I1»t 
 
 UTTERLY 
 
 MISTAKEN 
 
 Ani^ie Thomas 
 
 / 
 
UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 H IRorcl. 
 
 BY 
 
 ANNIE THOMAS 
 
 (Mrs. Pender Cudlip), 
 
 AUXnOK OF 
 
 'DENIS DONNE," "THE HONBLE. JANE, 
 Etc., Etc. 
 
 ly THREE VOLUMES. 
 
 VOL. T. 
 
 LONDON: 
 
 F. V. WHITE & CO., 
 
 31, SOUTHAMPTON STREET, STRAND, W.C. 
 
 1893. 
 
PRINTED BT 
 
 KELLY AND CO. LIMITED, GATE STREET, LINCOLN'S INN FIELDS 
 
 AND KIN6ST0N-0N-THAMES. 
 
V. / 
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 ^ CHAP. PAGE 
 
 c_3 I. — " It was a "Woman I " . . . . 1 
 O 
 
 oo II.—" I HAVE Lived 1 "... . 22 
 
 
 III.— Sir Walter 43 
 
 IV. — Under Electric Light ... 65 
 
 i> V. — The Lyn's Ldllabv . . . .85 
 
 VI. — Laura is Reminiscent . . . 1U8 
 
 S VII. — A Young Avenger . . . .133 
 
 VIII. — Laura " Clinches It ! " . . . 156 
 
 '^ IX. — Mrs. Davis sees Visions . 180 
 
 * X. — "On Border -land 'twiit Hate and 
 
 '4 Love" . . . •. .201 
 
 ^ XL— "Su Highly Hespfcted ! " . 224 
 
 ^XIL— Mrs. Greg 245 
 
 %i 
 
 J 
 
UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 " IT WAS A WOMAN ! " 
 
 " Lynton on its hill, Lynmoutli in its 
 hole. It is so hard to free oneself from the 
 fascination which each of these bits of 
 Arcadia exercise over one, that were it 
 not for the Cliff Railway life here would 
 become an unbearable effort to taste the 
 sweets of both." 
 
 It was a woman who said these words. 
 A woman who had tasted the sweets of life 
 in many another bit of Arcadia, as well as 
 in some of the most joyous cities of the 
 world. A woman to whom many <>f the 
 
 VJI.. I. 1 
 
2 UTTEKLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 most amusing denizens in the Beautiful City 
 of Prague were well known. And yet, 
 notwithstanding her charming experiences 
 of Bohemianism, a woman who was now 
 well contented to be what some of her 
 friends termed " buried alive by the sea at 
 Lynmouth." 
 
 For on the day on which this story 
 opens, it was blue, unclouded weather, a 
 golden day in one of the most faultless 
 summers that have been vouchsafed to us 
 of late years. 
 
 Moreover, the one who listened to her 
 was a man ; the only man who had aroused 
 a genuine interest in her heart during all 
 the thirty odd years of her sojourn upon 
 earth. 
 
 They had been sauntering down the little 
 esplanade which starts from the Ehenish 
 
"IT WAS A WOMAN!" 8 
 
 tower, and ends abreast of the Cliff Railway 
 when she spoke, and when he answered 
 they were midway up the almost perpen- 
 dicular cliff which that railway scales. 
 What he said then was : 
 
 "I have known Lynton and Lynmouth 
 for the last ten years. Neither of them 
 exercised the shghtest fascination over me 
 —till to-day." 
 
 lie emphasised his last words with a 
 stead}' searching look at her, but though 
 she saw and felt the look, she neither by 
 word or sign betrayed that she had the 
 faintest comprehension of its meaning, or 
 suffered the slightest embarrassment from 
 its intensity. Iler long dark lashed grey 
 eyes looked back at him unfalteringly, 
 *' unfeelingly " he thought. Iler delicately 
 mobile mouth, that he had already dis- 
 
4 UTTEELY MISTAKEN. 
 
 covered quivered with every variation of 
 its owner's most variable emotions, was at 
 its most composed rest now. 
 
 " Is she cold and hard ? or only a con- 
 summate actress ? " he asked himself as the 
 railway-car ghded to its bourn at the top 
 of the cliff, and he held his hand out to 
 assist his fellow-passenger to alight. But 
 she was engaged in collecting her sunshade, 
 guide-book, purse, and ticket, and so either 
 did not see, or could not take the extended 
 hand. 
 
 There was the faintest expression of 
 surprise about her eyebrows, as he, after 
 hesitating for an instant, walked along by 
 her side, accommodating his pace to hers 
 with the evident intention of at least 
 escorting her up into Lynton's principal 
 street, and that this should be his intention 
 
"IT WAS A WOMAN!" 5 
 
 annoyed her. She was one of the few 
 women who detest being sought, flattered, 
 and followed, unless she had permitted a 
 man to see that it was agreeable to her 
 that he should do these things. Xo such 
 grace as this had she extended to the man 
 at her side. All that was mascuHne in the 
 nature encased in that exquisitely feminine 
 form rose in revolt at the successful oppo- 
 sition of his will to hers on this occasion. 
 His mastery over her was brief, however, 
 for as they came out into the street from 
 the cHfT lane, she halted, and without 
 giving him either her hand or a smile, 
 said : 
 
 " If I could sketch, I should envy y<>ii 
 the colour-sensations you will have pre- 
 sently. I know how Wooda Bay looks on 
 a morning like this." 
 
6 UTTEELY MISTAKEN. 
 
 " Why not drive out and see it for 
 j^ourself ? I want you to advise me, really 
 I do ! I can't make up my mind which is 
 the best view of Ley Abbey. You'd hit on 
 it at once, and save me both time and 
 trouble." 
 
 " At the cost of wasting my own ! Time 
 is a thing I never waste, if I can help it. 
 Trouble is a thing I never take — for anyone 
 but myself! Good morning ! " 
 
 She nodded carelessly and walked on, 
 and he stood looking after her, admiring 
 her well-developed figure, slender limbs, 
 and high-bred points. 
 
 " She steps like a duchess on those slim 
 little feet, and carries her handsome little 
 head like one too ! She makes me hate her 
 with her confounded airs of ignoring my 
 existence, and yet ! Well, I'm an ass to 
 
"IT WAS A WOilANl" 7 
 
 hanker after her smiles and her presence, 
 for even if she were wiUing I wouldn't tie 
 myself up to such a prettily perfect piece 
 of selfishness for all the world could offer 
 me. Good-bye to you, Mrs. Poynter ! 
 Don't be afraid that I shall try to make 
 you waste any more time and trouble 
 about me." 
 
 lie had turned and was walking slowly 
 and reluctantly towards the Valley of 
 Eocks, of which he had j^romised himself 
 that he would make a series of sketches 
 this morning, llis chance meeting with a 
 woman whom he believed to be in Algiers, 
 at the Khenish Tower just now, had 
 quenched his ardour for sketching and 
 rekindled his ardour for her ! It has been 
 shown how his infirmity of purpose was 
 rewarded. 
 
8 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 " She must be thirty-three or four if 
 she's a clay," he told himself. "What's 
 the good of reminding myself of that 
 though ! Every year she owns to has 
 given her a new charm or perfected an 
 old one. They say she was lovely at 
 twenty ! she's that now, and that's the least 
 of her attractions. Where the devil does 
 the fascination come in ? for she doesn't 
 try to please or make me think about 
 her ? " 
 
 He was a fine-made, well set-up fellow 
 of thirty-five or thereabouts, who thought 
 this. A man who, although not a soldier, 
 had seen a good deal of hard fighting on 
 the recent battle - fields of the world as 
 " war-correspondent " to three or four of 
 our foremost dailies. His pen had made 
 him honoured and renowned, but it had 
 
"IT WAS A WOMAN 1" 9 
 
 not made him rich. Plenty of money had 
 been made, but even more had been s>pent, 
 for Guy St. Austle came of an open-handed 
 race, and he was continually forgetting that 
 it was his brother, Sir Walter, who had 
 the title, e^^tates and family nioney-l)ags. 
 On the whole it was not astonishing that 
 he should sometimes have allowed his 
 memory to play him lalse on this point, 
 for Sir Walter was his senior by three 
 minutes only, and during their childhood 
 and youth the twins had shared alike, and 
 no difference had been made in the treat- 
 ment they received from parents, friends, 
 and satellites. 
 
 But when their father died there came 
 a change. Sir Walter did not alter to ( luy, 
 but Guy altered to himself and every one 
 around him. His brother was not only 
 
10 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 anxious to continue the allowance Guy had 
 always received from their father, but to 
 add to it in a princely way. But Guy 
 would have none of it. He did not pose 
 as an injured man or a martyr, but he 
 went cheerfully away from the luxurious 
 home and equally luxurious club-life, with 
 nothing but the proceeds of the sale of his 
 own favourite mare in his pocket, and 
 when his family heard of him again, it was 
 as " that plucky beggar St. Austle, a fellow 
 who was always to the front, whose 
 graphic accounts of ' the war day by day ' 
 in the Universal Circulator, seemed to 
 bring the battle-fields into our very midst." 
 After this his professional paths were 
 those of pleasantness to him. The high- 
 bred gentleman not only held a graceful 
 and vigorous pen, but he was as well 
 
" IT WAS A WOMAN I " 11 
 
 versed in the arts of peace as he was in 
 those of war, as much at home in Clubland 
 as he was under canvas on the tented field. 
 Consequently his contributions to magazine 
 and journalistic literature were caught up 
 as quickly as he could write them. Still 
 he did not make money, or rather he could 
 not keep what he made. It flew through 
 his fingers as fast as his pen flew over the 
 paper. But however hard up he might 
 find himself at times, he preferred the 
 temporary embarrassment to accepting any 
 of the pecuniary aid which his brother 
 eagerly pressed on liim. 
 
 Five years before he came into this story 
 at Lynmouth he had made the great 
 blunder of his life. He had fallen in what 
 he thouffht was love with a ^nrl who was 
 a revelation to him in the way of loveli- 
 
12 UTTEELY MISTAKEN. 
 
 ness. Some lime after she Tvas an even 
 greater revelation to liim in the way of 
 fatuous siUiness, but in the meantime he 
 had spoken out not only to her but to her 
 people, and these latter held him as if he 
 had been in a vice. 
 
 Luckily for him marriage was out of the 
 question when they were first engaged, as 
 there was no war on, and his other enfrai^e- 
 ments were not sufficiently remunerative 
 for him to embark u|)on the matrimonial 
 sea with a wife who fancied that silken 
 sails were the only ones she could cruise 
 under. More luckily still, when a war did 
 break out it was in a country that was 
 pregnant with the seeds of every kind of 
 known fever, and his Laura suflered agonies 
 of fear that his letters might conve}- the 
 fatal taint to her. Lr«ied on b^' this fear, 
 
-ir WAS A WOMAN!" 13 
 
 she made a magnanimous proposal to the 
 effect tliat they should not correspond 
 during his absence. The truth being that 
 in addition to the terror she was in of 
 contagion from his letters, she was 
 oppressed by the dour doubt that he would 
 discover her to be the mere pretty puff-ball 
 she was if she wrote and he had time to 
 read hers. It did not occur to her that he 
 had already made the discovery, so she 
 was sh'ditlv chagrined when he assented 
 to her proposition without demur. Her 
 mother offered to receive and fumigate 
 letters for her, but to this Guy St. Austle 
 would not agree. Her eldest brother too, 
 bearing in mind the fact that Sir WaUer 
 St. Austle was still a bachelor, offered 
 himself as a medium. But Guy was 
 staunch to himself. " There could be no 
 
14 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 mediumship between himself and a woman 
 he loved," he said ; " between them it must 
 be hand-to-hand, lip-to-lip, heart-to-heart." 
 Laura Davis shrugged her well -draped 
 shoulders when she heard this, and assured 
 her anxious brother that there " would be 
 no hand - to - hand or lip - to - lip business 
 between them after Guy came home till 
 she was quite, quite certain that he had 
 been thoroughly disinfected." 
 
 "Pray God deliver me from evil — and 
 fools ! " he said as he stepped on board 
 the old trooper by which he had obtained 
 a passage out from Portsmouth. He took 
 out Laura's photograph presently, and 
 looked at it, and tried to set his pulses 
 beating at sight of her perfectly coloured, 
 shaped and clothed beaut}". But his pulses 
 would not obey him. "Yet I loved her 
 
"IT WAS A WOMAN!" 15 
 
 madly for a week or two," he thought 
 scornfully — of himself ! Then he put the 
 photograph away in haste and disgust, 
 thinking vexedly and disappointedly : 
 
 "The d — d nuisance of it is, I shall 
 never love as madly and happily again. 
 She's spoilt that for me." 
 
 His fine physique carried him through 
 all malarial dangers till nearly the end of 
 the campaign. Then he fell ill, so ill that 
 he nearly lost the life which that illness 
 made worth living. There were para- 
 graphs in the English journals about his 
 alarming condition, of course, and these 
 were pointed out to Laura by her watchful 
 friends. Simultaneously another para- 
 graph concerning the St. Austles appeared 
 in the London dailies : " Sir "Walter St. 
 Austle, Bart., is about to lead to the 
 
16 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 hymeneal altar Mabel, only daughter of 
 Pierce Eobins, Esq., of Manchester. It 
 is reported that the bride will bring to 
 her husband a fortune of a hundred 
 and fifty thousand pounds, in addition 
 to her large share in the Warlington 
 Mill factory." Miss Laura Davis read 
 the two paragraphs with commendable 
 attention, and then with delicate tact 
 referred to the one that concerned Guy 
 only. 
 
 " It will be a great relief to Mr. St. 
 Austle to know that I am not worrying 
 and fussing myself into an illness about 
 him," she said calmly to her brother, " so 
 it would be nice of you, Robert, to send 
 him a line telling him that he is quite a 
 free man as far as we are concerned, and 
 that I had rather not hear anything more 
 
" IT WAS A WOMAN '. " 17 
 
 about him after this, and anything else nice 
 that you can think of you know." 
 
 " His chances are dished for the baro- 
 netcy and money ! " her brother remarked 
 gloomily. 
 
 " Oh ! I never thought of thai," Laura 
 replied glibly. " Now do write to him like 
 a dear old boy to-day ! It's so dreadful to 
 have anything hanging over one's head. It 
 may help him to turn the corner towards 
 recovery if he hears that I am quite 
 resigned, quite prepared not to worry 
 myself a bit more about our silly little 
 affair whether he lives or dies." 
 
 Laura had never made herself actively 
 
 obnoxious to her family, but she had 
 
 always been a beautiful dead-weight upon 
 
 the more active members of it. Tlie vision 
 
 of her consigned to the care and keeping 
 VOL. I. 2 
 
IS UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 of the St. Austles had been agreeable to 
 the responsible members of the Davis 
 family. Therefore there was something 
 heroic in the attitude assumed by her 
 eldest — and most responsible — brother now. 
 
 " I'll write and tell Guy St. Austle the 
 decision you've come to, Laura, and 'pon 
 my honour if there's a spark of gratitude 
 in human nature the fellow ought to give 
 me a pension for life for being the 
 messenger of such good news." 
 
 She looked at him for a moment or two 
 with big, beautiful, surprised blue eyes. 
 Then she said, quite unexcitedly : 
 
 " You mean he will be glad to get rid 
 of me so easily ? So he will be, but all the 
 same he won't be able to get over the 
 feeling for the girl he thought I was at 
 first. But don't let us talk about him any 
 
" IT WAS A WOMAN' I •' 19 
 
 more," she added hurriedl}-, " there may be 
 fever, malarial fever ! deadly fever ! in the 
 very mention of his name. I dislike all 
 these subjects so much, danger and death ! 
 I've never put myself in the way of danger, 
 and never courted the idea of death ! He 
 lives in an atmosphere of both, and he'll 
 never have the family title or the family- 
 money now that twin - brother of his is 
 going to be married. Do promise me 
 you'll write and settle it as I wish to-day." 
 
 '• I will, dear — and you ? " her brother 
 said quietly. 
 
 "I? Oh! don't trouble about me, 
 Kobert. Old Daunton will give you an 
 extra share in the business the day I marry 
 him, and he would marry me to-morrow if 
 I liked." 
 
 " Then," said her brother, thinking of 
 
20 UTTEELY MISTAKEN. 
 
 himself first, as we are all apt to do, 
 " you're an infernal little fool if you don't 
 like ! Here goes for the letter to St. 
 Austle," he added, with admirably selfish 
 promptitude and decision, and sure enough, 
 that night that letter went. 
 
 Guy St. Austle came out of his malarial 
 fever and broken engagement a stronger 
 man, physically and mentally, than when 
 he had gone into them. He had expected 
 great things in the way of debilitating, 
 poisoning and corroding from the climate, 
 and the climate had not disappointed him. 
 On the other hand, he had expected 
 nothing that had any connection whatever 
 with womanly dignity, fidelity or sympathy, 
 from Laura Davis, and his scant}^ expecta- 
 tions were chillingly realised. He did not 
 waste a sij^h of regret on the thouj^ht of 
 
" IT WAS A WOMAN ! " 21 
 
 that beautiful body of hers with which he 
 had been briefly enraptured. He had not 
 a sintjle thrilUnfi thought of her i^arnered 
 up in his mind. To him she appeared 
 now to have been nothing better than a 
 beautiful, tasteless fruit ! — a marvellously 
 well- wrought piece of artistic wax- work, 
 animated from within by a puerile set of 
 uninterestinsj mechanical contrivances. 
 
 " And I've wasted my love on that 
 thing ! " he thought. " What shall I have 
 to give if a real woman ever crosses my 
 path ! " 
 
CHAPTER II. 
 
 " I HAVE LIVED ! " 
 
 She did not attempt to deceive herself by 
 any pretence of being glad that she had 
 got rid of him, when she sent him off to 
 the Valley of Eocks to sketch, and pursued 
 her way to the Lynton circulating library 
 alone. But she was conscious of there 
 being a lessened restraint upon her when 
 she felt that he had marched out of sight 
 in the opposite direction. 
 
 The works of fiction that were submitted 
 to her for approval were numerous and 
 good, but she had read the majority of 
 them some seasons ago. She turned them 
 aside, not impatiently or contemptuously. 
 
"I ILVVE LIVED!" 23 
 
 but with promptitude and decision, and 
 went back to the counter, behind which the 
 mistress of the establishment stood apolo- 
 getically anxious. 
 
 " I'm not difficult to please, nor do I 
 suffer from want of purpose in making a 
 selection," she said, with a smile that made 
 the mistress of the Hbrary commence un- 
 packing the latest consignment of light 
 literature from Mudie's at once ; " but 
 I'm afraid I must go away empty-handed 
 to-day. Your old novels have been my 
 own familiar friends for years, and the 
 later ones all deal with that ' Young love,' 
 which is pretty enough in fiction, and 
 pathetically silly in fact." 
 
 " I can recommend you some admirable 
 sporting novels, Madam : * The Girl in 
 the Olive-green Wide - awake ' ; * Blue- 
 
24 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 habited Miss Brunker ' ; ' Her Flea-bitten 
 Filly ' ; ' The Lost Leader, a tandem tale ' ; 
 there's not much pathetically siUy love in 
 any of these, Mrs. Poynter." 
 
 " But there is even more pathetically 
 spurious sport," Mrs. Poynter thought. 
 However, she said nothing, but waited, 
 turning over the leaves of a photograph 
 album, while the librarian unpacked her 
 new books. 
 
 " Here's something that's new, at any 
 rate," the latter said presently, handing 
 two volumes across to her customer. 
 " Whether it will suit you, or is good, I 
 can't say. I ordered it because the gentle- 
 man who wrote it is staying at the Lyndale 
 Hotel, and one takes an interest in a book 
 when one has seen the writer of it." 
 
 Mrs. Poynter took the volume, glanced 
 
"I HAVE LIVED!" 25 
 
 at the title and author's name on the 
 cover, and put it down, saying quietly : 
 
 " This, seasoned with a few others, will 
 do. I will send my little maid for them 
 by-and-bye." 
 
 " He's a very fine-looking gentleman, 
 this Mr. Guy St. Austle," the librarian 
 continued, pursuing her own train of 
 thought. " I've read in one of the Society 
 papers that interviewed him once, that he's 
 been hardly used by his family. They're 
 very high, the St. Austles ; and it seems he 
 would go and get his experiences for writing 
 in ways that didn't suit their pride. He 
 went first for a common soldier, but it was 
 soon found out that he was writing home 
 the most beautiful accounts of the war to 
 the papers, so he got his commission, and 
 now his family receive him again." 
 
26 UTTEELY MISTAKEN. 
 
 Mrs. Poynter listened with pretty, flatter- 
 ing interest to this fairy tale. It was not 
 much more like the real story, which she 
 knew well, than are the majority of the 
 garbled descriptions given of so-called 
 celebrities in the majority of so-called 
 Society journals. But she was not inclined 
 to stand forth and do battle for the truth 
 on behalf of Guy St. Austle. And this 
 passive spirit was not the result of indiffer- 
 ence. It arose from the profound con- 
 viction she had that she knew him better 
 than anyone else in the world did. So 
 what matter what others said or thought 
 of him ? 
 
 An hour later she was' buried in the 
 depths of a big, old-fashioned leather 
 chair, that was not beautiful to the eye, 
 but wonderfully soothing to the body. On 
 
"I ILWE LIVED 1" 27 
 
 lier right, the trim little garden that runs 
 down to the banks of the brawling, merrily 
 cascading "West Lyn, was visible through 
 the Gothic window, and waves of perfume 
 were being wafted in upon her from its 
 brilliant beds of bloom. Unconsciously, 
 the beauty and sweetness of the flowers 
 worked with a softening, relaxing influence 
 upon her mental system. She was per- 
 mitting herself to deli<]^ht in readinf^ that 
 story wherein the author's earnest, pas- 
 sionate love for herself revealed itself in 
 every page. 
 
 The title " I have Lived," had not pre- 
 pared her for what she was reading. It 
 had rather led her to anticipate that it 
 would be a history or rather a series of 
 reminiscences of the bolder, more adven- 
 turous and physically manly side of his 
 
28 UTT£ELY MISTAKEN. 
 
 career. She was not prepared to read, as 
 she was reading now, that he had only 
 begun to live according to his own accept- 
 ation of the word on the day he knew 
 her first, and that he had lived on the 
 thought of her and on the hope of her ever 
 since. 
 
 She put the open book down on the 
 table, and bent her head down till her lips 
 were lightly laid on the passage that had 
 told her the truth. "Adam might as 
 easily have sought a mate among the 
 beasts of the field, the fowls of the air. or 
 the fishes of the sea, after having seen his 
 Eve, as I might give look, word, or thought 
 of love to any other woman after the one 
 brief glimpse I have had of her below the 
 surface. And though I may never see her 
 aizain I shall be solitarv in the flesh onlv, 
 
"I HAVE LIVED!' 29 
 
 for her mind, her soul, her heart, will be 
 mine for ever." 
 
 So Guy St. Austle made his hero speak 
 and feel after a two years' separation from 
 the woman who had taught him that to 
 live without the love she could give him 
 would be no life at all. She kissed the 
 printed words, then lifted her head quickly, 
 laughing and blushing at the folly of it, 
 though there had been no one there to 
 witness the action. 
 
 " I want a tonic, I think, I am getting 
 weak in my old age," she said to herself, 
 " and the best tonic I can have is the 
 remembrance that I heard him say once 
 that he would tear his heart out of his 
 body rather than let it go into the keeping 
 of a woman who had been either a loving 
 or an unloving wife . He lias forgotten 
 
30 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 that sentiment I tliink ; but 1 must not 
 forget tliat he uttered it once and would 
 feel it again if I let him follow his impulse 
 and conquer me now." 
 
 She moved about the little room catch- 
 ing glimpses of herself now and again in 
 the square paper - frilled glass over the 
 mantelpiece. And as she did so she 
 caui^ht a reflection of her head held hio-her 
 and of a light of pride and something else 
 in her darkly fringed eyes. 
 
 " He went nearly mad for beautj^ once, 
 they say," she thought, and her chest 
 heaved passionately as she added with 
 sweet triumph and gratitude mingled, " but 
 that was the desire of the moth for the 
 candle. What he feels for me is — well ! 
 what I feel for him I suppose, and that is 
 that there is no one above him and no one 
 
'•I HAVE LIVED!" 31 
 
 beyond him for me. But I have been a 
 ■wife ! Whether I was an afTectionate or 
 an unlovinij one makes no difference to 
 the veto his principles have put upon his 
 love." 
 
 When she took up his book again, she 
 felt that she knew beforehand what ever}'- 
 page would bring forth and how it would 
 end. 
 
 " If it is as I 'think then I shall know 
 that he has not given me up, and shall be 
 fore-armed to] fight for |him against him- 
 self," she said. It did end as she knew it 
 would, and for an hour after she had read 
 the last line she'could not force her hand 
 to relinquish; its loving hold upon the 
 book. 
 
