separated the two rooms. A little fairy-like figure, her head crowned with masses of chestnut air. The prominent traits that first riveted your attention in the fair, saucy face, were the deep-blue liquid eyes and the mutine mouth — original of that photograph that Rolf Laroom had mused so bitterly over. " So you want your tea, mother, do you?" she continued, gliding swiftly to the table. " Why didn't you call me before, and not allow me to go on maundering over what that irreverent Dainty calls my musical box. Ah ! and there's Maurice, too, grown sick of my singing. How rude of you, sir !" she continued, with a little pout, as she busied herself about the tea-cups. " No, Rosie," said Mrs. Ellerton, smiling, " I don't think that is quite the case. Few people enjoy your singing more than we do." VOL. I. F 66 BROKEN BONDS. "Yes, you, mother. You know it's your bounden duty to enjoy what pleases any of us, and so we impose upon you to your im- mense delight to unlimited extent. But Maurice there — how dare you feel bored when I was singing? If I'm snubbed by Dainty, recollect he does it for the family, and I'll submit to it from no one else." Maurice's only reply was a lazy smile, as she handed him his tea, and a quiet " You know I enjoy your singing always, Rosie." " There it is, my mother," laughed the girl, as she seated herself on a low stool at Mrs. Ellerton's feet. " He's one of the ad- vanced thinkers. He's succumbed already to female agitation. He recognizes how clever we are. He'd paraphrase Kingsley's lines to me this minute if he dared. If it wasn't that he is afraid I'd throw lumps of sugar at him, he'd spout solemnly, BROKEN BONDS. 67 ' Women must work, While men they sleep, So an end to political groaning. Thank goodness, my lord," she continued, playfully, we have not quite arrived at that quandary yet. And if you don't come and turn over my music for me to-morrow, I'll sing you no songs." "Very lazy of him, Rosie, was it not?" said Mrs. Ellerton, as she fondled the chest- nut locks now deposited in her lap. "Lazy, mother!" cried the girl, her eyes dancing with mirth ; "it was worse," and as she spoke the riante face assumed an expres- sion of mock solemnity indescribably ludi- crous — " it was demoralizing." " Hold your tongue, you little torment !" cried Maurice, laughing, " or I'll carry you by force to the piano, and make you play the Annen Polka for the next two hours." " That's the tune they came out of the f2 68 BROKEN BONDS. Ark to, isn't it ?" retorted Rosie, nibbling a bit of bread and butter. " You rude old monster, I believe you were there and heard it !" " Send her to bed, mother ; she's getting past bearing to-night," cried Maurice Eller- ton, laughing. " When she nestles into your petticoats in that manner, and you give her, as you are doing this minute, encouraging pats on the head, I have always noticed a bad attack of impudence supervenes." The girl bounded to her feet with a ring- ing laugh. "Wretch!" she exclaimed, "if it wasn't unladylike, mother's presence should not prevent my avenging myself! I should bury my scissors in your shirt-front if I wasn't afraid of the police and dark cells — especially dark cells," she continued, with a little shrug of her shoulders. "We like warmth and sunshine, my mother, do we BROKEN BONDS. 69 not ?" and Rosie suddenly pressed her pout- ing lips on Mrs. Ellerton's cheek. "Yes, little saucebox. Go and sit down. What a tease it is !" But the loving look that followed the girl as she tripped across to the table showed that such teasing was very sweet to her. Although Rosie Fielding calls Mrs. Eller- ton mother, the latter is in reality only her aunt ; still she is the sole mother the girl has ever known. Mrs. Fielding died fifteen months after her marriage, when Rosie was but a few weeks old, and it was to the great, loving heart of his sister-in-law that the bereaved husband confided his infant daugh- ter. She grew up the pet and plaything of Mrs. Ellerton's two sons, and as she ap- proached womanhood, tyrannized over them in her own fitful, arbitrary fashion. But there was a considerable difference in the way they bore it. While Maurice was ever 70 BROKEN BONDS. her slave, and, though some dozen years her senior, always ready to abandon his own occupation to humour her childish caprices, Dainty constantly treated her commands with contemptuous indifference — did, indeed, upon occasion, box her ears sharply for in- terfering with or traversing his boyish machinations. The consequence of this is obvious. The younger brother stood much higher in Miss Fielding's estimation than the elder. She loved them both very dearly, but it was with the delicate distinction that, whereas she loved Maurice in good, honest, sisterly man- ner, her affection for Dainty had a strong cousinly taint in it. There are cousins and cousins — those that hate and those that love ; but the cousinly sentiment, as we all know, is always liable to ripen into something warmer. I don't mean to say that it had at present — nothing of the sort. Rosie herself BROKEN BONDS. 71 could not have explained how it was that she regarded them with dissimilar affection, and yet she was dimly conscious that she did do so. She would probably have replied, could you have questioned her upon the subject, " Well, you see, they are different, and I suppose that's the reason I don't quite love them both in the same way." When Rosie was about ten years old, Mr. Fielding also crossed the "Lonesome Bridge, which, with its golden gates, spans the River of Moaning," and followed his beloved wife to the "land of the leal." Rosie was left a very considerable heiress, and Maurice Ellerton and his father were named as her trustees. Ellerton senior has now been dead two years, and Maurice consequently is left sole trustee of Rose Fielding's fortune. This is enough, for the present, to enable the reader to understand Miss Fielding's position in the Ellerton family. 72 BROKEN BONDS. Suddenly a sharp, authoritative rattle of the knocker causes the inmates of the drawing-room to lift their heads in mute astonishment. A light, quick foot on the stairs follows the opening of the door, and Rosie has barely time to ejaculate, "Why, it's Dainty, I do believe !" ere that young gentleman presents himself. The mother's delicate cheeks flush, and her eyes glisten, as that scapegrace dragoon stoops down and kisses her. She loves her eldest son passing well, and very dear to her is Rosie, but the whole wealth of her deep, loving heart has been reserved for that youngest son, and he knows it. Albeit he is not much given to sentiment, and far from demonstrative in a general way, yet Dainty always makes much of his mother. He nods pleasantly to his brother, shakes hands with Rosie, and then exclaims, BROKEN BONDS. 73 " I am awful hungry, and have told Benson to send a tray up here with what- ever they can scramble up quick. Shocking desecration of your drawing-room, mother, but I can't eat dowmstairs by myself, and am not going to bother you all to come down." "Nonsense, Dainty," replied Mrs. Eller- ton ; " I must go and see about something for you." " You must do nothing of the kind. It isn't manners, you know, to run away di- rectly I come to see you. If Benson don't appease my unholy appetite in some shape, it is possible there may be a coroner's in- quest on Benson. Don't fidget, mother, I shall get plenty to eat." " Quite right to have it up here," laughed Rosie, with a saucy toss of her little head. " We might not have taken ' the bother ' to come down, you know." 74 BROKEN BONDS. " You would. Such a chance of some one to chatter to you'd never have missed." " I don't know about health, mother, but we ought to congratulate him on the stock of impertinence he has laid in at the sea-side. A most unnecessary addition, surely, to what he had on hand." Mrs. Ellerton only smiled. She was too well used to the badinage habitual between those two to pay much attention to it. Besides, here the tray made its appearance, and was it not necessary to see that Dainty was fed ? That nonchalant dragoon seemed to require a considerable amount of atten- tion, requesting his mother to pour out his wine for him, and perform other small offices during his repast. But Dainty was no novice in making much of his mother, and knew she wouldn't have been half satis- fied unless he had exacted a good deal at her hands. BROKEN BONDS. 75 Miss Fielding understood this also perfect- ly, and was especially careful never to jest on such occasions, otherwise Frank Ellerton had not been spared a laughing commentary on his laziness ; but Rosie was blessed with a quick perception and honest womanly sympathies, and, with all her love of fun, wouldn't have interfered between those two for the world. "Did you tell them to get your room ready, Frank?" inquired Maurice, as Dainty's meal came to an end. " No, old fellow, because I'm sorry to say I don't want it. I'm off again by the eleven- thirty train. Leave's up, and I've promised to ride a horse for Tom Corrance in the Bibury Stakes. Greatest brute out, I'm told, but they don't get rid of me very often, and,, one consolation, I fall very light when they do." 76 BKOKEN BONDS. " I wish you wouldn't ride races," said Mrs. Ellerton. " Pooh ! mother, this is only on the flat. I can't be more than kicked off, and that never does injury, except to one's personal vanity." " Well, I hope, Dainty, it won't take place in front of the stand, at all events," said Miss Fielding. " Ah ! we'll have a bet/Rosie, if you like. You owe me half-a-dozen pair of gloves, remember." " What a dun you are ! No one but you would have dared remind "me of such a trivial circumstance." " Gloves, like oysters, ma belle cousine, are getting rapidly unattainable, except by those whose purses know no bottom. We hand-to-mouth livers can no longer afford to let moneyed young women like you escape their liabilities." BROKEN BONDS. 77 "Well, I'll pay. But what's our bet to be?" "A dozen pair of gloves that I'm not kicked off." "You!" replied Rose, with a most con- temptuous moue — " as if that were likely ! Besides, do you think," she continued, with a winning smile, " that I should like to get gloves out of you in that fashion ? Don't you know I should be as mortified as your- self?" " Well, yes ; I don't think you'd care to see me come to grief, Rosie. We'll back the mount for a fiver between us — will that do?" " Yes — that's a deal better ; and don't come near me if you don't win, because I shall know you are only on dunning intent," retorted Miss Fielding, gaily. "Well, now, I must be off. God bless you, mother !" exclaimed Dainty, as he 78 BROKEN BONDS. * clasped her in his arms ; and with a warm pressure of his hand to his brother and cousin, Frank Ellerton took his departure. 79 CHAPTER V. WITH A BROGUE IN IT. "TF ever a man should be wooing in ear- -*- nest, and wish to test the progress of his suit, let him be assured that a short ab- sence will stand him in good stead. It should be just long enough to enable the object of his homage to miss him sorely, without extending to such length as to teach her once more to do without him. If her face don't tell him what he would fain know on his return, he is either a bad physiogno- mist, or can prepare himself for extended travel without delay. 