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BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
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BLACK BUT COMELY 
 
 OR, 
 
 THE ADVENTURES OF JANE LEE. 
 
 BY 
 
 G. J. WHYTE-MELVILLE. 
 
 IN THREE VOLUMES, 
 VOL. I. 
 
 CHAPMAISr AND HALL, 193, PICCADILLY. 
 
 1879. 
 
 \^AU rights reserved.~\ 
 
CHABT.ES DICKENS AND EV/TTo, 
 CRYSTAL PALACE PRESS. 
 

 00 
 
 Vo 
 
 ^ COE'TEll^TS. 
 
 §ook 1. 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 PAGB 
 
 " No SUCH Catch ! " 1 
 
 CHAPTER IT. 
 Jack Lopez 10 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 A Black Ouzel 21 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 Mervtn Steange 34 
 
vi CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Combe -Appleton 49 
 
 CHAPTER VT. 
 
 " FoRWAED James "... . . , QQ 
 
 CHAPTER VIT. 
 Two Strings 78 
 
 CHAPTER VIIT. 
 Bred m the Bone 95 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 "And is old Double dead?" .... Ill 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 " Sixty- MiLE-AN^ HOUR " 127 
 
 CHAPTER Xl. 
 Compromise 14B 
 
CONTENTS. vii 
 
 CHAPTER Xir. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Consent 162 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 Mr. Delapre 176 
 
 CHAPTER XIY. 
 An Explanation 192 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 "A Little Less than Kin" .... 210 
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 
 "A Little More than Kind" .... 224 
 
 CHAPTER XVIL 
 
 One of the Eamily 244 
 
viii CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER XVIII. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Market Value 257 
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 Tricks of the Trade 272 
 
 CHAPTER XX. 
 Palmistry 288 
 
BLACK BUT COMELY; 
 
 OK, 
 
 THE ADVENTURES OF JANE LEE. 
 
 f 00fe I. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 *' NO SUCH CATCH ! " 
 
 The day had not yet gone by when murderers 
 were hanged in public. Capital punishment 
 still afforded the multitude opportunity to 
 keep holiday, and combine with the excite- 
 ment of a tragedy the refreshments and 
 relaxation of a picnic. Therefore a pieman, 
 selling his dainties "all hot," did good business 
 in the crowd round Newgate, and accepted 
 with resignation — even thankfulness — the 
 
 VOL. I. B 
 
2 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 judicial catastrophe that brought grist to his 
 mill. 
 
 Why should he trouble himself about the 
 culprit, a journeyman tailor, who had stabbed 
 his wife in a fit of drunken ferocity, and been 
 convicted on the evidence of his sister-in-law ? 
 He could not look along the whitewashed 
 passages of the prison, nor into the bare blank 
 cell, where the doomed man cowered and 
 shook before that awful unknown to which 
 he w^as gliding so smooth and swift and sure, 
 upheld, it may be, for a moment at a time, 
 by the presence of two robust turnkeys, who 
 guarded him, as a timid passenger feels upheld 
 in a storm by companionship with some stout 
 skipper and his mate ; yet now and again 
 stung to agony at the contrast between tlieir 
 situation and his own. Would it have dulled 
 the pieman's enterprise, or the appetites of 
 his customers, to see the gray drawn face, 
 with the hunted look in its eyes — that most 
 
''NO SUCH CATCH!'' 3 
 
 pitiful of all expressions — by whicli a liuman 
 soul appeals for help to God and man in vain ; 
 to mark the twitching lip, the working 
 fingers, the sinking dwindled figure, whereon 
 those coarse clothes hung so loose and wide ; 
 or to realise in their own minds what it must 
 be to feel the absolute certainty — from which 
 there is no escape — of being there in an hour ! 
 fifty minutes ! three quarters ! How can the 
 moments run so fast, yet fall distinct, and 
 full, and merciless, each with its stab of 
 mortal fear ? 
 
 It is a dull dim morning in October ; you 
 might wonder so many inhabitants of the 
 busiest capital in Europe can find time to 
 €ome into the streets. IsTevertheless, as the 
 fatal hour approaches, the crowd thickens fast, 
 so that, our pieman finds himself jammed in 
 a corner, whence there is not the faintest 
 glimpse of the gallows, but where he is sur- 
 rounded by spectators who seem less inclined 
 
 B 2 
 
4 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 to stop their mouths with his pies than to 
 enlarge discursively on crime, culprit, sentence, 
 and general bearings of the case. Strange 
 that the softer sex should form a large portion 
 of this assemblage ; strange, too, that their 
 sympathies seem rather with murderer than 
 victim, and that the evidence of his sister- 
 in-law should excite general reprobation and 
 ill-will. 
 
 "Druv' to it, no doubt," observes a 
 greasy slattern, in a shawl and bonnet 
 literally shining with decay. ''That agger- 
 awated and put upon, as he didn't scarce 
 know whether he was dead or alive. Ah f 
 She was one with a tongue, she was. As 
 would let you hear of it again — and again 
 — and as^ain ! " 
 
 " It's my belief as that there sister de- 
 serves hanging a precious sight more than 
 he do," replies a neighbour, stout and re- 
 spectable-looking — a matron, indeed, whose 
 
''NO SUCH CATCH r' 5 
 
 character would be unimpeacliable but for 
 drink. *'I seen her myself on the trial. 
 'You're a nice one,' says I, 'with your clean 
 white collar and your black gloves. It would 
 be hard lines,' says I, ' for a man to swing 
 along of a saucy, trapesing minx like you!^ " 
 
 ''It's a hanging matter, too, missis," pro- 
 ceeds a bricklayer in fustian, " when you 
 come to knifin' on 'em. And I'm not sure 
 but the law is right." 
 
 " Knifin' ! " echoes a tall handsome woman, 
 with the swarthy skin, soft black eyes, and 
 clear-cut features of real gipsy blood. " I'd 
 have knifed him first, I would ! And so 
 would you, my beauty," she continues in a 
 loving whisper to the child sleeping on her 
 bosom, whose dark lashes and small high- 
 bred face denote no stolen offspring of the 
 Oentiles, but a true little Eomany of her own. 
 Then, while she stretches her fine figure 
 a-tiptoe, with her graceful head turned towards 
 
6 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 the "unseen gallows, she croons out a sweet- 
 toned lullaby in her own strange tongue for 
 the brown little lady in her arms, the 
 " rinheni tawni, Romany raivny^^^ as she 
 calls it, hushing and soothing her darling, 
 lest it should wake before its time. 
 
 Even the pieman could not but admire 
 this pair, so uncommon, so picturesque, and 
 so comely withal ; sleek and supple as a 
 leopardess and her cub, with something of 
 the wild-beast's watchful restlessness, half 
 suspicious, half defiant, its lithe and easy 
 movements, its sinewy, shapely form. 
 
 But soon -the crowd began to sway in 
 that resistless ebb and flow, against which, 
 as constituting the danger of an undisciplined 
 multitude, wooden barriers had been erected, 
 and other municipal precautions taken in 
 vain. At or near the gallows, something of 
 unusual interest seemed to have occurred. 
 A seething wave of humanity, that gathered 
 
''NO SUCH CATCH r' 7 
 
 streno^tli and volume as it rolled in, liftino- 
 the pieman off his feet, dashed him with 
 his portable oven to the ground. Its lid 
 flew open, and the dregs of a London mob 
 were soon scrambling for the contents. Such 
 a struggle caused more crowding, more curio- 
 sity, more confusion. Women began to 
 scream and faint ; strong men, in the instinct 
 of self-preservation, took cruel advantage of 
 their strength, and enhanced by their cowar- 
 dice the helplessness of the weak. Human 
 beings in a panic are like beasts in a stam- 
 pede. Those who have once gone down get 
 little chance of coming to the surface again. 
 The pieman, hurled against the gipsy, bore 
 her to the earth. Even as she fell, rose 
 another of those swelling, suffocating surges, 
 that seemed to dash her life out, as a wave 
 dashes a morsel of seaweed against the rock. 
 Blind, pinioned, choking for breath, brain 
 and senses failino; in her death-strus^de, tlie 
 
8 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 brave instinct of maternity conquered all. 
 The beautiful gipsy, with one last despairing 
 effort, iiung her child into the woman's arms 
 who, crushed herself, was helplessly crushing 
 her down, and so floated away into the un- 
 known, with the familiar wail of a wakino- 
 infant in her ears, and the little face she 
 loved stamped on eyes that were never to 
 brighten with earthly joys, nor fill with 
 earthly tears again. 
 
 But the other woman, like a woman, 
 strained every nerve to save the baby. 
 Catching it with the frantic effort of a wild- 
 cat, rather than a seamstress, she passed 
 the precious charge to a neighbour, as she 
 herself failed and succumbed. Ao^ain was 
 the child held aloft, when she who had taken 
 it seemed perishing ; and so it came about 
 that, changing hands half a score of times, 
 the little gipsy found rest at last in the 
 arms of a thick-set, swarthy, well-dressed 
 
''NO SUCH CATCH!" 9 
 
 man, and was saved. He contrived, by sheer 
 strength, to keep his feet and preserve the 
 infant unhurt, till he gained a lamp-post, 
 and, passing his arm round it, steadied him- 
 self for fresh efforts when he should have 
 recovered breath. Fortune so far favoured 
 him, that the pressure of the crowd began 
 to take another direction, and, with space 
 to gasp for air, he was able to look at the 
 helpless little mite of humanity thus com- 
 mitted to his charge. 
 
 " Well, this is a go ! " he muttered, 
 scanning the dark brows and lashes, the 
 pretty waxen features, the tiny well-shaped 
 hands of his new acquisition, with a strong 
 idea of leavins; it at once in the nearest work- 
 house ; but the child clasping him round the 
 neck, and nestling closer to his breast, with 
 a smile, he added : '' Dash it, little 'un, you 
 are a beauty ; I'll take you home with me, 
 as sure as my name's Jack Lopez ! '' 
 
CHAPTER 11. 
 
 JACK LOPEZ. 
 
 Had it been Abraham, Simeon, Mordecai, 
 Haman even ! But why Jack Lopez ? Jew 
 was written clearly on his rich dark com- 
 plexion, his blue-black hair, his fleshy aquiline 
 nose, his full curved lips, and the smooth 
 proportions of his round, well-turned form. 
 His clothes were far too glossy for a Christian's 
 everyday wear, and a certain Oriental taste 
 for magnificence was apparent in the pro- 
 fusion of jewellery that he seemed to carry 
 as a matter-of-course, even on such an occa- 
 sion, and that, strange to say, he brought 
 with him untouched out of the scramble. 
 Only a Jew could have preserved the polish 
 
JACK LOPEZ. 11 
 
 of his boots, the lustre of his hat, through 
 the ^' free fight " in which he had been en- 
 gaged; only a Jew would have recovered 
 so speedily the self-possession he lost during 
 the urgency of such bodily peril as he was 
 forced to undergo. 
 
 Yes, Jack Lopez was as much a Jev\^ as 
 Josephus ; but there was a soft place in his 
 heart, and the little waif he had rescued 
 from destruction crept in to nestle there 
 for evermore. These people have strong 
 affections, though confined to a narrow circle, 
 concentrated on their own kindred, their own 
 families, their own homes. So long as they 
 are mere acquaintances, why should the Jew 
 do more for the Christian than the Christian 
 does for the Jew ? But once make Shylock 
 your friend, and he will stick to you closer 
 than a brother, will invite you to his house, 
 welcome you to his family, give you his 
 counsel and his confidence, nay, will even 
 
12 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 lend you money at a reasonable interest, and, 
 believing in your integrity. Christian though 
 you call yourself, will trust you in all honour 
 with his " ducats and his daughter ! " 
 
 Jack Lopez, a little ashamed of himself, 
 and earnestly hoping that he might not 
 meet an acquaintance, gained the outskirts 
 of the crowd, leaped into a hansom cab with 
 his charge, who clasped her little hand round 
 Jiis forefinger, and so, not without certain 
 misgivings as to his reception, proceeded 
 rapidly home. 
 
 " Why, Jack, you must be mad ! '' 
 
 " As mad as a hatter, I think," replied 
 Jack, showing the boldest front he dared. 
 ''It's done. Bell, and there's an end of it; 
 we can't turn the poor little devil into the 
 street 1 " 
 
 He was no fool, and laid the infant in 
 Ms wife's arms, reflecting that, in all matters 
 connected with babes and sucklings, the 
 
JACK LOPEZ. la 
 
 sense of toiicli goes straiglit to a woman's 
 heart. 
 
 Mrs. Lopez, rocking it to and fro as you 
 have seen a young person of six rock her 
 doll, looked over its black head into her 
 husband's face with a comical expression of 
 expectation, suspicion, and surprise. 
 
 She was a fair florid woman, who desired 
 above all things to have children of her own, 
 but, after many years of marriage, had not 
 attained her wish. She fell violently in love 
 with Jack Lopez while yet a boarding-school 
 miss at Putney ; married him before she was 
 out of her teens ; shared with him the hard- 
 ships of bad times, bad business, and bad 
 management ; nay, sold cigars for him, over a 
 counter, at fourpence apiece ; and finally, when 
 certain desperate ventures, and a few judicious 
 advances to minors at sixty per cent., made 
 a rich man of him, worried her Jack con- 
 siderably with aspirations for promotion in 
 
14 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 the social sphere — " West-end airs," as he 
 called them — a longing for fashionable society, 
 and even vague hints as to the possibility 
 of presentation at Court. 
 
 This couple, differing in character as in 
 outward appearance, rubbed on nevertheless 
 comfortably enough. Jack went to business 
 morning after morning from his pleasant 
 house in Tyburnia, and returned, or not, to 
 an excellent dinner, as suited him best; nor 
 did " Bell " demand any account of his absence. 
 They say that, if you tell a woman such a 
 thing is ''made by machinery," she asks no 
 further explanation ; and, similarly, it seems 
 to me, that wives accept the term '^ business" 
 as a sufficient excuse for unlimited furlouQ-h, 
 dreading, perhaps, the strain on their faculties 
 that an investigation of all conveyed by that 
 comprehensive w^ord would impose. 
 
 So Jack got rounder and sleeker, and 
 fonder of the good things of life year by 
 
JAOK LOPEZ. 15 
 
 year ; while Mrs. Lopez grew redder of 
 cheeks, yellower of hair, portlier of form, 
 and more hopeless of children day by day. 
 Each thought the other ''a good deal altered," 
 wondering, perhaps, why they had ever married 
 all those years ago, by no means exulting in 
 their union, yet not exactly wishing they 
 had let it alone. Do you think Mrs. Anderson 
 really admired old John's scanty locks when 
 they were "like the snow," casting never a 
 thought back to the " Joes '' with other 
 surnames of her youthful days, and wondering 
 whether or not she had missed the great 
 prize of life ? When I see a venerable couple 
 more than usually affectionate, I respect 
 them no less for rectitude of principle than 
 sound common sense. I am persuaded they 
 are making the best of it, and quite right 
 too. Is not substance preferable to shadow ; 
 a waking reality to the impossible illusions 
 of a dream ? 
 
16 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 And yet, while we pass to leeward of 
 a bean-field on a summers evening, what 
 makes the hardest of us sigh to scent its 
 faint sweet fragrance, that wakes but does 
 not satisfy the senses, recalling certain foolish 
 longings, we ought long ago to have forgotten, 
 for the forbidden, the indefinite, and the 
 unknown ? 
 
 Jack Lopez and his wife lived habitually 
 in that condition of easy comfort and even 
 luxury which is common amongst Londoners 
 of our time, in the well-to-do middle class ; 
 with only a page to wait at dinner, there was 
 champagne on the table every day. Mrs. Lopez, 
 though satisfied to sit in her brougham behind 
 a single horse, felt no hesitation in spending 
 a guinea on a bouquet, and two on a stall 
 at the opera, whenever she had a fancy for 
 music or flowers. Jack could hardly cross 
 the street but in a hansom cab, and spent 
 a younger brother's income on the dinners 
 
JACK LOPEZ. 17 
 
 alone to wliich lie treated himself at Riclimond 
 and Greenwich during the summer months. 
 Both went to Dieppe every autumn ; and it 
 was only lamentable incapacity for handling 
 a gun, though his eye was accurate enough 
 on a billiard-table, that prevented Mr. Lopez 
 from renting an expensive villa, with five 
 hundred acres of shooting, in Surrey. ''Light 
 come, light go," is a true proverb in money 
 matters. When a man can make two or 
 three hundred by his business in a morning, 
 he soon acquires profuse habits of domestic 
 expenditure. His household accounts are 
 lumped in with the losses of trade, his 
 pleasures come out of its profits. Living 
 from hand to mouth is capital fun, so long 
 as there is plenty in both ; and when the 
 rainy day does come, why, after all, like 
 one who has to return a borrowed umbrella, 
 he is in no worse plight than at first. 
 
 The speculator who "began life without 
 
 VOL. I. 
 
18 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 a shilling," leaves oJ0f perhaps in the same 
 predicament ; but he places to the credit 
 of his account with Fortune the five, ten, 
 even twenty years that he has been spending 
 in luxury, and is not wholly dissatisfied with 
 the result. 
 
 " She's a sweet little thing. Jack," said 
 Mrs. Lopez, after the infant had lain in her 
 arms for about half a minute. *' There's not 
 many wives, my clear, would take a ready- 
 made baby like this, with such a black little 
 poll, and ask no questions. But, there, when 
 I say a thing I mean it ; and she might have 
 a worse mummy, mightn't she ? and a worse 
 home ? Oh Jack, she's opened her eyes, 
 I declare ! What a duck it is ! " 
 
 When her husband returned from business, 
 bringing to dinner a friend the exact counter- 
 part of himself, an extra bottle of champagne 
 was drunk in honour of the new inmate of 
 the household. It afforded an ensrrossino^ 
 
JACK LOPEZ. 19 
 
 topic of conversation from the soup (turtle) 
 to the dessert (pines) ; but when coffee was 
 served, and the men began to smoke, 
 Mrs. Lopez, who had not retired, because 
 after coffee came curacoa, suddenly re- 
 membered a difficulty that, strange to say, 
 occurred to none of them before. 
 
 *' My gracious me ! " she exclaimed, look- 
 ing hazily round, " I don't suppose the child 
 has ever been christened ; and if it has, 
 I don't know its name no more than the 
 dead. There's a J. L., in tiny blue letters, 
 printed on its little arm below the elbow, 
 but that's no clue at all.'* 
 
 *' Vaccination," observed Jack, senten- 
 tiously, between the puffs of his cigar. 
 
 His wife darted an indignant glance at 
 him, and the friend, who was a person of 
 resource, observed thoughtfully : 
 
 "J. L., ah, I see! Why not call it 
 
 Jael?" 
 
 c 2 
 
20 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 This remark was received with no more 
 favour than its predecessor. 
 
 " Nonsense, Mr. Samuel," returned the 
 lady; '^ might as well call it Sisera ! " 
 
 The friend smoked and pondered. Per- 
 haps he too was not insensible to certain 
 memories of the bean-field we mentioned even 
 now. 
 
 "' What should you say to Jane Lee ? " he 
 asked. *'It's short, simple, and to the 
 purpose." 
 
 *'Not much to the purpose," answered 
 Mrs. Lopez ; ^^ but perhaps it will do as well 
 as another. Jane Lee. It sounds respectable, 
 and it's a good travelling name enough. I'll 
 run upstairs now and see if the darling is 
 asleep ! " 
 
CHAPTEE III. 
 
 A BLACK OUZEL. 
 
 At five, pretty Jane Lee was the pet of every 
 servant, visitor, and guest in the household, 
 no less than of Jack Lopez and his wife. 
 Sleek, playful, active as a kitten, an inde- 
 fatigable romp, and a confirmed flirt ; the 
 child, to use their own expression, " had a 
 way with it " that neither male nor female 
 could resist. The clear-cut little face sparkled 
 with fun, the large dark eyes shone with 
 intelligence. The gipsy elf learned her letters 
 almost as fast as she looked at them, and 
 caught up the street cries outside with a readi- 
 ness of imitation that denoted much power of 
 mimicry and a correct ear. Jack Lopez was 
 
22 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 persuaded that he could provide no better 
 after-dinner amusement for his friends than to 
 stand his adopted daughter on the table, 
 behind the decanters, and bid her go through 
 her performances one by one, from the early 
 milkman to the boy with the evening beer. 
 His guests, men who looked habitually to the 
 main chance, decided that he meant to leave 
 her all he possessed, and Jack, they opined, 
 would '^ cut up well " when his time came. 
 
 At ten, the dark- eyed little maid seemed 
 generally recognised as a chief ornament of 
 the house. Master could not bear her out of 
 his sight, mistress treated her as a child of 
 her own, assuming, indeed, certain honours 
 of maternity on the strength of her treasure, 
 while the servants flattered her beauty, en- 
 couraged her whims, and strengthened her 
 evil propensities to the utmost of their power. 
 
 Jack, who knew his own affairs well enough, 
 spared no expense to give her a good educa- 
 
A BLACK OUZEL. 23 
 
 tion. Little Miss Lee might be seen, accom- 
 panied by a maid- servant, passing to and 
 from a young ladies' day-scliool in Bays water, 
 where she surpassed her class-fellows in quick- 
 ness and proficiency, no less than in repartee, 
 agility, mischief, and general insubordination. 
 Though rather too slim and angular, she was 
 still an exceedingly pretty child. Even in 
 London strangers would turn round to admire 
 her large dark eyes, coal-black hair, clear-cut 
 features, lithe willowy shape, straight limbs, 
 and the light tread of those slim supple feet. 
 
 A duchess once stopped in Kensington 
 Gardens to ask the maid who she was, and 
 calling her '^ a handsome little gipsy," while 
 she bent down to bestow a patrician kiss, 
 scarcely guessed how exactly she had hit the 
 mark. To gipsy blood she owed her health, 
 vitality, grace, beauty, and the wild turbulent 
 instincts that made all the troubles of her 
 .after-life. 
 
24 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 Music and languages she acquired with 
 little effort. In history and geography she 
 slurred her lessons over as well as another. 
 Drawing, no physiognomist, warned by the 
 want of curve in those delicate rectilinear eye- 
 brows, would have wasted time by endeavour- 
 ing to teach ; while dancing, again, seemed as 
 natural to that airy floating figure as flying 
 to a bird — so that for waltz, gavotte, and 
 cachucha, she never failed to carry off the half- 
 yearly prize. Her ready brain was accurate in 
 arithmetic, her supple fingers seemed no less 
 clever with the needle than the pen ; but of 
 all the girl's triumphs over her class-mates, 
 those earned in their singing lessons seemed 
 the easiest and the most complete. 
 
 Full and clear in its tone, the young voice 
 had something so wild, sad, and tender in its 
 expression, that listeners of mature age and 
 unexampled austerity, such as the French 
 teacher, a tough Swiss Protestant, or the 
 
A BLACK OUZEL. 25 
 
 experienced person who took charge of the 
 linen, were fain to look out at window and 
 wipe away their tears. 
 
 Jack Lopez, dreaming over his cigar after 
 dinner, loved to speculate on his adopted 
 child's proficiency in song. 
 
 "A good engagement,^' he reflected, "means 
 a pot of money, particularly when they're 
 handsome into the bargain. Why shouldn't 
 this black little rogue of mine come out as a 
 tip-topper one of these days and take the 
 town by storm ? Ah ! stranger things have 
 happened. I've had some queerish ups and 
 downs myself. Yes ; there's an opening if one 
 can hit it, and I should like to see her with a 
 brougham and pair before I die ! " 
 
 Then he would walk up and down the 
 room, smoking fiercely and buried in calcula- 
 tion ; for with this man pounds, shillings, and 
 pence necessarily entered into every relation 
 of life. Like Midas, the flavour of all he ate 
 
26 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 and drank seemed tainted with a smack of 
 gold ! 
 
 His wife, on the other hand, was little 
 given to speculation, seldom looking forward, 
 indeed, beyond the immediate future, as 
 -afforded in the prospect of luncheon and 
 dinner. Fat, contented, and comatose, it 
 needed slight medical knowledge to predict 
 she would be summoned to start for the great 
 journey at inconveniently short notice ; and 
 perhaps, with so full a habit, so drooping an 
 eye, and so florid a complexion, she was 
 wise to take no thought for difficulties she 
 might not live to encounter, and troubles that 
 would pass harmlessly overhead, when she was 
 laid in the grave. 
 
 So long as pretty Jane's light step was 
 heard dancing on the stairs, her clear voice 
 carolling like a bird in hall and passage, Mrs. 
 Lopez felt satisfied all was well, and left the 
 future, under Jack's supervision, to provide for 
 
A BLACK OUZEL. 27 
 
 itself. So year after year stole by, till one 
 bright spring morning, when he had been 
 gone to business about an hour, the maid, 
 taking breakfast to his wife's bedroom, 
 screamed out loud, and dropped her tray 
 with a crash on the floor. Her mistress was 
 as dead as Queen Anne. The doctor, pocket- 
 ing his lancets, shook his head, and muttered 
 " Apoplexy." Mr. Lopez was sent for from 
 his office, and Jane from her school ; the blinds 
 were drawn ; the servants spoke in whispers ; 
 a funeral with three mourning coaches paced 
 from the door ; and the household went into 
 decent black. 
 
 These things are a mere question of time. 
 The memory of Cleopatra may have kept fresh 
 for six months. Mrs. Lopez was forgotten in 
 six weeks, and before the year was out neigh- 
 bours began to wonder whether Jack would 
 marry again. 
 
 Miss Lee was sitting opposite him after 
 
28 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 dinner. She took the top of the table now, 
 and now for the first time it struck him how 
 self-possessed she had grown in manner, how 
 womanly in figure and face. 
 
 *' Jane," said he, '* ring for coffee, my dear, 
 and hand me a light. Why, how you grow, 
 child ! I never thought you meant to be so 
 tall." 
 
 She glanced at her own shapely figure in 
 the mirror and smiled. 
 
 " Tm the tallest girl in the school now," 
 she answered, " and the eldest, and, I'm 
 afraid, the wickedest. It's not my fault. Miss 
 Quilter says, but yours, dear. I've been so 
 spoilt at home ! " 
 
 Jack filled his glass. He was bracing his 
 nerves — "hinge-ing himself up," as he called 
 it — for an efi"ort. 
 
 '' How old are you, my dear ? " he asked, 
 with rather a shaky voice. " I'm sure I 
 forget." 
 
A BLACK OUZEL, 29 
 
 '* That's not at all a pretty question," she 
 answered laughing ; *' and if you forget I 
 don't see why I should remember ; but accord- 
 ing to my own reckoning I was nineteen last 
 birthday. I'm sure that's old enough for 
 anything ! " 
 
 He pondered with his hand on the de- 
 canter. The day he brought her home from 
 before Newgate had hitherto been kept as the 
 anniversary of her birth. Could she really 
 be almost twenty ? How old he was getting, 
 and how quickly time passed ! 
 
 " Janey, would you like to go away from 
 here?" 
 
 He dreaded some natural burst of regret, 
 even resentment, yet her answer caused him 
 less relief than disappointment. 
 
 *' Of course I should ! I am so fond of 
 change. I should like never to sleep two 
 nights in the same bed." 
 
 " I shall miss you," he faltered. 
 
30 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 " Oh yes ! I am sure of that ; you're very 
 fond of me, I know ; but can't you be just as 
 fond of me when I'm away ? " 
 
 A shadow as of pain crossed his face, 
 while he emptied his glass at a gulp. 
 
 *' I daresay I shall not forget you," he 
 continued. " Well, Janey, we can't all do as 
 we like in this world — that's to say, unless 
 we're enormously rich. My dear, I have made 
 up my mind to send you into the country 
 for a whole year." 
 
 " The country ! what country ? " she asked, 
 looking rather disconcerted. " Suppose I don't 
 like it when I get there ? " 
 
 ** If you don't like it, dear, you need only 
 say so. I've done my duty by you as if you 
 had been my own. If you're not happy in 
 the country, I'll have you back in to\\Ti. 
 But, Janey, this is a world of uncertainty, 
 particularly in the present state of the money- 
 market. Don't you lose a chance, my girl. 
 
A BLACK OUZEL. 31 
 
 if it comes in your way. I'm a good life 
 enough, I liope, but you must remember 
 there's nobody to look after you when I'm 
 gone ! " 
 
 By this it may be guessed that Jack 
 Lopez, like many other people, entrusted 
 those dependent on him to the care of 
 Providence, with a reliance that, applied 
 to his own case, would have been beyond 
 all praise. 
 
 Jane Lee, brushing her long black hair 
 before the glass on her dressing-table, took 
 these things seriously to heart. 
 
 " I'm not his child, I know," she reflected, 
 smiling at the swarthy beauty opposite, whose 
 white teeth gleamed, and black eyes sparkled, 
 as she smiled back in return. " How surprised 
 I was the first time he told me ! I wonder 
 whose child I am / I wonder whether I take 
 after papa or mamma ! I wonder if I shall 
 like these people I'm going to next week ! 
 
32 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 What's the use of wonderiiif]: ? There's no 
 end to it. I'm not to throw a chance away, 
 he said. Does he mean I'm to marry the 
 first man that asks me ? Girls always marry 
 before they're twenty, I suppose, and I'm 
 past nineteen now. I don't know that I 
 should mind it so much ; but he must be 
 handsome, and he must let me do as I like ! " 
 
 Now Jack Lopez had only made up his 
 mind to part with his treasure after much 
 consideration. She had been ailing a little 
 lately, and a clever doctor, who entrusted 
 Jack with his money speculations, had given 
 him an opinion — without a fee — to the effect 
 that she ought to have a good twelve months 
 of country air and quiet, in order to insure 
 the strength of voice and constitution pro- 
 mised by her fine organisation, if it had fair 
 play. 
 
 At twenty her guardian determined she 
 should go to Italy, for the best teaching 
 
A BLACK OUZEL, 33 
 
 afforded by the best school of music in the 
 world. Long before she was thirty, he 
 reckoned on her climbing the very top of 
 the tree. ** With engagements in London, 
 Vienna, and St. Petersburg," thought Jack, 
 " she will be independent of fortune, and 
 my business may go to the devil — as I often 
 think it must — and welcome, as far as she 
 is concerned ! " 
 
 So he answered an advertisement from 
 a clergyman in Somersetshire, and made 
 arrangements for the board and lodging of 
 Miss Lee, as entitled by this contract to 
 share the amusements and advantages of a 
 liberal establishment and an elegant home. 
 
 TOL. I. 
 
CHAPTER IV. 
 
 MERVYN STUANGE. 
 
 We do not think it necessary to accompany 
 our young lady in her journey on the Great 
 Western Railway, enlivened, as it could not 
 fail to be, by the polite attentions of her 
 fellow-passengers, a good-looking young gentle- 
 man who got out at Swindon, and an elderly 
 white-whiskered personage going '^ through " 
 to Barnstaple. If she felt a little lonely 
 when Jack, waving his disconsolate farewell 
 from the platform at Paddington, glided 
 out of sight, the change of scene, rapid 
 motion, pleasant country, and civilities of 
 her companions soon cheered her up. When 
 the train stopped at Reading, she would 
 
MERVYN STRANGE. 35 
 
 not have gone back if she conlcl. And yet the 
 girl was less unfeeling than impressionable; 
 not hard of heart, only young and thoughtless, 
 exulting in her enfranchisement from the 
 trammels of everyday life, roused by a sense 
 of coming adventure, and conscious of that 
 self-reliant spirit which sustains the most 
 inexperienced of birds, when first they leave 
 their nests to soar unaided on the wing. 
 
 Poor Jack, who could not face a mouthful 
 of luncheon, was smoking cigars and drink- 
 ing sherry sadly enough in his office, while 
 Miss Lee disposed of a packet of sandwiches, 
 two Banbury cakes, and a large cup of coffee 
 at Swindon, with the healthy appetite of 
 nineteen. 
 
 These refreshments sustained her quite 
 
 comfortably till she reached the end of her 
 
 journey — a small station with one porter, 
 
 no waiting-room, and time-bills of every line 
 
 in the kingdom but its own. Here she bade 
 
 D 2 
 
36 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 a gracious good-bye to the white-whiskered 
 person, who, hastening home to wife and 
 family, was nevertheless so fascinated by the 
 charms of her appearance and conversation, 
 that he peeped surreptitiously at her luggage 
 to ascertain her name. Then she put her 
 handsome face out of the window, to the 
 utter bewilderment of the rural station-master, 
 and asked if there was anybody waiting for 
 Miss Lee. 
 
 " Miss Lee I " echoed a deep voice ; and 
 a pale man, with his hand on the carriage - 
 door, reverentially added, in mournful tones : 
 *' I beg your pardon, are you Miss Lee ? " 
 
 '^ Yes, I am. You needn't beg my pardon," 
 answered the girl, with a little laugh, as of a 
 mocking spirit held decently in check. " I've 
 two boxes, please, in the guard's van, and 
 a hamper, and a dressing-case in the carriage 
 — you'll find it under the seat — and the 
 basket up there, and the wraps down here, 
 
MERVYN STRANGE. 37 
 
 and those books, and some newspapers, and 
 my umbrella, and — I think that's all." 
 
 While he hunted up these various effects, 
 nor, strange to say, congratulated himself 
 while so doing that he was still a bachelor, 
 she took a good look at him, and wondered 
 privately whether this could be the clergyman 
 in whose society she was to share " the amuse- 
 ments and advantages of a liberal establish- 
 ment and an elegant home." 
 
