L I E) RARY 
 
 OF THE 
 
 U N IVERSITY 
 
 or ILLINOIS 
 
 82-3 
 
 V. \ 
 
OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 BT 
 
 MRS. EILOART, 
 
 ALinOU OF "inE CUBATE'S DiaCIPLIIl," "JCfT A WOMAS,' 
 "PBOM THISTLES — G«APE«," nC, BTC. 
 
 IN THREE VOLUMES. 
 VOL. L 
 
 LONDON : 
 RICHARD BENTLEY AND SON, 
 
 XE^' BUELINGTON STREET. 
 1872. 
 
 [All Right* reserved.] 
 
'9 
 
 8t3 
 
 U.I 
 
 CONTENTS OF VOL. I. 
 
 CHAPTER PAOB 
 
 I. " OH, MY LORD, BEWARE OF JEALOUSY !" . 1 
 
 II. WHAT MRS. THORNTON SAW FROM HER BED- 
 
 ROOM WINDOW 22 
 
 III. MRS. THORNTON'S ANTECEDENTS . . Ss 
 IV. A MISPLACED WOMAN . . . .59 
 
 V. A WELL-BEHAVED YOUNG PERSON . . 74 
 
 VI. MRS. THORNTON'S GOOD ADVICE . .94 
 
 VII. THE HONOURABLE MRS. RUSHINGTON . 112 
 VIIL THE MEETING ON THE SANDS . . .125 
 
 IX. AUDLEY DALE ASKS COUNSEL, AND HAS IT 
 
 GIVEN 142 
 
 X. BEATRICE AND MILLICENT . . . .177 
 
 XI. CLARE HAS A LITTLE BUSINESS ON HER 
 
 OWN ACCOUNT 203 
 
 XII. HOW THE bishop's SOUL WAS VEXED . 223 
 
 XIII. THE BATTLE ON THE DENES . . . 237 
 
 XIV. WHAT BEFELL AT BEECHSIDE . . .255 
 XV. THE BISHOP FEELS HIS CARES INCREASE . 286 
 
 •4 
 
OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 CHAPTEE I. 
 
 " OH, MY LORD, BEWARE OF JEALOUSY ! '' 
 
 A CHILL evening in the middle of 
 -^-^ September, with a keen wind, that 
 seemed to speak already of the coming 
 winter, blowing from the great North Sea, 
 over the long bare sea coast, which, un- 
 broken by a single cliff, was so monotonous 
 as almost to be grand in its sameness, one 
 long level of sand stretching along for miles. 
 There were lights in the distance from the 
 town, and in the dim grey of the evening 
 the ships that were coming, or going, to all 
 parts of the world could be discerned, — 
 VOL. L 1 
 
OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 there was life behind and before — but on 
 the long low level of sand all seemed 
 hushed and still : not even a sea bird flying 
 across the bare dreary expanse. The 
 children who made hillocks or graves of 
 sand in the daytime, were long since asleep. 
 The few visitors who in the season sought 
 Wearmouth, had been driven in to their 
 lodgings an hour ago by the chill wind. 
 The faint murmur of the waves, as they 
 flowed in one after the other on the line of 
 sand, making fresh ripples in its margin, 
 and washing out those they had made the 
 day before, mingled with the little stir and 
 hum of the town ; but from the sands them- 
 selves no voice or cry arose. All was a 
 bare, still solitude, broken only by the 
 figure of a man pacing the sands with quick 
 restless steps. 
 
 He was a tall, angular figure wrapt in a 
 light overcoat. With his head inclined 
 slightly forward, and his hands folded behind 
 his back, he was, apparently, absorbed in 
 
" OH, MY LORD, BEWARE OF JEALO USYF 3 
 
 thought, and that, to judge by the knitted 
 brow, and the workings of the mouth, not of 
 the pleasantest kind. Not a handsome man 
 at all, and yet one whom it would have been 
 impossible to call plain, or pass over as in- 
 significant — a face that might have suited 
 either a martyr at the stake, or the fanatic 
 who had sent him there. A high, narrow 
 forehead, thin lips, ominously compressed ; 
 a sallow complexion, browned and tanned 
 by exposure to the weather ; sunken cheeks, 
 and a square, massive under-jaw, that would 
 have been more in keeping with a stouter 
 framework and a fuller countenance. He 
 was not above forty, but the thin, dark 
 hair was already streaked with grey, and 
 there were lines on the face not often seen 
 in the prime of life. There was brain, there 
 was mind in it ; but brain restless, and 
 troubled ; mind, narrowed, if not distorted. 
 Just now, the face was that of an intensely 
 miserable man, suffering under a grievous 
 wrong, real or imaginary ; but at no time 
 
 1—2 
 
OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 could it have been that of a happy one. 
 The elements of happiness — the easy tem- 
 per, the hopefulness, the buoyant elas- 
 ticity, that are innate to some constitutions, 
 had never entered into that of the Keverend 
 Harold Thornton. 
 
 He was not happy ; and just now he 
 thought that he had good reason for not 
 being so. There was a fiend — the very 
 ugliest, perhaps, of them all — keeping pace 
 with him on those lonely sands, and whis- 
 pering its venomous breathings in his ear. 
 He thought himself wronged, aggrieved 
 — ^where wrong would be irreparable — 
 where injury would be past forgiveness. 
 He had little enough to build upon, but the 
 fancies and dreams that a man with a morbid 
 turn of mind so easily torments himself 
 with — ghosts of his own raising — but these 
 were enough for his own misery, enough to 
 make him curse the day that he had been 
 beguiled by a woman's face, and placed his 
 honour in a woman's keej^ing. 
 
" OH, M Y LORD, BEWARE OF JEALOUSY!" 5 
 
 Up and down the sands he went. The 
 tide was now coming in, and it swept over 
 his feet. Mechanically he moved further 
 from the waters, but still continued his 
 restless pacing. If only so he could lay the 
 fiend that was tormenting him ! that kept 
 recalling looks and tones, words of defiance 
 and of anger, that a wise man would have 
 done well to have forgotten. 
 
 He had no right to think himself so in- 
 jured. Once* for all, this is no tale of sinful 
 passion to be painted with a sensuous hand, 
 dwelt upon lovingly in glowing colours, till 
 the sin so tenderly condemned is made to 
 look a fairer thing than the virtue over- 
 thrown. It is a story of a man's mistake, 
 and a woman's folly — of two miserable 
 creatures whose mutual misapprehensions 
 wrought, as is so often the case, as much 
 wretchedness, to one, at least, as any amount 
 of criminality could have done. 
 
 The cold wind became chillier yet ; but 
 the Heverend Harold Thornton did not heed 
 
OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 it. At last the rain, which had been 
 collecting itself in the clouds overhead, fell 
 heavily ; and even he, pre-occupied as he 
 was in his misery, could not but feel it. 
 He gave a little shudder. 
 
 " There is nothing for it but home ;" and 
 the bitterness with which he uttered the 
 word told fully how unhome-like home was 
 to him. He stepped on over the long 
 stretch of sand, and then turned inland 
 down a short lane that led from the coast, 
 past a few houses of an inferior kind, then 
 by a small grey church, lying back from a 
 little street, and so towards his own house* 
 which looked full upon the churchyard, and 
 was only divided from it by a narrow foot- 
 way and an iron railing. 
 
 It was not a pleasant look-out for a 
 dwelling-house. Although the churchyard 
 had been long disused, still there were the 
 grass-grown graves, the moss-covered tomb- 
 stones, with their more or less legible in- 
 scriptions, not half-a-dozen yards from the 
 
" OE, MY LORD, BEWARE OF JEALOUSY!' 7 
 
 windows of the rooms where the inhabitants 
 of the Kectory carried on their daily hfe. 
 It was an unseemly, irreverent jumbling of 
 the living and the dead, only no one thought 
 of it as such : even Mrs. Thornton, who had 
 complained of the ghastliness of her neigh- 
 bourhood at first, had become used to it 
 new ; and as to her husband, he had never 
 gi7en the matter a thought. 
 
 The Kectory was a long, low building, 
 ore storey high, much too large for the 
 liying, which was only valued at one hundred 
 and fifty pounds a year. But some of the 
 former occupants had augmented their in- 
 come, in spite of the unpleasant proximity 
 of the churchyard, by taking pupils. The 
 present rector did not choose to do this ; 
 his income, he would have said, whatever 
 his wife might have done, was sufficient for 
 all his simple needs : and his parochial 
 duties claimed all his time ; but, in truth, 
 if the Keverend Harold had turned his 
 thoughts to tuition, it would have been a 
 
OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 bad thing for himself, but a very much 
 worse for the boys. 
 
 But it was a dreary house for two people 
 and their two maids to live in, with large, 
 vacant rooms, and wide, bare corridors. 
 Ample fires and merry voices and steps miglit 
 have made the place endurable ; as it was, 
 the low, dark rooms were pervaded by a sense 
 of dreary chilliness. If a mouse squeaked, 
 or a rat gnawed behind the panels, the maids 
 were ready to cry out it was a ghost ; and 
 their mistress was almost justified in saying, 
 that no ghost of any sense but would look 
 for better quarters. Only the gloom, and the 
 chilliness, and the dulness, never weighed 
 upon the master, to whom the very quietness 
 and isolation of the Rectory and living had 
 been one great attraction to induce him to 
 leave a larger and more stirring sphere of 
 action. 
 
 The parish of St. Hilda was an off- 
 shoot of the town of Wearmouth. Only 
 twenty years ago it had been a village 
 by itself; but the town had crept on 
 
" OE, MY LORD, BE WARE OF JEALO USYP' 9 
 
 to it, or it had crept on to the town, 
 after the manner in which London Hnks 
 itself to its outlying suburbs. The connec- 
 tion had not increased the prosperity of 
 the parish. One poor, shabby little street 
 after another had grown longer, as the boat- 
 men and fishermen of the town increased 
 in number ; but scarcely any dwellers of a 
 better class came into St. Hilda, which was 
 now the most populous, and the poorest part 
 of Wearmouth. 
 
 The inhabitants — with the exception of 
 the few small shopkeepers who supplied the 
 wants of the rest — got their living, in one 
 way or another, from the sea. The streets 
 were narrow, with raised footways, paved 
 with small stones. They had been fairly 
 picturesque, with their red tiled roofs and 
 brown plastered fronts, till they were elbowed 
 by the four-roomed, square, brick tenements 
 of the new-comers into the parish. Now, the 
 place was crowded out of whatever quaint 
 old-world prettiness it might once have 
 
10 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 possessed. It was homely, sordid, and 
 unattractive to most eyes ; but Harold 
 Thornton, when he elected to live there, 
 had seen nothing of that in it, only looking 
 on it as a spot to which he had been called ; 
 and where he should find the work which 
 the Lord had given him to do. 
 
 He was in no fit frame for such work to- 
 night. What were the cares and troubles 
 of his parish, spiritual or otherwise, to a 
 man wholly occupied with one absorbing 
 conflict of his own ? Just now he was — as 
 he owned afterwards to himself — selfishly, 
 wickedly, wrapped up in the contemplation 
 of his own hurt, and had little thought or 
 care for the hurts of any of his flock — let 
 them be wounded as sorely as they might. 
 
 And thinking of one's own wounds always 
 makes them smart the sorer. The Rector 
 of St. Hilda was a jealous man, and he 
 had brooded over the few causes he had, 
 or fancied he had, for jealousy, till he was 
 as thoroughly miserable as he could very 
 
" OH, MY LORD, BEWARE OF JEALOUSY P ] 1 
 
 well be. And to-niglit, on his return home, 
 instead of going up to his own door, and 
 demanding entrance in the ordinary way, 
 he must prowl and peer about, Hstening 
 and watching, Hke a spy, even on his own 
 threshold. 
 
 He heard iiis wife's voice. She was at 
 the piano, singing her best and loiidest. 
 She had a clear, full soprano, well cultivated ; 
 and to-night she was exerting it to the 
 utmost. The song was one that called 
 forth all her powers, and her execution and 
 tones were altogether very different from 
 those of amateurs in general. Was she 
 singing like this in defiance of him ? They 
 had parted in anger. How could she sit down 
 to her piano and dash away song after song 
 like this ? If she had cared for his anger, 
 been grieved at his displeasure, she would 
 never have done it. Who would but a false, 
 heartless woman on the high road to that 
 destruction against which he had warned 
 her, and which warning she had so fiercely 
 
12 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 resented? That was what he said to him- 
 self, clutching his fingers nervously, as the 
 rich, full notes of the song floated on the air. 
 The drawing-room window was a small bay. 
 The centre blind was drawn down, but the 
 one on the side nearest to him was only 
 lowered half way. Something impelled him 
 to step forward and look at his wife — see if 
 her face was as untroubled as her voice. 
 He had to stoop a little to do so when he 
 neared the window ; but he saw her plainly 
 enough. The sight was hardly worth the 
 stooping for. She was, as I have said, at the 
 piano. The song had ceased just ias he neared 
 the window, and her hands were wandering 
 carelessly over the keys, while her face was 
 turned back, with the eyes fixed full on the 
 very man against whom he had warned her 
 — the man who he believed would injure 
 him in such sort as can never be forgiven — 
 the man of whom he had told her that she 
 would do well to stand in greater dread 
 than of any living — the man whom of all 
 
" OH, MY LORD, BEWARE OF JEALOUSY!" 13 
 
 others slie should have shunned with the 
 loathing that a good woman ought to have 
 of all things evil — here he was, where the 
 looker-on had said that he should never come, 
 by the fireside which he believed him capa- 
 ble of polluting ; by the hearth whose dis- 
 honour he credited him with contemplating. 
 
 It was not a pleasant sight for a husband 
 — still a great many men might have looked 
 on it without drawing from it the con- 
 clusions that the Be v. Harold did. Mrs. 
 Thornton was evidently indulging in a 
 flirtation — it was certain that she liked 
 the society of the gentleman she was with, 
 and that he was very well content with 
 hers. 
 
 He was standing by the piano, with his 
 hand on the pages of the music book. Mr. 
 Thornton could not see his face, but he 
 could hers ; she was looking up with far 
 more expression in her great dark eyes 
 than there was any occasion to throw into 
 them, and he was bending forward with the 
 
14 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 attitude of a man who was drinking in eagerly 
 everything those eyes were saying. The 
 lamp-light shone full upon her, and showed 
 a very handsome woman, certainly past 
 her premiere jeunesse, but perhaps all the 
 better able to make the most of the many 
 attractions that yet remained to her. At 
 this date Mrs. Thornton must have been at 
 least two and thirty, but might have been 
 taken for three or four years more. There 
 was a worn, weary look about the face even 
 at its best, and perhaps just now it was at 
 its best, for she was fond of singing, liked 
 an appreciative listener, and, of all listeners, 
 perhaps the gentleman now bending over 
 her the best of any. She must have known 
 troubles in her time, this woman, to have 
 aged as she had done ; but still it was a 
 handsome face, if a hard, and not very 
 lovable one. The features were good — 
 classically perfect in outline, but the com- 
 plexion was of a dead, set pallor. Now and 
 then, when she thought it quite safe to do 
 
" OH, MY LORD, BEWARE OF JEALOUSYP' 15 
 
 so, Mrs. Thornton rouged, but she had not 
 done so to-night. The hps were rich and 
 full, lighting up with their bright colour 
 the lower part of the face. The hair was 
 luxuriant and of a jet black — this, and the 
 intense darkness and brilliancy of the eyes, 
 the thick arched eyebrows, the deep colour 
 of the lips, made the face, in spite of its 
 customary pallor, a striking one at the 
 first glance. 
 
 But it was not a pleasant face — not the 
 face of a happy woman — not at all the face 
 that you would expect to see gracing the 
 inside of a rectory, or presiding at a clergy- 
 man's table. It was the face of a woman 
 who might be innocent and pure in deed 
 and act, but who, possibly through some 
 evil chance which she could not help, had 
 seen more than a woman should of the dark 
 side of life — whose eyes had been, perhaps, 
 compelled to look on evil things, but 
 who could never be the same as if she 
 had not so looked. If you had met with 
 
16 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 such a face behind the scenes of a theatre, 
 or m the circus of a travelhng equestrian 
 company, it would have seemed, especially 
 when lit up by excitement, just in its 
 element —it was utterly out of place in the 
 parsonage of a quiet country town. 
 
 She was well-dressed, and her hair was 
 elaborately arranged. Mrs. Thornton spent 
 a great deal of time, but not too much 
 money, over her toilet. She was always in 
 the fashion, too, and to-night she almost lit 
 up the dull sombre drawing-room, where 
 not an article but the piano was less than 
 forty years old, with her pretty muslin and 
 bright ribands — her dress was perhaps a 
 little too showy, but the general effect was 
 always good. Most people thought so at 
 least. As to Mr. Thornton, his wife's fond- 
 ness for dress was perhaps one of the 
 causes that had led to his present unhap- 
 piness. He cared so little, as he had often 
 told her, for such matters, and she thought 
 so much of them ; if dress was valueless in**-= 
 
" OH, MY LORD, BEWARE OF JEALOUSY T 17 
 
 his eyes why should she study it so much 
 for the eyes of others ? As he looked upon 
 her now, her floating draperies and shining 
 hair were so many sins in his eyes ; he forgot 
 to ask himself how it was they had once been 
 so many charms, and yet it is certain that if 
 Mrs. Thornton, when he first knew her, had 
 been as plain and sombre in appearance as 
 he now would have had her, he nevet* 
 would have sought to v/in her for himself 
 
 After a few words, she struck the piano 
 and sang again. Her listener changed his 
 position so that the light now fell upon 
 him. After all, vxis he a man of whom any 
 husband could have cause to be jealous ? 
 Why could not the Rev. Harold Thornton 
 have asked himself that question ? He was 
 much younger than himself, this supposed 
 invader of his domestic peace ; perhaps 
 about four-and-twenty, slight, tall, and with 
 the tone and manner of one well born and 
 gently nurtured. Nothing striking in the 
 face, features that it would be difficult to 
 
 VOL. I. 2 
 
18 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 describe — impossible to remember. Fair 
 hair and moustache, a colourless complexion, 
 a look of kindly good-temper — if the face 
 had any one predominant expression it 
 was that of indecision and weakness. A 
 man altogether whom yon would be more 
 inclined to like than to rely upon. But he 
 certainly did not look one prone to evil 
 himself, or likely to lead others into it. 
 Mrs. Thornton's eyes were very large and 
 dark, and she ivould say a great many 
 things with them that perhaps she did not 
 quite mean, but still, what husband in his 
 senses need have distressed himself very 
 muchj let her eyes rest as long as they would 
 on Mr. Audley Dale ? 
 
 Perhaps the miserable man outside was 
 not in his senses — crazed and distraught 
 with his own unhappy fancies ; but there he 
 stood, out in the rain and darkness, peer- 
 ing at those two by the instrument with 
 eyes that, if they had had the power, would 
 have blasted them. 
 
" OH, MY LORD, BEWARE OF JEALOUSY r 19 
 
 Luckily for them they had not. Luckily 
 perhaps for the unseen looker-on some faint 
 sense of personal discomfort made itself felt 
 through all his mental disquiet. If he had 
 stayed there much longer he would have 
 been wet through ; as it was, he felt chilled 
 to the bone, damp and wretched. He 
 would do what he had better have done 
 before he peered in at the window, go in at 
 once and seek shelter. 
 
 A servant let him in who was, to all 
 appearance, the very quintessence of what 
 a well-trained domestic should be. Neat 
 in her dress, with smooth hair, not a 
 bit of finery about her, and yet looking as 
 if well paid. A servant who would have 
 done credit to a much more pretentious 
 establishment than that of the Eectory. 
 Tall, slight, and of a good figure, which her 
 dress fitted to perfection ; perhaps about 
 twenty-five, with a face that had no imper- 
 tinent pretensions to prettiness, and yet 
 had nothing about it disagreeable for the 
 
 2—2 
 
20 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 eye to rest on. If it had not been for her 
 dress, and her manner, and her figure, you 
 would have called that pale, small- featured 
 face, where there were yet a few traces of 
 the small-pox, plain ; as it was, it seemed to 
 complete the tout ensemble and make up the 
 hecm ideal of a first class waiting-maid. 
 
 She looked sympathisingly at her master 
 as she let him in. Not impertinently so — 
 her looks conveyed just as much concern as 
 a well-bred domestic would feel entitled to 
 display when she remarked upon her 
 master's having been caught in the rain, 
 and brought him his shppers. 
 
 " Such a very wet night, sir, for you to 
 be out in. Mr. Dale is in the drawing- 
 room," she added : and how she did it, it 
 is impossible to say, but the tone in which 
 she uttered the last observation conveyed a 
 shade more sympathy than that in which 
 she spoke of the rain. It was impossible 
 for her master to feel afironted by her im- 
 pertinence, and yet that paragon of waiting- 
 
" OH, MY LORD, BEWARE OF JEALOUSY T 21 
 
 women, Charlotte Clare, had done an ex- 
 ceedingly impertinent thing — told her mas- 
 ter of a guest in his drawing-room, and 
 conveyed to him her regret and pity that 
 he should be there. 
 
 If the Rev. Harold Thornton was dis- 
 posed to play the part of Othello, here 
 was an lago in petticoats ready to urge 
 him on. 
 
OHAPTEE 11. 
 
 WHAT MRS. THORNTON SAW FROM HER 
 BED-ROOM WINDOW. 
 
 rilHE master of the house went into his 
 -^ drawing-room, and his guest came 
 forward with extended hand. What was 
 the other to do ? He hated this man with 
 all his soul; he believed that he contem- 
 plated the destruction of his peace and of 
 his honour, and yet, as things were, there 
 was nothing for him but to take his hand, 
 and exchange the usual commonplaces of 
 greeting. They were stiffly done on his 
 part, and not too easily uttered by Mr. 
 Dale. He was never at home in the Rec- 
 
WHAT MRS. THORNTON SAW. 23 
 
 tory when the Rector was there. It was 
 not that he had the slightest idea of the 
 disquietude which he occasioned him. Mr. 
 Dale was very free from self-conceit, and it 
 had never yet occurred to him that he 
 found such favour in Mrs. Thornton's eyes 
 as to trouble her husband. He liked her 
 very much, she was good-natured and 
 amusing, and clever enough to make him 
 believe in her as far handsomer, more 
 refined, an altogether higher being than 
 she really was. Mr. Thornton had had the 
 same belief in his time. He had gone from 
 one extreme to the other, and was desil- 
 lusionne, and a great deal more. His 
 wife was certainly neither the angel nor 
 the paragon he had thought her, but she 
 was quite as far from being the traitress he 
 imagined her capable of becoming. 
 
 There was an awkward interval which 
 Mrs. Thornton did her best to cover. It 
 was a wet night, and she was sorry for it ; 
 why had Mr. Thornton gone out in the 
 
24 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 rain ? He might have told her it was because 
 even the rain was more endurable than he 
 had found his home, but things had not 
 yet got to such a pass that he could say 
 this before Mr. Dale, and therefore he 
 sat silent in his usual chair, answering 
 absently, and with a sullen reserve that was 
 almost rudeness, the few remarks Mr. Dale 
 made to him. At last the other rose to go, 
 it was so clear that he was unwelcome, and 
 then husband and wife found themselves 
 alone. 
 
 Mrs. Thornton glanced at her lord. 
 " He's in a sweet temper," she said to her- 
 self, and then went on humming the air of 
 the song she had last been singing. Con- 
 sidering that they had so recently had a 
 quarrel, her attitude and manner were 
 enough to exasperate a sweeter tempered 
 man than the Rev. Harold Thornton. Both 
 were expressive of the most complete de- 
 fiance of himself, the most utter unconcern 
 as to whether or not he was affected by 
 
WHAT MES. THORNTON SAW. 25 
 
 their recent disagreement ; he conld not 
 help understanding them as such, and the 
 understanding did not tend to soften the 
 tone in which he spoke. 
 
 "I think I told you I would not have 
 that man in the house." 
 
 " Why did n't you tell him so ? would n't 
 that have been better than leaving me to 
 do it — or have left word with Clare to that 
 effect ? — she might have given him your 
 message — I don't see that it would have 
 been quite consistent with politeness for 
 me to do it." 
 
 "At least you need not have made him 
 so welcome as you did — let him lean over 
 your chair, turn your page, look in your 
 eyes and have you look back in his." 
 
 *'If that was so," she said, "he had the 
 best of it. His eyes are not worth looking at. 
 Now, nobody can say but what mine are." 
 
 "Woman !" he cried passionately, as he 
 paced the room to and fro, " do you only 
 meet me with a jest or a lie ?" 
 
26 OVT OF II ER SPHERE. 
 
 " At any rate, I meet you with more 
 courtesy than you do me/' she said, in a 
 tone which had the shghtest flavour of the 
 style called theatrical in it. If any one 
 conversant with the world behind the stage 
 had been there, he might have thought 
 that, notwithstanding the , immaculate re- 
 spectability of her present position, Mrs. 
 Harold Thornton was not altogether a 
 stranger to that world. Then she changed 
 her tone into one which had more the savour 
 of e very-day life, and continued. "^ It's per- 
 fectly absurd, Harold, going on like this. 
 How can you make such a fool of yourself ? 
 You have n't the slightest reason to make 
 yourself so miserable as you do, and what 
 on earth are you doing it for ? I like to 
 be admired ; Mr. Audley Dale likes to 
 admire me, and, whatever you may say, we 
 are both perfectly justified in the feeling. 
 I shall not affront him ; I shall not tell him 
 to stop away from the house ; I shall be 
 civil to him when he comes, and sing to 
 
WHAT IIMS. THORNTON SAW. 27 
 
 him as much as he pleases. If you Hke to 
 make yourself the laughing-stock of the 
 town by letting him see what degrading 
 suspicions you have formed, do so. / can't 
 help it, only do n't expect me to have act or 
 part in the matter. Now, if you are suffi- 
 ciently cooled down, shall I ring and have 
 the servants in to prayers T 
 
 He was in a very suitable frame of mind 
 for it ! but what could he do, — as she rang 
 the bell, and Clare came gliding in with 
 her usual step, as soft and lissome as a 
 cat's, followed by Deb, looking red and 
 sleepy from, her doze by the kitchen fire, — 
 but take the book and go through the usual 
 forms mechanically. Clare knelt down at 
 a respectful distance ; she was always w^ell 
 behaved, but in prayer-time propriety itself 
 Deb, when the reading had been unusually 
 long, and after a hard day's washing, had 
 been known to fall asleep and utter an 
 audible snore, but Clare was always wide 
 awake on such occasions, her eyelids just 
 
28 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 modestly drooped, her whole manner ex- 
 pressive of a subdued propriety that it was 
 charming to witness ; she never yawned, 
 never showed the slightest symptom of 
 weariness, never rose half a second too 
 soon ; always left the room with a staid, 
 reverent manner as if benefited and re- 
 freshed by what she had heard, with a low 
 good-night to both master and mistress, 
 which was in itself as nearly a benediction 
 as a servant so respectful as Charlotte Clare 
 would venture to utter to her superiors. 
 
 The prayers were read to-night as usual, 
 but Mr. Thornton's voice almost betrayed 
 the emotion that was surging within him. 
 They were long prayers — if I may say so, 
 tedious, and the reading was generally from 
 the Old Testament or the more abstruse 
 portion of one of the Epistles. Mrs. Thorn- 
 ton half sat, half knelt, as gracefully as ever. 
 Her attitudes were always good, if a little 
 too studied ; and perhaps she paid as much 
 attention as usual to-night to the devotional 
 
WHAT MBS. THORNTON SAW. 29 
 
 forms her husband was going through, but 
 that certainly is not saying very much, and 
 she rose as soon as they were over, and 
 proceeded to her bedroom, followed by Clare, 
 who sometimes undertook a lady's maid's 
 duties. 
 
 *' I do n't want you to-night," her mis- 
 tress said sharply, and then, closing the 
 door, drew up the blind of her bedroom wip- 
 dow^ and sat down by it. " How I hate that 
 woman !" she said, " I wonder whether 
 it is because there's nothing about her I 
 can find fault with. She's as perfect as a 
 servant can very well be, and perfection in 
 anything is simply detestable." 
 
 She looked out of her window vacantly 
 and wearily. There was no likelihood of 
 Mr. Thornton's interrupting her. He had 
 gone, as he generally did after one of their 
 disagreements, to his study, and would 
 most likely stay there for hours, " working 
 the bile off," as his wife irreverently said. 
 But she was in no humour for sleep herself. 
 
30 OUT OF HER SPUE ME. 
 
 She was more troubled than she had chosen 
 to let him see, by their late quarrel. She 
 did not care for him very much ; but she 
 liked peace and quietness. Perhaps, if she 
 had liked him just a little more, a quarrel 
 with him would have had more zest and 
 interest ; as it was, it only bored and 
 wearied her. They must go on together, 
 and why could n't they do it peaceably ? 
 
 The look-out from her bed-room window 
 was almost typical of her hfe, in its dull, 
 grey sameness. Beyond the Rectory garden, 
 where nothing grew but a few stunted trees 
 and cabbages, lay a field, or what had once 
 been one. The boys of the parish played 
 here ; and their feet had pretty well worn 
 away what verdure there had ever been. 
 Carpets were beaten by those few in St. 
 Hilda who had them to beat, and a donkey 
 or two made a point of browsing and getting 
 what poor nutriment they might from the 
 unfruitful ground. Then came two or three 
 hovels which by no license of the pen or 
 
WHAT MBS. THORNTON SAW. 31 
 
 tongue could one dignify as cottages ; tlien 
 the long, bare denes, with their monotonous 
 expanse of sand, and then the sea — to-night 
 in its still calmness, as tame and dull as the 
 denes themselves. There was nothing 
 lovely, nothing attractive, in the picture on 
 which her eyes rested. The rain had left 
 off, and the moon shone on it with a dull, 
 watery light ; as if even that was chary pf 
 the beauty which it gives so often to the 
 waves. But the lack of beauty struck less 
 painfully upon the weary woman looking on 
 it than did the dull, heavy sameness — the 
 want of stir or life. If there had been a 
 tempest, and the ocean raging, she would 
 have liked it better. There would have 
 been something to thrill her pulses, to 
 excite her brain, to stir the blood that 
 moved so slowly in her. As it was, all 
 seemed as languid and as dull as the long, 
 uneventful days that one after another 
 dragged their slow length along. 
 
 She drew away from the window, pre- 
 
32 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 sently, and went to the glass, slowly un- 
 winding her long, black hair before it. She 
 was very proud of her hair, and with some 
 reason : there was a wonderful quantity of 
 it, and it was very rich and beautiful. She 
 looked handsome enough, in spite of her 
 pallor, standing there before the glass, and 
 she gave a half sigh as she looked on herself. 
 
 " What's the good of it all, with no one 
 to look at me ? Oh, dear ! oh, dear ! I 
 wish I'd never tried to be respectable. I 
 didn't think it was so hard, or I don't 
 believe I should have made the attempt. 
 I'm thirty-two !" Mrs. Thornton was in 
 the seclusion of her chamber, or she would 
 have only owned to twenty-eight. " And 
 I wonder how it will be possible to mete 
 out the three-score years and ten ! What 
 a mercy it is we do n't live in the time of 
 the patriarchs I" 
 
 As she turned towards the window, she 
 saw that she had not lowered the blind, 
 and went forward to do so. Just as she 
 
WHAT MRS. THORNTON SA W. :33 
 
 was there, a figure moving in the garden 
 caught her eye. She knew the oiitlines 
 and the stealthy, well-trained step — un- 
 deniably graceful, but with a grace that 
 was unpleasant to see. You thought, as 
 you saw it, of a cat — a tamed leopard — 
 a panther with its claws cut — anything 
 but the genial, easy, simple grace of a 
 woman. 
 
 " Is that — can that be Clare V said Mrs. 
 Thornton, eagerly. " Now, what is taking 
 her out ? It's not a night for a moonlight 
 stroll ; besides, she ought to be in bed, 
 virtuously tucked up, with the very moon 
 and stars shut out, lest they should peer in 
 on her propriety. There's somebody in 
 coat and trousers peering over the garden 
 hedge. That paragon of handmaids has got 
 a lover ! I wish Harold was here to see 
 her. I should like him to learn that his 
 piece of domestic perfection is just as fallible 
 as any other woman. I expect they've 
 something else to talk about than texts, or 
 
 VOL. I. 3 
 
34 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 ' master's ' last sermon. I wonder, now, 
 what affianced ones in that class do find to 
 talk about V 
 
 She had an amused smile on her face 
 now; even the interest of her maid-servant s 
 love afiair was something. As the discreet 
 mistress of a household, she ought, of course, 
 to have summoned Clare in, and have re- 
 proved her for keeping tryst at such im- 
 proper hours. But instead of doing so, 
 she put out her candle, so that she might 
 not be observed from below, and continued 
 her watch. 
 
 Presently her interest deepened. At 
 first the affair had only had the excitement 
 of a little change in her monotonous life ; 
 but now, as the moonlight fell on the figure 
 of the man talking to Clare, it became more 
 personal. 
 
 *' He's uncommonly like Audley Dale," 
 she said to herself, and then began to 
 think how she should ascertain whether it 
 was he or not. Her window was a case- 
 
WHAT MRS. THORNTON SA W. 35 
 
 ment, opening from the middle. It would 
 be more easy to open one half of this with- 
 out attracting the attention of those below 
 than if it were of the ordinary shape. She 
 unfastened the bolt, and gently pushed one 
 half open ; then leaned forward, and Audley 
 Dale's voice, though in tones so low that 
 she could not catch the purport of the 
 words, caught her ear. She was sure it wasr 
 he ! And what could he be there for but 
 to make love to the immaculate Clare ? 
 Her attitude was too familiar to admit of 
 any other supposition, and her hand was 
 on his arm, as if it had a right to rest 
 there. 
 
 He did not stay long. Clare seemed as if 
 she would have detained him ; but he almost 
 broke from her. There was an impatient 
 farewell, as if he chafed at being hindered, 
 and then a leap over the garden hedge, and 
 he was gone ; and Mrs. Thornton, gently 
 closing her window, watched her maid turn 
 and re-enter the house. 
 
 3—2 
 
36 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 " To think of it !'' she said to herself. 
 " Audley Dale ! 1 did give him credit for 
 better taste. The creature's marked with 
 the small-pox ! and really it's not at all the 
 sort of thing he ought to do." 
 
 Mrs. Thornton looked staid and matronly 
 — almost motherly — as she sat back in her 
 low American chair, thinking matters 
 over. 
 
 " I shall give him a talking to to-morrow. 
 I do n't know whether I shall send Clare 
 away or not. No doubt Harold would 
 dismiss the poor sinner as quite unfit for 
 his saintly service ; but where should I get 
 a girl to suit me so well ? I do n't like her, 
 but she knows her work. But Audley Dale 
 must be brought to see that this sort of 
 thing can't be allowed. Nothing ruins a 
 young man first starting into life like a low 
 entanglement. Audley ought to be brought 
 to see it. Good gracious ! to think of 
 Harold's fancying he's in love with me ! 
 It would do him a great deal more good 
 
WHAT MRS. THORNTON SA W. 37 
 
 than anything of this kind. Form his 
 manners and improve him — which I do n't 
 think meeting my housemaid by moonlight 
 will do." 
 
CHAPTEE III. 
 