 As for her thoughts, while her clinging 
 fingers were caressing the words that had 
 
32 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 come straiglit from his heart to hers, they 
 were of the mixed sweet and ?jitter order 
 which are apt to fill the mind of a woman 
 very much and hopelessly in love, whether 
 she may be only twenty, or an " old thing of 
 thirty-five," as twenty would probably 
 describe Mrs. Poynter. She thought how 
 brave and steadfast he was to have held on to 
 such a forlorn hope as finding and winning 
 her all these years. She also thought how 
 glad — how gratefully glad she was that in 
 all respects she had grown worthier of that 
 faithful love of his. She tried to feel 
 humbly grateful, but the eflbrt to attain 
 humility was beyond her. Her heart swelled 
 with pride as she reflected that this man, 
 who was as wax in her hands, was no mere 
 common-place, more or less gallant and 
 gay gentleman, whose ways had been 
 
"I HAVE LIVED!" Xi 
 
 made so easy for him by the world that in 
 
 all things he regarded the fulfilment of his 
 
 heart's desire as merely his due. Here was 
 
 a man whose ways had been rough-hewn 
 
 from the moment he had reached manhood 
 
 and become a responsibility -to himself. 
 
 And in every way, in all things, he had 
 
 vindicated his manhood and justified the 
 
 judgment of Nature and Providence in 
 
 thrusting that responsibility upon him. 
 
 *' He may have erred, he may have gone 
 
 astray, but never meanly or dishonourably. 
 
 Oh, Guy I thank God that I am loved by 
 
 you ! — though for your own sake you must 
 
 never know that I repay that love a 
 
 hundredfold. I must never forget tlial I 
 
 have been a wife, though you would forget 
 
 it for a time." 
 
 Towards evening, having nearly learnt 
 VOL. I. 3 
 
34 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 his story b}^ heart, and finding that 
 certain phrases whicli had caught her taste 
 were constantly rising to her Hps, she came 
 to the conckision that its presence in her 
 room was decidedly injurious to her com- 
 posure. So putting on her hat she took 
 his eloquently silent ambassador under her 
 arm and went down to the Cliff Eailu'ay, 
 intendino^ to return " I Have Lived " to the 
 library at Lj^nton on the hill. But before 
 she could reach the car it bejian its G;lidin<^ 
 ascent, and being restless she decided not 
 to wait for the next journe}' up, but to go 
 instead and saunter througli Glen Lyn to 
 its crowninf}- "iorv. The Seven Falls. 
 
 The Lyndale Hotel is close to the 
 entrance of Glen Lyn, as everyone knows 
 who visits Lynmouth, but no one tem- 
 porarily sojourning in the place can be 
 
"I HAVE LIVED I" 35 
 
 expected to know where other sojourners 
 are staying, or if they know they cannot be 
 expected to remember. Guy St. Austle 
 happened to be staying at the Lyndale, and 
 the close proximity of its entrance-gate 
 made Glen Lyn seem the most appropriate 
 place for an after-dinner stroll and pipe. 
 Mrs. Poynter had not passed through the 
 gate ten minutes before Guy was through 
 it also, and she felt before she saw or 
 heard him that he was on her track. 
 
 lie did not address her by name or ofTer 
 any of the conventional greetings when he 
 came abreast of her. Ue only said : 
 
 " You spoilt my sketching this morning. 
 \Vliy were you so unlike your old self ? " 
 
 " Unlike my younger self you mean." 
 
 "UuUke the Mabel Poynter who first 
 
 taught me to knuw what a real man's real 
 
 3« 
 
38 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 life should be. I had been existing in the 
 shade ! I had been dancing with shadows 
 until I met you, and you know it ! " 
 
 " Since you met me have you lived P " 
 And for the life of her she could not repress 
 the triumphant note of joy — of more than 
 joy ! — which rose up and rang through her 
 words. 
 
 " Then you have read my story ? " 
 She bent her head in assent. 
 " Mabel ! I wanted to ask if you had read 
 it this morning, but you made me feel such 
 an unwelcome intruder here that I dared 
 not ask." 
 
 " I am glad you didn't ; I should have had 
 to say Xo then. I have read it to-day for 
 the first time — read it since I parted from 
 you in Lynton this morning." 
 
 " And you are — you think — ? " He paused, 
 
"I HAVE LIVED!" 37 
 
 for she had not been able to veil her eyes, 
 and he had read somethinfj of the feelinjr 
 which she had for him in that momentary 
 glance. " Forgive me," he said, " forgive 
 me for having made you my theme, the 
 motive power on which turns all that's 
 decently good in any sense in the book." 
 
 " Forgive you ! for what ? " 
 
 " For having disregarded the obvious 
 desire you have to get away from and 
 obhterate me " 
 
 "After readhig ' I have Lived,' I should 
 be the proudest woman in the world to-day 
 — if you had not made me that already," 
 she said, softly. " You have shown me that 
 our friendship has not made a deeper im- 
 pression upon me than it has upon you ; you 
 have made me feel that I was not wrong in 
 thinking of you as I do, as of the one man 
 
38 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 in the world on whom I may have most 
 absolute trust and reliance." 
 
 They had reached the little bridge under 
 
 the falls now, and were sitting down on a 
 
 mossy boulder. It seemed that there was 
 
 nothing to come between them! — a few words 
 
 and the mists might all have been cleared 
 
 away. He had forgotten that he had once 
 
 said he would never link his lot with a 
 
 woman who had been either an affectionate 
 
 or an unloving wife to other any man. 
 
 On this evening by the Falls of Glen Lyn 
 
 he min'ht have taught her to fori^et them 
 
 too. But he made no attempt to do so, 
 
 having wiped them clean off the slate of 
 
 his memor}'. AH he remembered, all he 
 
 thought of now was that he had loved 
 
 this baffling woman for a long time, and 
 
 longed for her constant companionship, 
 
'•I HAVE LIVED!" 39 
 
 which made him feel better, brighter, braver 
 and more at rest than he had ever felt before 
 he knew her. 
 
 " Trust mc, and rely upon me in the 
 way I pra}ed you to do two years 
 ago ! " he was saying, when there came 
 tlie sound of hurrying footsteps over dry, 
 parched grass, and the next moment a 
 man — Guy's counterpart! — with a huge 
 brindled bull-dog at his heels, made his 
 way across the river, over the rocks, 
 and joined them. 
 
 " Given you a surprise, old man," he 
 began, heartily clapping Guy on the 
 shoulder, then doffing his cap to Mrs. 
 Poynter he apologised for an unreason- 
 able intrusion at an uiitimcl}' hour. 
 
 " The fact is I have tracked Guy 
 from Ilfraconibo tlirouL'li the visitors* 
 
40 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 books, and I haven't seen him for twelve 
 months," he explained, and the lady rose 
 at once, shaking the dew from her deli- 
 cately laced skirts, and looking up at 
 the sky, which is always ready to betoken 
 rain in Devonshire. 
 
 " The interruption is an agreeable one as 
 far as I am concerned. Your brother and 
 I very rarely meet. Sir Walter, and when 
 we do there is one vexed question which we 
 never can settle. We had just raised it 
 when you came." 
 
 " Put the matter before me and I'll settle 
 it — as Guy wishes," he said boldly. 
 
 " The matter has been before you since 
 the be^inninfij of time," she said, irivinfr a 
 hand impartially to each man over river- 
 encircled rocks. "It is only this — must 
 the woman always be the weaker vessel, 
 
"I HAVE LIVED 1" 41 
 
 to be alternately vindicated and con- 
 demned ?" 
 
 " Yoiire not going in for politics or 
 county councils, or any other freedwoman's 
 rights, are you ? " Sir AValter asked. 
 
 As she faced him closely she thought, 
 " The twin shells are alike, but the kernels 
 have a distinct flavour." 
 
 " The only ' woman's right ' I go in for 
 is the right to help a man to do his best to 
 be true to himself, just as a man comrade 
 would help him," she said. 
 
 Then she gathered her delicately laced 
 skirts around her — she had changed from 
 the well-made tailor costume of the morn- 
 ing into something flimsier, but distinctly 
 more graceful, in honour of herself — and 
 stepped along the river stones on the down- 
 ward path towards Lynmouth. 
 
42 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 " Engaged to her ? " Walter hurriedly 
 whispered to his twin brother, and Guy 
 made no verbal reply, merely wagged his 
 head angrily. 
 
 " Free, then ! and by Jove ! something 
 worth going into fetters for. Guy, she's the 
 most fascinating woman I ever saw in m}'- 
 life." 
 
 
CHAPTER in. 
 
 SIR WALTER. 
 
 That rumour which had crept into print 
 some years before these days at Lynmouth, 
 relative to Sir Walter St. Austle's approach- 
 ing marriage,had been absolutely unfounded. 
 At the same time it must be confessed that 
 he had not Ijeen altogether innocent of 
 having set it afloat. The truth being that 
 without Guy's knowledge or consent, he 
 had dealt a blow for Guy's freedom by 
 leading Miss Laura Davis to supjjose that 
 Guy was no longer worth the chains he had 
 suflered her to put upon him, now that his 
 heirship was imperilled. 
 
 Ilis was a livelier, lighter, more change- 
 
44 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 able nature than Guy's. Perhaps circum- 
 stances had more to do with the difference 
 between the twin brothers than inherent 
 qualities. All things had gone smoothly 
 alike with both the boys until their father 
 died. From that day, however, most things 
 had gone roughly, very roughly, with Guy 
 for a time ; and even now, though he was 
 successful and fairly prosperous, one thing 
 was going very hardly with him indeed. 
 
 They were remarkably alike in person, 
 both being fine, well-grown, athletic-look- 
 ing men, pale in complexion, close- cropped, 
 aquiline featured. But there were points 
 of difference between them, all of which 
 went to show that Guy was the stronger 
 in many ways. His grey eyes were not so 
 large as Walter's well-opened blue ones, 
 but they were steadier and more penetrat- 
 
SIR WALTER. 45 
 
 ing. His hair was the same tint as Walter's 
 when they were boys, but years of exposure 
 to tropical suns had changed it from a sunny 
 brown to nearly black. It was thicker, 
 stronirer hair than that which covered 
 Walter's head. Both the men were the 
 fortunate possessors of firm, well-cut 
 mouths, and Guy's closely-shaven chin 
 carried out the expression of his lips, 
 whereas Walter's, though nicely moulded, 
 lacked decision and power. Walter's neck 
 at the back of his head was wide and lleshy, 
 Guy's was clean-cut and muscular, without 
 a line in it that betokened sensuality. 
 Walter's eyes roved with open, undisguised 
 admiration in them after every pretty 
 woman they caught sight of, no matter 
 what her age or condition. Guy held him- 
 self proudly aloof from the temptation to 
 
45 UTTEKLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 allow Ills eyes to express any feeling tliat 
 lie would not liave dared to word. 
 
 As in their faces so in tlieir figures, tliere 
 were distinctive traits which revealed them- 
 selves to perceptive eyes. Of equal height 
 and bulk, Guy was the stronger and at the 
 same time the sparer of the two, yet the 
 muscles of his arms and legs were developed 
 in a way that made Walter's fleshier ones 
 seem small beside them. Nevertheless, at 
 first sight, people were apt to think the 
 blue-eyed, sunny-haired baronet the 
 " better-lookin^^' fellow of the two." He 
 smiled and showed his white teeth far more 
 frequently than Guy did, consequently the 
 baronet was also declared to be " far the 
 better-tempered fellow of the two " by 
 superficial observers. Mabel Poynter was 
 not a superficial observer, and was disposed 
 
SIR WALTER. 47 
 
 to think the best that could be thought of 
 Guy's twin brother. Nevertheless, on this 
 first day of their meeting, against her will, 
 she was obliged to admit to herself that she 
 did not like Sir Walter St. Austle. 
 
 When they came out from the Glen Lyn 
 grounds the men, as a matter of course, 
 escorted her to the door of her lodgings in 
 Gothic Cottage, and here Guy prepared to 
 detach himself from the chain which her 
 mere presence flung over him, but Sir 
 Walter, whose eyes were much fascinated 
 and fixed upon her, interposed : 
 
 " The night is too good to waste in the 
 house — the sea will be looking ripping 
 under the moon. There's a beach, or an 
 esplanade of sorts, isn't there ? Come and 
 take a few turns on it, Mrs. Poyntcr ? " 
 
 She assented at once, walking on between 
 
48 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 them and talking to them impartially in the 
 frankest way possible. She saw that there 
 was something more than pleasure in Guy's 
 face at this slight concession which she was 
 making to his unexpressed wishes, and she 
 took herself to task for having relaxed that 
 rule which she had appointed herself to 
 observe. 
 
 " If he would only be content with my 
 friendship, my true, loyal, hearty comrade- 
 ship, this sort of thing might go on, but as 
 it is he won't take half a loaf, and I won't 
 give him the whole one to his hurt." 
 
 No, and she wouldn't have liked it if he 
 had been contented to take the half loaf. 
 His love was the dearest, sweetest, proudest 
 thing life had ever put within her reach, and 
 if he had been contented to give her friend- 
 ship now instead of it, she would have 
 
SIR WALTER. 40 
 
 died of the wound the chanfre would mve 
 
 c o 
 
 her. 
 
 At the same time she could not help 
 fighting against him and herself for what 
 she believed to be his good, and the staunch- 
 ness of his principles. 
 
 They sat down on the seat by the Ehenish 
 tower, and two of them would have been 
 pleased enough to let golden silence obtain, 
 for they were together ! close together ! 
 Her cloak brushed his coat-sleeve, and the 
 brim of her broad-leaved hat brushed his 
 shoulder. He longed to take her little un- 
 gloved hand as it laid ui)on her lap, its 
 lingers twisting about a l)it of purple 
 heather unceasingly. But he was not a man 
 who ever took the faintest shadow of a 
 famiharity with a woman. If .>he had looked 
 
 at him, and moved her hand the eighth of an 
 vol.. I. 4 
 
60 UTTERLY MISTAKEN, 
 
 incli towards his, he would have known that 
 he would not offend by taking that precious 
 little hand in his own, and pressing some of 
 the feelings of his heart into it. But she 
 did not look at him, nor did she move her 
 hand the eighth of an inch towards his. So 
 he sat still, seeming to look at the sea, while 
 in reality not a single change of expression 
 flitted over the face that was so dear to 
 him without his taking keen and ample note 
 of it. 
 
 Silence held no charm for Sir Walter. 
 He was in high, almost excited, spirits, for he 
 had not seen Guy for several months, and 
 the one thing in whicli the twin brothers 
 were precisely similar was the unswerving, 
 intense, and absolute devotion each had for 
 the other. 
 
 To be with Guy — and a charming woman 
 
SIR WALIER. 61 
 
 who knew when to speak and when to be 
 
 quiet — by the sea under a bright moon on 
 
 a hot night, wuuld liave been sufficient of 
 
 itself to raise Sir WaUer's spirits to an 
 
 exuberant pitch. But in addition to tliis he 
 
 had dined, and dined well, at the Valley of 
 
 Kocks Hotel, and though he had not taken 
 
 loo much wine he had taken a good deal. 
 
 lie was full of a new project too, and a 
 
 man is generally in ecstatic spirits when he 
 
 is nourishing and cherishing the infancy of 
 
 a scheme by which he is bound to win — or 
 
 lose — an enormous amount of money. At 
 
 this time, whenever he was nut thinking how 
 
 glad he was to be with old Guy again, and 
 
 to have a chance of " chumming up" with 
 
 Mrs. Poynter, he was thinking of his new 
 
 racing establishment, of a couple of Imo- 
 
 year-olds, who would pull him in a princely 
 
 4* 
 
 LIBRARY 
 
 UNivFwirrrw fiiiivni 
 
52 UTTEELY MISTAKEN. 
 
 fortune if tliey didn't happen to be poisoned 
 before they could run for the Blue Eibbon, 
 and of The Kniirht and The Knave, two 
 stallions that he had recovered from America 
 at a cost which he hardly liked to count 
 yet. 
 
 " I wish you could see them," he said, 
 speaking of the two-year olds, and addressing 
 Mrs. Poynter, " there's a bit of the Godolphin 
 strain in them ; they've those large, soft, 
 prominent e3'es that you only see in horses 
 with a bit of Arab blood in them. Their 
 pasterns are as delicate as your wrist." 
 
 He caught hold of Mrs. Poynter's hand 
 as he spoke, and held it up for a moment 
 in the moonlight, and durini? that mo- 
 ment Cainish sensations pervaded Guy's 
 breast. 
 
 Mabel took back her hand as if it had been 
 
SIR WALTER. 63 
 
 a bit of ice conveniently near to illustrate 
 Sir Walter's meaning ; for one moment she 
 caught her lip in and bit it hard. IIow 
 could any other man than Guy dare to take 
 her hand in his in that way without her 
 permit ? She knew that Guy would not 
 have done it, if even a dog had been an on- 
 looker. For Sir Walter to have done it 
 before another man, before Guy, shocked 
 her, and would have angered her if he had 
 not been Guy's brother. 
 
 " Let us walk about," she said, rising up 
 and drawini? the folds of her red cloak 
 closely about her. It was a gracefully-cut 
 garment, hi'di on the shoulders as the 
 fashion of the day is, richly lined with 
 wadded silk, and trinnned with grey astra- 
 chan. One hand, the hand that twiddled the 
 bit of heather, not the one that Sir Walter 
 
64 "UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 had dared to touch, crept out and held the 
 folds of this cloak over her breast. 
 
 "You make a lovely picture, you and 
 Gu}'," Sir Walter said, suddenly standing 
 apart and looking at them approvingl}-. 
 
 She made an impatient motion of her 
 head ; it was so slight that only Guy saw 
 and understood it. Then she remembered 
 that he was Guy's brother, and said : 
 
 " Tell me more about your horses ; I am 
 very fond of horses, they understand one so 
 well, and never misunderstand one. What 
 are these two-year-olds called that are to 
 bring such fame and fortune on the turf to 
 the St. Austles ? " 
 
 " They may come to grief ; I told you I 
 wasn't boastful about them," Sir Walter 
 answered reproachfully. 
 
 *'I am sure a'Ou wouldn't be boastful 
 
SIR WALTER. W 
 
 about anything," she said ; " you are too 
 
 much like " She hesitated for half a 
 
 second, and then said, " your brother ever 
 to be boastful ; but you are very sanguine." 
 
 " So would you be sanguine if you 
 owned these two-year-olds, and as for Guv's 
 not being * boastful,' I think he must be a 
 bloodless sort of chap if he doesn't let out 
 a bit of his elation at having kept your 
 friendship for the last four years "' 
 
 "You have not told us what you've 
 called the two-year-olds," Guy interrupted 
 impatiently. That his brother should dare 
 to offer broad flatteries to such a woman 
 as Mrs. Poynter annoyed and distressed 
 him, the more so tliat he (Guy) was 
 made the cause for the commission of the 
 offence. 
 
 " Performer and Promise of May, they're 
 
66 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 both entered for the Two Thousand next 
 May. Performer will make the running 
 for the Promise. Will you back my colours, 
 Mrs. Poynter ? " 
 
 " The Promise ought to make the running 
 for the Performer if there's anything in a 
 name/' she replied, and then it was ex- 
 plained to her that " the Performer is the 
 sweetest-tempered horse that was ever 
 foaled, and absolutely trustworthy. The 
 Promise of May, like many another fair 
 beauty, is capricious and apt to lose her 
 temper ever trifles. But the little chap 
 who's to ride her knows her right through, 
 and never puts her out by any chance. 
 My trainer says that the sympathy between 
 the boy and the iilly is so strong that she'll 
 always want what her jockey wants, and 
 rather break her heart than not do what 
 
SIK WALTER. 67 
 
 be wants her to do. He'll certainly want 
 to win the Two Thousand, for if he does 
 his fortune's made, and the Promise will do 
 all she knows to please him, so I think I'm 
 pretty safe, and }'0u may lay on her 
 freely." 
 
 " \Vliat are your racing; colours ? " 
 
 " Black and green." 
 
 " They don't sound pretty." 
 
 " But they are, they're so awfully neat. 
 It's not a vivid bright green, but a soft, 
 greyish green. You must see her run for 
 the Derby, too." 
 
 " Perhaps I shall not be in England by 
 that time." She glanced hastily at Guy as 
 she said this, and saw a sudden quiver pass 
 over his mouth. "Poor fellow! I wi.sh he 
 could realise that it is only for his sake 
 that I am making him temporarily un- 
 
58 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 happy," she thought, and pity moved her 
 to add, "It is equally probable though 
 that I may be settled down at the time in 
 my little Kensington house. I am a very 
 uncertain woman as far as my movements ; 
 I have no ties and very few friends, though 
 I have hundreds of acquaintances. Con- 
 sequently I go and come as the humour 
 takes me." 
 
 " Dull work travelling alone, isn't it ? " 
 
 " No, I take all my interests with me you 
 see, that is one good outcome of my isolated 
 position." 
 
 " It can't be a case with you of ' I care 
 for nobody, no not I, and nobody cares 
 for me ' ? " 
 
 "Indeed joii are right, Sir Walter. I 
 am not such a forlorn creature as I should 
 be if I could appl)- those lines to my own 
 
SIR WALTER. 59 
 
 case. I care for some people — a few — very 
 much." 
 
 "And everyone who meets you must 
 care for you ! " Sir Walter rushed his 
 words out tumultuously, and then felt 
 ashamed of having paid her such a crude 
 compliment. "As we are all here together 
 you must honour Guy and myself liy 
 letting us disturb your solitude sometimes. 
 The great thing in these places is to get 
 away from them as much as we can. Let 
 us make an excursion to Porlock to- 
 morrow. I did my guide-book all the 
 way from Ilfracombe, and it fired me witli 
 the idea of seeing the country between 
 here and Porlock without delay." 
 
 "We can go by coach to Porlock frf)m 
 Lynton," Mrs. Poynter said, and Guy's heart 
 bounded ; she was assenting to a proposition 
 
60 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 that would keep him in her company the 
 whole of the next day ! 
 
 " No, DO, we won't go by coach," Sir 
 Walter said eagerly ; " we'll rig up a dog- 
 cart tandem, and I'll drive you and Guy 
 over." 
 
 " You can't get even a couple of crocks 
 that will go together tandem in this place, 
 Walter," Guy put in hurriedly. 
 
 " Then I'll wire to Barnstaple for a dog- 
 cart tandem to be sent over here to-morrow, 
 and we'll defer the excursion to Porlock 
 till the day after," Sir Walter replied, with 
 the buoyant air of one who is accustomed 
 to have his own way in all matters both 
 great and small. 
 
 " I hope you won't trust yourself behind 
 a tandem on that Porlock road. For a 
 crood distance vou drive along the edije of 
 
SIR WALTER 61 
 
 a sheer clifl, that goes right down into the 
 sea, with nothing between you and destruc- 
 tion but a railin<T about a foot and a half 
 high," Guy said, addressing Mrs. Poynter. 
 
 " She would have to go on the top of a 
 coach along that same road if she doesn't 
 go with me," Walter put in. " Come, Mrs. 
 Poynter, I'm sure you're plucky, and I 
 never knew Guy shirk anything in the way 
 of danger before. We St. Austles never 
 do come to grief where horses are con- 
 cerned. Surely you'd as soon trust me as 
 you would a stage coachman." 
 
 " I am not shirking anything for myself, 
 m go with you, Walter, readily enough, 
 but, for God's sake, don't persuade Mrs. 
 ro)mter " 
 
 " I'm persuaded already," she inter- 
 rupted. If he went she was ready to face the 
 
62 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 danger, for if anything happened to him, 
 what good would her own hfe be to her ? 
 
 " Brava ! well done. That's settled then. 
 I wire for the tandem — the smartest Barn- 
 staple can turn out — to be sent over 
 to-morrow, and the day after we'll negociate 
 the road between here and Barnstaple. 
 Now what shall we do to-morrow? Go 
 to the Doone Valley and stir up the red 
 deer, and look for traces of John Eidge 
 and his Lorna ? " 
 
 " How restless you are," she laughed. 
 " Now I should su<?n'est that in view of the 
 Porlock drive tlie day after, I had better 
 take to-morrow quietly by the sea with a 
 book, and 3'ou two gentlemen had better 
 fish up to Watersmeet. You want to do 
 the right thing by L3'nmouth on the 
 occasion of your first visit to it I am sure, 
 
sill WALTER. 63 
 
 Sir Walter, and it is one of the righiest 
 tilings to do to fish up the East Lyn." 
 
 " Why shouldn't you take your book up 
 to Watersmeet, and encourage us when 
 you see our energies flagging ? " Sir Walter 
 asked boldly. "You said just now that 
 you had no one to consider but yourself, 
 and were rather mournful about it. Xow 
 just consider us to-morrow, and put the 
 finishing touch to our enjoyment of fly- 
 fishing and Watersmeet by going up with 
 us." 
 
 " Then you must let me be your hostess ; 
 you must lunch with nie at the Swiss 
 Cottage. On that condition, that I may be uf 
 some use to a couple of zealous and hungry 
 fly-fishermen, I will give up my restful 
 hours by the sea and go up to Watersmeet 
 tomorrow." 
 
64 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 "I shouldn't have dared to ask you," 
 Guy took an opportunity of muttering, 
 while his brother was momentarily 
 engrossed by a vision he had just caught 
 of a white-frocked beautiful woman cominir 
 slowly towards them. " Laura, by Jove ! 
 will she spot Guy, I wonder ? " he thought. 
 
CHAPTER IV. 
 
 UNDER ELECTRIC LIGHT. 
 