 Handsome ? — No. Ugly ? — Certainly not. 
 Tall, thin, clean-shaved, with pale clear-cut 
 features, and dark close - cropped hair, he 
 looked, and indeed liked to look, the character 
 he professed — something approaching an ideal 
 monk of the Middle Ages, as far removed 
 from the roystering friar of our English ballads 
 as from the proud ambitious churchman of 
 our English history. Admitting, rather than 
 boasting, that he was a Protestant, he covertly 
 admired the temporal supremacy affected by 
 
Sa BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 Eome ; and declared openly that, for organisa- 
 tion and discipline, the . Jesuits were the most 
 efficient body of servants employed by any 
 religion in the world. He could have borne, 
 perhaps inflicted, martyrdom ; would have 
 rejoiced in self-imposed penance, however 
 irksome ; exulted in priestly ascendency, 
 however absolute ; but could hardly have 
 sat down to such an occupation as tent- 
 making, for instance, labouring with his 
 hands, like an honest citizen, while he showed 
 his fellow- citizens the way to a better world 
 by doing their duty humbly, reverently, and 
 simply in this. 
 
 Entangled in a lady's luggage on the plat- 
 form of a railway station, he felt thoroughly 
 out of place, yet he seemed to have a liking 
 for the job, and no disinclination to take 
 the orders of his employer. 
 
 ''Did you come on purpose to meet 
 me ? " said she, when boxes, hamper, and 
 
MERVYN STRANGE. 3S 
 
 etceteras liacl been collected and placed on 
 s. truck. " I expected to see somebody quite 
 different; but I suppose it's all right, and 
 you're Mr. Tregartben, of Combe- Appleton ? 
 How far is it to the rectory ? " 
 
 He blushed and laughed — a faint blush, 
 a weak nervous little laugh. '^ You're 
 mistaken, Miss Lee. My name is Strange — 
 Mervyn Strange — at your service. I am 
 Mr. Tregarthen's curate. He couldn't meet 
 you himself, so deputed me to receive you 
 at the station, and put you into the carriage. 
 It's not more than ^yq miles. You'll be 
 there in plenty of time for dinner." 
 
 " Ain't you coming with me ? " asked the 
 girl, and wondered why he seemed so dis- 
 turbed at the simple question ; but though 
 she drove throu2:h some of the loveliest 
 scenery in the West of England, and that is 
 no small word, she found herself thinking 
 more of Mervyn Strange's abrupt jerky 
 
40 BLACK BVT COMELY. 
 
 manner, and tliin eager face, tlian of wood 
 and water, hill and dale, hedges and coppice, 
 variegated meadows, scented blossom-raining 
 orchards, all the summer beauties of the 
 landscape through which she passed. 
 
 And the clergyman, walking fast, as was 
 his habit, with long even strides, in the 
 track of her wheels, compared her with the 
 few women of his limited experience, not, 
 we may be sure, to her disadvantage — with 
 his mother, a buxom dame of fifty, his cherry- 
 cheeked sisters, a pretty flirting cousin, and 
 a young person of the middle class, who in 
 his Oxford days had interfered with his 
 fancy, if not his heart. What was the diff'er- 
 ence between Miss Lee and these estimable 
 people, that ranked her as it were in another 
 order of creation ? He could not describe 
 nor analyse it, but felt rather than knew that 
 in comparison with these, she seemed as the 
 rose to a cabbage, or such nutritious vege- 
 
MERVYN STRANGE. 41 
 
 table ; as a wild-bird to the j)lump, serious, 
 gobbling, domestic fowl ! 
 
 Was she beautiful? He could scarcely 
 ask himself the question before his senses 
 answered in a glowing affirmative. Beautiful 
 in the most dangerous of all beauty, to men 
 like him. The beauty of Circe in her teens ; 
 of the siren and the mermaid, rather than 
 the angel or . the nymph. St. Anthony, 
 perhaps, could have explained the temptation 
 that lurks under such outward comeliness, 
 its subtle nature, its insidious force, and the 
 tenacity with which it fastens on a prey, 
 grappling and dragging the victim down into 
 depths from which there is no hope of rescue, 
 till all has been lost that seemed worth while 
 to save. 
 
 This gentleman's education had scarcely 
 qualified him for the part he elected to play 
 in the great drama of life. Sensitive, stu- 
 dious, and retiring, he had left his mother's 
 
42 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 apron-strings to matriculate at a quiet college 
 in Oxford, without passing through the in- 
 termediate ordeal of a public school, which, 
 for a lad without brothers, who had lost his 
 father in childhood, seems an indispensable 
 course of training for the future. His abilities, 
 too, were such as reap the sober rewards of 
 the university, rather than command success 
 in the bustling competition of • the world. He 
 was no cricketer nor oarsman ; ignored boxing- 
 gloves, foils, and dumb-bells ; could neither 
 have leapt a hurdle himself, nor ridden a horse 
 over it to save his life. But he was man enough 
 to study ten hours on a stretch ; and as for 
 pluck, he had the courage of his opinions — 
 a kind of valour more rare among youths 
 than is generally supposed. Identifying him- 
 self with a party, whose aim seemed the 
 reformation of our reformed church back to 
 its original stem, he was conspicuous, even 
 while an undergraduate, for the stiffness of 
 
MERVYN STRANGE. 43 
 
 his circular collar, tlie austerity of his black- 
 silk waistcoat, and the inordinate length of 
 his frock-coat. He affected, indeed, a gravity 
 of deportment that the eight mistook for 
 hypochondriasis, and the eleven for hypocrisy; 
 but the man was in earnest, and proved it ; 
 for he lived on a crust, and imbibed know- 
 ledge from a lecture, while to the vulgar 
 temptations of wine and women, senseless 
 mirth, and unhallowed riot, he was adamant 
 itself. To sum up all, he kept within his 
 allowance, consumed no tobacco, played the 
 pianoforte in his rooms, read hard, thought 
 much, went in for honours, and took a 
 second-class. 
 
 But hedge your garden as you will, the 
 south wind steals through, with its insidious 
 whisper and its perfume-laden breath. In 
 " the High " was a musicseller's shop, behind 
 its counter stood a fair handsome girl, with 
 loving blue eyes, and soft brown hair, the 
 
U BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 wisdom of the serpent, and, for aught I know, 
 the innocence of the dove. Blake of Christ 
 Church sustained a shrewd rebuff when he 
 made her a proposal, after his kind ; and 
 Brazenose men had a tradition that Fred 
 Milo, called in college " the Infant Hercules," 
 from his strength of body and lamentable 
 weakness of mind, would have married her, 
 but that she simply and persistently refused 
 him every time he asked. Miss Morris had 
 her own ideas, probably, as to the material 
 advantages of matrimony, and was capable 
 enough, as these blue-eyed beauties generally 
 are, of managing her own affairs ; but she did 
 take an interest in the pale student who bent 
 his head so respectfully towards her own 
 over the counter, and Mervyn Strange, had 
 he but known it, might have succeeded where 
 the would-be profligate and the simple-minded 
 athlete signally failed. 
 
 He bought a great deal of music, never- 
 
MERVYN STRANGE. 45 
 
 theless, and stinted himself in certain neces- 
 saries of existence, to balance an outlay lie 
 could ill afford. He liked to pass tlie shop, 
 too, in his daily walks, and to feel his pulse 
 beat faster as he turned the well-known 
 corner, though retiring in sad confusion if she 
 spied him from amongst her wares. His was 
 obviously the faint heart that is said never 
 to win fair lady ; but whatever Miss Morris 
 thought she kept to herself, and if she 
 wondered at the bashfulness that contrasted, 
 perhaps favourably, with the daring of more 
 importunate admirers, waited patiently to see 
 what would come of it in course of time, 
 say, by Valentine's Day. This little idyl 
 was, however, prematurely stifled in the 
 sudden departure and subsequent espousals 
 of the damsel, who, summoned to nurse 
 a married sister and family at a distance, 
 all swollen out of knowledge by the mumps, 
 quitted Oxford suddenly, and without leave- 
 
46 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 taking. That she became the wife of a 
 flourishing pork-butcher in Bicester, nearly 
 as strong as Milo, and far more amusino; than 
 Blake, has nothing to do with my story, but 
 explains why Strange took his walks hence- 
 forth in a different direction, and the Hiorh 
 Street knew this pretty shopwoman no more. 
 
 It was only a scratch, but it taught him 
 something. He felt that, like the heroes of 
 antiquity, he too was vulnerable. Even 
 insolent Achilles, he remembered, must go 
 down if you knew where to hit him. The son 
 of Atreus, as his " Horace " reminded him, in 
 the midst of triumph was himself defeated by 
 a captive maid, so why should Mervyn 
 Strange of Pembroke escape the fate that 
 overtook Ajax, Agamemnon, and that private 
 gentleman in the Augustan age, who, under 
 the name of Xanthias Phoceus, has achieved 
 immortality, as an admirer of the scrubbing- 
 brush and the hearth-broom ? 
 
MERVYN STRANGE. 47 
 
 No, he was at least capable of caring for a 
 woman. Then came a thrill of pride and 
 pleasure with the consciousness, none the less 
 keen that he felt the dangler of such weakness. 
 A man of his views and temperament, when 
 he took orders, he had thought to rid himself 
 of the softer fancies once for all. God forbid 
 they should assail him even in a dream, for 
 the true priest, in his opinion, should own 
 allegiance to but two superiors, two interests — 
 his Master in heaven, his Order on earth ; the 
 cure of souls committed to him by her 
 authority, and the temporal, no less than the 
 spiritual, aggrandisement of his Church. 
 
 He could have argued for an hour on the 
 celibacy of the clergy, inferring rather than 
 asserting it was enjoined by the Scriptures ; 
 but insisting vehemently on its decency, its 
 expediency, the beautiful example it afforded 
 of self-sacrifice and self-renunciation. A priest^ 
 he would declare, is a soldier of the noblest 
 
48 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 service the mind can conceive. Ahvays in the 
 presence of the enemy, his harness must be 
 stainless, his weapons sharp and ready for 
 immediate use; above all, must he keep himself 
 unimpeded by such heavy baggage as con- 
 juo'al love, parental anxiety, or the exactions 
 of domestic affection. He must be prepared 
 to march at a moment's notice, wherever his 
 duty summons him, acknowledging no other 
 claim, and listening only for the trumpet that 
 calls him into action. Such were this enthu- 
 siast's views as to the requirements of his 
 calling, such was his interpretation of the vows 
 he took when ordained ; yet could a glance 
 from a pair of black eyes, a sentence spoken 
 in a merry mocking girlish voice, render 
 him thoroughly uncomfortable and unsettled, 
 harassing his imagination, vexing his con- 
 science, confusing his principles, prejudices, 
 and professions in harsh and hopelesss discord, 
 "like sweet bells jangled out of tune." 
 
CHAPTER y. 
 
 COMBE-APPLETON. 
 
 ''Like master like man," thought Jane Lee, 
 as the primitive country-built fly grated and 
 creaked down a steep hill into the clean 
 little village of Combe-Appleton. " I wonder 
 whether the proverb holds good with rectors 
 and curates. I wonder what a Somersetshire 
 parson's wife is like — I never saw one — I 
 wonder which of us will most astonish the 
 other. It seems as if my wonders would 
 never cease. But here we are. This micst be 
 the rectory. "What a funny little house ! and 
 oh, what a lovely garden ! " The driver, a 
 ruddy-faced person, in cotton gloves, with 
 silver lace round his hat, rang a bell under 
 
 VOL. I. E 
 
50 BLACK BUT COMELY, 
 
 the low-roofed creeper-grown porch, which 
 was answered by a smiling maid-servant, 
 dropping curtseys with every second word, 
 who ushered the new arrival into a comfort- 
 able room, half- study half-boudoir, that 
 opened on the entrance-hall. 
 
 "Missus will be down immediate, and 
 I was to bring the tea in at once," said 
 the maid, and vanished, leaving our young 
 lady at liberty to take a survey of her new 
 home. 
 
 There were book-shelves and books in 
 them. Sermons by the Eev. Silas Tregarthen. 
 There was an engraving above the pianoforte 
 — the Eev. Silas Tregarthen in full canonicals. 
 There was a stand with a photograph — again 
 the Eev. Silas Tregarthen. ''He's not the 
 least like Mr. Strange," thought Jane Lee, 
 but just then the door opened to admit a 
 full-blown comely woman, of a certain age, 
 who walked in with outstretched hands and 
 
COMBE-APPLETOJSr. 51 
 
 an assured step, sucli as became the mistress 
 of the house, and denoted she could be none 
 other than the wife of the Rev. Silas 
 Tregarthen. 
 
 "My dear, I'm so glad to see you. We 
 got your pa's letter — Mr. Lopez, I mean — 
 and we've been expecting you all day. No 
 ceremony, I entreat. Take your bonnet off 
 here, while they're unpacking your box 
 upstairs, and have your tea comfortable. 
 You'll enjoy it after your ride. The rector — 
 that's Mr. Tregarthen, my husband, you know 
 — was so vexed he couldn't go to meet you. 
 He sent his curate instead. I hope you didn't 
 miss each other. Mr. Strange makes such 
 mistakes sometimes. What did you think of 
 him ? Here comes the tea ; you must be 
 famished, my dear. Won't you like some- 
 thing substantial with it ? " 
 
 So one poured and talked, the other 
 drank and listened; each lady taking in, 
 
 E 2 
 
 
 \iS\M 
 
52 BLACK BUT COMELY, 
 
 with covert glances, tlie dress, accoutre- 
 ments, and general calibre, as it were, of lier 
 new acquaintance, forming tlie while a mental 
 estimate, not too flattering, of the tout 
 ensemble. "Fat, vulgar, ignorant, and good- 
 natured," thought the visitor ; " older by ten 
 years than she looks, feels, or wants to be 
 thought ; dress Bridgewater, manners Putney. 
 Considered to have made a catch when she 
 married the rector, a hundred years ago. 
 Jealous of him, no doubt, to this day. I shall 
 manage her well enough, but she will bore 
 me, I feel. Never mind, I came down here 
 to be bored, and get strong. If it's very 
 
 tiresome, I'll write home, and Mr. L will 
 
 be only too glad to have me back." Since 
 she knew he was not her real father, she 
 
 always called Jack Lopez, Mr. L , and 
 
 could turn him round her finger, by that 
 or any other name, with perfect skill and 
 success. Mrs. Tregarthen's conclusions were 
 
COMBE-APPLETON, 53 
 
 less decided, her thoughts more perplexed. 
 They ran somewhat in this wise : 
 
 ''Too dark for my taste, and as bold as 
 brass, in spite of her airs and graces. Yet it's 
 curious how men admire that forward kind of 
 girl. I wonder what Silas will think of her ! 
 I wish she hadn't come, but now that she 
 is here one must make the best of it. An 
 orphan too ! My heart warms to any orphan. 
 She'd do nicely for Mervyn Strange, if he 
 took a fancy to her. There are many objec- 
 tions, though, to a married curate. And most 
 likely she's looking her best now, with the 
 excitement of the journey, the flush and 
 the hurry, and one thing and another. I 
 daresay she won't be half as handsome 
 to-morrow." 
 
 Assuming, perhaps hoping, such might 
 be the case, Mrs. Tregarthen showed her 
 visitor into a pretty little bedroom, with 
 honeysuckles peeping in at the window, and 
 
54 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 there left her to prepare for dinner, after 
 the following caution : 
 
 ** You needn't make yourself very smart, 
 my dear. There's nobody but ourselves, 
 unless young Paravant should drop in, from 
 Combe- Wester. An old pupil of my husband's, 
 he's quite at home here, and as likely as 
 not to come without dressing at all." 
 
 Such a contingency, so expressed, seemed 
 startling enough, but it set Jane Lee thinking ; 
 and she certainly bestowed more care on her 
 toilet than seemed absolutely required by the 
 occasion, particularly to meet this uncere- 
 monious guest. 
 
 In white, relieved by a scarlet ribbon at 
 her breast, a scarlet flower in her bright 
 black hair, even Mrs. Tregarthen, with a 
 mental reservation that she did not admire 
 the style, was forced to admit she had seldom 
 seen so striking a person as Jane Lee. Her 
 husband, a puffy pompous personage, absurdly 
 
COMBE-APPLETON. 55 
 
 like his own picture hanging opposite, was 
 simply staggered, and murmured some un- 
 intelligible words of welcome as he took her 
 in to dinner, very different from the rounded 
 sentences he had prepared in his drive home 
 from attending the bishop at a neighbouring 
 rectory. To give him his due, Mr. Tregarthen 
 was a man of overpowering eloquence with 
 a pen in his fingers and a sheet or two of 
 foolscap before him. His best extempore 
 efforts, so surprising to his admirers, had 
 been learnt by heart, with plenty of time 
 to think them over. Nobody was more ready 
 at an impromptu, but, like many orators of 
 wider fame, he could not swim without corks, 
 and was all abroad if the voluminous notes 
 he prepared were forgotten or mislaid. 
 
 The party had scarce unfolded their 
 napkins when a shadow passed the window, 
 and a bell was heard to ring at the garden 
 door. 
 
56 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 ''1 told you so," said Mrs. Tregarthen, 
 looking round in triumph, as a young man 
 entered the room unannounced, to take his 
 seat at the table, with the less ceremony 
 that a place had been laid for him, and 
 he seemed to be expected as a matter-of- 
 course. 
 
 *'Mr. Paravant, Miss Lee;" the lady half- 
 rose, the gentleman made a bow, and their 
 introduction was complete. 
 
 While a neat-looking, neat-handed parlour- 
 maid waited on this party of four, dispensing 
 soup and fish, cruets and sauces, wdth the 
 utmost attention possible, and the least noise, 
 those whom she served w^ere stealing at each 
 other glances of curiosity and interest, not 
 devoid, on Miss Lee's part at least, of amuse- 
 ment and surprise. Mr. Tregarthen could 
 not take his eyes off the attractive young 
 lady who had that day arrived by rail and 
 fly to share his home. Mrs. Tregarthen, 
 
COMBE-APPLETON, 57 
 
 watching tier liusband as a cat watches a 
 mouse, seemed to express in her whole deport- 
 ment, from the restless hands and eyelids 
 to the quiver of gaudy ribbons that adorned 
 her head-dress, " I should like to catch you 
 at it ! " Mr. Paravant was admiring, in a 
 preoccupied, uneasy kind of way, the hand- 
 some girl who seemed to have dropped from 
 the clouds into this Somersetshire village for 
 his especial subjugation ; while Jane Lee, 
 kneading her bread thoughtfully between her 
 white fingers, speculated as to who he was, 
 what he was, why he seemed thus to come 
 and go unquestioned, and whether he too 
 — with the same privileges as her o^vn — 
 was " to be treated in every respect hke one 
 of the family." 
 
 Not being shy, our young lady felt un- 
 willing to forego information of any kind, 
 for want of asking. Fixing her dark eyes 
 on him till he fluttered all over, like a cock- 
 
58 BLACK BUT COMELY, 
 
 chafer with a pin through its back, she 
 hazarded the innocent remark that she had 
 passed through a beautiful country on her 
 way from the station, and paused to see how 
 it would be taken up. Young Paravant, in 
 some trepidation, felt himself called on to 
 reply. ''Glad you like it, I'm sure," said 
 he, blushing a little, and tugging at his shirt- 
 cuffs with the mauvaise honte that often 
 accompanies a good deal of self-assertion. 
 ''Pretty road from the station. I don't 
 know whether you passed Combe- Wester. 
 Depends on which way you came." 
 
 " Combe- Wester. Is it a low white 
 house, under the hill, with an avenue of 
 chestnuts, and an iron sfate into the hi^h- 
 road ? " 
 
 "Eight again! That's Combe- Wester, 
 fair enough. What did you think of 
 it?" 
 
 " I thought it looked very quiet, very 
 
COMBE-APPLETON. 5& 
 
 retired." She was going to add, " very dull," 
 but didn't, and was glad of it the next 
 minute. 
 
 " Yes, it's quiet and retired enough. It's 
 a good quarter of a mile, you know, from 
 the road. I hope you'll drive over and take 
 a look round some day. Miss Lee. I belong 
 there. Combe- Wester's mme." 
 
 She stole a glance at him from under her 
 dark eyelashes, that denoted a dawn of in- 
 terest, but did not betray one-tenth of the 
 surprise she felt. He seemed so unlike the 
 sort of person that Combe-Wester or any 
 other country-place could belong to. Jack 
 Lopez would have called him " a yokel ; " 
 the grown-up young ladies at Miss Quilt er's, 
 " a cub." He had dressed for dinner, 
 certainly, thereby falsifying the predictions 
 of his hostess, but he wore coloured trousers 
 and a black neckcloth. He was a good- 
 looking young fellow, too, with healthy 
 
€0 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 clieeks, sleek brown hair, and little deep-set 
 eyes, that were gray in one light, green in 
 another, but bright and keen in all. At 
 a market-dinner amongst the farmers, you 
 might have taken him for a subaltern of 
 militia ; whereas, at a military mess you 
 would have felt assured he was a civilian, 
 and a youth brought up in the country. 
 Miss Lee's knowledge of mankind, acquired 
 from interchange of opinions with her school- 
 fellows, was necessarily limited, but she made 
 up her mind, without the slightest hesitation, 
 that if it really belonged to him, the chief 
 merit of young Paravant was to be found 
 in Combe- Wester. 
 
 " I daresay you are very fond of it," 
 said she, turning languidly away to receive 
 the attentions of her host, who, doing as he 
 would be done by, pressed on her many 
 rural delicacies with overpowering hospitality, 
 especially recommending a certain West- 
 
COMBE- APFLETON. 61 
 
 country disli called '^junket," that met with 
 her entire approval. 
 
 As the Eev. Silas warmed under the 
 influence of good cheer, brown sherry, and 
 cider of his own bottling, better than most 
 people's champagne, he grew more and more 
 chatty and affectionate, engrossing the whole 
 attention of his visitor, while utterlv io-norinof 
 the scornful glances and snorts of indignation 
 launched at him by his wife. Miss Lee was 
 a good listener, and he detailed to her at 
 considerable length, the responsibilities of his 
 parish, the particulars of his preferment, the 
 peculiarities of the bishop, and shortcomings 
 of sundry parsons, his neighbours, who satis- 
 fied their consciences with three services a 
 fortnight, and went hunting twice a week. 
 Then he branched ofi" to his glebe, his Devons, 
 his breed of black Berkshire pigs. He was 
 a practical farmer, you see, and something 
 of a gardener as well, mowed his own lawn, 
 
62 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 budded his own roses ; lie would show Miss 
 Lee how to do the last, and flattered himself 
 he would inoculate her with a taste for country- 
 life. Before the dessert was set on, he had 
 already called her *' his dear young lady '* 
 three several times, and Mrs. Tregarthen 
 could stand it no longer. 
 
 '' When Silas has quite done with you," 
 said she, making with finger-glass and napkin 
 a signal, called by ladies " the move," and 
 so sailed off to the drawing-room without 
 further delay. 
 
 Here the conversation turned, naturally 
 enough, on the guest who arrived to dinner 
 so unceremoniously after they sat down. The 
 rector's wife could fight, none better, but she 
 could also manoeuvre. Subsequently, upstairs 
 with her husband, she was very likely to 
 give battle, but in the meantime a change 
 of front seemed mrore advisable than an attack 
 in line ; so, smoothing her brows, she addressed 
 
COMBE-APPLETON. 63 
 
 her companion witli one of those forced 
 smiles that the photograph reproduces to 
 perfection, but no painter has ever succeeded 
 in imitating on canvas. 
 
 '^ And what do you think of him, my 
 dear ? Good-looking, isn't he ? and pleasant- 
 spoken when he gets over his shyness ? 
 Having no children of our own, he's almost 
 like a son to the rector and me. Bless you, 
 he comes and goes here day after day, in 
 and out, just as he pleases ; but he's a fine 
 young man, you'll admit." 
 
 ''Oh, very," answered Miss Lee, whose 
 standard of male beauty, like that of her 
 companions, had been formed on certain 
 gentlemen - privates of Her Majesty's Life 
 Guards, frequenting the suburb of Bayswater, 
 with short red jackets and long blue legs. 
 " He ought to be taller, though, to suit 
 my taste." 
 
 " Taller ? I don't quite agree with you, 
 
64 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 my dear. He's as tall as the rector, and 
 Tm sure that's quite tall enough. I never 
 could see what there is to admire in a man 
 like a maypole. And he has a good pro- 
 perty, too. A very good property, if he 
 would take care of it. What he wants is 
 a wife to look after him and keep him 
 straight. " 
 
 *' But surely he's very young," objected 
 the other. '^ You wouldn't have him marry 
 before his whiskers are grown." 
 
 *^ I don't know anything about whiskers," 
 replied the rector's wife. '^ Why, if you come 
 to that, look at Mr, Strange. He's thirty, 
 if he's a day, and no more whiskers than 
 the back of my hand. Youth's a drawback, 
 perhaps, in some things, but after all, people 
 get older every day they live. No, there are 
 many men would make worse husbands than 
 young Paravant." 
 
 "Paravant — what an extraordinary name ! " 
 
OOMBE-APPLETON. 65 
 
 *' It sounds foreign, don't it ? But it's 
 a good old West-country family for all tliat. 
 They have been settled here and at Upper- 
 Appleton, from father to son, pretty near 
 three hundred years. James Paravant is 
 proud of his pedigree, I can tell you, and his 
 name too. It's French, you know, taken 
 from their motto, * Par avant ! ' you under- 
 stand, ' Alwavs in front.' " 
 
 " I see, and it's rather appropriate. I 
 suppose you call the present representative 
 * Forward James.' " 
 
 VOL. I. 
 
CHAPTER VI. 
 
 FOEWARD JAMES/ 
 
 The nickname stuck to him. It was repeated 
 from mouth to mouth till he could not escape 
 hearing it, and, notwithstanding some irrita- 
 tion, found himself compelled to accept the 
 title, and answer, without a murmur, to the 
 appellation of " Forward James." 
 
 Perhaps the sarcasm seemed less pointed 
 to him than to another. He pleased himself, 
 no doubt, by assuming that it inferred many- 
 noble qualities, such as active daring supe- 
 riority in field sports and athletic exercises ; 
 above all, a headlong gallantry in affairs of 
 the heart, which young men esteem and 
 appreciate in proportion to the awkwardness 
 of their advances and their ignorance of the 
 
''FORWARD JAMESr 67 
 
 other sex — who, while justly giving preference 
 to the diligent and painstaking over "the 
 laggard in love/' are yet sufficiently good 
 judges to recognise the wide difference that 
 exists between haste and speed. 
 
 Before Miss Lee had been six weeks at the 
 rectory, '' Forward James" was only too happy 
 that she should call him by any name she 
 pleased. 
 
 It was pitiable to see the complete sub- 
 jection into which this young man had been 
 brought, chiefly, I am bound to say, by a 
 course of treatment that he ought to have 
 rebelled against from the first. Miss Lee 
 rarely spoke to him at all. If she did con- 
 descend to notice his presence, it was only 
 to contradict his assertions, sneer at his 
 opinions, turn him generally into ridicule, 
 and impress on him practically the meaning 
 •of the word "snub." 
 
 Paravant, who, such as it was, had 
 
 F 2 
 
68 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 Mtherto been tlie unquestioned '' cock of his 
 own walk," felt utterly intimidated and dis- 
 heartened by an adversary so unlike those 
 over whom he was accustomed to obtain his 
 easy triumphs. Equally unable to fight or 
 fly, he seemed positively to court humiliation 
 and defeat. Hitherto he had considered 
 himself the '^ show man " of the parish, 
 owning the largest acreage, occupying the 
 best pew in church, possessing a four-wheeled 
 carriage, a good house and garden, stabling 
 for six horses, cows, bees, out-buildings, and 
 a conservatory. Independent in means, and 
 his own master — for his father slept with 
 the other Paravants in Appleton churchyard, 
 and his mother rented a furnished house in 
 Bath — it was the dream of every farmer's 
 dausfhter within a radius of three miles, to 
 become the wife of this paragon, thereby 
 taking precedence, as a squire's lady, of 
 sisters, rivals, and former friends. 
 
"FORWARD JAMES." 69 
 
 There are differences in rank of which the 
 Lord Chamberlain has no cognisance. A few 
 hundred acres of your own entitle you to more 
 consideration than the rental of half a county 
 from another; and ''Forward James," had he 
 seemed a little less forward in manner, might 
 have been received cordially enough amongst 
 the landed gentry as one of themselves ; but 
 he preferred to be king of his company, and 
 affected rather the society of those tenant- 
 farmers and tradesmen with whom his word 
 was law. The Eev. Silas had done what he 
 could for his pupil, and strongly advised him 
 to enter the militia or the yeomanry, but 
 James was too well satisfied with his o^^m 
 advantages to risk competition, and, being a 
 *' bumpkin " of the highest calibre, a bumpkin 
 he chose to remain. 
 
 Since Miss Lee's arrival he made some 
 excuse to dine almost every day at the 
 rectory, arriving there in such a heat and 
 
70 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 flurry as even the rector's cider seemed unable 
 to cool or compose. On these occasions, 
 however, he found the young lady's conversa- 
 tion either monopolised by the Rev. Silas, 
 who made no secret of his pleasure in 
 her society, or her interest engrossed 
 by Mervyn Strange, whose silence seemed 
 somehow much more to her taste than 
 his own platitudes. Presently he took 
 to watching for her in the garden, where 
 she spent much of her time reading or 
 working in the open air, and pounced upon 
 her with far-fetched excuses for his appear- 
 ance, and a transparent affectation of sur- 
 prise to find her in her usual haunt. All 
 this roused her sense of the ridiculous, and 
 provoked her a good deal at the same 
 time. 
 
 '^Mrs. Tregarthen at home. Miss Lee?" 
 he would inquire, with an air of the deepest 
 solicitude. " She is quite well, I hope. 
 
''FORWARD JAMESy 71 
 
 Passing tlie Iiouse at any rate, you know, I 
 thoiiglit I would call to inquire." 
 
 "Quite well, thank you, Mr. Paravant. 
 Wouldn't you like to see lier ? You'll find 
 her in the drawino;-room." 
 
 '* Oh yes ! the drawing-room of course. 
 Perhaps she's busy, Miss Lee ; perhaps I'd 
 better wait a little outside." 
 
 Then Jane would resume her work, taking 
 no more notice of him than of the great 
 blundering bumble-bee groping about among 
 the moss at her feet. After awhile he would 
 ask if he might smoke a cigar in her |)resence, 
 and, receiving permission, would light up with 
 exceeding satisfaction, because this meant an 
 uninterrupted interview with his idol of some 
 thirty minutes at least. 
 
 ' One day, under the influence of tobacco, he 
 became more demonstrative than usual. She 
 had dropped her book, and picking it up he 
 glanced at the title-page. 
 
72 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 '' French ! " said lie, with an air of in- 
 creased admiration. " Miss Lee, can you 
 speak French ? " 
 
 *^Yes, of course I can; can't you?" 
 
 *' Not exactly. You see I haven't been 
 taught. I've never learned lots of things 
 that fellows like Strano^e know. TreQ;arthen 
 didn't take much pains with me. I suppose 
 he saw I wasn't exactly a book-worm ; but 
 I'm not such a fool as I look, Miss Lee." 
 
 "That I can easily believe." 
 
 ''Ah ! now you're laughing at me. I don't 
 mind some people laughing at me ; but I 
 wouldn't stand it from everybody. I dare- 
 say you think I couldn't cut up rough — no 
 more I could with you ; but I can take my 
 own part as well as most if I'm put upon, and 
 always could from a boy ! " 
 
 ""Why, you're a boy now." 
 
 " I'm not, I'm past one-and-twenty. If a 
 man isn't a man at one-and-twentv what's the 
 
''FORWARD JAMESr 73 
 
 good of comino; of as^e, and mvino; the 
 labourers beer and all the rest of it ? Twenty - 
 one and my own master. Don't you think, 
 Miss Lee, it would be a very good thing if I 
 was to marry ? " 
 
 " For yourself, do you mean, or the 
 lady ? " 
 
 " For both. I should be very fond of her, 
 I can tell you ; indeed, I'm very fond of her 
 now." 
 
 '^ Then I certainly shouldn't advise you to 
 think of it. She would lead you the life of 
 a dog ! " 
 
 " But why ? If I did everything she told 
 me, and — and — liked her better than the 
 whole Vt^orld." 
 
 " I can't conceive anything more tiresome 
 and ridiculous. But why do you ask me of 
 all people ? " 
 
 "Because you are nineteen yourself — be- 
 cause you are so clever and so — so different 
 
74 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 from the people down here. Because, Miss 
 Lee — because ' ' 
 
 " Because you can't get another listener," 
 she laughed. '' Now, take my advice, it's meant 
 for your good. Do something. Go out into 
 life. Don't stay blinking here at the daylight, 
 like an owl in a hollow tree, but launch on the 
 stream, and ten years hence, when you feel 
 you are really a man, tell some lady you like 
 her, perhaps she will listen to you then. To- 
 day she would only laugh in your face. Don't 
 be angry. I'm not very old, but I think in 
 such matters I have forgotten more than you 
 ever knew." 
 
 He blushed scarlet ; tears of rage and 
 mortification rose to his eyes ; but he turned 
 his head away and made shift to swallow them 
 down. Jane Lee went on with her work, 
 thoroughly enjoying his discomfiture. 
 