 MES. Thornton's antecedents. 
 
 rpHE Eev. Harold Thornton had been 
 -^ about six years • domiciled in St. 
 Hilda. Before that time he had been 
 a very hard-working curate- in one of the 
 poorest and densest parts of London ; fight- 
 ing his fight manfully against the world, 
 the flesh, and the devil, as exemplified in 
 the flaring gin-palaces, the frowzy, over- 
 crowded lodgings, the narrow, squalid 
 streets, and the sin and the ignorance that 
 rose Hydra-like around him. He had done 
 his best ; he was a good man, although 
 perhaps not a very sweet-tempered one; 
 
MRS. THORNTON'S ANTECEDENTS 39 
 
 early and late he had toiled and striven, 
 holding his life often in his hand, visit- 
 ing dens from which even the police 
 would shrink, and tending death -beds, 
 which were enough to try even the iron 
 nerves of the most practised medical men. 
 He was a soldier of the Lord. So un- 
 happily constituted, that in some things he 
 must always fall wofuUy short of his 
 great Exemplar. But in long-suffering, 
 steadfastness, and unselfishness ready to 
 follow Him to the death. 
 
 At last he gave way — broke down in the 
 very prime of life — and found there was 
 nothing for him but compulsory retirement 
 and rest, or an early grave. Some one who 
 knew the man, the good that was in him, 
 and the work that, if spared, he might yet 
 do, offered him the living of St. Hilda. 
 It cost him a struggle to accept it. He was 
 so morbidly conscientious, so fearful of 
 swerving in the least from the hard, self- 
 sacrificing line of duty he had laid down, of, 
 
40 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 as he expressed it, drawing his hand from 
 the plough to which he had put it, that 
 even with all the warnings of his medical 
 adviser ringing in his ears, he had some 
 struggles with himself, much anxious con- 
 sideration, before he could prevail upon 
 himself to do so. Ought he not to stay 
 where he was and die ? Was it not his 
 j)ost, and had he any right to leave it ? If 
 St. Hilda had been a better living, in a 
 fashionable or very attractive part of the 
 country, he would certainly have answered 
 these questions in the affirmative, and re- 
 mained at his post till he had perished at 
 it. But as a population was offered to his 
 charge which was almost as poor as the one 
 he was leaving — a dull, unlovely country, 
 with the bleak east wind blowing on it, a 
 small stipend, and an untempting parsonage, 
 Harold Thornton thought himself justified 
 in giving himself a chance for his life, and 
 so settled at St. Hilda. 
 
 The keen cold air did wonders for his 
 
MRS. THORNTON'S ANTECEDENTS. 41 
 
 exhausted system. The duties, after all, were 
 lighter than in his London parish ; and, if his 
 people were poor, there was not that depress- 
 ing, squalid hopelessness, that dreary same- 
 ness of vice and poverty to contend with, 
 which had weighed him down like an in- 
 cubus. Wearmouth had twelve parishes 
 besides his own, so that there was no want 
 of clerical society in the neighbourhood ; 
 and, let him eschew all other as he might, 
 he was necessarily drawn into this, so that, 
 even in spite of himself, things were plea- 
 santer, brighter, and more cheerful, in St. 
 Hilda's than he had ever found them at St. 
 Lazarus. He grew better and stronger in 
 spite of himself He had really cared so 
 little for the matter — his own life had 
 always seemed to him the thing least 
 worth his troubling about. Then worldly 
 matters improved with him. A distant 
 relative from whom he had not had the 
 slightest expectations, left him a couple of 
 hundred a year. For his modest desires, 
 
42 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 he was a rich man. Everybody who heard 
 of his legacy said that he would marry now, 
 and soon after he did, though it is very 
 likely, if the lady would only have had him 
 on his smaller income, he would have mar- 
 ried just the same upon it. He was not 
 a man to consult prudence in pecuniary 
 matters — just now he did not consult pru- 
 dence at all, making, in his marriage, the 
 one great mistake of his life. 
 
 Wearmouth attracted a few visitors in 
 the season. It was cheap, if neither very 
 lively nor very pretty ; and one summer 
 Miss Henrietta Vane came there with her 
 aunt, a widow. The aunt was about to 
 marry again. She had brought her niece 
 Avith her, partly for company, partly to do 
 something for her while she had still no- 
 body but herself to consult about the doing 
 so. They were both showy women, sure to 
 attract attention wherever they went. 
 Miss Vane attracted a great deal when, 
 there being talk of an amateur concert in 
 
MRS. THORNTON'S ANTECEDENTS. 43 
 
 behalf of the funds of the life-boat, she 
 volunteered to assist, and did so in a style 
 that threw every one of her compeers into 
 the shade. 
 
 She looked splendid, too, as she sang. 
 The excitement, the applause, gave her 
 beauty a brilliancy and colour which would 
 have been enough, even without the slight 
 soupgon of rouge she had felt justified in 
 adding. People — ladies, especially, whose 
 daughters she had outshone — said that 
 she must have been trained for the stage, 
 or, at least, the concert-room. Such culti- 
 vation, and such a style, were wholly be- 
 yond any one who wished merely to shine 
 in a drawing-room. 
 
 Miss Yane, when, amidst all the compli- 
 ments she received after her performance, 
 some such remarks reached her ears, met 
 them by owning frankly (though untruly) 
 that she had been taught to teach, and 
 gave the name of a well-known operatic 
 singer, from whom she had received sing- 
 
44 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 ing lessons. She had pupils in London, 
 and the labour of teaching had been too 
 much lately for her, so her aunt, who was 
 always doing something good-natured for 
 her orphan niece, had brought her here to 
 recruit herself a little. 
 
 Mr. Thornton had been at the con- 
 cert. If " there's a divinity doth shape 
 our ends," his had certainly been shaped 
 for him that night. He disapproved of 
 such places of amusement — even the end, 
 with him, would not justify the means. 
 Why could not people, he urged, give their 
 money to the charity without having their 
 ears tickled, and their senses stimulated ? 
 But Mrs. Rushington, the wife of the one 
 wealthy parishioner in St. Hilda, had pre- 
 vailed upon him to take a ticket, and after- 
 wards make him join her party and go. It 
 was so difficult to say no to Mrs. Rushing- 
 ton^few, veiy few people indeed, could do 
 that. After the performance, she took him 
 into the temporary green-room with her, 
 
MRS. THORNTON'S ANTECEDENTS 45 
 
 and there he heard Miss Vane's account of 
 herself. 
 
 He was interested in her — but that is a 
 cold word. This woman won upon him 
 at once as no woman had ever yet done. 
 Sometimes he had thought of marriage as a 
 possible event in his life, if he could meet 
 with one who promised to be a suitable 
 help-meet in his work, and whenever he Jaad 
 pictured such a partner, it had been an alto- 
 gether diflPerent being to Henrietta Yane. 
 
 Passion, fancy — the strange madness 
 men called love — what had he, God's 
 servant, to do with it ? It would weaken 
 him for his vocation, turn him from the 
 upward path which he was treading so 
 painfully, and in which it was his never- 
 ending work to lead others. He was most 
 woefully ignorant of himself Because, till 
 now, his passions and inclinations had been 
 well kept under, or rather, had always gone 
 in the way he wished, he had made the great 
 mistake of believing that he had none. Now 
 
46 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 he had to learn that at length they had 
 slipped his leash, and henceforth would run 
 their way, not his. 
 
 He was now eight-and-thirty, and no 
 boy of eighteen ever fell more hopelessly, 
 madly in love with a j)retty pink and 
 white face than did he with the faded 
 classic beauty of Henrietta Yane. Never 
 in all his life had the faintest shadow of 
 such a feeling crossed him. He did not 
 even see his danger, till it was too late, 
 never felt his cords till he was bound in 
 them hand and foot, never knew that 
 Delilah's hand had touched his locks till 
 she had shorn his strength away. 
 
 It was so patent, the impression she had 
 made, that not only Miss Vane, who was 
 quick-sighted enough in such matters, but 
 her aunt and Mrs. Rushington — certainly 
 both of them ladies who were quick-sighted 
 too — saw it. When Mrs. Ridge had her 
 niece safely home, and they were sitting 
 over their snug little supper, each with her 
 
MRS. THORNTON'S ANTECEDENTS 47 
 
 modest little potion of hot brandy and 
 water by her, the aunt remarked — 
 
 "I think you've made a conquest to- 
 night ; and I am sure I hope so. At your 
 age — between ourselves, you know, you 
 were thirty last birthday — it's time you 
 settled." 
 
 " You need n't remind me of that, aunt. 
 What on earth does it matter how old a 
 woman is, so long as her looks do n't betray 
 her r 
 
 '' But your looks do betray you. When 
 you do n't rouge, and nobody ca,n do that 
 with safety by day-light, you look even 
 older than you are. That was one reason I 
 brought you down here — you are going 
 off so terribly. I thought a quiet little 
 out-of-the-world place like this would be 
 just the thing for both of us, and give us 
 the rest of which we're alike in need, but 
 you especially. But it'll be a very great 
 bit of good luck if you make a hit like this 
 into the bargain." 
 
48 OUT OF II ER SPHERE. 
 
 '' You're uncommonly plain-spoken, aunt. 
 I wish you'd remember that it may not be 
 altogether agreeable." 
 
 " It's no good being cross, Hetty. You 
 have gone off, that's all about it. You've 
 gone the pace a little too fast. You ner- 
 vous, excitable people always do. What- 
 ever would have become of me, with all 
 my troubles, and the life I've led, if I 
 hadn't taken things easily ? Just teU me 
 that." 
 
 " Nobody would credit you, certainly, 
 with undue excess of feeling," said Hen- 
 rietta, making pellets of her bread, and 
 eating them viciously. 
 
 '' "Well, they would n't, and a very good 
 thing for me too. — Have a Httle gravy. I 
 never knew a woman cook a sweetbread 
 better than our present landlady." And, 
 her niece declining the proffered gravy with 
 an imperious gesture, Mrs. Ridge took 
 the residue herself. 
 
 She was evidently enjoying her supper, 
 
MES. THORNTON'S ANTECEDENTS. 49 
 
 whatever her niece might do. A comfort- 
 able-looking woman always, she overflowed 
 with her intense appreciation of the good 
 things of this life whenever that meal 
 came round. For many years it had been 
 the one bright spot in the four-and-twenty 
 hours — the pleasant little oasis which, in the 
 daily round of her hard-working existence, 
 she had had to look forward to. She was 
 handsome still, and quite right in saying, 
 that she wore better than her niece. At 
 this period she was at least fifty, and might 
 have dropped eight years. She was round, 
 rosy, large and genial, good-tempered, and, 
 if a little coarse, good-natured and well- 
 meaning enough in her way. She meant 
 kindly now by her niece, even when she 
 was saying the most uuDleasant things ; 
 and, as she sipped her brandy and water, 
 and poured a little out of the decanter to 
 strengthen the dose with, she continued — 
 
 " You know, Hetty, you can t go on like 
 this. You'll never do for a concert singer ; 
 
 VOL. T. 4 
 
50 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 your lungs won't stand the strain, and if 
 you could, law ! what a life it is ! I've 
 stood it, because I always would take 
 things easy, and never let trifles trouble 
 me ; but you're not that sort, and as to 
 teaching, why, I think sweeping a crossing 
 would be a pleasant change to it. No, my 
 advice is this — and if you've a grain of sense 
 you'll take it — just lead that parson on. I've 
 heard a little about him ; the living is n't 
 much, but he has private property. If I 
 know anything about men, he'll be on the 
 sands to-morrow morning, and he won't be 
 thinking of his sermon either. You go too 
 — bathe first — the tide will be in early, and 
 that'll give you an excuse for having your 
 hair about your shoulders — there ain't such 
 another head of hair I reckon in this place. 
 I'll be there too, and if he's a grain of sense 
 he'll come and thank you for your song last 
 night. We'll go to his church next Sun- 
 day — I wonder if there ain't any old brasses, 
 or things of that sort, we could ask him to 
 
MRS. THORNTON'S ANTECEDENTS 51 
 
 show us afterwards — if there's nothing else, 
 there's safe to be a painted window in 
 memorial of somebody or other that I dare- 
 say never did a thing in their lives worth 
 remembering them for. Never mind, the 
 window '11 do to talk about. Law ! what a 
 comfort it will be to see you safe and re- 
 spectable. You're not the sort to stand 
 knockmg about in the world." 
 
 ". And do you think I'm the sort for the 
 eminently respectable life you wish me to 
 lead ?" said Henrietta, bitterly. '' Are my 
 antecedents quite such as to fit me- for 
 being the mistress of a rectory, and the wife 
 of a parish clergyman ?" 
 
 " Why, of course they are," said her 
 aunt, sopping up the last drop of gravy 
 with her bread. " A little cheese, Hetty — 
 I like it out of the middle with some of the 
 blue mould on it. Law ! what would life 
 be without suppers ? What are your ante- 
 cedents ? — Your papa was a solicitor ; no- 
 body can say anything against him, but 
 
 4—2 
 
 SS^^on.u^°'^ 
 
52 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 that perhaps he spent a little more money 
 than he ought. Never mind, it was his own 
 if he did. With regard to your mamma, 
 why, poor dear, she was his wife, and 
 nobody can say she was n't. As to her 
 having been on the stage first, what busi- 
 ness is that of any one's ? any more than it 
 is that I kept on the stage after I was mar- 
 ried, and had to keep my husband because 
 he would n't keep me, and so your papa cut 
 me, and made poor dear Polly do so too. 
 All that anybody that marries you need 
 know about me is that my late husband 
 was a doctor — I should n't even say he kept 
 a shop and sold seidlitz powders and patent 
 medicines. There's no occasion to let any one 
 know that Mrs. Bidge was Miss Josselyn, 
 and took the waiting-maids' parts till she got 
 too stout^ and had to do the heavy mothers. 
 I'm Mrs. Ridge, a medical man's relict, and 
 I'll defy anybody to' say anything else. 
 As to you, your papa did n't die very well 
 off, and you've had to give music lessons — 
 
MBS. THORNTON'S ANTECEDENTS. 53 
 
 youVe had some thoughts of going out 
 governessing — I'd say that, it sounds in- 
 teresting, a parson's sure to like it, their 
 girls so often have to go out — they know 
 what the life is. This Mr. Thorn— isn't 
 that it — will be sure to want to save you 
 from it — the idea of your having to en- 
 counter it will make you all the more 
 charming in his eyes ; he'll pity you, and w^ 
 know very well what pity's own cousin to. 
 There's no occasion to tell him you've ever 
 been before the footlights or behind the 
 scenes, and would have made a very fair 
 actress, especially in tragic parts, if only 
 you'd had the stamina to stand the life, and 
 the lungs to fill the house." 
 
 " Well, and your intended, and the en- 
 tertainment in America." 
 
 " Who's going to tell him anything about 
 that ? I sha'n't. I'm going to marry again — 
 I've been ten years a widow, living on my 
 means — said means arising from making my- 
 self generally useful at almost every one of 
 
54 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 the London theatres. Mr. Harrup is a 
 gentleman of property — so he says, and if 
 he does n't know, who does ? but his affairs 
 require his presence in the United States. 
 I'm going with him to spend my honey- 
 moon there. I'm not bound to say that 
 Mr. Harruj) proposes to give an entertain- 
 ment, ventriloquial and otherwise, and that 
 I, being a good pianoforte player, am going 
 to assist him. If anybody on this side the 
 water hears what we are doing on the 
 other, how will they know we're the same 
 parties ? I shan't tell 'em. Bless you, 
 once you're married, your husband will 
 think precious little of your aunt. The 
 best way to keep him from doing so will be 
 to teU him my income 's derived from an 
 annuity that dies with me, and Mr. Harrup 
 has a large family of orphan nieces and 
 nephews entirely dependent on him, and 
 whom he promised his beloved only sister 
 on her deathbed to look to. Mr. Thornton 
 won't trouble himself much about me, once 
 
MRS. THORNTON'S ANTECEDENTS. 55 
 
 he's heard that. I do n't want to disgrace 
 you ; of course, when you're a parson's wife 
 it won't do for you to have an uncle and aunt 
 who ain't so very much better than genteel 
 strolling players — and, being poor Polly's 
 only child, I should like to do what is right 
 by you — see you comfortably married, tho- 
 roughly set up amongst the respectables, and 
 then say good bye to you for ever. If you like 
 to drop me a line now and then you may ; if 
 I write back, you need n't be afraid of show- 
 ing your husband the letters — I shall know 
 what I'm about when I send them — but if 
 you do n't write at all, I sha'n't fret. I'm 
 not one to go on about heartlessness or in- 
 gratitude — stuff! if people expect to be 
 paid for any good turn they do, why do n't 
 they say so ? I shall take it, that you've 
 gone your way, and I've gone mine, and 
 we're the best of friends, only it's not con- 
 venient to see too much of one another." 
 
 '' I do n't think I shall like the life," said 
 Henrietta, doubtfully. 
 
56 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 " Well, it'll be slow, I dare say, at first, 
 but law! youll soon get into it. It'll be 
 safe,'' said Mrs. Ridge, emphatically, " and 
 with a woman like you, Henrietta, that 
 means a great deal. You'll have to give 
 the old women flannel petticoats, and hear 
 their grumblings. I don't see that you 
 need teach in the schools — put that on the 
 girls, there's always lots in every parish. 
 You must sing sacred music on a Sunday, 
 and perhaps eat cold dinners — but you'll 
 get on all right after a bit, there's no fear." 
 
 " And suppose after all your good advice, 
 aunt, there's no occasion for me to take it. 
 Suppose Mr. Thornton never gives me the 
 chance of showing what sort of a rector's 
 wife I should make ?" said Henrietta. 
 
 "Don't you be a fool, Hetty Vane," 
 replied her relative, sharply. " Or, what's 
 worse, pretend to be one. That man's 
 hooked. If ever I saw a fish caught, I've 
 seen one to-night. Now go to bed, or 
 youTL be fit for nothing to-morrow; You'll 
 
MBS. THORNTON'S ANTECEDENTS. 57 
 
 feel worse, as it is, for what you've been 
 doing to-night. Never mind, I think you've 
 done the best piece of work you've done for 
 yourself for one while." 
 
 Mrs. Bushington, whose eyes, as I have 
 said, were as clear as Mrs. Ridge's, ex- 
 pressed much the same thing to her hus- 
 band, as she sat in the privacy of their bed- 
 chamber brushing out her thick black hair. 
 
 "John," she said, " I think Mr. Thornton 
 is taken with the lady who sang to-night 
 —Miss Vane." 
 
 "A very good thing, too," said Mr 
 Rushington. " A clergyman ought to be 
 married." 
 
 "That depends upon the kind of wife he 
 gets," said Mrs. Rushington. " In this case 
 I think he would be better without one." 
 
 "I don't see why she shouldn't do as 
 well as any other. Did n't she say some- 
 thing about giving lessons in town ? I 
 wonder if she'd give them here. Do n't you 
 think you could sound her about Milly ?" 
 
58 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 " Thank yon, I do n't care to try — Milly 
 will do very well without lessons from Miss 
 Vane," said Milly 's mother. " She is not 
 at all the sort of person I should like to see 
 about my daughter." 
 
 Then she said nothing more to her hus- 
 band, but as she twisted her hair up for 
 the night round her handsome head, 
 thought to herself, " If Mr. Thornton 
 doesn't mind, he'll make a fool of himself, 
 as sure as my name's Margaret." 
 
CHAPTER IV. 
 
 A MISPLACED WOMAN. 
 
 TjI VENTS proved that both Mrs. Rushing- 
 -*-^ ton and Mrs. Ridge were right. Before 
 a fortnight had elapsed, Mr. Thornton had 
 proposed to Miss Vane, and been accepted. 
 She did not altogether like him, and per- 
 haps as much as such a woman could be 
 afraid of any man she was afraid of him. 
 Some instinct told her that under all the 
 fervid passion for herself, under all the 
 intense religiousness and self-abnegation of 
 which so many spoke admiringly, there yet 
 lurked something dangerous. Something 
 of which the man himself was not aware — 
 
60 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 latent fire, which might some day burn to 
 evil purpose — a touch of the wild beast 
 nature, which might w^ake when least sus- 
 pected. 
 
 Then she put such thoughts from her, 
 and asked herself what could she do but 
 take him? What better thing did life 
 hold out to her ? Her youth was gone, 
 and, handsome as she was, she was not 
 wearing well. She had already as many 
 grey hairs as her aunt, and there were 
 twenty years between them. A little 
 longer, and how the lines by her temples 
 and under her eyes would deepen and 
 lengthen, and no dressmaker be able to 
 hide that she was growing thin and 
 angular. 
 
 Giving music lessons was a great drud- 
 gery, and she had not been taught to 
 teach, her training having adapted her 
 rather for display. She would have liked 
 the stage or the concert-room infinitely 
 better than the tame career offered her, 
 
A MISPLACED WOMAN. 61 
 
 but, as her aunt said, and as she knew, she 
 could not stand the hfe. The foul air, 
 the late hours, the excitement — even the 
 continuous strain necessary to fill a large 
 area with the voice either in singing or 
 speaking — were too much for her ; she had 
 essayed it, and broken down. That had 
 been a terrible disappointment to her, for 
 she would have so dearly liked the lifa — 
 the triumphs, the applause, the display, 
 the comrades with whom she would have 
 worked, even the erratic, uncertain nature 
 of the employment, would all have been so 
 infinitely better than the safe, comfortable 
 security offered her in the Rectory of 
 St. Hilda. 
 
 However, as she said to herself, " I 
 cannot have just what I want, so I must 
 take what I can get, and make the best 
 of it." And the best of it she meant to 
 make ; she was not at all a bad woman ; 
 she would have told you that, like Becky 
 Sharp, she only wanted opportunities for 
 
62 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 being a very good one. But she was a 
 much better person than Becky — this poor 
 used-up, handsome Hetty Vane. She 
 meant to do her duty with the old women's 
 flannel petticoats, and the Sunday schools 
 too. She would be good and proper, and 
 try very hard to forget all that she had 
 seen and heard in her brief theatrical 
 career as Miss Howard. 
 
 There was a little society at Wearmouth 
 — plenty of clergymen and their wives, and 
 society too of a different kind, for it was a 
 garrison town — and whatever there was she 
 would make the best of it". The Bectory 
 was dull, its master s income not very large, 
 but she was a good manager, and had 
 learned enough economy from her aunt to 
 know how to make money go as far as most 
 women, and by-and-bye things might im- 
 prove. 
 
 Mr. Thornton v/as clever, every one who 
 heard him in the pulpit said so ; even she 
 herself had felt a momentary thrill when 
 
A MISPLACED WOMAN. 63 
 
 she heard his first sermon, and Mrs. Ridge 
 had wiped her eyes and given twice what 
 she had intended to the collection that 
 followed. Why should he waste his talents 
 much longer in this little nook of the 
 world? She would get him to write as 
 well as to preach ; draw men's eyes to him 
 if he could not their ears ; make himself 
 known and talked about. And then there 
 were such splendid openings in the Churcii ! 
 He might get a fashionable London living, 
 and, from that, a chaplaincy to the Queen, 
 a deanery ; by-and-bye it might even be a 
 bishopric ; fo^ as she said to herself, " It is 
 not often, but still, once in a way, we do 
 find a bishop that's been made so for his 
 brains." She had quite sufficient intellect 
 to appreciate Mr. Thornton's, and, she 
 flattered herself, sufficient tact and in- 
 fluence over him, to induce him to consider 
 his talents a marketable commodity. She 
 had had a good many flirtations in her 
 time, more or less tender, but she had 
 
64 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 never been in love in her life. It is not at 
 all in accordance with the general belief, but 
 there really are some women who can get 
 on without the tender passion altogether, 
 and Henrietta Vane was one of them. 
 
 There was a very short courtship, for 
 Mrs. Eidge's own wedding-day was drawing 
 near, and she wished to see her niece safely 
 disposed of before she re-entered matrimony 
 herself. There was no reason at all that 
 the courtship should be a long one, but 
 quite the reverse; as Mrs. Eidge frankly 
 told the Eector, " You can't go and see 
 Hetty when she's in lodgings by herself 
 in London. Besides, you'll have your 
 parish to attend to." 
 
 Mr. Thornton was very glad that there 
 should be no delay. Hetty told her aunt 
 that, as it was to be, the sooner it was over 
 the better ; and the marriage took place. It 
 was a very quiet one. Mr. Harrup came 
 down and gave the bride away. He had 
 been well drilled by his own intended for the 
 
A MISPLACED WOMAN. 65 
 
 occasion, and really looked and acted the 
 part of a benevolent gentlemanly pere de 
 famille, very well. There were no brides- 
 maids : Mrs. Ridge said frankly that Hetty 
 had but few friends, and some of those 
 would find the expense of a journey to Wear- 
 mouth more than they would like. " It's 
 best to begin as you mean to go on/' she 
 said to her niece, " and drop every one at 
 once. You cant keep up with your old 
 set, you know, so now is the time to give 
 them the cut direct." 
 
 Mr. Thornton liked the quietness of his 
 wedding beyond everything. Nothing 
 would have horrified him more than a 
 fashionable one, with its bridesmaids and 
 bouquets, its display and speech-making. 
 He carried ofi* his wife to Paris — it had 
 been the dream of her life to go there — it 
 was the paradise of women, she had always 
 believed, — it had been the wish of his heart 
 to visit it, for years. He had carried on a 
 correspondence with a leading minister of 
 
 VOL. I. 5 
 
66 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 the French Protestant Church, and there 
 were some matters he had long felt could 
 only be discussed with any satisfaction per- 
 sonally. This visit would give him the 
 opportunity he wanted, and which before 
 he had never felt justified in making. Al- 
 together the honeymoon passed off very 
 well. Mrs. Thornton received a very affec- 
 tionate farewell letter from her aunt, whose 
 marriage took place just a week after that 
 of her niece ; she read bits of it to her 
 husband, but did not offer to show it to 
 him. As she said to herself, it was best to 
 begin as people meant to go on, and not- 
 withstanding Aunt Harriet's promise of 
 discretion in her letter-writing, it was more 
 than likely that some day or other she 
 would forget it in one of her epistles ; and 
 she wished to keep up a correspondence 
 with her aunt, for whom, after all, she 
 cared a very great deal more than she did 
 for her husband. They came back to Wear- 
 mouth at the end of three weeks, — Mr. 
 
A MISPLACED WOMAN. 67 
 
 Thornton could not prevail upon himself to 
 stay longer away from his congregation. 
 He had had the one holiday of his life 
 — tasted for once what that vain transitory 
 thing earthly happiness is. A happiness 
 entirely mundane — without any self-sacri- 
 fice, any hard unlovely duty in it — a happi- 
 ness that depended sheerly upon blue skies, 
 a pleasant climate, change of scene, and 
 the constant presence of the woman he 
 loved. It was a delicious time ; and though 
 he had two or three interviews with M. 
 Bonneville, the pasteur whom he had so 
 wished to see, those interviews added very 
 little to the delight of that time. He used 
 afterwards, in the days when he was steeped 
 to the lips in misery, and seemed degraded 
 in his own eyes, and, to his distorted fancy, 
 in those of other men, to look upon this as a 
 period of sin and folly, which deserved the 
 retribution that followed on it. But at 
 any rate he was happy now — just as happy, 
 as he afterwards told himself, as if he had 
 
 5—2 
 
68 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 not a soul to be saved, or as if there was 
 nothing in the world worth caring for, but 
 the light of a woman's eye, and the smile 
 of a woman's lip. 
 
 His wife wished him to be happy : she 
 meant to make him so. She was pleasant 
 to live with on the whole, and if quick 
 tempered, still good tempered, — that is to 
 say, she did not take offence at trifles, 
 liked her own way, but still was ready to 
 concede that her husband might like his, 
 was very ready to study his peculiarities, 
 and give them a fair share of humouring. 
 She was very happy, too, these three weeks ; 
 there was too much to see for her husband 
 and herself to see much of one another, and 
 she came back to Wearmouth thinking 
 that, after all, a life in the walls of a 
 rectory might be more endurable than she 
 had imagined. 
 
 " Of course he will have the place done 
 up for me," she said to her aunt, and Mrs. 
 Eidge had replied. 
 
A MISPLACED WOMAN. 69 
 
 " I suppose so, but he may not think 
 about it, he's not that sort of man ; if 
 he doesn't, get him to put it in hand 
 when you come back, and look after the 
 tradesmen's bills yourself; Mr. Thornton's 
 just the kind of man to be cheated right 
 and left by any one who drives in a nail or 
 whitewashes a ceiling for him." 
 
 But Mr. Thornton had thought about 
 renovating the Bectory ; he was aware th'at 
 the furniture was old, for he had taken it 
 of the widow of his predecessor, and the 
 rooms wanted re-papering, for they were 
 faded and dull ; but, as he told his wife, he 
 could not afford to do it at present. His 
 schools cost him a great deal of money. 
 Nearly the whole expense fell upon Mr. 
 Rushington and himself, and their Paris trip 
 had cost him more than he had anticipated. 
 
 Mrs. Thornton thought it rather hard 
 she should have to go without a drawing- 
 room carpet because the infant school 
 wanted a new floor, but Mr. Thornton had 
 
OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 behaved very well while they were at Paris, 
 and made her some very handsome presents 
 — (how he blamed himself afterwards for 
 pandering to her vanity and sinful love of 
 display, as he expressed it) — and she was 
 not unreasonable, and so made up her mind 
 to wait for a time. 
 
 Then she made acquaintance with Wear- 
 mouth society in the persons of the eleven 
 other rectors and vicars and their eight 
 wives — of the three who had none, two 
 were widowers and one a bachelor — and 
 Mrs. Kushington called formally, with 
 her daughter Milly. The two ladies did 
 not take to each other very cordially at 
 first, but made up their minds to be on 
 friendly terms notwithstanding, each being 
 quite aware of what was due to the other ; 
 and then Mrs. Thornton tried, poor woman, 
 to do her duty, as the Catechism she heard 
 the Sunday-school repeat, phrased it "in 
 the station to which God had called her," 
 and found the doing so much harder and more 
 
A MISPLACED WOMAN. 71 
 
 uncongenial work than she had ever ima- 
 gined it would be. 
 
 If only she and her husband had under- 
 stood each other ! They might have done 
 withoutlove, if either had had a little compre- 
 hension of the other's nature. Hers craved 
 passionately for excitement — in any and 
 every form — dress, display, society; his found 
 enough in the routine of his daily life, behind 
 which lay that unseen world, with its terrors 
 and its hopes, to which he and all others 
 were wending. There was an intensity of 
 passion in him, far more than in her, and it 
 found two outlets — his religion and his 
 love. He was happy in neither, forever 
 dissatisfied with himself, forever falling 
 short of his ideal of what a Christian man 
 should be, and in his love continually seek- 
 ing for more than it would give, asking 
 something back for all that he had lavished, 
 and asking, tormenting himself in vain. He 
 wearied his wife, he bored her, and his 
 intense religiousness wearied and bored her 
 
72 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 too. She was not a pious woman — she 
 was quite willing to go to church twice on 
 a Sunday, and have family prayers. She 
 went visiting the old women, and assisted 
 in the Sunday-school. But there was an 
 end. She was not a bad woman, and she 
 really tried very hard to do her best as 
 well as she knew how ; but she was creed- 
 less, and, for all practical purposes, godless, 
 and one who was quite content to trouble 
 herself very little about the life to come, if 
 only she could have got a few more good 
 things in the life that she now had. 
 
 But the great need of her nature being 
 excitement, she found it for herself, and 
 that not after a very proper fashion. As I 
 have said, the barracks were just on the 
 outskirts of Wearmouth, and where there 
 are barracks, officers follow as a matter of 
 coiu-se. They all visited at the Bushing- 
 tons', and of course Mrs. Thornton visited 
 there too, so that it befell that she became 
 acquainted with Mr. Audley Dale, and the 
 
A MISPLACED WOMAN. 73 
 
 consequence of sucli acquaintanceship was 
 the state of things which I have depicted 
 in the opening chapter. 
 
 Mrs. Thornton did n't mean any harm — 
 she wished to amuse herself Mr. Audley 
 Dale did n't mean any harm — he wished to 
 be amused. But Mr. Thornton, to whom 
 the idea of amusement as a necessary of 
 life had never presented itself, could not 
 enter into the feelings of either of the 
 parties. He was a miserable man — of all 
 men the most miserable — deceived, injured, 
 and, it might be, on the high road to dis- 
 honour. These two were playing at a game 
 that was death to him ; but he was a 
 dangerous man to be played with in such 
 sort, if only grace could be given to these 
 misguided creatures to open their eyes and 
 see it. 
 
CHAPTER y. 
 
 A WELL-BEHAVED YOUNG PERSON. 
 
 -^^ /TES. THORNTON sat before her look- 
 -^^-^ ing-glass with that immaculate damsel, 
 Charlotte Clare, brushing out her tresses. 
 Clare was very handy about her mistress's 
 toilet, and Mrs. Thornton liked having as 
 near an approach to a lady's maid as her 
 circumstances permitted. It was a fine 
 bright morning, and Mrs. Thornton con- 
 templated going out, but before she went 
 she had something to say to Clare which 
 had better be said at once. 
 
 The morning light fell strong on that 
 young person s face, as she stood, the very 
 
A WELL-BEHAVED TOUNG PERSON. 75 
 
 picture of neatness and dutiful propriety, 
 brushing out the long thick tresses. Mrs. 
 Thornton looked at the reflection of her 
 face in the glass, and it certainly, notwith- 
 standing its air of propriety and decorum, 
 contrasted strongly, in the small meagre 
 features, the dull skin, and poor lustreless 
 hair, with her own magnificent outlines. 
 '' What an ugly creature 1" she thought to 
 herself; then aloud, " Why didnt they tie 
 your hands, Clare, when you had the small- 
 pox ? How ever could they let you make 
 such a fright of yourself T 
 
 Clare made no answer, she did not even 
 pull her mistress's hair tighter, which a 
 great many waiting-maids would have done 
 under the circumstances, but she coloured a 
 faint dull red, and her thin pale lips were 
 tightly set together, and in the greenish- 
 grey eyes a light stole that if any one had 
 been watching, who was versed in animal 
 nature, he would have thought of a cat 
 about to extend her claws to some purpose. 
 
OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 Mrs. Thornton saw the colour and the gleam 
 in the eyes, but she understood them just 
 as Httle as she did her husband, and went 
 rashly on : 
 
 " That reminds me of something I have 
 to tell you, Clare. I wonder how a young 
 woman of your age and appearance could 
 have acted in the imprudent way you did 
 yesterday evening. I won't say more than 
 that I sat at my bedroom window a little 
 time after I came up-stairs last night. I 
 must beg that what I saw then may never 
 be repeated. Gentlemen will do foolish 
 things, but you must know that even if 
 you were positively attractive, no one in 
 Mr. Dale's position could think of any one 
 in yours, but as a plaything for a little idle 
 time, if for nothing worse. But as it is, it 
 really makes the whole thing so totally 
 inexcusable on your part. I do wonder at 
 his forgetting himself ! it's past understand- 
 ing. However, I trust that you will be more 
 prudent for the future. I shall not acquaint 
 
A WELL-BEHAVED YOUNG PERSON. 77 
 
 your master with what I saw last night. 
 He would be sure to insist on your instant 
 dismissal if I did, and I really do n't like to 
 send you into the world without a scrap of 
 character, however foolish you may have 
 been." 
 
 Clare's dull red colour, which had almost 
 rivalled that of a brickbat, had faded now, 
 and her cheeks, in their greenish, siQkly 
 pallor, faintly imitated the tints of her eyes. 
 But she went on braiding and twisting the 
 wonderful coils of hair as deftly as ever, 
 and her mistress sat happily unconscious of 
 the storm she had raised within her hand- 
 maid. If the one woman could have killed 
 the other as by a lightning stroke, she 
 would have done it; if all those sheeny 
 satiny tresses which she was twisting and 
 braiding in her supple fingers could have 
 been turned into as many serpents that 
 would have hissed and stung and slain, 
 Clare would have turned them ; and yet she 
 stood there, brushing and braiding as if 
 
OUT OF HER SPHEEE. 
 
 nothing else were in her thoughts, and to 
 her mistress's long exordium said meekly, 
 " Thank you, ma'am." 
 