 Devonshire happened to be a favourite 
 haunt of the British tripper during the 
 months of that summer which has already 
 been described as faultless. A picturesque 
 journalist, who had spent a pleasant day or 
 two between Porlock and Dfracomlje, had 
 run up the region in a glowing article 
 which made everyone who read the 
 Universal Circulator long to be under 
 the clifTs by the sea at Lynmouth, or on the 
 edge of them at Lynton. " Purple Heath 
 and Precipitous Pleasures " was the title of 
 his charming descriptive sketch, and 
 
 VOL. I. 5 
 
66 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 forthwith thousands of the millions among 
 whom the U. C. circulated pined to be 
 under and on the ed^e of these heath- 
 crowned cliffs, and hundreds packed up 
 their travelling trunks and gratified their 
 pining. 
 
 Among those who did this was Mr. 
 Davis, the great varnish merchant of Old 
 Broad Street and Bow (where the manu- 
 factory is). He was the head of the house 
 now, the husband of a wife, the father of 
 several children, and, to his chagrin, the 
 sole protector of his beautiful sister Laura. 
 
 For lovely Laura had failed to fulfil 
 what some people hold to be woman's 
 highest mission in this world. She had 
 had many lovers, she had been the placid 
 recipient of many fairly good offers of 
 inarriage, but — there had always been a 
 
UNDER ELECTRIC LIGUT. 67 
 
 *' but " about the men who proposed to 
 her. 
 
 " The plain-spoke lad was fai- too rough, 
 Tlie rich j-oung man was nof rich enough ; 
 And one was too poor, and one too tall, 
 And one just an inch too short for " 
 
 Miss Laura Davis. 
 
 So she was still hanginn^ on the virginal 
 bough, a ripe, a very ripe fruit ! at which 
 many a man had pecked since the day she 
 released Guy St. Austle, but which no one 
 had been able- to pluck yet. 
 
 She was the beautiful vision in a white 
 frock of whom Sir Walter caught sight as 
 she advanced towards them, the redeeming 
 feature of an otherwise extremely common- 
 place and unattractive family part}-. As 
 often happens in the case of brotliers of 
 extremely good-looking girls, Mr. Robert 
 Davis was unprepossessing in appearance to 
 
68 UTTEELY MISTAKEN. 
 
 a marked degree. He was large and fair, 
 like Laura, but in figure he was flabbily 
 fat, and in complexion ruddier than the 
 cherry. His bigness gave one an impression 
 of strength or power, and though he was a 
 keen, energetic man of business, one forgot 
 his face and such expression as it held the 
 moment one lost sight of it. 
 
 His wife supplemented him well. H^r 
 money had helped greatly to set him on his 
 legs in the City when he married her, and 
 he never forgot this fact, and, more extra- 
 ordinary still, he never omitted an 
 opportunity of showing her that he 
 held her timely aid in most grateful 
 remembrance. If he was ever guilty of an 
 extravagant act, he committed it for the 
 sake of giving her some pleasure or present. 
 He would have had exactly the same 
 
UNDER ELECTRIC LIGHT. 69 
 
 amount of regard and the same feeling 
 of gratitude towards any other woman 
 whose money had helped him at the crisis 
 of his life. But this one happened to 
 have been in the way with her wealth and 
 her willingness to marry him, and he 
 repaid her to the best of his ability. 
 
 He had assured her when they married 
 that his sister Laura would not be a burden 
 upon them long. 
 
 " There are at least a dozen fellows after 
 her, and each one of them would be a good 
 match, so she's sure to settle soon. Till 
 she does you won't find her a nuisance, 
 Anna ; she's the best-tempered girl in the 
 world, and you can make her useful in the 
 bouse." 
 
 *' Making her useful in the house means 
 civinjj her authority in the house, and 
 
70 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 that I don't mean anyone but myself to 
 have, Robert," she said quietly, and there 
 that matter ended. But thouj^h Laura had 
 no authority in the house she stayed in it 
 for what Mrs. Eobert Davis thouo-ht an 
 
 o 
 
 unconscionably long time, owing to that 
 fastidiousness of hers which found some- 
 thing wanting in all the men who sought 
 her with matrimonial intentions. 
 
 It was hard upon Laura that her 
 fastidiousness should have stood in the way 
 of her comfortable settlement in a home of 
 her own, for she was regarded as ver}- much 
 in the way in the home of her brother. 
 There was no active animosity shown to 
 her by Mrs. Eobert Davis. In fact, the 
 latter constantly addressed her as " dear," 
 and invariably pointedly called attention to 
 any little useful act which Laura might 
 
UNDER ELECTRIC LIGHT. 71 
 
 now and then perform in the house. But 
 the way in which she called attention to 
 them showed the fact up strongly, that 
 Laura's acts of usefulness were exceptional 
 things. It was astonishing, too, how often 
 the room which Laura occupied would have 
 come in handy for the accommodation of 
 some person or other whom Eobert 
 especially desired to accommodate. When 
 the annual summer outings were discussed, 
 if Laura unadvisedly expressed a slight pre- 
 ference for one place over another, that 
 place was sure to be the one that disagreed 
 more than any other spot on earth with 
 Mrs. Robert Davis. These were shujht 
 crosses taken separately, perhaps, but taken 
 collectively and borne continually they 
 would have been exasperating beyond 
 endurance to a less sweet-tempered, thick- 
 
72 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 skinned and unsensitive nature than 
 Laura's. As it was, she bore innuendoes 
 and slights with a cheerful indifference that 
 sometimes made Mrs. Eobert Davis think 
 that she would leave off aiming them at her 
 pretty sister-in-law any longer. But the 
 next day she would forget this resolution, 
 and another surreptitious shot would be 
 fired into the handsome iron-clad, apparently 
 not at all to its discomfiture. 
 
 But all the while, under this affably 
 callous demeanour, Laura was thoroughly 
 perceptive and calmly resentful of the 
 intangible affronts that were perpetually 
 being put upon her. They did not sting 
 and hurt her much, but they annoyed 
 her at times and made her less graciously 
 sweet in manner, and therefore less 
 prettily attractive in person, than she 
 
UNDER ELECTRIC LIGHT. 73 
 
 always desired to be. She had the sus- 
 staining consciousness that she could at 
 any time put herself beyond the reach of 
 the annoyance by marrying one of the 
 least objectionable of the men who were 
 ready to marry her. But this was an 
 extreme measure, the consequences of 
 which would environ her for life. There- 
 fore slie deferred taking it, and so she 
 was a perfectly unfettered and heart- 
 whole Laura Davis, who came sailing up 
 to the group, composed of Mrs. Poynter 
 and the twin brothers St. Austle, that 
 night on the little Lynmoutli esplanade. 
 
 The two parties stopped simultaneously 
 as they recognised each other, for both 
 the St. Austles knew Mr. Davis, and 
 though Mrs. Poynter was a stranger to 
 the Davis family she felt that it would be 
 
74 UTTEELY MISTAKEN. 
 
 doing an ungracious thing to walk on 
 alone. She was a woman who never did 
 an ungracious thing of malice prepense, 
 and she was too true a gentlewoman to 
 do one inadvertently. So now she stood 
 by with a little look of interest on her 
 face that Guy thought wonderfully 
 fascinating, while the old acquaintances 
 greeted one another. 
 
 Laura had never suspected the little 
 ruse which Sir Walter had practised upon 
 her years ago, and so greeted him now 
 with the unfeigned cordial pleasure which 
 she had always felt in the society of 
 Guy's handsome, rich brother. She was 
 very glad to see Guy again, still it 
 seemed more in the proper order of things 
 that Guy should improve the occasion 
 conversationally with Eobert and his wife, 
 
UNDER ELECTRIC LIGHT. 75 
 
 and that she (Laura) should show Su: 
 Walter that she felt kindly towards him 
 still, though he was no longer her future 
 brother-in-law. The pretty woman hover- 
 ing so unaggressively in the background 
 did not give her a moment's uneasiness. 
 She presumed it was Lady St. Austle, 
 and began to wonder " if there were any 
 children." 
 
 " How odd it is to meet here,'' she 
 said, drawing her snow-white feather boa 
 closer round her throat and lovely chui ; 
 ** it's quite like a story-book meeting, and 
 shows that fact is stranger than fiction 
 after all ! " 
 
 "Don't see the oddness of it myself; if 
 one meets someone else, it must be some- 
 where you know ! Why not here as well 
 as in the Row, or equatorial Africa, or 
 
76 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 under the Pyramids, or at Margate, 
 
 or- 
 
 " Don't, dont suggest such a horrible 
 trysting place as Margate," Laura inter- 
 rupted, sending a well conceived and 
 executed shiver through her pretty frame. 
 " Who ever goes there ? I'm sure you 
 never did ? " 
 
 " On the contrary, I know and love my 
 Margate well. Before I allow you to dis- 
 parage it, you must prove to me that you 
 know it better than I do." 
 
 " You always did talk nonsense," she re- 
 plied, with gentle vivacity. Then she made 
 one step nearer to him and whispered : 
 
 " Won't you introduce me to Lady St. 
 Austle ? " 
 
 There would have been an embarrassing 
 pause for a moment had Sir Walter been a 
 
UNDER ELECTRIC LIGHT. 77 
 
 shade less self-possessed than he was, lie 
 made no attempt to explain, he merely 
 took Mrs. Poynter into the conversation, 
 and made her understand the situation by 
 saying : 
 
 " Mrs. Poynter, let me introduce Miss 
 Davis to you — an old acquaintance of mine 
 and Guy's." 
 
 The ladies bowed, and Mrs. Poynter 
 held out her hand. For half a second 
 Laura hesitated to take it, then, reflecting 
 that Mrs. Poynter "might be mashed on 
 Sir Walter just as reasonably as on Guy," 
 she took the extended hand dubiously. 
 
 " We were arran^zinfj an excursion for 
 to-morrow when we met you," Sir 
 Walter went on, addressing everybody in 
 his vivaciously casual way. " Watersmeet 
 — or the VaUey of Kocks " 
 
78 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 " I have seen them both," ]\Irs. Davis 
 cut in shrilly ; " it's so kind of you 
 wanting to include us in your party, Sir 
 Walter, but I do like fresh scenes, and 
 having been to Watersmeet and the Yalley 
 of Rocks only a day or two ago, I should 
 prefer a change " 
 
 "Do wait till you're invited before 
 3'ou refuse to go," her husband mumbled 
 to her reprovingly in an undertone, which 
 Sir "Walter considerately drowned by 
 loudl}^ proclaiming that for " all of them 
 to go to Barnstaple next day would be the 
 proper thing to do." 
 
 " AVe can get a four-in-hand I know in 
 Lynton — a char-a-banc, or waggonette will 
 do for us. I'll drive you, if you'll con- 
 fidingly trust yourself to me, Mrs. Davis ? 
 and," here he turned to ^Jrs. Poynter, 
 
U-NDER ELECTRIC LIGUT. 79 
 
 " we can pick out our tandem ourselves, 
 instead of relying on the livery-stableman's 
 judgment, d'ye see? So we distinctly score 
 by going to Barnstaple to-morrow. The 
 Valley of Eocks and Watersmeet must 
 wait." 
 
 She glanced instinctively at Guy before 
 she replied. He was looking at her with 
 an air of pleasurably anxious expectancy. 
 " Perhaj)s he would like to make up this 
 party for this very pretty woman," she 
 thought, and though there was a tightening 
 of her heartstrings at the bare idea, she 
 said cordially : 
 
 " Each plan of yours seems better than 
 the last. Sir Walter." 
 
 A rumour had reached her through some 
 friendly female channel that Guy had at 
 one lime — before he knew her — got himself 
 
80 TJTTEELY MISTAKEN. 
 
 into an entanglement with a young lady 
 whom his friends did not like him to marry. 
 There had not been a shadow of discredit- 
 ableness in the rumour, as far as he was 
 concerned. Discredit very rarely does at- 
 tach to a man who breaks off a matrimonial 
 engagement, for it is the women who give 
 the verdict, and they invariably find extenu- 
 ating circumstances in the case of a man 
 who perjures himself and breaks a promise 
 to one of their own sex. They say, "She was 
 not suited to him, and when he found that 
 out, poor fellow! what was there for him to 
 do but to break it off before the irrevocable 
 words were spoken that would have chained 
 them together for life ? " Or, " Well ! poor 
 girl ! I pity almost as much as I despise her ; 
 but what will you have when a girl shows a 
 man that she is ready to jump down his 
 
UNDEK ELLCTKIC LIGHT. 8l 
 
 throat ? He was impulsive, poor fellow ! 
 but she oucfht to have known better. He 
 has broken it off in the most honourable way. 
 His income and prospects do not justify him 
 in mnrrvins', he savs, and she ouijht to be 
 grateful to him for leaving her free." 
 
 If it is suggestad to one of these tolerantly 
 prudent ones that the man, being neither a 
 congenital idiot, nor an habitual drunkard, 
 must have known at the time of his pro- 
 posal to the unreasonably aggrieved girl 
 what his present means and future prospects 
 were, the answer is ready : 
 
 *' Oh ! I don't say that he is entirely free 
 from blame. But if she had any sense at 
 all she must have seen that he proposed 
 more from a sense of duty than anything 
 else. The truth is, the girls of the present 
 day are too ready to jump at any ofler ; 
 
 VOL. L 6 
 
82 UTIEELY MISTAKEN. 
 
 they don't stay to consider whether it is 
 made in earnest or not." 
 
 These and a hundred similar speeches had 
 been made b}^ the female friends of both 
 parties, when it had become known that 
 Guy St. Austle's engagement with Laura 
 Davis had come to an end. But when 
 Marian Poynter had heard of it she did 
 not endorse one of these sentiments, either 
 verbally or in thought ; and this night, 
 when she saw Laura for the first time, she 
 felt that it must have been terribly hard 
 for Guv to have lost the ri^ht to call such 
 a beauty his own. 
 
 " She seems very sAveet and tractable 
 too," Mrs. Poynter thought, as she watched 
 the lovely aunt, forbearingly and without 
 remonstratincT, submit to beino^ luir^fed 
 about, and interrupted every few seconds, 
 
UNDER ELECTRIC LIGHT. 83 
 
 by a pushing and aggressive little nephew 
 of four. Then a thrill of pleasure passed 
 through the matured woman's frame. " He 
 did not know me when he fell in love with 
 Miss Davis, nor when he fell out of love 
 with her either. I have nothing with which 
 to reproach either him or myself," she 
 thought. 
 
 They had left the little esplanade, with 
 its carefully-preserved Ehenish tower, behind 
 them, and were sauntering up the village 
 street, through which the river leaps and 
 gurgles. Mrs. Davis was explaining that 
 they had only come down to Lynmouth for 
 the evening. The Valley of Hocks Hotel, 
 at Lynton, was their head-quarters. 
 
 " Lynmouth wuuld have been better, as 
 far as getting to the sea quickly is ccju- 
 cerned, and of course it's cheaper than 
 
 (;* 
 
84 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 Lynton ; but Eobert and I are not the 
 people to balance expense against health, 
 and I always like a height better than a 
 valley," Mrs. Davis said, as they all pulled up 
 for a few moments at the wicket-gate which 
 leads into the garden of Gothic Cottage. 
 
 The little four-j^ear-old nephew had 
 relinquished his hold on Laura's dress, and 
 taking advantage of the slight diversion his 
 mother's speech was making, had run in 
 through the garden and open front door to 
 Mrs. Poynter's sitting-room. In another 
 moment he reappeared triumphantly, bran- 
 dishing a heavily-framed panel photograph. 
 
 "I rooshed in after a cat, and I found 
 you man on the table," the child said, 
 ingenuously, holding Guy St. Austle's Uke- 
 ness well up to view under the electric 
 light. 
 
CHAPTER V. 
 
 THE LI-n's lullaby. 
 
 There -was a slight sensation in the little 
 group, some being moved to anger and 
 some to mirth, by little Bob Davis's inop- 
 portune method of springing his discovery 
 upon them. For the electric light revealed 
 the features of Guy St. Austle, admirably 
 reproduced by that skilled Dublin photo- 
 grapher, who has learnt the great art of 
 letting well alone, and not touching up his 
 portraits out of all resemblance to their 
 originals. 
 
 Among those who were angry was the 
 child's mother ; and the reproofs she ad mi- 
 
86 UTTEKLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 nistered to her offspring made a wholesome 
 diversion, 
 
 "You are very, very naughty, Bobby. 
 You have taken what does not belong to 
 3^ou, and that is stealing. You shall not 
 have any cream to-night, and you shall 
 have to say another verse of your hymn. I 
 am shocked at you. Speak to him, Eobert 
 — make him feel his fault," 
 
 " Dear little man ! He only brought the 
 picture out to amuse us," Mrs. Poynter 
 interfered. " I think it was very clever of 
 him to see the likeness to Mr. St. Austle in 
 a moment." 
 
 " To take away a thing that does not 
 belong to you is stealing,'' Bobby's mother 
 harped on. " I am shocked — shocked — that a 
 child of mine should have been guilty of such 
 an act. Won't you reprove him, Robert ? " 
 
THE LYN"S LULLABY. 87 
 
 " lie has been reproved enough surely, 
 hasn't he ? " Sir WaUer put in. Then he 
 hoisted the httle boy up on his shoulder and 
 volunteered to be Bobby's horse as far as 
 the Lyndale Hotel, where a carriage was 
 waiting to convey the Davis party up to 
 Lynton. 
 
 It was really a very immaterial and unim- 
 portant thing in itself — this incident of 
 Bobby's unearthing and displaying Guy's 
 photograph ; but it had a marked and im- 
 portant effect on the manner of several of 
 the actors in this little drama this night, and 
 iuHuenced them more afterwards than would 
 have seemed credible to them. 
 
 To Laura Davis it was a revelation. She 
 had gone on for years thinking of Guy St. 
 Austle as a man who had been declined by 
 her for obvious and .s(ii>iljle reasons, but 
 
88 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 who was Still in love with, and " cut up," at 
 losing her. To discover suddenly that he 
 had given a portrait of himself to another 
 woman, and further that this other woman 
 carried the portrait about with her, was 
 mortifying. She was too sweet-tempered, 
 too lymphatic, and too cautious a woman to 
 make a fuss about the inevitable. But she 
 was too vain and feminine altogether not to 
 desire to resume her empire over his heart 
 now that she saw signs of that heart's wan- 
 dering into the keeping of another woman. 
 
 It never occurred to her that the photo- 
 graph might have been bought by Mrs. 
 Poynter, and that Guy might be absolutely 
 innocent of the offence of its being in her 
 possession. 
 
 Laura was a singularly unobservant 
 woman, and also a singularly ill-read one. 
 
THE LY^'S LULLABY. 89 
 
 She saw things that were right in front of 
 her, and took an interest in the topics that 
 were discussed in her brother's house. 
 Though she had always gone on liking Guy 
 better than any other man who had ever 
 approached her, t^he had never been ins])ired 
 to read either his books or his newspaper 
 articles. Though she had heard that he 
 had become what people called a celebrity, 
 it had not flashed upon her that he had a 
 certain market value for photographers. 
 When she went up to town I'rom her home 
 at Norwood, her whole time was given to 
 and her attention engrossed by millinery 
 and dressmaking cares. 
 
 The only shop windows before which she 
 paused, spell-bound, were those in which 
 exquisite hued silks and satins and a hun- 
 dred other marvellous textured materials 
 
90 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 were displayed in billowing folds. Even the 
 subtly simple arrangements of magnificent 
 flowers and ferns in the fashionable florists' 
 windows were powerless to attract and 
 detain her for more than a minute. Her 
 " brother had equally good orchids and 
 every other kind of flower that the florists 
 had," she was wont to say, " but such dress 
 materials were unknown in Norwood." So 
 it was that she had never noticed Guy's 
 photograph among the other lions, great 
 and small, which are on view for pubhc 
 adulation in Eegent Street. She lono-ed 
 now to see more of Guy, and to find out if 
 it were possible that he had transferred the 
 love he had once ofiered her to a woman 
 who " must be a good deal older and not 
 nearly as good-looking as I am," she 
 thought, and a gentle feeling of vexation 
 
THE LYNS LULLABY. 91 
 
 stole over her wlieu they came up to the 
 waiting carriage by the Lyndale Ilotel and 
 she knew that in a moment or two they 
 must part. 
 
 But Fate and Sir Walter favoured her. 
 When Mrs. Davis had settled herself in the 
 carriage, and surrounded herself with her 
 children, leaving little room for the others. 
 Sir Walter inveighed against the cruelty of 
 letting even the elephantine animal that was 
 between the shafts drag them all up such a 
 hill. 
 
 " Guv and I want a bit of a stretch, Miss 
 Davis ; if you and your brother will walk 
 up to Lynton, perhaps you'll let us walk 
 with you ? " 
 
 Before Laura could speak, Mrs. Davis, 
 who already had visions of Laura ensnaring 
 the baronet, settled it. 
 
92 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 " By all means walk up, Eobert ; we 
 reall}^ are too large a party for the poor 
 horse. The Valley of Eocks Hotel, driver ! 
 I shall only say au revoir to you, gentle- 
 men." 
 
 She drove off with her little flock, and 
 the others strolled slowly up the steep 
 ascent, Mr. Davis walking ahead with Sir 
 Walter and the pair who had been lovers, 
 bringing up the rear. 
 
 He knew she was going to say 
 something about the photograph, and 
 experienced a sensation of grim contempt 
 for himself for ■shrinking' from telling- her 
 the truth, which was that he had not given 
 his likeness to Mrs. Poynter. With what 
 pride he would have avowed the fact if he 
 had done so ! As it was, he feared that 
 Mabel mifjht onlv have bouirht it because 
 
THE LYN'S LULLABY. 93 
 
 he was a good deal talked about just now, 
 and not for any sweeter reason. 
 
 "It was very good-natured of Mrs. 
 Poynter to take Bobby's part. She 
 couldn't have liked his bringing it out ; 
 you neither of you could have liked it," 
 she began softly. 
 
 "Oh I I don't know. I think I was 
 rather pleased at the little chap's smart- 
 ness. He must have a quick eye to have 
 spotted the likeness at once. How old 
 is he ? " 
 
 " Four or five," Laura said hastily. She 
 did not mean to waste time in talkiu'^ 
 about her little nephew. " Has Mrs. 
 Poynter been here long ? " 
 
 "I don't know." 
 
 " Have you been here long ? " 
 
 " Only a day or two." 
 
94 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 " I suppose you knew she was here ? " 
 
 "Indeed, I did nothing of the kind," 
 Guy rephed impatiently. He was begin- 
 ning to get tired of being catechised. 
 But Laura, as has been said, was no' gifted 
 with keen perceptions. 
 
 "Then you met by chance. How 
 odd!" 
 
 "Do you think so? Just turn round 
 and look back at L3^nmouth ; it seems to 
 be hung with diamonds, doesn't it ? " 
 
 "You mean the electric liixht? Yes, 
 very pretty. I can't help thinking it funny 
 that 3'ou should have come down here 
 and found by chance a lady who carries 
 a big portrait of you about with her. 
 Or perhaps she is a greater friend of your 
 brother's than she is of yours ? Is that the 
 case ? " 
 
THE LYN'S LULI^VBY. 95 
 
 " No ; Walter met her for the first time 
 in his Hfe to-night." 
 
 " Really ! I thought they must be very 
 intimate, as he was arranging to drive her 
 out in a tandem." 
 
 " lie's rather an impulsive fellow, and 
 very anxious to give everyone he comes 
 across pleasure. Mrs. Poynter is an old 
 and highly- valued friend of mine. She 
 has never seen Porlock, and so Walter 
 asked her to do us the honour of letting 
 us show it to her, but I don't like the 
 tandem business on that road." 
 
 " You are going with them, then ? " 
 
 "lam." 
 
 " But he spoke of a dog-cart ; you'll 
 have to sit behind." 
 
 " I don't at all mind taking a back seat 
 in such company," he said laughingly. 
 
96 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 " And I prefer a back seat on a coach ; I 
 get so giddy if I look down on the 
 horses. When we go to Barnstaple to- 
 morrow will you take care that I have a 
 seat where I can't see the horses going 
 down those dreadful hills ? " 
 
 "That I will!" 
 
 " And — Guy, have you quite forgiven 
 me ; will you be as friendly as ever with 
 me acrain ? " 
 
 " I have nothing to forgive ; you were 
 quite right, and I am as friendly as ever 
 with you," he protested earnestly. He had 
 no intention of being re-subjugated by 
 Laura, but he certainly did not wish her to 
 suffer any pangs of remorse on account of 
 her renunciation of him loni? aj^o. 
 
 " Then will you do me a favour and 
 look after me on the coach to-morrow ? I 
 
Tilt: LYN'S LILL.\BY. 07 
 
 am really dreadfully nervous, and I shan't 
 enjoy the scenery or the air or anything 
 if I feel that I have to take care of myself." 
 
 "Certainly," he said, but there was no 
 enthusiasm in his tone. Laura was lovely 
 to look at, but he could not go on looking 
 at her for twenty miles, and he felt intui- 
 tively that her conversational powers had 
 not improved since those days when her 
 commonplaces had nearly bored him to 
 death. 
 
 " "Walter will score again as he did at 
 our birth," Guy thought, with mixed feel- 
 injTs of humour and annovance, as he 
 pictured Mrs. Poynter on the box-seat 
 amusing and interesting his brother all 
 along the road, while Laura poured her 
 platitudes about the steepness of the hills 
 into his ears. 
 