80 BROKEN BONDS. Jennie Holdershed, though nothing more than a little piqued at Dainty's indifference about their parting in the first instance, now thinks of him more than is judicious for a maiden who would still keep fancy free. Trout-fishing, certainly, is not half the sport it used to be a fortnight back, and there are a certain pair of somewhat stained kid gloves, which she had laughingly confiscated to her own use one afternoon, that Jennie seems to take great care of — in no hurry to wear them out, apparently, albeit they do not fit her shapely hand so very badly, for Dainty's extremities are quite of a feminine type. Her basket, too, is by no means so well filled as heretofore. It is not likely. She had not only enjoyed the benefit of his experience as to what fly to use, but his rod had always contributed liberally to the stor- ing of her creel. Still Jennie continues to fish ; it amuses her a good deal, if not quite BROKEN BONDS. 81 so entertaining as it used to be, and, thanks to Dainty's instructions, she is now a very fair proficient in the art. One fine afternoon, Jennie, pursuing her favourite diversion, arrived at a bend in the stream where a tiny promontory jutted out, covered with a clump of alders. She seated herself, for she felt a little tired, and gazed dreamily on the stream. Her tall, well- rounded, symmetrical figure made a pretty picture as, throwing off her hat, she leant back on the soft turf, with her head upon her hand. She had been there some ten minutes, when her attention was aroused by a man s voice the other side of the alders, lamenting his ill-luck in tones half petulant, half humorous. " Faith, and it's gone ye are now !" he soliloquized, in most racy Irish brogue ; " and if ye were but my own property, it's mighty little I'd fret about that same. It's VOL. t. G 82 BROKEN BONDS. the first time ever I came trout-fishing, and, by my sowl, I think it'll be the last ; and Dainty Ellerton, the impostor, he swore it was great diversion ! I'd like to see what he'd, think of it this minute, if he were in my shoes. 7 ' Jennie, her curiosity thoroughly excited, sprang quickly to her feet and made her way round the little alder-clump. Standing on the bank, with the butt of a fishing-rod in his hand, and gazing ruefully at the top joint, which was floating in the stream, was a tall, athletic young fellow, some twenty years or so of age. He rejoiced in hair which even the mother who bore him must have admitted to be red; a pair of light grey eyes, which twinkled with fun and high spirits; mouth large, and furnished with strong white teeth ; a frank, good-humoured face, though most decidedly not a handsome one. BROKEN BONDS. 83 "Well," he continued, "I suppose I'm bound to go in. Old Sherringham would be in a pretty taking about the loss of the rod. One comfort, wet clothes '11 be pleasanter, maybe, than dry ones to sit in this weather. Here goes." " I'm afraid you've got into difficulties," said Jennie, with a merry smile. Since he had mentioned Dainty's name, she felt irresistibly impelled to address this man. The discomfited fisherman turned quickly as her voice met his ear, gazed at her for a moment with unmistakeable admiration, then, raising his hat, replied, with all the gallantry and readiness of his country- men, " 'Deed, I thought so a moment ago ; but difficulties always vanish when such bright eyes as yours condescend to take an interest in their being overcome." The perfectly natural, respectful manner g2 84 BROKEN BONDS. in which the compliment was paid prevent- ed its bein^ the least offensive. "What's the matter?" inquired Jennie. " Ah ! then, it's the first time ever I tried fly-fishing, an' I've whipped and whipped, an' never rose a fish the day ; an' at last I thought I'd try a long cast, and, by the powers, I've hooked the opposite bank, I fancy ! Troth !" he continued, with a gay smile, "it's a blessing, ye know, to hook something, anyway." " It won't be very good to land," laughed Jennie; "and I don't see howl can help you." " Oh ! yes, you can," replied the fisher- man ; " ye can stand on the bank while I go in about it. Sure, ye can scream murther if I look in danger of drowning." " I don't think you run much danger," retorted the girl, gaily. " Faith, an' I'm much of the same way of BROKEN BONDS. 85 thinking, or I'd perhaps not be so bould. But it 'd be a blessing," he continued, as his eyes twinkled, " to have some one to screech directions about one's burying to, you know, av the stream proves deceptive. I'll leave you my watch and hat to take care of; and, faith, if I was making a regular will, and leaving ye sole legatee, ye'd not come into much more." With this he dashed into the stream, and, though he got wet considerably above his waist, succeeded in rescuing his rod, though at the cost of his flies, which were inex- tricably entangled amongst the weeds. " Thanks," he said, as he regained the bank. " Mighty ungallant of me not to have stayed there for good," he continued, laughing and pointing to the stream. " It's being ill-mannered enough to dispute the legacy, isn't it ? Had it been but a little 86 BROKEN BONDS. bigger, I'd never have ventured to be so rude as to come out." Jennie was immensely amused at her new acquaintance. His perfectly frank, unem- barrassed manner attracted the girl greatly. " I don't know where you are going," she said; "but I live in the village just above here, and if you would like to dry your wet clothes a little, and take a glass of brandy- and-water after your bath, my uncle, I know, will be glad to see you." Bibulous old gentleman, little doubt of that. Anyone in search of " nor'- westers "he invariably took an interest in. "You really are very kind," said the young man, with a courteous bow. " An' if ye'll allow me, I'll trespass on your hospi- tality. I ought to tell you who I am. My name's Weaver. I belong to the regiment quartered at Portland ; an' the divils — och, BROKEN BONDS. 87 I beg pardon, it's rne brother officers I mane — usually call me Tim." Mr. Weaver's brogue always became very pronounced when he got excited, but though it never quite left him, there were occasions when it became almost imper- ceptible. " Well," replied Jennie, making desperate efforts to suppress her laughter, "we shall be very glad to help you in your necessities, Mr. Weaver." But the quick Irishman perceived her amusement at once, and, purposely exagger- ating his natural accent, exclaimed, "Is it the length of the diminutive amuses ye ? Bedad, the crathurs are that lazy they'd make it shorter av they only knew how." " Excuse me," suddenly returned the girl, " but I was an involuntary confidante of your remarks on your difficulties by th 88 BROKEN BONDS. river. You mentioned Mr. Ellerton's name. Do you know him ?" " Know him ! Faith, I've known Dainty since I was the height of a walking-stick. I know him and all his people well. They're very kind to me whenever I happen to be in London. Not that that's often, for it's very few pounds I ever have to spare, and, as a rule, I stick pretty close to the regi- ment." This speech was very characteristic of Mr. Tim Weaver. That lighthearted Irishman never made the slightest concealment of his affairs to the world. He would confide his loves, embarrassments, &c, not only to the mess, but to any stranger that he might be thrown in contact with. And the perfect naivete with which he did it was irresisti- bly ludicrous. It was almost impossible to upset his imperturbable good-humour, and he would join in the laugh against him- BROKEN BONDS. 39 self with inconceivable gusto. Still he had once given evidence in his corps that it was possible to rouse him, and shown such a perfect recklessness of consequences upon that occasion, that nobody had ever ques- tioned since but that, far as the laugh might be carried against Tim Weaver, there was a limit it would be dangerous to pass. Most schoolboys in their earlier days idealize some boy of superior standing in the school to themselves, and elect him their hero. The delusion may sometimes not last long, at others it often extends over years, nay, even a lifetime. Now this was exactly Tim Weavers case. He had been originally, as a very small boy, at Lasterton with Dainty, who at that time had attained the dignity of " the fifth." Some distant cousin- ship existed between them, I believe. At all events, Dainty had been besought to throw the segis of his protection over the red- 90 BROKEM BONDS. haired little Irish boy. Dainty, stepping down from the Olympus-like slopes of "the fifth," to take care of him, which he did in curt, haughty fashion, seemed, to the im- aginative Irish child, like direct interference of the gods in his behalf. Dainty was al- ways kind to him, and, in return, warm- hearted, hot-blooded Tim almost worshipped his protector. This hero-worship had continued ever since. What was there Dainty couldn't do ? Who could ride like him, shoot like him, swim like him ? Who was so clever as Frank Ellerton ? Tim him self, par par en- these, was not a very trustworthy authority on this point. In short, in Mr. Weaver's eyes Dainty was not only a beaa sabreur, but an Admirable Crichton to boot. He believed thoroughly and implicitly that there was nothing beyond Dainty's capabili- ties, and he gauged all his acquaintance by BROKEN BONDS. 91 this ideal standard that he had erected for himself. Now, when a girl has conceived in her breast such germ of love for a man as to like him, esteem him, and think a little about him in his absence, no higher forcing power can be applied to such germ than to meet one who already idealizes the being she is unconsciously preparing to worship. Jennie Holdershed could hardly have picked up an acquaintance more likely to nourish this as yet embryo love of hers. The seed was sown, though she was a long way off acknowledging it as yet. She is of a type that by no means part with their hearts lightly; but when they do, it is aye for ever. Whatever may be their destiny — and they often marry, and make good wives, too — they never love twice. Ah, well ! you think such things cannot be — that there is no romance left in this material world of 92 BROKEN BONDS. ours. You mistake ; there is plenty of ro- mance still, when you once penetrate this veneer of civilization we so much affect. But we must refrain from further specu- lation on such psychological phenomena, and leave Jennie to take care of her own heart for the present. Ten minutes' time, and these fishers have arrived at the Upway cottage, and are genially welcomed by Captain Holdershed, who informs them that the Channel Fleet has put into Portland Roads. People not enjoying the advantage of that telescope of the Captain's said that one sloop of war had passed the entrance of the breakwater ; but then, what reliance could be placed upon men who didn't own a glass at all, and were not gifted with a nautical eye to look through it, even if they did? The Captain welcomed Mr. Weaver cor- dially, his cordiality increasing upon learn- BROKEN BONDS. 