 " Shall you stay to luncheon ?" she asked, 
 after a pause. '' We rather expect Mr. 
 
'' FORWARD JAMESr 75 
 
 Strange. He hasn't been near us for a long 
 time." 
 
 " Does it seem long to you ? " 
 
 " Yes ; the days pass rather slow in the 
 country, and a little excitement goes a great 
 way." 
 
 '^Then it is excitement to meet Strano^e 
 at luncheon ? Miss Lee, what can you see 
 in that fellow ? A pompous prig, I call him, 
 and I sometimes think I shall tell him so." 
 
 "Do. He will give you just the sort of 
 set-down you require. I don't know what 
 schoolboys call a prig, but Mr. Strange isn't 
 the least pompous, and, for my part, I think 
 he's very pleasant company." 
 
 If you have ever watched a kitten amusing 
 herself with a ball of string, you must have 
 observed that the instincts of the cat are 
 fully developed in its offspring, and that 
 the one has as little mercy on her plaything 
 as the other on her prey. Jane Lee could 
 
76 BLACK BUI COMELY. 
 
 have shown no more skill, taken no more 
 pleasure in making her admirer nnhappy, 
 had she been a coquette of ten years' expe- 
 rience — nay, for such obvious distress as his, 
 nine-and-twenty might possibly have felt more 
 compassion than nineteen. 
 
 He threw his cigar away with a jerk, 
 and rose stiffly to his feet. 
 
 " I — I don't think I can stay to luncheon," 
 said he, speaking rather low and thick. '^I 
 have just remembered that I had forgotten 
 an engagement for the whole afternoon. 
 Please make my excuses to Mrs. Tregarthen. 
 Good-morning, Miss Lee." 
 
 " Good-morning, Mr. Paravant." 
 
 " Good-bye." He put his hand out and 
 looked reproachfully in her face. 
 
 " I don't like saying good-bye," she 
 answered, taking the offered hand graciously 
 enough. '^ It sounds as if I was never to 
 see you again. Ain't you coming to dinner?" 
 
''FORWARD JAMES:' 77 
 
 *'That depends on you. I will if you 
 ask me, of course." 
 
 *' How can I ask you ? It's not my 
 Eouse. If it were, perhaps you'd have a 
 general invitation, only I should expect you 
 to behave a good deal better than to-day. 
 I'm quite afraid of you, Mr. Paravant, when 
 you're so cross." 
 
 *^ Afraid ! You afraid of me ! Oh Miss 
 Lee, dear Miss Lee, if you only knew " 
 
 She jumped up, gathering books and 
 needlework in her arms. 
 
 " There's the luncheon-bell ! " she ex- 
 claimed, hurrying into the house ; '^ and 
 here's Mr. Strange. It's too late to keep 
 your appointment now, Mr. Paravant. Better 
 make the best of it, and stay with your 
 friends while you can. Some people never 
 know when they're well off." 
 
CHAPTER VII. 
 
 TWO STRINGS. 
 
 Poor James Paravant, in the hands of such 
 a young lady as my heroine, was like a fly 
 in a spider's web. The more he tried to 
 extricate himself the more helplessly he 
 became entangled. Twenty times in the week 
 did he resolve to put an end to this feverish 
 life of longing and uncertainty in a serious 
 proposal, and was only deterred from so des- 
 perate a remedy by grievous ignorance as to 
 the form of words usual on such occasions, 
 and an instinctive conviction that he would 
 be refused point-blank ! 
 
 In the latter contingency it would be in- 
 cumbent on him, he thought, to carry out the 
 
TWO STRINGS. 79 
 
 part of a despairing lover by flying liis country, 
 or at least removino^ as far as Bath, there to 
 seek ^^ surcease of sorrow" in the society of an 
 admiring mother, and the mild excitements of 
 provincial dissipation. " She would be sorry," 
 he thought, " when it was too late, and the 
 heart that had worshipped her so fondly was 
 lost to her for ever." But in the meantime he 
 hungered to see her every day — was exceed- 
 ingly loth to leave Combe- Wester just as his 
 grass was ready to cut — ^and reflected, not 
 without reason, that one could hardly expect 
 to advance in the good graces of a mistress 
 by calmly resigning her to a rival, and giving 
 up the pursuit in disgust. 
 
 Had he a rival ? He asked himself the 
 question, very often, to answer it angrily in the 
 affirmative. With the instincts of a lower 
 nature, he mistrusted, no less than he disliked, 
 Mervyn Strange. While professing contempt 
 for a man who could neither ride nor shoot. 
 
80 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 nor tie flies, nor play cricket, nor, indeed, 
 drink beer and smoke tobacco, he was yet 
 conscious of the other's superiority in moral 
 energy, force of character, and the mental 
 qualities that win success in life. To enter 
 the lists against such an adversary was to 
 court defeat, and yet how could he bear to 
 abandon the contest ? The more he thought 
 the matter over the more he hated Mervyn 
 Strange, the more he felt satisfied his life's 
 happiness depended on the favour of Jane Lee. 
 In those complications which romantic 
 people call afiairs of the heart, there is nothing 
 so pitiable as a reversal of that superiority 
 erroneously supposed to be the prerogative of 
 man in his relations with the other sex. 
 When the lover grovels of his own accord in 
 the dirt, he cannot complain if he is trodden 
 on. " Forward James," as we have seen, 
 knew no French. He had never heard, nor 
 could he have translated, the sensible maxim, 
 
TWO STEINGS. 81 
 
 tiiat in all relations of life, "II faut se /aire 
 valoii^;" but there was not the same excuse 
 for Mervyn Strange. 
 
 - Before these two men had been six weeks 
 under the influence of Jane Lee's attractions, 
 each succumbed, in his own way, to the charm 
 that each, in his own way, did his utmost to 
 resist. 
 
 Paravant, as was natural, went down 
 without much struggle, but for his senior 
 the process of subjugation was longer, more 
 complicated, not devoid of cruelty and coer- 
 cion. Some girls, independently of education 
 and opportunity, are born coquettes, and of 
 these, an earnest, simple-minded man, espe- 
 cially when imaginative and self-conscious, 
 seems the natural prey. The strongest attach- 
 ments are those which defy the laws of pro- 
 bability, and the fitness of things. When a 
 boy's first love is a woman of forty, she finds 
 herself the object of an infatuation that, 
 
 YOL. I. O 
 
82 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 despise it thougli she may, is touching in 
 the absurdity of its self-abnegation and self- 
 sacrifice. When a young lady compels some 
 contemporary of her papa to dance attendance, 
 in chains and tight boots, on her every move- 
 ment, she enjoys an absolute sovereignty, of 
 which she cannot but recognise the absurdity, 
 while conscious that she is neither worthy nor 
 willing to be so adored by such an admirer. 
 
 When two people are thrown together, 
 Avhose paths through life have been shaped, 
 for them in opposite directions, for whom 
 straitened means, family quarrels, other en- 
 tanglements, have made affection a torment, 
 and marriage an impossibility, they will go 
 on caring for each other till they are gray, 
 with a constancy that can only be accounted 
 for on a principle of contradiction inherent in 
 the human race, derived perhaps from our 
 common mother in her garden of Eden, 
 hankering after forbidden fruit. 
 
TWO STBIA'GS. 83 
 
 Whereas, if Adonis, with ten thousand a 
 year in a ring-fence, marries Hebe with an 
 adjoining ten tliousand a year, also in a ring- 
 fence, cheered by the enthusiastic approval of 
 friends, relations, tenants in the marquee, 
 labourers on the lawn, and five columns of 
 the county paper, the chances are they will 
 be yawning in three months, wrangling in 
 six, and starting before the year is out on 
 a journey that, notwithstanding many stop- 
 pages, much hesitation, frequent turnings 
 back, and puttings on of the drag-chain, too 
 often terminates in sin, shame, discovery, 
 the Divorce Court, and misery for life. 
 
 Mervyn Strange, however — taking himself 
 to task severely in a solitary walk to visit a 
 parishioner — had not yet arrived at such re- 
 flections as these. Steep and rugged are 
 the heights of Mount Ida after our footsteps 
 have fairly entangled us in the thickets and 
 
 precipices that defend her shrine ; but the 
 
 G 2 
 
84 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 start is pleasant enough, rising gradually on 
 an easy incline, covered with grass and flowers. 
 The clergyman began to labour, and stumble, 
 and catch his breath, ere he was aware he 
 had really left the plain. The first time he 
 saw Jane Lee, he said to himself, "A thing 
 of beauty is a joy for ever ! " with the sense 
 of admiration, apart from any idea of pos- 
 session, that we . experience in contemplating 
 the macaws in the Zoo, for instance, the 
 Koh-i-noor diamond, or, say, the golden 
 image of Prince Albert, the great and good, 
 in Hyde Park. The second time, on leaving 
 her, he felt it required an effort to shake off 
 the influence of a presence that seemed to 
 hang about him like the memory of a scent 
 or a song. The third, he wondered what 
 she thought of hiniy and decided that if he 
 were not a clergyman, and if he had any 
 intentions of marrying, with many similar 
 contingencies, this was in every respect the 
 
TWO STEINGS. 85 
 
 sort of girl lie should like to make his 
 wife. 
 
 When a man has got thus far, he seldom 
 comes back again a single step. The thorns 
 may be sharp and frequent, the path rugged, 
 overgrown, and full of holes ; but, after all, 
 it is a garden of roses, even though they 
 hang out of reach. 
 
 Self-examination has been much recom- 
 mended by divines rather than philosophers, 
 as a wholesome discipline for the mind. I 
 am inclined to doubt if its effects are so 
 remedial as those of constant responsibility 
 and occupation. When the pressure is raised 
 to hard work it takes the nonsense out of us 
 with extraordinary effect ; and I am per- 
 suaded that no amount of solitary reflection, 
 no thinking a matter over, backwards and 
 forwards, to end where we began, enables 
 us to encounter its difficulties so successfully 
 as the energy we derive from intercourse, 
 
86 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 collision, even contest, Avitli onr fellow- 
 men. 
 
 Mervyn Strange had a long walk before 
 him through a pretty country, and not much, 
 necessarily, to take up his attention. The 
 invalid he proposed to visit was deaf as 
 well as bed-ridden. His sermon against next 
 Sunday was prepared — not written, you un- 
 derstand, because he persisted in preaching 
 extempore, and in doing it remarkably ill. 
 The school-feast, having taken place last 
 week, was off his mind. Appleton revel, 
 with its yearly overflow of drunkenness and 
 disorder, had not yet arrived. The hay- 
 harvest, now at its height of richness and 
 fragrance, affected him neither one way nor 
 the other. He could afford leisure for a 
 pitched battle with his own heart, and the 
 causa teterrima was Jane Lee. 
 
 His tactics seemed wronsr from the be- 
 ginning. In all contests of love or war, half 
 
TWO STRINGS. 87 
 
 measures must necessarily be fatal. You 
 may figlit, or you may fly ; but if you strike 
 it should be as hard as ever you can ; if you 
 run away you must break the bridges behind 
 you, and on no account turn back to look 
 after your baggage. In spite of their true 
 hearts and honest natures, I appeal to the 
 Eoyal Navy whether blue water is not an 
 effectual cure for love. 
 
 Green fields, however, particularly in the 
 rich West country at midsummer, have a very 
 different effect. New-mown hay, the song- 
 birds, the fainter note of the cuckoo, sweet- 
 brier overhead and buttercups underfoot, 
 are apt to soften and stultify. The male 
 Jieart, marble in St. James's, becomes wax 
 in Somersetshire ; and the ancients were right 
 in assuming nature to be a feminine deity, 
 though, unlike women in general, she seems 
 favourably inclined to her own sex. 
 
 Mervyn Strange could understand — nobody 
 
88 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 better — why to-day there was a deeper blue 
 in the sky, and why the wild aromatic odours 
 that breathed from a golden blaze of gorse 
 woke in his heart a thousand tender fancies 
 and desires — vague, indefinite, coming and 
 going, like the breeze over the hay-fields, 
 charged, like that pleasant air, with such a 
 sweetness as seemed to enthral his senses 
 and intoxicate his brain. 
 
 Who shall explain how the droning of 
 a bee, the lowing of a cow, the grating see- 
 saw of a haymaker sharpening his scythe, 
 could recall such a picture as this to the 
 imagination of a hard-worked parish priest ? 
 A pale proud face, with clear-cut features, 
 and lips somewhat too thin, that curved less 
 often in mirth than scorn ; a dainty head, 
 carried high, as though accustomed to wear 
 a crown ; dark waves of hair, shining, luxu- 
 riant, of which to possess one single thread 
 he would have sacrificed a limb ; taper hands. 
 
TWO STRINGS. 89 
 
 with the filbert -finished fingers suggestive of 
 her supple shapely race ; arched and slender 
 feet ; a lithe yet swelling form ; and eyes, 
 of which the glances that he always sought, 
 yet always shrank from meeting, seemed to 
 thrill him even here in the meadows — a full 
 league off as the crow flies. 
 
 " I must not think of her 1 " he told him- 
 self again and again, while he thought of 
 nothing else, as he swung along from stile 
 to stile, and field to field, at the rate of 
 ^ye miles an hour. " If I were weak enough 
 to allow it, this beautiful girl would take 
 entire possession of my faculties, and I should 
 be good for nothing in my calling as a priest. 
 For a layman, I can conceive no greater pride, 
 no greater happiness, than to throw his heart 
 down at her feet, and bid her take it up into 
 her bosom, or crush its life out in the dust, 
 that it might never beat for another again. 
 Oh what a lot I what a heaven upon earth ! 
 
90 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 to be hers, to serve her, to defend her, to 
 watch her every look and action, to be with 
 her day and night ! 
 
 " But this is the very thought that I must 
 drive out of my mind at any cost, at any sa- 
 crifice. St. George had never been canonised 
 but for the Dragon, and she is my Dragon, 
 standing across the path to heaven ! Oh 
 that we could meet in close and mortal 
 combat ! I would be content to perish at her 
 feet, her breath on my brow, her calm, cruel, 
 maddening eyes looking down into mine. 
 To perish ? Ay, but it would be to perish 
 everlastingly I And these poor souls com- 
 mitted to my charge, this score or two of 
 silly sheep entrusted to my keeping, here 
 literally in the wilderness — shall I not be 
 faithful over a few things ? Shall I, the 
 shepherd, leave them to the wolf, because 
 of a girl's dark eyes, that look upon me 
 kindly twice or thrice in a week ? Oh my 
 
TWO STRINGS. . 91 
 
 darling ! my darling ! how much would I 
 give up for your sake ! But no ! I dare 
 not. I tvill not ! Henceforth I must school 
 and harden myself, till I become a man of 
 steel. You shall be to me as the statue of 
 a goddess in a gallery, or the picture of a 
 nymph on a wall. I will come into your 
 presence without a tremor, leave it without 
 a sigh, and — and because I could love you 
 so dearly, I will worship you and care for 
 you no more ! " 
 
 Having arrived at this sensible deter- 
 mination, it is not surprising that the curate, 
 after fulfilling his parish duties, should have 
 so timed his walk and directed his steps, as 
 to pass his rector's garden at the hour Jane 
 Lee was pretty sure to be sitting there with 
 book or work-basket, under her accustomed 
 tree. 
 
 When people have made up their minds 
 to overcome temptation, they are usually 
 
92 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 indiscreetly eager to put their good resolutions 
 to the test. I doubt if the plan often answers, 
 and am inclined to think that for men, and 
 women too, it is safer, in such cases, to run 
 than to fight. Mervyn Strange, however, 
 was a strong-minded person, priding himself 
 on his force of character, and this was the 
 result. 
 
 A great start of surprise, assumed, no 
 doubt, because he must have expected to see 
 her, or why did he pass that way ? A rush 
 of blood to his brow, followed by unnatural 
 pallor and white twitching lips. A con- 
 strained oTcetino- that mierht have convinced 
 the merest schoolgirl of her power, and a 
 little nervous laugh, of which he was pain- 
 fully conscious and pitifully ashamed. Miss 
 Lee, on the other hand, seemed perfectly cool 
 and collected. It is not to be supposed she 
 was ignorant of the effect she produced, nor 
 do I believe but that a young lady can 
 
TWO STRINGS. 93 
 
 appreciate the homage she doubtless con- 
 siders her due, with as much discernment 
 at nineteen as at any subsequent period of 
 her life. 
 
 Miss Quilter was an excellent gover- 
 ness, her establishment was conducted on 
 principles of rigorous seclusion, befitting 
 such a nunnery of modern times ; yet a 
 little bird told me that her pupils, of all 
 ages, were in the habit of discussing with 
 considerable freedom the relative influence 
 of the sexes, and that in one of their par- 
 liaments, held under a certain sycamore on 
 summer afternoons after school-hours, little 
 Miss Moffat, whose frock barely reached her 
 ankles, was heard to declare, that in her 
 opinion no girl of spirit should be contented 
 with less than two admirers on hand at once, 
 or accept an offer of marriage till she had 
 already refused three ! 
 
 Jane Lee, then, the tallest, the hand- 
 
94 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 somes t, the most daring and precocious of 
 these budding beauties, cannot but have 
 studied such subjects — theoretically, at least 
 — with sufficient attention to form her own 
 ideas, and act up to her own opinions. She 
 was no blundering novice, stumbling here, 
 slipping there, and breaking her head or 
 her heart against an obstacle, in the flurry 
 and confusion of unaccustomed ignorance. 
 She seemed rather an experienced mariner, 
 who had carefully conned charts and taken 
 bearino;s for the traversino- of latitudes as 
 yet unexplored ; so that, in spite of his 
 seniority, his manhood, his acquirements, and 
 his calling, Mervyn Strange was a mere 
 puppet in . her hands. She could fool, tease, 
 soothe, or provoke him at will, and was 
 likely to give him about as much rope, show 
 him about as much mercy, as the cat already 
 mentioned affords to a mouse, or the kitten 
 to its ball of string. 
 
CHAPTER VIIL 
 
 BRED m THE BONE. 
 
 " Why do you never come near ns, Mr. 
 Strange ? No, I won t shake hands. I shake 
 hands with people who are glad to see me, 
 and you're not.'' 
 
 He had schooled himself to be ice and 
 marble, so the something: that shot throuo^h 
 him like an electric current while she spoke 
 was of no consequence whatever. 
 
 " I — I looked in as I happened to be 
 passing," he stammered. '' I had no idea I 
 should find you at home." 
 
 "That's just what I say. If you had, 
 you wouldn't have come ! Well, now you 
 are here you can make yourself useful. In 
 
96 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 the first x^lace, lielp me to tie up these 
 roses in one buncli. Not that way ! How 
 clumsy men are ! Their fingers are all 
 thumbs ! " 
 
 Her taper hands touched his own ; their 
 heads were bent over the posy ; he could 
 feel her breath on his cheek. What a 
 mercy that he could make up his mind not 
 to care for her ! Without such preparation, 
 the position would have been dangerous in 
 the extreme. He had taken a second- 
 class at Oxford, was a man of abilities over 
 the average, a good theologian, well read 
 in classical authors, ancient history, modern 
 literature, and he was racking his brains for 
 something to say to a girl of nineteen, yet 
 could elicit no more original remark than 
 the obvious truism that " Flowers are very 
 beautiful," adding, as a brilliant after- 
 thought : " You — you are fond of flowers, 
 Miss Lee?'' 
 
BRED IN THE BONE. 97 
 
 *' No, I'm not ! " she answered. *^ I hate 
 the order and neatness of a garden ; I hate 
 everything prim, and tame, and artificial I 
 should like to be a savage, Mr. Strange, 
 and dress skins in a wigwam ! " 
 
 But for his late resolutions, he felt how 
 willingly he would have exchanged the high 
 black waistcoat, soft hat, long skirts, and 
 decent externals of a Christian minister, for 
 beads, blanket, war-paint, and w^ampum, with 
 such a squaw as this to warm the lodge 
 and brighten the wilderness by her smiles ; 
 but he remonstrated gravely, nevertheless : 
 
 " You cannot be in earnest. Miss Lee ; 
 you cannot wish to barter the comforts of 
 home, the privileges, the luxuries, the social 
 advantages of civilisation, for a mere animal 
 existence, limited to such wants and pleasures 
 as are shared by the beasts of the field." 
 
 " Say rather the birds of the air. Fancy 
 the delight of being free. No clocks, no 
 
 VOL. I. H 
 
98 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 regular meals, no afternoon calls, no reading, 
 no writing, no duty towards your neighbour, 
 and above all, no friends ! " 
 
 He was hurt, and showed it. '' That is 
 not a kind speech," said he, '' Perhaps the 
 friends might feel lonely, though you would 
 not ! " 
 
 '' Who is there to miss me ? " she asked, 
 bending her dark eyes on him, with an ex- 
 pression half tender, half scornful, but wholly 
 perplexing, that pleased and pained him at 
 the same time. " Few girls of my age are so 
 much alone in the world. I don't complain. 
 I shouldn't like a lot of brothers and sisters, 
 uncles, aunts, and cousins. The ordinary hum- 
 drum relationships of life would only fret and 
 provoke me, and make me w^orse than I am. 
 No, it is better to be a wild bird, out of the 
 nest for good and all, flying from tree to tree, 
 at its own will, to perch on any branch it 
 fancies. If I were to pack up my traps, and 
 
BRED IN THE BONE. 99 
 
 disappear to-morrow morning, nobody knows 
 where, I don't believe I should be missed one 
 bit, and Fm sure I shouldn't care whether I 
 -were or not ! " 
 
 " You cannot mean it," he replied, in some 
 agitation. " It grieves me to hear you speak 
 like that. It seems so sad, so unnatural for 
 such a — such a — such a — person as yourself, 
 with youth, health, a good education, good 
 looks " 
 
 She interrupted him. 
 
 *' Stop a moment, good looks are a matter 
 of opinion ; and granting that I had them, 
 what's the use of being good-looking, with 
 nobody to look at one ? " 
 
 " There's many a gem of purest ray serene," 
 
 he murmured, for in truth, such was the man's 
 
 discomfiture in this unequal warfare that he 
 
 was fain to fall back on memory, rather than 
 
 trust ingenuity, for continuance of a contest 
 
 that threatened his downfall at every turn. 
 
 H 2 
 
100 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 ^' I know," she replied laugliing ; ^' but 
 I'm not serene, and I don't want to blusli un- 
 seen — I don't want to blush at all. Nothing 
 makes one look such a fool, Mr. Strange." 
 
 '' Miss Lee " 
 
 '^ I don't like you to call me Miss Lee. It 
 sounds stiff and formal. I suppose it wouldn't 
 be right for you to call me Jane ? " 
 
 He turned pale. All his good resolutions 
 were foro-otten. "I'm not sure." 
 
 " And yet Mr. Paravant does, and you're a 
 great deal older than James." 
 
 The good resolutions came back with a 
 rush, but brought with them not a shade of 
 colour to his cheek. 
 
 Called her by her christian-name, did he? 
 — that cub ! — and she let him ! To be sure, 
 " Forward James " might not have asked per- 
 mission. After all, what did it matter to him f 
 He was vexed to find himself irritated by such 
 a trifle ! 
 
BRED IN THE BONE. 101 
 
 " Shall I tell you the name I always think 
 of you by ? " he asked, with a little tremble 
 of the voice that no doubt she marked and 
 understood: "Dark, beautiful, shadowy, vague 
 as a dream, mysterious as night ; for me you 
 have never been Miss Lee ; anybody could 
 be Miss Lee : you are my ^ Beltenebrosa.' " 
 
 She had not an idea what it meant, but 
 her black eyes flashed, and a flush of pleasure 
 rose to her brow. 
 
 "Beltenebrosa!" she repeated. "Oh, thank 
 you, Mr. Strange ; what a lovely name ! I 
 shall always call myself Beltenebrosa, and it 
 will remind me of you. How nice to be so 
 wise ! to have read everything, to remember 
 everything, to know everything. Yes, a man 
 had better be clever than young, or strong, or 
 even handsome. James Paravant mio-ht have 
 puzzled a long time before he found me such 
 a name as that. It's too charming ; say it 
 again." 
 
102 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 Did she know how she tortured him ? 
 how this proud, sensitive, conscientious spirit 
 winced and withered under the alternate 
 applications of ice and fire so mercilessly im- 
 posed ? Let us hope not. Let us hope that 
 the higher aspirations, the deeper sufferings 
 of a character like this, were as unintelligible 
 as they would have been impossible to the 
 nature she inherited with her gipsy beauty 
 and her gipsy blood. 
 
 If she had one prevailing desire, one domi- 
 nating instinct, it was a wild longing for free- 
 dom — the real practical freedom of open air, 
 common, woodland, and moor. It seemed 
 to rise and stir in her veins like the sap in a 
 young tree that puts forth its leaves, dons its 
 holiday attire, and, so to speak, stretches out 
 its branches to meet the spring. For her, 
 the wealth of gray, and green, and pink, 
 and white, and lavender that deepens an 
 English landscape in early June, Hke some 
 
BRED IN THE BONE. 103 
 
 beautiful matron arrayed for a wedding-feast, 
 was no inanimate abstraction to be admired, 
 but an actual living personality to be loved. 
 While she drank in tlieir beauty through all 
 her senses, she would fain have identified her- 
 self with the breeze, the cloud, the broken 
 water, the dancing sunshine, and merged her 
 own being in that nature, which appeared to 
 her less the effect than the great first cause 
 of generation, hfe, and light. Sitting out-of- 
 doors whenever she had the opportunity, she 
 seemed to gain strength and refreshment from 
 air and light, as others do from food and wine. 
 The arch of heaven was her natural roof- 
 tree, and only in the boundless freedom of 
 space did she feel thoroughly at home. Even 
 in her school-days she would look wistfully 
 towards Kensington Gardens, as, passing to 
 and from Miss Quilter's polite establishment, 
 she coasted that urban wilderness, which pre- 
 vents Londoners from completely forgetting 
 
104 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 the poetry of out-door life, the hidden charm 
 that lies in groves and glades, summer skies, 
 breaking buds, and teeming bursts of nature, 
 vindicating her immortality, when 
 
 Every clod feels a stir of might, 
 
 An instinct within it that reaches and towers, 
 And grasping blindly above it for light, 
 
 Climbs to a soul in grass and flowers. 
 
 In the meantime she turned her bewildering 
 glances on Mervyn Strange, as if she had no 
 thouo:ht nor feeling; in the universe but for 
 him. He was losing liis head. 
 
 "Will you give me one of those roses?" 
 said he, bending towards the cluster in her 
 hand. " I — I shall value it exceedingly. I 
 am so fond of roses." 
 
 It was a lame conclusion. Shy men gene- 
 rally begin by asking for a flower, and pro- 
 bably so innocent a request is a fair challenge 
 enough, and as good as any other. Eosalind, 
 if I remember right, recommends an attempt 
 
BRED IN THE BONE. 105 
 
 at kissiner as the least indelicate resource for 
 breaking the awkward silence sometimes 
 observed in such interviews ; but so com- 
 promising an expedient seems more trying to 
 both parties, as involving immediate action 
 for attack and defence ; nor do I think that 
 a diffident suitor extricates himself from such 
 a position quite to his own satisfaction, or 
 that of his companion. The curate must have 
 meant to finish his sentence very differently, 
 as the young lady perhaps expected, but for 
 the sudden appearance of Mr. Tregarthen 
 crossing the lawn, with a less assured step 
 than usual, and a strange expression of con- 
 cern, even dismay, on his florid prosperous 
 face. Crushing a yellow envelope in his hand, 
 he took no notice of Strange, but walked 
 straight up to Miss Lee. 
 
 " Jane," he said, speaking, though hoarse 
 and thick, in a very kind voice — " Jane, 
 my dear young lady, Mrs. Tregarthen wishes 
 
106 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 to see you immediately. In tlie drawing- 
 room, if you please. Now, this moment, my 
 dear. You will find her quite alone." 
 
 And the two disappeared within the French 
 windows, leaving Mervyn Strange outside, to 
 congratulate himself on the escape he had 
 made, or ponder on the chance he had thrown 
 away. 
 
 But he could not tear himself from the 
 place. Curiosity, interest, affection, even 
 anxiety, anchored him to a spot so lately 
 hallowed by the presence of his Beltenebrosa. 
 Would she come back before dinner, and if 
 so, should he take up the thread of his dis- 
 course where he had left off, or wait for a 
 fairer opportunity, or tear this weakness from 
 his heart, and give up the idea once for all ? 
 Such renunciation seemed feasible enough this 
 morning ; was it possible now ? AYitli a keen 
 pang, it occurred to him that the sacrifice 
 mio-hfc be uncalled for, after all. What was 
 
BRED IN THE BONE. 107 
 
 this sudden communication, obviously tele- 
 graphic, this important message, to be deli- 
 vered privately in the drawing-room, and by 
 Mrs. Tregarthen herself ? Surely it must 
 mean an offer of marriage, conveyed indeed 
 on the electric wire, yet none the less impor- 
 tunate for that. And if so, was he a broken- 
 hearted man ? Had it come to this ? He 
 rather thouoiit he was. 
 
 "Then let the stricken deer go weep," 
 he murmured, with an achino^ sense of deso- 
 lation, a longing desire for solitude, silence, 
 and stupor, perhaps, rather than repose. 
 
 At such a moment he could but im- 
 patiently support the presence of a person 
 he disliked so much as young Mr. Paravant. 
 
 "Forward James," however, enjoying a 
 happy unconsciousness that he w^as ever un- 
 welcome, swung into the rectory garden and 
 clicked the gate behind him, with a jaunty 
 air of self-possession and content. He, too, 
 
108 BLACK BUT COMELY, 
 
 iiad been employing his leisure in pondering 
 on the charms of our young lady and her 
 reception of his advances, to arrive at the 
 conclusion that she was fully sensible of his 
 merits, and (/' gals were all alike ") only 
 assumed a little coyness and reluctance, for 
 the purpose of " bringing him on." He 
 returned to the rectory garden an hour before 
 dinner, in the hope of resuming a tete-d-tete 
 too abruptly broken off, and was sorely dis- 
 appointed when he saw the curate hovering 
 about the spot where he expected to find 
 Jane Lee. 
 
 The two men disliked each other cordially. 
 But what would you have ? This is a world 
 of shams — even far away in quiet Somerset, 
 they were obliged to be civil, and say 
 '' How d'ye do ? " 
 
 **Nice weather for haymaking," observed 
 the younger, wiping from his brow some 
 drops of perspiration, the result of uneasiness 
 
BRED m THE BONE. 109 
 
 rather than temperature. *' I've got forty 
 acres down in Appleton-Cleves. I should 
 be out more than a * pony ' if it came on to 
 rain. I suppose you won't pray for fine 
 weather on Sunday, shall you ? " 
 
 Strange looked displeased. " You had 
 better ask the rector," said he stifily. "The 
 welfiire of humanity is not dependent on 
 Appleton hay-harvest, but he will meet your 
 wishes, no doubt." 
 
 " Oh ! I don't want to put him out of his 
 way, nor you neither," answered the other, 
 w^ith ]3erfect equanimity. " In fact, I dare- 
 say I shall not be at church myself. I should 
 like to see Tregarthen, though, before I go 
 home to-night. I was thinking of dining here." 
 
 '^ The rector has received some important 
 news, and I fancy would rather not be dis- 
 turbed. He came out just now, much agi- 
 tated and perplexed. It is not five minutes 
 since he went into the house." 
 
110 BLACK BUT COMELY, 
 
 ''And Miss Lee?" 
 
 " And Miss Lee/' 
 
 Both coloured at the mention of her name, 
 both turned paler the next moment, each felt 
 he had read the other's secret and exposed 
 his own. If either entertained any previous 
 doubt or hesitation, his intentions were fixed 
 and decided now. There was the prize, here 
 stood his rival. It must be a stand-up fight, 
 and let the best man win ! 
 
CHAPTER IX. 
 
 *' AND IS OLD DOUBLE DEAD ? " 
 
 '' Compose yourself, my dear," said Mrs. 
 Tregartlien, as the glass doors closed behind 
 Miss Lee, shutting out the scent of flowers, 
 the song of birds, the smiling summer sky, 
 and her two lovers eyeing each other on the 
 lawn ; '' compose yourself, I — I — have some- 
 thing very painful to communicate ! " 
 
 The good lady was shaking all over — 
 hands, cap, ribbons, chain, lockets, and general 
 exterior vibrated like the leaves on a poplar 
 in a breeze. 
 
 "Let me break it to her, Selina,'^ inter- 
 rupted the rector. " Compose yourself, mj 
 dear, we must all encounter these trials soon 
 or late ! " 
 
112 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 The girl looked from one to the other, 
 with head up and muscles braced ; her dark 
 eyes glared and shone like those of a wild 
 animal trapped by hunters, a fera iiaturce 
 of some fierce and restless order, such as the 
 leopardess, the wild-cat, or the lynx. 
 
 '' Don't keep me in suspense," she said. 
 " Out with it ! I can bear anything ! " 
 
 '^ My dear, your guardian," sobbed the 
 rector's wife, and fairly burst into tears. 
 
 " Mr. Lopez, my dear," added the rector, 
 in a calmer voice, yet sadly troubled too. 
 '^ So sudden, so unlooked-for ! I had not 
 received the telegram five minutes before I 
 came to you " 
 
 She drew herself up, tall, handsome, and 
 defiant. 
 