 \()L. I. 7 
 
98 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 They had reached the hotel by this time, 
 and with brotherly forethought and zeal, 
 Mr. Davis would not hear of the two men 
 going back to Lynmouth till they had been 
 hospitably entertained. 
 
 " Well have a game of billiards first," 
 he said, " and then it will be the time for 
 devilled bones and champagne. This sea- 
 air ought to make us all hungry." 
 
 So the brothers stayed for two or three 
 hours, and Laura lulled all suspicion to 
 rest in Guy's soul of any desire to re- 
 capture him. She was so unaffectedly 
 good - tempered and unembarrassed, so 
 easily and perfectly friendly, and nothing 
 more, that lie^ began to accuse himself of 
 having underrated her intellect. 
 '■''' "She's a lovely woman, that Laura 
 Davis ; after all, Guy, you might have done 
 
TlIK LYN'S LULLABY. ?K) 
 
 a creat deal worse. Iler brother seems to 
 have struck oil with that business of his 
 from what he was telling me." 
 
 ^^You wouldn't look at her after a week 
 alone with her, and I wouldn't give myself 
 more than a month to contemplate her 
 continually, even if I were in love with her 
 looks still." 
 
 *' The other one has " 
 
 *' What do you mean by the other one ? " 
 Guy interrupted sharply. 
 
 " I meant Mrs. Poynter, but I see I made 
 a mistake," Sir Walter laughed out gaily, 
 but Guy answered unsmilingly : 
 
 " My dear fellow, when you've seen a 
 little more of Mrs. Poynter, you will under- 
 stand that she could never be the ' other ' 
 one to any man she liked ; she would 
 always be * the ' one ! " 
 
100 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 Sir Walter whistled for a minute or two, 
 then he said : " Coincidences strike one as 
 being shaped by the finger of fate very 
 often, don't they ? " 
 
 " You mean that it's strancfe the Davises 
 should have turned up here just now ? " 
 
 *' I might have thoucfht it stranf^e if Mrs. 
 Davis hadn't let out to me that she saw in 
 the last number of Entre Nous that 
 ' Mr. Guy St. Austle, the well - known 
 novelist and journalist, proposed spending 
 a month at Lynmouth.' " 
 
 " But — Laura didn't know ? " Guy ques- 
 tioned anxiously. He wanted to go on 
 thinking well of Laura. The idea that she 
 who had calm-bloodedly hurled him adrift 
 in the days of his poverty should now hunt 
 him in the days of his prosperity, was 
 repugnant to him. 
 
TUE LYNS LLLLABY. / A 101 
 
 " No, she didn't. Mrs. Davis said * Laura 
 was so sweet- tempered and acquiescent, 
 that she never enquired into their plans 
 or interfered with them.' So, they came 
 without letting Laura know you were here. 
 But you understand ! the ' finger of fate ' 
 has nothing at all to do with the thing. 
 I say! that's a jolly good likeness of you 
 that Master Bobby brought forth." 
 
 *' Capital one ; it's not touched up out 
 of all resemblance to me. It's just as 
 am. 
 
 *' Mrs. Poynter must value it highly to 
 encumber herself with it while she's 
 knocking about. When did you have it 
 taken ? — when did you give it to her ? " 
 
 "Had it taken about six months ago — 
 didn't I send you one r' — and never gave 
 it to her at all. I'm ofl' to roost now, the 
 
102 UTTEKLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 ripple of the two Lyns is a rattling good 
 lullaby you'll find. Awfully glad you've 
 come, old boy, and, if you'll have me, I'll 
 go down with you and have a look at the 
 old place when we're tired of this." 
 
 All the thoughts that fdtered throun-h 
 Sir Walter St. Austle's brain this night 
 before the ripple of the two Lyns lulled 
 him to sleep need not be chronicled here, 
 but some of them ran somethin2f after this 
 
 O 
 
 fashion : 
 
 " There's no doubt about it, a fellow 
 might do a thousand times worse than 
 marry that lovel}' woman. That brother 
 of hers must be a sharp chap to have 
 made such a splendid investment of the 
 fortune her father left her. Don't see 
 myself why Guy wants a wife with brains 
 for he has enough and to spare of his 
 
THE LYN'S LULI^BY. 103 
 
 own. Ile'd find her dollars more useful 
 in every-day life than any amount of 
 cleverness or culture ; and lie won't be 
 able to CO on for ever writinj^ about love 
 and war. But every man ought to choose 
 his own wife for himself. I know I mean 
 to do it, if ever I do marry." 
 
 The idea of marriage seemed more 
 possible, not to say harmonious, to him 
 this night than it had ever done before. 
 Perhaps this was due to the soothing influ- 
 ence of the ripple of the two Lyns. 
 
 When the rest of the party went on and 
 left Mrs. Poynter to enter her lodgings 
 alone, she was conscious of feeling a very 
 solitary woman. On no account whatever 
 would she have allowed Guy St. AusLle to 
 enter them with her, and try to cheer her 
 
101 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 np with a cliat for an hour or two about 
 those old, dear, dangerous times when 
 each knew, though neither had acknow- 
 ledged, that they loved one another. But 
 to see him walk off with another woman 
 who had been dear to him once was a 
 distinctly painful experience. It was no 
 use reminding herself that he had got over 
 his brief infatuation for Laura Davis before 
 he had ever met her (Mabel Poynter). 
 The fact remained that some of the love 
 she prized so highly, though she was 
 trying to chill and check it, had been 
 frittered away on someone else. She 
 was a generous as well as a sensible and 
 sympathetic woman. She made no attempt 
 to depreciate Laura's incontestable good 
 looks ; they were as patent to her as they 
 were to the rest of the world who had the 
 
THE LYN'S LLLLABY. 1C5 
 
 privilege of beholding them. Nor did she 
 do what many a brilliantly-clever woman 
 makes the mistake of doing sometimes when 
 the fangs of jealousy have her in their 
 grip, disparage Laura's mental endowments 
 namely, and incidentally reveal how infe- 
 rior these are to the jealous one's own. 
 But as she sat thinking deeply for hours, 
 wiih her eyes rivetted on that Hkeness of 
 Guv's, which seemed at moments to be 
 vitalised by the lamp-light, she did (ques- 
 tion whether she would be justified in 
 relinquishing Guy to what she felt his fate 
 would be if he married an uncongenial 
 wife. 
 
 " But if I save him from such a fate, the 
 day would come when he himself would 
 raise John Poynter's ghost ; and when he 
 did that, not even iny love would be strong 
 
1C6 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 enough to exorcise it and lay it finally to 
 rest," she said with a sigh, as at last she 
 rose and went up to her bedroom. 
 
 The windows were open, one looking into 
 the little garden full now to overflowing 
 with sweet-scented flowers, the other on to 
 the deserted villag:e street throu2:h which 
 the Lyns run. As she leant out to take a 
 last view for the night of the bounding 
 little stream she saw a man standing against 
 the opposite wall. She drew back confused 
 but happier than she had been a minute 
 previously, for she had recognised, and had 
 been recognised by, Guy St. Austle. 
 
 His desire to " go to roost " had been over- 
 come by a stronger craving to catch even a 
 glimpse of the shadow of the woman he 
 loved, and his craving had been more than 
 satisfied, for he had looked strai^iit into the 
 
THE LV.NS LULLABY. 107 
 
 eyes that were the sweetest in all the world 
 to him, and t^een that they lightened with 
 pleasure as they fell upon him. 
 
 "She is younger, much better-looking, 
 above all she is not tainted in his eyes 
 through ever having been possessed by 
 another man I — but his last thoughts to- 
 night will be of me" Mabel Poynter thought 
 as she laid her head on her pillow, " as mine 
 God bless him! are of him." And the 
 ripple of the Lyn kindly set itself to tlicse 
 words, and to their music Mabel Poynter 
 fell asleep. 
 
CHAPTEE YI. 
 
 LAURA IS REMINISCENT. 
 
 Unlike the professional coachmen, who 
 when starting from Lynton to Barnstaple 
 invariably suavely inquire of the gentlemen 
 who have booked for the journey if " they 
 wouldn't like to walk up the hill ?" Sir 
 Walter refused to start until each member 
 of the party was settled in his or her place 
 on or inside the coach. 
 
 They had with them a luncheon basket 
 from "The Valley of Eocks " Hotel, that 
 w^ould have done credit even to Fortnum 
 and Mason, and a couple of smart waiters 
 kept guard over this and the lighter road- 
 side refreshment hamper inside the coach. 
 
LAURA IS REMINISCENT. 109 
 
 The horses were good, upstanding, sturdy, 
 broad-legged animals, who knew as much 
 about going up and down hill as any horses 
 in Xorth Dn'on, and to say that accredits 
 them with vast knowledge of tlie ups and 
 downs of the road. Sir Walter as he took 
 his seat in a way that showed he liad the 
 knowledge and the power of how to sit on 
 the box, felt the exhilaration which is apt 
 to be the portion of a man wlio sees four 
 good horses in front of him and knows that 
 he is able to hit under the bars his near 
 leader without touching the noses or ears 
 of the wheelers. Added to the buoyancy 
 of spirit induced by this conviction, there 
 was additional stimulus in the facts that the 
 day was one of those rich ripe ones when 
 the whole atmosphere seems to be sur- 
 charged witli warmth and colour, and that 
 
110 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 a woman, who was as well physically and 
 mentally endowed as she was dressed, was 
 sitting by his side. 
 
 His spirits were contagious ; at any rate, 
 Guy had never heard Mabel laugh so 
 loudly, merril}^, and frequently as she did 
 during this drive. He had kept his promise, 
 planted Laura on a back seat, from whence 
 she could see neither the horses nor the 
 hills down which those horses trotted, and 
 planted himself by her side. But nothing 
 seemed likely to grow out of that planting. 
 Laura had not got ver}^ much more to say 
 for herself than she had in the old days 
 when her chirpy chatterings had made him 
 write himself down an ass for having pro- 
 posed to her. Consequentl}' silence set in 
 at brief intervals, and Laura began to think 
 she had been unwise in allowin'j her nerves 
 
LAURA 18 RKMIXISCENT. Ill 
 
 to take her so far away from the neigh- 
 bourhood of Sir Walter, for his rattling 
 voice and laugh was borne back to them 
 upon the breeze continually. 
 
 The mature pair in the middle were 
 perfectly happy in their own way, especially 
 after the first halt was called, when they 
 had done ten miles of the distance, for the 
 horses to be watered and the human beings 
 champagned. During this halt Guy climbed 
 down and made his way to the front, 
 where he had the pleasure of holding ^Mrs. 
 Poynter's glass while she nibbled a biscuit, 
 and Laura had a brief reversionary interest 
 in Sir Walter's attentions. 
 
 " IIow merry you have been in front. 
 I can't think how you can drive so well 
 while you are talking and laughing so 
 much. What has Mrs. Poynter been saying 
 
112 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 to amuse you so much ? " Laura began in 
 lialf-afTecte:! pique. 
 
 " Ton my word, I think I was laug^hini:^ 
 more at what I said myself than at what 
 Mrs. Poynter said," Sir Walter replied 
 candidly ; " my sayings were neither very 
 wise nor very witty, but they did duty for 
 beincj one or the other. Very small change 
 passes current easily on such a day and 
 occasion as this. I'm afraid Guy has been 
 neo:lectin2; his dutv if he hasn't amused 
 you." 
 
 " Oh ! your brother never was much of a 
 talker, and I'm afraid I shouldn't have 
 amused him or made him laugh even if he 
 had heard half I said, which I'm sure 
 he didn't," Laura rejoined with sweet 
 humility. " I am rather stupid, you know ! 
 When — when your brother and T knew 
 
LAURA IS REMLSISCENT. 113 
 
 each other much better than we do now," 
 she went on with a blush, "I used to try 
 so hard to understand all he said that I 
 used to tire myself out, and then I used to 
 make mistakes and i^et hold of what he 
 called the wron<^ end of the stick. It 
 must be so nice to be quick like Mrs. 
 Poynter is ; I'm sure she is, isn't she ? Listen 
 at Guy now ! " she added, lapsing under the 
 influence of jealousy into the utterance of 
 the once dearly familiar name, "he is 
 talking fast enough to her." 
 
 " Let me get you another glass of cham- 
 pagne," Walter said, wisely evading giving 
 an answer to the gently jealous plaint. 
 " No ! oh, you should, it will be hours 
 before we get any lunch. You're looking 
 after yourself, I hope, Davis ? Time's up 
 
 now, we must be getting along the road. 
 VOL. 1. 8 
 
114 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 You've taken the worst seat on the coach, 
 Miss Davis. What was Guy thinking 
 about to put 'you here, where you can see 
 nothing ?" 
 
 "I wanted to sit where I couldn't see 
 either the horses or the hills, it wasn't his 
 fault," Laura explained eagerly ; but Sir 
 Walter was out of ear-shot before she had 
 finished her sentence. She was very lovely 
 to look at, but he couldn't help feeling very 
 glad that his lines were cast on the box- 
 seat with Mrs. Poynter by his side, instead 
 of in the rear with Laura. 
 
 " Poor Guy ! he's rather in the dull 
 back there, I think," he said complacently 
 to Mrs. Poynter presently ; " she's awfulty 
 pretty and awfully sweet, but she's not 
 exactly the comj)anion I should choose for 
 a wet day in a lone house." 
 
LAUKA IS REMINISCENT. 115 
 
 " Is there anyone on earth that you 
 would choose for a companion under such 
 circumstances ? " she said quickly, and 
 before he could answer she went on, " I 
 know if I had to endure the wet day in a lone 
 house, books would be the only companions 
 I could tolerate — the only ones that would 
 find me tolerable." 
 
 " Can you stand solitude ? " he asked. 
 
 " Much better than I can society. I 
 can people my solitude with memories and 
 thouchts that are far more interestiufr to 
 me than I find the majority of casual 
 acquaintances." 
 
 " What an awful pity it is that such a 
 woman as you should prefer to live alone ! " 
 he remarked meditatively. 
 
 "I am alone here for my holiday, but — I 
 
 do not live alone." 
 
 8* 
 
116 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 She sighed as she spoke, thereby doing 
 away with the momentary impression he 
 had that the companion referred to must 
 be her own child. 
 
 " No mother would look so glum about 
 having the companionship of a kid of her 
 own," he thought as he glanced down 
 admiringly at her shapely head and mobile 
 face, and a identic feelincr of satisfaction 
 pervaded his heart. Somehow or other he 
 did not like to think of this woman as the 
 mother of another man's offspring. After 
 all there were strong points of resemblance 
 in the characters of these twin brothers. 
 
 It went against his own taste that he 
 should feel so much curiosity concerning 
 this woman and her manner of life, still 
 he could not restrain the expression of it. 
 
 " Have you thought it necessary to start 
 
LAURA IS REMINISCENT. 117 
 
 a i;lieep-dog ? Have you been compelled 
 to throw that conventional sop to Mrs. 
 Grundy?" 
 
 " Do you mean, have I an official com- 
 panion ? Indeed, at my staid age a sheep- 
 dog, as you call it, would be a very 
 unnecessary evil. My — my late husband's 
 daughter lives with me ; naturally, until 
 she marries, she will share my home." 
 
 "She's lucky to have such a charming 
 step-mother. Is she a child, girl, or 
 woman ? " 
 
 " A woman of twenty-three or four, and 
 a very attractive one." 
 
 "Wonder she hasn't married before 
 now I 
 
 Mrs. Poynter's face grew scarlet for an 
 instant, and if he had been looking at her 
 he would have seen her eyes flash. The 
 
118 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 next instant she had recovered her com- 
 posure, and was saying calmly : 
 
 " It isn't for want of being wooed that 
 she is still unwed, but she is a very 
 uncommon kind of girl." 
 
 " Superior woman, eh ? " 
 
 " No ; not at least in the sense in which 
 you are using the word 'superior.' She 
 cares nothing for women's rights, or the 
 higher education of women ; but on the 
 other hand, she is far from being feebly 
 feminine. I think most people would find 
 her very interesting — men especially." 
 
 " Pretty, eh ? " 
 
 "Very! pretty and fascinating." 
 
 " Do ^joiL find her very interesting ? " 
 
 " I have had charge of her since her 
 father died ; one is naturally interested 
 in one's charge." 
 
LAUKA IS REMISISCKNT. 119 
 
 " That meaiii) that you don't love her," 
 Sir Walter thought, but he only said 
 aloud : 
 
 " At any rate, you have interested me 
 in your young lady. What i.s her name ? " 
 
 « Ella." 
 
 " Has Guy seen her." 
 
 " What makes you ask that ? " she said 
 hastily and anxiously, and there was a 
 touch of astonishment in his tone as he 
 replied : 
 
 "Only because I wondered what he 
 thought of her." 
 
 "He has never seen her," she said, with 
 curious constraint. Then she added, with 
 an eflfort, " lie could only admire her ; he 
 would be sure to do that." 
 
 " Then you think I should be sure to 
 admire her too ? " 
 
120 UTTEELY MISTAKEN. 
 
 " Not as Guy would — as Guy will if he 
 ever sees her," she said with a little vexed 
 laufjh. *' How you have drawn me on to 
 discuss a subject I rarely mention, because 
 it is one to which I am unable to do 
 justice ! " 
 
 " I'm afraid I've been rather pertinacious 
 not to say inquisitive. I'll own up hand- 
 somely to it, and you'U have to forgive 
 me " 
 
 "How glad I shall be when we sight 
 Barnstaple," she interrupted ; " it will 
 suggest something fresh to talk about — 
 before I bore you hopelessly about Miss 
 Poynter." 
 
 "I don't think you could bore a man 
 even if you tried," he said admirinsfly : but 
 he added to himself, " But you would be so 
 jealous of a fellow you loved that you'd 
 
LAURA IS REMINISCENT. 121 
 
 half haraj^s yourself into your grave. 
 What's the crux between her and Guy I 
 wonder? lie's got it badly enough, and 
 she seems to think about him pretty much. 
 Here-' we are at Barnstaple, Mr.^. Poynter, 
 and you haven't bored me a bit, far less 
 'hopelessly,' yet." 
 
 " Dear me ! " Mrs, Davis's voice was 
 heard saying, " do you know I've been 
 asleep? This beautiful bracing air and 
 lovely scenery has quite overcome me. I 
 don't think I ever enjoyed a drive so much 
 in my life." 
 
 "Now having got to Barnstaple, let us 
 get out of it without a moment's delay and 
 find a place to picnic in,'' Sir Walter 
 directed, and presently they found them- 
 selves on a well-turfed, gently-sloping bank 
 under some larches by the river. 
 
V2-2 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 " Walter had the luck of it again to-day," 
 Guy St. Austle said to Mrs. Poynter as he 
 engineered her out of ear-shot of the others ; 
 " I heard your voices the whole time. 
 Happy Walter! he had something to say 
 and could say it to you." 
 
 She stooped to pick a piece of meadow- 
 sweet, and with her face concealed from 
 him said : 
 
 " We started a subject in which he 
 became interested, and about which I am 
 naturally eloquent — my daughter." 
 
 " Good Heavens ! your daughter I " 
 
 "My step-child I should have said. 
 Yes. Mr. Poynter left his daughter in my 
 charge. I have never mentioned her to you, 
 have I?" 
 
 " Never ! " Guy said briefly. It was 
 annoying to him that there was this other 
 
LAURA IS REMINISCENT. 123 
 
 hitherto unsuspected link between the dead 
 man and herself. " You have confided 
 more to "Walter in the course of three 
 hours than you have to me in the course 
 of three years," he went on reproachfully. 
 
 " Your brother has a very frank way of 
 finding out whatever lie wants to know," 
 she laughed, but though ahe spoke lightly 
 she was conscious of depression. Quick to 
 perceive everything that took place around 
 her, she was especially quick to notice how 
 any and everything affected Guy. He had 
 winced under that first mention of John 
 Poynter's daughter. " Will he wince 
 more when he sees Ella ? or what ? " she 
 thought uneasily, and a little pang shot 
 through her soul at the prospect of Guy's 
 seeing her late husband's daughter. 
 
 " I don't want Guy to hate anyone 
 
]24 UTTEELY MISTAKEN 
 
 belonging to me. I hope he won't hate 
 Ella ! " she said to herself excusingly. 
 
 Time did not fly that day at Barnstaple. 
 The wrong people got together and clogged 
 Time's wings. Moreover, even had Guy 
 been able to secure Mrs. Poynter's un- 
 adulterated society, as he sought to do, 
 there would still have been little satisfac- 
 tion in the achievement. For in feeling 
 they had come to a certain dangerous pass 
 about each other, and in seeming they did 
 not dare to approach this point, or rather 
 they did not know how to do it, for not to 
 " dare " was a phrase that did not obtain 
 in the vocabulary of either of them. 
 
 Strolling about the beautifully situated, 
 picturesque, and exquisitely clean old town 
 in the golden melloM'ed light of a perfect 
 
LAURA IS REMINISCENT. 12J 
 
 summer afternoon, they found themselves 
 on the bridge on which a mob of robbed, 
 cheated, and consequently infuriated, 
 farmers once cornered, and thought they 
 had cauijht, Tom Faf]jo[us. 
 
 " There must have been a lot of good 
 about that fellow ; he had the pluck to put 
 his roan at the parapet with a drop be3'ond 
 it of forty feet down into the river. It 
 must have been fine sport to see the men 
 he'd left behind him throwing their stones 
 after him and his strawberry roan as they 
 swam to shore." 
 
 " I should have wished him so well if I'd 
 seen him do it, I believe I'd have thrown 
 myself in the way of the stones rather tlian 
 that he should be hit, Sir Walter," Mrs. 
 Poynter said, looking at Guy though she 
 addressed his brother. 
 
126 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 " Do you admire mere brute courage so 
 much ? " 
 
 " There must have been something more 
 than mere ' brute couracfe ' about Fa^crus or 
 his roan mare wouldn't have been so 
 devoted to him. I think the prettiest story 
 I ever read is that of the mare kicking down 
 the stable door, rushing out, and fighting 
 the constables with teeth and hoofs who 
 were taking away her master." 
 
 " I fail to see anything prett}' in the 
 fiction, and if it was a fact I should heartily 
 regret that the mare's misguided enthusiasm 
 for a villain didn't meet with its just reward. 
 Faggus ought to have been hanged and his 
 mare shot. I am a man of law and order. 
 According to my idea, whoever breaks the 
 one or disturbs the other should be punished 
 for the commonweal." 
 
LAURA IS REMINISCENT. 127 
 
 " The man was hanged and the mare 
 was shot ! " Mrs. Poynter said thoughtfully. 
 " Poor Winnie ! she shared the fate that 
 befalls every living creature who loves 
 some one else better than itself. If she 
 had stayed in her stall and gone on eating 
 her oats philosophically when her master 
 whistled for her, instead of rushing out 
 and fighting for him, she might have lived 
 to a ripe old age." 
 
 " And never been mentioned in song or 
 story as she is now ; distinctly the straw- 
 berry roan scored by her action. Unselfish 
 devotion that may be extremely detri- 
 mental to themselves, is what everything 
 feminine ought to be trained to feel and to 
 display." 
 
 *' You don't mean that surely, do you, 
 Sir Walter ? " Laura asked wistfullv. She 
 
i::8 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 was beginning to think his gaiety a more 
 attractive thing than that gravity of Guy's 
 which was apt at times to merge into stern- 
 ness. But if he meant to demand devotion 
 that might be detrimental to her from the 
 woman he might finally elect to the 
 honoured post of Lady St. Austle, then 
 there would be serious drawbacks to the 
 position in Laura's estimation. Xot all the 
 infectious gaiety of manner in which he 
 was such a proficient, could compensate 
 her for " having everlastingly to put herself 
 out of the way for him," she reflected as 
 she smilingly refused Mrs. Poynter's offer 
 to change places with her, Laura, on the 
 homeward drive. But when half that 
 homeward drive was accomplished, Laura 
 was admitting to herself that Walter was 
 more congenial to her than Guy. She felt 
 
LAURA IS RKMINISCENT. 129 
 
 herself more on a par mentally with the 
 man wlio made jokes which she scarcely 
 grasped, and laughed heartily at them him- 
 self, than with Guy, who spoke seriously of 
 things of which she had no conception 
 with the evident expectation that she 
 would follow him, which she couldn't. 
 
 " You don't think your brother really 
 meant that he thou<?ht evervthinij feminine 
 ought to be trained to show unselfish 
 devotion, whether it may hurt them or 
 not, do you ? " she asked at last after 
 a prolonged pause, during which Gwy had 
 been condemning his brotlier as an empty- 
 headed ass for being mirthful and talkative 
 about that well-worn theme — himself. 
 
 " Walter often says what he doesn't 
 
 mean when he wants to be amusing ; he 
 
 certainly would never exact devotion that 
 VOL. L i) 
 
130 UTTEELY MISTAKEN 
 
 might be detrimental to tlie one who ex- 
 hibited it from any one man or woman. 
 He's the most unselfish fellow that ever 
 lived," he added warmly, regretting that he 
 had called Walter " an empty-headed ass " 
 in his thousrhts two minutes before. 
 