93 ing that Mr. Weaver was wet, and would have no objection to a "nor'-wester." The Captain betook himself very seriously to the composition of this specific for the benefit of his new and damp acquaintance, and with that consideration that marks true polite- ness, mixed himself another to keep his guest in countenance ; compounded them, too, of unusual strength, on the principle that Mr. Weaver, having been well watered externally, required less in, and that it was beneath his dignity as a host to drink milder fluids than the stranger within his gates — an idea this last ever uppermost in the Cap- tain's mind — part, we may say, of the code of honour of that bibulous mariner. Al- though Mr. Weaver was young, he had graduated in whiskey-toddy in his own country. If you have mastered the alpha- bet of that in " the west," it will take a good deal of the Saxon's brandy and water 94 BROKEN BONDS. to trouble you. The Captain was charmed at the ease and affability with which his guest disposed of the tumbler he had com- pounded for his delectation. " I like you, sir — you're a good fellow. Your clothes ain't half dried yet. Stop and have some supper with us. Jennie, tell that" (great redundancy of language here) " never-to-be-forgiven fool to broil an extra rasher, or something or another." The young man hesitated ; but Jennie interfering with a bright smile and quick little nod of endorsement, he replied, u Faith, Captain, to say no to a good offer is against all canons of polite society, more especially when one meets a gentle- man with such an illigant turn for the mix- ing of the spirits as yourself." That supper was a very cheery meal. The Captain was delighted with his new acquaintance, and Jennie much amused BROKEN BONDS. 95 with his good-humoured naivete; while, as for Mr. Weaver, he possessed that happy- knack of incorporating himself with what- ever society he might be thrown into, which must always be regarded as one of the most desirable attributes vouchsafed to man. Nothing ever upset Mr. Weaver's Irish self- possession ; whether conversing with coun- try girl or countess, he would have plea- santly confided his personal history and hopes to their ears ; nor would it ever have occurred to him to doubt that they could be otherwise than interested in his narrative. Plenty of humour and quick perception all the same in this wild Irish lad, and though not what is called ready of fence, yet his droll remarks often turned the tables on his assailants. " Ha ! ha !" laughed the Captain, in an- swer to some joke of Mr. Weaver's. " Good again, sir — good again. This is a lad of the 96 BROKEN BONDS. right sort, Jennie — very different from that kid-gloved, dandified swab that you took up with a while back." And the Captain's face, between liberal libations and merriment, glowed through the smoke-wreaths that sur- rounded it like a tropical sun. " Here's ' May we ne'er want a friend nor a bottle to give him.' Old buffers like me substitute that for ' Sweethearts and wives,' Mr. Weaver, on Saturday nights." " Ugh ! you ould havthen !" retorted the Ensign, " what'd you be missing out the women for in that way, the darlints ? It's mighty mane I'd think of the capacity of a man that couldn't drink the two of those toasts one evening in the week. Faith, as the song says, ' ye'd never do for Galway.' " " Wouldn't I?" roared the Captain— " tumbler for tumbler with any man in the country ! BROKEN BONDS. 97 ' As I sailed from the Downs in the Nancy, My jib ! how she smacked through the breeze ! She's a vessel as tight to my fancy As ever sailed on the salt seas.' D'ye sing, Mr. What's-your-name ? That grog-renouncing fellow, Jennie, could tune up, to give the devil his due." " Uncle, you had better stop throwing hard words at Mr. Ellerton. It so happens that he is a friend of Mr. Weaver's." " Is it Dainty Ellerton? Troth, Captain, an divil a greater friend I have in the world than Dainty. Faith, he's been pull- ing me out of the fire all my life !" " He's a white-livered milk-sop — that's what he is !" retorted the Captain, sullenly. " Hould your tongue, ye ould oraadhaun!" exclaimed the excited Irishman. " Tear an' ages, that I should live to hear Dainty called white-livered ! Listen to me, thin — indeed, I beg pardon, Miss Holdershed, but your uncle's talking nonsense." VOL. I. H 98 BROKEN BONDS. " Never mind apologizing, Mr. Weaver," replied Jennie, smiling. " He dislikes Mr. Ellerton, and abuses him with neither rhyme nor reason." a Listen to me, thin, the two of ye, and judge whether Dainty's got the soft dhrop in him. It's a good many years ago now when I was first chucked head and crop, a mere bit of a gossoon, into a public school. I don't think I ever was of a whimpering sort, but to a boy fresh from home the life there comes a bit hard at first, if he's the ill luck to fall into the hands of a bully. Ye may laugh, Miss Jennie, looking at the big baste I am now, but I couldn't take care of myself in those days. Well, the head of my house was a big fellow called Hawkins, and he just made my life a misery to me. Faith, the blackguard had a talent for bully- ing, and exercised it freely. Well, Dainty, I knew, had been asked to look after me BROKEN BONDS. 99 a bit ; and at times he would stop me and ask how I got on, and I always said pretty well, for you see I couldn't go sneaking and whining to him, and tell him what a miser- able little beggar I was in reality. How- ever, one day he came across me howling me little wretched heart out. You see Hawkins had thrashed me within an inch of my life that afternoon, and a slip of a boy as I was then couldn't help yelping. Dainty stopped and asked me all about it. I didn't like to tell him at first, but he soon got it all out of me. He didn't say much, but told me to meet him at the back of the Fives Court as soon as afternoon school was over. When I got there I found Hawkins, Dainty, and a lot more fellows of the upper school ; and then they told me there was going to be a fight ; that Dainty had told Hawkins, before all the Fifth, that he was a cowardly, skulking bully ; and that then h2 100 BROKEN BONDS. Hawkins had challenged him. Troth, I mind the thing well yet. Dainty called out to me before he stripped, and said, 'Now, young un, look after my things. I'm going to settle this matter for you.' They didn't look a match, for Hawkins was a deal the biggest of the two, an' I know I felt awful sorry; both for meself and Dainty. I thought he'd be licked, ye see, and bedad if he was I knew how I'd catch it. Well, Miss Jennie," continued Tim, turning to the girl, who he could but see listened with great interest to his narrative, " to cut a long story short, they fought for three quarters of an hour — an' a bigger fight was never seen at the back of the Fives Court. If Hawkins was the biggest and strongest, Dainty was a deal the most active, and quickest with his hands. It was a hard fight, but towards the finish Hawkins's weight and strength began to tell, and Dainty was being gradually worn down. Still, BROKEN BONDS. 101 knocked about, and growing weak as he was, he wouldn't give in. I suppose he'd have been beat, but some of the sixth inter- fered and stopped it. I can hear Dainty now, as, slowly putting his coat on, he turned round to his antagonist, and said, ' Recollect, Hawkins, whenever you lift a finger to young Weaver, you'll have to fight this over again, if it's six days a week.' What d'ye say now, Captain Holdershed?" cried the Irishman, triumphantly. " Say, sir, " replied that ever- thirsty mariner, with extreme presence of mind. " Say, sir," he repeated, solemnly, " I say that we must drink his health." Even Jennie, albeit she thought it was getting high time to interfere with the " nor'- westers," could not but assent to this toast. She had listened with sparkling eyes to Tim Weaver's story, so confirmatory as it was of her own estimate of Dainty Ellerton. 102 BROKEN BONDS. "Here's Mr. Ellerton's health!" And then the Captain, much given to snatches of Dibdin in his mirthful moments, trolled out — " 'Twas in the good ship Rover I sailed the world around, And for three years and over I ne'er touched British ground. At length in England landed, I left the roaring main, Found relations stranded, And went to sea again." The Captain had never been known to sing a song through, but when pleased he was continually breaking out into fragments of Dibdin, and sometimes under very mat apropos circumstances. " Mr. Ellerton's a trump ! — you're a trump ! — we're all trumps ! We'll just have one more glass, 'cos we're all trumps." And the veteran looked genially around him. "No, no!" cried Jennie, as she dexter- BROKEN BONDS. 103 ously captured the brandy-bottle ; " you ve had quite enough to-night, uncle. And I'm sure," she continued, meaningly, " Mr. Weaver must think it high time to be on his road to Portland." " 'Deed, and ye're right, Miss Jennie," replied the ensign. " Faix, it's curious how time slips away when the company's pleas- ant ! Good night to ye, Captain. Good night," he continued, turning to the girl. " Maybe ye'd not mind giving me a lesson in the fly-fishing some day ?" " Whenever you like," replied the girl, extending her hand, frankly. "We shall be always glad to see you." " Good night again, and thanks for your kindness, past, present, and to come," laughed the Irishman, as he vanished into the soft summer night. Jenny, sleeking her dusky tresses pre- 104 BROKEN BONDS. paratory to going to bed, meditates a good deal upon this school-boy story of Dainty Ellerton's heroism. 105 CHAPTER VI. SYMPTOMS OF TROUBLE. T\ AINTY ELLERTON is riding a series -*-^ of most indifferent mounts at the Bibury Club meeting this pleasant June afternoon, nor troubling his mind, shameful to narrate, one iota about his fair fellow- sportsman at Up way. Dainty says, laugh- ingly, that it has seldom fallen to the lot of a gentleman rider to have so many oppor- tunities of losing money, by yielding to the temptation of taking the long odds so hand- somely proffered against oneself, as have been his this day. But Dainty has hurt 106 BROKEN BONDS. himself little in that wise. He is now smoking a cigar on the steps of the Bibury Club Stand, and listening with placid indif- ference to a friend who, having purchased a daily paper, is reading out an account of the commotion caused by the sudden sus- pension of Clinch, Grant, and Chillingham. Dainty feels but little interest in the reverses that have befallen Clinch, Grant, and Chil- lingham. He meditates more upon how disappointed Rosie will be that he couldn't get that kicking brute of Corrance's nearer than second, and so failed to land that sixty pounds to five that he, in accordance with agreement, had ventured between them. If Dainty could but see into his brother's pri- vate room in King William Street, he would perhaps view the misfortunes of Clinch, Grant, and Chillingham with considerably more sympathy. Maurice Ellerton sits at his desk, his head BKOKEN BONDS. 107 buried in his hands. Occasionally he raises a pallid face, bearing testimony to his agony — his despair. He has locked himself in, so that no man may witness his humiliation. For weeks he has been haunted by a dread of this ; now the crash has come, and he literally cowers under the blow. It is not for himself — it is for the ruin in which he has involved those nearest and dearest to him. In this moment of supreme agony he can no longer juggle with himself; he knows that what he has steadfastly denied for the last year is true — that Rose Fielding is dearer to him than life — that he loves with all the fierce passion of a man in his prime, the love of whom, compared with that of youth, is as fiery burgundy to sparkling champagne. Even now, with ruin yawning all around him — black abysses gaping on every side, of a profundity and density only to be mea- 108 BROKEN BONDS. sured by the poor stricken mortal they con- cern — even now he loses all consciousness of aught else, and becomes involved in dreamy speculation as to whether she will ever love him. Even that mother, so loved, so revered, and to whom all this means the negation of the home, the luxuries, and the life that she has been accustomed to — even she for a moment fades from out of the tortured mans thoughts. He can think of nothing but how a pair of dancing blue eyes will look upon his folly — what a pair of laughing lips will have to say to his crime. His love has never been told — little likely to be told now, unless it escape him in a wild frenzied shriek of despair. What has he to do with love — a man who, in a few days' time, will call forth scalding tears from all that are dear to him — the mocking laughter of the world he mixes in ? Were it but fair commercial bankruptcy, then Maurice Eller- BROKEN BONDS. 