 " She ought to be much obliged to me," 
 thought Mrs. Thornton. " I think she is 
 — most mistresses would have sent her 
 adrift, but then where should I get any- 
 body to do my hair so well, or wait as she 
 does at table ? But what ever could Audley 
 Dale see in such a creature?" 
 
 She finished her toilet, and looked very 
 handsome in her little hat and pretty cos- 
 tume. The latter was rather of the shortest, 
 but Mrs. Thornton's feet were worth show- 
 ing. Then she went out, as she always 
 did at this hour, leaving Clare to clear 
 up her room and proceed with her usual 
 duties. 
 
 That exemplary young person was not 
 in just the frame of mind to perform them. 
 She stood just as her mistress had left her, 
 still, humble, meek, and proper, the very 
 heau ideal of a well-trained domestic, till 
 
A WELL-BEHAVED YOUNa PERSON. 79 
 
 she had heard the outer door close, and 
 then she drew a great breath as if to 
 relieve her overloaded chest, and shaking 
 her clenched hand in the direction which 
 she supposed Mrs. Thornton to have taken, 
 said fiercely, 
 
 " Curse her ! What does she mean by 
 it ? Twitting me with the marks on my 
 face, and looking the while at her own 
 smooth cheeks. Shouldn't I like to sear 
 them with an iron ! She talk like that ! — 
 she ! older than me by ten years, I'd swear 
 — why, while she was speaking and looking 
 at her face as if there was n't another like it 
 in the world, I could have pulled out half a 
 handful of grey hairs. Only they're plaited 
 in and hidden — she would n't for her life 
 show one — not the only things she's got to 
 hide, I reckon — not the only things I'd bring 
 to hght if I could." And Clare, Mrs. Thorn- 
 ton's pattern maid, walked up and down the 
 room diafing with the passion within her, 
 her eyes gleaming more than ever with a 
 
80 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 light that, if her mistress had but seen it, 
 must have scared even her careless soul. 
 Greener and fiercer and more venomous grew 
 her eyes — the wild beast in the woman had 
 woke, and was ready to seize and tear 
 anything that came in her way. The flimsy 
 draperies that had been thrown off would 
 have had but a poor chance of remaining 
 whole, had not Clare even in all her pas- 
 sion remembered that if she rent she should 
 have to mend. She shook the dress before 
 she hung it in the wardrobe. "If it was 
 only her, if it was only her," she cried, 
 while she did so, and then, her passion sub- 
 siding, the savageness of the feline animal 
 that had woke within her passing away, she 
 became once more her well-trained, supple, 
 active self, moving about the room as 
 deftly and as gently as if she lived for 
 nothing else than to show with what ad- 
 mirable precision a waiting-maid's duties 
 could be performed. 
 
 Charlotte Clare had a little histoiy of 
 
A WELL-BEHAVED YOUNG PEBSOK 81 
 
 her own. Nothing very striking about it, 
 but still, such as it is, it may as well be 
 repeated here. When she was fourteen 
 she had nearly died of the disease whose 
 traces she still bore. However, Clare 
 recovered, although, to have looked at the 
 cottage in which she had lived her short 
 life, and the room where she lay stricken 
 down by illness, it would have seemed as if 
 recovery were impossible. Out of this 
 squalid home the mother and two sons 
 were carried — stricken by the same disease 
 which had failed to conquer the gaunt, 
 tall girl who was now quite orphaned, her 
 father having died a year before. Clare 
 had been a good girl, a model girl, in the 
 Sunday-school, and her almost faultless 
 demeanour had attracted the attention of 
 the maiden sister of the Rector of the 
 village. She took the girl into her service, 
 made half domestic, half protegee of her. 
 Clare was intelligent, handy at her needle, 
 and her invariably proper behaviour soon 
 VOL. T. 6 
 
82 OUT OF HER SPHERE, 
 
 won upon Miss Dale, who believed in Clare 
 as the very model of damsels in her sta- 
 tion. She was a good woman, but she had 
 not much common sense, or else she might 
 have known that out of such a home as 
 Charlotte Clare had grown almost to 
 womanhood in, it would have been as 
 great a miracle as any in the Gospels for a 
 good, pure girl to come. It was a stand- 
 ing wonder to the medical man who had 
 attended Clare that she had conquered the 
 small-pox — "she ought to have died of it," 
 he said to a professional colleague ; it was 
 setting all sanitary rules at defiance for her 
 to have recovered as she had done ; but it 
 would have been setting every rule of 
 ethics at defiance if out of that narrow, 
 sordid home, where there was not even 
 spa,ce for the commonest requirements of 
 decency, such a girl had stepped as Miss 
 Dale supposed Charlotte Clare to be. She 
 was a clever girl, or perhaps I had better 
 say a cunning one. Good manners and 
 
A WELL-BEHAVED YOUNG FEB SON. 83 
 
 civil words went a long way with gentle- 
 folks, and so Clare used them. They 
 covered many deficiencies, just as the white- 
 washed front of the cottage where she had 
 lived made people oblivious that all its sleep- 
 ing accommodation for father, mother, sons, 
 and daughter, consisted of one room, twelve 
 feet by ten. So Clare was civil, and 
 something more — the best bred young per-- 
 son for her station. Miss Dale emphatically 
 declared, that she had ever met with. She 
 must have been born lacquered, her good 
 manners must have been natural to her like 
 a cat's sleekness or its velvet tread ; and a 
 few years' service with Miss Dale gave the 
 finishing touches to the exquisite polish. 
 
 The Kector had a large family. As was 
 only natural, the children were very frequent 
 visitors at their aunt's. Clare was most 
 attentive to the young ladies, and quite as 
 much so as there was any occasion to be to 
 their brothers. Clare had learned a great 
 deal that was not in the Catechism, or in 
 
 6—2 
 
84 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 the very good little books which Miss Dale 
 provided her with for Sunday reading. 
 That lady did not approve of fiction for her 
 servants, unless it was fiction well-seasoned, 
 to prevent its dangerous effects. Clare took 
 with reverent thankfulness the books her 
 mistress lent her, and helped herself to some 
 reading which she did not lend. There 
 was Pamela in the old bookcase. Clare 
 perused, and, we may hope, profited by it. 
 Also she took in sundry penny periodicals, 
 which, as they are written especially for 
 yoimg ladies of Clare's class, delight in 
 painting virtue rewarded, not, as in Pamela's 
 case, with a mere country squire, but with 
 a coronet, and thousands ad libitum. But 
 Clare had some sense. She took all this 
 cum grano salis. She did n't expect quite to 
 be my lady ; but why she should not be a 
 lady she could not see. She was not 
 handsome — Clare owned that — and the 
 small-pox had been a terrible infliction ; 
 but she had a good figure, and in every 
 
A WELL-BEHAVED YOUNG PERSON. 85 
 
 way knew how to make the best of herself. 
 Audley Dale was always about the house, 
 when at home for his holidays. Clare was 
 always in his way. He was a public-school 
 boy, destined for the army— a man of the 
 world in his own conceit — and Clare only a 
 country girl, whom his aunt had taken into 
 her service out of charity — an ugly girl, 
 too. Clare once overheard him call her 
 that, and she vowed a vow, after her owfi 
 fashion, that she would make him think 
 differently. Audley Dale could never tell 
 how it was done, but done it was — this girl, 
 not yet a woman, plain in his eyes, even to 
 repulsiveness — not even a lady — without 
 the graces and the accomplishments that 
 he had been used to in the women of 
 his own class, poor, lowly-born, and scarred 
 for life by disease, yet wound herself around 
 him, drew him on and on, till, he knew 
 not how, he felt something for her that if it 
 was not love, was as fatally akin to it 
 as the fascmation which a snake exercises 
 
OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 over its victim, is to the fond eagerness 
 of a self-forgetting passion. Love her ! 
 Could any man do that? Was it not 
 rather hate with v^hich this still, pale 
 girl, with the tigress nature dormant in 
 her, and all the tigress suppleness in her 
 gliding movements, and the untaught grace 
 which seemed part of her nature, inspired 
 him ? He could not tell, but she drew 
 him on and on till he was, in his own eyes, 
 and what was worse, in his own hand- 
 WTiting, irretrievably committed. 
 
 He had his commission, and joined his 
 regiment. Bound to Clare, as she weep- 
 ingly informed him, in honour. I am 
 afraid he would not have thought very 
 much of that if it had not been for two 
 or three letters that he considered bound 
 him too. 
 
 Clare had been prudence and coyness 
 itself, or these letters, which more than 
 hinted at marriage, might never have been 
 written. Her staidness and prudence 
 
A WELL-BEHAVED YOUNG PEBSON. 87 
 
 were never more manifest tlian in the 
 manner with which Audley Dale was lured 
 by a cold, passionless, nature and a plain 
 face, to imagine he felt a passion which 
 the woman who he thought had inspired it 
 could never have created in any man. She 
 had made him think himself in love, or 
 rather — he being just at that age when 
 a boy can hardly fancy himself a man 
 without having a passion of some kind 
 or other, just as he must smoke cigars, if 
 they make him sick, when he would much 
 rather be sucking oranges ; drink pale ale 
 and cold brandy-and-water, when he would 
 ten times sooner have ginger-beer — she 
 had contrived to throw herself in his way, 
 and make herself the object of the feelings 
 which he thought it incumbent upon him 
 to entertain. 
 
 A little while after Audley Dale had 
 received his commission as cornet in the 
 
 3rd, his father received great and 
 
 unexpected promotion — such promotion 
 
88 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 as sometimes falls to men less for wlia,t 
 they do than for what they do not. 
 He was nearly sixty. He had passed a 
 long life in the most blameless obscurity. 
 Nobody could say that the Eev. Theophilus 
 Dale had ever written, said, or done, any 
 one thing which he should not. He had 
 preached sermons that were of the mildest 
 and safest character. He was of the tamest 
 and discreetest order of Anglicans — looking 
 upon Ritualism with a mild wonder, as 
 a singular eccentricity of the times ; upon 
 Evangelicalism with a slight dislike, and 
 a suspicion that it might go too far. Of 
 the Broad Church and its muscular dis- 
 ciples he had seen little. Shoreleigh, where 
 he had spent the thirty years of his pastoral 
 life, had no clerical residents near him 
 tainted with the views either of Colenso or 
 of the authors of the " Essays and Eeviews." 
 It had been a quiet little nook, where 
 the sheep browsed peacefully, undisturbed 
 by strange tenets, and their pastor fed 
 
A WELL-BEHAVED YOUNG PERSON. 89 
 
 tliem with the safest and mildest doctrine. 
 He fed them, too, with other things — 
 with beef and bread at Christmas, and 
 soup all the winter through ; doing his 
 duty after his own fashion, in as quiet 
 and inoffensive a way as any nineteenth- 
 century rector could do it : and was as 
 much astonished as anybody else when the 
 Bishopric of Drowsehead was offered him. 
 
 But the Dales were a rising family. 
 How very much they were rising even 
 the Rev. Theophilus Dale did not know. 
 Two generations back the then head of 
 the family had been elevated to the peerage, 
 and he and his sons after him had made 
 themselves very useful to the government ; 
 so useful that when the Bishopric of Drowse- 
 head became vacant they thought they 
 had a right to hint that it could not be 
 better conferred than on a member of their 
 house. There could not possibly be a more 
 decorous or a safer man chosen for the 
 vacant post than their kinsman. His very 
 
90 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 insignificance, in all but family connection, 
 was a recommendation to the minister, who 
 had recently made some episcopal appoint- 
 ments which had brought much odium on 
 him, through his selecting men who were 
 too clever or too unpleasantly prominent 
 in one way or another. Now and then, 
 certainly — as Mrs. Thornton had said when 
 thinking of her own husband's chances of 
 preferment — a bishop is chosen for his 
 brains : but is the choice ever a popular 
 one ? Well, nobody could say that the 
 Rev. Theophilus Dale had been chosen for 
 his ; but he was likely to be a bishop quite 
 up to the average, notwithstanding. He 
 left Shoreleigh — the poor were very sorry ; 
 it was not likely that another rector would 
 come whose soup would be so good, and who 
 would look over their short-comings in the 
 way of church attendance, as leniently 
 as he did. He was near-sighted, too, and 
 what a blessing that is in a rector who 
 preaches long sermons, and whose people 
 
A WELL-BEHAVED YOUNG PERSON. 91 
 
 are inclined to doze on summer after- 
 noons, after a hard week's work ! Miss 
 Dale left too. She had nothing to induce 
 her to stay at Shoreleigh, when her 
 brother s family had gone. She did not 
 like Drowsehead, where the air was too 
 relaxing, but decided on residing at Wear- 
 mouth, which she thought might suit her, 
 and which had the advantage of being 
 only five miles away from Tring, a living 
 in the Bishop's gift, and to which he in- 
 tended to appoint his eldest son, Maurice, 
 on the death of the then incumbent, who, 
 at the time of the Bishop's accession, was 
 ninety, and who dying, with great con- 
 sideration, six months after that event. 
 Miss Dale had the satisfaction of having 
 her nephew at once near her. 
 
 She did not enjoy the satisfaction long. 
 
 Perhaps Wearmouth was too bracing — 
 perhaps she missed the daily influx of girls 
 and boys, the flow of young life around 
 her, to which she had been accustomed 
 
92 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 for years. But she had not been a twelve- 
 month in her new residence, before she 
 left it for a permanent one ; and her in- 
 valuable waiting-maid found herself again 
 thrown on the world, without even a legacy 
 to comfort her for her mistress's loss — that 
 lady having put off will-making day after 
 day, till at last the day came when the 
 doing so was quite beyond her. 
 
 Clare confidently expected that the 
 bishop's daughters would give her a place 
 about themselves, but they did not seem 
 disposed to do so, behaving, Clare con- 
 sidered, with shameful ingratitude, in not 
 studying her interests better. In truth, 
 her " dear young ladies " were not too fond 
 of their aunt's pattern waiting-maid ; they 
 had the instinctive dislike which most 
 women entertained, without knowing why, 
 for that very proper young person, and, 
 except that they gave her very excellent 
 mourning, which Clare had made up very 
 becomingly, she in no way benefited by the 
 death of her patroness. 
 
A WELL-BEHAVED YOUNG PERSON. 93 
 
 Just at this time Mrs. Thornton returned 
 from her honeymoon, and Clare offered her 
 services as parlour-maid, Deb, who had been 
 the Eector s factotum before, requiring some 
 assistance now. The duties of the situation 
 were hght ; it was near Tring, where one 
 of the Dales resided, and where another 
 might reasonably be expected to come some 
 day. Clare was content to take it while 
 waiting for what the future might bring 
 forth, and congratulated herself on her 
 wisdom in doing so, when, in the second 
 year of her service, the —3rd was quartered 
 in the barracks, and Mr. Dudley Dale, now 
 a grown man, might be seen almost daily 
 in the streets of the town, or lounging on 
 the sands of its sea shore. 
 
CHAPTER YL 
 
 MRS. Thornton's good advice. 
 
 lyrRS. THOENTON had a purpose in 
 -^"-^ taking her walk on the sands this 
 morning. She meant, if possible, to meet 
 Audley Dale, and remonstrate with him on 
 the exceeding folly of his conduct. '' No- 
 thing good can come of it," she said to 
 herself. " If it had been a pretty actress, 
 now, there might have been something to 
 be said for him. I think an affair of 
 that kind, at the beginning of a young 
 man's career, is rather beneficial than other- 
 wise. It polishes them up. Ive done a 
 good deal for Audley Dale, but he's very 
 
MRS. THORNTON'S GOOD ADVICE. 95 
 
 much in want of forming still. Well, he 
 may be, if he has such tastes as these." 
 
 The " season," such as it was, was at its 
 height in Wearmouth. Consequently the 
 sands presented a far livelier scene than 
 they had done the preceding night. The 
 tide was too low for bathing, but there 
 were more people lounging to and fro on 
 the promenade and the pier. Mrs. Thorn- 
 ton did not go on the latter — you caught 
 the wind too much there, and it was apt to 
 derange the hair — but she walked to and 
 fro on the sands, just at that part most 
 especially favoured by visitors, and not one 
 of these but looked at her with the atten- 
 tion her very striking appearance was calcu- 
 lated to call forth. 
 
 Several of the officers of the — 3rd were 
 there, a bright sunshiny day like this being 
 sure to call these warriors from their own 
 quarters, to bask in the sunshine, and the 
 bright eyes that would then be abroad. 
 All these recognized, and were recognized 
 
96 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 in turn by, Mrs. Thornton, but not one 
 would she allow to accompany her. '^ Mrs. 
 Kushington may have them all to-day/' she 
 said to herself. '' I only want Audley 
 Dale." 
 
 Presently she saw him. He came on 
 with a slow step, and a face that did not 
 give one the impression of his being quite 
 at ease. 
 
 " That poor fellow knows he's got into a 
 mess," said Mrs. Thornton to herself, " and 
 don't know how to get out of it. There's Mrs. 
 Eushington laid hold of him — Milly's with 
 her. Now, will he come, or will he stay with 
 them ? Ill never forgive him if he does. 
 After this morning he may devote him- 
 self to Milly as much as he pleases, but 
 just now I do want him all to myself" 
 
 Right in the sun, as if coveting his beams 
 to light up their bravery, three ladies sat, 
 forming a mass of colour that in itself was 
 attractive enough, even if the faces under- 
 neath the plumed hats had not been so. But 
 
MRS. THORNTON'S GOOD ADVICE. 97 
 
 the faces were attractive in the opinion of all 
 the officers of the — 3rd ; at least, of those 
 who, being unmarried, had any right to 
 think of faces at all ; and there was quite a 
 cluster of them round the seat which the 
 fair trio occupied. 
 
 " How that Mrs. E,ushington does go 
 on !" said Mrs. Thornton, as she eyed this 
 group. ''I do think, when a woman's 
 turned forty, and has got a daughter nearly 
 as tall as herself, it's time to give up 
 flirting." 
 
 Then she seated herself on a bench, at 
 a considerable distance from the group she 
 was eyeing, but still quite near enough for 
 any one of them to see her. She spread 
 out her dress, and the sea-breeze fluttered 
 its folds, and sent her ribbons flying in the 
 air. She was as bright to look at as the 
 group round whom the officers had gathered, 
 and from which she wished to draw one. 
 
 ''1 do hope that Audley will come. He 
 can't say he does n't see me/' 
 
 VOL. I. 7 
 
98 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 " That woman's bent on making herself 
 conspicuous/' thought Mrs. Rushington. 
 " I know she's sitting there to catch Audley 
 Dale — and he's going !" 
 
 He lounged off presently, looking, by the 
 morning light, handsome enough to excuse 
 a lady's wishing to keep him by her side. 
 He was fair, and thin, and tall, with a 
 slight moustache and fair wavy hair. It 
 was a boyish face still, though he was 
 twenty-four, but notwithstanding his public 
 school education, and the finishing touches 
 which his regimental training had given 
 him, to say nothing of Mrs. Thornton's 
 tutelage, he had not grown very far into 
 his manhood. There was a weakness and 
 an irresolution about the face ; it might 
 pass away in time, as the character de- 
 veloped and strengthened — if development 
 and strength should come — but at present 
 there was good reason for Mrs. Thornton 
 to feel, as she looked on him, '' He's only 
 a boy after all, and an artful hussy like 
 
MBS. THORN TOF'S GOOD ADVICE. 96 
 
 Clare might do anything she liked with 
 him." 
 
 And as she looked, a very magnanimous 
 resolution, which had presented itself to her 
 the preceding night, and with w^hich neither 
 her husband nor Mrs. Eushington, nor a 
 great many people beside, would have 
 credited her, became confirmed. '' It's the 
 only thing for him," she thought. " No- 
 thing but a positive engagement will keep 
 him out of this scrape." 
 
 There was plenty of room on the bench 
 she occupied for Mr. Audley Dale to seat 
 himself beside her, but she did not want 
 him there. She liked better to have him 
 bending over her, and obliged to take a 
 little trouble to hear what she had to say. 
 Also this gave her an excuse for looking 
 back at him and making play with her 
 magnificent eyes. 
 
 In spite of that very magnanimous reso- 
 lution of hers — although she meant to tell 
 him to give himself up in good earnest to 
 
 7—2 
 
100 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 the pursuit of another — still she wanted to 
 keep him just a little. She did not care 
 one whit for the reality — it would really 
 have bored her to have had him in love 
 with her — but she liked the semblance of 
 his devotion. Even if he married, which 
 was just what she intended to tell him to 
 do, she should still wish to preserve his 
 friendship, — and friendship between a 
 woman like Mrs. Thornton and a gentle- 
 man of Audley Dale's age means a great 
 many petits soins, and a degree of empresse- 
 ment and homage, which, if it has not the 
 warmth, has very much the look of love- 
 making. 
 
 Audley Dale had to lean over her now, 
 and listen to what she had to say. It was 
 in full sight of the lady to whom she 
 wished him to give his allegiance, but that 
 did not matter ; Miss Lisdale was not to 
 have him all. Friendship had its claims 
 and its privileges, and Mrs. Thornton was 
 not going to give up hers. As he leaned. 
 
MES. THORNTON'S GOOD ADVICE. 101 
 
 some one also saw him besides the gay 
 group in the distance. Mr. Thornton had 
 been called out that morning to a man in 
 his last illness. He was proceeding to him 
 now along the sands, the cottage to which 
 he was bound being at the extreme end of 
 his parish, and near the shore. He was 
 full of his work, thinking what he should 
 best say to the dying sinner, who had never 
 entered his church, who had openly scoffed 
 at him and all ministers of religion, but 
 who now, w^hen the dark waters of death 
 were threatening to submerge him, had 
 cried, " Help, or I perish 1" 
 
 He w^as going to see this man, whose life, 
 by all report, had been one long sin, who 
 had set God at defiance, and lived as if 
 good were not in the world. His danger 
 was imminent. The message sent had inti- 
 mated that he could hardly last out the 
 day, and before him w^as the judgment with 
 its terrors — heaven or hell, with its joys or 
 horrors. Things as true to the Rector as 
 
102 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 the ground he walked on, or the sea beside 
 him. That unseen world, with its awful 
 depths of endless anguish, its never-end- 
 iDg pangs, its unfathomable darkness, on 
 the one hand — and its bliss, of which no 
 tongue can tell, which the poet's wildest 
 imaginings could only shadow faintly, with 
 its white-robed angels and never-ending 
 songs of praise and triumph, — was as real to 
 this man as the forms and shapes around 
 him, as the voices and laughter borne on 
 the sea-breeze, as the men and women 
 passing to and fro, as the home which he 
 had left, as the cottage to which he was 
 hastening — as the two sitting on yon 
 bench, wrapped up in each other's converse, 
 and apparently oblivious of him, and of 
 aught but themselves in the world. 
 
 There they were. His wife, and the 
 man to whom he had forbidden her to 
 speak — shameless I lost — insensate ! — 
 Would nothing serve them, but that in 
 the eyes of all they must proclaim their 
 
MRS. THORNTON'S GOOD ADVICE. 103 
 
 sinful weakness ? Had his wife chosen the 
 most pubhc spot of all wherein to sit and 
 defy him ? They did not see him — to all 
 appearance they saw nothing but each 
 other. What was it — what could it be, 
 but love in its intensest and guiltiest form, 
 which could blind them thus, not only to 
 his anger but to all conventionalities ? He 
 knew too little of the world to know ho^7 
 far a woman may go, and yet have no severer 
 censure cast on her than for levity. Flir- 
 tation — ^platonic friendships— all the border- 
 land between passion and indifference were 
 unknown to him. Mrs. Rushington had 
 been quite long enough in his parish for 
 him to have learned a little from her, but 
 he had never thought of watching Mrs. 
 Rushington. Once or twice he had seen 
 things in her which had made him think 
 her not altogether the fittest guardian for 
 a young girl, nor so staid and decorous as 
 a matron of her years should be, but he 
 had withheld his judgment and abstained 
 
104 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 from condemnation. It would have been 
 well if he had been equally tolerant and 
 patient with his wife. 
 
 All the prayers whicli he had been turn- 
 ing over in his mind as fit to offer up left 
 him now — all the words which he had been 
 stringing together as calculated to awaken 
 the sinner to a sense of his desperate con- 
 dition, were washed from the tablet of his 
 mind, just as the waves of the sea, as they 
 poured in, washed away the footprints of the 
 children who had been playing on the sands. 
 For a moment he stood convulsed with 
 shame and anger ; then he recovered himself. 
 " I will put all thoughts of this woman and 
 her sin away — I will go upon my Master's, 
 work, and, till I have done it, she and her 
 guiltiness shall trouble me no more." 
 
 By a strong effort he did it. Turned 
 his head away, and went resolutely on ; 
 and Mrs. Thornton and Audley Dale, who 
 had seen nothing of the stern eyes fixed 
 upon them, continued their conversation. 
 
MRS. THORNTON'S GOOD ADVICE. 105 
 
 The lady had assumed a maternal tone — 
 she did now and then to Audley, and when 
 they were alone she called him by his Chris- 
 tian name. She did so now. 
 
 " I was very much vexed by something 
 I saw from my bedroom window last night," 
 she said. '' I need n't tell you, Audley, what 
 it was. How can you be so foolish ? You 
 do n't know to what this kind of thing may 
 lead — besides the bad taste of it 1 — The 
 utter absurdity altogether." 
 
 The young man coloured while she spoke. 
 He understood her; but then it was a 
 difficult subject to discuss with a lady — 
 even with Mrs. Thornton, who was not 
 just like other ladies. Of all but utter 
 folly he knew himself to be innocent, but 
 then how could he tell her even that ? — He 
 was more concerned about Mrs. Thornton's 
 share in the conversation than she was for 
 herself He felt much more awkward than 
 she did, who was quite prepared to speak 
 of the matter as lightly as one man would 
 
106 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 to another. Men often did speak to Mrs. 
 Thornton as if she were one of themselves. 
 Perhaps her being so constituted that they 
 could do so was one chief reason why, with 
 all her beauty, with all the admiration she 
 had inspired in the many who had looked 
 upon her face and listened to her voice, her 
 own husband was the only one who had 
 ever loved her. She was not masculine, 
 and certainly not mannish, but she would 
 speak of things that women are shy of 
 speaking of, and let them be spoken of in 
 her presence without reproof, meaning all 
 the time to be as staid and decorous as any 
 rector's wife should be. It was not igno- 
 rance on her part. She had had plenty of 
 opportunities of learning otherwise ; it was 
 not stupidity, for she was a clever woman ; 
 it was rather a want of that fine inner sense 
 of modesty — the reverence which womanli- 
 ness owes to itself, and so unconsciously 
 exacts from others. Audley Dale, if not a 
 very wise young man, was not a bad one. 
 
MRS, THORNTON'S GOOD ADVICE. 107 
 
 Even all the pollutions that a boy must 
 pass through in a classical training had not 
 neutralized the effect that his sisters, and 
 his mother in her lifetime, had had upon 
 him, and he hesitated and stammered now, 
 less because he was ashamed of the folly to 
 which Mrs. Thornton had alluded, than be- 
 cause he did not know how to speak of it 
 to her. 
 
 She spared him the necessity of re- 
 plying. 
 
 '' I see you are sorry for it," she said. 
 '^Be guided by me, and break it off alto- 
 gether. Don't come near our place for a 
 little while. I shall see quite enough of 
 you as it is. I've spoken to Clare, and I 
 think she has grace enough to be ashamed 
 of herself. What an ugly creature she is, 
 to be sure ! Now, I've something else to 
 propose. Do you know, I think the very 
 best thing possible would be for you to 
 marry ?" 
 
 He could answer her now, and he did 
 
108 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 with a light laugh, colouring up, however, 
 the while. 
 
 " Find me the means first. You would 
 not have me take my wife to the bar- 
 racks ?" 
 
 '' No — you ought to marry sensibly. I 
 do n't say for money, entirely ; but get 
 money. Your family and profession are 
 in your favour. You're tolerably good- 
 looking, without flattery, and Mrs. E,ush- 
 ington over there would almost give her 
 eyes to have you for her son- in law." 
 
 " And Mrs. Eushington's daughter V 
 His tone was a little ruffled. The colour 
 on his cheeks had deepened, and he looked 
 flushed as if with excitement. Was it pos- 
 sible that he was not prepared to carry on 
 the discussion as coolly as Mrs. Thornton 
 seemed disposed to do ? 
 
 " Oh, a girl of that age can be done any- 
 thing with, only take her in time. In Miss 
 Lisdale's case, I should say, especially — 
 take her in time. She's a shrewd, sensible 
 
MRS. THORNTON'S GOOD ADVICE. 109 
 
 girl, and will soon be aware of tlie advan- 
 tages on her side. Just now, her mother 
 is only disposed to think of those on yours. 
 It won t be very long before she outgrows 
 what little influence her mother has over 
 her. Just now, if exercised in your direc- 
 tion, it might have some sway. You want 
 a wife — if only to keep you clear of such 
 a piece of folly as you've been lately led 
 into. Milly Lisdale is just the girl for you : 
 staid, quiet, fairly pretty, and good style." 
 Mrs. Thornton prided herself on always 
 giving other women their full meed of 
 praise, and to do her justice she generally 
 gave good measure. " She has as much 
 money as I should think you have any 
 right to expect ; has a fair share of com- 
 mon sense, and is, I fancy, a little common- 
 place. All the better — those kind of 
 women always make the best wives and 
 the happiest." 
 
 Then she sighed. Of course the sigh 
 meant to imply that she was not common- 
 
no OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 place, and not happy, but Mr. Audlej Dale 
 did not care to understand her. 
 
 " Thank you," he said, " for the honour 
 you have done me in thinking so much of 
 my interests, but I am afraid I have hardly 
 given the subject sufficient consideration, 
 as yet." He was longing to tell her he 
 resented hearing Miss Lisdale's name in 
 her mouth — that to hear her spoken of by 
 any one, in the tone Mrs. Thornton had 
 used, was insufferable to him ; but how 
 could he ? That would have been telling 
 too much — more than, till now, he was 
 aware of himself Mrs. Thornton would 
 never have understood it, but it is quite 
 possible for a man in the first dawn of his 
 early love to be as tender, and coy, and re- 
 verential over it as a girl over hers. 
 
 She continued — "Now, I wish you to 
 think it over, and promise me — no, don't 
 promise, for if you can't see the neces- 
 sity of breaking off this other absurd affair, 
 without being bound by your word, a pro- 
 
3IBS. THORNTON'S GOOD ADVICE, ill 
 
 mise won t influence you. Break the thing 
 off at once and for ever — the sharpest mea- 
 sures are the best, and in the long run the 
 kindest. Now, I think I must be going 
 home. I've got to meet the Soup and 
 Blanket Committee. Mrs. Rushington's on 
 it ; but she hardly ever comes — when she 
 does, I think we should get on better with- 
 out her. You'll be at her garden party to- 
 morrow ? I hope I shall see that you've 
 profited by the good advice I've given you." 
 Then she w^alked on, leaving him about 
 as thankful for her good advice as the 
 recipients of such benevolence generally 
 are. 
 
CHAPTER VII. 
 
 THE HONOURABLE MRS. RUSHINGTON. 
 
 XT is quite time she was introduced at 
 -*- full length. It is only her due not to 
 leave her any longer in the background, 
 Mrs. Hushington's place on any scene being 
 decidedly in the front. She was certainly 
 handsome, and, at first sight, much in the 
 same style as Mrs. Thornton ; but a second 
 look revealed a great difference between the 
 two. Both were pale and colourless, but 
 Mrs. Thornton's pallor gave the impression 
 of ill-health, of a life that had been lived 
 too fast. It seemed hardly natural to her, 
 as if the roses would have bloomed there 
 
THE HON. MRS. RUSHINGTON. 113 
 
 had they not been withered away. That 
 was the reason rouge, when she dared use 
 it, improved her so much, which it would 
 never have done to Mrs. E-ushington, 
 whose paleness was of a healthier kind 
 altogether, a clear olive tint, giving the im- 
 pression of perfect health. Any colour on 
 that face would have seemed as impertinent 
 as on a statue's. Her hair was black like 
 Mrs. Thornton's, but not with the same 
 blackness. It had neither the glossiness nor 
 the ripple ; it was the blackness of midnight, 
 rather than that of the raven's wing, which 
 the other's resembled. Her features were 
 good, but in the least degree heavy; you 
 would think of the sphinx, of the Egyptian 
 countenance at its best, as you looked at 
 them. Mrs. Thornton's would remind you 
 of a Roman contadina transferred for her 
 beauty to some ahen sphere, and so paled 
 and worn before her time. 
 
 Mrs. Eushington's deep velvety eyes 
 never sparkled with the glitter and light 
 
 VOL. I. 8 
 
114 OUT OF II ER SPHERE. 
 
 that shone in the other's ; they were 
 languid, pleading, tender, indolent — the 
 ox-eyes of Juno, some one once called 
 them in Mrs. Thornton's hearing, and 
 she, who was not always good-natured 
 when speaking of Mrs. Bushington, said 
 that there certainly was something alto- 
 gether bovine about her. She was large 
 and tall ; a goddess amongst women, and if 
 her manners had been in keeping with her 
 physique, they ought to have been stately 
 and impassive ; instead of which Mrs. 
 Eushington, though she did not deserve to 
 be called a '^ frisky matron," was certainly 
 a gushing one. She was forty-two, and 
 impulsive as a girl ; much more so than her 
 own daughter; a desperate flirt, candidly 
 owning that she liked homage, and doing 
 her best to win it. 
 
 But no one ever said or thought ill of 
 Mrs. Bushington ; and there was this great 
 difference between her and Mrs. Thornton — 
 no man, let him admire her as boldly as he 
 
THE HON. MRS. BUSHINGTON. 115 
 
 might, ever forgot tlie fact of her womanli- 
 ness. She might be worshipped, and she 
 liked worship, but she stood on a pedestal 
 to receive it. There was no possibility of 
 treating her as bonne camarade, or of indulg- 
 ing in the freedom of allusion w^hich Mrs. 
 Thornton permitted. If any one had ever 
 done so, Mrs. Rushington would have 
 opened her great velvety eyes, and looked 
 at the offender in utter, blank, apparent 
 incomprehension of his meaning, but he 
 would have been banished from her pre- 
 sence thenceforth ; no second chance would 
 have been given him of offending. She 
 always had her court around her, but the 
 courtiers w^ere kept in admirable order. 
 
 She was like most large women, languid 
 in her movements, but there was an immense 
 fund of vivacity and impetuosity underneath, 
 which very often drew her into slight sins 
 against the minor convenances. She professed 
 to have a profound regard for etiquette, 
 but was constantly violating it ; she be- 
 
116 OUT OF TIER SPHERE. 
 
 lieved herself profoundly versed in know- 
 ledge of the world, but had a naivete^ which 
 is very rarely met with in a school-girl of 
 our day ; she had the slightest lisp in the 
 world, which gave an infantine simplicity 
 to her utterance, and she was simple in 
 many things beside ; only in the main her 
 intense w^omanliness kept her straight, and 
 kept other people about her straight too, 
 where another woman with the same 
 amount of vanity and half the beauty would 
 have found it very difficult indeed to have 
 kept, in appearance at least, from slightly 
 swerving from the path it behoved her to 
 tread. 
 