 " He's dead, I know he is ! " she answered. 
 " I am left without a soul to care for me 
 in the world ! " 
 
 Mr. and Mrs. Tregarthen looked at each 
 
''AND IS OLD DOUBLE DEAD?" 113 
 
 other in sore perplexity. Had she wept, or 
 screamed, or gone into hysterics, or done 
 anything that warranted the apphcation of 
 sherry and sal volatile, they would have known 
 how to act ; but this was a new experience, 
 a phase of grief they had never before seen 
 or realised. The girl's limbs were rigid, her 
 face pale and set, not softened in any degree 
 by so awful a calamity, but rather wild and 
 stern, as though accepting such an injury 
 less in sorrow than in ano-er. 
 
 *' You have anticipated me," said the 
 rector. " Alas, my dear, your forebodings are 
 too true I " and proceeded with much circum- 
 locution, many reflections — logical, obvious, 
 perfectly indisputable, yet none the more con- 
 solatory — to relate such particulars as he had 
 gathered from the telegram of her guardian's 
 demise. These were scanty, but clear and 
 conclusive enough. Jack Lopez had been 
 .ailing after dinner, in a doctor's hands at 
 
 VOL. I. T 
 
114 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 midnight, and dead before morning. It was 
 a commonplace event, and out of his own 
 immediate circle, affected nobody but a few 
 creditors who held his bills, of which they 
 were already beginning to suspect the 
 worthlessness. Said one Jew to another, 
 meeting in a stone-paved passage by Stag's 
 Court : 
 
 *'Have you heard about Shack Lopez ? " 
 
 *' Broke, is he?" was the reply. "Vyq 
 known it these three months." 
 
 "Worse than that, mine friend. He's 
 dead. Went off the hooks this morning at 
 sunrise." 
 
 " Glad he don't owe me anything. Shack 
 couldn't pay twopence in the pound. Poor 
 Shack ! what a fool he was ! " 
 
 And this was Jack's epitaph. Shorter and 
 less complimentary than that pronounced by 
 Justice Shallow on the bowman defunct — 
 " And is old Double dead ? " Few of us can 
 
''AND IS OLD DOUBLE DEAD?" 115 
 
 expect more. For one or two the columns of 
 a daily paper are ruled in black ; to half-a- 
 dozen it vouchsafes an incorrect biography of 
 the smallest type ; a few score find a place 
 at the end of the year in " our obituary of 
 notable persons deceased ; " but to your dis- 
 appearance and mine, the general public will, 
 in all probability, be profoundly indifferent. 
 Only a former friend or two, an acquaintance 
 here and there, who deals in the latest news, 
 will stop for a moment to ask carelessly — 
 " And is old Double dead ? " 
 
 Was it worth while to " shoot a good 
 shoot " for such obsequies as these ? Yes, it 
 is always worth while to shoot a good shoot ! 
 Stand up like a man, bend your bow, 
 straighten your back, draw your arrow to 
 the head, aim true and steady; whether you 
 get an outer or an inner ring, a white, a gold, 
 a bull's-eye, or miss the target altogether, do 
 your level best, and never doubt but that, 
 
 I 2 
 
116 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 according to your intentions, not your merits, 
 you will take a prize. 
 
 History fails to inform us how '' old 
 Double " cut up, but when his executors 
 administered the affairs of Jack Lopez, except 
 for a sum of five hundred pounds secured to 
 Jane Lee, he did not leave behind him a 
 shilling. Like many another speculator, he 
 seemed to have spent his money as fast as he 
 made it ; gambling in all kinds of stocks and 
 shares, so as to lose with one hand what he 
 gained with the other. Generous on occasion, 
 but never just, extravagant at all times, and 
 often dishonest, quick, acute, versatile, with 
 a strong belief in his own luck, he was fond 
 of boastinoj that it was his nature to be " a 
 man or a mouse," and that he would die a 
 millionaire or a beggar. It appeared sub- 
 sequently that he meant to make his ward 
 sole heiress of the noble fortune he hoped to 
 acquire, but these magnificent intentions have 
 
''AND IS OLD DOUBLE DEAD?" 117 
 
 notliiug to do with my story, as they were 
 never carried out. 
 
 It was a melancholy evening at the rectory. 
 Jane Lee could not be induced to leave her 
 room. Paravant and Strange, informed, rather 
 incoherently, by their hostess, of the calamity 
 that had befallen, felt it only decent to take 
 leave, and Mr. Tregarthen sat down to dinner 
 with his wife, much perplexed as to what 
 should be done and how to do it. Ought he 
 to offer the bereaved young lady a home ? 
 Perhaps she had no other friends. At her age, 
 and — and — with her appearance, she must not 
 be turned loose on the world. What did 
 Selina think ? Selina, as usual, saw both sides 
 of the question, prepared to approve which- 
 ever he did not. She pointed out, with some 
 truth, that the rector might find himself in a 
 false position, from which extrication would be 
 difficult, whether he adopted one course or the 
 other. If the girl were penniless, and he 
 
118 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 offered her a home, it would be exceedingly 
 awkward for all parties ; but again, if she 
 turned out to be an heiress, and he made no 
 sign, would they not lose the benefit of her 
 friendship, and their share, however small, in 
 the eventual advantages of her wealth ? It 
 was not for w^ant of discussion, that when tea 
 went into the drawing-room, nothing had been 
 settled but that the Eev. Silas should proceed 
 to London next day by an early train, and 
 learn what he could. In the meantime, Mrs. 
 Tregarthen would do all in her power, without 
 committing him, to console poor Jane, and, as 
 she phrased it, ^' keep the girl easy in her 
 mind." 
 
 In difficulties of a domestic nature, the 
 decisions at which people arrive are almost 
 always upset as soon as made. Mr. and Mrs. 
 Tregarthen, congratulating themselves that for 
 the present they had solved a knotty point, 
 and put off their trouble to a future day, 
 
''AND IS OLD DOUBLE DEAD?" 119 
 
 were somewhat startled and discomfited by 
 tlie opening of the drawing-room door, and the 
 apparition of Jane Lee on the threshold, tall, 
 pale, and noiseless as a ghost. She entered 
 the apartment perfectly calm and self-possessed, 
 to take up a position, with much dignity, bolt 
 upright in front of the master of the house, 
 who half rose and sat timidly down again, 
 fairly overawed. 
 
 " Mr. Tregarthen," she said, calmly enough, 
 " I leave here to-morrow morning. I am come 
 to wish you and Mrs. Tregarthen good-bye. 
 Don't look at me like that. I am going home 
 — straight home. I must see him before he's 
 screwed down ! " 
 
 '^Oh Jane ! " exclaimed the rector's wife. 
 
 *' I must see him," she repeated, in the 
 same monotonous voice, while her eyes 
 wandered vaguely over the other's face and 
 figure. " I have got to say good-bye ; I have 
 got to ask him to come back to me, if people 
 
120 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 ever do come back. But that's all nonsense. 
 When they go from here they go for good, if 
 they go anywhere ; but I clon't believe a word 
 of all that ! '' 
 
 Mrs. Tregarthen looked inexpressibly 
 shocked. She could find no words to reply, 
 while,- turning to the rector, Jane Lee pro- 
 ceeded, without altering a muscle of her 
 countenance : 
 
 ^' I shall start early. The train passes 
 before nine. If he knows anything now, he 
 will know I got to him as soon as I could." 
 
 " My dear, you can't go alone," gasped the 
 rector's wife. 
 
 " Why not ? I came here alone. Good 
 night, Mrs. Tregarthen ; good night every- 
 body. It's all over now. Bon soir la com- 
 pagnie ! " and she walked out of the drawing 
 room, sad and dreamy as Ophelia, but stern 
 and resolute as Lady Macbeth. 
 
 *' I had better take her with me," said the 
 
''AND IS OLD DOUBLE DEAD?'' 121 
 
 rector, after a long thouglitful pause. " We 
 sliall have to be off in o^ood time — I tliink I'll 
 go to bed at once. Will you tell them about 
 breakfast, Selina ? We shall want it earlier 
 than usual." 
 
 He rose from his arm-chair, but sank back 
 before he could get fairly on his feet. 
 
 " By all that's — that's — well — that's de- 
 testable ! " exclaimed the rector, '' I've got it 
 again. If it had only come on last week, or 
 waited till next I I was half afraid of it ! I 
 didn't feel right yesterday — you shouldn't 
 have let me drink port wine and cider the 
 same day. It's too provoking ! It does seem 
 so hard ! Now it's really caught hold of me, 
 I shall not be able to m^ove for a fortnight, 
 and as for going to London to-morrow, I 
 might just as well think of going to Peru !" 
 
 The rector's apprehensions were not un- 
 reasonable. It was simply an attack of 
 lumbago — his old enemy, that when it got 
 
122 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 him down would keep him down, he well 
 knew, as effectually as if he had been screwed 
 into his arm-chair. In vain his Selina mixed 
 him hot drinks of a comforting nature, and 
 turning him over on the connubial four- 
 poster, rubbed hartshorn and oil into his 
 back till her own hands were sore. By two 
 o'clock in the morning it seemed clear enough 
 that the Rev. Silas was incapacitated from 
 moving a limb, while his wife, through the 
 two hideous night-caps she persisted in wear- 
 ing, could hear Jane Lee making preparations 
 for immediate departure in her bedroom 
 overhead. 
 
 Mrs. Tregarthen was a person of resource. 
 Even could she have been induced to leave 
 her husband in his present state of helpless- 
 ness — a desertion, to do her justice, she con- 
 templated not for an instant — a railway 
 journey terminating in London, with the 
 charge of anybody or anything, was an un- 
 
''AND IS OLD DOUBLE DEAD?'' 123 
 
 dertaking of whicli slie felt perfectly inca- 
 pable, and therefore it never entered her 
 head to accompany Miss Lee ; but she re- 
 flected that what people cannot do for them- 
 selves other people can do for them, and, 
 as she argued, '^^ What's the use of a curate 
 except to take his rector's duty, and stand 
 in his rector's place ? " Yes, if he were ten 
 years older perhaps it would be better ; but 
 in great emergencies one must not be too 
 particular. Mervyn Strange, to use her own 
 words, was " as steady as old Time," and 
 Mervyn Strange should take the girl to 
 London, since to London she persisted in 
 going, under a promise from both that, after 
 making all necessary arrangements for the 
 funeral, they would return by mail train 
 that same night. 
 
 The curate, before his shaving-glass, at 
 six o'clock on a summer's morning, was no 
 less startled than pleased to receive from 
 
124 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 Mrs. Treo'arthen the following: brief and 
 dictatorial missive : 
 
 ''Dear Mr. Strange, 
 
 " Knowing you are an early riser, I 
 am not afraid this will find you in bed. The 
 rector is laid up with rheumatism, and I wish 
 you therefore to take his place in escorting 
 Miss Lee to London by the nine o'clock 
 train. I expect you both to return to-night 
 by the maiL Please come at once to the 
 rectory for further directions. 
 
 " Yours sincerely, 
 
 "Selina Tregarthen. 
 
 *' P.S. — Of course I need not remind you 
 that in committing such a charge to your 
 care, I rely implicitly on your character for 
 common sense and discretion." 
 
 That the curate should have selected a 
 newer suit of clothes, a neater pair of boots 
 
''AND IS OLD DOUBLE DEAD?'' 125 
 
 than those laid out for his usual wear, only 
 infers that he was mortal, and foolishly in 
 love with Jane Lee. That he should have 
 accepted such a trust, however joyfully, with 
 many misgivings and mental reservations, 
 infers that, like the rest of us, he had no 
 objection to rush on his fate blindfold, so 
 long; as his own hands midit tie the bandao^e 
 over his eyes ; but that he should have 
 packed a small portmanteau with garments 
 enough to last a week, argued a character 
 replete with foresight and precaution equal 
 to all emergencies, and, while hoping for the 
 best, prepared to confront the worst. 
 
 He was shocked, though, and deeply 
 moved, to mark the alteration one nio^ht of 
 sorrow had made in the beautiful features 
 of Jane Lee. As she stepped over the 
 threshold into the summer morning, he 
 started, as from a blow, to observe the contrast 
 of that pale drawn face with the glad sunshine 
 
126 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 and the fresh bloomino; flowers. He had not 
 the heart to pull one from its stalk and ofi"er 
 it to the mourner, but he thought sadly 
 enough of poor Ophelia, with her rosemary 
 and rue. After a few hasty injunctions from 
 Mrs. Tregarthen, he handed her respectfully 
 into the fly, and took his own seat by the 
 driver, on the box, without a word. She 
 appreciated this forbearance, we may be sure, 
 nor was her passionate grief for the loss of 
 her guardian so engrossing as to stifle certain 
 tender feelings of gratitude and even pre- 
 ference, created by the sympathy and con- 
 sideration of Mervyn Strange. 
 
CHAPTER X. 
 
 '' SIXTY-MILE-AN-HOUR." 
 
 A MAN in love, at least under middle age, is 
 usually an early riser. James Paravant, with, 
 forty acres of grass down in Appleton-Cleves, 
 thought well to visit his haymakers before 
 breakfast. Returning from that fertile meadow- 
 land by the higli-road, he thus met the very 
 fly that conveyed Miss Lee to the station, 
 and, catching a glimpse of her face in the 
 conveyance, felt much surprise and vexation 
 to recognise Mervyn Strange on the box. So 
 complete was his discomfiture, he had not 
 even presence of mind to stop the carriage, 
 in order to wish its occupant good-bye, but 
 stood gaping in the road, utterly paralysed 
 
128 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 and overcome. He pulled himself together, 
 as people unused to emergencies generally 
 do, just when it was too late, but showed 
 a deal of misapplied energy in trying to 
 make up for lost time. 
 
 In three minutes he was at his own stable 
 door, nearly half a mile off, vociferating like a 
 madman for groom and helpers. " Forward 
 James," as he often boasted, liked to ride 
 '^ something that could gallop a bit : " and, 
 to do him justice, seemed quite capable of 
 making the animal exert its powers. In his 
 present state of excitement he was not dis- 
 posed to let the grass grow under his feet. 
 
 " Isaac ! Reuben ! " he shouted, as two 
 close-cropped heads and four bare arms to 
 match appeared from the hay-loft. " Reuben ! 
 Isaac ! Here, one of you ! Clap a saddle on 
 Potboy. Be smart, man alive ! Not that 
 bridle — the Pelham. Don't hang at it for an 
 hour ! Have the horse turned round and 
 
'' JSIXTY-MILE-AN-HOUB." 129 
 
 ready by the time I come down ! " Then he 
 rushed u|)stairs to cram some money into his 
 pockets and put on a better hat. 
 - I suppose none of us ever ordered a horse 
 out in a hurry, not even on emero^encies involv- 
 ing matters of life and death, without experien- 
 cing certain hindrances and delays caused by 
 too religious an observance of those stable rites 
 that the most careless of grooms w^ould rather 
 perish than forego. By accustomed hands, 
 the animal can be stripped, saddled, turned 
 round and bridled in about two minutes ; but 
 it seems impossible for it to leave the stable 
 under five. Each foot must be lifted and 
 examined, perhaps blacked, the mane set 
 straight, combed, and finally water-brushed. 
 Nothing — not even a running accompaniment 
 of curses, as Paravant found to his ex- 
 treme diso-ust — can be made to hasten these 
 operations. 
 
 Miss Lee and her escort had already taken 
 
 VOL. I. 
 
130 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 their seats in a first-class carriage when 
 t^ Forward James/' lengthening a stirrup as 
 he went, passed through his own gate into 
 the high-road at a gallop. But Potboy could 
 slip along when he was extended, and under 
 the impression no doubt that he was running 
 for money, therefore, judging by his o^vn 
 experience, likely to be pulled up before he 
 could win, laid him-self out in such good form 
 as to brinof his master into the station within 
 seven minutes of the start from his own stable 
 door. 
 
 Both were exceedingly hot and uncomfort- 
 able. The horse relieved his feelings by a 
 shake, the rider by an oath ; for the latter 
 only gained the platform as a train glided 
 from it with asthmatic puffs and one of those 
 defiant Vvdiistles that seem to say, " Catch me 
 if yon can ! " 
 
 It is out of my power to explain why 
 Paravant should have felt so disappointed, or 
 
" SIXTY-MILE-AN-IIOUE:' 131 
 
 what lie intended to do had he arrived in 
 time. I do not believe he could give any 
 definite reason for being so hard on Potboy, 
 or that he had formed any plan in his own 
 mind for hindrance of the fugitives. His 
 heart was on fire, his head in a whirl. He 
 had never been accustomed to reflection, self- 
 control, or discipline of any kind, and rode 
 his horse as fast as it could lay legs to the 
 ground, simply because the violent exercise 
 and excitement served for the moment to take 
 him out of himself. 
 
 Flurried, disordered, red-hot, and in a 
 profuse perspiration, he felt painfully con- 
 scious that he looked like a fool as he gazed 
 after the departing train ; nor did it tend to 
 restore his equanimity that he might be 
 seen by two of the travellers in this ridicu- 
 lous plight, and laughed at for his pains. 
 He recovered, however, after a time, and 
 availed himself of his intimacy with the 
 
 K 2 
 
132 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 station-master to make some inquiries, while 
 lie lit a cigar. 
 
 " Any passengers this morning ? " he 
 asked, with such affectation of carelessness 
 as could only deceive a pre-occupied ofl&cial, 
 ruler in hand, and pencil in mouth. 
 
 " Two — first-class, Mr. Paravant," answered 
 the station-master, *'and one second. Did 
 you miss the train, sir ? I thought perhaps 
 as you might have been going up along of 
 Mr. Strange." 
 
 "Mr. Strange? Not I. Was he travel- 
 ling alone ?" 
 
 "Well, sir, I think not. He took two 
 tickets for Paddino;ton — returns thev was — 
 available by the down exjDress." 
 
 Eeturns ! Paravant felt that a load had 
 been lifted from his heart. She was coming 
 back, then, and he should see her again ! 
 The relief from pain amounted to actual 
 pleasure, and he could hardly bear even 
 
'' sixty-mile-an-hour:' 133 
 
 Strange a grudge for taking away his idol, 
 since he seemed pledged to bring it back 
 aofain. How miserable he would have felt 
 had he heard of her departure by accident, 
 and remained uncertain of her return ! How 
 well Potboy had brought him ! "What a 
 good little horse it was ! and how lucky he 
 came strais^ht to the station ! 
 
 He would have thought differently, per- 
 haps, had he overheard a conversation 
 between the two people in whom he was 
 so deeply interested, that originated in his 
 sudden appearance, and might never have 
 taken place but for his late arrival. 
 
 "There's James Paravant, I declare!" 
 said Miss Lee. pulling up the window, as 
 the train increased its speed. " What 
 on earth can have brought him to the 
 station ! " 
 
 " I think I can guess," answered Mervyn 
 Strange, arranging her wraps and belongings 
 
134 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 with tender care. " He came to see the 
 last of you, and to wish you good-bye." 
 
 He was pleased to think she had woke 
 up out of her sorrow enough to notice any- 
 thing, and encouraged her to talk, even 
 about his rival, rather than not talk at all. 
 
 " And he has seen the last of me," she 
 replied, with perfect composure. '' I don't 
 think I shall ever come back to Somerset- 
 shire again." 
 
 "But I've got our return tickets in my 
 pocket ! " exclaimed the clergyman, feeling 
 his brain turn giddy in a whirl of impossi- 
 bilities suggested by this startling declaration 
 of independence. 
 
 "People should never take returns," said 
 the ofirl. " How do we know we shall come 
 back ? A thousand things might happen. 
 In the first place, it's very easy to be killed 
 on a railway. Why, how fast do you suppose 
 we are going now ? " 
 
'' SIXTY-MILE-AN-IW UR:' 1 35 
 
 " Sixty-mile-an-hoiir." 
 
 '' I enjoy it I I tliink it's my nature to 
 go sixty- mile-an -hour. I wish we were always 
 flying through the air at this pace." 
 
 ^^So do I, Miss Lee, with my present 
 companion." 
 
 '' I told you not to call me Miss Lee ; 
 I like the other name best. Say it now, 
 this minute." 
 
 " Beltenebrosa." 
 
 He had a deep, grave, mellow voice, 
 capable of much inflection, which the habit 
 of intonincr had brouoiit to a hioii state of 
 
 o o o 
 
 cultivation. It was full of tenderness while 
 he dwelt on the beloved syllables, and 
 the girl could not but acknowledge its 
 charm. 
 
 In her sorrow and loneliness she was ready 
 to catch at any momentary respite from the 
 dull dead pain that seemed to eat her heart 
 away, and she found more than a distrac- 
 
136 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 tion in the influence she exercised over her 
 companion. 
 
 He was so kind, so considerate, so gentle 
 and sympathetic, how could she but respond ; 
 and, after all, what did it signify ? A few 
 sweet words, a soft glance, a whisper inter- 
 rupted by a sigh, these were little more than 
 courtesies absolutely exacted by the occasion. 
 They meant nothing in reality, and need 
 have no result. For some natures, such are 
 merely the small change of a currency used 
 in daily life ; for others they represent capital 
 and interest, boundless wealth, or utter beg- 
 gary and ruin. The man was playing for 
 all he had with losing cards ; the woman, 
 so to speak, staked but a few shillings, and 
 held a winning hand. 
 
 *'At Swindon already!" she exclaimed, 
 more gaily than she had spoken yet, as the 
 flying express brought them into that crowded 
 bustling station. '' Yes, it's a capital train ; 
 
" sixty-mile-an-hour:' ist 
 
 if it \Yasn't for the cause I sliould like my 
 journey very much. Oh Mr. Strange, you'll 
 wait for me while I go and wish him 
 good-bye ! " 
 
 Her voice changed, her face fell, her whole 
 frame seemed to collapse, and the curate felt 
 he would willingly have sacrificed a limb 
 to purchase the slightest mitigation of her 
 distress. 
 
 " Do you think I would desert you ? " 
 he replied, in those full musical tones. " Miss 
 
 Lee " She held up her finger, and smiled 
 
 through her tears. " Well, Beltenebrosa, I 
 ask nothing better than to shield you from 
 every trouble, share with you every sorrow, 
 and, if needs must, take your part against 
 everybody and everything ! " 
 
 She gave him a kind look, and rapidly 
 averted her eyes. Slight as was her insight 
 into such matters, and purely theoretical, 
 she had yet a feminine consciousness that this 
 
138 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 chivalrous declaration must surely be tanta- 
 mount to an offer. It was absurd, tbougb 
 provoking, that she could not help reverting 
 to little Miss Moffat's matrimonial opinions 
 at such a time. 
 
 " You are very kind to me," she mur- 
 mured, returning gently a pressure of the 
 hand he laid on hers. " Mr. Strange, you 
 have a good heart, and oh, I am so forlorn, 
 so forsaken, so thoroughly alone in the 
 world ! " 
 
 " My darling ! my own, shelter for life 
 in my arms, in my breast ! I will give up 
 all here and hereafter, for your sake ! " was 
 the answer that would have risen tumultuously 
 to his lips, but for the application, at this 
 critical moment, of a repressive appliance 
 called " the break," which brought their train 
 to a standstill in fifty yards, and reminded 
 the travellers, even before a guard's bearded 
 face appeared at their window, of the velocity 
 
" sixty-mile-an-hour:' 1 39 
 
 with, which they had sped. Morally and 
 physically, we can best appreciate the pace we 
 have been going by the jerk when we stop. 
 
 Whether proposals of marriage are often 
 hazarded in railway carriages, I cannot take 
 upon me to say ; but I imagine that to prove 
 successful, they must be completed at leisure 
 along the line, rather than offered in dis- 
 jointed phrases, amidst the bustle and con- 
 fusion of a station, and that station such a 
 junction as Swindon. 
 
 Mervyn Strange would have been more 
 than man, to finish what he had to say in 
 the presence of a ticket-collector, two porters, 
 and a w^aspish lady, who entered the com- 
 partment with several parcels, a novel, a 
 canary-bird, and an unwholesome son. But 
 he thought Jane Lee understood his meaning, 
 nevertheless. When he looked at her, she 
 averted her eyes ; when she spoke to him, it 
 was in the low-pitched voice that seems even 
 
140 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 more confidiDg than a whisper. Though he 
 anticipated her wants and wishes, pulling the 
 window up and down a score of times between 
 Didcot and Eeading, she never thanked him 
 in words, only with a soft shy smile, and 
 lastly, gliding into Paddington Station, when 
 he murmured, " How soon ! How quick we 
 have come ! I hope you're not tired ! " 
 there was a world of meaning in her gentle 
 answer : " Tired, oh no ! I wish it could all 
 be done over asrain." 
 
 The waspish lady entertained not the 
 slightest doubt they w^ere engaged, and liked 
 them none the better, we may be sure. 
 
 They had been travelling, you see, at the 
 rate of sixty-mile-an-hour, a pace w^hich 
 soon brings people to their ultimate desti- 
 nation. Jane Lee liked it, she said, and in 
 my opinion was calculated to sustain such 
 velocity with more impunity than her com- 
 panion. 
 
" SIXTY-MILE-AN-HO UBJ' 141 
 
 When Mervyn Strange helped her out, 
 she looked and felt perfectly calm, whereas 
 his blood was in a fever and his head in a 
 whirl. 
 
 A drive in a four-wheeled cab through 
 crowded London streets, even with the most 
 charming of women, provided she be accom- 
 panied by her luggage, soon brings a man 
 to his senses. He must shout at the top 
 of his voice to have the slightest chance of 
 being heard, and no romance that ever poet 
 dreamed can be proof against the constant 
 stoppages and interruptions of such a pro- 
 gress, not to mention the annoyance of bags 
 and bonnet-boxes sliding off the front seat 
 on his feet every ten seconds. It is but a 
 shilling fare from Paddington Station to 
 Jane Lee's old home in Tyburnia, yet the 
 curate had time to recover himself, and make 
 some attempt at a return to common sense, 
 before the cab stopped with a jolt at the 
 
142 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 liouse where poor Jack Lopez was lying 
 dead. 
 
 The blinds were down, the door-steps 
 dirty, the whole place looked very desolate. 
 After some delay, the bell was answered by 
 a slipshod woman, not strictly sober, and 
 Mervyn Strange began to understand how 
 delicate was the task he had undertaken, 
 how false the position in which he was 
 placed. 
 
 Yet now, more than ever, did he realise 
 the friendlessness of this black - browed 
 beauty, and, following her soberly and sadly 
 into the house of mourning, registered a 
 vow that, so long as he was above-ground, 
 come what might, his Beltenebrosa should 
 never want a champion and a friend. 
 
CHAPTER XL 
 
 COMPEOMISE. 
 
 It is not my intention to dwell on tlie 
 obsequies of a Jewish money-lender. Those 
 of poor Jack Lopez were conducted in accord- 
 ance with the impressive rites of his people 
 and his faith. The funeral oration pronounced 
 over his remains by a white-bearded Eabbi 
 would doubtless have done honour to one of 
 the patriarchs, but as it was spoken in the 
 grand sonorous tongue that preached to the 
 followers of Moses in the wilderness, beneath 
 Mount Sinai, I cannot vouch for its allusions 
 or its purport. They buried him with the 
 proper ceremonies, and Mervyn Strange only 
 reoTetted that such difference of belief as he 
 
144 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 was the last person to overlook, prevented his 
 readinof the touchinsf service of his own Church 
 over this Hebrew orpave. 
 
 But the curate had his hands full, never- 
 theless. In the first place, immediately on 
 arrival in London, he was obliged to apprise 
 Mrs. Tregarthen by letter that it would be 
 impossible to return the same night, taking 
 his chance of that lady's indignation at such 
 flagrant disobedience, and the untoward con- 
 struction she might put on his delay. In the 
 next, he must provide a resting-place for 
 Miss Lee, who could not possibly remain in 
 her old home under the circumstances, and 
 of whose fair fame it behoved him to be more 
 than careful in such an emergency. With a 
 discretion which deserved some credit, he sug- 
 gested Miss Quilter as a proper person to 
 receive her former pupil, and was pleased to 
 find this proposal less distasteful to the young 
 lady than he had feared. 
 
COMPROMISE. 145 
 
 Jane Lee, after a protracted visit to tlie 
 solemn chamber in which all that remained of 
 her guardian was laid out, came downstairs in 
 that dejected frame of mind, which seems only 
 desirous of being absolved from trouble, 
 responsibility, and necessity for thought or 
 action. She offered no objections whatever, 
 accompanying the curate to Bayswater with 
 unusual meekness, only stipulating that, when 
 all was over, she should pay one farewell visit 
 to the Jewish burial-ground where Lopez was 
 to be interred. 
 
 But the suspicious intuitive sagacity of 
 love had already taught Mervyn Strange that 
 the moods of Beltenebrosa changed no less 
 suddenly than the skies of an English May. 
 
 While thankful to have succeeded thus far, 
 he by no means underrated the difficulties to 
 come. The girl might turn round on him at 
 any moment and demand release from a con- 
 trol he had no shadow of rio^ht to enforce. The 
 
 VOL. I. L 
 
146 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 governess too miglit decline to receive a former 
 pupil, under such abnormal conditions, into an 
 establishment, of wliicb the very keystone 
 seemed conformity to the usages of society 
 and opinions of the world. 
 
 Here, however, he was to be agreeably dis- 
 appointed. Miss Quilter, though a school- 
 mistress of mature age, was, nevertheless, 
 romantic in her tastes, and jumped to con- 
 clusions like a girl. While she folded Miss Lee 
 in a condescending embrace, and made an 
 elaborate curtsey to Mervyn Strange, whom 
 she subsequently described as ''a striking- 
 looking person, and highly intellectual," she 
 sketched out a pretty little love story, of 
 which the couple before her were hero and 
 heroine, taking it for granted they must be 
 regularly and decorously engaged. Whatever 
 embarrassments might hereafter result from 
 these rose-coloured speculations, they seemed 
 at least to facilitate his task for the present. 
 
COMPROMISE. 147 
 
 and Mervyn Strange expressed himself — as 
 indeed lie felt — sincerely grateful for the good 
 lady's cordiality and support. Though digni- 
 fied, she was affable, and hospitably inclined 
 besides. " It is most fortunate," she observed, 
 with stately politeness, "that in such an 
 emergency I should have a spare room at my 
 disposal. Had it been during the vacation, 
 as you are well aware, my dear, I could have 
 offered you a greater choice of apartments, 
 but you will give me credit for good inten- 
 tions, and take the will for the deed." 
 
 From long practice, and close attention to 
 the best models. Miss Quilter was able to 
 command the choicest language, which she 
 used with appropriate gestures. She spoke, 
 indeed, "like a book," and made, as was to be 
 expected, a startling impression on Mervyn 
 Strange. 
 
 Few of us are close observers, or how dis- 
 agreeable society would become ; therefore all 
 
 L 2 
 
148 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 yoimg men and many old consider women of 
 mature age, in matters of the affections, to be 
 what they are pleased to term " out of the 
 hunt." But only w^atch the effect of a love- 
 song, well executed, on a drawing-room au- 
 dience, and you will never assent to such a 
 fallacy again. Hitherto, probably, you have 
 not taken your eyes off the young — henceforth 
 watch the faces of the old. Over sunken 
 cheek and furrowed brow and faded eyes, you 
 will mark a ripple from the '^long ago," 
 moving and quivering like the circles on some 
 calm gray mountain tarn, when you drop a 
 stone in its breast, that stirs the sullen surface, 
 because it has touched the cold dark depths 
 below. 
 
 It was but the other night, I detected 
 tears stealing down a cheek that I remem- 
 bered once fresh and fair amongst the freshest 
 and the fairest. They ran through wrinkles, 
 and were choked by rouge, but something 
 
COMPROMISE. 149 
 
 told me tliey came up from a heart in whicb. 
 there was one spot left that could ache for a 
 memory long dead and buried, yet unforgotten 
 still. I was not amused, only sorry and per- 
 plexed, for it seems sad to get old without 
 inheriting the immunities of age. 
 
 Miss Quilter had neither rouge nor — to 
 do her justice — wrinkles, on her staid hard- 
 featured face ; but her eyes were wet while 
 she embraced her former pupil for the second 
 time, and offered the curate a bony hand to 
 shake, thus conferring on him, as it were, the 
 freedom of the establishment with her own 
 royal assent. 
 
 *^ I see," she said, in reply to his earnest 
 and somewhat confused appeal. "Although 
 I must withhold my approval until I am 
 better informed as to details, this young lady 
 may be assured of my sympathy, both in 
 her loss and her gain." 
 
 Jane Lee stared, the curate blushed, and 
 
150 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 Miss Quilter, to. whom the embarrassment of 
 any false position was perfectly unintelligible, 
 passed calmly on. 
 
 *^ The mournful ceremony, you give me 
 to understand, will take place to-morrow. 
 My dear Miss Lee — on such an occasion I 
 feel constrained to call you by your chnstian- 
 name — my dear Jane, you will, I trust, con- 
 sider my house your home. This gentleman, 
 too, Mr. — if I mistake not — Mr. Strange, will, 
 I hope, take his meals here at his convenience, 
 though custom forbids me to offer him the 
 shelter of my roof under existing circum- 
 stances. Perhaps, at some future time, after 
 a decent interval, I shall have the pleasure 
 of receiving you both." 
 
 Jane Lee started like a woman awaking 
 out of sleep. 
 
 " You are mistaken ! " she exclaimed. 
 " Miss Qui Iter, I — I don't think you seem 
 exactly to understand." 
 