109 ton could have looked things in the face, his head lowered, it may be, but not bowed to the dust, as now. He had dared ask sympathy from his mother and Rosie under such circumstances, but now the halo of his disgrace must surround them too. He pon- ders over all these things in dull, dreamy fashion — thinks, even, of the blow it will be to that dandy hussar brother who thinks so much of him. Then he meditates whether it were not best to fly from all this disgrace while it is yet time. To do him justice, he is thinking far more of sparing the feelings of those he loves than of the consequences likely to accrue to himself when all becomes known. But shame upon him involves shame upon them. Should he go, while opportunity is yet vouchsafed him ? A sharp tap at the door breaks the thread 110 BROKEN BONDS. of his musings. He rises, opens it, and ad- mits Rolf Laroom. " A devil of a business this, Ellerton !" exclaims the latter. " The sooner we talk it over the better." " Sit down," replied Maurice, with a ghastly smile. "We can talk it over, if you choose ; but I presume even you can suggest nothing to save us." Mr. Laroom hesitated for a few moments. " I could name a dozen ways of pulling through, had it been anyone else ; but Clinch, Grant, and Chillingham hold those mortgages, you know." Maurice nodded. " Difficult now, you see," continued Laroom slowly, and speaking with great deliberation, " to recover those without putting down a large sum of money — more, by a good deal, than we can lay hands on, eh ? And yet, if we don't recover them, I BROKEN BONDS. Ill « fear, my dear Ellerton, you might be accused of breach of trust." " No need for your accursed recapitulation of how I stand," retorted Maurice fiercely. " Do you see any way out of it?" "Not just yet," replied Laroom. u But, bless you ! don't despair. I have seen worse scrapes than this weathered in the City in my time. Let me think a bit." There was silence between them. Maurice sat with his head once more buried in his hands, gazing down a vista of unutterable woe — picturing the wrecked lives of all those he held dearest, the shivering of all love for him in this world. Drearier future, perhaps, it were scarce possible for a man to look upon. Mr. Laroom, with vindictive, malicious eyes, sat watching his abased, un- conscious partner. Rolf Laroom, with his jealous, vengeful temperament, had discovered Maurice's 112 BROKEN BONDS. secret love for Rosie long before Maurice had admitted it to himself, and fell into the error of deeming it recognized and returned. To a man who could so cherish resentment of a girl's scorn, at what even he could but allow was a great impertinence, it may be easily imagined that to his perverted imagination this seemed but another wrong that required to be atoned for. At all events, Laroom regarded it in that light. He had made up his mind to wed Rosie Fielding, and all obstacles in his path to that end he intended should be removed, with slight scruple regarding the means to be employed therein. Not a man likely to be delicate about such means — capable, indeed, of resorting to anything that might serve his turn, as long as it lay within the limits of the law. At this present moment he looks upon the game as in his own hands. He considers BROKEN BONDS. 113 that lie alone can save Maurice Ellerton from exposure ; that he might perhaps even save the tottering firm of Ellerton & Co., and would be glad indeed to do so, should he succeed in driving the bargain he desires. " Well ?" suddenly exclaimed Maurice, hoarsely, as he raised his head. " Don't be impatient, my dear Ellerton," returned his partner, suavely. " I am afraid there is no doubt if everything tumbles to pieces, and all is dragged to the light of day, that the public, taking into their coarse minds to call a spade a spade, may possibly accuse you and your late lamented father of having made away with your charming ward's property. Of course, under those circum- stances," continued Mr. Laroom, delicately placing the tips of his fingers together, and leaning back in his chair, as if it really was no particular business of his, " the first thing VOL. I. I 114 BROKEN BONDS. to consider is how we can prevent every- thing* tumbling to pieces." "Go on," said Maurice, tersely. " Pray be cool. Please to remember that, if I am not concerned in that more unplea- sant contingency, yet I also am involved in the break up of Ellerton & Son." If he was, to judge by his easy, placid demeanour, he was either well insured with the underwriters, or had little cargo left aboard of that sore-beset argosy. " I suppose you have some scheme to put before one, when you are tired of hearing yourself talk," replied his auditor, hoarsely. "No, indeed, not much to-day," re- turned Laroom. "The prevention of things tumbling to pieces, as far as my experience goes, is simply a question of money. True, we don't know exactly where to lay our hands upon it at this minute, but it will be my business, between this (this being Tuesday) BROKEN BONDS. 115 and Thursday, to ascertain what we can raise, and what we require — more especially what will bring those mortgage deeds back into our own hands." Maurice's face flushed with excitement as, springing to his feet, he exclaimed, "By Jove, Laroom, you have saved me! We shall tide over it yet !" U I don't know, Ellerton," "replied the other, slowly. "The money is not raised yet, and you may not like the price you will have to pay for it when it is. Don't be too sanguine, is quite as good a motto as nil desperandum" And so saying, Rolf Laroom softly rubbed his hands, and regarded his partner from be- neath his half-closed eyelids. " Yes, I know," retorted Maurice, a little nervously. " But you are so clever, I know you will manage to hit off something between this and Thursday." i2 116 BROKEN BONDS. " Well, I hope so, or else Ellerton & Son will be numbered among things gone to decay. But it's no use giving in till the cards are played out ; throwing down one's hand is always a sign of weak intellect, how- ever things may look against one. There is always the forlorn hope that the adversary may revoke or commit similar misdemean- our. I'd see it out, if I were you." And as he concluded, Rolf Laroom stealthily eyed his companion with exceeding in- terest. " Pooh ! of course I shall," replied Mau- rice, quickly. " What could make you think otherwise ? But I can be of no more use here to-day," he continued, putting on his hat; "and, as this business has un- hinged me a good deal, I shall go quietly home." M Certainly ; but recollect you must be here on Thursday. Your assent will, at all BROKEN BONDS. 117 events, be necessary to what I may have to pat before you." " Of course," said Maurice, pausing to button his glove. " But I know you will succeed. I've great faith in your luck, La- room. Good-bye." Rolf Laroom nodded in reply, and in- dulged in a low laugh as the door closed behind Ellerton. " Yes, you do right to have faith in my luck," he muttered ; "but luck to me, Mau- rice Ellerton, may be by no means luck to you. This failure of Clinch & Co. brings the goal I have been aiming at these four years considerably nearer — in short, it is arrived at." He rose and lounged across to Maurice's desk. His eye fell upon an open Brad- shaw. "As I thought — studying obscure routes to the Continent," he said, musingly. " I 118 BROKEN BONDS. fancied he might meditate flight. But, Maurice Ellerton, that won't suit my book at present. You must hear my proposition first, at all events ; and if you reject it — well, T don't think you will find going abroad quite practicable. Nous verrons." And with this Mr. Laroom also sallied forth, in pursuance of certain tortuous schemes of which we shall speedily see the upshot. Maurice, meanwhile, with the feelings of a man whose sentence is temporarily sus- pended, strides away towards his home. He breathes again, and once more thinks that this great cloud of shame is to be arrested in its descent — may, indeed, never descend and overwhelm him. Miserable delusion ! as if the storms our follies and vices have gathered are not ever predestined to burst upon our uncovered heads ! " A lie," cries Carlyle, " must be taken up and expiated by somebody. If the BROKEN BONDS. 119 issuer escapes punishment, some one of the endorsers must suffer." It were greater justice that he who gave that lie to the world should bear the consequences. But, in commercial lies, alas ! the atonement has ofttimes to be made by the innocent. Mau- rice Ellerton has launched his lie, and most assuredly somebody will be the worse for it. It is in no very jubilant frame of mind that he rings at the door of his own house. Although no longer the despairing man of two hours ago, yet he wonders vaguely whether this day month that house will hail him master. A slight shiver runs through him at the thought of his mother and Rosie bowed down with shame in obscure lodgings, the locality undefinable to his mind, but, above all, obscure. He even hesitates at the umbrella-stand — noticing such trifling things as men with ruin staring 120 BROKEN BONDS. them iii the face are wont to do — and won- ders whether there will be one in that new home of theirs — wonders a^ain where he shall be, whether abroad or in prison. He has ascended the stairs and entered the drawing-room by this time, but finds it empty. Restlessly he paces up and down. He had jumped so rapidly to faith in Laroom at the office, that faith begins to fail him now. True, his subtle partner is clever ; but is this a knot possible to unravel ? A light step behind him, a light hand on his shoulder, and he turns abruptly round upon his mother. " Come and sit down, Maurice," she says softly, " and have a cup of tea with me. You are worried, my boy, and look — oh ! so fagged and tired ! I'm not going to pester you with questions — you know I never do. There, get into that chair, and I'll ring for the tea-cups and saucers, and BROKEN BONDS. 121 you can tell me as much or as little as you like of your annoyances." He sank into the chair she indicated, her every sentence stinging him. Yet a few days, and her heart might be well-nigh breaking for his sin. She busied herself for a few minutes about the tea-service ; then, seating herself beside him, stole her hand into his, and said, "Throw your business cares off till to- morrow, Maurice, and think what news you've brought home for the mother ; you know what a gossip she is, and surely you've something to amuse her with/' But Maurice's sole reply to his mother's little speech was a weary, loving smile. " Ah, well ! never mind. If you're too tired to talk, sit back and sleep," replied Mrs. Ellerton, as she passed her hand caress- ingly through his hair. Small chance of that, though, for sudden- 122 BROKEN BONDS. ly, like a gleam of sunshine, enters the bright little torment of that household, waving a telegraphic dispatch over her head. " Ah !" she exclaimed, pausing at the threshold, and shaking the paper she held in her hand, in mock minatory fashion at Mrs. Ellerton, " I thought so. Yes, there you are, mother, petting that lazy hope of the house, and never thinking of your poor younger children, who are ruined. Ruined, I said, mother ; I don't want to harrow up your feelings unnecessarily, but Dainty and I are lost past redemption ;" and with that Miss Fielding threw herself into a chair, and declared that nothing but an immediate cup of tea could prevent her from "going off." "What is it?" asked Mrs. Ellerton, smiling. " The workhouse — that's what it is," re- BROKEN BONDS. 