 And, as I said, nobody ever thought any 
 harm about Mrs. Kushington ; she was a 
 privileged person. Thinking of her and 
 Mrs. Thornton one instinctively recalls the 
 proverb of the favoured individual who 
 may steal the horse while his luckless com- 
 peer dare not look over the hedge. 
 
 Mrs. Eushington had a husband, just as 
 
THE HON. MRS. BUSHINGTON. 117 
 
 she had a riding-horse, and a pony-carriage, 
 a house and a conservatory ; but it was not 
 from him she derived the prefix to her name, 
 but from the Honourable Percy Lisdale, 
 whom she had married when she was one- 
 and-twenty, who had run through half her 
 money — she having unfortunately been an 
 orphan and her own mistress when she took 
 him — and would have run through the other 
 half had he not died first. She was not very 
 sorry — he had not been a pattern husband — ■ 
 and she married again two years later, but 
 this time was wiser in money matters, having 
 her own fortune settled on herself, while 
 Milly was amply provided for under her 
 fathers will, he having lived just long 
 6 nought to bequeath to her the ten thousand 
 pounds which a great aunt had left to him. 
 '' Tie it up tight," he said to the lawyer 
 when he gave him directions, " tie it up 
 tight. There^s not one man in a thousand 
 fit to be trusted with the spending his 
 wife's money." And he certainly had 
 
118 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 not been the one in the thousand. So 
 Milly was well provided for, and so was her 
 mother. 
 
 Mr. Kushington's income was not large, 
 but with what his wife added to it, was 
 enough for comfort. He was a barrister 
 by profession, but as she told her friends, 
 with that charming candour which distin- 
 guished her, she believed he had never had 
 a brief in his life, and would n't have known 
 what to do with one if he had. On his 
 marriage, he had given up whatever faint 
 hope he might have had of sitting on the 
 woolsack, and devoted the rest of his days 
 to the pursuit of photography, and to the 
 filling his post as Mrs. Eushington s husband 
 in a manner worthy of the dignity to which 
 she had raised him. He was very quiet, 
 very gentlemanly, and very inoffensive ; an 
 obedient, well trained man, who would 
 have filled the post of Prince Consort, if it 
 had fallen to his share, with all due decorum 
 and propriety, and indeed to be Mrs. 
 
THE RON. MRS. RUSHINGTON. 119 
 
 Eushington's husband was not much better 
 than being a Prince Consort in private 
 life. 
 
 Mrs. Rushington had taken the house 
 where they now hved. Previously they 
 had been travelling on the Continent, with 
 a view of perfecting Milly's accent — so her 
 mother said — then she considered it time 
 to settle, " Take a place and a certain 
 position, John," she gravely said to her 
 husband, " and bring Milly out into so- 
 ciety." 
 
 Beechside, at Wearmouth, presented 
 itself as a suitable residence. The house 
 was a good one — a modern villa — sub- 
 stantially built, and fronting the sea, lying 
 between the more populous portion of 
 Wearmouth, and that quieter part in- 
 cluded in St. Hilda parish. A little 
 distance, too, from the row or two of 
 terraces and parades that had sprung up 
 for the benefit of the visitors to the place. 
 The grounds were well laid out, if not 
 
120 OUT OF ITER SPHERE. 
 
 very large, and they were surrounded by a 
 stone wall, which gave sufficient privacy 
 to Mrs. Ilushington's garden parties when- 
 ever she held them. Of course what little 
 society there was in Wearmouth gathered 
 round her. She was its acknowledged 
 leader before she had been six months in 
 the place. The " Honourable" had a great 
 deal to do with it — they thought much 
 of that at Wearmouth — though some 
 said that as Mrs. Rushington only de- 
 rived it from her first husband, she ought 
 to have relinquished it upon marrying a 
 second. 
 
 All the clergy were hospitably entertained 
 by her. She was not particular as to their 
 different shades of opinion. Church was 
 church according to her, and whether high 
 or low, broad or narrow, mattered very 
 little. She always went, as a matter of 
 principle, to St. Hilda, and believed its 
 Eector to be one of the cleverest men in 
 the world. She did not care very much 
 
THE HON. MRS. RUSHINGTON. 121 
 
 for his wife — it was not that she was 
 jealous of her, but few women ever did 
 take cordially to Mrs. Thornton ; and now 
 and then, when decorum was strong upon 
 Mrs. Rushington, she intimated to her 
 husband her opinion that Mrs. Thornton 
 was not just the sort of person for Milly 
 to know. 
 
 Milly herself thought differently. She 
 got on very well with Mrs. Thornton ; and 
 whatever latent motherliness there might 
 be in the other s heart, was called up by 
 her. She really liked Milly — she would 
 have liked to see very much more of 
 her than she did, if her mother would 
 but have permitted ; but Mrs. Rush- 
 ington had her prejudices at times, and 
 she did not like to see Milly with a w^oman 
 of whose antecedents she had her sus- 
 picions. 
 
 Milly herself gave way to her mother, 
 to some extent ; but she liked Mrs. Thorn- 
 ton. She was clever, and had some- 
 
122 OCT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 thing to talk about ; and Milly had 
 not the highest opinion of her mothers 
 wisdom. She was a sensible, well-bred 
 girl, not remarkably pretty ; but, what 
 was far more in. her mother's eyes, with 
 an unmistakable air of good - breeding 
 about her. 
 
 "I wouldn't have cared how plain she 
 was," said Mrs. Eushington, "if only she 
 had style, and thank heaven she has that. 
 It would have been too hard upon me if 
 she hadn't." 
 
 Milly managed her mamma pretty well, 
 by never openly opposing her ; and to 
 some extent she let her have her own 
 way in this matter of Mrs. Thornton. 
 Somehow it was tacitly understood between 
 Milly and her step-father that Mrs. Rush- 
 ington w^as to be managed, humoured, 
 indulged, and let to have her own way 
 just as much as was good for her. They 
 would never have owned it, for the world, 
 to each other ; but they treated her like a 
 
THE HON. MRS. RUSHINGTON. 123 
 
 great spoiled child. In this family, though 
 very few outsiders knew it, the position 
 of mother and daughter was pretty well 
 reversed. 
 
 Milly took much better care of her mother 
 than her mother did of her ; and, all the 
 time, Mrs. Eushington imagined herself the 
 most prudent of matrons, the most wary 
 of mothers, and that, unless in a convent, 
 no girl could be kept under a stricter 
 regime than her own. 
 
 Milly was quite content ; she had as 
 much liberty as she wanted, and a great 
 deal more than . it would have been wise 
 to have allowed many girls. She listened 
 to her mamma's lectures on the hienseances 
 with the utmost decorum, and had her 
 own way in a great many things besides 
 that of visiting Mrs. Thornton, without 
 her mother having the remotest idea that 
 Milly's way and her own were entirely 
 different ; or that when she dilated to 
 her husband on the enormous difficulty of 
 
124 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 disposing of a girl in Milly's position, in 
 a suitable manner, Milly had in some 
 sort settled the matter by mentally, at 
 least, disposing of herself 
 
CHAPTEE YIIL 
 
 THE MEETING ON THE SANDS. 
 
 AUDLEY DALE remained for some 
 little time where Mrs. Thornton had 
 left him, chewing the cud of fancy that had 
 very little sweetness in it. What on earth 
 did she mean by talking to him like that 
 about Milly Lisdale ? Could n't a man look, 
 at a girl, talk to her, show a little pleasure 
 in her society, but that he must be set 
 down at once as in love with her: or 
 what was worse — ten times worse — his 
 cheek flushed angrily at the thought — 
 she in love with him !— Milly of all girls, 
 who was as good as gold, and worth a 
 
12G OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 dozen such as her own mother and Mrs. 
 Thornton put together. She to be spoken 
 of as if she were ready to fling herself 
 at a man's head for the sake of his family 
 and connections, and buy him with her 
 money, if she did not become aware too 
 soon how much that money ought to buy 
 for her. 
 
 If he had only paused to analyze his 
 emotions — which he never did, as we none 
 of us ever do — he would have discovered 
 that this very anger at Mrs. Thornton's 
 interference — this resentment at Miss 
 Lisdale's name being uttered as she had 
 uttered it, were tolerable indications of 
 the state of his feelings for her. But he 
 did nothing of the kind, only pushed the 
 sand impatiently to and fro with his foot, 
 as if he were trying to dig a hole in it ; 
 and presently glancing at the bench Mrs. 
 Rushington and her daughter had occupied, 
 and seeing it vacant, made up his mind to 
 return to the barracks at once. 
 
TEE MEETING ON THE SANDS. 127 
 
 There was a way of getting to them 
 without going through the town, and this 
 way, being much the quieter of the two, 
 suited Audley Dale this morning. It took 
 him by the sands ; and as soon as he 
 had left the part most frequented by 
 visitors, it was secluded enough, leading 
 past the martello towers, and here and 
 there the cottage of an outlying parishioner 
 of St. Hilda. This was just what Audley 
 Dale wanted this morning. He had been 
 troubled enough by what had taken place 
 the previous night. The chains which he 
 had forged in his folly had been pulled 
 just tightly enough to remind him that 
 they were still in existence; and then 
 Mrs. Thornton was aware of his folly, and 
 had favoured him with her advice. As 
 if it was so easy to take it — as if it was 
 so easy to throw a woman aside, when 
 he had been fool enough, in his own hand, 
 to promise her, almost in so many words, 
 that he would make her his wife ! 
 
128 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 And through it all, Milly's sweet, good 
 face was before lihu. If he was weak, at 
 least he was not wicked, and amidst all 
 this trouble into which he had plunged, 
 the bewilderment caused by advice being 
 given him which he was unable to follow, 
 and by other advice which he would have 
 been only too glad to have followed if he 
 could, the thought of the girl who he had 
 said was as " good as gold," came to tor- 
 ment instead of soothing him, weighing him 
 down with a sense of shame and unwor- 
 thiness. 
 
 '' If I do n't get her," he said, " itll be all 
 my own fault ; if that Jezebel does as she 
 promised and consults a la\vyer, and so 
 makes me the laughing stock of the whole 
 county, it '11 be no more than I deserve. I 
 shall sell out in that case and take the first 
 ship to New Zealand, look out for a spot 
 where no English papers can reach me, and 
 where I shan't have the least chance of 
 hearing when Milly Lisdale has married 
 
THE MEETING ON THE SANDS. 129 
 
 some fellow who, it's to be hoped, won't be 
 half such a fool as I've been." 
 
 As he went along, thinking himself the 
 most miserable being in existence, and not 
 comforted at all by remembering how much 
 of his misery was caused by his folly, 
 he saw the tall, spare figure of the Rector 
 of St. Hilda in the distance. Just then 
 these two had all of the shore that was in 
 sight to themselves. The one had left the 
 town, the pier, and the parade, behind him, 
 and, the beach here forming a small bay, 
 they were shut out from his sight : the 
 other had just quitted the cottage to which 
 he had been summoned, a lonely hut, 
 standing quite apart, some distance from 
 the town, and with not another dwelling 
 beyond it on the opposite side for miles. 
 
 He had been standing almost face 
 to face with death. Doing his best to 
 bring the sinner to repentance, and avert 
 the terrors of the coming doom. In that 
 unseen world to which the miserable 
 
 VOL. I. 9 
 
130 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 wretch to whom he had been ministering- 
 was hastening he believed. He beheved 
 with all his heart and soul the awful tidings 
 he had had to tell — the im23ending hell, 
 the possible heaven. It was all as real, as 
 true to him as the earth on which he 
 walked — the sea, whose murmurs were in 
 his ears. He had been with a soul that 
 was all but lost, he had been telling it how 
 salvation might be attained, in the same 
 spirit in which he might have held out a 
 rope to a drowning creature sinking in the 
 waves. He had been wrestling with all his 
 force in prayer, trying his best to bring 
 before this perishing outcast the only means 
 by which safety from everlasting doom 
 might be obtained. Had he succeeded ? 
 Who could tell ? A fierce paroxysm of 
 pain had made the patient incapable of 
 attending to his ministrations, and this had 
 been succeeded by a fit of utter uncon- 
 sciousness ; it was more than possible that 
 on this death might supervene, that before 
 
THE MEETING ON TEE SANDS. 131 
 
 he returned in the evening he should find 
 the wild, reckless life had closed without a 
 sign. Had he gathered this perishing soul 
 within the fold — had it been given him to 
 save it for evermore ? If only he could have 
 known ! If only the age of miracles had 
 not been wholly past, and that from sea or 
 sky some breath might whisper, some sign 
 arise that evil had lost its hold, and that 
 there was yet one more penitent over 
 whom the starry hosts might rejoice with 
 trembling ! 
 
 And in this frame of mind he saw the 
 man advancing towards him whom of all 
 others in the world he believed his greatest 
 enemy. Not yet in deed — he had spoken 
 to himself of shame and sin, but he had 
 only meant the light looks, the unseemly 
 words, the profane thoughts, that were as 
 yet only the preludes to the deeper wrong 
 that might come. Coming as he did from 
 a sinner dying, and, perhaps, unpardoned, 
 earth seemed so little, his own hurt, his 
 
 9—2 
 
132 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 own passions, so insignificant compared to 
 the imminent peril of a lost soul. Was there 
 not one all but lost before him ? Was it 
 not his duty as priest, as God's appointed 
 minister, to warn this one of the error of 
 his ways ? to bid him turn aside while yet 
 there was time ? What was his own private 
 sorrow in the matter ? What was it that 
 this sinner had sinned against himself? 
 that, if not warned, he might do him the 
 deadliest wrong one man could work 
 another ? Should he be dumb and mute for 
 that ? should he lift no voice of warning, 
 because in this matter it might seem as if 
 he were the last who should speak ? What 
 were all the conventionalities of life, the 
 forms that men made chains of for them- 
 selves, to the chance of turning the sinner 
 from the error of his ways, and bringing the 
 wicked to repentance ? 
 
 He came up to Audley Dale accordingly 
 with outstretched hand, instead of passing 
 him by, as he had meant before to do, with 
 
THE MEETING ON THE SANDS. 133 
 
 averted eyes ; and Audley, who was bliss 
 fully unconscious of having given offence, 
 took the hand and wondered what Mr. 
 Thornton had to say to him. He wondered 
 still more when he did hear what he had 
 to say. 
 
 '' I am about to speak to you on a matter 
 which perhaps is the very last that you and 
 I should be expected to discuss. When 
 the domestic peace of a man is invaded the 
 invader is generally considered the very last 
 he should address." 
 
 "That confounded Clare!" thought 
 Audley. " Hang it ! I'm to catch it from 
 him as well as from Mrs. Thornton. Did he 
 see me, too, last night ?" 
 
 " I am not influenced by convention- 
 alities — where I see a wrong I think I 
 should point it out — where a misdoer, I 
 should warn him. If the wrong affects 
 myself, if the misdoing is to my own hurt, 
 is that any reason why I should desist from 
 telling the transgressor to pause in time. 
 
134 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 to pause before weakness and folly, bom 
 perhaps of idleness, may become sin and 
 undoing ; to remember that there is another 
 beside himself, that — oh ! iihe cannot think 
 for her, how can / bring myself to speak of 
 the woman in this case ?" 
 
 " He's a trump, to take it to heart like 
 that," thought Audley, impressed by the 
 passionate earnestness of the man before him. 
 In all his easy-going days he had never met 
 anything like it. His father was decorum 
 itself; but when he had to deal with sin, 
 with the hard ugly things underlying all our 
 smooth, bland civilization, he did so with 
 a suave evasiveness, passing on, looking 
 another way, as the Priest and the Levite 
 did to that unpleasant-looking person, the 
 wounded traveller. There were awkward 
 things in the world ; all people were not as 
 nice and as well-behaved as they should be ; 
 but the less said about such matters the 
 better — they were not things to be discussed 
 in a pulpit or before young people. As to 
 
THE MEETING ON THE SANDS. 135 
 
 Audley's brother, the Rev. Maurice Dale, 
 he was earnest enough in his way, but then 
 it was earnestness of another sort altogether 
 to Mr. Thornton's. To think of this man 
 wealing so grave a face because his waiting- 
 woman had been detected in impropriety 
 whicK might lead to harm ! Audley felt 
 grieved for him, and ashamed of himself. 
 " I am very sorry," he began. 
 
 " I hope you mean it," said the other, 
 impressively. *' I know too well how men 
 of the vorld— men of this world, at least — 
 look on such matters : it is but a woman 
 lost and undone, only a home dishonoured, 
 a life worse than lost — they have had their 
 play, and another pays the cost. If I dared 
 to speak to you of other and of higher things 
 1 would. Surely to you I ought to dare, 
 to you^ tiained in a Christian home, and 
 bearing tiie name you do, you at least 
 ought to be that rare thing, a Christian 
 soldier — one who holds his duty to his God 
 dearer evea than his duty to his queen — 
 
136 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 you at least must know the inevitable out- 
 come of such a course — the wages of sin, 
 into which, however pleasant the fruit, 
 transgression surely ripens." 
 
 " I never was more ashamed of myself in 
 my life," said Audley. "I give you my 
 honour, you shall have no cause to complain 
 of me again." " Hang that Jezebel," aside, 
 " if he only knew what a fix I'm in with 
 her !" 
 
 " I wish I could think so," said the other 
 eagerly; "having spoken to you, not so 
 much as one gentleman to another vho has- 
 forgotten the trust placed in him, but rather 
 as God's minister, warning one that ff he sins 
 against him, he sins yet more deeplf against 
 another and an infinitely higher, I wish I 
 could feel that it will be as you ssy." 
 
 " I know all that, my dear sir," gasped 
 Audley, all his usual nerve and self-confi- 
 dence paralysed by the intense earnestness 
 of the man who was speaking to him, and 
 feeling more like a boy called to order by 
 
THE MEETING ON THE SANDS. 137 
 
 his sclioolmaster than he had ever yet done 
 in all his boyish life — " but — but — upon 
 my soul — no, I mean upon my honour — on 
 my word, you make too much of it. The 
 whole thing has been the sheerest, maddest 
 folly on my part. I wish I could explain, 
 I wish I could tell — but there, the whole 
 thing is unworthy the troubling you with. 
 I have been sorry for it all along. How the 
 devil I got drawn" into it — I mean, how ever 
 it happened, is more than I can say. But 
 there, I hope you will believe me when I 
 assure you, that if I have acted like a fool 
 in this matter, that is the utmost of my 
 offending, and that it shall never be the 
 cause of annoyance to you again." 
 
 " I believe you, and I hope, with all my 
 heart, that you will believe I have spoken 
 not only out of regard to myself but to you. 
 In such a matter a man might well be ex- 
 cused for being selfish, but I don't think 
 I have been entirely so." 
 
 " Of course not — good heavens, no I 
 
138 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 There are very few who would take such a 
 matter to heart as you hav^e done, or give 
 an offender a warning so kindly. I owe 
 you a thousand thanks — and — and — you'll 
 not be too hard on her." 
 
 " Is it for you to become her intercessor ?" 
 cried the other, in a tone whose sharp pain 
 Audley Dale failed to understand. " Hard 
 on her ! Might it not be better if I could 
 be ?" And a change passed over his face, 
 such as might be caused by some sharp 
 paroxysm of pain. For a moment the lips 
 quivered, as if they found speech impossible, 
 then he waved Audley Dale away — '*We 
 will go our separate ways now, but I think 
 we shall tread them more peacefully be- 
 cause of this meeting." 
 
 " I hope so ! To think of my folly 
 causing you so much vexation ! But I 
 wish you could believe that it has been 
 only folly " 
 
 " If I believed that it was more," — and 
 now there was a light in Harold Thornton's 
 
THE MEETING ON THE SANDS. 139 
 
 eyes that said "dangerous/' the light of 
 the wild beast nature underlying all that 
 saintly life, all those beliefs in the unseen, 
 all that faith in dogmas and creeds by 
 which it had been tamed and kept down — 
 " if I thought that it was, as yet, anything 
 else, though I have come from the death- 
 bed of a sinner hastening to that eternity 
 upon whose brink we are all standing, 
 though I am God's minister, sworn heart 
 and soul to do His work, to offer my own 
 feelings, my own passions, as the most ac- 
 ceptable sacrifices on His altar — I think — I 
 think the natural man would rise within 
 me, and it would be scarcely safe for us two 
 to stand as we are doing, face to face, upon 
 these sands. No, young man, 1 do acquit 
 you of aught but folly — had I dreamed of 
 anything more, it would have been righted 
 in another manner." 
 
 Then the two did go on their separate 
 ways, and Audley Dale said to himself — 
 
 "Well out of that at last. I think that 
 
140 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 poor fellow is half crazed. I'll talk this 
 over with Masters, and, somehow or other, 
 he must see me out of this scrape with 
 Clare. Hang the jade ! To think of her 
 bringing a sermon like this upon me ! to 
 say nothing of Mrs. Thornton's lecture. A 
 hard morning's work I've had of it between 
 the two." 
 
 And as Mr. Thornton went on, his 
 thoughts were — 
 
 " Have I spoken effectually ? Have I 
 been too harsh with him? Have I held 
 out threats where I should only have used 
 persuasion ? I think not, I hope not. He 
 took it all in good part — in better part than 
 I could have dared to hope for — and he 
 has given me his word that this folly shall 
 cease. He stands on his honour now — the 
 vainest, idlest thing it seems of all — and 
 yet such men as he are bound by it, where 
 religion would fail to persuade, where virtue 
 would fail to move. His honour ! he holds 
 by it more than by Heaven, would abide 
 
THE MEETING ON THE SANDS. 141 
 
 by it rather than by God. Well, it is his 
 God ! and by his God he has sworn to me. 
 Surely I may be content — and yet, if I 
 could only have brought him to the feet of 
 mine '/' 
 
CHAPTEE IX. 
 
 AUDLEY DALE ASKS COUNSEL, AND HA^ 
 IT GIVEN. 
 
 "m /TAUEICE DALE^S Eectory and paa- 
 -*^*-'- toral fold were exactly ^ve miles 
 from the farthest point of Wearmouth. A 
 lonely place, with a few fishers' huts 
 for habitation, one gentleman's house 
 which had not been occupied for twenty 
 years, another, with whose owner the 
 young Eector was not on good terms, a 
 church, bare, plain and ugly, with one bell, 
 and that cracked : flat, unlovely scenery, a 
 wide expanse of sand and coast in front, a 
 wider expanse of downs, where stunted 
 
AUDLEY DALE ASKS COUNSEL. 143 
 
 herbage only grew, and where stunted 
 sheep fed in the rear. No hedges to divide 
 what few fields there were — few men and 
 women, fewer trees — about as unpromising 
 a place altogether as any young aspirant for 
 success in life could be set down in to begin 
 his career. 
 
 The parsonage was a plain, ugly grey 
 stone house, that never looked warm even 
 in summer time ; that chilled you to lopk 
 upon, even on the sunniest day, as it would 
 to let the eyes rest on a huge block of 
 Wenham ice. In the garden grew a few 
 stunted wallflowers, and there were a few 
 attempts at flower beds, but they were 
 badly kept, and the lawn was rugged and 
 besprinkled with dandelions. A few pota- 
 toes and other vegetables were in the rear, 
 but the young E-ector did not care very 
 much for horticulture, and left his man of 
 all work — who was pretty well past work 
 altogether — to do as much or as little as he 
 pleased. The front garden was divided from 
 
144 OUT OF II ER SPHERE. 
 
 the road that wound before it by a low stone 
 hedge, and on the inner side of this hedge 
 grew two or three tamarisks, the only 
 green things which flourished here. You 
 could not perceive the sea from the Rec- 
 tory garden, though you might from one 
 or two of the upper windows, but you 
 could hear its murmur, as indeed you would, 
 go to what part of Tring you might. The 
 ocean seemed the one great living fact in 
 that still place. If it were not for its 
 never-ending voice, you might have been 
 tempted to think that the last day had 
 come and gone, and that the world, having 
 done its work, had gone to sleep for ever. 
 
 If one person in the course of an hour passed 
 the Rectory grounds that was the most ; so, 
 without scandalizing the proprieties, Mau- 
 rice Dale and his guest. Temple Masters, 
 coulds tand on either side the little white 
 painted garden gate and smoke their cigars. 
 Maurice had done his work for tlie day. 
 He did not delight in early services, there- 
 
A UDLEY DALE ASKS CO UNSEL. 145 
 
 fore he never gave them ; but he had 
 visited two old women, and one old man ; 
 given the former tea, and the latter tobacco ; 
 looked in at the school, and wondered why 
 it was that poor people's children had such an 
 especial leaning to dirty noses ; had strolled 
 through the churchyard, and had a little 
 chat with the sexton, then went in to 
 lunch with Temple Masters, who had just 
 come in from fishing, and felt himself .a 
 man with his day before him. 
 
 How long the days were in that old- 
 world parsonage, and that little sandy nook 
 of the world, with its stillness broken only 
 by the everlasting voice of the ocean, with 
 the little cares, and homely troubles that 
 made up the lives of those around — so little 
 and so homely, and yet so often the page 
 by page, the line by line, by which a 
 whole tragedy was written. It would 
 have been out of the question for any one 
 in the Kev. Maurice Dale's position to 
 have been sent there, had not a combination 
 
 VOL. I. 10 
 
146 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 of prudential motives dictated his banish- 
 ment to what might else seem a clerical 
 Siberia. 
 
 Tring fell vacant just at an opportune 
 time. It would be an easy position for 
 him to fill, till a better offered itself ; and 
 the living was not a very poor one ; and 
 the Rev. Maurice would be safe there — 
 out of the way of doing mischief, his father 
 hoped — that is, of saying things which, if 
 they were bad enough in the mouths of 
 laymen, were infinitely worse from the lips 
 of those who were not of the laity. At 
 any rate, if in the stillness of Tring he did 
 say such things as he had said, there would 
 be nobody to hear him. 
 
 But the Bishop was mistaken. Nothing 
 is truer than that "Satan finds some mischief 
 still for idle hands to do.'' He found — or, 
 if he didn't, the Bishop, who believed 
 loyally in his Satanic Majesty, gave him 
 the credit of it — plenty for Maurice Dale 
 to do even in Tring. He wasn't broad 
 
A UBLEY DALE ASKS COUNSEL. 147 
 
 and he wasn't high, and he wasn't low, 
 but he grieved his father just as much 
 as if he had gone to the furthest tether of 
 either one of these extremes. The Bishop 
 had taken things easily ; but it had been 
 with the decorous, gentlemanly ease of 
 days gone by, when there was little ex- 
 pected of the clergy, and neither the press 
 nor the people had Argus eyes for their 
 shortcomings. But Maurice Dale took 
 things easily, after quite another fashion to 
 his father's. If he would only — as so many 
 clergymen of a past day had done — have 
 been content to be a country gentleman of a 
 staid and quiet stamp, it would have been 
 w^ell. He was that — very much more of 
 a country gentleman than he was a priest — 
 indeed, he was not a priest at all; but 
 he did things and said things that no 
 country gentleman, wise in his generation, 
 would do. He must meddle in politics — 
 the politics of a liberal school — had spoken 
 very plainly about the game laws, and 
 
 10—2 
 
148 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 meddled in some matters in which the 
 Bishop thought it would have been well 
 to have let things alone. The Bishop 
 had never meddled in his life. The 
 bishopric had fallen to him on account 
 of his utter inoffensiveness. None of his 
 people had meddled — they had gone with 
 the tide, and the tide had landed them 
 in pleasant places — the House of Lords 
 and an episcopal palace. That was what 
 had come of not meddling ; and what but 
 ruin, or what would be almost as bad, 
 banishment to that penal settlement, Tring, 
 could befall Maurice, who was meddling 
 with everything ? 
 
 Life was so stagnant at Tring. He 
 could n't write — at least not anything to 
 boast of. He had no turn for light literature, 
 so he could not solace himself with a weekly 
 box from Mudie's. There was very little 
 society, and that not of a kind that 
 suited him. He fished, but fishing gave 
 him time for thought ; and it was thinking, 
 
A UDLEY DALE ASKS COUNSEL. 149 
 
 according to the Bishop, at least, that 
 led him to stray into forbidden ground, 
 where he should never have disported 
 himself. 
 
 He had no taste for his clerical duties. 
 He had been brought up to the Church 
 just as, if he had been a poor man's son, 
 he might have been brought up to be 
 a carpenter's journeyman. He meant to 
 do what was right ; but his work troubled 
 him. He was not quite sure whether he 
 beheved all the creeds he had to enunciate, 
 but thought it safest to conclude that he 
 did ; and his sermons were about as good 
 as the average of sermons. It was the 
 week-day part of his labour that wearied 
 him. What should he say to these poor 
 souls with their hard lives — their little 
 cares which were so great to them ? If 
 he could only have set matters straight 
 for each, given one the store pig, paid 
 the other's rent, set this one straight before 
 the world by clearing off his bill at the 
 
150 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 general shop, it might have been well 
 enough. He began by doing something 
 of the sort, and found he was impoverishing 
 himself, and making paupers of his peasants, 
 and earning, besides, a very fair stock 
 of ill-will from the neighbouring farmers. 
 He gave up his beneficence, at least he 
 practised it on a smaller scale, and finding 
 it impossible to right matters in Tring, 
 took to trying to right them all over the 
 kingdom. 
 
 He had made himself unpleasantly con- 
 spicuous — according to the Bishop, flown 
 in the face of the powers that be ; he had 
 written to more than one paper on the state 
 of labourers' cottages ; he had headed a 
 subscription to reimburse a boy's parents 
 for the expenses they had been put to on 
 account of his picking up a dead leveret. 
 When the lad came out of prison, he was 
 quite a hero in his own eyes, and those 
 of his relatives ; and that little dead hare 
 had been worth as much as a whole 
 
AUDLEY DALE ASKS COUNSEL. 151 
 
 poulterer's shop to them. He had in- 
 sulted the higher authorities — according 
 to the Bishop again — by snatching an- 
 other boy from their very clutches ; a 
 seven-year-old urchin sent to Wichnor 
 Castle for grazing the bark of a tree with 
 his peg top. Maurice Dale had paid the 
 fine, told the bench — some of them his 
 fathers most intimate friends — what he 
 thought of them, in that suave, bland toiia 
 of his, in which he would utter the most 
 terrible things — terrible, at least, according 
 to the Bishop — and then gone off express 
 to Wichnor Castle, armed with the legal 
 authority to rescue his poor Httle captive. 
 The Bishop was a miserable man — miserable, 
 at least, whenever he thought of this son 
 of his. If he would go about the country 
 flying in the faces of its rightful rulers, 
 outraging all proprieties and decorums, and 
 standing up for all the dirty little boys who 
 hacked trees or pilfered game, what good 
 would it do the Bishop's soul, even though 
 
152 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 he was wrapped in purple and fine linen, 
 and slept under the shadow of a mitre ? 
 Maurice Dale was a thorn in the side of that 
 meek man, his father, just the one drop 
 of bitterness infused in the cup which 
 would else have been of such a grateful 
 sweetness. 
 
 The Bishop was coming to see Maurice 
 now. To stay with him for a little time, and 
 give him a lecture on the error of his ways. 
 There was to be a charity sermon at St. 
 Mary's, the most important church in 
 Wearmouth, the next Sunday ; and the 
 Bishop had been solicited to preach it. 
 He had promised compliance ; and Tring 
 being but five miles from the town, he had 
 elected to stay there for some days previous, 
 and take the opportunity to make what 
 impression he could on the mind of his 
 son. 
 
 The sermon with which he meant to 
 address him had given him very much more 
 trouble than the sermon with which he 
 
A UBLEY DALE ASKS CO UNSEL. 153 
 
 was to appeal to tlie pockets of the 
 parishioners of St. Mary's, Wearmouth. 
 
 He was to come that day. As far as he 
 knew how, Maurice had had the Rectory 
 put in order for him ; but it was not at all 
 the kind of place for a bishop to sojourn 
 at. His housekeeper was overpowered by 
 her responsibilities. She was deaf, old, 
 and rheumatic — much could not be ex- 
 pected of her — but Maurice had gone 
 through the rooms himself, done his best to 
 indoctrinate the old lady with his ideas as 
 to a suitable dinner, and now stood at the 
 Rectory gate, wondering how long it would 
 be before the sound of his father s carriage- 
 wheels was heard. 
 
 He was very much Hke his brother 
 Audley, so like that one description may 
 serve for both. They were each a little 
 over the middle height, slight, with fair 
 hair and skin — -just the type of Saxon face 
 that you may see at its lowest behind a 
 plough or a flock of sheep, when it is 
 
154 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 heavy, but good-humoured, has short hair 
 and blunted features — at its best lounging 
 in clubs or mess-rooms ; and then it is 
 languid and bored — and the hair is long 
 and silky, and the features are a little 
 refined and sharpened. It may be that then 
 there is some admixture of the Norman 
 element in it — necessarily, for the face to 
 be in these loftier regions ; but it is the 
 Saxons who have left us this face. We 
 never got it from the Danes or any other 
 of the invaders of our soil who have made 
 themselves at home upon it. The brothers 
 had much the same voice, soft, low, but not 
 musical — the well-trained voice of a gentle- 
 man. That was what struck you in them 
 both, they were gentlemeUy men who could 
 not do or say a rude or unkind thing ; for 
 Maurice, in his most terrible moments, 
 when the Bishop had most cause to fear 
 for him, was always polite and well-bred. 
 Let him utter the most dreadful truths, 
 the manner in which he expressed them 
 
A VjDLUY bale asks COUNSEL. 155 
 
 took away, if not their sting, at least the 
 power of any one resenting too bitterly the 
 wound. 
 
 The two were not at all handsome or 
 remarkable in any way — there are thou- 
 sands of such faces — but they were well 
 enough. They were not particularly clever, 
 but Maurice was certainly the cleverer. 
 If he had not been, the Bishop, with whom 
 a little talent went a very long wa,y, 
 thought that perhaps he never would have 
 got into the mischief he had done. 
 
 As Maurice Dale and his guest Temple 
 Masters stood on either side the Rectory- 
 gate, they were a sufficient contrast to 
 each other. Temple was some years the 
 senior, a large, strongly built man, with a 
 face that had fewer claims to beauty than 
 even those of the Dales. At the first sight 
 you would not call him even good looking ; 
 at the next, you would hesitate before pro- 
 nouncing him ugly ; at the third you would 
 feel that this was a face that had something 
 
156 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 in it worth all the good looks in the world. 
 There was promise, strength, intelligence 
 here ; it was a rehable face, its owner 
 would make his way ; he must be one who 
 would push on in any career he adopted, 
 who would like the road the better for not 
 being too smooth ; climb the hill all the 
 more cheerily because of its very steepness. 
 There was power in the overhanging brow, 
 in the dark sunken eyes, the thin set lips, 
 the round prominent chin, and the obsti- 
 nate combative-looking nose ; power in 
 the way the head was set on the shoulders, 
 in the firm tread, the erect, if not graceful 
 carriage. Temple Masters had what women 
 love infinitely more than either intellect, 
 beauty or wealth — strength — that was the 
 charm about him ; he was a man to trust in 
 and look up to, every way rehable ; women, 
 and some men too, felt that he had the 
 strength of a giant, and it was not very 
 often that he used it like one. 
 
 Now and then he did ; he was truthful, 
 
A UDLEY DALE ASKS GO UNSEL. 157 
 
 kind, fairly gentle, but there was a little 
 hardness underlying it all. He had not 
 had to do with smooth things, having had 
 a very different upbringing to those two 
 young aristocrats the Dales. His lines had 
 never fallen in the velvet pastures of a 
 wealthy E-ectory. 
 