COMPROMISE. 151 
 
 " Perfectly, my dear, perfectly. And per- 
 mit me to observe, that Mr. — I believe I am 
 correct — Mr. Strange has shown much proper 
 feeling, and exercised a wise discretion in 
 thus takino: me into confidence. I will now 
 beg you to excuse me while I give directions 
 for the preparation of your apartment ; and 
 I shall hope to see Mr. — yes, Mr. Strange 
 back to dinner at half-past six o'clock." 
 
 The visitors looked at each other in 
 silence, nor was there indeed opportunity of 
 explanation, for Strange felt himself fairly 
 bowed out till dinner-time, and Jane Lee 
 was so completely bewildered by the excite- 
 ment of the day, that she could not utter a 
 syllable. 
 
 Friendless, desolate, perplexed, at such a 
 moment even her strong nature seemed to 
 give way and float helpless on the tide, 
 accepting the future with that apathy which 
 owes its resignation to despair. 
 
152 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 She had been accustomed from childhood 
 to depend on Mr. L., as she called him, for 
 advice, assistance, and all she required; and it 
 seemed impossible to realise that her friend and 
 protector was gone for evermore, that there 
 was nobody to appeal to, nobody to counsel, 
 nobody to control her now. In this last con- 
 sideration alone, she found some leavening of 
 comfort, for the wild element in her gipsy 
 nature always longed for freedom, chafing 
 even under government the mildest and most 
 legitimate. This it was that caused her to 
 loathe the bare idea of returning to Somerset- 
 shire, and becoming once more the inmate of a 
 respectable country clergyman's house. The 
 domestic routine, the regular meals, the un- 
 varying order and decorum of such an estab- 
 lishment, vexed and irritated her the more 
 that she could not explain why ; and although 
 she felt grateful to Mrs. Tregarthen for her 
 kindness, nothing would have pleased her 
 
COMPROMISE. 153 
 
 better than to know she was never to set eyes 
 on that primitive and uninteresting person 
 again. 
 
 The rector's wife, however, by no means 
 returned this calm indifference. After the 
 down express had arrived, wdthout bringing 
 her absentees, she could hardly sleep a wink, 
 for mingled feelings of anxiety and indig- 
 nation, that the receipt of Mervyn Strange's 
 letter by next morning's post did little to 
 allay. 
 
 " He might have telegraphed," she ob- 
 served, ignoring that brevity which is no less 
 the soul of electric communication than of 
 wit, and which could not possibly have done 
 justice to the penitence conveyed in four 
 closely-written pages from the curate to his 
 rector's wife. " Funeral or no funeral, he 
 ought to have brought her back at the time I 
 fixed. It is most unusual, most indelicate, 
 most insubordinate ! The only redeeming 
 
154 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 point in the whole business is his taking her 
 to Miss Quilter. Mr. Tregarthen, I don't 
 think you attend to what I say ! " 
 
 But the Eev. Silas could only attend to 
 the pain in his back, that caught him at every 
 turn when he tried to change his posture on 
 the stool of repentance he was pleased to call 
 an easy-chair. 
 
 '' She w^ill be home after the funeral, my 
 dear," answered the sufferer, between his 
 groans. ''Don't distress yourself. It will 
 all come right. I suppose he has left her 
 everything. I wonder how much it is." 
 
 " Something handsome, no doubt," replied 
 the lady. " People always say * as rich as a 
 Jew.' That's my great difficulty. If she 
 hadn't a farthing I should know^ w^hat to do." 
 
 ''We couldn't well turn her out of doors, 
 Selina ? " said the rector doubtfully. 
 
 " Yes, we could !" answered Selina. "After 
 the way in which they have both behaved, I 
 
COMPROMISE. 155 
 
 should not hesitate to send her packing at 
 once, and Mr. Strange too." 
 
 " Strange is a good curate, my dear, prac- 
 tical, earnest, industrious ; his heart is in his 
 work." 
 
 That is to say he took much of the duty, 
 most of the visiting, and all the trouble off 
 his rector's hands. Many a parish priest has 
 just such an invaluable assistant ; all are not 
 so ready as the Rev. Silas to acknowledge it. 
 
 " Nonsense ! " exclaimed his wife. " There 
 are as good fish in the sea as ever came out of 
 it ! He's in my black books, I can tell him. 
 And now, it's time for you to take your 
 taraxacum. My gracious ! if here isn't that 
 young gaby Paravant. He's seen me through 
 the open window, and I can't say ^Not at 
 home.' " 
 
 Sure enough, " Forward James " was haunt- 
 ing the accustomed spot. Trusting implicitly 
 in those return tickets mentioned by the 
 
156 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 station-master, he arrived full of confidence, 
 and never doubting he should have an inter- 
 view with his beloved, had got himself up for 
 the purpose with peculiar care. So startling a 
 combination of colours has seldom been seen 
 in conjunction with a white hat, relieved by a 
 crape, and, to use his own words, " something 
 neat round his neck." Even Mrs. Tregarthen, 
 who did not profess to be a judge of such 
 matters, felt uncertain whether to admire or 
 deride. James, however, thoroughly satisfied 
 with a revision of his own person in the glass, 
 had no doubts on the subject, and seemed, 
 even to the accustomed perceptions of his 
 hostess, more absurd, more jaunty, more con- 
 ceited, and altogether more intolerable than 
 usual. 
 
 " We've got most of it cut," was the salu- 
 tation of this bucolic dandy, who considered 
 his own hay-harvest of paramount importance 
 to the universe. '* It's a lighter crop than I 
 
COMPROMISE. 157 
 
 expected, but if the weather holds up I shan't 
 complain. How's the lumbago, rector ? And 
 — and — I say — where's Miss Lee ? " 
 
 On such a subject it was Selina's privilege 
 to assume the initiative. ''The rectors no 
 better," she auswered, with some asperity. 
 *'And not likely to be unless he takes the 
 advice of people who understand nursing, and 
 know what illness really means. If ever you 
 have a wife of your own, Mr. Paravant, I 
 hope you'll know her value, and mind what 
 she says ! " 
 
 '' Certainly, certainly," answered Paravant, 
 only wishing he had a wife of his own, if he 
 could choose her for himself. " I should always 
 do as Pm told, only Pve nobody to tell me. 
 And — I say, Mrs. Tregarthen, I suppose your 
 young lady is not down yet — tired with her 
 journey, eh? There's nothing so fatiguing, 
 you know, as being tired." 
 
 He was blushing — actually blushing, and 
 
168 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 the rector's wife, reading him like a book, as 
 any woman might, did not know whether to 
 be most provoked with herself or him, or that 
 least docile of curates, Mervyn Strange. 
 
 It was so embarrassing not to feel sure 
 how matters stood. If Miss Lee turned out 
 an heiress, she would do very nicely for young 
 Paravant ; if she had nothing, she might as 
 well marry Mervyn Strange, and thus absolve 
 them from all responsibility in her future ; 
 but, until this knot was disentangled, the 
 position seemed sadly embarrassing, and LIrs. 
 Tregarthen by no means underrated the diffi- 
 culties of her task. 
 
 "I don't know, I'm sure, whether she's 
 tired or not " said the rector's wife, movino^ 
 across the room to give her husband a 
 nauseous mixture that tasted of turpentine 
 and smelt of beeswax. " How should I, more 
 than a hundred miles off ? She's in London, 
 James Paravant, that's where she is, and, as 
 
COMPROMISE. 159 
 
 far as I can make out, that's where she's 
 likely to remain." 
 
 '^ In London ! " the young man actually 
 gasped; "and — and, Mrs. Tregarthen, don't 
 you expect her hacJc ? " 
 
 " No, I don't ; I never expect anything 
 nowadays. I didn't expect she'd be off by 
 express with Mr. Strange ; I didn't expect 
 one's own curate to fly in one's face, before 
 one could turn round : I didn't expect the 
 rector to sit in his easy-chair, and groan, 
 instead of asserting his authority like 
 a man. It's no use talking to me about 
 expecting, James ; blessed are those that 
 expect nothing, for they shall not be dis- 
 appointed ! " 
 
 He turned as white as his hat ; and 
 Mrs. Tregarthen, a soft-hearted woman 
 enough, felt her natural indignation at the 
 conduct of the absentees melting into pity 
 for this poor deserted swain. 
 
160 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 '' I think ril go home," muttered Paravant, 
 looking helplessly about him. " It's very 
 awkward, you know, Mrs. Tregarthen, all 
 the hay down this catching weather, and 
 my bailiff off to Thornbury revel, of 
 course. If you'll excuse me, I'll go back 
 at once ; I ought never to have come 
 away." 
 
 There were tears in his voice. Bumpkin 
 as he was, the poor fellow could feel, and it 
 would have relieved him to hide his face 
 in his hands and blubber like a schoolboy. 
 
 *'I wish I could ask you to dinner," said 
 his hostess, kindly ; " but the rector can't 
 get out of his chair, and my dinner is only 
 a make-believe, as you know, when there's 
 sickness in the house. Good-bye, James. 
 Look in to-morrow, my dear ; we're always 
 glad to see you, and perhaps we shall hear 
 something more by to-night's post." 
 
 A small crumb of comfort, but it served 
 
COMPROMISE. 161 
 
 this disconsolate young gentleman for lunclieon 
 and dinner too. It was a clear case ; lie had 
 lost his appetite, there could be no further 
 doubt now that he had lost his heart. 
 
 VOL. I. M 
 
CHAPTER XII. 
 
 CONSENT. 
 
 '' I can't accept it, Mr. Strange." 
 
 " Why not ? " 
 
 *' I feel it would be wrong. I cim young 
 and inexperienced enough, but I know I must 
 not lay myself under such an obligation to 
 any gentleman in the world." 
 
 " But it is so small a sum." 
 
 "That is nothing to the purpose. If it 
 was five pounds, instead of five hundred, I 
 ought equally to say No ! " 
 
 They were sauntering together in Ken- 
 sington Gardens, a place of all others in 
 which to talk about love, rather than money. 
 Beltenebrosa, tall and pale, in her mourning 
 
CONSENT. 163 
 
 looked more beautiful than ever ; the curate 
 walked by her side with the meekness of a 
 sheep going to the shambles. 
 
 Jack Lopez had been laid decorously in 
 the grave. His executors were making the 
 best arrangements they could, at a startling 
 reduction, to satisfy his creditors. Jane Lee's 
 legacy was safe enough, but certain wise 
 precautions of the law Avould delay its pay- 
 ment for several months. In the meantime 
 she was without a shilling, and Mervyn 
 Strange pressed her hard to accept the loan 
 of five hundred pounds he had recently with- 
 drawn from the sum of one thousand Consols 
 standing in his name at the Bank of England, 
 and constituting indeed his whole available 
 capital. 
 
 "Whatever I ask you," said he, and the 
 deep voice quivered with irrepres^ble pain, 
 "it is always the same. With me you never 
 seem to find any difficulty in saying No ! " 
 
 M 2 
 
164 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 '* Do you tKink it is so easy ? " she 
 answered. '^ How you mistake me, and how 
 you underrate yourself ! Can you not com- 
 prehend that the lips must often be taught 
 to say No when the heart means Yes ? '^ 
 
 He did mistake her thoroughly. How 
 could he conceive that it was this girl's nature 
 to make such an admission, and yet mean 
 little more by it than a phrase of common 
 thanks for some common courtesy ? He was 
 surely justified in taking her hand and catch- 
 ing it to his lips, after satisfying himself that 
 nobody was looking on. 
 
 *' Jane," he murmured, " no — Beltenebrosa, 
 my Beltenebrosa ! Let your heart plead for 
 me, and let your lips answer as it prompts. 
 I entreat you to accept, not this only, but 
 all my worldly wealth — I ought to say worldly 
 poverty — for I have little to offer beyond 
 such devotion as no woman ever won, no 
 woman on earth ever deserved, but yourself. 
 
CONSENT. 165 
 
 I wonder at my presumption too. You are 
 fit to be a queen, and I ask you to share 
 a humble home like mine ! " 
 
 " Am I fit to be a queen ? " 
 
 In the dark eyes came a soft and beautiful 
 languor ; it was pleasant to be so flattered, 
 so adored — why should she not inhale the 
 incense, and yield her senses to its sweet 
 intoxication while she could ? 
 
 With Jane Lee, the present seemed all- 
 sufficient ; there was that rare disposition — so 
 capable of physical enjoyment — which seldom 
 looks forward and never back. 
 
 "Oh Beltenebrosa!" continued the clergy- 
 man, " women are not blind. You must have 
 seen how I love you. Have pity on me — if 
 you take no thought for yourself — and say 
 you will be my wife." 
 
 It was a regular proposal, such as would 
 have come up to the exacting standard of 
 little Miss Moftat herself, and could not have 
 
166 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 been more correctly advanced by a Ijishop. In 
 a flash, she took in the whole situation — the 
 arguments for and against the advantages and 
 the drawbacks. That five hundred pounds 
 weighed heavily in the balance. It was in- 
 convenient to be wholly without money, par- 
 ticularly when one had no home. Yes, she 
 would borrow his ^yq hundred, and accept his 
 offer. Marrying must be a future considera- 
 tion ; but there was something pleasant and 
 creditable in being engaged. Miss Quilter, 
 no doubt, would afford the sanction of her 
 approval. The whole school would look at 
 her with admiration, and she need never go 
 back to the rectory in Somersetshire again. 
 
 " Do you want me to promise? " she asked, 
 with such a brioht smile as mioht have 
 
 o o 
 
 defeated a Dean and Chapter. " What would 
 you like me to say ? " 
 
 *' That you will marry me, my darling, at 
 once, and love me all the days of your life," 
 
CONSENT. 167 
 
 replied the curate, believing tlie heaven he had 
 so often preached of was beginning to dawn 
 for him on earth. 
 
 " If I take this naonej, 3'ou will feel as if 
 you had bought me. Five hundred pounds ! 
 What James Paravant calls 'a monkey.' Poor 
 James Paravant ! And do you really think I 
 am worth a monkey ? " 
 
 He felt and looked hurt. How could she 
 speak so lightly ? and was it not simply cruel 
 to remind him of his rival at such a time ? 
 Nothing would have induced him to swear ; 
 but secretlv, no doubt, with reo;ard to James 
 Paravant, he relieved his feelings v\'ith some 
 clerical equivalent for a curse. 
 
 " You are worth all this world to me," he 
 answered, in a voice quivering with emotion. 
 " Perhaps, for your sake, I am forfeiting my 
 welfare in the next." 
 
 *' You must be very fond of me ! " 
 
 " I am not ofoins: to tell vou so, over and 
 
168 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 over again. My darling, I love you so madly 
 that it amounts to torture." 
 
 *'And you want to cure yourself with the 
 only certain remedy. Some day you will 
 wake up recovered, and in your right mind. 
 Then you will wish you hadn t, and say so." 
 
 " When I do, may my tongue rot out of 
 
 my mouth I When I do, may I But 
 
 you know better. This is only to try me." 
 
 " Then I accept the money, and as for the 
 other matter, I suppose I need say no more 
 than " 
 
 *'The two things are wholly distinct," he 
 interrupted. " Forgive me that, in my agita- 
 tion, I have not kept them separate. Believe I 
 may, I have been thoughtless, and in too great a 
 hurry, but not wanting in delicacy of feeling. 
 Such beauty as yours is enough to turn any 
 man's head, were he ten times a priest ! " 
 
 She laughed lightly ; not the least like a 
 girl of twenty, engaged for the first time. 
 
CONSENT. 1G9 
 
 " There is no accounting for tastes," said 
 she. '* I wonder what you can see to admire 
 in my black face.'* 
 
 " Beltenebrosa ! " he murmured, pressing 
 to his heart the slender hand she slipped 
 within his arm ; for they had reached Victoria 
 Gate now, and were passing out of Fairyland 
 into Bayswater. 
 
 It is something, if for ever so short a 
 walk, to have trod the enchanted ground. 
 Henceforth one is free of the guild, and, so 
 to speak, a brother of the craft. Birds, and 
 breeze, and running waters speak no longer 
 in an unknown tono^ue. Those sono-s with- 
 out words, those voices of the air that never 
 pass the portals of material sense, tell us 
 strange secrets, perhaps far better unrevealed, 
 because of such learning comes suffering ; and 
 for Hope, with her illusions of pleasure, we 
 have accepted Memory with her reality of 
 pain. 
 
170 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 There was a parable for all time in that 
 tree of j)aradise wliich bore the knowledge 
 of good and evil as its fruit. 
 
 Hungry, reckless, and disobedient, the 
 child of man must needs pluck and eat ; and 
 be disappointed, and never know peace, nor 
 innocence, nor fulness of content again. 
 
 Who so happy as i\Ier\yn Strange, walk- 
 ing towards the City, with head up, and long 
 confident strides, to purchase in the cheapest 
 mart such articles of haberdashery as he felt 
 the occasion demanded, revolving; the while 
 certain arrangements required by our paternal 
 laws before a man can call the most friend- 
 less of young ladies his own ? He was dream- 
 ing a dream that bordered on ecstasy, and 
 would have been unalloyed happiness, but 
 for one consideration. How was he to stand 
 excused before Mrs. Tregarthen, and in what 
 words of penitence, what form of special plead- 
 ing, should he deprecate the ano-er of that 
 
CONSENT. 171 
 
 justly-infuriated dame ? He could not con- 
 ceal from himself that the charges she would 
 too surely bring against him were well-founded 
 and difficult of refutation. He had most cer- 
 tainly committed a breach of trust. Was 
 there not something like abduction in the 
 taking of Jane Lee from her temporary homej 
 and, under pretence of a funeral, hurrying 
 her clandestinely into marriage ? What would 
 the weekly papers say — those censors of our 
 morals, our manners, and our dress ? He 
 shuddered to think of some withering article, 
 couched in editorial eloquence, and holding 
 him up to public reprobation, as '^ a clerk in 
 holy orders'^ enacting the part of leading 
 villain in a dramatic history of love and law. 
 But she was worth the risk, his beautiful 
 Beltenebrosa — ay, were the risk a certainty, 
 and the penalty ten thousand times as vile ! 
 
 She too gave her mind to reflection, but 
 hers was no simple maiden's dream of pure 
 
172 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 unreasoning love ; on the contrary, slie was 
 wide-awake, never more so, and looked her 
 position in the face with calm impartial eyes. 
 No ; she could not bring herself to submit 
 to the yoke. Freedom, freedom was the 
 boon for which she longed ; and, behold, 
 it was already within her grasp. Five 
 hundred pounds. Even her limited ex- 
 perience taught her it was but a small 
 sum on which to beoin the world. But the 
 basis of her whole character w^as self-reliance ; 
 and she never doubted for a moment that, 
 with her voice, her courage, and her j)ersonal 
 attractions, she could make her own way, 
 and climb unassisted to independence, even 
 wealth. 
 
 '' Poor fellow ! he's dreadfully spoony," 
 she reflected, with a pity not devoid of 
 scorn ; *' and he wdll be wretched when he 
 finds Fve thrown him over ; but it will 
 console him to think Fve taken his money. 
 
CONSENT. 173 
 
 and, after a time, when I send it back — 
 which I swear to do the day the executors 
 pay up — he will have got over the worst, 
 and be surprised to find it hasn't killed 
 him after all. But I don't think he'll ever 
 marry anybody else." 
 
 She must have had some intuitive know- 
 ledge of the male heart, apart from experience 
 — natural, inborn, like the instinct which 
 teaches her sex, while yet in short frocks, to 
 nurse and dandle a doll. 
 
 It w^as easy enough to explain to Miss 
 Quilter that her clothes required revision, as 
 she could not afford a new fit-out ; and the 
 good lady saw no reason why Miss Lee's 
 boxes should not accompany her in a four- 
 wheeled cab for such thrifty purpose of repair. 
 She was an early person herself, and thought 
 the girl wise to start directly after breakfast, 
 with a promise of returning to dinner, ac- 
 companied by Mr. Strange. He would be 
 
174 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 occupied all the morning too, and had ar- 
 ranged to meet her at Yerey's, and take her 
 — yes — take her to the Zoological after 
 luncheon ; there could be no harm in that ! 
 
 " She's an affectionate creature, under her 
 cold exterior," thought the schoolmistress ; 
 wondering that her visitor, usually sparing 
 of caresses, should have embraced her so 
 warmly at parting, with her dark eyes full 
 of tears. '^ Poor dear I No father, no mother, 
 no friends. It's a mercy this young clergy- 
 man has turned up to look after her and find 
 her a home." 
 
 Mervyn Strange came back to dinner light 
 of step and jaunty of demeanour, as became 
 a successful swain. 
 
 " And what have you done with Jane ? " 
 was Miss Quilter's natural question, put with 
 that heavy playfulness which people think 
 appropriate to such frivolous occasions as 
 betrothals, marriages, and christenings. ''' I 
 
CONSENT. 175 
 
 hope you haven't had a quarrel in the cab, and 
 left her to walk ! " 
 
 '* Jane ! Isn't she with you f " 
 
 " No. Isn't she with you ? " 
 
 Then it came out she had left the house 
 at half-past nine, and neither of them had set 
 eyes on her since. 
 
i00k IL 
 
 CHAPTEE XIII. 
 
 ME. DELAPRE. 
 
 Miss Lee's first impulse, when she found 
 herself a free agent, with two boxes full of 
 clothes on the roof of a four-wheeled cab, and 
 five hundred pounds in her pocket, was to 
 hurry into the country and fill her lungs with 
 free air from heaven, under the greenwood 
 tree. Such a fancy was, no doubt, tempting, 
 but our young lady had already taught her- 
 self to act on reason, rather than instinct, and 
 reflected that, to enjoy real liberty for man 
 or woman, there is no place like London. 
 
MR. DELAPRR 177 
 
 Its crowds and labyrinths are alike favourable 
 to concealment. There is a case on record, 
 of a refractory husband who ran away from 
 his wife, and lived twenty years in the next 
 street, without detection by that ill-used and 
 justly-incensed lady. Like the Lovel of a 
 touching ditty, still chanted in our nurseries 
 as '^ The Mistletoe Bough, '^ and with no better 
 success — 
 
 Unceasing she souglit him, and found him not ! 
 
 " Where to, miss ? " asked the cabman, 
 banging the door after she got in. 
 
 *' Marshall and Snelgrove's," answered the 
 fare, as boldly as if she meant to buy a year s 
 outfit ; but long before she could arrive at 
 that emporium, she bade him set her down 
 near a cab-stand, alleging that his cushions 
 were dirty and smelt of gin. An extra 
 shilling soothed his wounded spirit under such 
 an accusation, and, choosing another vehicle, 
 
 VOL. I. N 
 
178 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 she simply told its driver to go on till ordered 
 to stop, thus, like a Eed Indian, *' covering 
 her trail." At a quarter of a mile she directed 
 him to a railway-station, where the luggage 
 was taken out, and he was discharged. 
 Hence, after an hour's waiting, she took a 
 fresh departure, satisfied that at last she had 
 destroyed all traces by which she could be 
 followed up. There was no difficulty in 
 obtaining quiet lodgings in a narrow street 
 off Long Acre, and by five o'clock. Miss Lee, 
 for the first time in her life, sat down to 
 tea in a room of her own, as free, she told 
 herself, with irrepressible exultation, as a bird 
 on a bough. 
 
 I fear it modified her triumph very little 
 to reflect on the consternation she left behind 
 her in Bays water and elsewhere. She 
 laughed outright to realise Miss Quilter's 
 puzzled face, and Mrs. Tregarthen's indignant 
 frown. She wondered whether the rector 
 
MR. DELAPR:e. 179 
 
 missed her mucli, and how Paravant bore the 
 absence of his idol. Then she thought of 
 Mervyn Strange, looked in the glass over 
 her chimney-piece, shook her head and 
 smiled. 
 
 Fresh, cool, and so handsome, that her 
 landlady, who was a tolerably respectable 
 woman, regretted not having been more 
 stringent as to references, Jane Lee emerged 
 next morning, prepared to carry out certain 
 plans, the result of many hours' considera- 
 tion, finally brought to perfection during 
 an elaborate toilet, after a good night's 
 rest. 
 
 In the first place, having sent for a 
 morning paper, and studied its advertise- 
 ments at breakfast, she secured a neat well- 
 turned-out brougham, looking as like a private 
 carriage as possible, not by the hour, nor the 
 day, but the week. She might want it more 
 than once, she reflected, to visit at the same 
 
 V ^ 
 
 IS tu 
 
180 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 places, and had already learned tliat the world 
 is governed by appearances, graduated on its 
 own ad valorem scale : the lady on foot — 
 the lady in another persons carriage — the 
 lady in her own. She made her bargain, 
 therefore, with a wise liberality, stipulating 
 that she should be drawn daily by the same 
 horse, driven by the same man, the latter 
 in top-boots, the former in brass-mounted 
 harness, with ribbons at each ear. Getting 
 into such an " equipage," as her landlady 
 called it, faultlessly dressed, she seemed in- 
 deed, to use the words of that observer : 
 *'None of your make-believes, but a real 
 lady born, as did credit to the lodgings and 
 the street ! " 
 
 " I believe I could act any part, in any 
 station," thought Miss Lee, pulHng the check- 
 string in a shabby tumble-down street. " It 
 seems so easy to be a great lady, and to look 
 like it, when the appliances are all to one's 
 
MR. DELAPRK 181 
 
 hand. I should get tired of the character, 
 too, I daresay, after a time. Change, I 
 think, is what I really love, and a spice of 
 adventure. Something to brisk one up, and 
 make one look out for oneself. No. I should 
 not have been a good wife for a parson. Poor 
 Mr. Strange ! He was very fond of me. I 
 hope he's got over it. No. I don't ! I 
 shouldn't like him not to care. Yes, that's 
 the door. Goodness ! how dirty, and what 
 a funny little place ! " 
 
 It was indeed more filthy than funny, 
 in broad daylight, and, except to the initiated, 
 looked anything in the world but a private 
 entrance to one of the brightest little theatres 
 in London. The cobbler in the " Arabian 
 Nights," who had been taken to a certain 
 locality with a bandage over his eyes, could 
 only make his way there a second time when 
 blindfold again. How many haunts are there 
 in our great puzzling city, that we find readily 
 
182 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 enough after dinner, but might seek for hours 
 after luncheon in vain. 
 
 With some difficulty her driver detected 
 a bell, hung so high as to defeat the impu- 
 dence of those diminutive town-bred urchins, 
 who would have asked no better fun than 
 continually to ring it, and run away. After 
 some delay, it vv'as answered by a stout, 
 comely, well-set-up gentleman, dressed with 
 the utmost splendour, wearing smiles on his 
 good-looking face, and a flower at his breast.- 
 
 The incongruity of this person vrith his 
 surroundings struck Jane Lee as so ludicrous, 
 that she lowered her veil to conceal a 
 laugh. 
 
 " I beg your pardon," said she, from 
 inside the carriage ; "I have taken the 
 liberty of calling, to know if I can see 
 Mr. Delapre." 
 
 '^ Certainly, madam, certainly," with an 
 elaborate bow, and the utmost courtesy of 
 
MR. DELAPRR 183 
 
 manner. ''I am Mr. Delaprd — at your 
 service. What can I do for you ? Had you 
 not better aliglit, and step in ? '' 
 
 ~ "He must be used to pretty women in 
 broughams," thought Jane Lee, rather dis- 
 appointed that such an appearance as hers 
 should create no more sensation. " He 
 doesn't seem the least put out of his way. 
 How he shines all over — teeth, boots, and 
 especially his hat ! I wonder whether he 
 will be equally polite when I've told him 
 my business, and he sees me into the carriage 
 to go away ! " 
 
 Thus speculating, she followed Mr. Delapre 
 up one flight of stairs, and down another, into 
 a dingy passage, cool with breaths from the 
 outer air, till, stopping to open a door with 
 his pass-key, he made another profound bow, 
 and motioned her to walk in. 
 
 *' I wish I had a better room, madam," 
 said he, " for the reception of so distinguished 
 
184 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 a visitor. But when ladies come to see an 
 actor they must put up with an actor's 
 accommodation. Pray be seated, and — and 
 — may I offer you a glass of wine ? " 
 
 Decanters stood on the table, and beauti- 
 fully cut glasses, also fresh flowers, a photo- 
 graph-book, a box of cigarettes, and a drawing 
 in chalks, half-finished. There was a bad 
 portrait of somebody as Eichard the Third 
 on the wall, surmounting a fencing-mask, 
 leather jerkin, and pair of foils. Jane Lee, 
 who had never seen nor pictured to herself 
 such a chamber, so furnished, felt interested 
 and amused. 
 
 Declining sherry at one o'clock in the 
 day, she calmly took a seat, and put her 
 veil up. It was gratifying to observe that 
 he seemed at least startled bv the face thus 
 disclosed. 
 
 *' I called early on purpose," said his 
 visitor, in the measured tone that harmonised 
 
MR. DELAPR:^. 185 
 
 SO well witli lier calm imperious beauty. '* I 
 was desirous to see you, and am fortunate to 
 liave found you at home." 
 
 " Pardon me," he interrupted, " the good 
 fortune is mine. I would not have missed 
 seeing you for more than I can say." 
 
 '^ My visit is purely a matter of business," 
 she resumed, with increased dignity, *' and is 
 soon explained. I wish to obtain a professional 
 engagement." 
 
 He had suspected it from the first, but 
 felt a little disappointed nevertheless. It 
 would have been such a romance, such a 
 triumph, had this beautiful woman fallen 
 in love with him from stalls or boxes, and 
 driven here, brougham and all, to tell him 
 so ! These things never did happen, but 
 that was no reason they never should. Oh ! 
 why was not life all melodrama, rather than 
 comedy, farce, sometimes burlesque ! Well, 
 well, business must be attended to, and bread 
 
186 BLACK BUT COMELY, 
 
 is a necessity of existence, thougli we can 
 do without flowers. 
 
 "An engagement?'^ repeated Mr. Delapr^, 
 whose father's name was Dobbs. " You are 
 aware, madam, that this is a serious matter, 
 requiring consideration. You are not, I 
 think, in the — in the profession. Excuse 
 me, I see it at a glance. Have you any 
 proposal to make ? Perhaps I had better 
 hear what you have to say." He had 
 dropped the fine gentleman and spoke in a 
 business-like manner enous^h. 
 
 She puzzled him. Her dress, her bearing, 
 the neat quiet brougham, above all, its driver 
 in his top-boots, inferred neither the flashy 
 adventuress, nor the painstaking woman, 
 toiling for a livelihood at so much a week, 
 Jane Lee's worldly wisdom was already 
 bearing fruit. 
 
 ** Proposal?" she returned. "The pro- 
 posal ought to come from the gentleman. 
 
MR. DULAPEJS. 187 
 
 Mr. Delapre, if I tell you my private history^ 
 it is of course in the strictest confidence, and 
 must 2:0 no farther." 
 
 He changed back to the fine gentleman — 
 the stage fine gentleman — with marvellous 
 versatility. " Hear me swear," he began. 
 
 " You needn't swear. It's unnecessary 
 and profane. Your word is quite sufficient. 
 The real truth is " — " now for a crammer," 
 thought both speaker and listener — " the 
 real truth is, that I — I am a married lady, 
 and separated from my husband." 
 
 He drew his chair nearer, assuming an 
 expression of sympathy, interest, and deep 
 concern. 
 
 " I need not enter into all that,'^ she 
 continued. "Enough to say that we weie 
 unhappy together, and have agreed to live 
 apart. Perhaps it is my fault, perhaps 
 not." 
 
 He expressed in dumb show how impossible 
 
188 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 it was that she could be to blame. And his 
 visitor proceeded calmly with her confidences : 
 
 '' IncomjDatibility of temper, and an im- 
 practicable mother-in-law. Selfishness on 
 one side, inexperience on the other. Ignorant, 
 innocent, and married from the schoolroom. 
 I had better have tied my skij^ping-rope round 
 my neck and drawn it tight ! But that's 
 nothing to the purpose now." 
 
 He was watching her narrowly. If she 
 would only act like this before the foot-lights, 
 he might do worse than entertain her proposal. 
 
 "Excuse me," said he, "do I understand 
 that you have thrown off" your husband's 
 control, and are a perfectly free agent ? " 
 
 " Perfectly." 
 
 The command of countenance with which 
 she concealed a smile showed no small histri- 
 onic power. It imposed on Mr. Delapre, who 
 began to think she might be telling the 
 truth. 
 
MR. DELAPRB. 189 
 
 " May I ask your name ? I beg pardon 
 for beinof so unceremonious." 
 
 She had prepared herself for this very 
 natural question, and bowed calmly while she 
 answered : 
 
 " Certainly. It saves a deal of trouble. 
 Mrs. Bell" 
 
 "And you really wish to go into the 
 drudgery of our profession ? AYith all its 
 attractions, I am bound to warn you that it {5 
 a drudgery, particularly at first." ■ 
 
 " I am not afraid of hard work. I like 
 effort, mental or bodily. I am aware I must 
 begin at the foot of the ladder, and persevere, 
 step by step, till I reach the top." 
 
 " The progress is slow," he returned ; '' and, 
 with all the perseverance in the world, most 
 uncertain. But I own I love my calling, and 
 would follow it if I had to sing in a chorus at 
 twelve shillino's a week." 
 
 This from a man Avith something like as 
 
190 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 many thousand pounds (borrowed money) 
 sunk in theatrical property, seemed a high 
 compliment to the profession. 
 