123 plied Rosie, demurely. " Never mind Mau- rice, mother ; it is I who require all your sympathy and attention." " What is it, child?" " Oh, dear ! read. I'm sure I haven't the heart to tell you ;" and so saying, Rosie tossed the telegram across to her aunt. u Beaten half a length. The brute did run honest, but 1 could not get home. Clean broke in gloves, are we not ?" " Serve you right, you little gambler !" laughed Mrs. Ellerton. "You'll have to economise now, and go about in mittens." " In what ?" exclaimed Rosie, sitting bolt upright, and staring at her aunt in pretended amazement. " Mittens." " What ! knitted things without fingers — things that are never worn, except by vine- gary old cats !" cried Rosie, springing to 124 BKOKEN BONDS. her feet. " No, Mrs. Ellerton, never ! Ring the bell for a cab — I prefer the workhouse." Pleasant to listen to this jesting about ruin to a man who knew it had all but come — who saw it gaping fathomless, un- bridgeable, before his eyes. And now Rosie has glided to his side, and leans her hand in loving sisterly caress on his shoul- der. " What is it, Maurice ?" she asks—" what makes you look so sad ?" And once more has Mrs. Ellerton stolen her hand into her son's, and fondles it in mute sympathy. Is it to be wondered that Maurice Ellerton, conscious of the wrong he has wrought these women, suffers torture inconceivable? Every loving word, every caress that they employ to wean him from his dark thoughts, is but an additional arrow planted in his soul. Small cause of surprise to us, to whom the writhing nerves lie bare. BROKEN BONDS. 125 He can sustain such agony no longer, and, brusquely pleading a severe headache, he escapes to his own room. 126 CHAPTER VII. MAURICE ELLERTOn's WALK. "1 /TAURICE ELLERTON next morning ■*■"-*■ would have fain gone out from his home unseen, unnoticed. Little likely that was possible, with his mother's loving, watch- ful eyes, all open to the fact that her first- born was in sore trouble. She was down betimes; although she constantly let him breakfast alone, and depart for the City without seeing her, she glided gently into the dining-room this day almost as he sat down. She received his kiss quietly, and made no attempt to draw from him what it BROKEN BONDS. 127 was that so weighed upon his spirit, but the sweet solicitude with which she hovered over him during the meal showed how she would fain share his burden if she might. Rare was Mrs. Ellerton's tact and tender- ness with those she loved. She never har- assed them with question or obtrusive sym- pathy in their hours of darkness. She only fluttered softly around them, in a gentle fashion altogether her own. Little conversation passed between mother and son, but Maurice understood perfectly what Mrs. Ellerton's presence meant this morning. He could not repress an inward shiver, as she said, " Must you go to work to-day ? You look scarcely fit for it." "Nonsense, mother; I'm well enough. Add to which there is a good bit of business on hand just now. Even if I was ill, which I am not, I should have to put my shoulder 128 BROKEN BONDS. to the wheel for the next week or two." " You know best, Maurice," she replied, softly, " but I would it were otherwise. I know a few days rest would be good for you." " Rest !" he thought to himself, bitterly. " Shall I ever know it again ? Even if we tide over this difficulty, ray crime will be but hidden, not buried — liable to be dragged to the light of day at any time." At last he is in the street, and walks me- chanically cityward. Walks rapidly, too, after his wont ; but ere he reaches Temple Bar he reflects that it is useless his going there to-day. Laroom had said that it would be Thursday before his plans for their extrication could be completed — quite possible that the case, indeed, might prove beyond his powers of cooking, although, as Maurice well knew, they were considerable. Truth to tell, Rolf Laroom had much to say BROKEN BONDS. 129 to Maurice Ellerton's present position. He it was who, some time back, when the firm was first suffering under pressure, had sug- gested the borrowing of money on Miss Fielding's property. Of course they could pay it off again as soon as things came a little round. But it was not likely the affairs of Ellerton & Co. would come round when the virtual manager of the firm was a man bent on the ruin of his partner, to serve his own ends. Rosie's estate became like a milch cow to the tottering mercantile house. A mortgage on that was their re- source in all cases of emergency. Cases of emergency waxed frequent, and at the pres- ent moment Miss Fielding s property is mortgaged to its full value. Clinch, Grant, and Chillingham are the holders of those deeds, and their creditors are now demanding their money in shrill, clamorous chorus. Foreclosure of those deeds is imminent, should VOL. i. k 130 BROKEN BONDS. such clairus not be promptly complied with. Foreclosure in this instance simply means the publishing to the world that the whole of Miss Fielding's property has been fraudu- lently made away with by her trustees — to wit, Francis Ellerton, her uncle, now de- ceased, and Maurice Ellerton, her cousin, still alive to expiate that breach of trust as the laws of his country have de- creed. Maurice turns and retraces his steps. He walks rapidly westward now. He has no particular destination, is scarce conscious, indeed, in what direction his footsteps drift. Man has a tendency to drown reflection in such cases by violent exercise. But if " black care " sits behind the horseman, how is the mere pedestrian to get away from him ? Though your capabilities be of the highest, yet shall you fail to walk away BROKEN BONDS. 131 from that gnawing at the entrails which men call remorse. Maurice Ellertons crime at this time hardly presents itself to his mind in its true turpitude. Our sense of moral rectitude is speedily numbed when the straight path is once departed from ; and Maurice at present meditates only on the consequences of his offence. He is thinking not so much about what those consequences may be to himself; it is the anguish it will occasion to those so dear to him that fills his soul. If the blow could fall upon him alone, he had been content to make such atonement as the law might exact; but when he thought of his mother and Rosie, with heads bowed to the ground by the shame they must be partici- pators in — when he thought of proud, fas- tidious Dainty, scarce able to look his brother- officers in the face, by reason of the reproach that would attach to his name, Maurice k2 132 BROKEN BONDS. Ellerton tasted the first bitter fruits of the seed he had sown. He wanders on up Oxford Street, down Bayswater way, wondering at times whether he carries his guilt legible in his face. A policeman has a strange fascination for him. He meditates when he passes one, as to whether that is the man destined to arrest him. Shall he be at large this day week ? — and where will they take him first ? He pictures to himself the preliminary examina- tion before a police magistrate ; how his friends, he thinks, will flock to hear that. And then, God! he fancies his mother reading it in the evening paper. The blood surges to his temples, his head swims at the thought ; he grinds his teeth savagely and impotently. To what end? He is com- passed in the toils his own hand has wrought ! And men do take such walks, and think BROKEN BONDS. 133 such thoughts, even when their offending has been infinitely less than Maurice Eller- ton's. Has reckless gambling or reckless extravagance never led to similar reflection ? Ruined man for the most part wrecks some luckless woman in the fulfilment of that destiny he has carved out for himself. Again and again does Maurice Ellerton ask himself the question, how is this blow to be averted from those he holds dear? And ever and again rings back in his ear the stern response — the innocent usually suffer with the guilty. When men, from lust of gold, indolence, or want of principle, bring themselves to shame, they bring their people also thereto. "Well," he mutters, "it's possible, after all, Laroom may manage to pull us through. He is clever, full of resources, and by no means despondent. But then," he reflected, with a dreary shudder, " it can be only for 134 BROKEN BONDS. the time ; it will be a respite, not a re- prieve." He turns into Kensington Gardens by the gravel-pits, still wandering indefinitely, still engaged in the pursuit of the unattainable — the escape from his own thoughts. No, crossing the sea nor journeyings into foreign lands do not rescue us from that Nemesis of memory that attends upon our misdeeds. We bear it about with us, like the fabled Hebrew, unless, indeed, our conscience and better self get sodden with perpetual iniquity. You may so saturate the soul with vice that it shall lose all sense of that better and brighter existence it was born to — be con- scious of nothing but an instinctive thirst to gratify its own selfish appetites at all costs — have neither feeling of love, regret, nor remorse left to it. In uneducated natures this is, of course, common ; in cultivated man or woman one of the saddest sights this BROKEN BONDS. 135 sua looks down upon — final wreck of a human being who has been taught to think. As he passes the fountains, a chubby-faced urchin of four or five years old, in hot pur- suit of another, trips and falls heavily on the gravelled walk. Maurice, ever good- natured and kindly to children, picks him up, and endeavours to soothe him ; but, absorbed in his own woes, and frightened at the stranger, the boy refuses to be pacified, and screams tumultuously for his nurse. Maurice resigns his charge on her approach, and continues his walk ; but even this slight incident wrings his tortured mind. He is rather fond of and wont to be popular with the little people, and as he wends his weary way onwards, he mutters bitterly to himself, "The very children can see my sin written in my face I" Mechanically he turns into Hyde Park ; 136 BROKEN BONDS. he is scarce conscious of where he is going, or he would never have walked up Rotten Row in his present mood. The meeting with acquaintances is the last thing he would consider desirable, and though Maurice Ellerton is not very often seen there in the morning, yet he is tolerably well-known to society when he does put in an appearance. More than one fair head bends to him from the Ride ; many a nod is bestowed upon him as he presses onward with quick, regu- lar stride, in search of that unattainable goal he shall never get sight of in this world. Such greetings as his pre-occupied mind is conscious of he returns curtly, but many a bow and nod escapes his notice. Still, no- body stops him ; there is that in his face, set and absorbed as it is, that makes his acquaintance instinctively refrain from pull- ing him up. " Likely to get short answer," think some. " Looks as if he had lost a BROKEN BONDS. 