 No coming mitre, no kinsman^s coronet 
 had cast their grateful shadows over his 
 cradle. He was the son of a poor gentle- 
 man, who had left him just enough to pay 
 for his education and to start him at the 
 Bar, and Temple had grown up, knowing 
 very well that he had nothing but his own 
 brains and his own right hand to look to ; 
 there were no wealthy relatives on the best 
 terms possible with government, to place 
 stepping-stones in his way. He had every- 
 thing to achieve for himself, if he was to 
 achieve anything at all. 
 
 He was getting on pretty well — that is to 
 say, by dint of a little law reporting which 
 he had managed to get hold of, and by 
 
158 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 practising the strictest economy, he was 
 able to make both ends meet and keep out 
 of debt. He would have lived on cheese 
 parings rather than have run into debt, but 
 he managed somehow to get something a 
 little better than the parings. 
 
 A brief came in now and then, and one 
 or two solicitors, of more discernment than 
 their brethren, spoke well of him, but as 
 yet Temple Masters only had his foot on 
 the lowest rung of the ladder. There it 
 was, reaching up into the clouds above him, 
 with a woolsack for a comfortable resting- 
 place at the very top, and all sorts of good 
 things ; Chief-justiceships, Puisne-judge- 
 ships, silk gowns, and three hundred guinea 
 retainers ; at different heights of the ladder. 
 Should he ever get any of them, or was he 
 to be content with just a step or two 
 beyond the bare maintenance he had 
 already secured? Temple Masters never 
 asked himself the question, never had done 
 so. From the first there had been one 
 
A UDLEY DALE ASKS CO UNSEL. 159 
 
 tiling which he had taken for secure and 
 certain, and that was ultimate success. 
 Perhaps he might not attain to the very 
 summit of the ladder, but he had made up 
 his mind that he would not be content with 
 anything very much below it. 
 
 I have said that the great charm of 
 Temple Masters was the strength which 
 attracted men as well as women. It was so ; 
 in any trouble or emergency, feebler souls 
 were sure to turn to him. He was so 
 reliable, he might mix a little satire with his 
 counsel, have a whip in the very hand which 
 he held out to help, but still the counsel 
 would be worth the taking, and the help 
 would be as readily tendered as the casti- 
 gation. It was this helpfulness which had 
 made Audley Dale resolve to ask his advice 
 in his present predicament, and he was now 
 coming over from Wearmouth, as fast as a 
 friend's dog-cart would bring him, in order 
 to make a clean breast of everything to 
 Masters, and ask him how he should extri- 
 
160 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 cate himself from the dilemma he had been 
 weak enough to get into. 
 
 The Bishop was coming to Wear mouth, 
 and perhaps it would have been more duti- 
 ful for Audley to have gone to the station 
 to meet his father, and driven over deco- 
 rously in the fly from there with him. But 
 just now Audley did not feel dutiful ; 
 in fact, he had almost forgotten all about 
 his lordship and the coming charity ser- 
 mon, and was entirely absorbed in his own 
 troubles. 
 
 He had arrived at one conclusion which 
 had made him hasten to borrow the dog- 
 cart of his friend, in order to lose no time 
 about consulting Temple Masters, and that 
 was that it would be a very good thing 
 indeed to take Mrs. Thornton's advice and 
 marry Milly Lisdale. He liked her, he was 
 beginning to be quite sure of that — ^he liked 
 her — well, perhaps as much as, or more than 
 he could ever like any other girl, and if he 
 could only break with that miserable Clare, 
 
A VBLEY BALE ASKS COUNSEL. 16 l 
 
 lie would propose at once to Milly. Slie 
 had money — lie had thought a good deal 
 about her money, and had not thought at 
 all the less of himself for doing so. It was 
 natural that he should marry a woman with 
 money ; he had never been told so in so 
 many words, but somehow the idea had 
 been placed pretty clearly before him. He 
 had his profession and his position, and the 
 lady he married ought to be able to do' 
 something towards maintaining the latter ; 
 that had always seemed a matter of course, 
 and, therefore, as he really honestly liked 
 Milly, her having money made matters so 
 much the pleasanter. If only Clare, with 
 her white face and her feline movements, her 
 youth that was so unlovely, her grace that 
 was so repulsive, did not stand in the back- 
 ground, a warning figure, like the ghost of 
 his past folly, telling him that for him to 
 settle down in smooth decorous paths, with 
 Milly Lisdale or any other for his wife, should 
 never be while she lived to claim him — to 
 
 VOL. I. 11 
 
162 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 hold him to her by chains that he had 
 forged in his madness, by ties that had 
 seemed so Hght when he had woven them in 
 his folly, but that the wisdom he had grown 
 into in his maturer years would find itself 
 taxed to the utmost to break. 
 
 The sound of wheels struck on Temple 
 Masters' ear as he stood by the Bectory 
 gate. It was not a grateful sound. This 
 holiday of his had been a rare indulgence ; 
 the very stillness and torpidity of the place 
 was grateful after his London work. To 
 stroll on the one bit of beach that permitted 
 walking, to saunter down the narrow lanes, 
 or stand like this with Maurice Dale for 
 company, but not for conversation, this was 
 just what he wanted for rest, and he did not 
 care to have this delicious inertia broken in 
 upon by any other visitor however august. 
 The news of his lordship's impendmg visit 
 had not been at all grateful to him, but the 
 Bishop had not been expected till the even- 
 ing and dinner time. What evil wind was 
 
A UDLEY DALE ASKS CO UNSEL. 163 
 
 bringing him so much sooner ? He took 
 his cigar from his mouth, and looking at 
 Maurice, said, ruefully, " The Bishop V 
 
 *M do n't think he'd come in a dog-cart," 
 said Maurice, " I caught a glimpse of one 
 through the hedge ; "he might though, if 
 there was nothing else at the station." 
 
 " He'd rather foot it,'' said Temple. " No, 
 the dog-cart does n't mean the Bishop," and 
 he felt grateful for the respite. He had 
 met the Bishop once, and a repetition of 
 the honour was not welcome. 
 
 Then Audley drew up at the gate, and 
 Maurice called his one man of all work to 
 take the horse into the stable. 
 
 " Put him up for to-morrow," said Aud- 
 ley, "I'm going to stop the night. Can 
 you give me a shake-down, Maurice ?" 
 
 " That depends — we do n't know how 
 large a retinue his lordship may bring — if 
 we've only Price we can do it. Have you 
 had lunch ? Will you come in, or stay out 
 here and take a weed ?" said his brother. 
 
 11—2 
 
164 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 *' I'll stay out here. I've had lunch. No, 
 thanks, I do n't want to smoke. Oh, lord ! 
 how deliciously quiet you are here !" 
 
 " Have you driven all the way from 
 Wearmouth to tell us that ? Or have you 
 hurried like this to be in time to see his 
 lordship ?" asked Temple Masters. 
 
 " No," said Audley ; and then he was 
 silent, thinking how he should say what he 
 had come there to tell. It had seemed so 
 easy to make a " clean breast of it " when 
 he had been at Wearmouth, just to resolve 
 to '^ tell Masters all about it, and ask him 
 to get him out of the mess ;" but now he 
 was there, face to face with Masters, how 
 should he begin this very awkward story ? 
 He had not seemed to see its awkwardness 
 before, nor so thoroughly to reahze how 
 very small a figure he should make in his 
 own narrative. He did n't mind his brother's 
 presence. If Masters was to know, why 
 not he ? but how was he to begin telling 
 Masters ? Should he plunge into matters 
 
A VDLE Y BALE A SKS CO UNSEL. 165 
 
 at once by saying lie had made a fool of 
 himself He knew if he did, that Masters 
 would reply that nothing was more proba- 
 ble, and that, to say the least, would be dis- 
 couraging. How he envied Masters stand- 
 ing there, so cool, so every way master of 
 himself. Had he ever got into a scrape ? 
 Did he know what one was like ? What 
 made him always so ready to get other 
 fellows out of theirs ? and how the deuce 
 could he get him out of this if he stood 
 there like an idiot without telling him 
 of it? 
 
 Presently Temple Masters looked at him. 
 ** If you did n't come here to tell us that 
 Tring is quiet, nor to see his lordship, may 
 we ask what brought you ? Was it to 
 stand there pulling to pieces the very few 
 bits of green there are in this desolate part 
 of the kingdom ?" 
 
 Audley dashed into his subject. '' I came 
 to see you." 
 
166 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 " Want a father confessor ?" said Maurice. 
 '' Sha'n't I do ?" 
 
 " You raay hear if you like, and help if 
 you can — I'm in a scrape, and I want to 
 get out of it. Masters, there, knows every 
 one's troubles and has none of his own, 
 lucky dog ! I want him to help me out of 
 mine." 
 
 " Is it debt ?" said Maurice. " No, you 
 would n't come to either Masters or me for 
 help in that." 
 
 Audley shook his head. There he stood 
 with his eyes fixed on the ground and his 
 hands in his pockets, stirring the gravel 
 with his foot, much as he had done the 
 sand of the sea shore, looking like anything 
 but a lady's ideal of a gallant dragoon. 
 
 Masters looked at him again, and said^ 
 '' It's a petticoat ?" 
 
 " No, it's two," said Audley. Then he 
 had the grace to add, thinking of the " girl 
 as good as gold " — " Heaven forgive me for 
 naming them together." 
 
AUDLEY DALE ASKS COUNSEL. 167 
 
 Then he told the whole miserable story. 
 If he had been more guilty perhaps he 
 would have been less ashamed than he was. 
 Still, at the best, it was humbling to feel 
 how this plain half- taught girl, his aunt's 
 protegee, sprung from a labourer s cottage, 
 had drawn him into her toils — to own that 
 she had proofs of his folly, that he had 
 been weak enough even to say upon paper 
 what it would have been madness to have 
 said even by word of mouth. He had been 
 little more than a schoolboy at the time, 
 and if Clare was of his own age in years, she 
 had been very much his senior in everything 
 else. But there it was ; he had forged his 
 chain, and was now powerless to break it. 
 For years he had been leading a life of de- 
 ception and meanness, temporising, palter- 
 ing with a woman he had never loved, and 
 now almost hated, because he did not know 
 how to get quit of her. Quit of her he 
 must get now. There were reasons, im- 
 perative reasons, why she must be broken 
 
168 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 with, but how was it best to be done ? How 
 could it be done without an exposure that 
 would cover him with ridicule ? 
 
 Temple Masters heard him attentively. 
 ^' You have n't told me all," he said, when 
 he had done. " I decline to prescribe 
 unless I know the full particulars of the 
 case. What are these reasons ?" 
 
 "I want to — to settle," said Audley, 
 with a heightened colour. 
 
 " Lady fixed upon ?" 
 
 Audley nodded. " A nice girl, — a girl 
 that will suit me to a T. That his lordship 
 can't object to, young, pretty, and a lady, 
 money of course — you see one must have it 
 on one side or the other." 
 
 " And a good girl, of course ?" 
 
 " Good as gold," said Audley, using his 
 favourite expression. " How else could a 
 fellow introduce her into his family ?" 
 
 Temple took his cigar out of his mouth 
 and flung the end away — a sure sign that 
 a philippic was in store. When he had 
 
A UDLEY DALE ASKS CO UNSEL. 169 
 
 the merest fragment between his fingers, 
 something of amiability hngered about him. 
 With this rejected fragment went every 
 particle of mercy for the forlorn one who 
 had sought his aid. 
 
 " I admire you more than I can say/' he 
 began. " The modesty of man ! You have 
 led — well, perhaps, a life not very much 
 worse than those of your fellows, but by 
 your own showing not very much better— 
 and you propose to settle down and give 
 the task of converting you into a respecta- 
 ble member of society to the hands of a 
 girl, who, if she is half as good as you say, 
 must be infinitely too good for the task pro- 
 posed for her. Young, pretty, fresh, pure, 
 to say nothing of the money ; and this crea- 
 ture is to have the honour of converting 
 you from the error of your ways, and main- 
 taining you afterwards. There do n't seem 
 any scruples on your part. Not the 
 slightest notion that this bargain of yours 
 is a very unfair one for her — not the 
 
170 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 slightest hesitation in taking so much and 
 giving so little. Upon my word, when I 
 think of what men are with regard to 
 women, T wonder we are not swept off the 
 face of the earth as not fit to cumber it. I 
 suppose there's scarcely a fellow living but 
 thinks the very dregs of his life, however 
 stale and rank, good enough to offer to the 
 best and purest woman living 1" 
 
 " I have n't yet come to the dregs of 
 mine,'' said Audley, with a little spirit that 
 was a refreshing contrast after his crest- 
 fallen manner but two minutes before. *' I 
 want you to help me out of the mess I've 
 got into. Can you, and will you ? I do n't 
 want a sermon. I know Milly Lisdale is a 
 great deal too good for me — I suppose if 
 we were all to be judged by our deservings 
 there's scarcely a man on earth would find 
 a woman bad enough for him — but I'll 
 make a good husband to Milly, once I'm 
 out of this scrape, and as to her money 
 which you make so much of, why how ever 
 
A UDLET DALE ASKS CO UNSEL. 171 
 
 do you suppose we could get on with- 
 out It r 
 
 " Well, that's your way of looking at it. 
 I suppose it's what you've been brought up 
 to ; it seems in the natural order of things 
 that some men are to be maintained by 
 their wives. If you were a bricklayer or a 
 carpenter, you'd scout such an idea as con- 
 temptuously as you would the thought that 
 your wife should have the privilege of 
 getting drunk on Saturday night instead of 
 yourself; being a gentleman there's nothing 
 incongruous in the fact of the lady you 
 choose paying the house-rent and the 
 butcher's bills." 
 
 " If she does n't pay them I can't," said 
 Audley, honestly. " I wish my father had 
 made me a bricklayer or a carpenter. I 
 doubt whether 1 should ever have got into 
 this scrape then." 
 
 '* Can you help him, Masters ?" said Mau- 
 rice Dale. " I know the girl. You'll have 
 your work to do. She was a live plaything 
 
172 OUT OF HER SPHEBE. 
 
 of my aunt's — a good young woman who was 
 always getting us fellows into scrapes. I 
 tliink the Bishop was rather partial to her 
 — I do n't think quite enough so to welcome 
 her as a daughter-in-law. I do n't like her 
 myself. I think one especial reason why I 
 hated her was because she was so plain — 
 so very plain, that it seemed as if nature 
 herself must have had a spite against 
 her." 
 
 "How old were you when you committed 
 yourself? I mean when you wrote those 
 letters ?" asked Temple Masters ; '^ and 
 how many has she ?" 
 
 " I never wrote but three in my life. I 
 was eighteen at the time, Masters. I shall 
 be indebted to you for ever, if you'll get 
 them for me." 
 
 " And she's twenty-five ; plain, well- 
 educated for her position, and fairly 
 clever." 
 
 " Very cunning — cunning as the devil," 
 said Maurice Dale. " How ever you came 
 
AUDLEY DALE ASKS COUNSEL. 173 
 
 to keep this from me all these years, young 
 one !" he added, turning with a look of mild 
 pity on his brother. 
 
 " Because all these years IVe known my- 
 self a fool and been ashamed to talk about 
 it. No one,'' he said passionately, "ever 
 should have known of it if I had n't been 
 driven to desperation." 
 
 '' I wonder what price Miss Clare fixes 
 on these letters," said Temple Masters, 
 thoughtfully. " They might surely be re- 
 deemed by something less than your valu- 
 able self Have you ever offered her any 
 other equivalent for them ?" 
 
 *' IVe tried that on, and it won't do," 
 said Audley. "It would take a heavier 
 sum than I can raise to get those scrawls 
 from Clare." 
 
 " Every man has his price, and according 
 to Walpole, every woman, too," said Temple 
 Masters ; " but I expect these effusions of 
 yours will have to be bought with sopae- 
 thing beside the current coin of the realm. 
 
174 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 I must see this woman, before I decide 
 upon the price that will buy her over." 
 
 " If any one can find her price, Temple, 
 it will be you. If any one can manage her 
 you will," said Audley, eagerly. " I believe 
 if any one can help me out of this infernal 
 scrape and make me a free man it will be 
 yourself I wonder what instinct it is that 
 makes a sworn old bachelor like you under- 
 stand women so thoroughly." 
 
 " I'll do what I can for you," said Temple. 
 *' It's rather a curious affair to manage. 
 If you were in real peril," he added 
 thoughtfully, "I wonder whether you 
 would be so confident in my resources as 
 now." 
 
 " I'd trust you with my life, old fellow ; 
 it would be in less danger with you than 
 my temper. I wonder what on earth has 
 hindered me coming to you to get me out 
 of this trouble, long before." 
 
 " Well, I may as well tell you that you 
 have nothing to dread from this person but 
 
A UDLEY DALE ASKS COUNSEL. 175 
 
 being made tlie laughing stock of your 
 friends. She has no pull over you, as you 
 were under age at the time; still, she 
 might be likely enough to find some scamp 
 of an attorney who would carry the case 
 into court, unless you came down hand- 
 somely to prevent his doing so." 
 
 " I'd rather pay anything than have such 
 an exposure," said Audley, ruefully. 
 
 " Of course you would, it's never pleasant 
 to own that one's been a fool, however firmly 
 the conviction may be imbedded in one's 
 own mind," said Temple, thoughtfully. '' I 
 did n't give you credit for much wisdom, 
 my dear Audley ; but I must say you have 
 rather exceeded my expectations in this 
 instance, as to the amount of folly you were 
 capable of in your green and salad days." 
 
 He strolled ofi* with a fresh cigar. He 
 had said his say — ^poured forth what little 
 bitterness was in him, and now was resum- 
 ing his ordinary amiability. Whenever 
 Temple Masters smoked his better genius 
 
176 OUT OF IIER SPHERE. 
 
 was in the ascendant. Presently he found 
 Maurice by his side. 
 
 " You'll have to buy off this creature," 
 he said. *^ I'm as poor as a rat, but I must 
 help Aude. He can't help himself, you 
 know ; it's impossible out of his pay and 
 his allowance, and if it ever comes to the 
 Bishop's ears he'll cut him off with a shil- 
 ling. I've been long expecting that fate 
 for myself, so it may be half-a-cro^v^Ti be- 
 tween the two of us." 
 
 " Money won't buy off this woman, and 
 I do n't think I shall find her so easy to 
 manage as Aude thinks for ; she'll expose 
 him if she can do nothing else. Still some- 
 thing must be done. But I'm afraid from 
 what I gather of her, he's put his foot more 
 deeply in the mire than he imagines." 
 
CHAPTEE X. 
 
 BEATHICE AND MILLICENT. 
 
 A LONG, solidly-built stone wall ran 
 -^-^ round Mrs. Rushingtons domain. 
 At one part — that especially appropriated 
 to croquet players — it was lined by a belt 
 of such trees as would best bear the sea 
 air ; but this was in the rear of the house. 
 In front the east winds took care nothing 
 should thrive, and therefore the expanse of 
 grass before the house was only broken by 
 flower-beds, in which geraniums and calceo- 
 larias luxuriated for a time, to be renewed 
 each season. To break the dead flat of the 
 wall in the front of the house, Milly had 
 
 VOL. T. 12 
 
178 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 persuaded her mamma to have a bank 
 raised and turfed, and as this fronted the 
 sea, and was at a sufficient distance from 
 the beach to have some little privacy, the 
 terrace it formed proved a very favourite 
 resting-place of the young lady's when the 
 weather was warm enough to make sitting 
 out of doors enjoyable. 
 
 It was a bright warm day, and the villa, 
 with its gay sun-blinds and beds of flowers, 
 lay, a pretty bit of colouring, basking in the 
 sun. It was almost too bright to be En- 
 glish, but now and then, on our best sum- 
 mer days, we do see something of the glory 
 and the beauty of colour even in our cli- 
 mate. The sea was a shining expanse of 
 glass, or molten silver, stretching far and 
 wide in front. The sky was really blue, 
 scarcely a cloudlet of white, even, to soften 
 its brilHancy. It was too warm for walking 
 to be pleasant, so people lay on the beach, 
 or sat on the pier under sunshades or um- 
 brellas, rejoicing in the bit of Indian sum- 
 
BEATRICE AND MILLIGENT. 179 
 
 mer that had come, when they were only 
 looking for autumn's chill caresses. Alto- 
 gether it was so enjoyable, so bright, in 
 spite of the heat and the glare, such a treat 
 to revel in warmth, and be glad of the sea 
 breeze when it rose, that Milly Lisdale might 
 well say, as she did to the friend sitting 
 d la Turque, close by her on the beach, — 
 
 "If it is only half as fine as this to- 
 morrow, I think everything will go off ^s 
 well as even mamma could wish it." 
 
 Mamma herself was in the distance, re- 
 posing luxuriously on a couch in the shade 
 of the verandah. She had a book which 
 interested her greatly. She was an inde- 
 fatigable novel reader, but Mudie's box, 
 when it came down, was subjected to a strict 
 investigation. Married women might read 
 anything, according to Mrs. Eushington, 
 but for young people's reading some super- 
 vision was necessary. Milly took her own 
 way with the novels as she did in most other 
 things ; read what she liked, and submitted 
 
 12—2 
 
180 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 to be lectured if the book was of a class 
 that Mrs. E-ushington did not approve of, 
 but read all the same ; fortunately her 
 tastes were not much in favour of the 
 more highly-flavoured class of literature, 
 so that it was not very often she was in 
 opposition to her mother. To-day Mrs. 
 Eushington was luxuriating in a novel by 
 Dumas. It was an indulgence she did not 
 often permit herself, but once in a way she 
 practised it, in order, as she said, to keep 
 up her French. There was a slight impro- 
 priety about it, which gave it the keener 
 relish, and she was a httle uneasy while 
 she read it, and perhaps this very uneasi- 
 ness made her enjoyment all the greater. 
 
 Mrs. Thornton would have read the book 
 without any scruples at all, and very likely 
 have seen no reason why Milly should not 
 read it too. She was not particular in such 
 small matters ; but it is doubtful whether 
 she would have enjoyed the book one half 
 as much as Mrs. Eushington did, whose con- 
 
BEATRICE AND MILLICENT. 181 
 
 science was troubling her all the time she read 
 it, and who, as she turned a page and began 
 another chapter, looked from it towards 
 Mill J and her friend, and said — " Thank 
 goodness, those girls do n't seem to want 
 anything but one another/' 
 
 They did suffice for each other just now. 
 They had plenty to say, that was evident ; 
 and if the house, and the red and yellow beds 
 in the foreground, were a pleasant picture, 
 the girls made it all the pleasanter. Milly 
 had a shrewd, sensible little face ; perhaps 
 it was a little stretch of good nature to call 
 her pretty, for her features were irregular, 
 and she wanted that brilliancy of colouring 
 which in youth far more than makes up for 
 defective outlines. She was thin, and, in- 
 deed, almost angular ; tall ; and there was 
 the promise of her ripening into a fine woman 
 by and bye, though never into so superb a 
 sultana as her mother made. But she was 
 graceful, and had a good style about her-^ 
 knew how to dress well and make the most 
 
182 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 of her thick dark hair, her white teeth, her 
 clear, if pale, complexion, and whatever 
 good points nature had blessed her with. 
 She was not a beauty, and she knew it, and 
 the knowledge never disquieted her ; she 
 liked beauty in other women — was proud 
 even of her mother's — was, if a little self- 
 willed and opinionated — which, perhaps, 
 under the circumstances was rather to be 
 desired than not — thoroughly good-natured 
 and good-tempered, with a bright sunshiny 
 way of making the best of things and 
 people, which in her path through life was 
 likely to be a much greater blessing to her 
 than her money or any amount of beauty 
 could have been ; and if Audley Dale had 
 not shown himself hitherto possessed of 
 any great amount of common sense in some 
 matters, he had certainly evinced his dis- 
 cernment when he pronounced Milly Lisdale 
 to be as good as gold. 
 
 Her companion was, in every way, a con- 
 trast to quiet, sensible Milly. She was bright 
 
BEATRICE AND MILLICENT. J 83 
 
 all over — the very brightest thing that in 
 that little nook of sunshine, where sea and 
 sand and flowers, and the very houses, were 
 radiant and glowing in the summer light, was 
 to be seen. She was about Milly's age, per- 
 haps a few months the elder ; she was not 
 so tall nor quite so thin ; just as well 
 rounded as a girl of twenty should be with 
 out wakening uncomfortable anticipations 
 as to her figure in the future. She revelled 
 in colouring ; her dress and her ribbons 
 looked a clearer white, and a brighter blue 
 on her than they would have done on any 
 other. Her cheeks had such a sweet rose 
 tint, and her eyes such changing lustre in 
 their grey depths. She was not exactly 
 fair, for her skin caught the sun, and now 
 and then freckled or showed the prettiest 
 tint of sunburn in the w^orld. Her hair 
 was neither auburn nor brown, nor golden 
 nor chestnut, but a mixture according to the 
 light of all these shades. Her features 
 were not perfect ; the mouth was a little 
 
184 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 too large, and the nose — well, if people 
 liked to be ill-natured, they might be justi- 
 fied in calling it a snub, but it was a much 
 more seductive nose on a woman's face 
 than the purest Grecian or the loftiest 
 Roman. She was fashionably dressed — 
 much more so than Milly, who always 
 toned the fashions down to suit her own 
 style, while this girl followed the mode, let 
 it fleet by as quickly as it would. You 
 might call her, if you pleased, a girl of 
 the period, which, I take it, does not mean 
 such a very bad gii'l either. She certainly 
 had her faults : she was vain, and liked ad- 
 miration — peculiarities which no girls but 
 those of the nineteenth century have ever 
 evinced ; she liked dress, and now and then 
 ran to the verge of her allowance ; she 
 would play croquet all day, if there was 
 any one worth playing with, and dance all 
 night if her partners pleased her. She 
 liked novels better than serious reading ; 
 hadn't the slightest turn for science, and 
 
BEATRICE AND MILLICENT. 185 
 
 had forgotten every one of the 'ologies which 
 she had been compelled to learn something 
 about at school. On the other hand, she 
 was good-natured to a fault ; had more 
 than once gone without a new dress, in 
 order to help a poor pensioner ; taught 
 diligently in her Sunday school, and was 
 almost adored by her class ; was a very 
 dutiful daughter to a father and mother 
 who spoiled her, and a very good sister to 
 a bevy of urchins of both sexes at home. 
 
 Her name must have been given her in 
 a fit of parental inspiration. How else 
 could this imperious, wilful creature — for 
 she was all that — have come to be Beatrice ? 
 Or had she grown into the character ? — 
 fashioned herself after the name, as some 
 women seem to do ? But there she was — 
 j ast the creature, that, if she had lived three 
 hundred years ago, Shakespeare might have 
 been credited with taking for his ideal of 
 that sweetest piece of perversity he ever 
 drew. 
 
OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 "It will be fine, to-morrow," she said, 
 looking wonderfully weather-wise. " The 
 glass says, set fair, and so does the sky. 
 I'm glad of it. There's nothing I like 
 better than a garden-party, and it would 
 be so vexing when you've caught such a 
 great gun as a bishop, in this part of the 
 world, not to have a sunshiny day for him 
 to go off in." 
 
 " Do n't say too much about the bishop 
 before mamma," said Milly ; *' she is so 
 dreadfully afraid that you or I sha'n't 
 behave with due propriety. She's in doubt, 
 too, whether we ought not to ask him 
 to say grace before high tea, and is full 
 of speculation as to whether he will come 
 in his apron." 
 
 " I hope he will not make the whole 
 thing slow," said Beatey Lay ton. " You've 
 almost too many of the clergy, Milly. 
 They're well enough in their way, but 
 I do n't like to be overdone with them." 
 
 ''We can't help ourselves here," said 
 
BEATRICE AND MILLICENT, 187 
 
 Milly. '' Country society is so limited, and 
 especially the society at Wearmouth. At 
 nearly all our gatherings it's black coats 
 or red, and the black predominate/' 
 
 "But rouge gagne, in this instance, I 
 think," said Beatey. '* Milly, have n't you 
 a deeper interest in the Bishop than any 
 speculations as to his apron or the pro- 
 priety of his saying grace ? I should have, 
 I know, if there was a possibility of his 
 being rmj papa-in-law. Good gracious ! 
 when one comes to think of it, it must 
 be rather an awful thing to be connected 
 with a Bishop." 
 
 There was a little, a very little colour in 
 Milly 's face, but she neither averted it 
 nor turned away her eyes. ''I suppose 
 it would be no use to pretend I don't 
 understand you, Beatey," she said pre- 
 sently, "for I do; but you are rather 
 premature in this instance ; I have n't had 
 the chance of having the Bishop for my 
 papa-in-law offered me as yet." 
 
188 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 " Well, I did n't think you had — but it is 
 to be ; after one sort or another, that chance 
 will be given you. I did n't suppose you d 
 had a real, regular offer ; very few men make 
 them now-a-days. I think they hedge, as 
 they call it in racing ; somehow they make 
 themselves understood if we mean to say 
 yes, without giving us a fair opportunity of 
 saying no. No girl can go about now-a- 
 days triumphing in her conquests, like a 
 wild Indianess, with her enemy's scalps 
 hanging from her girdle. Men have grown 
 wary and cautious, wonderfully cautious, 
 but " 
 
 "Well, but " 
 
 Beatey laughed. " Sometimes we can 
 overmaster their caution, clever as they are. 
 But — revenons d nos moutons — to come back, 
 not to the Bishop, but to somebody very 
 near him. Milly, I do think you like 
 Mr. Audley Dale." 
 
 " There's nothing objectionable about 
 him, is there ?" 
 
BEATRICE AND MILLICENT. 189 
 
 "Not at all; I'm glad I've found it 
 out, though. I shan't flirt with him now ; 
 if you've brought him down with your 
 arrow, why should I waste one upon him ? 
 I should have flirted with him else; no 
 
 end No, he's not objectionable ; indeed 
 
 I rather like him. He's good-looking, 
 though I don't care for good looks in a 
 man ; has the manners of a gentleman, I do 
 care for that ; and the connection is first- 
 rate, awfully grand! But Milly, if* you 
 marry Mr. Audley Dale, you'll have to be 
 the master ; that's where he would never 
 have suited me, I want some one to govern 
 me. Now, my belief is, whoever marries 
 Mr. Dale will have to govern him." 
 
 " Well r said Milly, with a quiet smile, 
 that almost admitted the truth of what 
 Beatey had said, and at the same time 
 evinced a sense of her own capabilities 
 for the task. " Is there any great harm in 
 that ?" 
 
 "Not a bit, if you like doing it, but 
 
190 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 I should n't. I like to have my own way 
 dearly, now, but I'd rather give in by-and- 
 bye, and let somebody else have his. One 
 has a right, you see, to be a tyrant before- 
 hand, if it's only to convey a full sense 
 of one's value. But I don't want to be 
 a tyrant always. If ever I find my master, 
 I think I shall be ready to obey him." 
 
 " If you had not found your master, 
 Beatey, the idea of the possibility of 
 obedience would never have occurred to 
 you," said Milly, shrewdly. 
 
 There was the loveliest deepening of the 
 rose tints on Beatrice Layton's face, the 
 prettiest possible confusion ; then she looked 
 up saucily. *' I think I'll tell you. You've 
 been very good, and have n't tried to cheat 
 me in that matter of Audley Dale. That's 
 what I always liked you for when we were 
 at school at Bonn together. If you have a 
 friend you know how to be a friend, and 
 honest and straightforward with her. I 
 do hate little underhand ways ! People 
 
BEATRICE AND MILLICENT. 191 
 
 that find out all one's secrets and never tell 
 one any of theirs. Do you remember Laura 
 Bye ? A nice scrape I nearly got into 
 through her after you had left school, about 
 an officer that would go past the window 
 every day, and two students that sat in the 
 next pew to ours at the English chapel. 
 Fine fuss Madame Weimar made about 
 that. As I told her, it was very hard 
 if they could n't go there to improve their 
 English pronunciation ; well, that Laura 
 Bye sneaked about me in the meanest 
 manner. I could n't have thought it. The 
 officer — he was Count something ; but there, 
 I can't remember everybody's names. There 
 are such lots of people pay one attention 
 as one goes through life ; one had need to 
 keep a list to remember them all. Well, 
 he wrote to me in abominable French, and 
 I showed it to Laura — she, mean thing, 
 told I Would you have believed it ? And 
 madam e watched me as a cat would 
 a mouse, for the rest of the term. I 
 
192 OUT OF II ER SPHERE. 
 
 answered the letter though ; you see I 
 was bound to do that, if only to let the 
 poor fellow know how very improper it 
 was of him to send it, and I cut Laura 
 dead for ever after, and told her why 
 I did it." 
 
 " Well, what has Laura to do with me ?" 
 "Nothing, only that you wouldn't have 
 acted like her ; you could n't ; you Ve been a 
 dear now, in this affair ; thoroughly open 
 and candid ; no mincing or pretending you 
 dont care for Audley Dale, when you 
 know all the time you do ; and I'm going 
 to return the confidence. You'll keep the 
 secret — there ! I ought to be ashamed of 
 myself for naming such a thing, but 1 do 
 think, yes I do, that — ^that I've met my 
 fate 1" 
 
 Beatey paused after this announcement, 
 and looked to see if Milly was overpowered, 
 which Milly was not ; she only said, " Who 
 
 is he r 
 
 " He has a pretty name, at least the first 
 
BEATRICE AND MILLIGENT, 193 
 
 is ; it's Temple — sounds nice, does n't it ? I 
 don't like the surname, but the two do 
 very well together. Temple Masters, I've 
 known him, oh ! three years ! and he comes 
 up and down to Richmond, and dines with 
 us sometimes of a Sunday. He's clever, 
 wonderfully, astoundingly clever ! not hand- 
 some — but I like his face for all that ; it's 
 just the kind of face for one to see by-and- 
 bye on the bench with a Judge's wig on.^ 
 Whenever I look at that face, dear, I seem 
 to see that especial wig, and know that it 
 will be there before long. He is n't rich, 
 no one expects that of a barrister, you know, 
 till he's old and grey ; but the money will 
 come, I'm not afraid of that, only I'm not 
 going to let him have his own way alto- 
 gether about it." 
 
 "As to the way he's to get it you 
 mean ?" 
 
 " No, but as regards me — I know he 
 cares for me, and he thinks I do n't know 
 it, and does n't mean me to know it till he's 
 
 VOL. I. 13 
 
194 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 making his way. Goodness knows how 
 long that will be ! Why should n't I know 
 it at once ? I do n't want him to come to 
 me with a bag of money in one hand and 
 his heart in the other. Let him bring me 
 the heart and 111 take it — let him come to 
 me honestly and say he's a poor man, and 
 ask me if I'll have him, and there'll be some 
 credit in my doing so ; there'll be none by 
 and bye, when he's almost coining money. 
 I've set my mind upon conquering him in 
 this. He's so proud, and thinks himself 
 so strong ; let us see who is the strongest ! 
 I have been counting upon to-morrow ever 
 since I heard he was in this part of the 
 world and likely to come. If only the 
 Bishop does n't hinder his being here. 
 Wretched old soul, I'll never forgive him if 
 he does. If only to-morrow is as fine as 
 to-day — I always look my best in sunshiny 
 weather — I think I shall have the glory of 
 seeing him at my feet — metaphorically at 
 least — of course, I do n't expect him to 
 
BEATRICE AND MILLIGENT. 195 
 
 spoil his trousers by going down in the 
 dust. Oh, Milly ! if I only succeed in this 
 I shall be the happiest creature going !" 
 
 *' That's to say, you mean to get your 
 own way to show how you intend to let 
 him have his." 
 