 " He was telling my brother last night 
 that we ought to go on into Cornwall, and 
 asking us all to pay him a visit if we did. 
 But we're such a troop, aren't we ? — unless 
 Bessie decides to send the children and 
 nurses home, or leave them here. He said 
 he should invite ]\irs. Poynter too ; do you 
 think she will go ? " 
 
 "Can't possibly say." The thought of 
 showing Mrs. Poynter the old home that 
 was so dear to him was very pleasant to 
 him, though Walter was the master of it, 
 and she would be Walter's guest. 
 
LAUKA IS KEMINISCENT. 131 
 
 "You would be one of the party I suppose, 
 wouldn't you, Mr. St. Austle? " 
 
 "Yes, I haven't been there for a long 
 time ; I'm longing to see the old place 
 again." 
 
 " I have the photographs you gave me of 
 the entrance-hall and drawing-room still. It 
 must be a beautiful place, and such a pretty 
 name too, Trehearne Towers " 
 
 "Trelyn Towers!" corrected Guy. 
 
 "Trelyn! well that's just as pretty, isn't 
 it ? " She was quite approving in her 
 manner. 
 
 " Good God ! I loved this woman once," 
 thought Guy, "and all the time she was 
 thinking it would be pleasant to be the 
 mistress of the house with a pretty name." 
 
 In thinking this he did Laura an injustice. 
 Her interest in the home of his forefathers 
 
132 UTTEKLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 had been partly feigned to please liim in the 
 old days. Her forgetfulness of its proper 
 name was a (genuine thincr now, when she 
 met and wished to please him again, for she 
 was, as she had a habit of admitting, a very 
 stupid woman, who had little or no memory 
 of anything outside the margin of her daily 
 life. 
 
 
CHAPTER Vn. 
 
 A YOUNG AVENGER. 
 
 " May I come and see you to-morrow ? it 
 would be so kind of you to let me ? " Laura 
 asked in a sudden access of intensely 
 friendly feeling towards Mrs. Poynter, when 
 the party were separating that night. 
 
 "Eemember we start for our tandem 
 drive to Porlock at half- past ten," Sir Walter 
 put in remindingly. 
 
 " Oh ! I forgot that plan," Laura said, 
 blushing vividly. She had been brought up 
 in rather a rigid school of surface respect- 
 ability, and .she could hardly conceive the 
 idea that a woman who looked j?o proper as 
 Mrs. I'oynter would take a lung drive in the 
 
134 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 dashing style which surrounds a tandem 
 like an atmosphere, alone with a couple of 
 young men, unless she were engaged to one 
 of them. 
 
 Mrs. Poynter frowned thoughtfully, not 
 angrily. She fathomed Laura's meaning at 
 once, and recognised the justice of it. 
 *' Even at my age I have no right to do 
 this," she thought. Then she said (and 
 her answer was addressed to the brothers 
 as much as to Laura) : 
 
 " I had not forgotten it, but I don't think 
 I ever heartily assented to it. I shall ask 
 them to excuse me, and so I shall be able 
 and very glad to receive you to-morrow, 
 Miss Davis." 
 
 "But I don't feel a bit like excusing you ; 
 I've secured the tandem, and don't mean 
 to be defrauded of the object for which I 
 
A YOUNG AVENGER. 135 
 
 secured it," Sir Walter put in jestingly, but 
 with real earnestness of purpose. *' Come, 
 Guy, speak up ; we won't be thrown over 
 by ]\Irs. Poynter in this way, will we ? " 
 
 '* I like the idea of your pleasing your- 
 self in every way, and I don't like the idea 
 of your being driven tandem along the 
 edge of a cliff that's only protected 
 by a little railing that is rather an orna- 
 mental feature than a protective measure," 
 Guy said, quickly, addressing Mrs. Poynter 
 and ignoring Walter's running fire of 
 protesting words.- lie had gleaned from a 
 glance at Mrs. Poynter that she did not 
 wish to become the object of his brother's 
 marked attentions, and though he felt 
 hopeless about her himself, he liked pro- 
 tecting her from any other man. 
 
 " That being settled, I shall look for you 
 
 
136 UTTEKLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 to-morrow, Miss Davis — " ]\Irs. Poynter 
 was beginning, when Mrs. Davis struck in : 
 
 "I hope you will all dine with us to- 
 morrow at eight, Mrs. Poynter. The 
 gentlemen will be home by that time from 
 Porlock, and they can paint the lily as 
 much as they like, and try and make you 
 feel sorry for what you will have missed. 
 We none of us know either Porlock or 
 the road to it, so we can't edit their 
 statements about the beauties of either." 
 
 This was a speech of unparalleled length 
 and perspicuity from Mrs. Davis ; but she 
 had been inspired by her husband to make 
 it in a brief, emphatic whisper, while the 
 argument about Mrs. Povnter's goino' or 
 not going to Porlock was being carried 
 on. She was very apt at acting on her 
 husband's hints and instructions. She had 
 
A YOUNG AVENGER. 187 
 
 been the recipient of many of lliem, and 
 she hud found that if acted upon impli- 
 citly they always tended to their worldly 
 welfare. 
 
 " ' Ilalf a loaf is better than no bread ' ; 
 my brother and I accept your invitation 
 with pleasure, Mrs. Davis, but I still feel 
 that you have behaved rather badly to us," 
 lie added, turning to Mrs. Poynter. 
 
 She could afford to smile, as slie did, 
 good temperedly, at his disapproval, for it 
 was clear to her that Guy thought she had 
 done right. 
 
 Laura Davis arrived at Gothic Cottage 
 the following day, looking deliciously crisp 
 and cool in an azure-hued cambric. She 
 had not been actuated by any particular 
 motive in asking to see more of Mrs. 
 
138 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 Poynter. She was only conscious of a 
 vague desire to find out if there was any- 
 thing between the widow, who was older 
 and not nearly as pretty as herself, and 
 either of the two brothers. She was also 
 quite willing to exchange the companion- 
 ship of her sister-in-law and the children 
 for that of this stranger, who had seen so 
 much more of life in its attractive phases 
 than she herself had done. Placid as she 
 was, there were times when Laura grew 
 rather tired of the comfortably luxurious 
 dulness of her brother's house. To make 
 a friend of Mrs. Po^^nter might turn out to 
 be an advantageous thing. " She might 
 like to have a girl to stay with her some- 
 times in the season, it would be as nice for 
 her as for me," Laura, who knew nothing 
 of the existence of the step- daughter. 
 
A YOUNG AVENGER. 139 
 
 thought, as she glided down the Cliff rail- 
 way and made her way to Gothic Cottage. 
 
 She was so early in the field that Mrs. 
 Pdynter had not finished either her letters 
 or her breakfast. But there was nothing 
 discomposing about Laura. She was 
 neither aggressive, nor apologetic. She made 
 no laborious efforts to explain away or 
 account fur her premature presence, but 
 just told the truth and took the offered 
 coffee and toast in a simple, straightforward 
 way that was characteristic of her. 
 
 "Getting up early always makes me 
 hungry, and I got up quite early to see the 
 St. Austles start in their tandem. They 
 looked so nice, and so much alike sitting 
 there side by side. I don't wonder that 
 you wished to go with them. What made 
 you alter your mind ? " 
 
140 UTTEKLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 There vras not the shadow of impertinence 
 in this bold question. Laura had no 
 intention of being intrusively curious, and 
 Mrs. Poynter was neither secretive nor 
 suspicious. 
 
 "I was hurried into accepting Sir 
 Walter's invitation by that powerful, carry- 
 all-before-it manner of his. I had re- 
 pented it at leisure during our drive yester- 
 day, and I was very much obliged to you 
 for giving me an excuse for getting out 
 of it." 
 
 "When I heard you were going with 
 them I thought you must be engaged to 
 one or other of them. One would think 
 that naturally, wouldn't one ? " Laura 
 questioned earnestly. 
 
 " I am not engaged to either of them, so 
 for their sakes as well as my own I am 
 
A YOUNTt avenger. 141 
 
 glad I dkln't go with them, as our action 
 would have been so — so foolishly mis- 
 construed." 
 
 " You would have thoucfht the sam3 
 thing if you had heard they were going to 
 take me." 
 
 " I am a much older woman than you 
 are, moreover my position is different. I 
 am a matron of many years' standing." 
 
 Laura nodded her head slowly in assent, 
 and looked thoughtfully at her hostess. 
 
 "Still I am glad I didn't go," Mrs. 
 Po}Titer went on lightly. 
 
 " And I am glad too — as you're not 
 engajred to one of them. I shouldn't have 
 liked to hear things said that Eobert and 
 Anna would have been sure to say. They 
 are both very particular, and they would 
 have blamed the St. Au.«?tles just as much 
 
1-J2 UTTEKLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 as they would j^ou, if they had thought 
 they were carrying on with you without 
 being engaged." 
 
 " But now the minds of your family and 
 yourself will be set at rest," Mrs. Poynter 
 said, laughing. 
 
 They rose as she spoke, and Laura's eyes 
 fell upon a long, low table on which were 
 arranged Mrs. Poynter 's writing-case, 
 several bowls of roses and two or three 
 photographs, but Guy's was not among the 
 latter she noticed with some satisfaction. 
 
 " You don't give Mr. St. Austle's photo- 
 graph a place of honour on your writing- 
 table ? " 
 
 " I haven't it on my writing-table." 
 
 " Oh ! but who is this? " Laura exclaimed, 
 picking up a framed miniature on ivory. 
 " What a wonderful face ! Is it a fancy 
 
A YOUNG AVENGER. 143 
 
 picture, or a likeness of anyone you 
 know ? " 
 
 " It's a likeness of my step-daughter, Ella 
 Poynter, done by herself." 
 
 " Does it flatter her ? " 
 
 " You will be able to judge soon. I have 
 heard from her this morning. She wishes 
 to come and join me here." 
 
 " How clever she must be to paint any- 
 thing so beautiful as that.''* 
 
 "I have no doubt you will see some 
 more of her work when she comes down," 
 Mrs. Poynter replied, with a scarcely per- 
 ceptible shiver ; " when it's a labour of love 
 it's exquisite, as in this instance." She 
 pointed to the miniature. 
 
 " lias she ever painted you ? " 
 
 "Yes," Mrs. Poynter replied, laughing 
 again. 
 
144 UTTERLY MISTAKEN^. 
 
 " Was that a labour of love ? — ^is it 
 exquisite ? " Laura persisted, and Mrs. 
 Poynter seemed to be weary of the subject, 
 for she answered abruptly : 
 
 " She painted what she saw in my face, 
 no doubt, but the result is not pleasing." 
 
 " I wonder if she would make a good 
 picture of Mr. St. Austle — has she ever 
 painted men ? " 
 
 " Never from life that I'm aware of," said 
 Mrs. Poynter, answering the last portion 
 of Laura's speech only. " Now shall we 
 go and idle awa}' an hour or two by the 
 Glen Lyn falls ? Shall we take books, or 
 rely upon one another for entertainment?" 
 
 " I like talkinnj better than readini?, but 
 I'll take a book if you like," Laura agreed 
 amiably. So Guy St. Austle's latest work 
 was put into her hands and she dived into 
 
A YOUNG AVEXGEK. 145 
 
 its pages at intervals through the hours of 
 the morning. 
 
 " I wonder who all these people are ? Do 
 you think they're real, do you think he will 
 ever put you or me in a book, '^Lr6. 
 Poynter ? I shouldn't like it at all." 
 
 " If he does you'll never know it ; we 
 none of us see ourselves as others see us, 
 you know." 
 
 " But other people would know it and 
 
 they would be sure to tell me of it, 
 
 especially if I were put in disagreeably, you 
 
 know," Laura urged with more acumen 
 
 than Mrs. Poynter had given her credit for 
 
 possessing. Then there was silence for a 
 
 few minutes. For the one woman it was 
 
 filled with an.\i(ju.s, half remorseful, half 
 
 resentful thoughts. For the other, it was 
 
 filled with vain conjectures as to why Mrs. 
 VOL. I. 10 
 
146 UTTEELY MISTAKEN. 
 
 Poynter and her step-daughter didn't like 
 one another. " Can it be about Guy, I 
 wonder ? " she thought. " Stupid, some 
 women ! if a man likes you best he tells you 
 so, and if he likes someone else better than 
 you, what is the use of worrying about it ? " 
 It was a happy philosophy, and Laura not 
 only preached it to herself, but practised 
 it pretty faithfully. 
 
 " I feel as if we had become great friends," 
 Laura said kindly when they were parting 
 that morning ; " it will be so nice our all 
 going down to Cornwall together, and when 
 we £^0 home asrain I shall always feel 
 that I've someone to go to when you're in 
 town." 
 
 " My step-daughter's appearance on the 
 .scene will probably alter all my plans. 
 Ella yery rarely asks me to do anything for 
 
A YOUNG AVENGER. 147 
 
 her, when she does I feel bound to do 
 it. She may not wish to go to Trelyn 
 Towers." 
 
 " Oh, I hope she will," Laura said fer- 
 vently. " She might paint us all." 
 
 " She might," Mrs. Poynter rejoined 
 
 dryl}-. 
 
 m * * * * 
 
 It made quite a little sensation among 
 them all that night at dinner, this promised 
 visit from Mrs. Poynter's hitherto unknown 
 step-daughter. Mrs. Poynter had naturally 
 not carried the miniature in her pocket, nor 
 did she reply very eloquently to the en- 
 quiries about Ella. But Laura was rapturous 
 in her description of the " sweet little 
 dark face and purple eyes with the curly 
 lashes." 
 
 "Aren't you longing to see her?" she 
 
 10* 
 
148 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 enquired of Guy, and he replied carelessly 
 but truthfully, " Not a bit of it." 
 
 He had discovered that Mabel did not 
 wish her to come. 
 
 Meantime the cause of this excitement 
 was quietly and quickly making her pre- 
 parations to join the one woman in the 
 world for whom she had as hearty a dislike 
 as she had an unmitigated contempt. 
 She had every reason to think herself well 
 justified in nursing both these feelings. For 
 something had transj)ired at the time of 
 her father's death which made her vow 
 girlish vengeance against the woman whom 
 she had never liked as her father's wife. 
 Why this dislike should have intensified 
 from that time Mabel Poynter did not know, 
 for she was ignorant of the existence of 
 the weapons which Ella meant to use 
 
A YOUNG AVEKGER. H9 
 
 against her in the fulness of time, when 
 a good crushing opportunity arose. The 
 girl thought the opportunity had arisen 
 now, and was coming down to Lynmouth 
 with her weapons in her travelling trunk, 
 prepared to use them without compunction. 
 She sharpened them by recalling the 
 splenetic look, and peevishly suspicious 
 expression and manner which had so hurt 
 and pained her in her father during the last 
 few months of his life. The girl had adored 
 her father to the end, and had been adored 
 by him in return till that unwanted 
 Mabel had intervened to make him first 
 selfishly happy, and towards the end sel- 
 fishly miserable. Ella had resented his 
 happiness with her mother's successor to 
 a certain degree. But this resentment was 
 as nothing to that which she felt when she 
 
150 UTTEELY MISTAKEN. 
 
 discovered that the unwanted woman had 
 made her father's last days a torment to 
 him. 
 
 " She shall be punished for it ! " she had 
 sworn, as she knelt in the room in which 
 her father had died the dsij after the funeral, 
 after having gathered together a bundle 
 of his carelessly-kept papers. "I don't 
 know how, or when, or why! but she 
 shall be punished, by me." 
 
 She was not a dramatic j'oung person by 
 an}^ means, the one who took this task of 
 vengeance upon herself. But she was an 
 unfortunate combination of artistic tem- 
 perament, meagre education, and warm 
 heart. Her one great gift was that of 
 portraiture, and though she often failed 
 in the draughtsmanship of the accessories, 
 she never failed in expression or colouring. 
 
A YOUNG AVENGER. 161 
 
 She painted what she saw with rare feeling, 
 exquisite delicacy, fidelity, and subtle sym- 
 pathy. But in painting what she saw she 
 frequently painted what her sitters had not 
 meant her to see. 
 
 Perhaps she had done this in the case 
 of her step-mother, as the latter told Laura 
 Davis that " Ella painted what she saw in 
 my face, but the result is not pleasing." 
 
 " She hasn't dared to refuse to have me, 
 though she hates my going there," Miss 
 Poynter said gleefully to herself, as she 
 read the few lines in which Mrs. Poynter 
 agreed to receive her at L}nmoutli. She 
 had packed her trunks before she had 
 received the letter, but now she raised the 
 lid of an unstrapped one and laid several 
 pencilled and painted studies of a head 
 on the top of everything else 
 
152 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 " I shall ask Mabel Poynter to undo my 
 boxes for me, and the first thing she will 
 see will be these studies of Guy St. 
 Austle, head and face ! That will make 
 her shiver, for she'll think it's love of his 
 good looks that has made me take the 
 trouble to make so many sketches of him. 
 I love to see her looking vexed and anxious, 
 and not daring all the time to ask me why 
 I do it. Perhaps she'll send him away 
 before I get there! If she does I shall 
 feel sure that he is the man. If he is! — 
 poor papa ! — poor darling, shamefully-used 
 papa! — you will know wherever you are 
 that your little daughter has not forgotten 
 you and loves you dearly stiU." 
 
 Ella carried out her programme to the 
 letter. There was scant courtesy, and no 
 cordiality whatever in the way in which 
 
A YOUNG AVENGER. 153 
 
 she greeted the woman on whom she had 
 in a measure forced herself. Nevertheless, 
 she made that woman useful. 
 
 " Come to my room with me, j\Irs. 
 Po}'nter, and help me to undo my boxes," 
 she said, with the slight imperiousness, 
 not to say insolence, which had charac- 
 terised her manner to Mrs. Poynter ever 
 since her father's death. And when Mabel 
 lifted the cover and saw the various pro- 
 files, three-quarter and full faces of Guy 
 St. Austle, that were scattered about, Ella 
 observed scornfully : 
 
 " Been at my favourite work you see ? 
 I am never tired of making sketches 
 of that man, for I fancy he and I will 
 have something to say to one another one 
 day." 
 
 "That day may be sooner than you 
 
154 L'TTEELY MISTAKEN. 
 
 think, for ' that man ' is staying at Lyn- 
 mouth now." 
 
 " I knew it," Ella said coldly. Her step- 
 mother looked up at her qiiickty, and Ella 
 thought she read fear in the glance, fear 
 and distrust. 
 
 It is so essentially human to see in the 
 face of one whom we suspect the reflection 
 of our suspicion So-and-so, has wronged 
 us, we think, in some way, large or small. 
 Accordingly, when we meet probably un- 
 conscious So-and-so, we read confusion or 
 defiance according to what we have decided 
 he is feeling, in his totally expressionless 
 gaze. We look at him with angrj^ embar- 
 rassment unintentionally, and as in a 
 looking-glass we see the look repeated on 
 his face. Or we deem him so hopelessly 
 regardless of the debt he owes us, that 
 
A YOUNG AVENGER. 155 
 
 we glance at him with careless scorn ! and 
 lo ! " careless scorn" lurks in the pose of 
 his haughtily averted head, and under the 
 lowered lids of his scornfully averted eyes. 
 In fact, when we scowl at the world it 
 scowls back at us promptly. When we 
 doubt it, it doubts us with tenfold force. 
 When we lie in wait to catch it tripping, it 
 has us by the heels in no time. When we 
 loathe and would shun it, it pays back our 
 loathing with ten per cent, interest, and 
 resigns us without so much as holding a 
 fm^er out to hold us back. 
 
 But if we " love " our portion of it, it 
 loves us with regal largeness in return. 
 
CHAPTER Vm. 
 
 LAUEA " CLINCHES IT ! " 
 
 "Why has she come? You say she has 
 never Hked you. (There must be some- 
 thing wrong about her, if that's the case.)" 
 This last sentence parenthetically to him- 
 self. 
 
 " She has a right to share ni}' home, 
 wherever it may be." 
 
 " Honestly, Mrs. Poynter, I must tell you 
 that I don't think your step-daughter bears 
 any one of our party any particular good- 
 wiU." 
 
 " But she knows nothing, absolutely 
 nothing, about any one member of it, with 
 the exception of myself, and I certainly 
 
LAURA " CLINCHES IT!" 157 
 
 am not conscious of having deserved her 
 ill-will. Believe me, Sir Walter, there is 
 nothing but girlish, almost childish, petu- 
 lance beneath that suppressed manner 
 which irritates you so much. I came in 
 her way and took her place as mistress of 
 her father's house, when it was the height 
 of her childish ambition to fill that place. 
 She felt sore, she has cultivated the sore- 
 ness, and it's added to by the fact that she 
 is to a great extent dependent on me. I 
 pity poor Ella from the bottom of my 
 
 heart, but " 
 
 There was a rustle in that portion of the 
 library at Trelyn Towers which was 
 screened oflf from the rest of the room to 
 make a cosy writing corner for the lady 
 visitors who preferred it to their own rooms, 
 and Ella stepped out into the dumb- 
 
158 UTTEELY MISTAKEN. 
 
 foundered presence of her step-mother and 
 Sir Walter St. Austle. 
 
 "Don't waste any pity on me for being 
 dependent on you, Mrs. Poynter ; I will try 
 to pay all my debts to you in time " 
 
 The girl began her speech with a poor, 
 pathetic attempt at dignity, but before she 
 had spoken a dozen words she lapsed into 
 furious raj)idity, an always feeble error. Her 
 clear, olive skin glowed with an angry red ; 
 her humid purple eyes deepened into black 
 behind their long, curly lashes ; and her 
 slender, lithe little form quivered with the 
 emotion she longed to pourtray imposingly. 
 
 " Ella ! " Mrs. Poynter began, in utter 
 astonishment. Then she added impatiently ; 
 " Don't talk such folly ! Some people 
 might make the mistake of thinking you 
 meant it." 
 
LAURA "CLINCHES IT!" 169 
 
 For once Ella felt cowed and confused. 
 She could not delude herself into fancying 
 that she had either embarrassed or alarmed 
 her step-mother by the childish petulance 
 with which she had thrown down her little 
 glove. But that she had annoyed ]\Irs. 
 Poynter was evident. Mrs. Poynter an- 
 noyed and not frightened would be no 
 sport at all. After all, those weapons 
 which were concealed in Ella's writing-case 
 would not very seriously wound a foe who 
 ofTered an armour of either indifference or 
 defiance to their poisoned points. But 
 would she remain either indifferent or de- 
 fiant if Mr. St. Austle saw them bared 
 to strike her ? Xo ! Ella, after a week's 
 keen observation of the pair in the de- 
 lightful unrestraint of a bachelor's country 
 house, thought decidedly not. 
 
160 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 Against her sense of right, against 
 her better judgment, even against her 
 instinct of self-preservation, which was as 
 keen in her as it is in most women, Mrs. 
 Poynter had come to Trelyn Towers and 
 had brought Ella with her. Being with 
 Guy daily, hourly almost, in his own old 
 home was dearly pleasant to her at times, 
 and at others desperately painful. The 
 pleasant times were when he was taking 
 her about in the gardens and shrubberies, 
 the stables and kennels, telling her of the 
 days when he had ridden his first pony by 
 his pretty mother's side ; of when and 
 where he had shot his first rabbit as a tiny 
 boy of seven, and later on, when, as 
 proudly-elated chaps of ten, Walter and 
 he had gone out with the hounds with 
 their father, and not ridden merely to the 
 
LAURA "CLINCHES IT!" 161 
 
 meet with their mother, as in previous 
 years. Listening to him, sympathising 
 witli him, taking a keen interest in all 
 his half-suppressed, loving reminiscences of 
 his mother and those boyish days, she 
 forgot herself, and lapsed into such happi- 
 ness as startled her. When she became 
 conscious she was revelling in it. And 
 then she would draw back into her shell 
 of reserve, and cause him to feel that he 
 had made no more way with her than he 
 had that first day at Lynmouth, when 
 Walter came with boisterous, cheerful con- 
 fidence into their lives. 
 
 The painful times were those when 
 Ella's searching eyes were bent on her, 
 with a look tliat she felt was intended to 
 remind her of something which would be 
 
 bad to remember. But what that some- 
 VOL. I. 1 1 
 
162 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 thing was she could not for the life of 
 her imagine. For Ella could not know! 
 Certainly Ella could not know anything of 
 the only circumstance in her life which 
 poor Mabel Poynter desired to be buried 
 in oblivion. 
 
 There were other moments of perplexity 
 and embarrassment for her, in addition to 
 those just mentioned. Sir Walter had 
 fallen, in his gay unobservant way, into a 
 habit of treating her in a semi-fraternal 
 manner, that would have been delightfully 
 flattering to her had she dreamt for a 
 moment of relaxing her determination 
 never to marry his brother. But this was 
 a dream she would not allow herself to 
 indulge in. She had no fancy for hear- 
 ing her hero say, when the first love- 
 glamour was over, and the matrimonial 
 
LAURA 'CLLN'CHES IT!" 1B3 
 
 chain began to gall ever so slightly, that it 
 
 had been foreign to his tastes and against 
 
 his instincts that he had eaten of a fruit 
 
 which had been plucked by another 
 
 man. 
 