137 pot of money," muse some observant young men, to whom that calamity is constantly accruing. " Looks as if committed to run- ning away with some woman with whom he didn't want to," remarks Mrs. Skendle Lynks to the last juvenile victim of her full- blown fascinations. But perfectly oblivious of the gaily-dressed throng, Maurice Eller- ton holds on his way. He has nearly reached Hyde Park Corner, when a lounger on the rails confronts him, and Maurice finds his path barred by his hussar brother. " Bless my soul !" ejaculates Dainty — " why, what has brought a working bee like yourself so far from the hive this summer's morning? To think of finding you, old fellow, disporting yourself among the drones and butterflies ! But what's the row ? — you look all out of sorts." " I am," returned Maurice. " Business 138 BROKSN BONDS. bothers, which it is needless to explain. I thought a walk might do me good, and have been for a stretch all round Kensington Gardens. Come and give me some lunch at the ' Rag ' — I feel I want it, Dainty." "With all my heart," replied Frank Ellerton, as he linked his arm within his brothers, and led the way to that great military caravansary. When they were comfortably seated at one of those small tables beneath the por- trait of Mistress Eleanor Gwynne, with the marble-framed looking-glass of that royal concubine flashing the faint sunlight which permeates that apartment down upon their repast, Dainty had more leisure to study his brothers face. He saw at once, as he gazed upon the haggard features, that it was in- deed sore trouble that beset him. Maurice, too, habitually most abstemious in the mat- ter of wine, demanded champagne, and filled BROKEN BONDS. 139 and emptied his glass with ominous celerity. Noting all these things, Dainty felt assured that his brother had come more or less to grief — a business crash of some kind, he presumed. u Look here, Dainty," exclaimed the elder brother, in a thick, unnatural voice at last, " we have been sworn allies hitherto — brothers in heart, not only in name. Is it not so ?" " Indeed it is, old fellow. You stood to me like a trump when I had to pay the consequences of my youthful indiscretions. If you hadn't pulled me through, Maurice, God knows where I might have been now ! I shouldn't have been in the dear old corps, that's certain." " Well, when I tell you I fear I'm on the verge of similar trouble," responded the elder brother, slowly, and filling his glass 140 BROKEN BONDS. once more to the brim as be spoke, "I know I can depend upon you." Dainty looked very grave, and his reply came measured and low. " Every stick I have is yours, Maurice, if you choose. I am afraid it's not very much, but we'll realize the commission, chargers, and what is left of my younger son's portion. Should it but stop the gap I'm satisfied." His brother gave a faint smile as he stretched his hand across the table ; and, as the pair exchanged a warm clasp of the hand, he said, " True as steel, Dainty — I knew it ; but it's nothing of that kind I want of you. If the wreck is to come, the leak will be be- yond your stopping. But I've more to ask of you than that. Don't you understand me?" Dainty paused for a few minutes, and then gravely answered, " No." BKOKEN BONDS. 141 There was silence between them for a little. Frank Ellerton watched his brother's countenance keenly, and could not but recognize the troubled workings of the mind therein. It was long ere Maurice spoke again. At last came the hoarse whisper, " Who's to tell our mother?" "What! is that all?" cried Dainty, cheerily. " Pooh ! as if the darling mum would break her heart as long as you, Rosie, and I were safe and sound. Confound it, Maurice, you ought to know her better. You and I may feel bitterly that she may have to forego luxuries she has been accustomed to ; but she ! — why, she'd laugh over bread and cheese, and insist upon it she preferred the rind in times of scarcity. No, no, old fellow, don't you fancy the mother can't take a facer." And Dainty gave his brother a bright, re-assuring smile. But Maurice had no answering smile to 142 BROKEN BONDS. give back. He knew — God help him ! — that he was telling but a small half of the truth. He knew as well as Dainty that those two women he so loved would face ruin honestly come by as bravely as need be ; could hold their heads high, and confront the world gallantly enough in such case. No weak, maudlin, hysterical women were they, but honest, true-hearted ones, who could share courageously the troubles of those they loved, and without moan for the disaster that had overwhelmed them. But disgrace ! that was another matter. The haughtier the heads the lower they are bowed on such occasions, and none knew better than Maurice what proud, sensitive women were his mother and cousin. " Well," he said, at last, " I'm not quite myself, Dainty. Things are going badly with us, I don't deny, but it may be that I magnify our difficulties. At all events, La- BROKEN BONDS. 143 room takes a much less despondent view of the situation than myself," "Of course he does," said Dainty, sen- tentiously. " You're hipped, out of sorts — liver out of order, probably. Take a run away somewhere, and leave Laroom to fight the battle out." " Nice advice that, from a soldier," replied his brother. " Take leave of absence in the midst of the fray. Oh ! Dainty, you to counsel me that !" "No," replied the hussar, with much con- fusion, " of course I don't mean that. You're bound to stand to your guns for the present, but get change, Maurice, as soon as the crisis is over, whether it end in victory or defeat." " Yes, I think I shall," replied the elder brother, slowly, as he rose, and again emptied his glass. " Good-bye. Don't for- get, Dainty, you'll have to stand by me in 144 BROKEN BONDS. the way I told you, if it comes to the worst. Tis you must break it to them at home." "Depend upon me, and depend upon them. If I never have to break worse news to them than that, it's little I'll mind," replied Frank Ellerton. " Good-bye." Dainty stood watching his brother from the club steps, as he walked rapidly away eastwards. "I'm afraid, poor old fellow, he's gone a mucker. I never saw him pitch into champagne in that way before at luncheon. But, after all, the mother's got her jointure, Rosie's a young woman of large property, and there's sure to be something saved out of the smash. It can't be half so bad as he pictures it to himself." And thus musing, he lit a cigarette, and commenced smoking with very tolerable satisfaction. 145 CHAPTER VIII. USURIOUS INTEREST. fTlHERE are men — God help them ! — edu- -*■ cated men, in good positions — ay, moving in the best society — to whom all that is brightest and best in this world is a sealed book — to whom a fine poem, picture, or other work of art, is no more than its marketable value — who gauge all such pro- ductions as merely a good investment, and who yet, notably in the matter of pictures, accumulate most valuable collections — men who get demonstrative only at cunning entrees or rare wines — whose idea of theatri- cal entertainment is limited to pretty faces vol. r. l 146 BROKEN BONDS. and liberal display of those charms that puritanical views hold indecorous. Very rife indeed these worshippers of " Our Lady of Pain " at this present. Rolf Laroom was one of these men — earthiest of the earthy; but a man who bought plenty of pictures, old plate, old carving, old books, old china, and other articles of virtu as the year went round. He bought such things as mere speculations. To him they might have been calicoes, nut- megs, or other cargo ; he bought for a rise, as he would have invested in any other promising-looking stock. But he was a shrewd man, and purchased under sound advice. He had made much money in this wise, and he had not invested that money in Ellerton & Company. Mr. Laroom, too, had speculated both daringly and successfully in many other ways besides these. Such ventures he kept BROKEN BONDS. 147 entirely to himself, and they had nothing to do with the firm in which he was really managing partner. That firm Rolf Laroom had deliberately consigned to destruction, unless Rose Fielding should choose to ran- som it. The failure of Ellerton & Co. would be a mere mercantile fiction as far as he was concerned. He had plenty of money invested in other names and in other coun- tries with which to re-commence his career, that bankruptcy once got finished with. That bankruptcy is now imminent, and it rests entirely with Rolf Laroom whether it shall take place or not. That gentleman has gone closely into the affairs of the house in the last eight and forty hours, and has arrived at the conclusion that, between his own private resources and what assistance he can command in other places, Ellerton & Son are to be placed firmly on their feet again. He is perfectly aware that, if it l2 148 BROKEN BONDS. was his interest to manage instead of mis- manage the affairs of the firm, it is a sound, and easily to be made a thriving, business. He has counted up the costs on either side. He is willing to sacrifice some money, not so much, either, as will even- tually be seen, for the attainment of his object — a goal so steadily kept in view these years past — the hand of that petulant child who scorned his love, who struck and taunted him that summer afternoon four seasons ago. A curious mixture, this passion of his, bearing about equal proportions of love and hate. Coarse, sensual love for the girl's delicate beauty is blended with a fierce de- sire to stand to her in the light of lord and master. Laroom's conception of both love and matrimony is purely Asiatic. He holds aMahomedan's creed on such points; and a man of his vindictive temperament is likely BROKEN BONDS. 149 to exact a heavy reckoning for the blow that childish hand had dealt in its righteous wrath. Better Rose Fielding should lie cold and still in her grave than find her third finger circled by a ring of this man's welding. Mr. Laroom sits in his private room in King William Street, this Thursday morning, awaiting the coming of his chief. He is leisurely counting up the tricks in his hand, and looks upon the game as good as won. " Of course he loves her — I know that ; but what can come of his love when he is convicted of fraud, breach of trust, &c. ?" mutters the junior partner. " I should pre* sume a man would sacrifice a lot of love to avoid conviction of felony. Then she — how can she say me nay when her cousin's good name — ay, even his liberty — her own for- tune, and the fortunes of all she holds dear- est, depend upon her answering in the 150 BROKEN BONDS. affirmative. Bah ! it is very simple. If Maurice Ellerton cannot, in his own interests, overawe any scruples she may entertain to start with — ma foi /" continued Laroom, with a shrug of his shoulders, " he richly merits transportation, or what other reward it is that embezzlement meets with in these islands." Mr. Larooni's views of domestic polity were decidedly Eastern and autocratic. "Well," he mused on the other hand, " if she dares to treat my advances with the contumely she once did — ah ! we stand on a very different footing now, my little lady. Yes," he continued, as his face lowered into a heavy, malignant scowl, " I'll place your lover in the felon's dock, ma mie 1 and I'll make you and yours paupers in the land. You shall know silks and laces no more, but slop through the streets in draggled draperies. Ah ! this other side of the pic- BROKEN BONDS. 