 " It's my turn now, it will be his by and 
 bye. If I conquer now it will be to stoop 
 by and bye. Any girl will take a rising 
 man making his thousands a year. I choose 
 to be the exception, and show that I will 
 take him while he's got them to make. At 
 least, well, no — I don't mean him as yet 
 to be quite sure of me, but I do want to be 
 thoroughly sure of him. I want to see 
 which is strongest, the man's pride or his 
 love — there it is — I think that's all about 
 it." 
 
 ^' You mean to lead him on to make an 
 offer, and you're not quite sure whether 
 you'll say yes ?" 
 
 " That's about it — I shall mean yes, you 
 know — yes, with all my soul, for I do like 
 
 13—2 
 
196 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 him, Milly, but I do n't wish him to be too 
 sure of it just yet. I shall have to be 
 humble enough by and bye. 
 
 " You humble — I should like to see you, 
 Beatey." 
 
 " You will see it," said Beatey, with a 
 rueful shake of the head, " but not yet. I 
 think that's the great attraction Temple 
 Masters has for me. That drew me to him 
 at first, set me thinking about him, you 
 know, and wondering whether such a man 
 could ever care for such a girl as I. I 
 did n't wonder long. But let him marry 
 whom he will, he is one of those who will 
 rule — that's why I call him my fate. I 
 assure you I struggled against it at first, 
 but it was no use, I had to give in, one 
 always must give in to fate, but I must 
 have my little victory first. Well, govern- 
 ing must be rather a trouble ; I wonder 
 how you'll like it, Milly — that will fall to 
 your share, just as being governed will to 
 mine.'' 
 
BEATRICE AND MILLIGENT, 197 
 
 '^ If I have it to do, I must make the 
 best of it," said Milly, " and take care that 
 nobody finds it out, not even the subject 
 over whom I rule — there's a great deal in 
 management.'' 
 
 " Yes, there is," said Beatey, and glanced 
 at Mrs. Rushington — the best managed 
 woman in the kingdom, according to her. 
 " I do n't think Mr. Audley Dale will 
 ever find it out. You won't mind my say- 
 ing so, I know, but I don't think he's 
 particularly clever — not like Temple Mas- 
 ters, you know ; but then the other is n't 
 nearly so good-looking ; it all comes to the 
 same thing. You don't mind my saying so, 
 do you T she repeated anxiously. 
 
 '' Not a bit," said Milly, " I know it well 
 enough. No, he is n't clever ; no, nor so 
 very handsome, and there's nothing at all 
 particular about him, but I've seen a great 
 deal of him since we've been down here, 
 a,nd somehow I've got to like him. That « 
 the plain truth, Beatey, I do like him — I 
 
198 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 think I could make him ha23py and myself 
 happy, too. If I take him, I dare say I 
 shall have to look after a great many things 
 besides just the house, and the servants, 
 but I sha'n't mind that. I was never one to 
 think it such a great thing for a woman to 
 be always on her knees before her husband, 
 I'd rather walk side by side with mine. A 
 man may be very likeable without being a 
 hero or particularly great in anything. 
 Temple Masters may suit you, Beatey ; you 
 were always an ambitious little soul ; but do 
 you know if I were coupled with such a 
 demi-god as you make him out to be, I 
 should feel like the lady to whom some 
 king proj)osed himself, that he was only a 
 husband fit for state occasions, and that I 
 should like a more common-place mortal for 
 every-day wear." 
 
 Mrs. Rushington had come to the end of 
 another chapter, and, looking up, saw the 
 two girls still in animated conversation. 
 All of a sudden it occurred to her that it 
 
BEATRICE AND MILLIGENT. 199 
 
 might not be strictly proper for them to 
 remain there so long. Some of the officers 
 from the barracks might be passing, or 
 people might leave the Parade and stroll 
 that way. She was certain their heads could 
 be seen above the wall ; she felt alarmed, 
 and beckoned Milly, first secreting her book 
 very carefully. v 
 
 " Do n't sit there any longer, my dear 
 child," she said in her most impressive 
 voice. " It's hardly the thing — I'm certaiYi 
 you'll be seen from the other side. Take 
 one of the garden seats where no one, not 
 even with an eye-glass, can see you. 
 Beatrice Lay ton is n't quite so careful as she 
 should be in such matters. No wonder ; 
 Mrs. Lay ton's ideas are sadly lax as regards 
 young people." 
 
 "Won't you go in, mamma, yourself?" 
 said Milly. " Do n't you find the sun rather 
 warm ? I think it's always on the front of 
 the house at this time. The morning-room 
 
200 OUT OF HER SPHEIiE. 
 
 is a great deal pleasa.nter — Beatey and I 
 will be in presently." 
 
 Mrs. E-usliington rose, gathering her book 
 under her voluminous draperies, and pro- 
 ceeded to the cool, pleasant morning-room 
 at the back of the house. " I want to rest 
 to-day," she said, '^ I shall have so much to 
 see to to-morrow. Have you remembered 
 the directions I told you to give cook and 
 Green, Milly ?" 
 
 "Yes, mamma, and thought of the flowers, 
 and been to the confectioner's. Don't 
 trouble yourself. Everything will go well. 
 Shall T bring you a table for your book ? 
 Would you like the blind lowered ? There, 
 I think you will do nicely now." 
 
 " And come in, Milly, from the bank. I 
 am sure you can be seen from there, and 
 people always have so much to say. Young 
 girls cannot be too careful. I wonder, when 
 people think of their responsibihties, that 
 they ever wish for daughters. What ever 
 
BEATRICE AND MILLICENT. 201 
 
 would have become of you, Milly, if you 
 had had Mrs, Thornton for a mother ?" 
 
 " Poor thing !" said Milly ; and a pity 
 stole into her shrewd little face that softened 
 and made it positively pretty. " I wonder 
 what a child would have done for her ?" 
 
 " Do n^t talk hke that, Milly," said her 
 mother, severely. " Providence never sends 
 children to people who can't take care of 
 them ? What ever would that woman do 
 with a baby? Now, go, and 111 k^ep 
 quiet. I declare when I think of to-morrow 
 and the Bishop, and Mrs. Thornton, I feel 
 positively faint. I do hope, now, she won't 
 flirt too outrageously to-morrow — and you 
 won't stop on the bank seat." 
 
 "We'll be in, presently, mamma," said 
 Milly, and then went to the bank seat, 
 where she resumed the oriental attitude 
 she, as well as her friend, had before 
 adopted, and remained in it for half-an- 
 hour, by which time the sun was shining 
 so directly down on Beatey and herself 
 
202 OUT OF II Eli SPHERE. 
 
 that a retreat into the house was desira- 
 ble. 
 
 " I've left mamma pretty comfortable," 
 she said to Beatey. " She's got a French 
 novel — ' Doctor Basileus/ by Dumas. She 
 don't want me to see it, and wouldn't 
 have me read it for the world ; and she's 
 hiding it from me, which wouldn't be of 
 very much use, only that I do n't care for 
 Dumas, and once tried this book, and 
 could n't get through it at all. I've seen to 
 everything for to-morrow. There's nothing 
 at all for mamma to trouble herself about. 
 But it amuses her to think that she's 
 overborne with work. The Bishop is 
 almost too much for her, and I think she's 
 a little afraid of you, Beatey, to say nothing 
 of Mrs. Thornton — poor Mrs. Thornton ! 
 who is so blissfully unconscious that she is 
 mamma's hete noire ; and I do n't think, if 
 she did know it, the knowledge would 
 distress her very much." 
 
CHAPTER XL 
 
 CLARE HAS A LITTLE BUSINESS ON HER 
 OWN ACCOUNT. 
 
 "l/TES. EUSHINGTON'S garden party 
 -^-^ was an event in Wearmouth. Her 
 parties were always pleasant. She was a 
 liberal provider, and whether the refections 
 were suppers, or high or little tea, they 
 were such refections as might be partaken 
 of with very considerable satisfaction. 
 People were] not very rich in Wearmouth, 
 so that the hospitalities were generally on 
 rather a contracted scale, which, made Mrs. 
 Rushington's shine by contrast. Then, too, 
 everybody at her house seemed bound to 
 
^04 OUT OF II ER SPHERE. 
 
 look and feel his or lier pleasantest. The 
 hostess had the gift of putting people 
 at their ease. It was not what she did, 
 but rather what' she did not do. She 
 brought people together, and then left them 
 pretty well to themselves, with the excep- 
 tion of the two or three whom she favoured 
 by permitting their attendance on herself. 
 But she was so genial, so thoroughly happy 
 when looking her best, and with a crowd 
 to admire her, that she seemed a living 
 incarnation of sunshine and geniaUty. 
 
 Mrs. Thornton was looking forward to 
 this garden party with as much eagerness 
 as any one. Not that she cared for garden 
 parties in general ; daylight was always 
 trying, and croquet bored her ; it was not 
 half so good as dancing ; but she had an 
 especial interest in this one. It was to be 
 the first occasion when she should see 
 whether Audley Dale was willing to follow 
 the advice she had given him, and was ready 
 to devote himself to Milly Lisdale. He 
 
CLARE HAS A LITTLE BUSLNESS. 205 
 
 was not to devote himself too mucli. She 
 meant to have a httle of his time, herself ; 
 but he was to pay quite sufficient attention 
 to the young lady to let her see what 
 he intended. She took great pains with 
 her dress to-day. It erred a little in being 
 rather overdone. That was Mrs. Thornton's 
 fault, according to Mrs. Rushington, who 
 had only to clothe her superb proportions 
 in the simplest garb, and it looked like 
 a queen's robe. But she looked very ^^ell ; 
 a handsome woman, yet, as her glass told 
 her ; and, considering her limited means, 
 likely to be quite as well dressed as any one 
 she would meet at Beechside that day. 
 
 Clare assisted at her toilette with her 
 usual assiduity. She was the most re- 
 spectful of handmaids, and, to all ap- 
 pearance, took as much interest in her 
 mistress's appearance as that lady did 
 herself Mrs. Thornton surveyed herself 
 in her long cheval gla,ss with seme com- 
 placency. What a grief it had been to her 
 
206 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 husband when she bought that glass. Seven 
 pounds thrown away, that a woman might 
 see herself from head to foot ! She was 
 tolerably satisfied with her appearance ; but 
 her face clouded over a little as, through 
 the thick coil of hair twisted round her 
 head, she saw one silver thread gleaming. 
 
 *' Can't you pull it out, Clare V she said, 
 " without tumbling my hair ?" And Clare 
 pulled it out gently. She ha,d wonderful 
 self-control. She hated the woman on 
 whose head she was ofl&ciating, intensely, 
 and yet she pulled away that gray hair so 
 gently as not to call forth one expression of 
 pain. " That will do, Clare. Gray hairs 
 at my age !" said Mrs. Thornton, " My 
 mother didn't have one when she was 
 forty 1" 
 
 " Could you spare me for an hour or two 
 this afternoon, ma'am ?" said Clare, in her 
 softest voice. "I should be back quite 
 time enough to finish your laces." 
 
 " Oh, yes ; go by all means. You do n't 
 
CLARE HAS A LITTLE BUSINESS. 207 
 
 look well. I think you want a little fresh 
 air ; or is it biliousness ? You are bilious, 
 are n't you, Clare ? People with that 
 thick, muddy skin generally are. Yours 
 is such an unhealthy paleness. I often 
 wonder, when I look at you, that you keep 
 so well as you do." 
 
 Down stairs Mrs. Thornton went, not 
 thinking a bit that if she had struck her 
 handmaiden with a whip she could scarcely 
 have wounded her more than she had done. 
 She was not a bad mistress ; very good- 
 natured, not too exacting, and fairly liberal. 
 If her servants had been moral pachyderms 
 they might have got on well enough with 
 Mrs. Thornton. She never meant to hurt 
 their feelings, because it never occurred to 
 her that they had any feelings to hurt. 
 Clare she certainly disliked ; but she would 
 not have deliberately annoyed her. She 
 had taught her a pretty sharp lesson, 
 as far as Mr. Audley Dale was concerned ; 
 but it was necessary, and there was an end 
 
208 OUT OF II ER SPHERE. 
 
 of the matter with her. But there was not 
 an end of it with Clare. 
 
 Mr. Thornton was waiting for his wife, 
 as was generally the case when they went 
 out together; but for once he was not 
 angry at having to wait. He had been 
 kinder, gentler, more easy to get on with 
 as she phrased it, since yesterday. He was 
 so glad that he had had the courage to 
 speak, as he had spoken, to Audley Dale ; 
 so glad that the other had taken his speak- 
 ing in good part. Every way he was 
 thankful. If the other had really loved 
 his wife, or she had cared for him, would he 
 have given her up so easily ? No, not 
 though he could have spoken to him with 
 all the thunders of the law, with all the 
 persuasions of the gospel. If the sin had 
 been, as he had thought it, growing into 
 his soul and mingling with his nature, till 
 it was all one foul corruption, could he have 
 plucked it up at a word, as he had done, 
 and cast it from him ? No ; he had taken 
 
CLARE HAS A LITTLE BUSINESS. 209 
 
 the foul growth in time, crushed it as 
 soon as it appeared, before it had taken 
 root in the soil. What a blessed thing 
 it was that he had been brave enough and 
 true enough to speak as he had done — 
 blessed for his own peace and household 
 honour — but how much more blessed for 
 the souls that he had, maybe, saved from 
 death ! 
 
 He must have wronged his wife — judged 
 her too hardly. She was weak and vain, 
 as it was the nature of women to be. He 
 ought sooner to have remembered this, and 
 interposed with his strength between her 
 and the possible destruction he saw coming. 
 Was he not her head, her lord, her 
 guardian ? Was it not for him to save her 
 even from herself? Why had he not 
 sooner done that which he had done at 
 last — put one strong arm round her, and 
 held the tempter off with the other? 
 Had he not been too hard upon her for 
 forgetting the duty and the obedience due 
 
 VOL. I. 14 
 
210 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 to his wishes, and thought too Httle of the 
 duty he owed her ? He had taken care 
 of her at last — poor, weak, plotting creature. 
 She would be safe now, even in despite 
 of her own folly. 
 
 He had been dreading this garden party 
 before. He should see his wife at her 
 worst — as he never liked to see her. She 
 would be surrounded by men who would 
 say all the false, deceitful things that 
 women so like to hear. She would show 
 that she was pleased with them, and exult, 
 as a child might with new toys, in all the 
 false homage, the flatteries which she 
 should resent as insults. That would 
 not be all. Audley Dale would be there, 
 hanging over her, making himself con- 
 spicuous above others by the attention he 
 paid her. Now — now — this would be just 
 the opportunity for him to j)ut their 
 intercourse on another footing. He might 
 stop away altogether. If he came, he 
 would so comport himself that she must 
 
 i 
 
CLARE HAS A LITTLE BUSINESS. 2il 
 
 see the old pernicious familiarity of their 
 intercourse was to be at an end. He would 
 be strange and cold, and let her turn her 
 eyes on him as she might, she would 
 have to learn that never more those eyes 
 would lure him to her side. Some way 
 or another he would let her see that their 
 glamour was past, that the spell was 
 broken, and that she was to him no more 
 th an just any other woman. On the whole, 
 he hoped Audley Dale would be there. 
 It would be best for them to meet at 
 once, and for her to realise the change that 
 had come over him. She would suffer a 
 little, but it would be more through her 
 vanity than anything else. He had taken 
 things in time, and as yet she would suffer 
 nothing but through her vanity. 
 
 He spoke very kindly to his wife when 
 she came down. She never asked him, 
 as another wife might another husband, 
 how he liked her dress. She knew very 
 well if she had he would have expressed 
 
 14—2 
 
212 OUT OF IIER SrilERE. 
 
 a thorough disapproval of every article she 
 had on as unfit for the wear of a Christian 
 woman. The little compliments, the kindly 
 flatteries, that make such a pleasant ad- 
 dition to the daily fare of married life, he 
 never paid. A man in the habit of 
 measuring his words, he would have 
 thought such as these vain and light — a 
 sinful waste of speech. Oh ! how precious 
 waste sometimes is ! Stinted measure is 
 sometimes the worst economy. His wife 
 would not have loved him — it was hardly 
 in her to love any man — but she would 
 have Hked him a very great deal better, 
 gone on her way much more pleasantly and 
 happily, if now and then he had told 
 her her dress suited her, or her hat made 
 her look like a girl of eighteen. 
 
 But he did his best now — his very kind- 
 ness was austere and grave, but that he 
 could not help — he told her they had a very 
 fine day, and hoped the heat of the weather 
 would not tire her before they arrived at 
 
CLARE HAS A LITTLE BUSINESS. 213 
 
 Beechside. Then he offered her his arm — 
 a thing he was still old-fashioned enough 
 to do, but she was not old-fashioned enough 
 to take it, and she walked on by his side 
 wondering what had made him so unusually 
 complacent. 
 
 " If he were like any one else, I should 
 say it was the prospect of meeting the 
 Bishop, and that he had an eye to contin- 
 gencies ; but he is n't like any one but him- 
 self in the world. If livings were hanging 
 as thick as blackberries on brambles, he 
 would n't put out his hand to gather them 
 as long as he thought there was one herring- 
 fisher or boatman would be the better for 
 him at St. Hilda.'' 
 
 To some extent she understood her hus- 
 band by this time. She knew that the 
 ambitions of this world, such ambitions as 
 even clergymen the most pious think them- 
 selves justified in entertaining, were not for 
 him. He had found his sphere — the one 
 where good work was to be done, where 
 
214 OUT OF II ER SPHERE. 
 
 men were leading hard lives, battling with 
 the ocean for their daily bread, and in the 
 sharp, fierce struggle for existence, all too 
 apt to forget that any other life than this 
 was possible to them. Men so familiarized 
 with death that he lost his awe and 
 majesty, so used to be on the borders of 
 another world that all sense of its terrors 
 had become blunted in them. Men who 
 wanted another voice than that of the ocean 
 in their ears to tell them of Him who made 
 the waves be still — to make even death and 
 danger their teachers, by telling them that 
 after death would come the judgment, and 
 that for hardened, impenitent souls there 
 were greater perils than land or sea could 
 ever know. This was enough for Harold 
 Thornton ; his wife saw that she must be 
 content with St. Hilda, and she made up 
 her mind to be content. It was a disap- 
 pointment; he had talents, if he would 
 only have made a right use of them. But 
 what was the use of all the talents in the 
 
CLARE HAS A LITTLE BUSINESS. 215 
 
 world if people would n't display them ? 
 A dozen bishops might come and go, and 
 the Rector of St. Hilda would not know 
 how to profit by their advent. But Mrs. 
 Thornton, by this time, was beginning to 
 be thankful for small mercies. As this parti- 
 cular Bishop had come, and the party in 
 his honour was likely to be an unusually 
 brilliant one, it was a very good thing that 
 her husband was in a tolerable temper, and 
 that the storm which but two days before 
 had arisen appeared to have subsided. 
 '^ Hell behave himself decently, at any rate, 
 to-day," she said ; "I suppose he's sense 
 enough to see that he did make himself 
 ridiculous the other night. " 
 
 Clare waited till her mistress had left the 
 house, and then, without staying to arrange 
 the bedroom, proceeded to make her own 
 toilette. The long grey hair which she 
 had pulled out so dexterously was still 
 around her finger. She looked at it venom- 
 ously, '^ I wish it was a snake, for her 
 
216 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 sake. She's got many a one besides this, 
 and they show a little plainer in that plait 
 behind than she thinks for. She's old 
 enough to have grey hairs in plenty, what- 
 ever she may try and make me believe to 
 the contrary. Never mind, if IVe only 
 luck, the luck I ought to have, the luck I 
 deserve to have, I shall turn the tables on 
 her yet, and have some one to pick out my 
 grey hairs when they come." 
 
 Clare dressed in her own room ; a very 
 neat little place, quite different from poor 
 Deb's untidy sanctum on the other side of 
 the landing. She was exquisitely neat, not 
 only in herself, but in her surroundings. 
 Something of this might be due to Miss 
 Dale's careful training, a great deal more to 
 the innate tendencies of the woman ; and 
 how such tendencies had come, considering 
 Clare's cottage home, and her antecedents 
 for generations, was just one of those pro- 
 blems that might puzzle a psychologist. 
 The dress she put on now was what not 
 
GLARE HAS A LITTLE BUSINESS. 217 
 
 one girl in a thousand, born and reared, 
 and descended, mind, as Clare had been, 
 would have chosen. There was nothing in 
 it that the most captious mistress could 
 justly have found fault with, and yet it had 
 the effect of making Clare look very much 
 more unlike a servant, of however superior 
 a class, than any amount of finery would 
 have done. And it was not expensive either 
 — like her mistress, Clare had the knack of 
 making a little money go a long way, but 
 any lady might have worn that dress and 
 felt herself appropriately attired. It was 
 a quiet muslin with a little black silk fichu, 
 a white tulle bonnet with some simple 
 flowers in it, and pale grey gloves. The 
 flowers, gloves, and boots were all good, the 
 sleek black hair was elaborately dressed, 
 and as Clare took a parting glance in her 
 little eight-inch-long looking-glass, she said 
 to herself with a smile of triumph, " No 
 grey there !" 
 
 'Mt isn't quite time yet," she added. 
 
218 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 *' and I do n't want to be in a hurry. Better 
 him wait for me, than me for him, and he 
 never was one to keep his time too well — 
 I'll look at his note again." 
 
 She took out an envelope from her poc- 
 ket, and drawing out the enclosure, read — 
 
 " Be on the Denes below Stone's Point 
 at four o'clock this afternoon. — Thursday." 
 
 That was all — no signature, no date but 
 Thursday, and this note had reached her 
 by the afternoon post, two hours ago — but 
 it was a great deal to Clare. 
 
 ''■ It's his hand, and he wants me. Wants 
 to see me, and has something particular to 
 say, though he won't tell me that here. 
 He don't care for me, I'm not such a fool 
 as to think that, but I can do without his 
 liking afterwards, if I can only make him 
 believe he likes me well enough to keep his 
 word. Why should n't he ? I think I've 
 got the making of a lady in me — a better 
 one than that cat with her grey hairs. I 
 should not be the first that's risen, and I'd 
 
CLARE HAS A LITTLE BUSINESS. 219 
 
 make him a good wife, and manage his 
 money better than many would. He'd 
 better keep his word — he'd better," she 
 said, venomously. ''I suppose he's begin- 
 ning to think that now. What I said to 
 him the other night has frightened him, 
 made him feel that I'm not to be played 
 with any longer. 
 
 " It's time I was off, now — I do n't want 
 to keep him waiting too long, he may make 
 it an excuse for going altogether." She 
 took up her parasol and went down. Deb 
 met her in the hall, " You'll be back in 
 good time to iron they laces, Clare — Missis 
 was particular they should be done to-day." 
 
 " I'll be back in an hour or two, Deb, go 
 on with your washing;" then she slipped 
 out. " Iron her laces ! I wonder how long 
 this will last. Not much longer, if I play 
 my cards well. I should like to see madam's 
 face when I tell her I'm looking for a maid 
 for myself; I'd give Deb the place, but 
 she's too vulgar. I should like a girl with 
 
220 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 manners about me, when I have one, but 
 there are so few good servants now-a- 
 days/' 
 
 On she went, quickly but gracefully. 
 Let Clare move as swiftly as she might, 
 her movements never had the appearance 
 of being hurried. Stone's Point was a 
 lonely part of the Denes not very far from 
 that especial place on the beach where the 
 E>ev. Harold Thornton had met Audley 
 Dale the day before. Of all the bare, 
 wide expanse of sand, it was, perhaps, the 
 most solitary part, and Clare supposed that 
 it was for this reason she had been invited 
 there. " They'll miss him at Mrs. E-ush- 
 ington s," she said ; " Madam will be 
 staring her eyes out looking for him. 
 She'd be ready to tear out mine if she 
 only knew where he was. He ought to 
 be here. I don't see him ; it's too bad 
 of him to be keeping me waiting, and 
 there is not a place to sit down in. There's 
 the sand, but it will spoil my dress, and 
 
CLARE HAS A LITTLE BUSINESS. 221 
 
 when he comes I shall look just like a 
 nurse-girl minding the children. What's 
 that — the point of an umbrella ? I'm certain 
 it is, and there's somebody lying under- 
 neath it. Had I better go up, or wait 
 here ? If there was only a seat I but it's 
 no good standing like a sign-post, and 
 staring at the water, I think I'll go up to 
 him. You're taking it easy, sir !" 
 
 And Clare's thin lips were compressed 
 venomously — perhaps it occurred to her 
 that if ever Audley Dale was her legiti- 
 mate property, she would read him a 
 lesson for taking it thus easily. She could 
 see nothing but the upper portion of an 
 umbrella, which, appeared above a long 
 barricade of sand some children had erected 
 as the outworks of a castle which they 
 had not had time to finish building. 
 With, that and his umbrella, the figure 
 was pretty well sheltered from the sun, 
 which, was now pouring fiercely down on 
 sea and sand. It was the figure of a 
 
222 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 man. Clare saw the long trousered limbs 
 stretching lazily on the sand — saw too the 
 flutter of something white, which she con- 
 cluded justly to be a newspaper, and again 
 she remarked to herself that Mr. Dale was 
 taking it easily. " I'm past my time ; 
 so it's too bad of him. It is not as if 
 he did n't expect me to be here already. 
 If it was a lady now he w^as expecting, 
 I guess he'd be on his feet, hat in hand. 
 What a sinful shame it seems I was n't 
 born a lady ! Well, well, I have a pull 
 over him no lady has, and I'll let him see I 
 know how to use it. I wonder if he'll 
 have the civility to look this way if I 
 cough, or how long he means to keep me 
 standing here like a stone ? Eh — um, eh — 
 um," and Clare gave utterance to a very 
 tidy little cough, and the umbrella was 
 lowered, the paper dropped, and hat on 
 head instead of in hand, Temple Masters 
 stood before her. 
 
CHAPTEH XII. 
 
 HOW THE bishop's SOUL WAS VEXED. 
 
 XF the advent of the Bishop of Drowse- 
 -■- head at Mrs. Eushington's garden 
 party had caused no little excitement 
 amongst some of the expected guests, the 
 Bishop himself had been not a little per- 
 turbed at the thought of making his 
 appearance there. He had been to such 
 gatherings as a Hector, but he was 
 not partial to them. He didn't play 
 croquet, and he did n't like standing 
 about while other people did so — sometimes 
 the grass was damp ; on the driest day 
 he had an instinctive feeling that it was 
 
224 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 SO, and that the damp would permeate 
 through the soles of his boots, and into the 
 very marrow of his bones ; and it was 
 always too hot or too cold ; if you got in 
 the shade under the trees there were 
 disagreeable things to be met with ; you 
 were obliged to take an interest in 
 matters that you didn't care at all 
 about, and seem amused when all the 
 time you would much rather have been 
 at home with the day's Times. 
 
 But he thought he ought to go as a 
 matter of civility to a lady who appeared 
 to have been civil to his sons. It 
 was a very good thing for Maurice to 
 have such a house to visit at ; if anything 
 could cure him of the eccentricity of his 
 ways, and incline him to walk in smooth 
 and pleasant paths, it would be knowing 
 ladies of this class, mistresses of pleasant 
 houses, dispensing a graceful hospitality ; 
 for even garden parties were considered 
 graceful by some people ; and, as he had 
 
BO W THE BISHOPS SO UL WAS VEXED. 225 
 
 heard, was the case in this instance, with 
 well endowed daughters to marry. 
 
 But there was a difficulty about his 
 getting to Beechside. He had come over 
 from Wearmouth in a fly, which he might 
 have ordered to call for him to-day, but for 
 thinking that there would of course be 
 vehicles suitable for his use to be found at 
 Tring. But there was nothing of the sort 
 — nothing but a chaise cart belonging to 
 the butcher, and the dog-cart in which 
 Audley had driven over from Wearmouth. 
 The Bishop had been a little hurt, the 
 preceding day, at finding neither of his 
 sons at the station to meet him. • Maurice, 
 he thought, might surely have borrowed 
 an equipage from one or other of the 
 neighbouring gentry, in which to convey 
 his* father to the Bectory. Price, as he 
 mounted on the box of the fly on that oc- 
 casion and sat beside the driver, felt himself a 
 smaller man than he had ever yet done since 
 his master became a Bishop. But it turned 
 
 VOL. T. 15 
 
226 OUT OF II ER SPHERE. 
 
 out that Maurice had not been so much to 
 blame in the matter of the carriage. There 
 was but one family resident in his parish 
 who might be classed under the head of 
 gentry, and he was not on such terms 
 with this one as to justify him in asking 
 them for the loan of their carriage for his 
 father. 
 
 Maurice had his horse, certainly, but the 
 Bishop never rode on horseback ; even if 
 he had done so, he would as soon have 
 mounted Maurice's horse as he would one 
 of his hobbies, having misgivings that 
 either would be equally likely to run away 
 with its rider. The chaise- cart was not 
 to be thought of, or else there was no doubt 
 but that the butcher would have lent it. 
 The whole affair then resolved itself into 
 the dog-cart conveying the Bishop into 
 Wearmouth, or into that vehicle being em- 
 ployed to convey some one else into the 
 town to send a more worthy equipage for 
 his lordship. Price was strongly in favour 
 
HOW THE BISHOFS SOUL WAS VEXED. 227 
 
 of the latter. Price was even more fearful 
 of his master's committing himself than his 
 master was. His accommodation had not 
 been quite what he could have wished at 
 the Rectory, owing to Mr. Audley Dale's 
 stopping the night, and there were many 
 things in that bachelor establishment which 
 grieved Mr. Price sorely, as not at all con- 
 sistent with his lordship's dignity, but if 
 he were to enter Wearmouth in a dog-cart, 
 then Price felt as if his master might as 
 well have remained Rector of Shoreleigh to 
 the end of his days for all the good the 
 bishopric would do him. 
 
 The Bishop said they might as well see 
 the dog-cart, and they went to the stables. 
 
 "I think it will do," said Maurice. 
 '' After all, who will see you in it ?" 
 
 Price felt as if he must speak. He could 
 keep silence no longer — but then Price had 
 been twenty years in the Dale family, and 
 on several occasions had assumed the right 
 of uttering his opinion. 
 
 15—2 
 
228 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 " I do n't think it will do at all," said 
 Price. " Every one's eye will turn to his 
 lordship — they knew him the instant he set 
 foot at the station — and is that a thing for 
 him to sit on, or a horse for him to ride 
 behind ? 'T is n't as if we were still at 
 Shoreleigh," said Price ; "his lordship 
 might, in an emergency, have mounted such 
 a vehicle ; but we have left Shoreleigh, and 
 things are different, and I put it to you, 
 Mr. Masters, whether that's a proper equi- 
 page for my lord T 
 
 " I do n't like the look of the horse," said 
 the Bishop. 
 
 " The horse is as quiet as a lamb," said 
 Maurice ; " quiet, but with splendid action, 
 and a wonderful stepper. I drove out from 
 Wearmouth to St. Ewald's last week with 
 him — Grey lent him to me — twenty miles ; 
 did it in less than two hours ; back to 
 Wearmouth the same night. I had to 
 attend a meeting in favour of the Ballot, a 
 working men's demonstration ; I dare say 
 
HOW THE BISHOP'S SOUL WAS VEXED. 229 
 
 jou Ve seen something of it, sir, in the 
 papers ?" 
 
 ''Yes, I've seen it," said the Bishop 
 sadly. It would have been hard if he had 
 not. A great yellow placard, announcing, 
 among other names, that the Rev. Maurice 
 Dale would address the meeting, had been 
 the first thing that attracted his eyes at 
 the station, painfully confirming what the 
 morning's Times had told him. 
 
 *' We Ve seen it, sir," said Price, solemnly. 
 Maurice had always been the black sheep 
 of the family, and even Price felt that he 
 had a right at times to lift up his voice, 
 and convey at least indirect reproof by its 
 tones. Indeed Price was privileged. The 
 Bishop would hardly have known how to 
 sustain his new state without Price to help 
 him bear the burthen. He had a habit of 
 looking and appealing to him in minor 
 matters, which had grown upon him since 
 his sister's death. He had looked to her 
 a great deal — if his wife had lived, he would 
 
230 OUT OF UEli SPHERE. 
 
 have been morally dependent upon her. 
 He wanted a walking-stick, he was a man 
 who could not get on at all alone, and Price 
 had come to be regarded as this walking- 
 stick ; and, to do Price justice, however 
 necessary he might be to his master, he did 
 not plume himself at all unduly upon such 
 necessity. 
 
 Master and man, if one may speak so of 
 a bishop and his confidential attendant, 
 were a contrast in appearance. The Bishop 
 was tall, angular, and, if it had not been for 
 something of inherent weakness pervading 
 his whole appearance, would have been 
 dignified. He had a benevolent, bland look 
 about him which was very becoming to a 
 bishop ; he really was good-natured to such 
 an extent that, if it had not been for his 
 elder daughter and Price, he would have 
 been woefully imposed upon. His hair was 
 gray, his features regular, and his com- 
 plexion pale — altogether, he had just the 
 appearance of a bishop. Nature, at any 
 
HOW THE BISnOFS SOUL WAS VEXED. 231 
 
 rate, had fitted him externally for the 
 post. 
 
 Price felt that — felt, too, that he was not 
 outwardly adapted for a bishop's servitor. He 
 was rotund and florid, and short — his per- 
 sonal appearance had never troubled him 
 while he only waited on a rector, but it was a 
 trouble to him now. Price did the best he 
 could, dressed himself as carefully as he did 
 his master, his broad-cloth was almost good 
 enough for a dean, his general get-up was 
 unapproachable. Price dressed as a matter 
 of conscience ; it was the least he could do 
 when Nature had been so niggardly to- 
 wards him. 
 
 " We Ve seen it, sir," said Price, looking 
 severely at Maurice. In his side that 
 eccentric young cleric was a sorer thorn 
 even than in his master's. Then Price 
 looked at the dog-cart, and shook his head ; 
 and the Bishop looked at Price, and made 
 up his mind not to adopt that low vehicle. 
 
 " T had better stop here," he said, " than 
 
232 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 enter the town in so unsuitable a manner. 
 Some arrangements, however, must be 
 made against next Sunday. Could not Sir 
 Thomas Brewster oblige me? Surely he 
 must have a carriage which he might place 
 at my disposal ?" 
 
 *' He has half-a-dozen," said Maurice, "but 
 I should n't like to ask him for one. He 
 and I don't quite hit it together, and I 
 should n't like to be Tinder an obligation to 
 him." 
 
 "Tithes?" said the Bishop. Once, in 
 his rectorial life, he had had a dispute with 
 the great landowner of his parish. It re- 
 ferred to tithes, and the Bector, who was 
 perfectly in the right, had, with unusual 
 pertinacity for him, stood on his right. He 
 had got the better in the matter, and the 
 doing so had involved some considerable 
 pecuniary advantage, but still he had 
 always felt that the result was hardly 
 worth the unpleasantness it had cost. A 
 clergyman ought to be on good terms with 
 
HOW THE BISHOP'S SOUL WAS VEXED. 233 
 
 the Squire of his parish, and quarreUing, to 
 say nothing else, was undignified and un- 
 gentlemanly. '' I would avoid any un- 
 pleasantness about money matters, if pos- 
 sible," he said. 
 
 "No, it isn't the tithes — I've nothing 
 to complain of there — but it's his new dog- 
 kennels and stables " 
 
 " Well r said the Bishop. 
 