 " And even Guy would be sure to have 
 
 his moments of impatience and un- 
 
 generosity when he got accustomed to me 
 
 as his wife. All men have them ! And 
 
 all women too for that matter. And as 
 
 his wife I should be bound to listen to the 
 
 verbal outcome of these moods ! It would 
 
 be too awful to hear him say that he was 
 
 sorry I had ever belonged to another 
 
 man ! I love him so that I might get to 
 
 hate him, if he hurt me to that degree. 
 
 Whereas, now, I shall go on loving him to 
 
 the end, and he I — yes, 1 feel sure he will 
 
 go on wishing for me." 
 
 11- 
 
164 UTTEKLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 This was the line of argument she would 
 take, against her impulses, in favour of 
 love and Guy, every night when she got 
 herself into her own room alone. She 
 would strengthen them considerably, now 
 and again, when she had been more than 
 ordinarily heavity tempted during the day. 
 For she was still vouncf enough to feel " the 
 maddened pulses glow " when his hand 
 pressed hers, or his eyes seemed to burn 
 as he held her under their spell. In fact 
 she was very much in love with her fine, 
 handsome, clever lover, very much in love 
 with him, very proud of him, very jealous 
 of him, and it may be added very much 
 afraid of ever becoming his wife. 
 
 There was a second light romance 
 going on in the house, of which no one 
 seemed to take much heed, thou2"h in 
 
LAURA "CLINCHES IT I" 165 
 
 reality the Davises were desperately alive to 
 
 it, and desperately desirous that it should 
 
 culminate iu a speedy common-place 
 
 marriage, without any preliminary hitches 
 
 or jars. Mr. Davis had his own sound, 
 
 business-hke, strong reasons for wishing to 
 
 see his lovely sister well settled in life 
 
 soon, and Mrs. Davis understood the wish, 
 
 without knowing anything of the causes 
 
 which gave force and volume to it. 
 
 Sir Walter was very much enamoured by 
 
 this time. The constant sight of such 
 
 a lovely, good-tempered woman as Laura, 
 
 had brought him to the pass of feeling 
 
 that everything would look very leaden- 
 
 hued for a time, should he lose that sight. 
 
 Moreover, he admitted to himself that 
 
 " her dollars would come in very handy," 
 
 for things had gone wrong with his most 
 
1G6 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 promising two-year-old tlioroiiglibreds ; 
 so wrong that the colt could never be 
 started on any but an insignificant local 
 race-course, where it would have nothing 
 half as breedy as himself to beat. Further, 
 his famous sire, the Knight, for whom he 
 had paid four figures, had died of heart 
 disease. Altof^ether thincrs were lookinj? 
 very mournful, both in his breeding and 
 traininiT stables ; and thou2:li he made no 
 moan about it to those around him, he 
 beijan to acknowledcre that a rich wife 
 would be not only a luxury, but a 
 necessity for him. Laura was rapidly 
 becoming a most charming necessity to him, 
 but, great as the pace was, it was not half 
 fast enough for Mr. Robert Davis. 
 
 "I want to see Laura settled, well 
 settled, before another month is over our 
 
LAURA "CLINCnES IT!" 1G7 
 
 heads," he would say repeatedly to his 
 wife, who would respond feelingly : 
 
 " So do I, I am sure, Robert ; 1 should 
 have been glad to see her settled in a 
 home of her own years ago, but you gave 
 in to all her nonsense, and allowed her 
 to let good chance after good chance slip 
 through her finfrers." 
 
 o o 
 
 " This is the best chance she has ever 
 had, and it mustn't be let slip through her 
 fingers. I think he means straight enough, 
 but he's such a deuce of a time about it. 
 Why don't you drop in on them some 
 morning when they're spooning away in 
 the billiard-room, under the pretence of 
 his teaching her billiards. He'd have to 
 speak out if you saw any billing and 
 cooing going on." 
 
 *' Kobert ! you never asked me to do 
 
168 UTTEELY MISTAKEN. 
 
 anything so underhand before in your 
 life," she said, shocked out of her usual 
 aquiescent amiability. 
 
 " I never felt so underhand before in 
 my life," he replied irritably ; " it's no use 
 bothering you with my business worries, 
 Anna, so don't ask me anj^thing, but just 
 do as I tell you, clinch this matter with 
 Sir Walter as soon as you can." 
 
 After all the matter was clinched by 
 Laura herself, in a very justifiably 
 feminine fashion. 
 
 The whole party had gone to a ball one 
 night, that was got up by subscription among 
 any number of the adjacent families to in- 
 augurate the reign of good-fellowship 
 between the " County " and professional 
 townspeople, just before an impending 
 general election. It was held in the 
 
LAURA "CLINCHES IT : " 169 
 
 rooms of a picturesque hotel, rooms 
 that were normally devoted to the service 
 of bazaar projectors, political orators, 
 amateur theatricals, missionary meetings, 
 and other entertainments of a more 
 or less popular order. But they lent 
 themselves admirably to the require- 
 ments of a ball. The white-washed walls 
 gleamed snowily through wreaths of ivy 
 and trophies of flags. The summer houses 
 in the old-world garden that climbed up a 
 steep hill in a series of rough terraces, made 
 deliciously cool and sequestered "sitting- 
 out " rooms, and it was in one of these 
 latter that, when the night was well on, Sir 
 Walter St. Austle " spoke out," as Laura 
 afterwards described his action to her 
 brother. 
 
 There had been quite an easy flow of 
 
170 UTTEELY MISTAKEN. 
 
 conversation between them for at least 
 twenty minutes. Silence had always been 
 mildly abhorrent to Laura's essentially 
 sociable nature and chatty disposition. It 
 has been told how, in the days of her en- 
 gagement to Guy St. Austle, she had always 
 laboured under a faint dread of not being 
 able to catch on to his meaning, and there- 
 fore of responding in an irrelevant, not to 
 say an imbecile, manner. But with Sir 
 Walter she laboured under no such de- 
 moralising; fear. His remarks were never 
 over her head ; his loquacity never laid 
 her under the obligation of originating 
 a conversation. In short, she was at her 
 most placid ease with him, and her sense 
 of comfort made her a most soothing com- 
 panion to the excitable, volatile man at 
 her side. 
 
LAURA "CLINCHES IT I" 1.1 
 
 " Tliere goes your brother. Who is it with 
 him ? " Laura asked, pointing out a pair 
 who had just stepped out of one of the open 
 windows of the ball-room and were wend- 
 ing their way towards the river that took 
 its tortuous course through the j^arden. 
 *' Mrs. Poynter, I suppose ; he generally gets 
 with her when he can, doesn't he ? " 
 
 "In this instance it's Miss Poynter ; Guy's 
 not going to transfer his allegiance from 
 the step-mother to the step-daughter, I 
 hope, for somehow I don't quite like that 
 little girl." 
 
 "She's very nice-looking," Laura said 
 generously ; " sometimes her funny little 
 dark face is quite pretty (not nearly as 
 pretty as she has made it in her likeness of 
 herself, though), and her eyes are wonder- 
 ful. But I never sliould think her quite 
 
172 UTTEKLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 good enough for Mr. St. Austle ! I never 
 thought myself quite good enough for him, 
 you know." 
 
 She looked him so frankly in the face, 
 she so honestly meant what she said, that 
 Sir Walter was staggered into saying : 
 
 " Not good enough for him ! You're 
 good enough for the best fellow breathing, 
 a great deal too good for me, or I should 
 have asked you before now to be my wife." 
 
 "And I should have said before just 
 what I say now, that I shall hke very much 
 indeed to be your wife," Laura said with- 
 out emotion, but with agreeable earnest- 
 ness. "You know all about your brother 
 and me, so I have nothing to tell. He's 
 the only person I have ever been engaged 
 to before you ! And I never seemed 
 quite properly engaged to him, because I 
 
LAURA '-CLINCHES IT I" 173 
 
 was in a friirht for fear I shouldn't under- 
 stand him or bore him or something. 
 Now I don't feel that with you a hit,'" 
 she added heartily, and Sir Walter tried 
 to feel flattered by her expression of 
 absolute confidence. 
 
 " I can't be thankful enough that you 
 found out your mistake about Guy when 
 you did," Sir Walter answered gallantly. 
 He was trying hard to forget that Laura 
 had only found out her mistake about Guy 
 when it appeared more than probable that 
 Guy's fortunes would always remain at a 
 low ebb. It was more than probable he 
 thought now that the <Av\ had never cared 
 for Guy, and that she had been hurried 
 into the engagement by the wishes of her 
 family. " No such pressure was being put 
 upon her now I She was coming to him 
 
174 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 of her own free will," he told himself 
 proudly. 
 
 " I shall give your brother a hint of this 
 to-night! "he said in his joyous desire to 
 make every one around him as happy as 
 himself. 
 
 " Do ! " Laura said cordially ; " he has 
 been wishing for it so much." 
 
 The phrase sounded harshly in Sir 
 Walter's ears — " Wishin<T for it so much ! " 
 
 o 
 
 Then the possibility of it occurring had 
 been discussed in the Davis family. How- 
 ever, Laura couldn't help her people con- 
 jecturing about and diplomatizing for her. 
 He had felt all along that they were not 
 nearly as refined either in mind, manner, or 
 physique as she was. But what did that 
 matter ? He was going to marry her, not 
 them. 
 
LAURA "CLINCHES ITl " 175 
 
 "It's a little chilly; shall we go in? 
 That's a lovely waltz they're playing!" 
 she hazarded. 
 
 He put his arms round her and drew 
 her towards him. 
 
 "Oh, my hair ! " she cried gently, as he 
 kissed her. " The worst of the parted 
 fringe is that if half-a-dozen hairs get out 
 of place you look untidy." 
 
 " Never mind ! you'd look lovely if 
 every hair on your head was out of place," 
 he said rapturously. 
 
 " Oh, no, I shouldn't. I should look like 
 one of those classical creatures, Gorgons 
 aren't they called ? " she said laughing. 
 " Now, shall we go in and tell "Robert ? " 
 
 He would much rather have stayed with 
 
 her a Utile longer in the sequestered 
 summer-house, but her will was law in 
 
176 UriERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 these early days. So they went in, and 
 Eobert was told. 
 
 " There's no man in the world to whom 
 I should give my sister with so much satis- 
 faction," he said huskily ; and it was with 
 the greatest difficulty he restrained him- 
 self from asking, " when the wedding would 
 be?" 
 
 Meanwhile Guy had been drawn down 
 to the bank of the river by Miss Poynter. 
 He had been dancinsj with her, hearinsf 
 from her in fragmentary sentences that she 
 had for months been in the habit of makin^f 
 countless studies of his head. 
 
 " The first one was a slavish copy of the 
 big photograph Mrs. Poynter has of you," 
 she told him, " but directly I began to draw 
 your face I saw so much more in it than the 
 photograph shows. I think you will see 
 
LAURA "CLINCHES IT 1 " 177 
 
 yourself more in my studies of you, sketchy 
 as they are, than you ever saw in a Ukeness 
 of yourself before." 
 
 He was not in the least flattered. Intui- 
 tively he felt that the girl had some object 
 to cjain that she miofht turn him to ac- 
 count in gaininfr. It was neither love of 
 him nor admiration of him which had led 
 her to see more and try to reproduce more 
 in his face than the photograph had shewn 
 her. 
 
 "The portrait painter's is a charmingly 
 interesting talent ; you have evidently not 
 laid yours up in a napkin," he said care- 
 lessly. He was wanting to be back with 
 Mabel, and wondering what she would 
 think of his midnight promenade with her 
 antagonistic step-daughter. There was not 
 
 the slightest touch of sentiment, there was 
 VOL I. 12 
 
178 UTTEELY MISTAKEN. 
 
 not the faintest attempt on her part to 
 initiate a flirtation. In spite of her words 
 about his face and her power of reading it, 
 he saw that for some reason or other he 
 was more repellent than attractive to her. 
 At the same time he saw that he held a 
 deep interest for her. What did it mean ? 
 
 Suddenly she said : 
 
 " Do you believe in telling character 
 from handwriting ? " 
 
 "If there's any character to be told — • 
 yes!" 
 
 " Will you mind giving me an old scrap 
 of your writing ? " 
 
 "You shall have a folio of manuscript 
 that has come back with a proof of a story 
 to-day." 
 
 " Has your writing altered much since — 
 say several years ago ? " 
 
LAURA "CLINCHES ITI " 179 
 
 " Not much — not at all, I believe." 
 
 " Don't give me anything that's written 
 on lines," she said eagerly ; "I want what 
 will look like a bit of a letter." 
 
 "You shall have it without fail to- 
 morrow, and I trust you'll read a very 
 pretty character from it of me." 
 
 " Oh, it's no nonsense of that sort that 
 I'm thinking of," she said abstractedly, and 
 when he asked her what other " motive she 
 had for wanting a scrap of his writing," 
 she answered brusquely : 
 
 " That I am not going to tell you ; you 
 may know in time. I can't say, I don't feel 
 
 sure, but ! Now we'll go back and 
 
 danc€." 
 
 12' 
 
CHAPTER IX. 
 
 MRS. DAVIS SEES VISIONS. 
 
 " Now that the offer is made and accepted, 
 I shall tell St. Austle what's the truth, and 
 that is that I am due in town on important 
 business, and I shall take Laura and you 
 wdth me. She can't stay on in the house of 
 the man she's engaged to ; it's not the right 
 thing to do. But I hope before we go 
 the wedding day will be fixed for an early 
 date." 
 
 " But, Eobert, Laura must have time to 
 get her trousseau ! " liis wife said depre- 
 catingly. Her husband's recently developed 
 anxiety to get rid of his sister puzzled and 
 slightly alarmed her. But she was not an 
 
MRS. DAVIS SEES VISIONS. 181 
 
 imaginative woman. She did not go out of 
 her depth to meet evil half-way. 
 
 " Her trousseau be I mean can't she 
 
 and you together get her trousseau ready 
 in a month at the latest ? What on earth 
 should they Unger on for ? they're neither 
 of them chickens ! He'll be glad to settle 
 now he has made up his mind to it you'll 
 find, and I'll have no delays on our side." 
 
 " We can't ask him to hurry on the 
 marriage, Eobert. Laura's feelings must 
 
 be considered. Laura would be shocked at 
 the appearance of indecent haste." 
 
 Now that Laura was about to make a 
 brilliant marriage, Mrs. Eobert Davis felt 
 quite tenderly towards her. 
 
 " Laura's feelings ! Laura's fiddlesticks ! 
 There are other things to be considered 
 besides feelings now. Her interests are at 
 
182 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 stake. There's many a slip between the 
 cup and the lip. I don't want any slip to 
 happen here." 
 
 " What do you want me to do, Eobert ? " 
 
 " You leave St. Austle to me, but impress 
 upon Laura that there must be no shilly- 
 shallying on her part. When he presses 
 for an early marriage, as he will, she's to 
 agree at once without any mock-modest 
 hesitation." 
 
 " Very well ! I'll tell her. But I can't see 
 any reason for being in such a hurry. The 
 engaged time is the happiest of a girl's life." 
 
 Mr. Davis almost stamped with im- 
 patience, and permitted himself to speak 
 more roughly than he had ever spoken to 
 his wife before. 
 
 "Look here, Anna, if any confounded 
 nonsense of this sort is talked, and the 
 
MRS. DAVIS SEES VI-SIONS. 183 
 
 marriage is deferred, I shall have to thank 
 voii for half ruiiiiii'4 " 
 
 " Robert ! " the poor woman interrupted 
 pleadingly, " don't speak, don't look at me 
 like that. I'll do everything you wish, only 
 I can't see " 
 
 '* You surely can see to do what I tell you, 
 
 my dear Anna," he said more temperately, 
 
 and his dear Anna promised that she would 
 
 obey his directions to the letter. 
 
 « * « « « 
 
 Sir Walter not only met, but outstripped, 
 Mr. Davis's views on the subject of an early 
 marriage. He had not only brought himself 
 up to the point of being very much in love 
 with his beautiful, placid betrothed, but 
 some of her money would be useful to him, 
 and that right soon. His losses on the turf 
 and on his breeding farm had been heavier 
 
184 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 lately than anyone surmised, much less 
 knew — with the exception of himself and 
 his bankers. It was not at all immaterial 
 to him that the beautiful woman he was 
 going to marry was — through her brother's 
 wise investments and good management — a 
 wealthy woman. 
 
 " Davis is a fellow who would never 
 have anything to do with any concern 
 that's not as sound as a bell," Sir Walter 
 told Guy, when the latter asked " where 
 Laura's money was ? " 
 
 " Davis is a very long-headed, far-sighted 
 fellow. I haven't bothered myself about 
 details, but he told me the other day that 
 his ostensible business — the varnish — is 
 merely one of the smaller irons he has in 
 the fire." 
 
 " Sorry to hear it. I'm not fond of 
 
MRS. DAVIS SEES VIblONS. 1S5 
 
 unmentionable big irons myself," Guy said. 
 *' However, his affliirs don't concern us, so 
 long as Laura is all safe." 
 
 " 0, safe ! safe as houses," Walter re- 
 sponded confidently. Then he went on 
 to say that he was glad to find that his 
 brother and his bride-elect were on such 
 good terms ! 
 
 " Good terms ! " Guy echoed. " My dear 
 old boy, who could help being on good 
 terms with such an awfully sweet, nice 
 woman as Laura is, and always has been 
 since the day I knew her first ? You didn't 
 think I was going to bear malice because 
 she threw me over long ago, did you ? " 
 
 " Well, hardly ! " Walter said hesitatingly, 
 for he remembered how uncommonly pleased 
 Guy had been to be thrown over. 
 
 " It will come off soon, I hope. I want 
 
186 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 to see you turned off before I start for 
 Australia." 
 
 " Australia ? What are you going to 
 Australia for ? " 
 
 " Like the country, and want to run a 
 play in Melbourne before I try my luck 
 with it here." 
 
 " What an unsettled chap you are ! " 
 Walter said feelingly. 
 
 " Haven't had much to settle me yet," 
 his brother replied, half-smiling, half- 
 sighing. " ' Settling ' for me would mean 
 now subsiding in comfortable, apathetic, 
 selfish, semi-idleness in bachelor's quarters 
 in London, where I should run in a groove 
 and soon rust out. 1 have plenty of work 
 in me still, but to do it properly I must 
 get out of the old country for a time." 
 
 "How would Laura like Australia for 
 
MRS. DAVIS SEES VISIONS. 187 
 
 the honeymoon trip, I wonder ? — A grand 
 idea, Guy. I'll write and propose it to 
 her. Wlien must you go — August ? " 
 
 " I thought of leaving Plymouth in the 
 Maori Queen, on the 20th August " 
 
 **Then I'll ask Laura to make me the 
 happiest man on earth on the loth, and 
 we'll join you at Plymouth on the 20th. 
 I wish you were taking a wife of your own 
 out, Guy ; you'd settle fast enough then ! " 
 
 Guy pufled away unexcitedly at his 
 cigarette, examined the petals of a York and 
 Lancaster rose carefully, and said — nothing ! 
 
 " I was rather in hopes that something 
 would come of Mrs. Poynter's visit here," 
 "Walter went on nervously. lie was quite 
 boyishly anxious to see his brother as 
 liappy in holy wedlock as he himself 
 meant to be soon. It had always been so 
 
188 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 with Walter. He always had wanted to 
 see Guy in the possession of every pleasant 
 thing which fell to his own share. In his 
 inexperience he believed that his wife was 
 going to ]Drove the pleasantest thing the 
 world had yet bestowed upon him, so, 
 naturally, he wanted Guy to have a wife too. 
 
 " Something did come of Mrs. Poynter's 
 visit here. I got fonder of her than I'd 
 been before, and, God knows, that was 
 needless," Guy said gruffly. He hated 
 having his feelings laid bare and dissected 
 by the hand of fraternal affection. At the 
 same time he loved Walter better than 
 ever for showing such interest in him at 
 this crisis of his (Walter's) own life. 
 
 " And she ? " 
 
 "She managed always to put me off 
 when I was on the point of telling her so." 
 
MRS. DAVIS SEES VISIONS. 189 
 
 " Yet, if ever a woman was in love with 
 a man in her life, Mrs. Povnter is in love 
 with you," Walter said, as solemnly as if 
 he were stating a fact with which Guy was 
 presumably totally unacquainted. 
 
 " She likes me, I know that," the latter 
 said thoughtfully; "but something holds 
 her back. She's always holding herself in 
 check, yet there's no mortal reason why 
 we two shouldn't join hands and go along 
 the road together. No other woman 
 has ever interested me and fulfilled all 
 my requirements in a woman as she 
 does ; and I believe if she could be 
 made to speak out, that she would 
 say that it's the same on her side about 
 me. But some cursed shadow has stepped 
 in between us, and — well ! perhaps I may 
 find solace in dramatic success in Australia, 
 
190 UTTEELY MISTAKEN. 
 
 to say nothing of the smiles of Austrahan 
 girls." 
 
 " Do you think she loses under old 
 Poynter's will if she marries again ? " 
 Walter suggested prosaically. 
 
 "I don't know. That's a thing that 
 wouldn't deter her ; she knows I've enough 
 for both." 
 
 "She's a very independent-spirited woman. 
 She wouldn't like owing everything to her 
 husband, even to you." 
 
 " It's not that, I'm sure, but what it is 
 God only knows ! — it's a good motive, on 
 that I would stake my life. Mabel couldn't 
 be actuated by any but a good motive." 
 
 His eyes grew deeply tender as he spoke 
 about her, and the bluer eyes of his more 
 emotional brother filled with sympathetic 
 tears. 
 
MRS. DAVIS SEES VISIONS. 191 
 
 " Dear old Guy ! " lie said fervently. 
 " It's beastly hard that 1 should have it all 
 my own way, as I've had it all along, 
 while you, my other half, come in for such 
 a lot of roughnesses. I get the woman I 
 want above every other woman, and, as it 
 happens, she'll bring me the money I 
 happen to want at the present moment 
 also ; while you can't get the woman you 
 want, and who wants you, without regard 
 to money at all, but simply because there's 
 some beastly back-stairs, evil influence at 
 work between you. Do you think it's that 
 step-daughter?" Tlien he told Guy how 
 Ella had slipped out from the cosy writing 
 corner upon Mrs. Poynter and himself one 
 day, and repeated as well as he could 
 remember the words she had used. 
 
 " Poor little Ella ! it's rather rough on 
 
192 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 her to be suspected of scheming," Guy 
 said compassionately. Without being a 
 vain man there was human nature enough 
 about him to make him feel very tolerantly 
 towards a girl who had taken so much 
 trouble in doing justice to his characteristic 
 face. He had unquestionably interested 
 Miss Poynter he felt, though he did not 
 think for a moment that there was any 
 tender feeling in the interest. Her scarcely 
 veiled antagonism to her step-mother struck 
 him as being " childish," and absolutely of 
 no consequence at all. He attributed it to 
 her filial loyalty to her dead mother, and 
 rather respected her for the sentiment, 
 though he was sorry to see it levelled 
 against the woman he loved. 
 
 Just before leaving Trelyn — the party 
 had broken up and dispersed as soon as 
 
MRS. DAVIS SEES VISIONS. 193 
 
 Laura's en<?ai{eineiit to the host was 
 announced — Ella had taken Guy aside and 
 told him that she had "found out what 
 she wanted to know from his hand- 
 writing, and that what she had found out 
 had made her like him better than she had 
 done before." " Perhaps some day I may tell 
 you why I wanted it," she had added. " I 
 certainly shall do so if I can save you from 
 making a very, very, very terrible mistake." 
 At the time he had laughed at the comic 
 solemnity of her words and manner. Tliere 
 was something ludicrous in the idea of this 
 girl, who appeared to be rather slow-witted 
 and ill-informed on every other subject 
 than painting, taking him under her small 
 wing, and according him the promise of 
 her protection should need for it arise. 
 
 She had seen his smile of amusement and 
 VOL. I. 13 
 
194 UTTEELY .MISTAKEN. 
 
 been nettled by it. But slie had sliown no 
 resentment at the time. He was sure to 
 put himself in the position she had pre- 
 dicted. And then ! Well ! then it would 
 be time enough to let him know why she 
 had tried to familiarize herself with his 
 character through the mediumship of his 
 features and handwritincr. 
 
 Perhaps not even the bridegroom-elect 
 was more impatient for the wedding-day to 
 arrive than was his brother, for Mrs. 
 Poynter was to be one of the guests, and 
 Guy had no fair excuse for presenting him- 
 self before her ''until that time. Indeed, 
 she had told him that she and her step- 
 daujyhter would not ^o back to town till 
 the eve of the wedding, and though she 
 had told him she should "be moving 
 about " till that time, she had not given him 
 
MRS. DAVIS SEES VISIONS. 195 
 
 her flying addresses. So lie remained at 
 Trelyn Towers with Walter, and improved 
 the time by polishing up the play which he 
 intended taking to Australia with him. 
 
 It was well for Sir Walter at this junc- 
 ture that he had such a felicitous matri- 
 monial prospect before him, for another 
 piece of ill-luck befell him in his training 
 stables. This time it was " The Promise of 
 May," the filly who was intended to be the 
 " crop of the bunch of three-year-olds " 
 the following year who went wrong. Xo 
 blame attached to anyone, either to her 
 trainer or to the boy who rode her and 
 loved her better than his life, but a back 
 sinew was strained, and all hope of the 
 faultless filly being an Ascot winner next 
 year was over. 
 