 '^Twelve shillings a week," repeated Jane 
 simply. " I suppose I should not earn more 
 at first. I ought to tell you, Mr. Delapre, I 
 have an independent fortune." 
 
 He stared, but tried not to look so 
 astonished as he felt. This was altoo-ether a 
 new experience. Many young ladies, hand- 
 some and ordinary, had come to ask him for 
 engagements, but none till to-day in a private 
 carriage, professing a noble disregard for 
 salary. 
 
 ''Mrs. Bell," he replied, with much cordi- 
 ality, '' I am most anxious to meet your views. 
 I will see what can be done. Kindly favour 
 me with another call — say to-morrow, at the 
 same hour. I shall hope to make you such an 
 offer as you may think it worth while to 
 entertain." 
 
MR. DELAPMR 191 
 
 Then lie attended her to the carriage, with 
 as much deference as if she had been a 
 duchess, and stood at his door, bare-headed, 
 while she drove away. 
 
CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 AN EXPLANATION. 
 
 The well-appointed brougham might now be 
 seen very often turning into Whynot Street, 
 or waiting at the shabby entrance to the 
 Nonsuch Theatre. Its manao^er and Mrs. BeU 
 were plapng a game of cross-purposes. Each 
 wanted to force the other's hand, both to con- 
 ceal their own. Mr. Delapre was mystified. 
 He could learn nothing about his beautiful 
 acquaintance but what she chose to tell him, 
 and, notwithstanding his knowledge of the 
 world — his own world be it understood, lively, 
 but limited — felt he was at a disadvantage. 
 
 The lady's appearance, he opined, would 
 draw full houses ; nor could he conceal from 
 
AN EXPLANATION. 193 
 
 himself that she was gifted with those talents 
 which, properly cultivated and brought out, con- 
 stitute an actress. He heard her sing without 
 accompaniment, and found it difficult to judge 
 the performance impartially, so ingratiating was 
 the manner of the performer. Her voice, 
 though it would scarcely fill a concert-room, 
 much less a theatre, seemed perfectly under 
 command, and lent itself so easily to the 
 meaning, rather than the words of her song, 
 that a listener could not but imagine he was 
 taking part in it himself He prevailed on 
 her to read aloud from Ophelia and Lady 
 Teazle. She was neither too pathetic in the 
 one nor too flippant in the other, while to her 
 eyes came dreamy madness and sparkling 
 satire at will. He proposed that she should 
 take off her bonnet, and let her long black 
 hair stream over her shoulders, for Lady 
 Macbeth, in the sleep-walking scene ; but she 
 cut him short with a quiet refusal to make 
 
 VOL. I. 
 
194 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 any alteration in her toilet ; remarking that a 
 woman should be forty at least, and stout in 
 proportion, for the part of so energetic a 
 housewife, particularly when she gives the 
 henpecked Thane *' a piece of her mind." 
 
 Yes, it was on the cards that Mrs. Bell 
 might be an extraordinary success. Strange 
 to say, this flattering possibility caused the 
 manager much hesitation and perplexity. 
 
 Mr. Delapre was a good fellow enough ; 
 open-handed in money matters, hospitable, 
 well-conditioned, and, if fond of pleasure, 
 liking to share it with his friends. But he 
 was also a vain man ; in matters of personal 
 advantage, an egotist to the core. Handsome, 
 versatile, essentially dehonnaire, he always 
 played the ladies' parts on his own boards, and 
 was unwilling to share, even with the other 
 sex, that applause which it is only fair to 
 say was freely accorded by an enthusiastic 
 audience. 
 
AN EXPLANATION. 195 
 
 He had climbed the ladder too fast, and 
 been spoiled by success. The height turns a 
 man giddy at thirty, that, twenty years later, 
 only makes him careful not to fall. 
 
 Now, if Mrs. Bell should take the town 
 by storm, even though brought out under his 
 auspices, he would no longer be first fiddle 
 in his own band. No money could repay 
 him for the loss of that position. On the 
 other hand, if he afforded her a fair start, 
 and she failed, the interests of the theatre 
 must necessarily sufier by her incapacity. 
 Besides, there were jealousies enough in 
 the company already. In what company are 
 there not ? More than one actress of Ions: 
 standing was quite capable of making his 
 dictatorship exceedingly troublesome, if she 
 suspected her own claims were overlooked. 
 No man in his senses voluntarily lays him- 
 self open to the attacks of a woman's spite, a 
 woman's tongue, and a woman's wit. These 
 
 2 
 
196 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 weapons, sharpened by a sense of injury, and 
 wielded by the long experience of an actress, 
 can penetrate the toughest hide, and would 
 pierce a rhinoceros to the quick. In the 
 green-room, as in the Cabinet, individual dis- 
 satisfactions create a difficulty at every turn, 
 and he who would drive either coach to its 
 destination, requires to study and humour the 
 various tempers of his team. 
 
 So lono*, too, as his relations with this 
 beautiful acquaintance took no definite shape, 
 they seemed flavoured with a spice of romantic 
 mystery, exceedingly flattering to his self-love. 
 He liked the company to gossip and specu- 
 late, carrying tales from one to another of 
 his adventures, his bonnes fortunes, his pre- 
 eminence in a refined profligacy. Perhaps, in 
 the whole range of dramatic character, he 
 most admired Don Giovanni ; and largely 
 valuing his own reputation as a lady-killer, 
 enjoyed with no little zest such a conversa- 
 
AN EXPLANATION. 197 
 
 tiou as the following, held on a terrace at 
 Kichmond, overlooking the river. 
 
 Said Mrs. Trevelyan of the Excelsior 
 Theatre to Miss Mountcharles of his own : 
 
 " Is it announced, Fanny ? I think at 
 last we may venture to congratulate him." 
 
 " The pitcher has been to the well so 
 often ! " replied Fanny, with the shrug of 
 her pretty shoulders that was her telling 
 point. " If it's broke at last, and you will 
 send him a wedding-present, so will I." 
 
 '^What do you mean, fair ladies?" said 
 the manager, inexpressibly gratified. " You 
 speak dark sentences, like witches, as you are." 
 
 '^ Mayn't we congratulate you?" asked 
 Miss Mountcharles. 
 
 "And condole with the others — the 
 mille e tre ? Poor things, I'm sorry for 
 them ! " added Mrs. Trevelyan, a married 
 woman separated from her husband, and 
 therefore entitled to commiserate. 
 
198 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 '^Upon my life, you're too hard on me," 
 said Mr. Delapre. '' Do I look like a marry- 
 ing man ? I appeal to Mrs. Trevelyan." 
 
 ''Frankly, you do not ! " replied that lady, 
 with a laugh. " But it's too bad of you, all 
 the same. You asked her to sit on the box. 
 You took her out in a boat. She thinks 
 you made the party on purpose for her, 
 and no wonder. If you don't propose this 
 evening, going home, you are simply a villain 
 with a sniiling cheek, a traitor of the deepest 
 dye, and all the rest of it. Men are so 
 heartless ! " 
 
 " She wouldn't accept me," he answered, 
 with infinite coxcombry. 
 
 " Wouldn't she ! " murmured Miss Mount- 
 charles. " I wonder what she expects ? " 
 
 " She would make a capital Donna Anna," 
 whispered the other in her friend's ear. " I 
 wish he mayn't have asked her to study the 
 part. Hush ! Here she comes." 
 
AN EXPLANATION. 199 
 
 Mrs. Bell, walking along the terrace to 
 join them, se.emed as little like a broken- 
 hearted damsel as possible. '^ Donna Anna 
 may have been as dark/' thought Mr. Delapre, 
 "^^ but I doubt if she was half as handsome ; and 
 if she had carried so fine a figure or so light 
 a step, I think she would never have been 
 forsaken." Then he asked her whether he 
 had not better hurry dinner, and treated her 
 so entirely as queen of the revels, that the 
 company, looking meaningly in each other's 
 faces, voted their volatile manager *^ settled 
 at last ! " 
 
 Now, this Eichmond party was the result 
 of reflection, and so to speak, strategy, on the 
 part both of lady and gentleman. Jane Lee, 
 or Mrs. Bell, as she chose to call herself, 
 perhaps not without kindly remembrance of 
 him who had given his evil destiny the 
 name of Beltenebrosa, soon found that the 
 mere keeping up of appearances as a fine 
 
200 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 lady melted money fast, even in a lodging 
 near Long Acre. The brougham and its 
 well-dressed coachman alone ran away with 
 ten guineas a week. Eich attire cannot 
 be worn for nothing, and she had been 
 tempted to purchase so much jewellery as 
 made a terrific hole in her capital. The 
 time had not arrived for payment of her 
 legacy, and, when it did come, she was 
 determined to return every shilling to 
 Mervyn Strange, though she should have to 
 sweep a crossing for her daily bread ! At 
 far too short a distance she could already 
 see the end of her resources, and still her 
 acquaintance with Mr. Delapre afforded 
 nothing more substantial than high-flown 
 compliments, and promises that bore no 
 fruit. They must come to an understand- 
 in of, and she resolved to tell him so at the 
 first opportunity. This could hardly be done, 
 however, on the box-seat of a coach, not to 
 
AN EXPLANATION. 201 
 
 mention tlie proximity of those genial spirits 
 who crowded its roof; the manager's whole 
 attention was necessarily absorbed in the 
 guidance of his team. 
 
 To sit behind four horses (a very different 
 thing from driving them), with only as many 
 fingers for the same number of reins, and a 
 whip in hand, of which the thong is incon- 
 veniently light and long, seems the correct 
 thing for fast gentlemen to do. 
 
 Mr. Delapre, who aspired to the character 
 of a man of fashion — which he could not 
 be — rather than a man of talent — which he 
 was- — felt no scruple in risking the lives of 
 half-a-dozen ornaments of the British drama 
 up-and-down-hill over Wimbledon Common, 
 with a scratch team, unsound and insubor- 
 dinate, all pulling difierent ways at once. 
 It was more by good luck than skilful driving 
 that coach and freight ever arrived at the 
 Castle Hotel, Kichmond, to stop and set 
 
202 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 down, ignominioiisly, outside its covered 
 porch. 
 
 Some of the passengers did not know 
 their danger, others braced their nerves with 
 champagne ; all looked forward to the return 
 journey, after an early dinner, with more 
 confidence than might have been supposed. 
 
 In the meantime, Mr. Delapre, who 
 handled the reins and gave the entertain- 
 ment, was an object of interest and admira- 
 tion to his guests. The ladies especially, 
 with hearts softening under the influence of 
 roses, sunshine, and cooling drinks, felt he 
 was more fascinating than ever, and w^ondered 
 how that pale woman by his side, who 
 accepted his attentions with the utmost 
 indifl'erence, could look so calm and cold. 
 
 *' Handsome, my dear ! Not a bit of it ! 
 Too tall by a foot ! " whispered little Miss Light- 
 foot, who excelled in the dance, to Madame 
 Shenck, a full-blown blonde, with no talent 
 
AN EXPLANATION. 203 
 
 in particular but that of looking well in all 
 costumes. *^Too dark for my taste," replied 
 madame, in remarkably good English, " and 
 no colouring whatever ; " while Miss Mount- 
 charles told her next neighbour that the 
 manager's last flame looked as yellow as a 
 guinea, and Mrs. Trevelyan vowed she was 
 as pale as a ghost ! 
 
 He continued to make strong running 
 nevertheless, contriving after dinner, when 
 they all went for a stroll in Kichmond Park, 
 to detach Mrs. Bell from the rest, and walk 
 away with her, as Miss Lightfoot observed, 
 *' all amongst the deer, and the oaks, and 
 the fern, as if they wxre regularly en- 
 gaged 1 " 
 
 Beltenebrosa was in her element. Like 
 some woodland nymph, she seemed to absorb 
 strength and energy from the sylvan scene, 
 and looked more beautiful than ever, while 
 she moved light and stately through flickering 
 
204 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 gleams and shadows, under tlie greenwood 
 tree. His artistic perceptions could not but 
 be roused to admiration, and with an intense 
 consciousness of self-approval, he reflected on 
 the increase of fame he must have gained in 
 his own circle by discovering this queenly 
 creature, and keeping her as yet so success- 
 fully to himself. 
 
 He was only waiting an opportunity to 
 tell her something pleasant and indefinite to 
 that efl'ect, but they had not walked two 
 hundred yards before she stopped short, and 
 turned full upon him, with the following 
 pertinent appeal : 
 
 *' I wanted to see you alone, Mr. Delapre — 
 that is why I consented to this solitary expe- 
 dition. You and I must come to an under- 
 standing, without any more shilly-shallying — 
 now — once for all ! " 
 
 The tone was abrupt, the manner peremp- 
 tory. Under such unfavourable conditions 
 
AN EXPLANATION. 205 
 
 even Mr. Delapre could not make love to 
 advantao'e. 
 
 ''We have often been alone before, Mrs. 
 Bell," he answered courteously, '' but never in 
 so sweet a spot. Forgive me if I hint that 
 such a scene is more appropriate to pleasure 
 than busiuess." 
 
 '' You know the proverb," she replied ; 
 " one must always come before the other, 
 Mr. Delapre. I will be frank with you." 
 He bowed and made an attempt to take 
 her hand, which was not successful. " I am 
 at the end of my resources. The first time we 
 met I told you I had an independent fortune. 
 Since then circumstances have altered. I must 
 now endeavour to make my own way in the 
 world. You have often hinted at an engage- 
 ment, but put me off from day to day. I 
 cannot live on promises." 
 
 '* No more can I ! " he exclaimed excitedly. 
 " Mrs. Bell, shall we make a bargain ? " 
 
206 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 His whole manner had chang^ed, and it 
 roused her indignation to feel that an admis- 
 sion of poverty lowered her in his esteem. 
 
 *' The man is not a gentleman," she said 
 to herself, "I never quite thought he was;" 
 but she only observed aloud : " There must be 
 two parties to every bargain. Let me hear 
 what you have to propose." 
 
 Something in her manner checked while 
 it attracted him. He wondered and was 
 provoked at his own nervousness. What 
 was this woman more than other women 
 that his lip should shake and his heart fail 
 him to woo her like the rest ? Courage, 
 man ! They were all the same — at least in 
 the drama — and to be won by a coup de 
 main ! 
 
 He floundered and hesitated. 
 
 *' I will do anything to — to meet your 
 wishes, if, on your part, you — you will try 
 to meet mine. Oh Mrs. Bell, it would 
 
AN EXPLANATION. 207 
 
 break my heart to think I was never to see 
 you again. We are together too seldom as 
 it is. If — if you would confide your future 
 to my keeping, I would do everything in 
 the power of man to make it a happy one» 
 Were you unmarried I could speak plainer; 
 but, after all, what are marriages like yours ? 
 Mere conventional forms. Do not let us 
 waste our time in discussino^ such lamentable 
 superstitions." 
 
 She understood him perfectly, and where 
 another woman would have been frightened 
 or irritated, felt only some amusement and 
 much contempt. 
 
 '' Suppose I am free ? " she said, with 
 rather a bitter smile. '' Suppose I have been 
 divorced, or never married at all ? " 
 
 He laughed uncomfortably. *' In that 
 case," said he, " I could only wish I were a 
 marrying man myself But, believe me, 
 Mrs. Bell, those are the most lasting attach- 
 
*208 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 ments that depend wholly and solely on the 
 heart. You won mine from the first. If you 
 think it worth keeping you have only to 
 say so." 
 
 *' That is not the engagement I asked for/' 
 she answered, with such scorn in her dark 
 eyes as caused him to lower his own. 
 
 He had lost his temper and was losing 
 his head. '' A bargain is a bargain," said he 
 rudely. " You understand my terms. Take 
 thjem or leave them." 
 
 Jane Lee was proud of her self-control ; 
 nevertheless, had she been a man, she would 
 have knocked him down then and there. 
 She bit her lip instead, turning a shade paler 
 than before. 
 
 *' After this, Mr. Delapre," said she, 
 *' you and I must be strangers. Do not 
 think because I am a woman I cannot take 
 my own part and resent an injury. I shall 
 not return to London on your coach. No, 
 
AN EXPLANATION. 209 
 
 nor even walk back with you to The Castle. 
 Make what excuses you choose to your guests. 
 I conclude you will prefer any falsehood to 
 a confession that you have grossly insulted 
 the only defenceless lady of your party ! " 
 
 He protested, pleaded, apologised to no 
 purpose. Angry and crestfallen, he returned 
 alone to his guests, putting the best face he 
 could on the absence of his companion, who 
 calmly continued her walk on and on through 
 the remotest solitudes of Kichmond Park, 
 rather pleased than otherwise with the ex- 
 citement of a skirmish in which she had so 
 entirely the advantage. 
 
 YOL. T. 
 
CHAPTER XV. 
 
 " A LITTLE LESS THAN KIN." 
 
 While the ^'three-cornered team," as an old 
 ostler called it, was putting to, while actors 
 and actresses, who were bound to be home 
 in time for a performance that commenced at 
 eight P.M., were discussing the merits of the 
 entertainment, the peculiarities of their host, 
 and above all, the unaccountable absence of 
 Mrs. Bell, who, it appeared, was not to accom- 
 pany them back to London, that lady saun- 
 tered pleasantly through the ferns among the 
 oaks and the deer, enjoying the delights of 
 this beautiful wilderness the more leisurely, 
 that she determined not to return to the 
 
''A LITTLE LESS THAN KIN:' 211 
 
 hotel till Mr. Delapre and his party were 
 fairly off. Her perfect health and truly- 
 shaped frame hardly knew the meaning of 
 fatigue, and it was with no sense of lassitude, 
 but only in a delightful consciousness of 
 freedom from the trammels and decorum of 
 conventional life, that she flung herself down 
 among the ferns, and watched a herd of fallow- 
 deer crossing a sunny glade in single file, 
 whisking an ear, stamping a foot, or cropping 
 the tender herbage as they passed. Suddenly, 
 quick as thought, the careless pacing walk 
 changed to a startled scurry, and they scoured 
 off at speed to disappear behind the nearest 
 thicket, while Jane Lee, conscious of a shadow 
 between her and the light, sprang to her feet 
 with a quickened pulse, and the sense of 
 irritation that waits on fear. A man's voice, 
 harsh and guttural, broke the sylvan silence 
 with a mild request, that only its dictatorial 
 
 tone magnified to a threat. 
 
 p 2 
 
212 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 '^You ain't a got such a thing as a 'arf- 
 pint about you, marm ? " 
 
 The speaker was a slender, shapely, good- 
 looking fellow enough ; very dark, very dirty, 
 with beautiful teeth, and a^ most unpleasant 
 smile. He wore earrins^s and a red neck- 
 handkerchief. The rest of his attire was in 
 rags, while feet without stockings peeped 
 through the rents in his clumsy boots. A 
 less desirable companion to walk with through 
 a lonely wood could hardly have been found 
 on a summer's day. And for a few startled 
 moments, the well-dressed lady thus accosted 
 wished herself back on Mr. Delapre's coach, 
 wandering leaders, kicking wheelers, and all. 
 She had plenty of courage, and soon recovered 
 herself. 
 
 " Half-a-pint ! " she repeated. "I sup- 
 pose you mean beer. How can I carry beer 
 about with me ? Do you think I keep it in a 
 smelling-bottle ? Go on, my good man, and 
 
"A LITTLE LESS THAN KIN.'' 213 
 
 don't waste your time talking nonsense. I 
 should say youVe had beer enough already." 
 
 '' I ain't a good man," he answered sulkily, 
 though somewhat cowed to find his presence 
 created so little dismay. *' And I ain't a had 
 beer enufF a'ready. No, nor yet 'arf enufF — 
 there ! You've a got the price of a pint about 
 you somewdieres. Come, hand it out ! " 
 
 She would willingly have paid for a pint, 
 or even a gallon, to be quit of him, but re- 
 flected that, to get at her silver, she must 
 produce a little porte-monnaie containing all 
 the remnant of her store, and thus ofier an in- 
 ducement to robbery with violence on the 
 spot. In one rapid glance she satisfied herself 
 no assistance was at hand ; in another, she 
 scanned the tramp's slight small-boned figure, 
 and calculated that if it came to a trial of 
 strength, she might be able to hold her 
 own. 
 
 " You'll get nothing from me," she said 
 
214 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 firmly. ''Come, my man, it's no use. Drop 
 it, and walk on ! " 
 
 " Walk on ! " lie replied ; '' yes, I'll walk 
 on along o' you. It's not such a honner w'en 
 all's said and done ! Wot, you won't, won't 
 ye ? Then I'll just make ye ! " 
 
 Oh for the gleam of a park - keeper's 
 shiny hat I Not a living creature was in 
 sight, not so much as a fawn or a rabbit, 
 only the birds sang joyously in the dark 
 depths of woodland ; and the broad palmated 
 ferns grew high enough to screen any lawless 
 deed of outrage or rapine. 
 
 He took her by the wrist in a grip of 
 steel, scarcely to be expected from those taper 
 fingers ; but her blood was up, and she made 
 her white teeth meet in the brown dirty hand. 
 He wrenched himself free, drew a clasp-knife 
 from his pocket, and opened it with a frightful 
 curse. 
 
 Her courao'e failed her now ; she believed 
 
"A LITTLE LLSS THAN KIN." 215 
 
 her hour was come, and put both hands up to 
 screen her eyes, entreating him to spare her 
 life — only spare her life — and take all she 
 had! 
 
 Instead of committing murder then and 
 there he shut up his knife and stared in her 
 face with unfeigned surprise, muttering broken 
 sentences in some outlandish tongue she had 
 never heard before. By degrees he seemed to 
 recover his composure, and presently burst into 
 a hearty laugh. 
 
 "You ain't got no Eomany," said he, "not 
 a word — not even a morsel of patter ; but you're 
 one of us ! I ought to have spotted you at first. 
 1 might have knowed it without seeing of it 
 marked in your skin. Only a Purrum or a 
 Kaulo-Camlo could be so black and so comely. 
 Ah ! the Gorgios may bluff and bounce, but 
 their women can't hold a candle to the Lovels 
 and the Lees. Yes, yes ; there you stands, 
 my sister ! A true, thorough-bred Eomany ! 
 
216 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 And to think I've been a looking for you nigli 
 fifteen years, and found you without a candle 
 at last ! " 
 
 ''Your sister ! " she gasped ; " and you've 
 been looking for me I What do you mean? " 
 
 He laid his slender finger — tawny, un- 
 washed, yet so like her own — on the arm that 
 her struggles had bared to its elbow, and 
 pointed out the tiny blue initials to which she 
 was so accustomed, she hardly knew they 
 were there. 
 
 *'See here," said he. "Ever since I was 
 a child of five, I have been taught to look 
 for a woman who carries that mark on her 
 wrist, and bring her back to her kindred and 
 her tribe. I am a Lee, and so are you ; but 
 it's no matter for that. When Shuri Lee 
 left the camp, she carried a baby with her, 
 marked as you are now. She never came 
 back. I was but a little lad, and yet I 
 remember how Fio-htins: Jack took on. He 
 
"A LITTLE LESS THAN KIN." 217 
 
 hadn't been married long enough to make it 
 easy for him, poor old chap ! Ah ! it would 
 be different now, may be ; but his hair might 
 never have turned so white, if he hadn't lost 
 wife and child all in one go ! Well, we've 
 been a seeking the babe ever since, us Lees, 
 the whole of the tribe. Look ye here. J. L., 
 that's Jericho Lee. I'm marked too, same 
 as yourself. We ought to be pairs ! " 
 
 She turned giddy, and for a moment faint. 
 The old oaks seemed to reel and stagger all 
 round. Then came the strange reaction that 
 follows every startling experience, the un- 
 accountable sense that it is neither so new, 
 nor so extraordinary, nor so overpowering 
 as it ought to be. That in some state of 
 existence, something of the same nature has 
 occurred to us before, that we are a little 
 disappointed, and that, hovv^ever wonderful the 
 revelation, we had expected more. 
 
 *' Do you mean you know me ? " she asked, 
 
218 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 trying to sjDeak calmly. " Do you remember 
 my mother ? What was she ? Who am I ? 
 Tell me all you can." 
 
 ''You are a true Komany/' was his answer. 
 " What the Gentiles call a Gipsy, and so am 
 I. We have a proverb : ' A Komany never 
 lies to a Eomany, nor speaks truth to a 
 
 Gorgio.' You may believe what I tell 
 
 J? 
 you. 
 
 "You asked for beer just now," she said, 
 putting her hand in her pocket, with some 
 vague idea this new acquaintance ought to 
 be humoured and conciliated. 
 
 *'Not from you! Not from you!'' he 
 repeated, earnestly enough to betray the 
 strength of a temptation he thus overcame. 
 " Gipsies take no toll of each other. I am 
 in rags while you are in satins, but perhaps 
 I could show money against you now." 
 
 With that he pulled a handful of gold 
 and silver from his pocket, and bade her 
 
"A LITTLE LESS THAN KIN:' 219 
 
 " take what she would, the Lees were always 
 ready to befriend each other." 
 
 Such an offer could not but inspire con- 
 fidence. Beltenebrosa felt all her courage 
 had come back, while her curiosity was 
 keenly stimulated by this strange adven- 
 ture. 
 
 " Where were you going when you found 
 me here ? " she asked. " Do your people 
 make a practice of robbing every unprotected 
 woman they find in a lonely spot ? " 
 
 '^I was going to our camp," he answered, 
 ignoring the last part of her question. " It 
 is not an hour's walk from this place. Come 
 and see the gipsies in their home. We will 
 give you a sisters welcome." 
 
 She hesitated. It would not be dark for 
 hours. The days were surely past for kid- 
 napping grown-up people, and the temptation 
 was strong to study in their own haunts the 
 race with which she had always felt so un- 
 
220 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 accountable a sympathy, to which she began 
 to think she might be near akin. 
 
 *' I will come and pay you a visit," she 
 replied loftily. "No, do not fall behind. 
 I am never ashamed of my company ; and 
 I want you to tell me all about your people 
 and your tribe." 
 
 So this strangely- matched pair walked on 
 through Eichmond Park, in the golden glows 
 of the summer afternoon ; and by the way 
 each imparted to the other such details of 
 their respective lives as roused a keen interest 
 in both. Jericho, inheriting from his southern 
 ancestors many refined instincts common to 
 the Arab, the Gipsy, the Eed- Indian, and the 
 Patrician of Western Europe, felt strangely 
 fascinated by this being of a superior order, 
 w^ho was yet a kinswoman, and belonged to 
 his own race. He had never seen anyone 
 so beautiful, and of a beauty, moreover, to 
 which his eye and taste were trained. Dark 
 
''A LITTLE LESS THAN KIN." 221 
 
 brows and locks, white teetli, and delicate 
 features were common enough amongst the 
 women of his tribe, but never till to-day 
 had he looked on gipsy charms enhanced 
 by civilised culture and rich attire. 
 
 Let poets say what they will, *' beauty 
 unadorned " can never hold its own with 
 beauty owing its dressmaker a bill that 
 '' carries over " three figures to the other 
 side. 
 
 Jane Lee, too, scanned, not without a 
 certain contemptuous approval, the agile form 
 and dark expressive face of the youth who 
 had so frightened her at their first acquaint- 
 ance. While he talked on — teaching her their 
 pass-words, and affording much curious in- 
 formation on the peculiarities of the Eomanies, 
 as she must now learn to call her kindred — 
 she could hardly believe this pleasant, well- 
 spoken, imaginative companion was the same 
 man who had seemed to her an hour back 
 
222 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 but an ill-conditioned tramp, thirsting for 
 the vulgar gratification of beer. 
 
 "You know a great many things," she 
 observed, with condescending surprise, not 
 lost on the keen-witted gipsy; "why, where 
 did you go to school ? " 
 
 His dark eyes sparkled, and his smile 
 showed a handsome set of teeth ; but there 
 was something of dignity in the carriage of 
 his head and the wave of his arm while he 
 replied : 
 
 " Look round, my sister, as far as your 
 eye can see, as far as your thought can fly ; 
 you cannot even then compass the teaching 
 of a school the Eomany goes to day by day, 
 all day long, and all night too. He learns 
 to read in the blue sky above, to write on 
 the wide earth below, and to calculate in 
 the number of fools he gets a living out of 
 at every village fair. Yes ; the Eomany 
 never leaves school like the Gentile. I 
 
"^ LITTLE LESS THAN KIN:' 223 
 
 myself have to-day got the lesson by heart 
 I have been learning all my life. See, there 
 is the smoke rising from our kettles ; welcome, 
 my sister, to your own people and your 
 real home ! " 
 
CHAPTER XVI. 
 
 "a little more than kind." 
 
 Jane Lee started back at a sound like 
 thunder, wkich proved to be nothing more 
 than an up-train on the London and South- 
 western Railway, passing directly overhead. 
 Sheltered by one of its most imposing 
 viaducts, the gipsies had taken up their 
 quarters for the night. Savoury odours rose 
 from a score of kettles, and slender wreaths 
 of smoke, escaping into the air, attested that 
 they extracted from the smallest supply of 
 fuel the largest amount of fire. In the whole 
 encampment there was but one caravan — a 
 wooden structure like a Noah's Ark on w^heels. 
 The other dwellings consisted of rough sticks 
 
'M LITTLE MORE THAN KIND." 225 
 
 and tattered blankets, arranged with such skill 
 as to form picturesque and tolerably comfortable 
 tents. The gipsy, like the Chinese, holds in 
 respect the wisdom of his ancestors, and, in 
 his mechanical contrivances, refuses to depart 
 from customs handed down through a hundred 
 generations. He affects a residence to-day, 
 on an English heath or common, of the same 
 shape and texture as that which served his 
 forefathers under the Shepherd Kings by the 
 fluctuating w-aters of the Nile. 
 
 Picking her way through charred sticks, 
 broken pans, bundles of rags, and dirty 
 children, Jane Lee followed her guide to the 
 caravan mentioned above, at the door of 
 which, up three wooden steps, on a rush- 
 bottomed chair without a back, sat its pro- 
 prietor, taking the refreshments of evening air, 
 and strong tobacco out of a short pipe, in 
 alternate whiffs. 
 
 This personage was so remarkable in ap- 
 
 \0L. I. <i 
 
226 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 pearance as to merit description. He seemed 
 long past the prime of life, but tough and 
 vigorous still, standing about ^yq feet nine 
 in height, on a pair of legs and haunches 
 fit to carry a Colossus. His shoulders looked 
 narrow, but his girth of chest was deceptive 
 and enormous. His neck was short, and very- 
 thick, his jaw large, firm, and somewhat 
 underhung, which gave his face the resolute 
 yet honest expression of a mastiff. He had 
 long muscular arms, tapering to a round 
 wrist, and small thick hand, with knuckles 
 less than usually prominent. This member, 
 which it seemed more natural to call " a 
 fist," looked capable of inflicting the severest 
 punishment without receiving injury. 
 
 Fighting Jack, indeed, had been in his 
 day a terror to the London prize-ring, and 
 one of the hardest hitters on record. Even 
 now, though more than fifty years of age, 
 after a rough life, and much sorrow, with 
 
"A LITTLE MORE THAN KIND:' 227 
 
 much drink to drown it in, lie liked to boast 
 that, '' though he warn't quite so handy on 
 his pins, nor yet so saucy with his return as 
 he used to be, it took a fairish good man to 
 stand up to him still ! " 
 
 With all his ruggedness of feature, there 
 was something picturesque in his appearance, 
 that impressed Jane Lee not unfavourably. 
 He seemed more like the chief of a warlike 
 desert tribe than the head of such a gang 
 as this, tinkering saucepans for trade, and 
 robbing hen-roosts for spoil. 
 
 Without betraying the slightest surprise at 
 her approach, he bent on her a piercing look 
 from under the black brows that so contrasted 
 with his snow-white hair. 
 
 " Don't you go for to speak to him till he 
 speaks to you," whispered Jericho. ^* There's 
 one thing he can't a-bear, and that's a woman's 
 tongue." 
 
 But Jane Lee was not to be intimidated. 
 
228 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 Walking boldly to tlie wooden steps tliat 
 fenced his throne, she looked him full in the 
 face, and asked : 
 
 ^' Are you the master here ? I've come to 
 see your people, and expect you to show me 
 round the camp." 
 
 He was fairly staggered, testifying his 
 emotion by smoking in shorter and fiercer 
 puffs than before, while he turned wrathfully 
 from the young lady to her guide. 
 
 " What's up now ? " he demanded. *' Who 
 
 the is this, brother ? And why the 
 
 have you brought her to me f " 
 
 " I have found her at last, uncle," replied 
 the younger gipsy respectfully. '^ Show him 
 the marks, sister. Speak up, and say how 
 Jericho was after you all these years, and 
 brought you home at last." 
 
 Fighting Jack trembled from head to foot ; 
 the pipe shook between his broad strong teeth. 
 He came tottering down the steps, and took 
 
"A LITTLE MORE THAN KIND." 229 
 
 the young lady by the hand, swaying to and 
 fro like a man in drink. 
 
 " Tell me the truth," he growled fiercely, 
 while he loosed the spotted kerchief round his 
 thick brown throat. ''Look ye here, you 
 dursnH lie to me, neither of ye. I'd do for 
 you both, as sure as you stand there alive ! " 
 
 " It's no lie, uncle," pleaded Jericho, 
 trembling like a leaf. " Show him your arm, 
 sister, and have done with it." 
 