 " He asked my opinion about them, and 
 I told him frankly, the money would* be 
 better spent in a score or so of decent cot- 
 tages. It struck me, as it was, that his 
 dogs and his horses were much better 
 housed than many of my parishioners. Sir 
 Thomas took offence ; none was meant, but, 
 you know, if one's asked one's opinion, 
 one's bound to give it. Then we'd another 
 little difference. He sent a small boy in 
 my school to jail for helping himself to a 
 turnip, damages one farthing, costs five 
 shillings. I was out of the way when he 
 did it. When I came back, I had the 
 
234 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 mother at me. Of course I paid, and 
 fetched the child away from Wear- 
 mouth. Sir Thomas didn't like it. I'm 
 afraid I did express my mind with un- 
 necessary plainness to the clerk of the 
 justices. And then we have had one or 
 two Httle disputes about poachers. He 
 preserves very strictly, and, somehow, 
 some of my people do n't quite like it — 
 neither do I. As I told him, the game laws 
 were the worst relics of feudalism we had 
 left ; Sir Thomas was offended, and we 
 have n't spoken since." 
 
 " Of course you have n't. How could 
 you exj)ect anything else ? How should I 
 have got on in Shoreleigh as I did if I 
 had meddled with matters so completely 
 beside my vocation ? I thought you would 
 be safe here," said the Bishop, mournfully. 
 " You've only one landed proprietor in 
 the place, and you've managed to quarrel 
 with him. I had a dozen, including the 
 large farmers in Shoreleigh, and I never 
 but once had a difference with any. Why 
 
HOW THE BISHOFSSOUL WAS VEXED. 235 
 
 can't you leave these matters to those 
 whom they concern ? Now, I suppose Sir 
 Thomas will not think it incumbent upon 
 him to call on me ?" 
 
 *' I do n't suppose he will, but I thought 
 these matters, being in my parish, con- 
 cerned me. But about the dog-cart, sir ? 
 Can you trust yourself in it, or must we get 
 you another conveyance from Wearmouth ? 
 I'd ride over at once and secure one, but 
 I'm booked for Shotsham. There's a meet- 
 ing there to-night, in favour of the dis- 
 establishment of the Irish Church. I am 
 so sorry to leave you, but I've promised 
 to attend. I believe they expect me to 
 speak ; but Masters here is going into 
 Wearmouth to-morrow. If you really think 
 you can't trust yourself behind Stamper 
 he'll do his best for you." 
 • " Good heavens !" cried the Bishop. 
 *' Did I ever attend a public meeting in 
 my life ? — and for such a cause ? If I 
 Tiiust go to Wearmouth — and really I shall 
 
236 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 hardly care to show myself amongst the 
 people — let me have some conveyance that 
 will not utterly disgrace my office. Mr. 
 Masters, may I trouble you to see to that 
 for me T 
 
 "With two horses, please, sir,'' inter- 
 posed Price. ". His lordship ought not to 
 enter that town with less than two.'' 
 
 " I'll see to it, my lord, with pleasure," 
 said Temple Masters. " Lend me your nag 
 early to-morrow, Maurice. I want as long 
 a day as I can have before we are due 
 at Beechside. Please, Audley, come this 
 way, and give me some further instructions 
 about the commission I'm to execute for 
 you." 
 
 And the commission which Temple 
 Masters was to execute was the errand 
 which had brought him on the Denes 
 to-day, and caused him now to stand face 
 to face with Charlotte Clare, instead 
 of the younger and more pliable gentleman 
 whom she had expected to meet there. 
 
CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 THE BATTLE ON THE DENES. 
 
 /CHARLOTTE CLARE was a cle^^r 
 ^-^ woman, and the moment she saw 
 Temple Masters she felt that some danger 
 to her well-laid scheme for raising herself 
 in the social scale was at hand. She never 
 flinched. " Let them try their worst/' she 
 said to herself; " and they'll find me equal 
 to them." She looked at Mr. Temple 
 Masters as if she had never seen him in 
 her life before, though she perfectly re- 
 membered him as a visitor to the Rectory 
 at Shoreleigh, on one occasion, and had 
 since seen him at Wearmouth, in company 
 
238 OUT OF HER SPHEME. 
 
 with Aiidley Dale. He was there instead 
 of his friend, that was clear, and it was 
 also clear that his being there boded no good 
 to Charlotte Clare. She looked him full 
 in the face, with the blank, vacant look 
 of a mere stranger, and made as though she 
 would have passed on ; but Temple inter- 
 posed. He took his cigar out of his mouth, 
 and threw it away, then touching his hat, 
 slightly, said " Miss Clare, I presume V 
 
 She understood the tone. It was not 
 that in which he would have addressed his 
 equal ; but neither was it that in which he 
 would have spoken to an ordinary serving- 
 woman ; her dress and manner made an 
 impression on him. As indeed they had. 
 
 " Very well got up,'' said Temple Masters 
 to himself " Decidedly plain, but, given 
 favourable circumstances, has the making of 
 a lady in her. She does n't care for that 
 simpleton, Audley — I should say a woman 
 with those eyes never cared for any one but 
 herself — which will make my task all the 
 
THE BATTLE ON THE DENES. 239 
 
 easier. I need have no compunctions about 
 blighted hopes and innocence betrayed. In 
 this case I should doubt whether there has 
 ever been any innocence to betray. My 
 dear Audley, looking at this woman, I 
 do n't wonder that she was too much for 
 your inexperience, despite her green eyes 
 and the traces of the small-pox." 
 
 " He's clever," said Clare, looking at him. 
 " And he's a lawyer, and they say is to do 
 great things. Oh, that wretch ! That 
 mean, cowardly skunk, Audley, to set 
 him upon me !" Clare never spoke strong 
 language, unless when intensely excited, 
 and sure of privacy ; but she generally 
 thought it. Her refinement was so sheerly 
 superficial that to tliinhy as she would not 
 have spoken for the world, was an immense 
 relief to her. She faced Temple Masters 
 now, and said in her demurest tone, '' My 
 name is Charlotte Clare, sir." He knew 
 all about her, so it was no use pretending 
 to be any better than she was, and taking 
 
240 OUT OF II Ell SPHERE. 
 
 the '' miss " as a matter of course. " But 
 you have the advantage of me." 
 
 " I am a friend of Mr. Audley Dale's. I 
 think you know him. I am here on his 
 behalf Possibly it was him you expected 
 to meet on the Denes this afternoon ?" 
 
 " If Mr. Audley Dale had been a gentle- 
 man, he would have come/' said Clare, 
 viciously. " Leading me to believe that he 
 would be here, and then sending some one 
 else in his place. If he is n't ashamed of 
 showing himself " 
 
 " No, he is n't ashamed, nothing of the 
 sort, but he has an engagement, as 
 perhaps you know, at Beechside ; and, 
 besides, he thought it better to let me see 
 you. Mr. Audley Dale has done some 
 foolish things in his time, as perhaps you 
 are aware — some very foolish things when 
 he was a boy at Addiscombe." 
 
 He was watching her intently — -just as 
 he might have watched a witness in the 
 box, in whose talents he had every con- 
 
THE BATTLE ON THE DENES. 241 
 
 iidence, and in whose veracity none. 
 Temple Masters was a fluent speaker, and 
 knew kow to attack the weak points of a 
 jury ; but if ever he won his way to wealth 
 and position, it would be far more by those 
 keen, eager eyes of his, and the still soul 
 keeping watch behind them, than by any 
 flight of eloquence. He was taking the 
 woman's measure, and already he had 
 pretty nearly gauged it. It would be 
 difficult to grapple with her. Audley Dale 
 was deeper in the mire than he thought 
 for. This was no common village girl, who 
 might be easily bought or frightened off. 
 If this woman thought she had a hold, she 
 would keep it to the death. He warmed 
 to his work. The difficulty of it cheered 
 him on. 
 
 " I do n't know what foolish things you 
 mean,'' she said, presently. " Whatever 
 he did at Addiscombe, he was old enough 
 to know what he was about. If a gentle-- 
 man gives his word to a poor girl — a good 
 
 VOL. I. 16 
 
242 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 girl, too, sir — who might defy the whole 
 world to say a word against her — I take 
 it he is bound to keep to his promise, and 
 not to fling her off because he thinks a lady 
 with a little money might suit him better. 
 I do n't know whether Mr. Audley Dale has 
 ever acted foolishly ; but if this is what he 
 thinks of doing, I am sure he is acting 
 wickedly now." 
 
 *' Uncommonly well done, by Jove !'' 
 thought Temple Masters. " Mildly heroic, 
 and do n t carry it too far. Good ! I'd 
 swear you were good, you jade ! and 
 you'd sell your so-called goodness just as 
 sordidly and basely as any lost creature in 
 the streets would barter her vileness : only 
 you'd make a better bargain. You want a 
 wedding-ring and a position. She, poor 
 wretch, wants a crust and a glass of gin. 
 Good ! Why there is n't fire enough in you 
 to go astray !" 
 
 Then he said aloud, ''Do n't you think 
 all this is a little beside the question. 
 
THE BATTLE ON THE DENES. 243 
 
 We're not talking of Mr. Audley Dale's 
 marrying any one — young men of three or 
 four-and-twenty are not in such a hurry to 
 enter into matrimony as boys of eighteen. 
 They know too well all that the doing so 
 involves. There are so many unpleasant 
 responsibilities, and if they marry, in 
 a conventional sense of the word, be- 
 neath them, so many unpleasant conse- 
 quences, consequences which are not coi^ 
 fined to the man, but fall very much more 
 heavily on the partner of his indiscre- 
 tion." 
 
 "I'm ready to face such consequences, 
 sir," said Clare. '* It's of no use pretending 
 to misunderstand you. We may as well 
 be clear and open. I have considered 
 myself for some years past, and with good 
 reason, engaged to Mr. Audley Dale. I've 
 letters in his handwriting proposing mar- 
 riage ; other letters saying that it should 
 take place when he was of age. What have 
 I done to him that he should not keep his 
 
 16—2 
 
244 OUT OF II ER SPHERE. 
 
 word ? IVe been true to him every way — 
 let my time go by when I might have 
 married others, and- well married, too, and 
 done all I could to make myself fit for the 
 position he could raise me to. I should 
 make a better lady than many born to it. 
 I should n't bring him a fortune, but I'd 
 save him one. I'd take my chance of other 
 unpleasantnesses, I should live them down ; 
 and when once a womaa marries, she's her 
 husband's equal, people would forget before 
 long that I was n't so till he made me. As 
 to his family, well, they'd get over it in 
 time, as many a family has got over such a 
 thing before." 
 
 " Fairly put. It might all be as you say, 
 if Mr. Dale were still in the same mind that 
 he was some years ago. But he is not. A 
 man sees with different eyes to a boy's — 
 I'm not going to urge anything in favour of 
 his inconstancy — I only admit the fact. We 
 must make the best of the fact — it can't be 
 altered, but to some extent it can be 
 
THE BATTLE ON THE DENES. 245 
 
 atoned for. If any reasonable compensa- 
 tion " 
 
 " A jury would give me ^yq thousand 
 pounds/' said Clare. 
 
 " I doubt that, and you would n't get it 
 if they did. Audley Dale is a poor man, 
 worth nothing but his pay and a small 
 allowance from his father. The Bishop is 
 a most exemplary man — but there, you 
 know him, and I need n't expatiate on his 
 good qualities to you ; but knowing him^as 
 you do, you can judge whether he would 
 feel himself called upon to pay such a debt 
 as this ; whether he would not feel himself 
 as fully justified in refusing to do it, as he 
 would a debt incurred at the gaming table, 
 or on the race course." 
 
 " There would be the disgrace," hissed 
 Clare, and her eyes shone with an evil 
 light, and her sallow cheeks were lit up — 
 she had more fire in her after all than 
 Temple Masters had given her credit for. 
 
246 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 *'Mr. Audley would be punished as he 
 deserves to be." 
 
 " I do n't think the disgrace would affect 
 him as much as you imagine. Men, even 
 juries, look at these matters in a different 
 light to what women do. You are a year 
 Audley Dale's senior, when you were both 
 in your teens that year made a great 
 difference. Perhaps you threw yourself in 
 his way — made the most of your opportuni- 
 ties— led him on — played with him — a.sgood 
 women like yourself know so very well how 
 to play and to lead. He was fool enough 
 to write those letters — hut — he is not fool 
 enough to abide by them. He did a rash 
 thing as a boy, he will not do a mad one as 
 a man. He will not ask his family to 
 welcome, his equals to receive, a woman 
 who tries to hold him by a tie which he 
 loathes, which he is ashamed of himself for 
 having forged; a woman greatly beneath 
 him in birth, in education, and who proves 
 by thus persistently forcing herself upon 
 
THE BATTLE ON THE DENES. 247 
 
 him how greatly she is beneath him in 
 honourable feeling and self-respect. I 
 think that's the way a jury would have 
 looked at it had he been of age when he 
 wrote the letters. In that case they might 
 have given damages, but they would only 
 have been nominal ones, while, as it is, he 
 would only have to put in a plea of infancy 
 and there would be an end of the matter. 
 If it came before the public, of course he 
 would be laughed at a little, and the Bishop 
 would be pitied. Neither the laughter nor 
 the pity would hurt either of them very 
 much, and I do n't suppose a single lady in 
 the kingdom would think herself justified in 
 refusing Audley Dale because he did not 
 choose to put his late aunt's waiting-maid 
 on a footing of equality with his sisters." 
 
 " You can talk, sir, it's your business," 
 said Clare, coldly. Her colour had subsided, 
 and the green stillness of her eyes was as 
 placid as ever. " But other lawyers can 
 
248 OUT OF UEK SFHEME. 
 
 talk too, and there are two sides to every 
 question." 
 
 "So there are, I admit it ; but I think 
 we should have the best side in this. Still 
 there is no need to bring matters to such a 
 point as we have been speaking of. Mr. 
 Dale considers that you may have some 
 right to feel aggrieved. Perhaps you had 
 no right to form the expectations which 
 you did, but still you have formed them. 
 It is possible that, as you say, you may have 
 let other chances of establishing yourself 
 go by. It is not yet too late for you to do 
 so, especially if a small dowry were in the 
 way. He is not rich, but still, as reparation 
 for any imintentional wrong he may have 
 committed, he would do his best for you. 
 I need hardly say, that in such a case he 
 would expect his letters returned to him." 
 
 "You need hardly have said it," said 
 Clare, looking at him now with her pale 
 face of a livid whiteness. " I expected 
 that was coming, all along. Will you tell 
 
THE BATTLE ON THE DENES. 249 
 
 Mr. Audley Dale from me that I have n't 
 changed if he has, that I am still in the 
 same mind I was when he wrote those 
 letters, and by what they say and the pro- 
 mise he gave me then I'll stand ; if he's 
 wise he'll do so too. I'm not to be bought 
 off ; if I had been a lady you would n't have 
 dared to try it on. Women like me are 
 made only to be trodden on and played 
 with. Let Mr. Audley Dale do it if he 
 dares !" 
 
 '' Dangerous !" said Temple Masters to 
 himself " There'll be mischief here if we 
 do n't mind. She's at white heat now, she 
 may be a little wiser when she cools, but I 
 doubt it." To her he said, "You may 
 think better of this by and bye. I think, if 
 you turn the matter over, you will agree 
 with me that the course I have suggested is 
 the best for yourself as well as for Mr. Dale. 
 I won't urge it on you now ; if you think 
 anything further of it, let me know. Any 
 letters directed to Temple Masters at the 
 
250 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 Rectory, Tring, will be sure to find me, 
 whether I am there or not. Good after- 
 noon. I do n't pretend to saj that my 
 interest in you is great enough for me to 
 advise you sheerly for your own sake. But 
 if I did look at it from your side of the 
 question I do n't know that T could advise 
 you to a better course. I hope no womanish 
 temper will prevent your taking it. I 
 should give you credit for more wisdom 
 than that. Good afternoon — you'll remem- 
 ber — Temple Masters." 
 
 She returned his parting salutation. He 
 was obliged to own that even Milly Lisdale 
 or Beatey Layton could hardly have done 
 it better. But she muttered to herself as 
 she did so, " When I do write, Mr. Temple 
 Masters, it won't be to tell you I've taken 
 your liberal offer. You're clever, and if T 
 wanted a lawyer on my side I do n't know 
 that I could choose a better. But there 
 are others as clever as you ; and such letters 
 as Mr. Dale's are worth a little more than 
 
THE BATTLE ON THE DENES. 251 
 
 you want to make me believe. But it is n't 
 the money that they'll fetch. I'll keep them 
 
 for I'll keep them to punish and humble 
 
 the man who thinks he can fling me off 
 like an old glove. Oh, Lord ! if I had 
 loved him what should I be bearing now ! 
 He comes to the house, and bends over 
 that woman — lets her look in his eyes, and 
 w^hisper nonsense to him, and thinks I can 
 come in and out, and see it all unmoved. 
 Can I ? You should know a little better 
 what I'm made of, Audley Dale ! Then 
 there's a talk of him and Miss Lisdale. 
 There may be some truth in it. She has 
 money, and as he can't marry Mrs. Thorn- 
 ton, she may not so much mind his 
 marrying some one else. It will be a 
 good blind, and Miss Lisdale will be easily 
 managed — a little more easily managed 
 than me. Let them go on — let them go 
 on. I've waited very long. I'll wait a 
 little longer. 
 
 "Now I'll go home and think matters over 
 
252 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 — think how I shall best punish that mean ! 
 cowardly ! false I vile ! WEETCH 1 ! !" 
 She said the last words rather than 
 thought them. They came hissing out 
 between her teeth ; and their utterance,, 
 though very low, was a relief to her. 
 
 Another woman would have found 
 vent for such a storm of passion as was- 
 raging within her in hysterical shrieks or 
 tears. But Clare did nothing of the kind. 
 That was never her way. The tears or 
 hysteria would have involved an expression 
 of impotence, which would have been 
 humbling even to herself — the words 
 seemed like so many daggers, and sym- 
 bolised the thrusts she hoped to inflict in 
 retribution. She repeated these with several 
 more, and then walked quickly home — 
 swiftly and gracefully ; and stolid Deb, 
 on her return, did not see that anything 
 was amiss ; neither would a much quicker- 
 witted person than Deb have thought that 
 anything was wrong, beyond the headache 
 
THE BATTLE- ON THE DENES. 253 
 
 of which Clare complained, as she asked 
 Deb to get her some tea. 
 
 " And then see that there's a nice, bright 
 fire, and put the irons down. I've got 
 those laces to do," she said. She had 
 always a habit of ordering Deb about, and 
 causing her to feel very much the inferior 
 of the two. And as she went upstairs 
 to take off her walking dress she murmured 
 to herself, " Do n't I wish they were like 
 that shirt I've read of somewhere ;• and 
 would eat into madam's flesh, till they'd 
 poisoned it like a cancer !" 
 
 If hell is within us, and wherever we go, 
 brought about by our own sinful and 
 unruly hearts — if for each mortal his own 
 passions make his own pandemonium, even 
 in this world, without waiting for entrance 
 into another, then Charlotte Clare was 
 already experiencing as much torture as 
 any lost soul can be supposed to know. 
 And yet she smoothed out her gloves, and 
 put her dress and bonnet away as carefully 
 
254 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 as if she had come from a common -place 
 tryst, where all had gone off smoothly and 
 pleasantly ; and she drank her tea, and 
 ironed the laces afterwards, as composedly 
 as if the wish that she had uttered respect- 
 ing them had not come from the very 
 bottom of her heart. 
 
CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 WHAT BEFELL AT BEECHSIDE. 
 
 TEMPLE MASTERS was more success- 
 ful In his quest for a carriage than he 
 had been in his mission to Charlotte Clare. 
 In good time an equipage, duly appointed 
 with two horses, and, considering it was a 
 hired affair, looking not so unfit for a bishop, 
 arrived at the Rectory gate at Tring. 
 Even Price was satisfied with it, and 
 having surveyed it carefully, retvimed to 
 assist his master in his toilet, and give him 
 a favourable report of the equipage. So far 
 the Bishop was satisfied. He should enter 
 Wearmouth as a bishop ought to enter it ; 
 
256 OUT OF ITER SPHERE. 
 
 but he was still in doubt as to whether or 
 not he should wear his apron. He was as 
 much puzzled as a lady sometimes is as to 
 whether full dress or demi-toilette will be 
 the most suitable attire for any special 
 occasion. He rather inclined to the apron, 
 especially as Price was decidedly in favour 
 of it. But then, if Price could have had his 
 way, his lordship would have gone about 
 with a mitre for every-day w^ear, and taken 
 his apron to bed with him. He should 
 meet a number of the local clergy at Beech- 
 side — for, if the clerical element had been 
 excluded from the society of the place, the 
 society would have been very limited 
 indeed. The Bishop wished to impress, 
 but not to overawe. He had no doubt but 
 that as a bishop he was a very formidable 
 person, indeed, in their eyes. He re- 
 membered the days, such a little while 
 back, when a bishop had ranked next to 
 a crowned head in his own. Would not the 
 apron be too palpable a proof of his 
 
WHAT BEFELL AT BEECH SIDE. 257 
 
 superiority? Something that had better 
 be laid aside in ordinary hfe, just as a 
 sovereign might lay aside the insignia of 
 his state ? On the other hand, ought he 
 not to wear such insignia — to keep the 
 burthen of his exalted position, however 
 much he might be inclined to lay it aside ? 
 Price seemed to think so. On the whole 
 he wovild be guided by Price and wear the 
 apron. It was an age of laxity an^i 
 irreverence, not at all a time for those who 
 honoured their order to lay aside the out- 
 ward symbols of it. He would stand by 
 the apron, as he would by anything else 
 characteristic of his cloth. 
 
 Price had resolved to accompany his 
 master. Of course he did not wear 
 Uvery ; but as only the driver had 
 come with the brougham sent for the 
 Bishop, Price considered that his presence 
 on the box would be better than that of no 
 second servant at all. " I shall be handy 
 to open the door, when your lordship 
 
 VOL. L 17 
 
258 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 alights, and clear the way, in case of any 
 crowding. No doubt but people will be 
 curious to see your lordship when you do 
 them the honour of visiting their town." 
 
 Now and then the Bishop wished that 
 Price would forget he was a lord eccle- 
 siastical. He was for ever reminding him 
 of his own dignity, till sometimes the re- 
 membrance of it became wearisome ; indeed 
 the dignity itself had not been of his seek- 
 ing. He had not achieved greatness, it 
 had been thrust upon him ; and sometimes 
 he wished it had not been so thrust. He 
 had been a happier man in that Westshire 
 Rectory, to which his great relations now 
 and then sent their younger branches for 
 change of air, or as a beneficial relaxation 
 after a hard-working session. The shadow 
 of his family dignity had rested on him 
 pleasantly, giving him a mild reflected 
 splendour which had been easy to bear, and 
 had added not disagreeably to his social 
 importance. But it had entailed no re- 
 
WHAT BEFELL AT BEECH SIDE. 259 
 
 sponsibility upon him — no more, that is, 
 than he was very well able to sustain. His 
 income was equal to it. It would not have 
 been pleasant to have been poor. As a Dale, 
 cousin to Lord Carlyon, of course it was 
 only proper that he should live in rather 
 better style than did other rectors and 
 vicars — keep a carriage and pair and main- 
 tain a good table — be liberal, too, in his 
 benefactions of soup and blankets, and con- 
 tribute handsomely to his parish schoofe. 
 All this he had done, and never felt the 
 doing it weigh heavily upon him. He had 
 lived upon pleasant terms with his neigh- 
 bours — old-world country squires, with 
 their Toryism in the fashion of a hundred 
 years back. He had sat on the bench and 
 been guided by the wisdom of the clerk, 
 let his fellow magistrates have their own 
 way in the matter of poachers, and been 
 liberal of doles to the wives and children of 
 those they sent to prison — done his best, 
 with the most good-natured intentions in 
 
 17—2 
 
260 OUT OF II ER SPHERE. 
 
 the world, to pauperise his parish and verify 
 the Scripture — " The poor shall ye always 
 have with you." Life had been pleasant 
 enough in this little nook, where the world 
 had gone by and taken no notice of him — 
 where his light had twinkled in a comer, 
 and nobody had taken heed whether it 
 burnt more or less brightly — much plea- 
 santer, he was afraid, than it was likely to 
 go on in Drowsehead, where people were 
 scrutinizing his every movement and say- 
 ing, and expecting all sorts [of things from 
 him, the least of which would be a heavy 
 tax on his capabilities. 
 
 Still, as far as he knew how, he would 
 do what was expected of him. He was 
 going to do it now. A bishop should mix 
 in society, and unbend, and be pleasant 
 with his clergy, and kind and genial to 
 ladies ; he was going to be all that, but at 
 the same time wear the apron, and let them 
 see that he had not forgotten his bishopric. 
 Down he came, full of this resolve, and 
 
WHAT BEFELL AT BEEGHSIDE. 261 
 
 turned into the rectory drawing-room — a 
 little low dark room, with the furniture in 
 it of the previous occupant, and looking as 
 cheerless and unlovely as a bachelor's draw- 
 ing-room generally does look. His two sons 
 were there ; they had been looking out of 
 the window while waiting, and exchanging 
 observations on the hired brougham and 
 the borrowed dog-cart. They were tired of 
 waiting now, and Audley was drumming his 
 fingers on the glass, and Maurice whistling 
 — was it, " Sally come up ?" 
 
 The Bishop did n't like it ; he never ap- 
 proved of whistling — a habit in which 
 Maurice persistently delighted ; it was un- 
 clerical, to say the least, and Maurice might 
 have been better employed than in stand- 
 ing there whistling and looking out of 
 window instead of attiring himself to ac- 
 company his father. He was dressed in 
 a morning costume that was the facsimile 
 of Audley's. The Bishop could have sworn 
 — that is, supposing a bishop could swear 
 
262 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 about anything — that they were made by 
 the same tailor. A morning- coat, grey 
 trousers, and a black neck-tie. He al- 
 ways would wear black neck-ties — the 
 bishop and he had had several arguments 
 on this very matter, but he had not ex- 
 pected that he would wear one on an occa- 
 sion like this, when the Bishop was to make 
 almost a public entrance into the society 
 of Wearmouth. He stood there calmly and 
 leisurely, and looked at the Bishop, not with 
 any impertinence, but still as a son might 
 look at a father who had kept him waiting, 
 and said, " If you are quite ready, sir, per- 
 haps we had better start." 
 
 Then he really meant to go in that dress 
 — in that morning-coat, those grey trousers, 
 and that black neck-tie — the very dress of 
 his brother, who was a lieutenant of horse. 
 There was not the slightest thing about 
 him to show his cloth, and the Bishop him- 
 self, from the time he was ordained a curate, 
 would almost as soon have thought of put- 
 
WHAT BEFELL AT BEECH SIDE. 263 
 
 ting a hempen rope round his throat as 
 anything but a white neck-tie. He said 
 something to that effect to his son, who 
 made answer, " I do n't want to show the 
 shop wherever I go, sir, any more than 
 Aude here. We do n't care to be always 
 in uniform — it's getting to be almost as low 
 for one in our line as in his." 
 
 " I wish you would avoid slang and 
 such expressions as you have just used," 
 said his father. " Did you ever hear 
 anything but good English when at 
 home ?" 
 
 Maurice shrugged his shoulders, and 
 looked slightly sorry. "It's a villainous 
 habit, I know, but every one does it. You 
 should hear Hartley ?" 
 
 " Who is he ? If he is so versed in slang 
 I should hardly care to hear him." 
 
 '' Hector of Wye, four miles from here. 
 I'd back him against any public school 
 boy. If we want to knov/ the last new col- 
 loquialism, we have only to listen to him. 
 
264 OUT OF HER SPHERE, 
 
 He made a first-rate speech last night at 
 the meeting." 
 
 " Mr. Hartley was there, too ?" said the 
 Bishop, with half a groan. 
 
 "Well, yes, he rather goes in for that 
 kind of thing. You see, when a parish is so 
 small, what is a man to do ? It does n't fill 
 up his time nor his thoughts — one can't be 
 always pottering about with the old women, 
 poor old sinners ! and if you have n't a 
 soul in your parish that you can exchange 
 a rational idea with, you must find some 
 means of filling up the time. If one was in 
 a town, now, — but there, I don't know," 
 said Maurice Dale, a little mournfully, 
 " that Hartley and I should get on any 
 better if we were." 
 
 " I do n't know that you would," said the 
 Bishop, as severely as he knew how. " The 
 more contracted the sphere in which a 
 dangerous example manifests itself the 
 better. I should say Mr. Hartley and 
 you would certainly both be better in 
 the seclusion of a village." 
 
WHAT BEFELL AT BEECH SIDE. 265 
 
 " T is n't that," said Maurice, still looking 
 on the ground — a habit he had when speak- 
 ing of his clerical duties ; " but I do n't 
 know that either Hartley or I do our work 
 so particularly well that we need want 
 more of it. But had n't we better be off, 
 sir ? Mrs. Rushington will begin to think 
 she is not to have the pleasure of seeing 
 you r 
 
 " The brougham will take us all," said 
 the Bishop ; " what need is there to have 
 that dangerous-looking dog -cart out at 
 all ?" 
 
 ''I must drive it back," said Audley. 
 " The fellow who lent it me expects it at his 
 quarters to-day. Maurice was coming with 
 me. A close carriage always makes his 
 head ache." 
 
 " Drive in to Wearmouth in — that — 
 thing ?" said the Bishop with a pause be- 
 tween every word, and looking aghast at 
 his elder son. 
 
 " IVe often done it, sir, or driven it else- 
 
266 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 where, — at least, whenever I could borrow 
 it of the fellow that owns it, and I shall be 
 fit for nothing if I go inside this warm day. 
 I must beg that you will excuse me." 
 
 "What else could the Bishop do ? He 
 got into the brougham, and there he sat in 
 solitary state, with Price on the box, while 
 his two sons followed him. It had been a 
 planned thing that they should do so. One 
 or other ought to have travelled with their 
 father, but both shrank from it. 
 
 " I shall never hear the last of that 
 meeting, last night, if I do," said Maurice. 
 *' He has come over here on purpose to give 
 me a lecture as to my ways, and I do n't 
 mean to give him the chance if I can help 
 it. If I'm shut up with him I'm at his 
 mercy, and he'll show none. It's very hard 
 — I'm doing the best I can after my own 
 way — why can't he let me alone in it." 
 
 Audley would have gone with his father, 
 but just then he was in no humour for a 
 tete-d-tete. He had made up his mind 
 
WHAT BEFELL AT BEECHSIDE. 267 
 
 about Milly Lisdale, but till he was quite 
 sure bow she had made up hers he did not 
 want to say anything to the Bishop about 
 her. And by two or three words that the 
 Bishop had dropped, and a little curiosity 
 he had shown about Miss Lisdale, it had 
 seemed very probable to Audley that he 
 might be subject to cross-questioning when 
 alone in the carriage with his father, which 
 cross-questioning he was especially anxious 
 to avoid. So the Bishop drove inta the 
 town in solitary state, and his sons followed 
 him, and he was received by Mrs. Bushing- 
 ton with all the honours she knew how to 
 pay. 
 
 She was just a little afraid of him. Her 
 continental experiences had not brought 
 her across many bishops, and she had lived, 
 if not a fast life, at least a very easy one. 
 With the clergy of Wearmouth, who formed 
 so leading a feature in its society, she got 
 on well enough, but then, with the excep- 
 tion of Mr. Thornton, the clerical world 
 
268 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 took matters comfortably, and Mrs. Eush- 
 ington felt that for any little derelictions 
 from the strict line of Puritanic propriety 
 she had little to fear from them. But a 
 bishop was another matter ; and this bishop 
 was new, and nobody had ever heard any- 
 thing of him before he came to his see. 
 He might be the strictest of the strict — 
 Evangelical enough to look upon theatres 
 as a delusion of the evil one, and dancing 
 as a sport fit only for the arch fiend. Very 
 likely he was strict — if he had been Broad 
 or High, j)eople would have heard of him ; 
 now-a-days it was only the Low Church that 
 went on its way quietly, and never made 
 itself conspicuous at all unless by being 
 more disagreeable than other people to its 
 neighbours. 
 
 She had scolded her husband, and lec- 
 tured Milly and Beatey as to their proper 
 behaviour. She was full of fears lest Mrs. 
 Thornton should misbehave herself in one 
 way or another. " That woman makes 
 
WHAT BEFELL AT BEECH SIDE. 269 
 
 such dreadful play with her eyes, and al- 
 ways when other people are looking," said 
 Mrs. E-ushington to herself. 
 
 It was late when the Bishop came, 
 owing to that little dispute about Maurice's 
 toilet, and nearly every guest had arrived. 
 Mrs. Thornton was there, looking as well as 
 she ever did look by daylight ; she was 
 flushed and animated. Here was an oppor- 
 tunity for display, and, poor thing ! how 
 she enjoyed it. Her life was so cold, and 
 straight — she had compared it herself once 
 to a long narrow walk between two high 
 walls, and, lo ! here was an outlet into 
 something fresh and bright, a gHmpse of 
 a world where other things were talked 
 of than Bible societies, Sunday schools, 
 and clothing clubs. The people she met 
 here, being so many of them more or 
 less connected with the Church, did neces- 
 sarily talk of such things, but they were 
 not always before their eyes, as her 
 husband would have had them or similar 
 
270 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 matters before hers — they had met to 
 spend a few pleasant hours together — 
 to pay compHments, say pleasant things, 
 and look and seem their best. How nice 
 it all was ! how pleasant the sunshine 
 and the flowers ; not that she cared so 
 very much for flowers, unless in a well 
 made-up bouquet ; and the pretty dresses 
 — next to being well dressed herself, Mrs. 
 Thornton liked to see other people so. 
 What a blessed relief it all was from that 
 dull Rectory parlour, with its hideous 
 paper, and its dreary look-out on the 
 churchyard and its graves ! 
 
 She looked keenly at the Bishop, and 
 was not half so much afraid of him as 
 Mrs. E/Ushington was. " He's a good old 
 soul," she said, " and I should say would 
 make a capital papa - in - law." Then 
 Audley Dale came up to her, but she 
 put him ofl* ; ''Go and speak to Miss 
 Lisdale first, sir ; then if you like, come 
 back and tell me how youVe prospered." 
 
WHAT BEFELL AT BEECH SIDE. 271 
 
 Her husband saw him come and go, and 
 felt more satisfied than ever that he had 
 spoken as he had. He had evidently only 
 come to his wife out of sheer politeness, 
 because it would look strange if he did 
 not, and for nothing more. Thank heaven ! 
 he had put a stop to that folly ; it was 
 over and done with ; he might breathe 
 like a free man ; free at last from the 
 awful dread that had been hanging over 
 him. 
 
 Milly Lisdale and Beatey Layton were 
 together. Milly was looking very charming 
 in her quiet little way. Beatey was a 
 blaze of prettiness ; a little disquieted too, 
 under all her colouring and brightness. 
 What did Temple Masters mean by not 
 making his appearance ? Was he afraid 
 to come — afraid to venture near her, or 
 was he staying away out of sheer in- 
 difference ? Milly read her friend s trouble, 
 and put an end to it as soon as she 
 
272 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 well could. " Have n't you brought Mr. 
 Masters with you ?'* she said, as she shook 
 hands with Audley. " There's no one like 
 him for croquet. We shall all be dis- 
 appointed if we do n't see him." 
 
 " He will be here soon," said Audley. 
 *' He is a busy man, as you know, and 
 even down here, can't always call his time 
 his own." 
 