151 ture has its charms too. When I think of proud, haughty Mrs. Ellerton, who never deigned to treat me with more than distant politeness, in lodgings at Kentish Town, or some such locality, I fancy she will deem that she had done better to have welcomed Rolf Laroom more cordially to her roof." Laroom's animosity to Mrs. Ellerton is perfectly unfounded. It proceeds from a cause common enough. Of lowly birth and doubtful credentials, he regards society ever with a jealous, scrutinizing eye. He ima- gines slights, conjures up insults, is on the qui vive for word or look of disparagement regarding himself. The man is cursed with enormous personal vanity, and conceives himself neglected, or treated with studied disdain, when he is not made much of; sensitive even then to the most trifling word or action that may jar against his inordinate self-esteem. There are plenty of people 152 BROKEN BONDS. mixing in good society, with most undeni- able credentials as regards birth and posi- tion, who voluntarily clothe themselves in this garment of Nessus, and take upon themselves purgatorial pains in consequence. Mrs. Ellerton had never fancied Mr. Laroom. Her brave, true, honest woman's heart instinctively shrank from the coarser clay of which he was composed ; but as a friend of her son's she had ever treated him with courtesy and consideration. Because she had not descended to tickle this man's vanity, he would exult in seeing her reduced from affluence to poverty. It is well to be careful how you admit these earth-worms within your gates. It is seldom that, as in Laroom's case, they have power to sting, but their capability of spit- ting venom concerning you is always exist- ent. A good deal of evil-speaking, lying, and slandering is done by these vain, mor- BROKEN BONDS. 153 bid people in the course of a twelvemonth. It had been Laroom who, in the early- difficulties of Ellerton & Co., had insidi- ously suggested the raising a mortgage upon Miss Fielding's property. Blandly, gently, hesitatingly as he had insinuated it in the first instance, yet had he been perfectly prepared for the indignant rejection with which Maurice Ellerton met his proposition. But the money had to be raised — where could they obtain it so easily ? What harm could it do Miss Fielding ? It would be all paid back in a few months ; they would be then through their difficulties, and Miss Fielding not a whit the worse for the assist- ance she had unwittingly afforded them. Were she old enough, indeed, to properly understand the case, would she not be only too glad to come to the assistance of those who had brought her up — loved and cher- ished her from childhood ? Old Mr. Eller- 154 BROKEN BONDS. ton, in his weakness and senility, would sign anything Maurice put before him — indeed, did daily — trusting implicitly to his son. " Non vi, seel scepe cadenclo" quoth the Latin Grammar, does it not? — freely trans- lated by the schoolmasters of a past genera- tion, "Not by extreme violence, but by per- petual moderate flogging, or i dropping into' — is the classical dictum best inculcated to youth." We know something about the power of friction in these days of railroads ! and that the iron that will neither bend nor break, may be worn through in an incon- ceivably short space of time. The friction of Laroom proved too much for Maurice Ellerton, and in a luckless moment of des- peration, the first mortgage of Rose Field- ing's property was signed and negotiated by her trustees. But mercantile firms, like private individuals, once gotten into difficult- ies, are apt to remain there. Of course BROKEN BONDS. 155 there are exceptions, but looking round upon one's individual acquaintance, we can only come to the conclusion that those of our friends whom we have once ascertain- ed to be in that somewhat melancholy plight, are there yet, and likely to die in such circumstances. True, it don't seem to affect them much, though ever and anon come crises in their lives. Ellerton & Co. were not destined to prove an exception. The Rubicon was crossed, the first step, that only one, the pro- verb tells us, that costs anything, was taken, and from thenceforth, as I said before, Rose Fielding's property became the milch-cow of that tottering firm. If you could analyse the feelings of a professor of petty larceny, I presume you would discover that all feel- ing of compunction ceased after the success- ful abstraction of the first pocket-handker- chief. The higher educated the man is, the 156 BROKEN BONDS. better his position in this world, the longer I imagine would he be conscience-stricken at the iniquities he is committing. You see he has so much more to lose, to take a pure- ly philosophical view of the case. Putting morality entirely upon one side, Mortimer Rumbold, the great city financier, and Jem Spraggs the costermonger, are not suffering quite in the same proportion, when finally atoning for their flagitious practices. Do not mistake me, and imagine for one moment I do not think it right and just it should be so. As his opportunities were so much greater in this world, so much less is there to be urged in extenuation of his fall. I only wish to point out that the lash of the law must sting the educated man more sharply than it does him who, bred in the kennel, drank in felony at his mother's breast, and has taken to criminal practices from his youth upward. BROKEN BONDS. 157 Mr. Laroom has made one slight error in his calculation. His jealous instinct has enabled him to discover Maurice's love for Kose Fielding, but he makes a mistake, as we know, when he deems him an accepted and favoured lover. At last a clerk glides in and says Mr. Ellerton wishes to see him. " Now for it," he mutters. " I expect him to wince ; probably he'll not give in to-day, but of course he must eventually," and with this reflection, Laroom rose and obeyed the summons. " How are you ?" said Maurice, as he rose and shook hands. " Sit down there at once, and then tell me what you've done. Have you discovered a life-buoy ?" He spoke in nervous hurried manner, and the forced laugh with which he concluded jarred painfully on the ear. Not an inflex- ion of the voice, not a quiver of the mouth, 158 BROKEN BONDS. was lost upon Laroom. It was in strong contrast to the nervous excitable tones of his chief that his steady deliberate response was made. "You are over-sanguine, Ellerton. Scrapes like these are not settled quite so easily as an undergraduate's debts by a rich uncle." " But you have done something ? " ex- claimed Maurice. " No, indeed ; but I have ascertained to some extent what it is possible to do. These people, Clinch, Grant, and Chillingly, hold mortgages on Miss Fielding's property to the amount of fifty thousand pounds. That fifty thousand pounds, the most urgent thing you have to deal with," — and Mr. Laroom em- phasized the pronoun strongly — "can be procured on certain terms. Not hard terms either, I should say, but still you may hesi- tate to subscribe to them. Another twenty thousand would see us fairly through the BROKEN BONDS. 159 crisis. That also is, I think, to be procured, but requires a little further seeking for. I have not yet had time sufficient to devote to it." Maurice Ellerton gave a great gasp of relief. There was salvation for the present, at all events. He clutched like a drowning man at this raft of safety, so vaguely held out to him. " Who is it that is to find us this money?" he said at length. " And what are we to pay for it ?" " I intend to find the money," replied Laroom; "that is, upon certain condi- tions." " You ?" exclaimed Maurice, in unfeigned amazement. " Even III have had many other irons in the fire, besides my share in Ellerton & Co. these last six years. I have prospered fairly, and though it won't leave me much 160 BROKEN BONDS. behind, yet I can find this fifty thousand pounds." Maurice looked almost incredulously at the speaker. Had this capital been acquired at the expense of the firm ? He had right, he thought, to question the possession of so much money in the hands of one who some half-a-dozen years ago was but a clerk in their employ ? No, his right was forfeited. "Who was he now, to complain of fraudulent practices ? "And you are willing to advance this sum ?" he muttered, at length. " Yes, providing you give me the security I require." " Confound it, man," muttered Maurice, impatiently, " who should know what se- curity we can offer better than yourself?" "True; but suppose that I had discovered some further security, of which you have never taken note. How then?" inquired BROKEN BONDS. 161 Laroom, with his dark eyes fixed keenly on his companion's face. " I'd say you were a clever man. Take it and welcome," replied Maurice, " so you but see those infernal mortgages settled." " You mean what you say ? There is to be no reservation between us. If I find that fifty thousand pounds, I may claim the best security Ellerton & Co. can yield me for my money ?" " Of course : certainly," replied Maurice, nervously. He was beginning to feel a little afraid of his partner. " Good. Then don't be annoyed if you find it something that may a little surprise you. If I advance that money, my security shall be Miss Fielding's hand." And Laroom leant quietly back in his chair. "How do you mean? I don't under- stand you," replied Maurice, with a some- what puzzled expression. He thought VOL. I. M 162 BROKEN BONDS. vaguely that Laroom aimed at something under Miss Fielding's own hand — deed, document, or what not. That he was pro- posing to marry Rosie never for one instant crossed his mind. Laroom winced as if cut with a whip. To a man of his jealous, morbid temper, nothing could have come so terribly home as Maurice Ellerton's utter want of compre- hension of his meaning. His eyes gleamed for an instant with all the ferocity that lay latent in his nature. For a few seconds he felt that he could infinitely prefer that his offer should be rejected. It was rough abasement of the man's inordinate self- esteem — what they could not even imagine — his wishing to wed among them, these haughty merchant princes. That he could be guilty of such presumption, surpassed their understanding. Well, let them look to it. Rose Fielding's hand, or he would BROKEN BONDS. 163 sweep Ellerton & Son away, like the house of cards that, but for him, they in reality were. He mastered his passion with a mighty effort, gulped down the fierce tor- rent of invective that rose to his lips. Had he not learnt early the advantages of self- control, Rolf Laroora had never attained his present position. Then, in a voice that still shook a little from the violence of the storm that raged within him, he said quietly, " Miss Fielding's hand in marriage is the price that I demand for my assistance in this matter." " What !" exclaimed Maurice Ellerton, in the tones of a man who still doubted whether he heard aright — " you want to marry Rose Fielding?" " Yes," returned the other, curtly, be- tween his teeth, yet further stung by Mau- rice's somewhat contemptuously accentuated interrogatory. m 2 164 BROKEN BONDS. " And have you any reason to suppose, may I ask," rejoined Maurice, his temples flushing, and speaking in those icy tones so well understood by society, " that Miss Fielding would accede to your request?" " Miss Fielding, I presume, will consult the interests of those she holds dearest to her upon this occasion," replied Laroom, still manfully mastering the wrath within him. " It is no new story ; girls marry every day to prop up their falling families." Every vein in Maurice Ellerton's body tingled at his partner's cool, cynical speech. He was by no means cognizant of the coarse, sensual, vindictive nature of the man he had to deal with ; but the idea of his adored Rosie handed over in mere mercantile fash- ion to such a man as Laroom, made his pulses beat tumultuously. When two clouds, heavily charged with electricity, come into collision, thunder, BROKEN" BONDS. 