 Turning back the sleeve of her dress, she 
 pushed down a costly bracelet that girt it, and 
 stretched her full white arm for inspection. 
 Fighting Jack stared and gasped, without a 
 word. Then he turned his head away, and 
 put the ends of his dirty neckcloth to his 
 eyes. 
 
 Presently he looked kindly in her face. 
 '' You're welcome, my dear," said he ; " you'll 
 stay here to-night — in the old man's crib, you 
 understand. Oh, you must ! You shall have 
 
230 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 the best of everything — linen sheets, and black 
 tea four shillings a pound — gold, my dear, if 
 you'd eat it. Turn your face this way. Ah ! 
 you're like your mother, you always was ! I'll 
 go in and get ready. I won't be a minute. 
 Don't you stir a finger, I'll be back directly." 
 
 Then he mounted the steps, and disap- 
 peared through his wooden door, like the 
 cuckoo in a cuckoo-clock. 
 
 Fighting Jack was no exemplary character, 
 far from it, not even a decently respectable 
 member of society, but he possessed some 
 redeeming qualities, of which not the least 
 extenuating was, a constant heart, that could 
 love one woman in a lifetime, and be very 
 tender for helplessness of any kind, parti- 
 cularly in a child. Whether this unreasoning 
 and protective fidelity, like that of a mastiif 
 or bulldog, may or may not have some 
 affinity to the combative instinct, also common 
 to these animals, that refuses to acknowledge 
 
"A LITTLE MORE THAN KIND:' 231 
 
 defeat, I am scarcely physiologist enough to 
 determine, though, in my own experience, 
 I can call to mind more than one example 
 of such heroes, only half brutalised by their 
 heroism, whose courage sometimes sank to 
 ferocity, but whose kindliness more often rose 
 to the highest pitch of generosity and self- 
 sacrifice. Fio^htino: Jack married a woman 
 he loved very dearly. It was the great plea- 
 sure of his life to deck her out in the gaudiest 
 of clothing^, the costliest of ornaments. The 
 gipsy's wife, he liked to boast, could wear as 
 heavy jewellery as the squire's lady, paid for, 
 too, every carat of it, with her husband's 
 money. He knew no better, poor fellow ! 
 He thought a woman preferred dress and 
 decoration to everything else on earth, and 
 he would have given, he did give, his very 
 life-blood to indulge her with what she liked. 
 The mending of kettles and making of rush- 
 bottomed chairs are not lucrative branches of 
 
232 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 industry, even when supplemented by petty 
 larceny in the matter of linen and fowls, but 
 in the company he affected, Jack Lee soon 
 found that his fists would gain him a profit 
 he could never hope to earn with his fingers, 
 and that a first-class boxer might afford to 
 dress " his missus " — for that was his ambition 
 — no less extravagantly than a lord of the land. 
 So he went into training, fought his maiden 
 fight triumphantly, finished up his man in 
 thirteen rounds, and pocketed a clear fifty 
 pounds with hardly a scratch. Proud and 
 happy was the winner when he chucked the 
 battle-money, every shilling of it, into his 
 wife's lap ; prouder and happier still when she 
 burst out crying, and entreated him, with her 
 arms round his neck, never, no never, to run 
 such a risk for her sake again ! Not that she 
 cared for him as he did for her — the true 
 secret, perhaps, of his infatuation ; but what 
 woman could remain unmoved by so touching 
 
''A LITTLE MORE THAN KIND." 233 
 
 a display of daring and devotion, particularly 
 when thus crowned with success ? 
 
 Then his backers discovered he could take 
 
 punishment, to use their own expression, 
 
 *' like a glutton," so they matched him with 
 
 a celebrity on whom the talent laid three to 
 
 two, as having a stone the best of the weights, 
 
 and being hitherto unvanquished. The fight 
 
 created extraordinary interest, and w^as 
 
 attended by many people who would have 
 
 been sorry to see their names in print. The 
 
 " dark one," as the sporting papers observed, 
 
 wore his adversary down by dogged courage, 
 
 correct fighting, and superior condition ; 
 
 leaving the ring sadly mauled, indeed, and 
 
 almost blind, but once more a winner, *'' after 
 
 an hour and three-quarters." Again to quote 
 
 from the sporting papers : " Ding-dong, hammer 
 
 and tongs ! A fair, old-fashioned, stand-up 
 
 fight, and a splendid exhibition of true English 
 
 pluck ;" which last encomium, as the conqueror 
 
234 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 was a gipsy and the conquered a Jew, must 
 be accepted for what it is worth. 
 
 So Fighting Jack became a celebrity 
 also, and it was soon time " to put the strings 
 on," and make a profit " the other way up," 
 by a certain dishonest arrangement that losers 
 call '^ a Cross." His patrons trained him, 
 therefore, to enter the ring for another con- 
 test, giving him strict injunctions at the last 
 moment, and one hundred incontrovertible 
 reasons, to sell the fight. He earned his 
 money fairly, though much against the grain, 
 laying himself open to the severest punish- 
 ment, and doing his duty, as he understood 
 it, with a loyal turpitude that sprang from 
 a warped sense of honesty and gratitude to 
 his knavish employers. 
 
 His honour rooted in dishonour stood, 
 And faith unfaithful kept him falsely true. 
 
 His wife might have worn satins and 
 velvets at a guinea a yard after that, but 
 
''A LITTLE MORE THAN KIND:' 235 
 
 Jack never more faced his man in a roped 
 ring ; for within six weeks of this last dis- 
 graceful performance, the execution took place 
 at which she lost her baby and her life. It 
 was months — years — before the prize-fighter 
 could hold his head up again. 
 
 To use his own words : "He got it so 
 heavily he couldn't come to time ! " 
 
 The man's heart was a large one, and 
 perhaps, though ashamed of his weakness, and 
 never admitting it but in his cups, he felt 
 pain in that region more keenly than would 
 many a sufferer of weaker fibre and less 
 resolute will. That metaphor is old and 
 well-worn, but apposite nevertheless, which 
 describes the oak as rent and shattered by 
 a gale, while the sapling stoops and bends 
 to rise ao-ain unhurt. 
 
 Fighting Jack was a blackguard, no doubt; 
 but not a bad specimen of his class — frank, 
 daring, with many characteristic opinions. 
 
236 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 sufficiently primitive, and a strong deter- 
 mination to have his own wav. 
 
 This quality he demonstrated on the 
 spot. '* Yes, you must share the old man's 
 crib," he repeated, descending his wooden 
 steps, after a brief absence within the caravan ; 
 ^^ and the old man's supper, too, my pretty 
 lady. Ah ! I can't hardly bring my tongue 
 to call you daughter. Now, wdio'd have 
 thouorht it ? Blessed if I don't beo-in to 
 
 o o 
 
 judge as it isn't all happy-go-lucky, heads- 
 and-tails, just as the numbers come up ! 
 Well, nothing was too good for your mother, 
 my dear, and there's nothing here in the 
 camp, nor out of it neither, that shall be 
 too good for you ! " 
 
 He would take no denial. It seemed to 
 him only natural that he should be obeyed. 
 With a certain courtly hospitality, that be- 
 longed to his gipsy descent rather than his 
 pugilistic education, he ushered Jane Lee 
 
"A LITTLE MORE THAN KIND:' 237 
 
 into his dwelling, giving her a hearty but 
 respectful welcome, and bidding her, so long 
 as it suited her convenience, to consider this 
 wooden house her home. The sun had already 
 set, the protracted twilight of an English 
 summer's day was glimmering into darkness. 
 How was she to get back to London, even if 
 she knew the way, and where else could 
 she find shelter; supposing, and this seemed 
 most unlikely, that the gipsies would permit 
 her to leave their camp ? She must make a 
 virtue of necessity and remain here all night. 
 It seemed no such hardship. On the con- 
 trary, perhaps from hereditary instinct, per- 
 haps from feminine curiosity, the girl felt 
 interested in her surroundings, and anxious 
 to become more familiar with a wanderiner 
 life that seemed the very ideal of that freedom 
 for which she had often longed. Jericho, too, 
 was a new experience. How could he be so 
 ragged, so dirty, yet look so like a gentleman ? 
 
238 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 Why did lie move so gracefully, yet speak sucli 
 vulgar English ? And what was this secret 
 influence that in the twinkling of an eye had 
 elicited a romantic and mysterious character 
 from a mere low-lived tramp asking for beer ? 
 Fighting Jack, naturally enough, puzzled 
 and impressed her exceedingly. Altogether, 
 Jane Lee found so much to think of, that 
 when Jericho brought her supper to the top 
 of the wooden steps she couldn't eat a morsel. 
 The repast was no less anomalous than the 
 mode in which it was served. He handed her 
 a silver drinking-cup and a wooden platter. 
 On the one smoked a savoury stew, in the 
 other bubbled Devonshire cider, cooled in a 
 spring and sparkling like champagne. A 
 clasp-knife and spoon of horn were flanked 
 by a silver fork without crest or cipher, a 
 table-napkin of fine linen lay neatly folded 
 for her use, and the salt-cellar consisted of 
 a hideous saucer, cracked to the rim and 
 
''A LITTLE MORE THAN KINDJ' 239 
 
 clumsily mended, but which any fancier of 
 old china would gladly have purchased at 
 its weight in gold. 
 
 ~ Looking round, the furniture of the little 
 hut seemed equally incongruous. There were 
 silken hangings inside the door, and a velvet 
 curtain at the narrow window. There was 
 even a diminutive dressing-glass, and an 
 attempt at a toilet-table, supplied with a tin 
 basin, a paper of pins, and a tortoise-shell 
 comb. " No brushes," thought Jane, with 
 comical dismay, "and no soap!" In a 
 recess stood the bed, a wooden contrivance 
 much too frail to carry Fighting Jack, and 
 that seemed, moreover, not in the best repair. 
 It boasted, however, linen sheets, perfectly 
 clean and dry, a pillow with a lace edging, 
 re-sewn at the corner where it had once 
 been marked, and a patch-work quilt of the 
 brightest colours, rather dirty, but soft, warm, 
 and comfortable enough. 
 
240 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 Presently a knock at his own door an- 
 nounced a visit from the proprietor, and 
 Fighting Jack, still smoking, looked in with 
 a radiant smile. 
 
 " Make yourself at home, my pretty," said 
 he, hiding his pipe in the palm of his hand. 
 " Where ivoidd you be at home, I should like 
 to know, if it warn't here ? Liberty Hall, this 
 is, for you leastways. Feed, fill, and call for 
 more. Why, you haven't eaten scarcely a 
 scrap, nor drank scarcely a drop ! My service 
 to you, my dear, and a hearty welcome ! " 
 
 He put the silver mug to his lips — 
 obviously from politeness — for he set it down 
 again little emptier than before, while the 
 girl thanked him for his care, and assured 
 him that her supper was all she could desire. 
 
 He listened, with a sad wistful look on his 
 stern old face, and pondered silently, without 
 moving an eyelash, for some seconds after she 
 had done speaking. 
 
''A LITTLE MORE THAN KIND." 241 
 
 " It's her voice," he said, with a little catch 
 of his breath ; " it's her very words, and the 
 pretty trick she had with her hand. Let me 
 call you daughter, my dear, and kiss you on 
 the forehead this once, for I never thought to 
 see the like of my Shuri above-ground again ! " 
 
 She bent her cool white brow to meet his 
 lips, and the old prize-fighter kissed it reve- 
 rently, religiously, as devotees kiss the relics 
 of a saint. 
 
 He was back half a lifetime, in the prime 
 of his strength and manhood, happy in the one 
 ennobling influence that had raised him to a 
 thinkino^ beins: from a mere courao-eous beast. 
 For one moment it flashed across him that he 
 might have made a better use of his chances ; 
 that if he had taken up some respectable trade, 
 and worked at it steadily, he should now be 
 able to off'er this noble creature a worthier 
 home ; the next, his knowledge of human 
 nature, acquired in all classes of society, as 
 
 VOL. I. E 
 
242 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 seen at their worst, suggested that she might 
 have been more estranged from the humble 
 mechanic than the daring adventurous gipsy; 
 and he smiled grimly to reflect that, with all 
 its evil, no woman could listen unmoved to 
 the recital of such a life as his ! 
 
 " I won't intrude on you no longer, my 
 dear," said he, after a pause, in which he 
 stared at her with steady unconcealed ad- 
 miration. "Oh, I haven't forgotten my man- 
 ners, nor her as larnt me ! You get ready for 
 bed, my dear. I'll send in Nance — a handy 
 lass she is, and a Lovel, but she couldn't hold 
 a candle to you. Ah ! show me one of them 
 that can — -Kaulo-Camlos, Petulengros, Hearnes, 
 Marshalls, and Stanleys — one down, t'other 
 come on. She shall make you a cup of tea — my 
 Shuri always relished her tea — and you lie 
 down, my dear, it'll do you good. If you 
 feel strange or lonesome, sing out, and I'll 
 answer as true as a clock. I won't be far off. 
 
"^ LITTLE MORE THAN KIND:' 243 
 
 I've laid my blanket and plenty more 'baccy 
 under the steps. And — and — look ye here, 
 my lass, if you've got such a thing as a bit of 
 a prayer in your mind, give it mouth. I can't 
 think of one myself. I haven't offered to say 
 mine for nigh upon twenty years ! " 
 
 B 2 
 
CHAPTER XVII. 
 
 ONE OF THE FAMILY 
 
 I HAVE an old frieDiI who professes strong- 
 objections to staying with some relatives, on 
 the ground that they treat him '"'like one 
 of the family." In his case, he protests this 
 imceremonious welcome means second-class 
 fare and second-growth claret. In my own 
 experience I have sometimes observed the 
 same advantage taken of too close an intimacy. 
 The fatted calf is killed for a strancrer, but 
 husks are considered o-ood enouq;h for the 
 iamiliar friend. As re^-arded her entertain- 
 ment, Jane Lee found nothing to complain 
 of ; but on awakimj, after a sound nio-ht's 
 rest, she discovered that she was in so far 
 
ONE OF THE FAMILY. 245 
 
 considered ^' one of the family," as to be no 
 longer a free agent, and Fighting Jack's hospi- 
 tality in his own camp was of that arbitrary 
 and inconvenient nature which firmly refuses 
 to speed the parting guest. 
 
 For a few bewildered seconds she could 
 not remember where she was, nor how she 
 got here, but when she recalled her scattered 
 ideas, and rose to dress, she was first in- 
 dignant, then frightened, to observe that her 
 own garments had been taken away. In 
 their place was laid out a picturesque costume, 
 of the same style as that in which Nance 
 attended on her the nig^ht before, thouo-h 
 of brighter colour and more costly material. 
 Presently that tawny handmaid, who seemed 
 to have been on the watch, appeared with 
 cold water in a pitcher and hot tea in a 
 mug. Perhaps acting under orders, the girl 
 answered questions in such a gibberish of 
 real Eomany, mixed with thieves' patter and 
 
246 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 tinkers' English, that the visitor could not 
 understand a syllable, and finding it impos- 
 sible to regain her lost apparel, was obliged 
 to make the best of the garments provided 
 instead. 
 
 With the aid of Nance, whose nimble 
 fingers could accomplish most tasks of dex- 
 terity, from pea-and-thimble to picking of 
 pockets, she was soon in her new dress, and 
 could not dissemble her satisfaction at its 
 efiect, even as seen in a cracked mirror, six 
 inches by three. She felt she was embarked 
 on an adventure such as had often been 
 talked of amongst her school-companions at 
 Bays water, and it seemed none the less to 
 her taste, that it bore some afiinity to the 
 mystifications of a masquerade. But she 
 had scarcely time to admire herself, before a 
 sudden jolt of the whole tenement took her 
 off her feet, and she became aware, "with 
 much the same feelings as those of its 
 
ONE OF THE FAMILY. 247 
 
 occupant, when the horse is put to a bathing- 
 machine, that her caravan was in motion, 
 and the troop of wanderers in all prol)ability 
 on the march. 
 
 When she looked out, it was over the 
 back of a tall white horse, plodding between 
 leafy hedges, fresh and fragrant in the dews 
 of a summer's morning. 
 
 Jericho, smoking his early pipe, walked 
 by the shaft, and bade her " Good-morrow " 
 with as little emotion as if they travelled 
 together every day of their lives. 
 
 " Where are we going ? " she asked, " and 
 where is the master ? " 
 
 ''We doesn't call Jack Lee 'Master,'" 
 answered the gipsy, " we calls him ' Patron,' 
 and so must you. As to where he is, why, 
 where he is always at this time o' the morn- 
 ing, hack', and we're a-goin', as we goes 
 always at this time o' the mornino- 
 forward J' 
 
248 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 " Stop the horse then," she said, '' I want 
 to get down and walk." 
 
 " I dursn't," he returned, hooking over 
 his shoukler. " The Patron said as you 
 mustn't." 
 
 Was she a prisoner ? Had this queer 
 old man, who professed to be her father, 
 really a design to carry her off, and in these 
 days too ? It seemed impossible. Yet that 
 iron face of his looked capable of anything. 
 She felt a good deal frightened, but not 
 without some relish for the excitement of 
 such a situation. 
 
 " Jericho," she whispered, in that soft tone 
 she had already discovered none of the other 
 sex could hear unmoved, "we didn't know 
 each other yesterday, but to-day you are my 
 oldest friend here, and bound to be on my 
 side. Tell me, what have t\i(^j done with 
 my things ? Can you get them back ? " 
 
 " Hush ! " he answered. " Stow that, and 
 
ONE OF THE FAMILY. 249 
 
 speak fair. You don't know the Patron. 
 Give in to him, and he'll stand by you 
 through thick and thin. But I wouldn't 
 try to cross him — not if I was you. Ah ! 
 you ain't a-seen him yet with his frill out. 
 You'd never forget it if you had." 
 
 " Why, Jericho ? Is he so terrible ? " 
 '* Terrible ! I believe you. Now just 
 look here : it was but last week, a Gorgio 
 down in the swineherd's country wanted to 
 sell him a gry (that's Eomany, sister), well, a 
 horse, then — such a vicious devil you couldn't 
 get a bridle on it. The dealer swore black, 
 and all black, it was as quiet as a lamb ; 
 but when we went to examine the beast, it 
 charged at us, open-mouthed, like a dog. 
 Well, sister, the Patron drew himself together, 
 and let out. Ah ! there's no living thing 
 can stand up to one of Fighting Jack's left- 
 handers, and the crittur went down like a 
 log. ' You've killed my horse,' says the 
 
250 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 Gorgio, ^ and I'll give you in charge/ says 
 lie, putting his hand out to take and collar 
 him. ' Drop that, brother,' says the Patron ; 
 ' I can stun a horse, easy enough,' says he, 
 ' I might kill a man ! ' and the dealer, though 
 he was a tall black-whiskered chap, twice the 
 weight of any gipsy, was glad to stand a 
 drink and say no more about it. I've told 
 you afore, sister, and I make bold to tell 
 you again — don't go for to cross the Patron. 
 It's as much as your life's worth. Steady ! 
 Here he comes." 
 
 Fighting Jack, smoking as usual, now 
 made his appearance, and accosted his visitor 
 with a deference she hardly expected, yet 
 could not but mistrust, as inferring a con- 
 sciousness of mastery and perfect control 
 over her movements. To inquiries concern- 
 ing their destination, he would only answer 
 vaguely that they were travelling West. 
 When she demanded Avhat had become of 
 
ONE OF THE FAMILY. , 251 
 
 her clothes and belonmncrs, he assured her 
 they were in safe keeping and would be 
 restored at a proper time. For the present, 
 he said, she must be content to remain in 
 the caravan, wearing the costume of her tribe. 
 She must make some allowance for a father's 
 fancies. How could he bear to part with 
 her again on the very day after he had re- 
 covered his long-lost child ? She would find 
 a gipsy's no unpleasant life. They had neither 
 flocks nor herds, house nor land ; but they 
 owned all out-of-doors ; they possessed what- 
 ever they desired that belonged to their 
 neighbours ; and they never need want for 
 ready money so long as every passing year 
 produced its annual crop of fools. A young 
 woman might do worse than take her share 
 of so noble an inheritance, casting in her 
 lot with the Eomanies and old Jack Lee I 
 
 "Do you mean to keep me here a 
 prisoner ? " she asked, with as much dignity 
 
252 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 as the jolting caravan permitted, for the 
 road was rough, and the white horse j^loclded 
 on regardless of its ruts. '^ Do you think I 
 am such a child I don't know the laws of 
 the country ? Do you think I have no 
 friends to miss me, and track me out, and 
 hand over you and your peoj)le to be dealt 
 with by the nearest magistrate. Come, Mr. 
 Lee, a joke is a joke, and I've humoured 
 you thus far ; but I could have you trans- 
 ported for keeping me here against my 
 will ! " 
 
 He looked at her with sincere admiration. 
 " You're a true Lee," said he affectionately, 
 '* down to the heels of your boots ; and I'm 
 proud of you ! But when you bounce about 
 lagging of your old father, my dear, you 
 make him feel more like a laugh than a 
 cry. Say you're joking now. You wouldn't 
 do it if you could. Not you ! " 
 
 *' This is a very impracticable old gentle- 
 
ONE OF THE FAMILY. 253 
 
 man," thought Jane, whose coolness seldom 
 deserted her, *' and threats seem only to 
 amuse him ; but as for my staying amongst 
 these people, with their tawdry finery, their 
 tattered blankets, their fleas and their dirt, 
 I must make him understand it's preposterous, 
 and that without delay ! " 
 
 " Patron," she said, " because I'm a 
 girl " 
 
 " Won't you call me * Father,' " he in- 
 terrupted, ''just for this one'st ? " 
 
 " We'll see about that when we are better 
 acquainted. In the meantime, because I'm 
 a girl perhaps you think me a fool, easily 
 frightened, easily deceived ; and you believe 
 you can keep me here, like a bird in a cage, 
 till it suits your pleasure to let me out ? " 
 
 " I could if I would, easy enough, pretty. 
 But that's not my way with them as I love. 
 Now, steady, my lass ; let's talk sense a bit. 
 Business is business." 
 
.:254 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 He refilled liis pipe, and clenched it unlit 
 between his teeth, as was his custom, when 
 bringing his mind to bear on some knotty 
 point. No two men could be more unlike, but 
 watching; the kind thouo-htfulness of his ex- 
 pression, he reminded her of Jack Lopez, and 
 the girl's eyes filled wdth tears. 
 
 "Business is business, my dear," he re- 
 peated, '^ and that's but another word for 
 money, set it up which end you will. Us 
 Komanies is forced to do without, the best we 
 can. But when all is said, a pound's worth of 
 silver means meat, drink, and baccy, a bit of 
 fire to cook with, and a blanket to sleep in ; 
 that's about the size of it, and wot's that but 
 man's life ? Now, look ye here, pretty; you 
 came to us in silks and satins, chains and laces, 
 like any lady of the land, and in your little 
 pocketbook, or what-not, I counted two five- 
 pound Bank of England notes, four golden 
 sovereigns, half-a-crown, and a threepenny 
 
ONE OF THE FAMILY. 1255 
 
 l)it. Oil, don't you make no mistake ! I've 
 got it here safe, and I wouldn't wrong yon, 
 not of a brass farden ! That's fair and square 
 enouofh." 
 
 o 
 
 " It is if you hand it back." 
 
 '^ Don't you be afraid. It's a sight safer in 
 my pocket than yours. Now look ye here ; a 
 man doesn't live to be over the half-hundred, 
 in the ring or out of the ring, but he larns to 
 put two and two together. I counts your 
 money careful, and I says to myself : ' Jack,' 
 says I, ' a young girl, not if she was a banker's 
 daughter, doesn't carry fourteen quid two-and- 
 nine about her for pocket-money. This here 
 young woman,' says I, ' have left her home for 
 reasons,' says I, ' and brought all her plunder 
 alono;/ I ain't so fond of wao;erino; as I used 
 to be, but I'd wager a gallon now as I ain't 
 very far out ! " 
 
 He waited for an answer, and she frankly 
 admitted that fourteen pounds two shillings 
 
256 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 and ninepence represented the whole of her 
 worldly wealth. 
 
 " I knowed it ! " said Fie^htins: Jack, tri- 
 umphantly ; " and that's one reason as I was 
 so pleased to think you'd found your own 
 peoj^le and come home at last. You've been 
 brought up a lady, a real lady ; oh, I can see 
 it with half an eye ! Some day, pretty, you'll 
 tell the old man how, and where, and why. 
 But what's a lady with no more than fourteen 
 quid to keep her ? Why, I've made as much 
 in a morning buying and selling of a lame 
 horse ! No, you're better with me, under 
 your father's roof, as is natural — though it's 
 more liker a carriage nor a house, and none 
 the worse for that ; far better here than loose 
 and lone on the wide world, with empty 
 pockets and such a handsome face as yourn ! " 
 
 Then he lit his pipe, and proceeded to 
 smoke in thorough enjoyment, as having ex- 
 hausted the argument, and settled the whole 
 matter to their mutual satisfaction. 
 
CHAPTEE XVIII. 
 
 MAEKET VALUE. 
 
 Eeviewing the situation, with a cahii courage, 
 probably inherited from that formidable cham- 
 pion Fighting Jack himself, Jane Lee decided 
 that, for the present, she must let things take 
 their course, and make the best of her cap- 
 tivity with the Egyptians, till it should please 
 the Patron, in his wisdom, to set her free. 
 For a few days the change of scene and habits 
 was exciting enough. In her gipsy costume, 
 laughing with Jericho, helping Nance to cook, 
 or listening to the old boxer's tales of ad- 
 venture, she seemed to forget her own iden- 
 tity, and could sometimes almost fancy herself 
 as true a Romany in character as she had 
 
 VOL. I. s 
 
258 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 now learned she was by birth. The other 
 gipsies treated her with a deference exceed- 
 ingly gratifying to her vanity, while the 
 Patron's care kept out of her sight and 
 hearing such details of their wandering pre- 
 datory life as could- shock her sensibilities, 
 or offend her finer taste. She was, so to 
 speak, a princess in the tribe, and received 
 the homage due to a member of the royal 
 family from all. 
 
 But after a few days the situation became 
 irksome in the extreme. By the time she 
 had mastered the names of some score of 
 vagabonds, male and female, who formed the 
 gang, she discovered that, with all the beauty 
 of face and form neither dirt nor tatters 
 could conceal, with all their inherent pride 
 of birth, and professed superiority to the 
 rest of mankind who lived in houses, the 
 men were without valour, the women without 
 discretion, while honesty seemed an unknown 
 
MARKET VALUE. 259 
 
 quality, and the honour proverbial even 
 among thieves was stretched, on occasion, to 
 a most treacherous elasticity. She grew very 
 tired of the life and the company, only 
 waiting, with the resolute persistency of her 
 character, for an opportunity to wrench herself 
 free from both. To escape had seemed at 
 first an easy matter, but day by day she 
 became more convinced that a captivity is 
 none the lighter because imposed by affec- 
 tion, and prison locks are none the less secure 
 because the gaoler turns his key with a 
 paternal smile. 
 
 There were two lawless natures in the 
 troop, who sunned themselves with unfeigned 
 enjoyment in her presence, to whom her 
 departure would seem as a withdrawal of 
 the very air they breathed. 
 
 One of these was Jericho. The young* 
 gipsy had been much struck by the courageous 
 
 demeanour that so resisted his attempt at 
 
 s 2 
 
260 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 robbery, in the solitude of Kichmond Park. 
 And a subsequent acquaintance with the 
 heroine of that adventure served but to 
 deepen an impression so favourably begun. 
 Jane Lee, with her proud carriage, soft voice, 
 and refined Ijearing, was a being of superior 
 order, when compared to the Joans, Nancies, 
 and Mado'es, who had hitherto constituted 
 his experience of womankind. She moved 
 among them like a queen, and while they 
 hated her cordially in consequence, not a 
 man in the tribe but felt honoured bv her 
 notice, and seemed to stand an inch taller 
 on his bare feet, for a look and a smile from 
 the Patron's haughty visitor, who, wise in 
 her generation, took care to be sparing of 
 both. Jericho, conscious that she noticed 
 him more than the others, felt proud of a 
 distinction that encourao;ed certain vaoaie 
 hopes he had begun to cherish. He was one 
 of the Lees, he argued, like herself. Their 
 
MARKET VALUE. 261 
 
 families had intermarried for generations, 
 holding themselves, indeed, as the congenital 
 branches of the oldest family amongst a people 
 to whom Kohans and Montmorencies are but 
 mushrooms of yesterday. Why should he 
 not aspire to make this paragon his wife ? 
 Had he not been the lucky one of the whole 
 tribe to light on their lost princess ? Were 
 they not marked with similar initials on the 
 arm ? There seemed a fate in it ! The same 
 stars that watched over royal dynasties no 
 doubt protected a gipsy's destiny ; and when 
 Fighting Jack had quite done with life and 
 leadership, who could show a better right to 
 stand in his shoes than his kinsman Jericho, 
 married to his daughter Jane ? 
 
 Meantime, the first step was to obtain the 
 Patron's consent. And he fairly trembled to 
 think of the outbreak so ambitious a suit was 
 likely to provoke ; for what was his own sense 
 of admiration, and even attachment, compared 
 
262 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 to the old man's infatuation for this glorious 
 creature, who had come at last to brirfiten 
 the end of his life, like a fine sunset at the 
 close of a foul day ? 
 
 Fio^htino' Jack seemed never tired of 
 watching^ his lono'-lost child, content to 
 sit and stare at her, pipe in mouth, by- 
 the hour together, silent, and perfectly 
 happy only to know she was in sight. A 
 man of few words at all times, and prone, 
 I fear, to strike sooner than speak, and swear 
 sooner than pray, he watched her every look 
 and gesture, with something of a dog's mute 
 vigilant fidelity, that anticipates the very 
 wishes of its owner. 
 
 If Jane Lee had asked for anything 
 unattainable without its commission, there 
 is no crime at which the Patron would have 
 hesitated, to gratify her desire. Yet now, 
 perhaps for the first time, he began to regret 
 his antecedents were not of a diftcrent nature, 
 
MARKET VALUE. 263 
 
 and that lie could meet his daughter's eye 
 with a clear conscience, as having been an 
 honest, as well as a brave man, all his life 
 long. 
 
 Youth is too much given to look forward, 
 yet, strangely enough, it never seems to 
 anticipate the time when rest and retro- 
 spection constitute the pleasure of existence ; 
 when it is delightful to stretch the weary 
 limbs in an arm-chair over a sea-coal fire, or 
 under a sunny wall, while the failing mind 
 floats on an ebbing tide of memories and 
 reflections, far back into stirring scenes that 
 shift, and waver, and vanish like the shadows 
 in a dream. There is a complacent smile on 
 the old man's face while, marshalling his 
 phantom troops, he passes in orderly review 
 the dangers, contests, and triumphs of his 
 prime. How petty now seem jealousies and 
 heart-burnings that formerly embittered the 
 very bread he ate. How gladly would he 
 
264 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 offer the well- remembered rival a hand that 
 once itched to take him by the throat. Was 
 it worth while to watch and wait, to strain 
 and strive for the wisp of laurels that came 
 at last to his share? And how could he ever 
 have been such a fool as to pine and sicken 
 for those his stature was too low to reach ? 
 When halfway down the hill, even long 
 before entering the dark valley that leads 
 to the foreign land, how happy must he be 
 who can look back on a journey in which 
 trips, and stumbles, and errors have been 
 atoned for by an earnest desire to keep the 
 straight path, a steadfast resolve, in spite 
 of sinking strength and miry ways, to carry 
 his burden faithful to the end ! Jack Lee 
 felt, rather than knew, now, when it was too 
 late, that his course had been without a com- 
 pass, his efforts fruitless, his success a fallacy, 
 and his life a mistake. All the more did it 
 seem incumbent on him to provide a safe 
 
MARKET VALUE. 265 
 
 refiio'e for this lono^-lost daue^liter so unex- 
 pectedlj restored. It needed far less know- 
 ledge of the world than he had acquired to 
 warn the old prize-fighter that a handsome 
 young lady, with wild blood in her veins, 
 could have no more dangerous enemies than 
 a wilful disposition and an empty purse. 
 
 *' If you was to make your lucky some 
 fine morning, my dear," said he, with an 
 air of profound wisdom, *^ and mind ye, our 
 people has eyes as can see through a mile- 
 stone, pretty nigh, and ears to hear a watch 
 tick a'most after it's run down. But no 
 matter for that, if you was to up-stick and 
 away, back among the Gorgios, as is nateral, 
 why, where be you to find a home ? that's 
 wot beats me. I asks you where's ? No, no, 
 my pretty. It's a tale as has been told too 
 often, but it's always the same finish. A 
 handsome hearty lass, as thinks she knows 
 best ; a bare cupboard ; a hard try to get 
 
266 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 work, and to do it after it's got. Ah ! I've 
 knowed plenty as yarns their bread by both, 
 and I tell ye, the needle takes more out of 
 'em than the spade ; then hunger, and strong 
 black tea, and perhaps, a mouthful of gin. 
 I've been downhearted myself, and I'm not 
 going to deny but what liquor warms the 
 blood and keeps the mind easy, right, or 
 wTong", till it's died out. So the g;al gets a 
 sweetheart, maybe a swell, maybe a counter- 
 jumper. ' And now,' says she, ' I've all / 
 wants.' Only women has queer fancies, and 
 she can't be off wondering, at odd times, 
 whatever she should do if he was to take 
 and leave her ! It makes her think of them 
 lio'hts flashino; in the river, and the Ions; level 
 bridges, quiet and empty, with the clocks 
 a-strikin' to tell her it's time to be out of 
 this, and go somewheres else. It turns her 
 sick, poor thing, and she takes a 'three of 
 gin' this turn, and doses of it down 'cause 
 
MARKET VALUE. 267 
 
 it does lier good. Wot's the use, it all comes 
 about at last just as slie thought it wouldn't. 
 A long wait, a short letter, plain-spoken and 
 unkinder than none ; a empty pocket, and, 
 what's worse, a empty heart. Not a morsel 
 of bread, only a bottle of spirits with the cork 
 out, and we needn't ask who stands treat. 
 Then the whistling shop, good clothes turned 
 into drink, and a thirst as woitt be squenched, 
 contrivino; how to o;et more. So it comes to 
 the saloons, and the streets, and maybe, the 
 river after all ! " 
 
 His voice was thick and hoarse, a tear 
 hung in his shaggy eyelashes, and he lifted 
 her hand reverently to his lips. The girl, 
 touched by the affection of his tone, felt 
 impelled to give him her entire confidence, 
 and imparted a piece of information she knew 
 the next moment she oucrht to have withheld. 
 It was a false move, but once made, could not 
 be taken back. 
 