 Meanwhile at Norwood preparations for 
 
 i;i* 
 
]95 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 Laura's marriao^e were beincr made with 
 the lavish hberahty which had been Eobert 
 Davis's great characteristic since he had 
 begun to amass weaUh by other means 
 than that of his ostensible business, the 
 manufacture, namely, of varnish. Every 
 friend, and nearly every acquaintance on 
 either side was bidden to the banquet and 
 ball which were to be given in honour of 
 the alliance. The contino-ent of aristo- 
 cratic people, Sir Walter's following, was 
 small in comparison with the masses who 
 belonged to the Davis faction. But they 
 (the aristocrats) were likely to make up 
 for the smallness of their numbers by the 
 magnitude of their condescension in coming 
 so far from the borders of their own world 
 as the merchant prince's house at Norwood. 
 And the City faction were nearly all rich to 
 
MRS. i>AVIS SEES VISIONS. 197 
 
 a degree that was revolting to the other side, 
 and fully equal to the latter in arrogance. 
 
 But the probably conflicting claims of the 
 rival factions at the forthcoming auspicious 
 function was a matter of supreme indiffer- 
 ence to the Davises. Laura herself was 
 bUssfully regardless of everything but the 
 supreme fact that she was going to marry 
 an extremely nice man, who would never 
 expect her to understand an}thing she 
 didn't care about ; be the mistress of an 
 extremely nice house to which she could 
 invite everyone who had ever been kind to 
 her for the purpose of being kind to them 
 in return, and do exactly as she hked with- 
 out having to " consult Anna." Not that 
 she had ever fancied that she writhed 
 and suffered torture under the harrow of 
 Mrs. Davis's rule, but she had always been 
 
198 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 good-temperedly conscious that the rule 
 was there, and that she would be restricted 
 by it did she ever attempt to venture 
 beyond its modest bounds. 
 
 Mrs. Davis was busily engaged with big, 
 muniticent household cares which she de- 
 lighted in encountering, as she was so well 
 supplied with the munitions of war to 
 meet them. And as for Mr. Davis, he had 
 far more important matters to think of 
 than possible collisions between the 
 " swells " whom he pretended to despise, 
 and those mighty moneyed magnates for 
 whom he had a sincere veneration. 
 
 As the day of his sister's marriage ap- 
 proached his spirits became so buoyant, not 
 to say boyishly volatile, that those who 
 knew him best — his wife and Laura — were 
 convinced that some more than ordinarily 
 
MR.S. DAVIS SEES VISIONS. 1U9 
 
 brilliant stroke of fortune had befallen him. 
 lie was so exuberant in manner that 
 visions of his being knighted — or perhaps 
 even being made a peer — for some big 
 financial service rendered to the Govern- 
 ment or the countr}^ at large, floated 
 cloudily through Mrs. Davis's rather vague 
 but trusting mind. She had gathered from 
 some source or other — not directly from 
 her husband — that he was connected with 
 a private bank, and she knew that bankers 
 were sometimes ennobled for no other par- 
 ticular reason than because they were 
 exorbitantly rich. She allowed herself to 
 dream of having a voice in the selection of 
 the title, and thought that the name of 
 their Norwood hou.se, " liezare," would do 
 very well. " Lady liezare ! " She almost 
 heard her name called out at the first 
 
200 UlTEELY MISTAKEN. 
 
 Drawing-room which she would of course 
 attend next season, and condescendingly 
 resolved that Laura, who would be Lady St. 
 Austle by that time, should have the honour 
 of presenting her. But like a wise woman 
 she kept these visions to herself, not even 
 hinting them to Laura, and concealing from 
 Eobert that she was noticing his exhilara- 
 tion of spirit and manner. 
 
 " Dear Eobert ! he wants to give me a 
 pleasant surprise by-and-bye " she thought 
 affectionately, and so she would not thwart 
 him in his intention, or blunt the point of 
 it by appearing to anticijDate the glories of 
 which she dreamt. 
 
 Poor Mrs. Davis ! 
 
CHAPTER X. 
 
 " ON BORDER-LAND 'tWIXT HATE AND LOVE." 
 
 Ella Poynter sat in her own room in her 
 step-mother's house in Kensington. It was 
 the prettiest bed-room in the house — com- 
 manded the best view of the not very far 
 distant gardens, had the sunniest aspect, 
 and was rendered more interesting than 
 any of the other rooms by reason of having 
 two or three odd recesses in it. It always 
 seemed to the girl herself that Mrs. Poynter 
 was trying to make up to her for some- 
 thing ! That "something" Miss Ella 
 shrewdly suspected would not redound to 
 Mrs. Poynter's credit if it were ever made 
 public. Ella believed herself to be on the 
 
2C2 UXTEELY MISTAKEN. 
 
 track of it, and she had no scruples in 
 following it up by fair or foul means. She 
 felt pitilessly towards her father's widow I 
 Years of unbroken kindnesses which she 
 had received from Mabel only made the 
 girl still more dislike the woman who 
 had stepped into her own dear dead 
 mother's place, and so acquired the right 
 and the power to show those kindnesses. 
 Her heart swelled with jealous rage as she 
 thought of " how happy she would have. 
 made dear Papa, how probably his happi- 
 ness would have kept him alive till now " 
 if this soft-eyed, fascinating, sympathetic 
 woman had not " wheedled " him into 
 marrying him. Ella always took it for 
 granted that Mabel had exerted all her 
 arts to lure the late Mr, Foynter into 
 matrimony, and she thought and spoke of 
 
" ON BORDER 'TWIXT HATE AND LOVE." 203 
 
 her step-mother to her most familiar friends 
 as having run after " poor dear Papa in the 
 most barefaced manner." 
 
 They had come back to town two or 
 three days ago, and now Ella sat in her 
 room comparing the scrap of manuscript 
 which Guy had given her with a well- 
 worn letter which was lying on the table 
 before her. Close by a very exquisitely 
 and faithfully painted miniature portrait of 
 Guy stood propped up on a small table- 
 easel. It annoyed Mrs. Poynter, Ella 
 knew, that she should possess so perfect a 
 likeness of Guy jiainted b}"" herself. There- 
 fore she had it very much cm evidence in 
 her room, and arranged fresh flowers before 
 it daily, after the manner of a shrine. 
 
 Moreover, another feeling than hatred 
 of Mrs. Poynter had cre})t into the girl's 
 
204 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 heart concerning this hkeness and its 
 original. From the moment she discovered 
 that his handwriting did not tally with the 
 writing of the letter before her, she had 
 allowed her artistic and womanly apprecia- 
 tion of his manly good looks to take 
 possession of her. She nourished and 
 cherished her fancy for him. idealising 
 him, and endowing him with many 
 qualities which she thought a man ought 
 to possess. But she did not give him 
 credit for the staunchness, the sincerity 
 and real, manly, pure honourableness which 
 were amongst his strongest characteristics. 
 
 That he had been and still was in love 
 with the step-mother of whom she (Ella) so 
 cordially disapproved she felt vexedly sure. 
 But this love should receive such a shock 
 soon, she resolved, as would kill it for ever. 
 
"ON BORDER 'TWIXT lUTE AND LOVE." 205 
 
 She gloated over the well-worn, much-read 
 letter that was lying open before her ! She 
 filled her mind and charged her memory 
 with some of its passionate phrases ! She 
 longed to know what manner of man he 
 was, he who addressed those hot, com- 
 promising words, in confidence that they 
 would be well received, to her father s icife! 
 There was not the slii^htest doubt about 
 it in Ella's mind. She had found the letter 
 ticketed " from my false wife's lover " in a 
 drawer of her father's writing-table just 
 after his death, before anyone else had 
 meddled with his papers. It never oc- 
 curred to her to think that there could be 
 any mistake about it anywhere, any weak 
 place in the strong chain of evidence which 
 she believed she had gathered into her own 
 hands against her step-mother. The terms 
 
206 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 in which that letter was couched were 
 plainly and unmistakably disgraceful and 
 dishonourable. Ella's cheeks had reddened 
 with burning shame when she read them 
 first, but she was hardened now by her 
 hatred of Mabel, and if the latter would 
 have been pulled down and crushed to the 
 earth by the publicity of them Ella would 
 have read them aloud without hesitation in 
 the market-place to-morrow. 
 
 It was as thoroughly compromising a 
 letter as a passionate, careless man has 
 ever penned to] the weak, wicked woman 
 who has trusted and confided in him. 
 It began by addressing her as his " own 
 darling, between whom and himself nothing 
 could come." It reminded her of a dozen 
 indiscretions of which they had been guilty 
 during " old Poynter's frequent absences." 
 
„0N BORDER 'TWIXT HATE AND LOVE." 207 
 
 It passionately averred that in all but 
 name he regarded her as his wife, and 
 implored her, his " own darling M.," to 
 come to him entirely and cast aside those 
 few remaining fettering scruples which 
 bound her to a husband and a home she 
 hated. It promised her ease, love, luxury, 
 if she would be brave and dare the world 
 instead of living the " crippled life of 
 lying to keep up appearances," which she 
 was stru^frlinir to do. It jeered and 
 laughed at, ridiculed and insulted the hus- 
 bapd from whom he had lured her. And it 
 wound up with the assertion that he was 
 "hers till death!" but there was no signature. 
 No wonder that the blood of the 'arl 
 whose father had been so tricked and 
 degraded, boiled as she read the scorching 
 phrases of illicit love. Xo wonder that 
 
208 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 she longed to wreak some subtle revenge 
 upon the fair-seeming woman to whom 
 this letter was written, and in whose guilt 
 she confidently believed. The only wonder 
 was that she had held her avenging young 
 hand so lorn?. But she had done so with 
 the hope of striking the more surely, and 
 now she was to be rewarded for her hardly 
 sustained patience she told herself, for she 
 would be able to strike the sinner a deadly 
 blow through her love for the honest, 
 honourable gentleman who believed her 
 (Mabel Toynter) to be a pure, virtuous 
 woman. 
 
 "When I'm sure of her, when he has 
 asked her to be his wife, and she has got 
 over her pretended reluctance and accepted 
 him, then I'll hand him this letter and poor 
 Papa's note upon it, and see him read it 
 
"ON BORDER TWIXT HATE AND LOVE." 209 
 
 before her face." This had been Ella's first 
 intention. But before long — as soon indeed 
 as she began to entertain warm feelings 
 towards Mr. St. Austle herself — she de- 
 termined to intervene with that damning 
 letter before Mabel could taste the delights 
 of being engaged to Guy St. Austle even 
 for a day. 
 
 She was making ready to throw down 
 the glove as she sat in her pretty room 
 surrounded by a dozen evidences of her 
 step-mother's thoughtful consideration for 
 her. They had only just come home, and 
 half the day had been spent in inspecting 
 and trvincT on the dresses and hats which 
 they were going to wear at Laura Davis's 
 wedding, two days hence. And now Ella 
 was resting a bit before she went down to 
 
 afternoon tea. 
 
 VOL. I. 1 1 
 
2]0 UTTEELY MISTAKEN. 
 
 " There are sure to be lialf-a-dozen 
 people buzzing round her, and if he's one 
 of the number I'll introduce a subject that 
 3'oung ladies don't generally discuss for 
 the sake of seeing that woman shiver," 
 Ella thought as she slipped into a tea- 
 jacket of a hue and texture that suited 
 her clear brown complexion and supple 
 girlish little figure well. 
 
 "Oh, it's hateful! hateful! to see a man 
 you like and could love worthily if he'd 
 ask you, taken up with such a piece of 
 vicious falsity as Mrs. Poynter," Ella said 
 aloud in her jealous, angry vindictiveness. 
 " But when once he has read that letter 
 written to her by a scoundrel whom she 
 loved while poor dear papa was alive ! he'll 
 hate her and leave her ! leave her and I 
 shall laugh at her, and she won't dare to 
 
"ON BORUEli TWJXT HATE AND LOVE." 211 
 
 turn round upon me. And he shall show 
 that he scorns her, ur I'll — I'll " 
 
 In her impotent wrath she did not know 
 what to threaten or what she was saying. 
 It was like a douche of cold water in her 
 heated face when, after knocking, her step- 
 mother's maid opened the door and said : 
 
 " My mistress's love, and will you come 
 down. Miss Poynter ? Mr. St. Austle and 
 other visitors are in the drawing-room." 
 
 " I will go down directly," Ella gasped, as 
 composedly as she could ; but, in spite of 
 her utmost endeavour to seem cool and un- 
 concerned, her agitation was very palpable. 
 
 "I think Miss Ella must have been j)lay- 
 acting all by herself," the maid told her 
 fellows at the kitchen tea that evening ; " she 
 was ranting away at a fine rate when I 
 knocked at her door, and when I opened it 
 
212 UTTEELY MISTAKEN. 
 
 there she was leaning on her elbows before 
 her glass, staring at her own face as if she had 
 never seen it before. I can't see anything 
 to make a fuss about in Miss Ella's looks. 
 She has pretty eyes, that I will say for her ; 
 but her skin's as brown as a berry. She's 
 not to be looked at in the same day as Mrs. 
 Poynter." 
 
 " She's a deal younger," the page re- 
 marked approvingly. He was in the inter- 
 mediate state, too old for a page boy proper, 
 and too 3'oung to be called a footman. 
 Still he was of an age to make observations 
 about the other sex. 
 
 Miss Poynter was her quiet little rather 
 repressed self by the time she reached the 
 drawing-room. Her eyes dilated and 
 deepened at sight of Guy St. Austle, 
 with whom she was doing her best to fall 
 
" ON BORDER 'TWIXT HATE AND LOVE." 213 
 
 desperately in love, wiili a view to wiuiiiiig 
 him away effectually from the pernicious 
 wiles of her abhorred step-mother. It was 
 clearly her duty to do all that was in her 
 power to save an honourable gentleman, 
 *' such a good-looking one too," from the evil 
 fate of becoming the trusting husband of her 
 (Ella's) father's false wife. It counted for 
 nothinix with Ella that the evil doer was 
 perfectly quiescent in the matter of Guy 
 St. Austle, that in fact she made no effort 
 whatever to beguile him or lead him on. 
 lie was beguiled by her, and he was follow- 
 ing her up, and Ella thought it a heinous 
 and mean sin on her step-mother's part 
 that those thini,^s should be. 
 
 The other visitors drifted away one by one 
 until Guy only was left. While the others 
 remained Mrs. Povnter had devoted herself 
 
2U UT'JERLY ]\:1ST/.KLX. 
 
 more exclusivel}' to tliem, leaving Guy to 
 be entertained by Ella, and wliile this state 
 of things lasted Ella let her purpose of 
 covering her step-mother ^vitli ignominy be 
 in abeyance. But as soon as Mrs. Po3'nter 
 was free to join in their conversation un- 
 fettered by the rival claims of other guests, 
 Ella began to work her own spirit up to a 
 properly vindictive pitch for the purpose of 
 overwhelming the wrong-doer with well- 
 deserved humiliation. She was panting 
 for an opportunity of introducing the 
 subject which should surely sting Mrs. 
 Pojmter, and presently that unconscious 
 woman made what Ella thought a good 
 one. 
 
 *'Have you seen Miss Davis since you 
 have been in town ? " Mrs. Poynter asked. 
 " I heard from her the other dav, she seems 
 
"OX EOliUER 'TWIXT HATE AND LOVE." 1:15 
 
 to be very happy. What a sweet, trustful, 
 unexactinfT nature she has ! " 
 
 "I went to call on them yesterday, with 
 Walter, and left that blessed individual 
 there to dine. They both seemed very jolly 
 I thought ; she will suit Walter splendidly, 
 counteract his restlessness and never irritate 
 his nerves by being irritable herself!" Guy 
 said heartily, and Ella put in sententiously : 
 
 "I hope she will never deceive your 
 brother, Mr. St. Austle. Those quiet 
 women have a way of deceiving their 
 husbands sometimes, I've heard." 
 
 "I don't think there's any fear of that," 
 Guy laughed ; while Mabel with a 
 heightened colour and rather a perturbed 
 manner, said : 
 
 " I don't think you or any of us are 
 called upon to discuss such possibilities." 
 
216 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 " I suppose you tliink that I, an unmarried 
 girl, ought to pretend to be ignorant of 
 such improper ' possibilities,' " Ella said 
 eagerly, with as near an approach to a 
 sneer as she dared venture to execute, 
 under the clear disapproving gaze of her 
 step-mother ; " but unfortunately," the girl 
 went on hurriedly, " they are possibilities 
 that one can't help thinking about, as 
 we see so many of them realized. Look 
 here ! " she added, picking up a weekly 
 journal, " see this long paragraph about 
 Lord Deriot having commenced divorce 
 proceedings against his wife. I wonder 
 how he found her out ? I wonder if he 
 found a letter from her lover ! — that's the 
 way half " 
 
 " Ella ! " Mrs. Poynter interrupted. There 
 was a ring of sharp pain in her voice as 
 
"ON BORDER TWIXT HATE AND LOVE." 217 
 
 she uttered the single word, that made 
 EUa's heart leap with malicious joy, and 
 gave Guy an uneasy feeling, he could not 
 fancy why. 
 
 " Why do you say ' Ella,' like that, and 
 try to stop me, Mrs. Poynter ? Mr. St. 
 Austle wouldn't believe me if I pretended 
 to be if?norant of such horrible thinjrs as 
 married women's faithlessness and sin. I 
 was only going to say that it's through 
 indiscreet letters — so I have heard — that 
 half the women are found out. Why 
 you're looking as much shocked as if you 
 had never even heard the subject mentioned 
 before ! Lord Deriot isn't like some 
 husbands I've heard of, he isn't going to 
 forgive his wicked wife and die quietly of a 
 broken heart." 
 
 Her eyes flashed lire, her bosom heaved, 
 
218 UTTEKLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 her words fell like shot on her hearers' 
 ears. Mrs. Poynter looked at her in 
 surprise, dashed with anger and pity. How 
 much did the girl know ? did she know 
 anything, or had she hit upon this terrible 
 topic in mere malevolent inadvertence ? 
 Mabel forced her mind away from the 
 subject and tried to re-introduce that social 
 calm in the atmosphere which Ella had 
 disturbed. 
 
 "You still mean to go to Australia?" 
 she asked of Guy, and he answered : 
 
 "Unless something very unforeseen occurs 
 within the next ten days." Then he went 
 on to tell her that there was a strong vein 
 of Colonial interest in his new play, and so 
 successfully took the conversation away from 
 those dangerous divorce depths into which 
 Ella had plunged it. But tliough he did 
 
"OS BORUER 'TWIXT HAl'E AND LOVE." 1'19 
 
 this, tlioiigli he went on ably seconding all 
 Mabel's efforts to keep the conversation on 
 a light social level, Ella saw that he looked 
 pained and thoughtful, and hugged herself 
 "vrith delight at the idea of having im- 
 planted the first seed of doubt in his 
 mind. 
 
 " It's my duty to Papa, to poor dear 
 Papa, who die'/ of that woman's wickedness, 
 to expose her, and save poor Guy St. 
 Austle from her toils. Why should she 
 have everything? Papa's money, and I 
 dependent on her ! and Guy's love ! She 
 ought to be punished in this world ; poor 
 Papa spared her, but I don't see that I am 
 called on to do it. She ought to go tlirougli 
 some of the open shame and misery (iiat 
 other women who have done wron;^' have 
 to suffer here. IIow do I know that 
 
220 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 she'll be punished hereafter ? she may repent 
 and be forgiven. Besides, if she is punished 
 I shan't know it. I want to see her 
 humbled here, and I want her to lose Guy's 
 love. When she's quite humbled and he 
 hates her, I think I can be kind to her, 
 perhaps ; I even might go so far as to ask 
 him to speak to her. But she must suffer 
 first ! — oh ! yes, she must suffer first." 
 
 It had become a fixed idea — more than 
 that, a religion — with Ella Poynter that she 
 was the chosen instrument throus^h whom 
 Mrs. Poynter's nose was to be brought to 
 the grindstone. There were moments when 
 she could not help remembering how 
 uniformly kind and considerate the ill- 
 starred woman had been to her (Ella) since 
 the day of her father's marriage until now. 
 But these were moments of weakness, Ella 
 
" ox BORDER TWIXT HATE AND LOVE." 221 
 
 thought, and so she lived through them and 
 blotted them out as quickly as possible. 
 They were most successfully blotted out 
 now, when bhe was forced to admit that 
 her step-mother was looking remarkably 
 attractive, and that Guy St. Austle was 
 visibly very much alive to the fact. 
 
 " How can he bear to hanker after other 
 men's leavings ? " tlie girl thought angrily, 
 " Oh, he shall know — he shall know that she 
 is not only poor Papa's widow, but that 
 she was a forgiven icife! — a woman some 
 other man left, and Papa had pity upon ! 
 He shall know it ! he ought to know it for 
 his own sake — and mine." 
 
 "We shall not meet again till the 
 wedding-day," Mabel was saying, very 
 decidedly, while these thoughts were 
 filtering through her step-daughter's little 
 
2-22 L'TTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 brain. " I hope tlie sun will shine very 
 brightly upon them, I hope every omen will 
 be auspicious that day." 
 
 Ella's body and soul knit themselves 
 together resolutely and strengthened her to 
 make yet another effort to corner and 
 confuse the wrong-doer. Her lithe little 
 figure shivered through every muscle and 
 nerve as she fixed her big purple eyes on 
 her step-mother as she asked : 
 
 " Did the sun shine brightly on yoic the 
 day you married Papa ? — were all the omens 
 auspicious then ? — if they were I don't 
 believe in omens." 
 
 " There was no sunshine about on the 
 day I married your father, it was mid- 
 winter, and a hard black frost reigned," 
 Mrs. Poynter said coldly. " Must you go 
 now, Mr. St. Austle ? I \^ on't say good- 
 
" ON BORDKR "TWIXT HATE AND LOVE." 223 
 
 bye, for we shall meet again before you go 
 to Australia." 
 
 "And so .shall we," Ella said eagerly. 
 " I want to give you a plot for a play, Mr. 
 St. Austle— a plot from real life !— I'll tell 
 it to you when I see you again." 
 
 " Younij ladies should know nothin^j of 
 plots or plotting," he answered carelessly, 
 and Ella felt insulted by his indifference. 
 
 frC3> 
 
 t>? 
 
 • — ##"• 
 
 Is (J 
 
CHAPTER XI. 
 
 " so HIGHLY RESPECTED ! " 
 
 "Mr. Davis seems to feel parting with 
 his sister terribly," several of the guests 
 remarked to one another, when — the cere- 
 mony over — they were strolling about the 
 reception-rooms at Eezare, looking at the 
 costly wedding gifts which were strewn 
 about. Laura's circle of friends and ac- 
 quaintances had been liberal in their marks 
 of approbation of her choice of a husband, 
 and of her lot in life being so admirably 
 well cast. The City people had come down 
 with such an amount of jewellery and 
 silver as would have enabled Laura to 
 start a jeweller's and silversmith's shop 
 
" so HIGHLY RESPECTED ! " 2-25 
 
 with a good stock-in-trade, and Sir Walter's 
 set Lad contributed a fair number of ex- 
 ceedingly pretty, if less expensive, articles. 
 Altogether, the show of wedding presents 
 was a very brilliant one, and Lady St. 
 Austle was radiant with pleasure at the 
 sight of it. In fact, the only person who 
 was not radiant with pleasure on the 
 occasion was the master of the gorgeous 
 house, the brother of the radiant bride, 
 Robert Davis, the millionaire and City man, 
 himself. 
 
 There was a magnificent banquet, to 
 which over two hundred guests sat down ; 
 and, in spite of Sir Walter's prayers and 
 entreaties, the speech-makers seemed about 
 to have it all their own appalling way, 
 when an awkward and startling interruption 
 occurred. 
 
 VOL. L l.j 
 
226 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 The oldest friend of the family, the donor 
 of the most magnificent of the three dia- 
 mond necklaces which had been bestowed 
 upon lucky Laura, had faltered and stag- 
 gered through numerous elongated and 
 involved sentences, and had wound up 
 with a burst of well-meant but incompre- 
 hensible emotion in praise and laudation 
 of the bride, and Sir Walter had replied 
 tersely and happil3^ Then someone else 
 had projoosed the health of their honoured 
 and estimable friend Mr. Davis, the brother 
 of the bride, and Mr. Davis was just getting 
 on his legs to reply, when the untoward 
 incident occurred. 
 
 It came in the form of that modern 
 messenger of Fate, a telegram ; and as 
 Mr. Davis read it, his jaw dropped, a 
 sickl}" pallor overspread his face, and he 
 
"SO HIGHLY RESPECTED!" 2.'7 
 
 sank down into his chair like one who has 
 had a bad blow or an attack of faintness. 
 
 Two hundred pairs of eyes were on him, 
 for the attention of the whole party had 
 been enforcedly bestowed upon him when 
 he rose to return thanks, and at least a 
 hundred pairs of lips questioned eagerly, 
 " What is the matter ? " He fought valiantly 
 for a moment with his weakness, rose up 
 again, thanked them briefly, and under 
 cover of the cheers and confusion that 
 followed, slipped out of the room, un- 
 noticed by every one apparently but his 
 wife. 
 