165 lightning, and other wild ravages are usual- ly the result. Two human beings, similarly impregnated, are wont also to discharge their petty lightnings and destructive ten- dencies on such occasions. More hopeful opportunity for angry, passionate storm, re- solving itself, after the manner of humanity into fierce, malignant determination to do its worst possible to its neighbour, can be scarcely conceived than this present situa- tion. " But," said Maurice at length, in very measured tones, determined, if he can, to stifle the whirlwind within him, " what can be your object in wishing to marry Miss Fielding ?" Very stately indeed Maurice, as he puts this question, and emphasizing the " Miss " in manner unmistakeable. " You want to know why I wish to marry Rose Fielding?" replied Laroom, with most 166 BROKEN BONDS. deliberate intention, and laying a slight in- flection on the Christian name. " I will tell you, somewhat curious that it has not already occurred to a business man, like yourself," and his lip curled in some slight derision. Well it might. Had Maurice Ellerton ever been a business man, he had never have stood in such grievous situation as he now does. As it is, he awaits Laroom's further speech with intense interest. " I intend to be brief," continued the lat- ter, " and therefore will not dilate upon the lady's charms or my own passion. But you must surely see that, if I wed Rose Field- ing, in a few months more those estates are mine in right of my wife. I shall be simply paying off mortgages on my own property. I get the land for my money. Virtually, I am only changing my investment. I wish to be candid with you. When Miss Field- ing, being my wife, obtains her majority, BROKEN BONDS. 167 Ellerton & Co. will owe me fifty thousand pounds for taking up these mortgages. Now half of that money I must raise, and that the firm shall, at its convenience, refund to me ; as regards my own moneys, we will consider that debt cancelled, in consideration of the property I shall acquire with my in- tended bride." Maurice listened passively and attentively, and, when the speaker had finished, he thoroughly grasped the audacity of his scheme ; then Maurice Ellerton's blood once more surged furiously through his veins. Deep-laid, indeed, had been Laroom's calcu- lation. 11 Ellerton & Son," he replied, bitterly, " can have no words to express their thanks. You propose to find twenty-five thousand pounds yourself, to assist in raising twenty-five thousand more, and the price of this assistance is to be the hand of a high- 168 BROKEN BONDS. bred beautiful girl, and landed estates worth close on eighteen hundred a year ! In the annals of usury I don t think I ever met with anything more iniquitous ! To speak roughly, and leaving the lady out of the question, you demand at least seventy thou- sand pounds within the twelvemonth for the loan of twenty-five, and your assistance to raise a further twenty-five. Do you think, Mr. Laroom, I am mad to buy money at this price ?" " I think you will be mad if you don't," replied the other, drily. " Allow me to call your attention to two points that seem to have escaped you. The unpleasantness of appearing in the felon's dock, in the first place; and, secondly, that this usurious profit is not to be paid by you." "Good God! sir, and do you think that I would sacrifice Rose Fielding's interests to save myself?" cried Maurice, vehemently. BEOKEN BONDS. 169 A sardonic smile wreathed Laroom's lips as he replied, slowly, " What a man has once done it is but fair to conclude he may do again. You have not shown yourself so sensitive concerning Miss Fielding's interests in the past." " Good heavens, no !" cried Maurice, as, sinking into a chair, he buried his face in his hands, and almost cowered in his self- abasement. In his fierce excitement the fact had, for the moment, escaped him. What right had he to attack Laroom ? He, at all events, proposed to give something for the plunder he wished to obtain ; but he, Maurice Ellerton, had abstracted all this money without giving any consideration for its use whatever. He shrinks conscience- stricken at the great wrong he has done this girl, whose interests are entrusted to his charge. She, too, whom he would have sooner died than bring sorrow upon ! At 170 BROKEN BONDS. what sacrifice of himself would he not make her reparation, were that possible ! And now suddenly comes before his mind the picture of Rose Fielding as this man's wife — this man who makes no scruple of trading on his knowledge of another's crime to obtain his end^ ; who proposes to purchase his wife and her belongings as a good and lucrative investment, and expects that he, Maurice Ellerton, will aid and abet him in such a sacrilege, for the saving of his own miserable self! No! let Ellerton & Son perish ! — let all who are nearest and dearest to him go down in that shipwreck, midst all the agony and tears his shame must bring upon them ; better all that than that his bright saucy Rosie should be the bride of such a man as Laroom. The latter sits silently watching, trying to fathom his companion's thoughts. u My game to wait," thinks Mr. Laroom. " That last re- BROKEN BONDS. 171 mark must have been very hard to swallow, will take some time to digest ; we will see what comes of it." Suddenly Maurice raised his head. Very white his face now, and his lips tremble as he speaks. " And do you suppose, sir — have you any grounds for supposing that Miss Fielding would assent to such a proposal on your part ?" " Most assuredly. Miss Fielding will pro- bably understand, when you explain it to her, how much her interests are involved in entertaining my proposition favourably. My experience of women teaches me that they are pretty keenly alive to such points." His experience ! Yes, such women as had smiled upon Laroom's love, if that be the right name for it, were doubtless very much alive to their own interests. " But supposing," continued Maurice, with 172 BROKEN BONDS. forced calmness, speaking indeed through his set teeth almost, " Miss Fielding should think fit to decline the honour of your hand?" "Then I should imagine, in your very peculiar position, you will be at no loss for arguments with which to make her recon- sider her decision," sneered Laroom. "And do you dare to presume, sir, that I would use my influence, or counsel her to give her hand to a low-bred hound like yourself?" exclaimed Maurice, with blazing eyes, and all control utterly lost. " Pooh ! don't talk heroics to me," retort- ed Laroom, brutally. " You made no bones about negotiating her property. It is little use having a fit of spasmodic virtue about negotiating the sale of the girl herself. Pshaw !" he continued, rising, " there have been love passages between us before this. Don't think to impose " BROKEN BONDS. 173 What more he might have said is for ever gulfed in the stream of Time, for at this' juncture a walking switch, that lay upon the table in dangerous proximity to Mau- rice's fingers, fell with all the force Ellerton could master across his cheek. " Liar !" thundered Maurice, literally trembling with passion. For a second Laroom was half blinded by the blow ; then he sprang like a tiger at his assailant's throat. They closed ; a short, fell, fierce struggle, in which not a word was spoken, no sound but the labouringbreath and the trampling of their feet ; and then, as Mau- rice uttered a furious execration, Laroom, with a heavy crash, came to the ground. " I've half a mind to trample the miser- able life out of you !" said Maurice, in hoarse savage tones, such as men use when they tremble on the verge of murder ; and in his rage he struck his adversary with his 174 BROKEN BONDS. open hand once more upon the cheek. ' For a few seconds Laroom la} 7 motionless, his adversary standing menacingly over him. Then Maurice walked contemptuously away, and Laroom slowly got up, and wiped away the blood that trickled down his face. He said never a word till his hand was upon the door, then turned with a lurid light in his eves — " I've two blows to reckon for, Maurice Ellerton," he said, in a thick unnatural voice, and with a face distorted by passion. " The first I received four years ago ; the second just now. They shall be paid in full before many days are over. You I con- sign to a felon's doom. As for Rose Field- ing, I will ruin her, and every soul connected with her !" "I ask no mercy for myself," replied Maurice haughtily — " do your worst. You did but get your deserts. As for Miss BROKEN BONDS. 175 Fielding, I see no cause that your vengeance should fall upon her." " Her accursed white hand struck well- nigh as hard as yours, in days gone by, be- cause I stole a kiss from her prudish lips. I told you there had been love-passages be- tween us," he continued, with a ferocious smile. " She shall pay well-nigh as dear as you for her peevish behaviour. I'll deprive her of silks, laces, equipage, ornaments, and all that women hold dearest." Suddenly, like a lightning flash, came an inspiration across Maurice Ellerton. His face was irradiated with triumph, as he re- plied, in clear, ringing tones, " Rose Fielding, Laroora, lies beyond your power. Not a lace, not a glove, not a toy can you deprive her of. For me, I am at your mercy, and scorn to ask grace at your hands. Be quick in your vengeance. You'd scarce let the cut on your cheek heal, I 176 BROKEN BONDS. should fancy, ere it were gratified. Go." And Maurice pointed authoritatively to the door. A menacing gesture of his hand, and La- room was gone. 177 CHAPTER IX. A SUPPER AT UPWAY. " T FOR my part, never can understand -*-5 why a man falls in love, and heartily give him credit for so doing, never mind with what or whom," says one of our great- est satirists. There is one occasion, though, upon which, with all due deference, I think he deserves but little credit — such a very everyday occasion, too, moreover. I mean when he falls in love with himself. And men do it, in their different ways, continu- ously and habitually, railing meanwhile at the vanity of women. It is curious why we VOL. I. N 178 BROKEN BONDS. all cherish this same passion of vanity. As Rousseau says somewhere, there never was man yet who did not derive more pain than pleasure from it, unless he were a fool. Are our sisters more fortunate, think you ? But there was never any rule yet without an exception, and if ever there was a man to whom no credit is due for falling in love, it is Mr. Weaver. He has a faculty for it. He catches love as others catch cold. Tis chronic with him. He commenced in the nursery, and has suffered under it from his youth up. He has experienced severe com- plications of the disorder, and is familiar with the inconveniences of having his heart torn asunder. A house divided against itself, we are told, cannot stand. Mr. Weaver would have confided to us that a heart divided into three pieces also could not stand the care, anxiety, and hot water that such great capacity of loving was wont BROKEN BONDS. 179 to entail upon it. Mr. Weaver could no more have refrained from making love to any- thing in petticoats than have paid his own or the nation's debts. Age or station was no check upon him. He'd have behaved with considerable empressement to his grand- mother, and has a speciality for kissing maidservants. He tumbles in and out of scrapes of this nature with a facility all his own ; and there is a story current of him in the mm.. 30112 042045671 TSfcJT> Z«8£*> - 38» 3#'" II? " PK3g>C^^» ^ 3» ^^^pT-^5 i*Zm3