268 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 ^' You need have no fear for me, 
 Patron," she said. ^^ I'm not ffoino^ to starve, 
 and I'm not going to take in needlework, and 
 I'm not going to drink gin. I shall have five 
 hundred pounds of my own in a few weeks. 
 That's enough to keep a young woman out of 
 mischief, I hoj)e ! " 
 
 '* Five hundred pounds ! " The Patron 
 literally gasped. She was precious enough 
 before, but the refined gold seemed gilt now, 
 and the lily painted to some purpose. '' Five 
 hundred pounds ! " he repeated. " That a 
 dauo'hter of mine should have five hundred 
 pounds ! Why, it's a purse for a queen ! 
 I won't ask you how you come by it, my dear, 
 but however do you mean to spend it all ? 
 Pigs, poultry, sheep, cattle, horses, you might 
 set up at once, and do such a business as 
 would drive every other gipsy out of the 
 trade. I could turn the money over in six 
 weeks with New Forest ponies alone ! " 
 
MARKET VALUE. 269 
 
 She lauoflied at his eag-erness. " I have a 
 
 better plan than that/' she said. '' I must 
 
 get it first though, and I ought to go to 
 
 Tjondon ; but we're travelling the other way, 
 
 surely." 
 
 He lit a fresh pipe. This inheritance, no 
 doubt, made his daughter an exceedingly valu- 
 able prize, but he could quite understand that 
 she might slip through his fingers during the 
 formalities necessary for its acquisition ; while, 
 on the other hand, if he kept the goose in too 
 close captivity, the golden eggs might not be 
 forthcomino' at all. The result of his reflec- 
 tions was that he ouo-ht to hold on for the 
 present to the auriferous bird, and he resolved 
 to take Jericho into his counsels, giving that 
 willing auxiliary strict injunctions to counter- 
 act all attempts of the prisoner to escape. 
 
 He might have been more puzzled had he 
 known that Jane Lee's intention was to return 
 the whole sum to ]\Iervyn Strange, at some 
 
270 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 future time, when she had obtained by its aid 
 a firm footing in society ; and though she 
 sometimes speculated as to whether she was 
 not bound in honour to fulfil her engagement, 
 should it be impossible to liquidate her debt, I 
 fear she came to the conclusion that rather 
 than substitute the former payment for the 
 latter, she would repudiate both ! 
 
 After such a confession, the gipsy's guest 
 found herself free to leave the caravan at such 
 intervals as she chose, and, ignorant that she 
 was only the more closely watched, rejoiced in 
 this comparative release. The Patron seemed 
 anxious to please and humour her, judgiug 
 discreetly enough that, even from the strictest 
 custody, a girl worth five hundred pounds 
 might find fifty ways of flight, at ten pounds 
 a bribe. He knew his people well, and 
 thoroughly appreciated their devotion to their 
 chief — ^a romantic and honourable fidelity, 
 incorruptible by silver, but hardly proof 
 
MARKET VALUE. 271 
 
 against gold. It was imperative, he tliouglit, 
 to make lier captivity agreeable, and tlius 
 neutralise her natural inclination to escape. 
 
 She was allowed, therefore — alv\^ays in gipsy 
 costume, for the Patron himself kept her original 
 silks and satins under lock and key — to go 
 abroad with the others, on such expeditions as 
 entailed no danger of collision with the rural 
 police, and always under the care of Jericho, 
 who assumed her guardianship the more readily 
 that the Patron had thought well to drop 
 certain hints regarding the market value of 
 his charge. 
 
 " She mustn't slip through our fingers, 
 lad," said the old man — '^ neither yours nor yet 
 mine. She's as handsome as paint ; you can 
 see as much without a candle. But you mind 
 what I tell ye, she's better nor that — she's as 
 good as gold ! " 
 
CHAPTEE XIX. 
 
 TRICKS OF THE THADE. 
 
 Jane Lee, with lier natural vivacity of 
 character, thoroughly enjoyed emanci^Da- 
 tion from the jolting caravan, in which 
 she had spent nearly a week without change. 
 She had grown tired of the Patron, Nance 
 was no longer an object of curiosity, nor 
 Jericho, though he thought differently, of 
 interest. The other gipsies she had ''reckoned 
 up," as she called it, in the first eight-and- 
 forty hours ; and without some fresh excite- 
 ment, some active occupation, she felt as if she 
 must die from sheer depression of spirits, and 
 diso:ust with her uneventful life. Inheritino- 
 the roving tendencies of her race, she longed 
 
TRICKS OF THE TRADE. 273 
 
 for change of scene and surroundings, from 
 the same instinct that prompted them to 
 strike their tents, and shift their encamp- 
 ment, week bv week. It was with no slio;ht 
 sense of hope and excitement that she learnt 
 from Jericho the Patron's intention to attend 
 Swansdown Eaces with his whole gang, squat- 
 ting on the edge of the moor, in a wild 
 corner, called '' Nobody's Nook," where three 
 counties met, and whence he could detach, 
 and recall his foraging parties so conve- 
 niently as to keep them, in a measure, '^ on 
 the windy side of the law." 
 
 " It's the pleasantest jaunt of the whole 
 year," said Jericho, " and the most profitable. 
 The constables dursn't interfere, because as the 
 one can't get liberty to cross over the other's 
 border. There's sticks for the gathering, and 
 no questions asked, rabbits half as big as 
 sheep, feeding out by scores, and not a keeper 
 nearer than five mile. Two days' racing, and 
 
 VOL. I. T 
 
274 BLACK BUT CO^LELY. 
 
 twice as many fools as you'd nnd at Kings- 
 bury or Hampton. Nance took three quid 
 dukkering alone, last time, Ijesides a note 
 as she Ijorrowed unbeknownst from a farmer's 
 breeches-pocket. It was a country note, and 
 we dursn t eo for to chano;e it — but that's 
 neither here nor there." 
 
 '' ' Dukkering ? ' " asked Jane Lee. '' What 
 do you mean by dukkering ? " 
 
 '^Summat as you W'ould do better than 
 most, sister. The Gorgios calls it ' telling of 
 fortunes.' You goes smiling up to a gentle- 
 man on horseback — them's mostly the softest 
 with such as you — and you looks so sweet, 
 and speaks so kind, half turning your bead 
 away, and laying of your hand on his horse's 
 neck, that he outs with a quid, just for the 
 pleasure of putting his fist in yours, while 
 you gammons him about his bold looks and 
 his handsome face, and the dark woman not 
 a hundred miles off, nor yet ten, as is break- 
 
TRICKS OF TEE TRADE. 275 
 
 ing her heart for him, because as she comes 
 of a different race, and it's as much as her 
 life's worth for them to be seen together, when 
 she's forbidden to think of him, even in her 
 dreams. And so it is ! " added Jericho, 
 kindhng suddenly into a blaze of passion, 
 as unexpected as it seemed uncalled for. " I 
 can't a-bear it, sister, and I won't ! If I was 
 to catch you carrying on like that with the 
 best Gorgio as ever sat in a saddle, I wouldn't 
 care, not if I was to swing for it next 'sizes, 
 but I'd knife him as sure as I stand here — 
 don't you make any mistake — and maybe you 
 too ! " 
 
 She turned on him a calm look of asto- 
 nishment, even ridicule, that made him feel 
 exceedingly uncomfortable and thoroughly 
 ashamed. They were walking alone, some- 
 what in advance of the troop, having deter- 
 mined to spare the old white horse by ascend- 
 ing on foot a steep interminable hill, that 
 
 T 2 
 
276 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 offered fresh views of rich and varied beauty 
 at every turn. Below lay wide extending 
 plains of field and forest, meadow and corn- 
 land, wooded knolls, dark ravines, and sunny 
 slopes, losing themselves in a dim haze, lit 
 up by the gleams of a winding river that 
 shone out at intervals in threads of light be- 
 low the distant hills. Underfoot they brushed 
 i:he wild red heather, bursting into bloom, 
 .-and overhead a clump of fir-trees, dark and 
 majestic as cedars, stood out against the calm 
 blue sky, laced with level streaks of cloud. 
 The gipsy's whole being was stirred by the 
 scene, and he felt that now or never must 
 -he lay his heart open to his companion, and 
 set his future on the cast, or, as he expressed 
 it, "go in a perisher and take his chance." 
 
 '' I'm a fool, sister," he said, with some- 
 thinsf like a blush on his brown face. "But 
 it seems to me, as you makes fools of us all ! 
 I hadn't no call to let out like that, and I 
 
TBIGKS OF THE TRADE. 277 
 
 asks your pardon free. I'm the last as would 
 want to catch you tripping, the very last, 
 a-cause I know^s too w^ell what would come 
 of it. Ah, we keeps it out of our minds with 
 drink and what not, but it's a fearful matter 
 is death ? " 
 
 " What do you mean ? '' she asked, turning 
 jDale, for there was something ominous in his 
 earnest manner, and stern, though pitiful 
 face. 
 
 "You ought to know%" he answered. 
 " But, though you're a Eomany born, you've 
 taken your teaching from the Gorgios, and 
 there's a many things wherein us is wiser nor 
 them. We holds by our own laws. Maybe 
 you thought as w^e hadn't got none. I 
 shouldn't wonder if you didn't believe as 
 you was free to go where you would, and 
 marry who you liked. Never such a thing ! " 
 
 She started. Her captivity had not yet 
 appeared in so slavish a light ; but the com- 
 
278 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 bative instinct was roused, and she answered 
 defiantly : " Who's to prevent me ? " 
 
 " Not me ! I hopes from my heart ! " he 
 answered, with a shudder; ''and yet needs 
 must, whether or no, if I got the office regular 
 from the tribe. But it wouldn't come to that; 
 never say it. You're not the sort as would 
 take up with a Gorgio." 
 
 '' Why not ? " 
 
 /' Sister, shall I tell you why ? Yes. It's 
 only fair you should know, and you won't bear 
 me ill-will. Them laws was m.ade hundreds 
 and hundreds of years before you and me was 
 born. When a Eomany lass — no matter 
 whether she's a Kawny, a chiefs daughter, 
 such as you, or a come-by-chance, like 
 Mumping Madge — thinks well to forget her 
 tribe and her nation for the sake of a stransfer, 
 there's no two ways about it — she must never 
 come back no more ! " 
 
 ''She wouldn't want to, I should think." 
 
TRICKS OF TEE TRADE. 279 
 
 "Ajj but slio mustn't bo seen to •disgrace 
 us neither. So we brings her case before our 
 own beaks, and they gives sentence according." 
 
 "And what is the punishment?" She 
 tried to speak carelessly, but her voice faltered, 
 and her heart sank in spite of herself. 
 
 '' We cast lots who is to do the job ; shak- 
 ing beans in a bag, maybe, or pulling straws 
 out of the Patron's hand. Him as gets the 
 devil's number clears out of camp and goes to 
 work at once, tracking and following of her 
 up, no matter where she's hid, till he comes 
 within arm's length at last." 
 
 '' And then ? " 
 
 He pulled his knife from its sheath, ran his 
 finger along the edge, and made as if he drew 
 it acros's his throat. The pale face, the glisten- 
 ing eyes, told their own tale. No spoken 
 denunciation could have seemed so terrible 
 as this vao'ue susfo-estion of murder in dumb 
 
 O Oo 
 
 show. 
 
280 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 She was fairly intimidated, but summoned 
 all her courage to dissemble the truth. 
 
 '' I don't suppose even death will deter a 
 woman from having her own way," she an- 
 swered lightly. " However, I no more want 
 to marry a Gorgio, as you call them, than a 
 gipsy ; so it makes little matter to me. Come, 
 we have had enouo-h of horrors ! Tell me 
 something about the races, the booths, the 
 shows — all the fun of the fair." 
 
 Then Jericho launched out, nothing loth, 
 on an enthusiastic description of the enjoy- 
 ments he anticipated from the next three 
 days. Swansdown Eaces, it appeared, con- 
 stituted., a Western Saturnalia, established, it 
 would seem, on behalf of a rustic population, a 
 trifle thirstier than Londoners, with equal 
 tendencies to vicious indulgences, but less 
 shrewdness, and a greater aptitude to be 
 gulled by palmistry, ring-dropping, the con- 
 fidence trick, and other iiagrant impositions 
 
TBICKS OF THE TRADE. 281 
 
 practised by rogues who keep sober, for the 
 cozenincT of fools \vlio Q-et drunk. 
 
 Such a gathering was the gipsies' harvest. 
 Encamped on Nobody's Nook, a bare edge of 
 moor, tolerably dry in all weathers, where fuel 
 was to be had for the stealing in certain 
 adjoining coppices, owned by an absent squire, 
 they established a basis, as it were, from which 
 they could carry on their dishonest operations 
 with as much comfort as success. No keepers, 
 indeed, meant no game, but there were hen- 
 roosts tumbling to 2:)ieces on every side, 
 curs chained to empty casks, that barked 
 furiously, but never woke their master till the 
 thieves had got clear off, and, better still, 
 handsome farmers' daughters, happy, healthy, 
 and io;norant, never o-rudo-ino^ a bit of bacon 
 and a mug of cider to the plausible gipsy, 
 buying taA^dry tinsel at the price of virgin 
 gold, and crossing their own toil-worn palms 
 with silver, to bo pocketed by svrartby 
 
282 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 fortune-tellers, for the promise of an un- 
 declared lover, a prospective husband, and an 
 eventual family, seldom kss than ten. Even 
 without the races, such a primitive neigh- 
 bourhood vv^as after the Eomany's o\Yn heart; 
 but when these indigenous advantages came to 
 be enhanced by a two-days' gathering, that 
 collected from far and near an agricultural 
 population, taking scarcely another holiday 
 in the year, it is easy to conceive how large 
 a share of the besotted workers' earnings went 
 into the pockets of the persuasive idler, and 
 how, after Swansdown Eaces, the Lees and 
 Lovels who attended were sleek and saucy, 
 and flush of ready money for at least a month. 
 '' There's business to be done too," con- 
 tinued Jericho, warming to his narrative, ''for 
 a chap as knows a horse when he sees him, 
 and sees him when nobody else don't know 
 as he is looking on. It's a good game, sister — 
 you wouldn't peach — you dursn't — so there's 
 
TRICKS OF TEE TRADE. 283 
 
 no call for telling of yoii. 'Twas but this 
 time two year, I was on tlie ground afore 
 sunrise, looking after a wire as I let drop 
 out of my liand by cliance overnight, at 
 Brimscombe Brake, by the back of the 
 course. I w^as afraid a ra.bbit mio^ht have 
 got hung up in it and hurted hisseif. 
 I'm fond o' dumb critters, and I'd a-taken 
 of him out, you may be sure. Well, I warn't 
 a-thinking of anything particular, when I 
 see two swells, as far as I could judge, for 
 it was barely light, standing right in the 
 middle of the track. ' Hold on a bit, Jerry,' 
 says I to Jericho — that's me, sister — ' and keep 
 dark — this here ain't no business of yourn,' 
 so I dropped down among the heather, soft 
 and quiet as a mouse. Presently I hears 
 - the blowing of horses half a mile off, and a 
 beat of hoofs, even and regular, the way them 
 thorough-breds gallops, when they stretches 
 out. Ah ! I've always said as 'twas cruel 
 
284 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 hard lines to lag a cove for choring a gry. 
 Horse-stealing's against the law — that's right 
 enough — but think of the temptation, sister, 
 and gipsies is but flesh and blood, after all. 
 
 "Well, nearer they comes, and past me 
 like a flash. I could just tell one from 
 t'other. Three of them there was. The first 
 and the last seemed larger than the middle 
 one, more growed-out-like, but he was the 
 beauty. Dark chestnut, with one white foot 
 in front — oh ! I took notice — and an eye in 
 his head almost as bright and soft as your'n, 
 sister, and as big again." 
 
 Jericho, losing himself for a space in 
 memories of this paragon, Jane Lee showed 
 sufficient interest in his tale to ask : " Did 
 he win ? " 
 
 " I couldn't make sure. He was gaining 
 on the first, when they passed my hiding- 
 place, and the third horse, he couldn't come 
 a-nigh, try how he would, but wot I heard 
 
TEICKS OF THE TRADE. 285 
 
 was good enough for me. Says one of the 
 swells, turning round to light his weed, and 
 chucking of the match into the back o' my 
 neck, he stood that close : ' A very satis- 
 factory trial,' says he. ' Never was extended,' 
 says he, the way them Gorgios bluffs amongst 
 theirselves. ' Why, it makes him five pounds 
 better than the old horse, at the weights, 
 and I don't sec how he can lose.' T'other 
 was a younger chap, with bright eyes and a 
 smooth face. 'Lose!' says he, 'don't talk of 
 it,' says he ; ' I've gone for the gloves this 
 time. Let's get back and have some break- 
 fast ! ' 
 
 '' I'd had mine — I never starts without — 
 but I was home before them, I'll lay a wager. 
 And the Patron, he didn't cut no time to 
 waste neither. In less than an hour he'd 
 rigged hisself out in a brand-new suit of 
 broadcloth, clean collar, starcher, and a tall 
 hat. If he'd kep his gloves on and his 
 
286 BLACK HUT COMELY. 
 
 mouth shut, blest if you'd a-known him from 
 a parson or a beak. Off by rail, too, first- 
 class, and everythink. Oh, he didn't do it 
 by halves ! That's the best plant as we've 
 ever been in, before or since. If I could 
 take such another morning walk, only once 
 in the year, I'd travel in my carriage and 
 pair, like a lord of the land." 
 
 Her interest was flagging. '' I suppose 
 you all backed the handsome chestnut," she 
 said, with a yawn, " and he won ? " 
 
 ''Better than that," he answered. "He 
 laid agin him free. First at evens, then at 
 two and three to one, till the very morning 
 of the race, and he never come to the post. 
 The blacksmith lamed him someway, d'ye 
 see, putting of his plates on so bad as he 
 couldn't turn round in his box. That black- 
 smith warn't asked to lift a hammer for the 
 stable again, and hadn't no need. He's hard 
 up, I daresay, by now ; but I seen him 
 
TRICKS OF THE TRADE. 287 
 
 myself, driving a trotting matcli for a liundred 
 sovereigns, money down, the week before last. 
 He's a kinsman of the Patron. That's how 
 it~ come about, very like. A Lee always 
 stands by a Lee." 
 
 The intricacies of his narrative were lost 
 on his listener, who was deep in her own 
 thoughts. Swansdown Races, if she could 
 profit by the opportunity, seemed to promise 
 a fair chance of escape. Turninix matters over 
 in her own mind, with characteristic rapidity, 
 she formed a plan that she thought might 
 afford liberty of action in detaching her for 
 a time from her comrades ; and, if nothing 
 better came of it, would at least furnish such 
 amusement as should take her for a few hours 
 out of herself. Jericho was obviously in a 
 communicative mood, and she determined 
 to get out of him all the information she 
 required. 
 
CHAPTER XX. 
 
 PALMISTRY. 
 
 " I OUGHT to take my share of work, no less 
 than phaj," said she. '"' What was it you told 
 me I could do, Jericho ? Dukkering, I 
 think you called it. I should like to try 
 my hand." 
 
 '' Can you read the stars, sister ? " 
 
 " Can you ? '' 
 
 '^ No ; I can't ; nor nobody else ! That's 
 the bare truth. Dukkerino-'s different. It's 
 no use humbugging of you." 
 
 " Well, it's not very difficult, I daresay. 
 How am I to beoin ? " 
 
 o 
 
 He assumed an air of importance befitting 
 
PALMISTRY. 289 
 
 so lofty a subject, and entered at once on 
 a scientific explanation. 
 
 ''Of dukkering, my sister," said he, *'tliero 
 is^ three kinds. Us Eomanies practises all, 
 but the Chorodies — mean low scum, as their 
 very name tells you, and the Kora-mengre, 
 hawkers and criers of stinking fish, and such 
 like — never tries it on but with two at most. 
 This here knowledge, as teaches us to peep 
 behind the curtain that hangs afore next week, 
 was larnt us by our fathers, who were larnt 
 by their fathers, hundreds and hundreds of 
 years back, in the beginning of time. The 
 first, and the oldest way of all, is to tell 
 a fortune by the stars, but it won't take 
 with the Gorgios now as it used. Perhaps 
 they thinks our right to the stars no better 
 than theirs ; nor you can t always get a look 
 at them neither, even on summer nights ; so 
 it's easier to fall back on the four suits, or 
 the palm of a man's hand. I could larn you 
 
 VOL. I. u 
 
290 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 the first in ten minutes, if so be as I'd got 
 a pack of cards in my pocket ; but the 
 daddies is ahvays ready, and I'll show you 
 the three lines of fate — so as you'll never 
 forget them again — in less than three 
 minutes. " 
 
 He took her slender hand in his own, and 
 turning the palm uppermost, traced with 
 his brown finger the light creases, scarcely 
 perceptible, on its delicate surface. 
 
 " This here, sister," said he, " is the Line 
 of Life. See how it travels right athwart from 
 finger to wrist, and loses itself at both ends, 
 because a man can't tell where he came from, 
 when he was born, nor where he is going 
 when he dies. That's wot beats us, Gorgios, 
 Eomanies, and all ! There's the Line of Wealth, 
 very faint it is, and uncertain, but cutting 
 deeper as folks grow older. Just like money 
 comes with years to them as lays their mind 
 to it, and saves up against the time as they 
 
PALMISTRY. 291 
 
 won't want for nothing but tlie price of half 
 a day's work with a spade. It's a line, this 
 is, as you mustn't make much account of 
 wi4:h young folks, gals in particular ; them 
 won't hear of money or money's worth, along- 
 side of love ; but the farmers, especially the 
 fat 'uns, likes to be told they've got it strong ! 
 Then here's a mark as you show plainer than 
 t'others ; this means going from place to 
 place, foreign or what not. When you've a 
 brown-faced curly-haired chap to deal with, 
 you may tell him as he's bound to make 
 a long voyage ; and if there's rings in his 
 ears, you're safe enough in warning of him 
 as his lawful wife is looking out for him this 
 minute across the sea ; but you won't go for 
 to make mischief, you may say, if there's any 
 petticoats by, for he'll be generous to the 
 poor gipsy like a free, brave, open-hearted 
 sailor, and she wouldn't bring tears into the 
 
 blue eyes or the black, according to the 
 
 u 2 
 
292 BLACK BUT COMELY, 
 
 company, as is a watching of him now with 
 a sore heart alons^ of his handsome face. He'll 
 out with a bit more silver, you may be sure, 
 for fear as the gipsy should peach, though 
 he'll laugh right out, and swear as he don't 
 believe a word, and only does it for the 
 sport ! There's another yet, sister, going 
 across from the thumb. It's called the Line 
 of Fate, this is, and you must be very careful 
 how you work it when you've to do with 
 old folks, or even the middle-aged. If it's 
 short and shallow, on a soft young hand like 
 your own, you may out with it plump, as this 
 is the sign to teach how long they has to 
 live. Soon as it runs in to meet the Line of 
 Life there's no more to be said. The candle's 
 burnt out, and the game's up. I'd pass it 
 over, if I was you, with the toughest customers, 
 and stick to the money or the sweethearts. 
 Nobody thinks themselves so old as they 
 can't do with plenty of both, and you needn't 
 
PALMISTRY. 293 
 
 believe in these no more than you like. It's 
 diflferent with the Line of Fate." 
 
 He spoke in an altered tone as though, 
 like other priests of a false superstition, he 
 had discarded all but the most impossible 
 and preposterous tenets of his creed. 
 
 '' Then you think I have a long time to 
 live ? " said she, inspecting the lines on her 
 own palm, with an interest of which she felt 
 half-ashamed. 
 
 He caught the slender hand and pressed it 
 to his lips. 
 
 " Sister," said he, looking round to make 
 sure they were not observed, " when your 
 time comes, I'll ask no better than to take my 
 chance with you for good and evil. If you 
 and me take our leap in the dark together I 
 don't care when it is nor where." 
 
 Jane Lee, I need hardly observe, at this 
 stage of my narrative, was one of those women, 
 fortunately rare as they are dangerous, who 
 
294 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 consider they have a prescriptive right to the 
 homage of all mankind. They seem to believe 
 that the other sex is created, like the lower 
 animals, for their especial service without 
 thanks or remuneration, and that, in no case, 
 are they to admit the justice of a proverb, 
 which insists on the same sauce being served 
 with the gander that is appropriate to the 
 goose 1 So long as a man could be of the 
 least use, she felt justified in availing herself 
 of his time, intellects, money, everything he 
 chose to offer. If he was such a fool that he 
 must needs fling his heart after the rest of his 
 possessions, so much the w^orse for him ! She 
 didn't want it, she didn't ask for it, but she 
 looked on it in the light of an umbrella, for 
 instance, politely offered during a shower, a 
 temporary convenience to be opened, made use 
 of, and returned with thanks. 
 
 Women of such temperament, if they care 
 
FALMISTEY, 295 
 
 to try, usually attain considerable social suc- 
 cess. They skate on thin ice indeed, but it 
 seldom gives way under their light careless 
 tread. They play with the sharpest instru- 
 ments, but avoid cutting their own fingers, 
 and warm themselves comfortably at a fire 
 that scorches more earnest natures to the 
 bone. They have just enough feeling to take 
 an interest in the game. Were they perfectly 
 callous there would be no pleasure in playing, 
 and can gauge the fever raging in the hearts of 
 their victims, by an agreeable sense of warmth 
 and vitality in their own. To give them their 
 due, they are exceedingly loath to come down 
 from the high ground whence they elect to 
 offer battle. When they do, their defeat is 
 irremediable and complete. 
 
 The Amazon of history is said to have cut 
 off her right breast that its shapely outline 
 might not hinder the drawing of her bow, but 
 
296 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 our modern Pentliesilea, whose low-cut dress 
 w^ould hardly permit the concealment of such 
 an eyesore, practises a less obvious mutilation, 
 and leavino; her bosom to sink and swell before 
 an admiring world in all its natural softness, 
 attains a deeper immunity by hardening and 
 scarifying her heart. 
 
 "Do you mean you like nie so much?" 
 asked Jane Lee, in those half-tender half- 
 mocking tones that so bewitched her listener. 
 " Why, Jericho, you always call me your 
 Sister, and you haven't known me much more 
 than a week ! " 
 
 '*' A week ! What matter for that ? Does 
 it take a week for a man's eyes to be blinded, 
 and the very heart scorched up in his body ? 
 I tell you, that time when I dropped on you in 
 Eichmond Park I felt how it was p'oino- to be 
 ■ — the first five minutes was enouo-h ! " 
 
 " But you don't think ladies — I mean, you 
 
PALMI8TBY, 297 
 
 don't suppose women are so impressionable ? 
 I wouldn't look at the best man in the king- 
 dom unless I'd known him at least a year and 
 a day." 
 
 '' That's a match ! Shake hands on it ! 
 In a year and a day I'll come and put you in 
 mind of what you said this minute. You'll 
 forget, likely enough, but I won't. It'll be 
 meat and drink, clothes and firing ; ah! the 
 very pith and marrow of life to me from now 
 till then." 
 
 "And in the meantime ? " 
 
 " In the meantime there's nothing on this 
 mortal earth as you can ask that I won't grant, 
 free. Says you : ' Jerry, I wants this or 
 that ;' no matter what — a velvet go wnd, a gold 
 ticker, jewels for your ears, or your fingers, 
 or your hair — and Jerry, he answers : * Eight 
 you are.' If 'tis a lagging matter, more nor 
 that, though Jerry should swing for it, silks 
 
298 BLACK BUT COMSLY, 
 
 or velvets, laces or diamonds, you won't need 
 to ask ao^ain ! " 
 
 " You say so now, Jerry, and think so, 
 perhaps ; but sujDposing I vv'anted you to do 
 something, and the Patron told you not, 
 how would it be then ? You like me, I 
 daresay, but you're afraid of /wm." 
 
 ^'Try me ! " 
 
 There was a world of faith and devotion 
 in the dark eyes that met her own so honestly. 
 She pitied him, and could not help shov»ing it. 
 
 *' Poor Jerry ! " said she. " I suppose I 
 ought to believe you. At least you deserve 
 a trial. Now you can do something to please 
 me, if you will." 
 
 " Speak up, sister, it's got to be done, 
 rio'ht or wrono^ ! " 
 
 " Then you must persuade the Patron to 
 let me go with you to the races. I am so 
 tired of that caravan. I have scarcely been 
 
FALMISTBY. 299 
 
 out of it for an hour till to-day. I want 
 to see a little life. I want to liear people 
 speak English again, instead of a gibberish I 
 cannot answer nor understand. Will you 
 explain to the Patron ? Do you know what 
 I mean yourself ? " 
 
 "I suppose I do, sister. You must come 
 to it gradual. Like a singing-bird as is caught 
 and shut up in a wicker-cage — he takes and 
 puts a sod of turf in at first, so as it shouldn't 
 think it's never got to be out o' doors no more. 
 You've seen the Eomanies in their camp, now 
 you'd like to know hovf we carries on when 
 we's afield — you want's to take the rough 
 with the smooth." 
 
 '' Exactly, Jerry. You understand me 
 already. Now promise you will manage for 
 you and me to start off together early the 
 first day of Swansdown Eaces, away from 
 all the others, we two by ourselves. What 
 
300 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 I want is a holiday, and not to be account- 
 able to anybody but you." 
 
 He looked thoroughly happy. Such an 
 expedition, so carried out, seemed all that 
 was most enjoyable in the world. 
 
 'Til try to persuade the Patron," said 
 he. " But he's liker to say yes for you than 
 for me. I don't know what to think, though, 
 of your going out on the dukkering lay ; 
 you're not used to it, you know." 
 
 " Oh Jerry ! that will be half the fun. 
 Besides, I don't want to shirk my share of 
 the work, and I'll bring back all I make, 
 fair, honest, and above-board, like — like — a 
 real Komany." 
 
 She smiled in his face, so handsome, 
 so mirthful, so exquisitely provoking, that 
 Jericho lost his head, and tried to pass his 
 arm round her waist. 
 
 For some secret reason, his effrontery 
 
PALMISTBY. 301 
 
 seemed to excite amusement rather than 
 indignation. 
 
 '' You are in too great a hurry by a year," 
 she said, disengaging herself with a laugh — 
 " and a day. A bargain is a bargain. Here 
 comes the caravan. Don't forget your pro- 
 mise, Jerry. Good-night ! " 
 
 The Patron's opposition to their scheme 
 was less violent than had been anticipated. 
 
 Fighting Jack felt in the position of the 
 gentleman who was presented with a white 
 elephant. He had attained the possession of 
 something very valuable, no doubt ; but its 
 care entailed trouble, responsibility, and ex- 
 pense. Though he considered the best of 
 everything not a jot too good for his daughter, 
 and grudged no outlay on her behalf, he 
 would have liked to see her more grateful 
 for the comparative luxuries with which he 
 surrounded her ; more alive to the incon- 
 
302 BLACK BUT COMELY. 
 
 veniences she caused liim in the way of 
 politeness, sobriety, and an occasional clean 
 
 shirt. 
 
 " I'm not sure I didn't do as well with- 
 out her," thought the Patron, reflecting on the 
 amount of strong drink he usually took during 
 Swansdown Eaces. '' But it would never do 
 to let her slip through my fingers now. 
 Dash it ! wot a handsome lass it is ! And 
 five hundred pounds ! It's a vast of money. 
 Them good-looking ones is mostly bad to 
 drive ; but when a gal's got ^ve hundred 
 pounds, it gives her a kind of a right to 
 have her own whims and her own way. 
 I must humour the lass. My Shuri was 
 always at her best when I humoured of her ; 
 and if the wench really wants to go playing 
 of her high jinks at these here races, why, 
 go she must. I'll see she's well looked after, 
 but Jack Lee's not the man to say her nay ! " 
 
PALMISTRY. 303 
 
 So it was settled at iiiglit-fall, after the 
 important business of encamping, that the 
 young lady should try her luck next morning, 
 in appropriate costume, as a gipsy fortune- 
 teller, under the tuition and guardianship of 
 Jericho Lee. 
 
 END OF VOL. I. 
 
 CHAELES DICKENS AND EVANS, CBYSTAL PALACE PRESS. 
 
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