 In a minute she had followed him up 
 
 into his dressing-room. lie was standing 
 
 before an open escritoire, hurriedly filling 
 
 a pocket-book with bank-notes and papers, 
 
 his hands trembling like aspen-leaves, an 
 
 15* 
 
228 UTTEELY MISTAKEN. 
 
 unaccountable look of crouch in his 
 bearing and of dread in his eyes. 
 
 « Eobert ! " 
 
 Her hand was on his arm as she spoke his 
 name, with a ring of such tenderness in her 
 voice as he had never heard before. The im- 
 patient scowl which had overspread his face 
 when he thought that she had followed him, 
 " out of curiosity to pry into his affairs," 
 vanished as he realised the depth of loving 
 sympathy which her tender tones revealed. 
 
 "God formve me for having distrusted 
 her ; but my trust in everyone, in every- 
 thing, is shaken," he thought, as he stooped 
 to kiss her, at the same time putting her 
 gently out of the way. 
 
 " Go back to our guests, Anna dear. 
 They will think there is something amiss 
 if we are both absent. Go back at once ! " 
 
"SO HIGHLY RESPECTED:" ITJO 
 
 " There is something amiss," she said 
 sorrowfully. 
 
 " Xo, no ! — a mere business matter gone 
 a trifle wron^j. I must <io and settle it. 
 Go back to our guests ; be brave, keep up 
 a good heart ; don't — don't let them sus- 
 pect anything yet." 
 
 " Eobert ! " There was a sharp ring of 
 anguish in her tone now. " There is some- 
 thing wrong, terribly wrong ; I see it in 
 your face. Something dreadful is going 
 to happen. Keep me with you ! " she cried 
 suddenly ; " let me help you." 
 
 " You will help me best by going back 
 to our guests. I must go, now at once ; 
 time is of vital importance. I can't stay to 
 explain — I will write to you to-night. Go 
 back, and don't .say that I have left home. 
 Let them think I shall rejoin them pre- 
 
230 UTTEELY MISTAKEN. 
 
 sently. Go back! for Heaven's sake, go 
 back ! " 
 
 He had been hurrying a few articles of 
 clothing into a Gladstone as he spoke, 
 and now he stood, bag in hand, looking 
 strangely hunted and wild, she thought. 
 She read ruin in his face and manner, but 
 never for a moment did she think of how 
 she herself would be affected by it. Her 
 first thought was for him, her second for 
 the little boys, for whom she had already 
 begun to plan brilliant futures. 
 
 " Kiss the children before you go, 
 Eobert ? " she pleaded. " Yes, yes ! I will 
 go back to the company at once." 
 
 " Go ! kiss the boys for me. I will 
 write to-night," he jerked out. Then he 
 stepped to the window which opened on 
 to one of the terraces that ran up to the 
 
"SO HIGHLY RESPECTED!" 231 
 
 second storey at the back of the house. 
 " Good-bye ! I'll write to-iiiglit," he said, 
 smiling in a ghastly way that thrilled her 
 with far more pain than if he had scowled. 
 *' Keep up, Anna ; don't let them think 
 anything yet ! " 
 
 He was gone ! lie had sneaked out of 
 his own house in a way that shocked her, 
 but not a single doubt or suspicion of him 
 crossed her mind. Something terrible had 
 happened, that was clear enough ; and she 
 must do her best to help him in the way he 
 had commanded. Iler brain was throb- 
 bing, her hands were cold and clammy 
 with the anguish of her nervousness. But 
 after a moment or two she steadied her 
 limbs, and went back to the banquet from 
 which she had scarcely been missed. 
 
 To one or two of those who sat near to 
 
232 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 her she remarked, that " a business man's 
 time was never his own," dressing her poor 
 anxious face with a false smile as she spoke. 
 It seemed to her that every one at those 
 magnificently decorated tables must be 
 conscious of and wonderincf about the 
 
 o 
 
 absence of the giver of the feast. But as a 
 matter of fact, no one but herself missed 
 him, much less marvelled at his dis- 
 appearance. 
 
 It was a gorgeous feast, and no one was 
 anxious to curtail it. The different cliques 
 separated and respectively enjoyed them- 
 selves, each disparaging the other set with 
 much complacency. The few with whom 
 this story has to do were too happy in 
 their own immediate present to take any 
 note of the hostess' air of suppressed 
 distress. Sir Walter and his bride, as 
 
"SO HIGHLY RESPECTED l" U33 
 
 became them, were li^ht-lieartedlv in- 
 different to everyone but themselves, and 
 Guy St. Austle sat next to the woman 
 •whom he knew loved him as dearly as he 
 loved her, though she persisted in so un- 
 accountably holding aloof from him. On 
 his other side was Ella, well satisfied for 
 the time being to get his divided attention, 
 since she felt sure that in ifood time she 
 would be able to open his eyes to the 
 worthlessness of the woman who at present 
 held his infatuated heart in her unworthy 
 thrall. No I not his heart I Ella didn't like 
 to think that it was his heart which her 
 step-mother controlled. It was his vanity 
 that Mrs. Poynter flattered and ])y that 
 means obtained and maintained a pernicious 
 ascendancy over him. All — even the best 
 men are vain, the girl argued, and those 
 
234 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 horrid, middle-aged women, especially the 
 ones with wicked experience, knew exactly 
 how to pander to this special masculine 
 vein. " Now I will never flatter him ! Guy 
 shall never get anything but the simple 
 truth from me, however painful it may be 
 for him to hear it," the stern young moralist 
 thought. And all the while she was 
 flattering him by every art of which she 
 was the innocent mistress. Listening to the 
 few words he let drop for her individual 
 benefit as if they were valuable as refined 
 gold or diamonds of the purest lustre, and 
 (subtlest flattery of all) showing the 
 keenest annoyance whenever he gave 
 absorbed attention to Mrs. Poynter, her 
 words and wants. 
 
 There was no flagging in the hilarity. 
 All was going as merrily as the proverbial 
 
"SO HIGHLY RESPECTED!" 235 
 
 marriage-bell when Lady St. Austle rose to 
 go and change into her travelling dress. 
 Then for the first time she ol^served the 
 absence of her brother. 
 
 " Where is Eobert ? " she said, addressing 
 no one in particular, and her question 
 remained unanswered, for at the same 
 moment the butler approached his mistress 
 and whispered something to her rapidly. 
 
 In a few minutes confusion reigned 
 throughout the assemblage of unthinking 
 guests. Eumours were heard of a bank 
 having stopped payment under odd cir- 
 cumstances. The presence of the arm of 
 the law was felt in (he atmosphere. Mr. 
 Davis was wanted aiKl was not forthcoming. 
 Mrs. Davis when questioned was dumb with 
 shame and fear for the husband by whom she 
 was determined to stick whatever might be- 
 
236 UTTEELY MISTAKEN. 
 
 fall him. Strange men came in and assumed 
 airs of being within their rights when they 
 took possession of everything they found 
 on the premises, including Laura's wedding 
 presents. *' It's the biggest private bank 
 failure that's been known for half a 
 century," one of the unwelcome incomers 
 told half-a-dozen of the upper servants in 
 confidence, " and your governor's one of 
 the slipperiest rascals out. Lucky for him 
 if he isn't a lifer if he's caught, and he 
 can't have got far ; they're sure to catch 
 him." 
 
 The two women, the wife and sister, 
 rushed away into such privacy as they 
 could find, and cried together over the 
 appalling, inexplicable blow which had 
 fallen upon them. " Send everone away," 
 Mrs. Davis had implored of Sir Walter 
 
'•so HIGHLY RESPECTED!" 237 
 
 when the first murmurs arose ; " make 
 them all go. There's something dreadful 
 happened, and poor Robert has gone up to 
 the City to meet it instead of waiting here. 
 You know what Robert is ? You know that 
 he wouldn't waste a moment when business 
 calls him. Make all the people go, Walter ; 
 the sound of them in his house when he's 
 away from it in trouble drives me mad."' 
 
 " They shall all go and — 111 not take 
 Laura away from you to-day," Sir Walter 
 replied with an impetuous gulp. He 
 realised quite as fully as the unhappy wife 
 did that ruin had fallen upon Robert Davis, 
 and he grasped another fact which she 
 battled against entertaining yet. Ruin was 
 not the worst thing from which Robert 
 Davis had fled. Fraud and disgrace were 
 in the atmosphere that surrounded his 
 
238 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 abrupt and surreptitious departure. 
 " Thank God I can take Laura clear away 
 from it all," he thought, manfully, as he 
 faced enquiries and put the best colouring 
 he could upon the ugly subject ; " her sweet 
 heart would have broken for this trouble if 
 she had not had me to turn to." 
 
 When he said that he would not take 
 Laura away from her, all that was unselfish 
 in Mrs. Davis's nature rose up. 
 
 " Give me the only happiness I can have 
 till Robert comes back," she said ; " let me 
 feel that Laura is safe and happy and away 
 from all this trouble, Walter. He always 
 thought so much of his sister, you know ? 
 It would half kill him if he thought that a 
 business trouble of his spoilt her wedding- 
 day. And the trouble will be over soon, 
 whatever it is. Eobert has such a splendid 
 
"SO HIGHLY RESPECTED!" 239 
 
 head, and he's thought so highly of in the 
 City." 
 
 She spoke with a good show of con- 
 fidence in her own assertion, that all 
 would be well soon, and that Eobert would 
 come back, but all the time, poor woman, 
 her heart belied her words. Sir Walter 
 saw through the brave effort of wifely 
 loyalty, and knew that the kindest thing 
 he could do for the poor harassed woman 
 would be to rid her of the presence of 
 everyone before whom she felt it incum- 
 bent on her to hold up. So he dismissed 
 the guests with as little lame an explana- 
 tion as he was capal)le of uttering, and 
 prepared to take his wife away. 
 
 "Don't mind, dear," Laura said afTec- 
 tionately to her sistor-in-law as she was 
 taking leave ; " if Robert has lost a lot 
 
210 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 of money, he is welcome to the fortune 
 he has made for me. Walter would have 
 every penny settled on me you know, 
 so I can do what I like with it, and we 
 shall both like to give it to dear old 
 Eobert ! " 
 
 " Oh, Laura ! thank God, thank God, 
 your money is safe," Mrs. Davis sobbed ; 
 " his children and I have the ricfht to 
 suffer with him, but he has been a sood 
 guardian to you, Laura dear ? — a good 
 guardian, and a good brother ! I can 
 always feel proud of him for the way he 
 has taken care of you." 
 
 " And evervthiuCT will come rio-ht soon,"' 
 Laura said soothingly, between tears and 
 IS miles, " and until it does, Eobert must 
 use my money as if it were his own. 
 Walter is rich, we shan't want it ? The 
 
"SO HIGHLY RESPECTED!" 241 
 
 carriage at the door, is it ? Oh, I must go, 
 but it's dreadful to leave you like this." 
 
 She ran down hastily, trying to smile 
 hopefully at the frightened servants as she 
 passed groups of them who were standing 
 about to watch her departure. Her 
 brother's carriage was to take her to the 
 station, but she had scarcely seated her- 
 self, and been followed into it by her 
 husband, when a tumult arose. 
 
 Some of the men in possession objected 
 to such valuable horses being taken ofT 
 the premises under the existing circum 
 stances. In other words, the horses and 
 carriage were seized, and it was in a 
 common hired lly that Sir Walter and 
 Lady St. Austle drove away from liezare. 
 
 " You will let Hubert use my money, till 
 
 he gets his own back again, won't you ? " 
 VOL. I IG 
 
242 UTTEELY MISTAKEN. 
 
 Laura asked cheerfull}-, when they were 
 steaming away from Southampton to the 
 Isle of Wight, where the first few days of 
 their honeymoon were to be spent. And 
 Sir Walter could not help looking rather 
 rueful as he answered : 
 
 "Don't be very much cut up, my 
 darling, if we find that your brother has 
 used it already. Things must have come 
 to a terrible pass before this could have 
 happened," 
 
 Laura looked thoughtful, but not very 
 much distressed. 
 
 " J)o you think he will be poor now ? " 
 she asked ; " will they have to give up 
 Eezare? Poor Anna! — she was thinking 
 what a pretty title it would be if they 
 made Robert a peer." 
 
 " I don't think ' they ' are likely to do 
 
"SO HIGHLY KE.^PECTED:" 243 
 
 that," Walter said gravely, "but we'll 
 hope for the best, and if the}' have to 
 give up Rezare, we'll find a ])reltier place 
 for them down in Cornwall, near Trel3'n. 
 By the way, Laura, I think we will settle 
 down at Trelyn as soon as we can, and 
 give up the Australian scheme. What do 
 you say ? " 
 
 " I say that whatever you want to do is 
 best : I don't like the sea very much, and I 
 do hke Trelyn. Poor Robert ! he won't 
 like settling down in the country at all, so 
 I hope it won't come to as bad as that for 
 him. He's a City man, Ijorn and bred, you 
 know, Walter ; it will be hard to turn him 
 into a country gentleman." 
 
 "Very hard, but we must do our best," 
 said Sir Walter. 
 
CHAPTER XII. 
 
 MRS. GREG. 
 
 When Robert Davis escaped from his own 
 house and grounds unmolested, he counted 
 himself a fortunate man, in spite of the 
 mass of misery which had crashed down 
 upon him. The dread of being arrested, 
 like a common felon, had been upon him 
 from the moment that teleo-ram had been 
 put into his hands. Defaulter, forger, 
 swindler, as he knew himself to be, he still 
 retained a considerable portion of that 
 proper pride which becomes a prominent 
 City man. If he could once get out of the 
 country, without first standing in the dock, 
 life might still hold something worth living 
 
MKS. GREG. 246 
 
 for. He tried to bestow a little approval 
 iipou himself for having got Laura so well 
 settled before the crash came. This 
 marriage, which he had managed for her, 
 would in a measure compensate her for the 
 loss of every penny she possessed in the 
 world. At any rate, the St. Austle pride 
 would intervene between Laura, who was 
 one of them now, and want of any kind. 
 About his sister, he told himself, his mind 
 might be perfectly at rest. 
 
 Then he thought of his wife and boys ! 
 
 Perhaps for them it would be better if 
 he put a bullet through his head without 
 any further delay. As the widow and 
 children of a suicide they would receive 
 more consideration from a compassionate 
 world than they were likely to get 
 as the wife and children of a living 
 
246 UTTERLY MISTAKLN. 
 
 swindler! But, personally, the idea of 
 blowing out his -brains was repugnant 
 to him. If he could only get clear 
 away out of the countr}^, his Gladstone 
 was sufficiently well stuffed with bank 
 notes to enable him to make a new start 
 under a new name. Then Anna and his 
 children could rejoin him, and this dis- 
 tressing incident should be blotted out of 
 their lives. 
 
 He had roamed on in an indefinite way 
 w^hile thinking these thoughts. Instinct had 
 taught him to avoid the railway station, 
 wdiere he felt tolerably sure a detective 
 and a fond embrace from handcuffs were 
 awaiting him. He could not walk about 
 all day with that " infernal compromising 
 bag " in his hand. No one would think of 
 searching for him in the immediate vicinity 
 
MRS. GREG. 247 
 
 « 
 
 of liis own home. It was here, of course, 
 that seclusion and safety could be found 
 until the vigilance of the bloodhounds of 
 the law relaxed a bit. He turned down a 
 lane as his ruminations reached this point, 
 and found himself walkini:^ abreast of a line 
 of detached cottages of gentiUtv on the one 
 side, and a prettily planted row of evergreen 
 shrubs and fir trees on the other. In two 
 or three of these cottage windows cards, 
 bearing the words, "Lodgings to let," were 
 hanging up. He knocked at tlie door of 
 one of these, and it was opened to him at 
 once by a handsome woman, who struck 
 him at once as being out of keeping wilh 
 her surroundings. 
 
 " I see you have lodgings to let ? " he 
 began politely ; " I should like to take 
 them for a week or two, but I am a 
 
248 UTTERLY MISTAKEX. 
 
 t-transfer, an American ; I can't offer you 
 any references." 
 
 She had led the way into a pretty little 
 sitting-room as he was speaking, and after 
 asking him to be seated she went on care- 
 lessly : 
 
 " I am a strancrer here also. I can c'ive 
 you no references, therefore all I ask of you 
 is the rent, two guineas a week, in advance 
 for a fortnight. An American are you? 
 How singularly well and - without accent 
 you speak our mother tongue ! " 
 
 " It's a mistake to think that the nasal 
 drawl is indispensable," he laughed. He 
 was beginning to feel quite hilarious, and 
 as if he were playing in a light comedy. 
 Already his past life seemed to have re- 
 treated very far into the background. He 
 quite felt like the stranger in the land which 
 
MRS. GKI.G. 249 
 
 lie proclaimed himself to l)e. He wanted 
 rest and time to think so much ! " Anna 
 and the children would be right enough ! 
 someone would look after them until he 
 could pull himself together, and assume his 
 proper place again. Meantime this was a 
 snug little hiding-place, and the woman 
 who kept it was a lady, and wouldn't worry 
 him." 
 
 He unpacked and locked away his be- 
 longings in the drawers that were placed at 
 Lis disposal in the bed-room, and by the 
 time be went back into the adjoining sitting- 
 room it was six o'clock. The lonjrinir to see 
 an evening paper to read the })aragraph 
 about his own awful sma-sh was upon him, 
 but he did not dare to go out and get one 
 from the station. He rang the bell, and it 
 was answered by his landlady herself. 
 
250 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 "Is there sucli a thing as an evening 
 paper to be got near here ? " he asked ; 
 " have you a servant whom you can send 
 for one ? " 
 
 "Will you have The Globel it has just 
 been brought to me, you are welcome to 
 it," she told him. She brought it in 
 presently, and he saw that her eyes were 
 fixed upon a column, headed by the words, 
 in big letters : 
 
 "Fraudulent Failure of a Bank. Hun- 
 dreds Euined. Startling Eevelations." 
 
 His hand shook as he took the paper 
 from her. 
 
 " Thank you, Mrs. — Mrs. — I beg your 
 pardon ! I have not asked your name 
 yet ? " 
 
 "I am called Mrs. Greg," she said care- 
 lessly, " and your name is ? " 
 
MRS. GKEG. 251 
 
 " Denham — Eobert Denham," he said, 
 remembering, " providentially," as he said 
 to himself, that his linen and hat-lining 
 were marked E. D. 
 
 She looked at him with half-humorous 
 scorn in her dark purple eyes. " ^Mien 
 had he seen eyes like them lately ? lie was 
 sure he had seen those eyes before, but 
 where ? His memory was surely not going 
 to fail him? He began to feel profound 
 pity for himself, to feel that he had been 
 hardly dealt with in having received sucli 
 a bad blow, on what would otherwise have 
 been such an auspicious day in the annals 
 of the Davis family. 
 
 " What time would you like to dino, Mr. 
 Denham ? " she asked, laying what lu; 
 thought a most uncalled-for empliasis on 
 his name. 
 
252 UTTEKLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 " Eight, of course," lie replied sharply, 
 forgetting for the moment that he was not 
 speaking to his hired cook. " I beg your 
 pardon," he added hurriedly, " I should have 
 said I would dine at eight o'clock if quite 
 convenient to you." 
 
 " It will be as convenient as any other 
 hour, Mr. Denham. I am new at the trade 
 of ' landlady ' — almost as inexperienced I 
 fancy as you are at the profession of 
 lodger " 
 
 " What do you mean ? " he interrupted 
 nervously. Was he to be harassed still 
 further by this odd-looking woman's innuen- 
 does and suspicions ? 
 
 " I onl}' meant — what I said," she laughed ; 
 " will you tell me what I am to get for your 
 dinner ? " 
 
 He was abstracted again, and in his 
 
MRS. GREG. 253 
 
 abstraction he muttered : " 0, just a 
 simple dinner, clear soup, a little fish, 
 and a couple of entrees — you know I don't 
 care for a joint — I mean a — well — I had 
 better leave the catering entirely to you, 
 Mrs. Greer." 
 
 She busied herself about the room for a 
 few minutes, making all things that she 
 touched look more graceful from the con- 
 tact of her finjrers. It fidgeted him into a 
 state of fury nearly to see her moving about 
 in that soft, noiseless way, when he wanted 
 to be alone in order to think ! He was 
 feeling unaccountably tired, faint, and 
 weary ! "What an awful thing it would be 
 if he were to have an illness there, become 
 irresponsible, delirious perhaps ! A doctor, 
 a local doctor, who might recognise him, 
 would be sent for, and then ! 
 
254 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 The bare supposition of such a possi- 
 bility made him shiver. 
 
 " I am not feeUng well," he murmured ; 
 *'I know how to treat myself; don't be 
 alarmed if I surrender to weakness and stay 
 in bed for a few days. Don't send for a 
 doctor unless I specially desire you to do 
 so." 
 
 There was a beseechinsj tone in his voice 
 that drove all the mockino- humour out of 
 her eyes. 
 
 " Poor man ! " she said, coming up 
 suddenly to him and holding out her 
 hand heartily. " Don't fear to trust me. /, 
 too, have had to pay the penalty that we must 
 all pay sooner or later when we are found 
 out in a sin that outrages the world. I am 
 sorry for you. You may rest assured that 
 you are safe in mv house." 
 
MKS. GREG. 1:55 
 
 " What do you mean ? " he stammered, 
 trying to look dignified and faiUng signally 
 in the attempt. 
 
 " I mean that I have been too unhappy 
 myself ever to add knowingly to the 
 unhappiness of a fellow-creature, Mr. 
 Denham. If you wish to stay quiet 
 and unseen in my house for some reason 
 you don't Hke to confide to me, quiet and 
 unseen you shall be. No one comes here 
 but the tradesmen's boys." 
 
 " Are you a widow ? " he asked. 
 
 She shook her head. " I am a wife 
 whose husband is rarely at home." 
 
 " Away on business or pleasure ? " 
 
 Uer face flushed at the tone more than 
 the words of his en(|uiry. 
 
 " Perhaps a mixture of both," she said, 
 scornfully ; " I make him as happy as I can 
 
266 UTTERLY IMISTAKEN, 
 
 when lie comes home, and as questions bore 
 him I never ask him any." 
 
 " A. jealous and not too happy woman," 
 he thought, pityingly ; " thank God, Anna 
 has never had to doubt or reproach me on 
 that score." For a few moments he felt 
 vastly superior to the unknown Mr. Greg, 
 and warmly disposed to be a sympathetic 
 friend to the probably neglected wife. 
 
 "Bless 3'ou for promising to save me 
 from all unauthorised intrusion," he said, 
 emotionally. Then to his infinite relief she 
 went out of the room, and he flung himself 
 on the sofa to try and get some rest for his 
 weary body and soul. 
 
 While he rested and waited for his 
 dinner she went back to the little kitchen 
 that glowed and was brilliant with a 
 goodly array of highly-polished copper 
 
MRS. OREO. 257 
 
 Utensils, ;iiid took counsel with her 
 servant about the new lodger's simple little 
 repast. 
 
 " Go and do this marketing at once, 
 Ellen," she said, " and when you come back 
 I must come and help you to cook. I shall 
 get into his ways after a day or two, and 
 then the late dinner will go like clock- 
 work." 
 
 " But master's come home this evenini;, 
 ha.sn't he, ma'm ? " Ellen asked ; " trust me 
 to cook the dinner ; Mr. Greg can never 
 bear you out of his sight when he is at 
 home." 
 
 Mrs. Greg smiled faintly. " His sense of 
 expediency will make him spare me to- 
 night, Ellen. We are not rich people ; we 
 must try to please and keej) a lodger who is 
 
 willing to pay liberally." 
 
 VOL. I. 17 
 
258 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 " I suppose master has a good deal 
 of money, as he's able to be about visit- 
 ing so much," Ellen said, tentatively, 
 but her mistress only replied with a 
 cool look that checked the girl's 
 curiosity. 
 
 " The sooner you start on your errands 
 the sooner Mr. Greg's dinner will be set 
 going," she said quietly. Then she went 
 back to her own little sanctum, where a 
 fine, well-set-up, soldier-like man lounged 
 back in the one arm-chair, smoking and 
 reading a newspaper. 
 
 A look of irrepressible love and pride 
 overspread her face as she advanced 
 towards him, and placing one hand on 
 his shoulder, bent down and pressed her 
 lips to the cheek he indolently offered to 
 her caress. 
 
MRS. GREG. 259 
 
 " I heard you come in, Ted, dear, but 
 I couldn't come to you at once. I was 
 interviewing my new lodger." 
 
 " Man or woman ? " he asked curtly. 
 
 " An elderly man, says he's an American, 
 and wishes to live here as much in seclusion 
 as possible." 
 
 Mr. Greg laughed. " Wants to be a 
 dark horse, eh? Well, we'll humour his 
 fancy if he pays us for it. Why do you 
 wear black, Marian, when you know how I 
 hate it ? " 
 
 " Black is my only wear, because it's the 
 cheapest," she said, trying to speak cheer- 
 fuUy. 
 
 He made an impatient movement. 
 " Money ! money ! you always throw the 
 want of ' money ' at my head as soon as 1 
 come home. Have you got anything in 
 
260 UTTERLY MISTAKEN. 
 
 the house to give me ? I've had no luncheon 
 
 to-day." 
 
 " Shall I get you a chop, Ted ? " 
 
 " If you've nothing better to give me," 
 
 he said, crossly. 
 
 END OF VOL. I. 
 
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UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS-URBAN A 
 
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