 He felt ashamed of himself as he made 
 the excuse. Ashamed to think what it 
 was that was detaining Temple. Many 
 a far worse man would not have felt 
 half so humbled as did Audley Dale when 
 he reflected upon the position into which 
 he had brougrht himself. He was more 
 in love with Milly Lisdale than he was 
 aware of, himself — more thoroughly in 
 earnest in the whole matter than he had 
 given himself credit for being in anything, 
 or he never would have looked with the 
 loathing that he did on the woman who had 
 trammelled him, with the scorn that he 
 
WHAT BEFELL AT BEEGHSIDE. 273 
 
 did on himself for being so trammelled. 
 What right had he — fool and idiot — who 
 had done his best to make shipwreck of 
 his life at its very ontset^ to offer him- 
 self to this girl with her unsullied life, 
 her innocent thoughts, with all her past 
 lying so clear and open that there was 
 not a day of it that she would fear to 
 speak of — not an action that the whole 
 world might not know of. 
 
 What did Temple Masters mean when 
 he said that any man thought the dregs 
 of his life good enough to offer to any 
 woman ? Had he, Audley Dale, only the 
 dregs of his to offer to the girl before 
 him ? Heaven forbid ! He had not come 
 to that yet. Weak he had been, perhaps 
 weaker as a man, in that he had not in 
 one way or another wrenched apart the 
 chains which had bound him, than as a boy 
 in forging them. Idle, thoughtless, selfish, 
 vain — thinking that it was not too much to 
 ask a woman for her all and give her back 
 
 VOL. T. 18 
 
274 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 that which would cost him next to nothing. 
 But after all, there was something more than 
 the dregs of his life yet left for him to give ; 
 if only the very best that he had to offer 
 would be thought by Milly Lisdale worth 
 her while to take. 
 
 He was getting a little afraid of that now 
 — a little more fearful of himself, a little more 
 in awe of her. He had said she was as good 
 as gold — was not gold too good for him ? 
 
 Beatey Layton brightened up internally 
 after his explanation, such as it was, about 
 Temple Masters. Externally she had been 
 all radiance — then she thought, as he had 
 made her feel so very much the happier, 
 she would do him a good turn in recom- 
 pense for the one he had unintentionally 
 done her, and run off and leave him alone 
 with Milly. " I do n't know whether he 
 has anything to say to her, or whether 
 he hasn't, but I may just as well give 
 him a chance," she thought. People were 
 calling her, so that she had a good excuse 
 
WHAT BEFELL AT BEECHSIDE. 275 
 
 for running off, and away she went, leaving 
 the two in what she felt was, if an offer was 
 to be made, the very snuggest place in the 
 world in which to make it — a little ivy- 
 covered nook in the farthest corner of 
 the grounds, where nobody was likely to 
 see them, thanks to an intervening shrub- 
 bery, which in spring and summer was a 
 mass of sweetness and fragrance of lilac and 
 syringa. They would be quiet enough there 
 for a little time if they wanted to be quiet, 
 and they would be so near other people, 
 and the croquet players on the large lawn, 
 that they could hear directly if they were 
 wanted ; but, indeed, you could not be 
 very far from any one in the grounds 
 of Beechside, which were of as limited 
 extent as those of most seaside villas. 
 
 " I think we must go," said Milly. 
 "People will be wanting me. IVe a 
 great deal to do and to see to, you 
 know, and I haven't yet made acquain- 
 tance with the Bishop." 
 
 18—2 
 
276 OUT OF II ER SPHERE. 
 
 She wanted to get away. Something told 
 her that Audley Dale was in earnest and 
 might want to keep her there. Was he 
 going to propose as soon as he had come ? 
 He looked like it : he looked as if he 
 meant it, and how very awkward it would 
 be just then with so many people about, 
 and she with so much to see to. 
 
 She had been expecting an offer from 
 him for some time past, and had made up 
 her mind to accept it when it came. Milly 
 was a sensible girl, and had had offers 
 before, and had put them by as gently and 
 with as much regard to the feelings of 
 those who made them as she knew how to 
 exercise. But still, offers were trying things. 
 " They put one out," said Milly to herself ; 
 "whether one says yes or no, they're 
 awkward." She did not mean to say no 
 this time, which perhaps might make the 
 matter more trying still. There was so 
 much expected of her ; Mrs. Rushing- 
 ton would either think it her duty to 
 
WJIAT BEFELL AT BEECH SIDE. 277 
 
 devote herself entirely to the Bishop, ■ or 
 she would suffer herself to be absorbed by 
 a flirtation with one or other of her favour- 
 ites, and in either case the majority of the 
 guests would want some one else to look to 
 them. People are not very exigeante at 
 garden parties, and Mrs. R-ushington's were 
 always popular, but still, matters lay 
 very much on Milly's shoulders, and she 
 wanted to be about her work now. 
 
 *' I do hope that whatever he's going- to 
 say, he'll let it be till people are nearly 
 going," she thought. " I wish he'd let me 
 get past him now, and — I do believe he's 
 blocking up the way on purpose." 
 
 Something made Audley Dale desperate. 
 Was it his cowardice ? Had he resolved to 
 rush on his fate and brave the worst ? He 
 had not had the slightest fear of there 
 being any worst a little time ago, but now 
 he had, and he felt as if he must know it. 
 The sooner things were over the better ; he 
 would not go amongst all that crowd and 
 
278 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 not feel, one way or another, sure of his fate. 
 " If she won't have me I must put up with 
 it," thought poor Audley ; "perhaps its 
 no more than I deserve, but I feel as if I 
 must know my fate at once." 
 
 *' Milly," he said, '' do stop, just a minute, 
 I do n't want to introduce you to my father 
 just like anybody else, like Beatey Layton 
 or Gary Burke — do n't you see ? — do n't 
 you know ?" 
 
 " It is to be 1" thought Milly. " Now, 
 why he couldn't have put this off till a 
 suitable time, I can't conceive. Men are 
 such unreasonable creatures. Whoever 
 would think of his making me a proposal 
 just when I'm wanted in half-a-dozen places 
 at once. There's mamma calling me. Oh, 
 dear, if he'd only let me go !" 
 
 " I do n't know anything," she said, " but 
 that mamma wants me. I think she is 
 with your father. Had n't we better go ?" 
 
 How she wished she had never entered 
 that little arbour. Beatey and some other 
 
WHAT BEFELL AT BEECHSIDE. 279 
 
 girls had come in with her. They had been 
 talking and laughing together, then the others 
 had run off to get up a new game of croquet, 
 and just as Beatey and she were about to 
 follow, Audley Dale had, unluckily, met 
 them. "It was all so unfortunate ; everybody 
 would know what was going on; one might 
 just as well have it all said before them," 
 thought Milly, " and only think, when I go 
 out amongst them, they'll look at me as if 
 to ask whether I'm really engaged or not." 
 
 "Not yet, not yet, Milly — only one 
 minute longer." 
 
 He took her hand and held it very 
 tightly, and there came a light and a ten- 
 derness into his face such as Milly had 
 never seen there before. It moved her, in 
 spite of her perplexities and her many cares 
 as the mistress of the revels de facto. "If 
 he would only have done it at any other 
 time," she thought. It would have been so 
 nice to have given herself up to the full 
 enjoyment of such a moment — to have let 
 
280 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 herself be loved, and have let him see that 
 he was so too, but now there were a hun- 
 dred conflicting cares and worries, all so 
 commonplace and so little, and yet with 
 such imperative claims upon her. 
 
 " Only one minute, Milly, I must speak 
 to you that one minute." 
 
 " Well, if it must be, it must," she 
 thought. " There's mamma wondering 
 where I am, and to-morrow I shall have 
 such a lecture when she tells me of how 
 overdone she has been, and how I vexed 
 her by never being just where she wanted 
 me. I dare say I shall hear that the Bishop 
 will have thought it odd." Then she 
 looked at Audley not unkindly. *' The 
 sooner it is got over the better, I sup- 
 pose," she thought resignedly, " if he will 
 do it." 
 
 " Milly, I did n t mean to speak to you 
 like this — not all of a sudden, but it 
 seems as if I cannot go on in this way 
 any more. I must make myself under- 
 
WHAT BEFELL AT BEECHSIDE. 281 
 
 stood. I care for you so very much, I 
 wish, oh ! I do wish, Milly, when you see 
 my father, it will be as one who cares for 
 me a little." 
 
 *•' Poor fellow !" thought Milly, compas- 
 sionately. " I'm certain there's mamma 
 again. And, oh, dear, I can hear papa talking 
 to Mr. Hurst about the collodion process ; 
 when he gets upon that there's nothing to 
 be expected from him. I wonder whatever 
 people are doing, with nobody to set tl»em 
 going, or keep them together," then she 
 looked at Audley, and wished she had a 
 little longer time in which to pity him. 
 
 " Do n't you think you could like me, 
 Milly ; not for my deservings. Heaven 
 knows, but just because I like you so very 
 much ?" 
 
 '* I must get this over," thought Milly, 
 ^' I'm certain I'm going to cry. Good 
 gracious, only think of it ! going back with 
 red eyes ! I wonder what I'd better say ? 
 how shall I make him understand ? If one 
 
282 OUT OF HER SFHEliE. 
 
 had nothing to do but to say no, it would 
 be so very easy, but then, no is just what 
 I don't want to say." 
 
 She said nothing, but bent her head just 
 a httle, and for a moment was as happy, 
 and as forgetful of all the realities of the 
 little world within the garden walls as if 
 she had been the most foolish, unpractical 
 person going, instead of sensible, matter-of- 
 fact Milly Lisdale, who had so many things 
 to look after and take care of, her own 
 mamma included. Just a moment, while her 
 lover folded her in his arms and kissed her, 
 and she forgot to trouble herself lest any- 
 one should be looking ; and the next, scared 
 and frightened at her own forgetfulness, 
 she was twisting herself out of his arms, 
 and saying, " Let me go away, please, and 
 don't come near me any more to-day. 
 You don't know how much I have to 
 think of and to see to, and I shall be fit for 
 nothing if I fancy people are talking and 
 wondering about me. Do n't say anything 
 
WHAT BEFELL AT BEECHSIDE. 283 
 
 to your papa till you get him home — no, 
 nor to any one else — I can t bear it ; but 
 go to Mrs. Thornton — you and she always 
 get on so well together, and I do n't care if 
 you tell her everything. I do like her, if 
 mamma does n't ; and, for gracious sake, 
 do n't — do n't do that again, and do keep 
 away and don't let us be talked about." 
 Audley, in the extent of his happiness, had 
 been kissing her once more, and she was 
 now sufficiently recovered to feel horrified at 
 his doing so. She looked at him now 
 keenly, if affectionately ; much in the same 
 way that now and then she looked at her 
 mamma. *'I must have him taken care 
 of," she thought, " and kept from making 
 himself ridiculous." She slipped out of 
 the arbour, and went straight to Mrs. 
 Thornton, who was sitting oq a bench 
 where every one could see her, looking 
 on at the croquet players, and turning back 
 now and then to a middle-aged officer, who 
 was doing his best to make himself agreea- 
 
284 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 ble to her ; lie was heavy, he was not par- 
 ticularly intelligent, and he had very little 
 to say for himself, but he was a blessed 
 change from such society as usually fell in 
 her way. She was looking happy and 
 animated, and her husband for once did not 
 feel inclined to blame her for looking so, 
 although in a sphere totally uncongenial to 
 himself At any rate, it w^as not Audley 
 Dale to whom her smiles were given, and 
 on whom her eyes were turned in all their 
 lustre. That was something. He wished 
 he could see her looking so happy at home, 
 but at any rate it was a great deal that she 
 was not looking happy with the man who 
 had so disquieted him. After all, had he 
 not a great deal to accuse himself of? 
 Why had he not spoken sooner than he had 
 done ? And why had he judged so harshly 
 when a few words seemed enough to set all 
 this coil of misery right ? He was as nearly 
 happy as he had been at any time since 
 the first month of his marriage, and might 
 have continued so had it not been for Milly 
 
WHAT BEFELL AT BEECHSIDE. 285 
 
 Lisdale. She was full of her responsibilities 
 and anxieties : Audley must be kept from 
 distracting her. How should she get 
 through her duties else ? She bent down, 
 and whispered to Mrs. Thornton, "Please 
 take care of Audley Dale, and for goodness' 
 sake keep him from troubling me." 
 
 Then Mrs. Thornton knew what was ex- 
 pected of her, and knew, too, what had taken 
 place, and she rejoiced that her hopes had 
 so far been realized, and that Audley Was 
 likely to be so well provided for. She 
 seized Milly's hand, and looked as if she 
 would have liked to kiss her — as she 
 would. She was a good-natured woman, 
 and she liked this girl, who had been kind 
 to her. " Send him to me, dear," she said. 
 "Til take care of him." And she did, 
 keeping him at her side, and from troubling 
 Milly ; and Mr. Thornton's peace of mind 
 was at once overthrown, and he was more 
 miserable than, on that bright day and in 
 such a scene, it would be easy to conceive 
 that any one could be. 
 
CHAPTER XV. 
 
 THE BISHOP FEELS HTS CARES INCREASE. 
 
 "m /TRS. RUSHINGTON kept tlie Bishop 
 ■^*-*- to herself for a time. She thought 
 it due to him to do so, but after a while 
 other claimants on her attention presented 
 themselves, and his Lordship found, not a 
 little to his relief, that he was left some- 
 what more to himself. His hostess had 
 overpowered him. She had so much to 
 say, such an affluence of words, she was so 
 evidently bent on doing him honour, in- 
 troducing every one to him, and making him 
 feel that he was the hero of the day, when 
 he would so very much rather have been 
 
TEE BISHOPS CARES INCREASE. 287 
 
 left to wander by himself, make acquaintance 
 where he could, and sit or stroll as he 
 pleased. But at last he was free from his 
 hostess. She had done all that propriety- 
 required of her, she thought ; surely now 
 she might give herself up a httle to the 
 enjoyment of the time ; and she did so, and 
 Milly found her work enough for her, with- 
 out giving more than a passing thought 
 now and then to her lover. She looked 
 once in a way at him, and saw that he Vas 
 very well amused with Mrs. Thornton. 
 Nothing was further from Milly's thoughts 
 than any idea of jealousy. Mrs. Thornton 
 was her friend. She liked her, notwithstand- 
 ing her '' odd ways '"' and her large eyes ; 
 she was clever, and hked the books that 
 Milly liked, amongst which, certainly, good 
 novels figured — I really don't see why 
 a girl should n't read a novel some- 
 times ; but at any rate I may frankly 
 own that Milly liked to read them oc- 
 casionally, as well as good books of 
 
288 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 a more solid class. It was something to 
 have any one like Mrs. Thornton to talk to. 
 She found her amusing herself, and was not 
 at all disposed to quarrel with Audley for 
 finding her amusing too. If only Mr. 
 Thornton could have taken the same 
 rational view of matters that this sensible 
 little lady did, what an immense amount 
 of misery he would have spared himself — 
 to say nothing of other people. Nature 
 had given this man so many good things ; 
 why had she not added thereto the virtue 
 of common-sense ; that pleasant, easy, com- 
 mon sense which does not expect too much 
 from any one — above all, which does not 
 lead us to expect every one is to be cast in 
 the same mould as ourselves, and see with 
 the same eyes. He was miserable enough 
 in his way this bright afternoon ; but the 
 poor Bishop, after another and less trying 
 fashion, was not quite happy, either. He 
 thought he would not be monopolized by 
 any one again, and therefore took care not 
 
THE BISHOP'S CARES INCREASE. 289 
 
 to join any group, or attach himself to any 
 particular person. But he wandered about 
 the not very extensive grounds, making his 
 own observations, and, after a fashion of his 
 own, taking note of the peculiarities of 
 such clergy of his diocese as were there 
 assembled. 
 
 It was a good opportunity ; the clerical 
 element formed such a large ingredient in 
 the society of Wearmouth, that to any one 
 who wanted to study the clerical character 
 perhaps as amusing as any other in its very 
 various manifestations — that garden party 
 offered many advantages. But the Bishop 
 was not disposed to be amused by what 
 he saw ; indeed, before long he felt himself 
 greatly aggrieved by what he saw and 
 heard. These men were there, all at their 
 ease, and, notwithstanding his presence, not 
 at all restrained in showing themselves as 
 they were. Every one always did feel so 
 easy and so at home at Mrs. Rush- 
 ington's, that not even a bishop could 
 
 VOL. I. 19 
 
290 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 congeal them into formality, or make them 
 remember that there were things that in 
 such a presence should not be said, and 
 opinions which it might be as well not ta 
 utter till they had some idea what his 
 opinions were. There was a little knot of 
 them together — at any social gathering 
 given a certain number of professionals of 
 any class, they will get together, and they 
 ivill talk ^' shop," and I think the clergy in 
 this resj)ect are greater sinners than either 
 medical men or lawyers. Soldiers don't 
 count when, as in this case, they all come 
 from the same barracks, and of course have 
 thoroughly exhausted each other's mental 
 resources, whatever they may be, before 
 they meet on other ground. But here was 
 a group of the clergy of the place, and the 
 Bishop, unhappily for himself, sat near ; so 
 near, that although unperceived, he could 
 not help hearing every word that passed. 
 Some of them had appeared to him before 
 as wanting in that due regard to propriety, 
 
THE BISHOPS CARES INCREASE. 291 
 
 that suave, bland decorum of dress and 
 manner which had always seemed to him 
 so indispensable in his order ; his son was 
 not the only clergyman present who had 
 appeared anxious to drop every vestige of 
 his cloth ; several of those there assembled 
 had appeared quite as anxious as Maurice 
 or Audley could have been not to show 
 themselves in " uniform." If it had not 
 been for Mrs. Rushington pointing out the 
 different individuals to him who composed 
 the group, and telling him their several 
 designations, it is certain he would never 
 have imagined that one half of them 
 were entitled to place " Reverend " before 
 their names — they were very irreverent 
 now, and if they did talk " shop," it was in 
 such a manner that it would have jarred 
 less on his nerves had they left it alone 
 altogether. 
 
 They had got on the subject of their 
 schools. Maurice Dale, who had joined the 
 group, had started the topic. Practically he 
 
 19—2 
 
292 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 knew less about the working of his schools 
 than any clergyman in the diocese. He 
 did his best, and he spent his money, but 
 everything else had to be left to the master 
 and mistress, and so on the whole the 
 schools at Tring were not a particular suc- 
 cess ; but Maurice was great on the subject 
 of schools in general, would have had them 
 as universal as taxes, as free as air ; and, 
 considering that this was some years before 
 the Education League or Union had started, 
 he deserves all the credit that is due to the 
 pioneers of their age. Mr. Hartley had fol- 
 lowed his lead, and was talking away fluently 
 enough ; the Bishop would have known 
 him — even if he had not been pointed out 
 to him by Mrs. Rushington as the " Eector 
 of Wye, and the oddest creature that ever 
 breathed" — by the euphemisms to which his 
 son had alluded. He talked slang — he 
 could n't help it — but he talked splendid 
 English, too, when he liked ; but those 
 objectionable modes of expression gave a 
 
THE BISHOP'S CARES INCREASE. 293 
 
 piquancy to his discourse that would have 
 dehghted any hearer but the Bishop. He 
 was a tall, slight man, with a thin, pale 
 face, of good family, and, as the Bishop well 
 knew, his living and his private property 
 together amounted to an income of two 
 thousand a year, and if a Jew clothesman 
 had been asked the value of every article 
 he had on he would perhaps have put down 
 the sum total at five and thirty shillings. 
 He certainly wore a neck-tie, and it was not 
 black, but it would have been a perversion 
 of words to have called it white, and it was 
 limp and tumbled. The Bishop could have 
 groaned as he looked at that neck-tie and 
 thought of the position the Bev. Septimus 
 Hartley held, and the duties that were ex- 
 pected of him, the example he ought to 
 show, and the position he was expected to 
 maintain. After such laxity in his attire it 
 was not to be wondered at if he was equally 
 lax in other matters, and it did not at all 
 surprise the Bishop to hear that his views 
 
294 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 on school management were as heterodox 
 as those of Maurice. The Rev. Theobald 
 liudford was one of the party. From the 
 Kev. Theobald the Bishop had at first sight 
 expected great things. His attire was 
 faultless, his neck-tie speckless ; let him 
 have been seen anywhere and you could 
 have taken him for nothing but what he 
 was — a clergyman of the Established 
 Church ; a Httle high in his views, but not 
 tQ the point of intolerance ; a gentlemanly, 
 well-bred man, perfectly aware of his posi- 
 tion and of what was due to it. The Bishop's 
 heart had fairly warmed to him, till he had 
 seen that the Bev. Theobald, though nearly 
 fifty, with a wife and a couple of daughters, 
 had evidently come to that garden party 
 with the intention of enjoying himself as 
 much as if he had been the youngest officer 
 from the barracks. He played croquet con 
 amove — as he flirted — he told riddles and 
 anecdotes, laughed, made jokes, and gene- 
 rally comported himself in anything but a 
 
THE BISHOPS CARES INCREASE. 295 
 
 €lerical manner. The Bishop was not 
 austere, no one could say that, but he 
 liked a clergyman to remember himself and 
 his cloth in something more than in his 
 garments, and Mr. Rudford had joined in 
 the conversation now with a fusillade of 
 riddles which played like fireworks round 
 the heavy batteries of the other speakers. 
 
 Thej were discussing, now, the benefit 
 of the Scriptures as a class-book. Mr. 
 Rudfori approved of them. He didn't 
 bring arguments in favour of his views, but 
 he brought jokes, which amused the others, 
 if they did not convince them. Mr. Street, 
 who was High Church, too, but much 
 broader than he was high, was not of the 
 same way of thinking. " A great many of 
 those old legends," he said, " unless very 
 careful!/ explained, will do children rather 
 more harm than good. I do n t know but 
 what when you come to tell them of Joshua 
 bidding the sun stand still, or the world 
 rising 3ut of nothing in six days, you might 
 
296 OUT OF HEM SPHERE. 
 
 as well give them ' Hop-o'-my-Thumb,' or 
 'Cinderella/ at once — not as diluted by 
 Cruiksbank, though. The old Teutonic myths 
 will do them as much good as the Jewish 
 ones — rather more — they've more imagin- 
 ation in them, and less bloodthirstiness." 
 
 Could the Bishop believe his ears ? He 
 had heard of the Broad Church, as lie had 
 of the broad gauge, and, practically, knew 
 as much of one as of the other. He had 
 never been brought in such contact with it, 
 before. What did Mr. Street mean by 
 holding such views ? How had he got into 
 the sheep-fold, where he was now disporting 
 himself so very like a robber ? He looked 
 keenly at him. There was nothing of the 
 robber in Mr. Street's appearance. A well- 
 made, dapper little man, Avho perliaps, by 
 most people, would have been taken rather 
 for a rising barrister, or a solicitor with 
 plenty of business, than what he was — 
 keen, shrewd, clever-looking, but with 
 nothing very dreadful about him. Surely 
 the others would take this matter up. Such 
 
THE BISHOP'S CARES INCREASE. 297 
 
 sayings as these were not to be passed over 
 with indifference. They none of them 
 looked very much startled, however, with 
 the exception of Mr. Thornton, who had 
 just come up to the group, and who, in 
 spite of his own private misery, would have 
 answered Mr. Street, had not Maurice Dale 
 observed — 
 
 '^The little wretches are always losing 
 their places. They cut a chapter down to 
 three parts of its length, and whenever they 
 come to a verse with a few hard names, 
 they're safe to skip it. I always find it so 
 with mine." 
 
 " We can't better the Bible, either, as a 
 lesson-book," said Mr. Rudford. " Does 
 any one know, by-the-bye, what was the 
 first thing Noah did when he came out of 
 the ark T \ 
 
 No one seemed inclined to guess ; but Mr. 
 Thornton now broke in. His tone, at least, 
 if unduly solemn, was a relief to the Bishop's 
 ears. He was a wretched man. He had come 
 towards the group to be a little out of the 
 
298 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 sight of what was making his wretchedness 
 almost into madness ; but he could not keep 
 silent now. What was his hurt that he 
 should think of it, when others, the 
 sworn servants of the altar, were treating 
 high and sacred things so irreverently? 
 How could he stand dumb as a sheep, even 
 though the ruin of his home and hearth 
 was impending ? Surely there was a worse 
 ruin now before him. 
 
 " We have no right to speak of this book 
 as we are doing," he said, "no right to 
 ask whether or no it is suitable for a lesson- 
 book. Enough for us that it is the one 
 book, above all others, for the young souls 
 entrusted to our charge to learn — line upon 
 line, precept upon precept, work it into 
 them, word by word, and verse by verse, 
 till it becomes part of their very lives — 
 familiar to them as the air they breathe ; 
 useful as the bread they eat — that is 
 what we have to do with regard to this 
 book. It is no question of expediency, 
 
THE BISHOP'S CARES INCREASE. 299 
 
 or of fitness ; of hard words and difficult 
 meanings — it is the one food we must give 
 these young starvelings, wanting which they 
 perish, and we shall be asked for them, 
 and have no account to render." 
 
 In season and out of season he was always 
 ready to speak ; but his words seemed out 
 of season, now, even to the Bishop. "Let 
 your moderation be known unto all men," 
 was his favourite text, and he had certainly 
 always been moderate in all things. "Jhe 
 man ought to be a Dissenter," he thought, 
 " if he talks like that. I wonder if he was 
 originally brought up for one ?" In truth 
 Harold Thornton would perhaps have spoken 
 less vehemently , and more to the purpose, had 
 it not been for the keenness of the pain that 
 was torturing him. He had to speak, he 
 had to forget his own trouble ; but still his 
 anguish made him speak fiercely and bit- 
 terly, in despite of himself, or, at least, as he 
 would not otherwise have done at such a 
 time and place. For a moment his earnest- 
 
300 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 ness silenced the men around him ; then Mr. 
 Rudford said, in his usual bland, pleasant 
 voice, with conciliation and good temper in 
 every tone — 
 
 " Yes, we must have something to appeal 
 to — something better than a mere moral 
 code on the ' Tommy Goodchild ' system. 
 There are vices a master must check, and 
 he wants a higher authority than his own 
 to appeal to. That's where he would never 
 get on, unless we allowed him to infuse a 
 very strong religious sentiment into his 
 teaching. How else is he to deal with a 
 thief, or a liar, for example ?" 
 
 " I should say give him a good hiding," 
 said the E-ev. Maurice. 
 
 " Quoting the Scriptures won't do it," 
 said the Rev. Septimus Hartley. "If a 
 boy's born a cad all the sermonising in the 
 world won't make him better. I do n't think 
 when I was at Harrow any of us stole. I 
 suppose we were too well off : but if a fellow 
 lied — and some of them did — the master 
 
THE BISHOP'S CARES INCREASE. 301 
 
 who took notice of it would tell Mm it was 
 a blackguard thing, and he ought to be 
 ashamed of himself If he'd quoted Scrip- 
 ture, the boy would have thought him a 
 muff. If he'd sermonized in any other 
 fashion he would have said it was rot. But 
 that sort of appeal to his better feelings 
 generally settled the business. A fellow 
 does n't like being called that kind of thing 
 twice over.'' 
 
 "But it strikes me," said the Bev. 
 Theophilus Street, '' that it would n't be of 
 much use to appeal to the class with whom 
 we have to deal on the score of black- 
 guardism." 
 
 " That's just what I say," said Maurice 
 Dale. '' After all, in such cases a hiding 
 settles the matter most satisfactorily." 
 
 Milly Lisdale came up then. " Mr. Eud- 
 ford, I can't have you talking about all sorts 
 of grave matters here. You know you are 
 wanted everywhere. Please come and make 
 yourself useful at croquet. The game 
 
302 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 always seems so flat if we don't have you 
 in it." 
 
 Mr. Rudford went off to where a bevy of 
 young ladies were awaiting him. Talk of 
 curates, there never was one half so popular 
 as the good-tempered, gentlemanly Rector, 
 with his fifty years. '' It's a sin for you to 
 keep away from us," said Milly. " You 
 know very well you're my right hand in 
 everything. Now, please make yourself 
 useful here." 
 
 Which Mr. Rudford did, after his own 
 fashion, by firing off jokes, riddles, and 
 stories, till croquet was at a stand-still, and 
 all who had got together to form another 
 game could do nothing but listen to him. 
 Never mind, Milly was satisfied. They 
 were all happy. Mamma, too, was well em- 
 ployed. She had the heavy ofiicer upon 
 whom but a little time before Mrs. Thornton 
 had been turning such languishing eyes. 
 He couldn't talk, but he could listen, or 
 seem to do so ; and she was pouring forth 
 
THE BISHOPS CARES INCREASE. 303 
 
 a string of reminiscences of their conti- 
 nental journeyings. She liked this officer. 
 Stout as he was, he waltzed divinely, and 
 waltzing was, next to flirting, Mrs. Rush- 
 ington s weakness. She did n't approve of 
 it for young people, but there were a great 
 many things young people might not do 
 which matrons could, according to Mrs. 
 Kushington. Milly liked square dances as 
 well as round ones, otherwise she would have 
 followed her mamma's example, instead* of 
 her precepts. Beatey, who was as fond of 
 the valse a deux temps as Mrs. Rushington 
 herself, had got into trouble more than once 
 on that account since her stay at Beech- 
 side, Mrs. Bushington thinking it needful 
 to keep a keener supervision over her 
 daughter's friend than over her daughter. 
 Milly looked at her mamma now, and was 
 satisfied. " She will do. Captain Derge 
 will keep her amused for the rest of the 
 day. Papa's going on nicely, making him- 
 self agreeable to those three old ladies. 
 
304 OUT OF II ER SPHERE. 
 
 Well, that's as much as I could expect of 
 him. Where's Beatey ? Good little crea- 
 ture ! Keeping those heavy Tomkinsons 
 going, and I know she's put out, because 
 Temple Masters does n't put in an appearance. 
 Yes, I think people are comfortable ; and 
 there's Mrs. Thornton keeping Audley from 
 teasing me. What a blessing, to be sure, 
 that she's here to take him off my hands !" 
 
 Not an vmmixed blessing, if Milly 
 Lisdale had only known all. If she 
 could but have told how, even when out 
 of his sight, Henrietta Thornton's hus- 
 band was dwelling on the looks and the 
 words she was bestowing upon the man by 
 her side — how he seemed to hear the one, 
 and see the other, even though he kept per- 
 sistently away, and said to himself that he 
 would not go near her lest he should outrage 
 decorum, and sin in his anger against 
 the conventionalities that society required 
 of its mentors. 
 
 " The liar ! the double-faced, equivocating 
 
THE BISHOP'S CARES INCREASE. 305 
 
 liar I" he said to himself. " Only yester- 
 day, and he told me I should have nothing 
 to dread from him ; thanked me for 
 dealing so mercifully with him, and lo ! 
 here he is, parading his admiration for 
 that wretched woman even before my eyes, 
 as if he gloried in her weakness and my 
 possible dishonour I And I was so happy ; 
 but a few moments ago so happy ; and 
 now all the airy fabric I had erected 
 is levelled to the dust — to the dust, whelre 
 he will bring that woman who is weak 
 enough to believe in him. If I go too 
 near, I shall forget myself. I feel as if 
 I could strike him to the earth, and I 
 dare not so openly disgrace my calling — 
 no, nor her, poor wretch, though she has 
 little claim to pity at my hands." 
 
 The little coterie had broken up when 
 Milly Lisdale had drawn away Mr. 
 Rudford, and Harold Thornton wandered 
 aimlessly along. A turn of the shrubbery 
 brought him to the embowered seat where 
 
 VOL. I. 20 
 
306 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 the Bishop was resting in the shade of 
 the Hlacs and laburnums, and without 
 noticing the aproned dignitary who sat 
 at one end of the seat, he flung himself 
 on the other. To another man it would 
 have seemed a desirable opportunity of 
 making the acquaintance of his spiritual 
 lord — once, such a chance would have 
 filled his wife's heart with delight, in the 
 hope that he would profit by it, and that 
 great things might come of it by-and-bye ; 
 now, if she had seen him, she would have 
 known that nothing of the kind could 
 come, and the utmost she would have 
 hoped, would have been that he would 
 not make himself ridiculous, and frighten 
 the Bishop by his desperate earnestness — 
 which was pretty well what he had done 
 already. 
 
 The Bishop looked at him as he sat 
 down ; at the thin pale face, the tender 
 nervous mouth, but which yet had such 
 an ominous power of compression in it ; 
 
THE BISHOP'S CARES INCREASE. 307 
 
 at the thin hair, grey already at the tem- 
 ples ; at the high narrow forehead, and the 
 fire of the unquiet restless eyes. 
 
 " I hope he's not an enthusiast/' thought 
 the Bishop, " but he looks like one ; 
 there are a great many dangerous things 
 going about now-a-days, but enthusiasm 
 always has been, and always will be, the 
 most dangerous of all." 
 
 He thought at first of getting up and 
 walking away. He did not altogether 
 like being in company with this man; 
 even the very contiguity made him feel 
 uncomfortable ; but the seat suited him ; 
 the back sloped pleasantly, and the lilacs 
 and laburnums gave a grateful shade, 
 without intruding themselves, as green 
 things sometimes will intrude, unpleasantly. 
 And he was tired; Mrs. Hushington had 
 walked him round and round, and lionized 
 him, and pointed some people out, and 
 introduced others, and talked and expati- 
 ated and dilated till his head went fairly 
 
 20—2 
 
308 OUT OF II ER SPHERE. 
 
 round. He was glad of tins rest; tlie 
 place was out of every one's way, and 
 through the trees he could see what was 
 going on, if he cared to be so amused, 
 without being annoyed by too much 
 observation himself No, it was not worth, 
 while to leave it just because that un- 
 happy-looking man had sat down near 
 him, but he did wish it had been any- 
 body else ; even Mr. Street, with his 
 heretical doctrines, or Mr. Hartley, with, 
 his euphemisms, would have been better 
 than one who was much fitter for a con- 
 venticle than a church. 
 
 Presently Mr. Thornton addressed him. 
 The poor man, in his intense earnestness, 
 could not stop there, and not talk to 
 his Bishop. Heaven knows, with little 
 thought enough of any possible gain to 
 himself in so doing, but such an oppor- 
 tunity as this had been the wish of his 
 heart ever since he came into the county. 
 There were so many wrongs to right. 
 
THE BISHOP'S CARES INCREASE. 309 
 
 SO many shortcomings of the past to atone 
 for ; so much evil to amend ; why should 
 he not at once address his spiritual lord, 
 (the man, ^Vho — if, unlike his predecessor, 
 he had the will — had certainly the power 
 to take at least some steps in the right 
 direction,) and tell him something of what 
 was so greatly needed ? 
 
 Poor Bishop ! If he had only known 
 what was menacing him now, he would 
 certainly have left that seat, comfortable 
 as he found it. 
 
 Then Mr. Thornton began to speak, 
 introducing himself as the Kector of St. 
 Hilda, and telhng the Bishop what a good 
 thing it was he had come amongst them — so 
 much had been hoped for from his advent. 
 
 "Yes," said the Bishop blandly. "I 
 think that sermon next Sunday will do 
 good. The Sailors' Widows' Fund seems 
 an excellent cause to support. I shall 
 be very happy if any assistance of mine 
 can be of benefit in the matter." 
 
310 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 " All, we want help in a thousand ways 
 besides. Souls are perishing around us, 
 and we, who should be ready to save and 
 help, are contending and disputing amongst 
 one another, or ignoring the very found- 
 ations of the faith which yet it is incum- 
 bent on us to teach others. These are 
 hard days to live in— so much needed, 
 so much wanted ; it seems so impossible to 
 fulfil the thousandth part that is required, 
 and yet if we fail — if we fail — if through 
 weakness or inertness we fall short, who 
 shall say what irremediable misery may be 
 caused thereby !" 
 
 " One's responsibilities are heavy ;" said 
 the Bishop, " distressingly so at times." 
 
 Mr. Thornton resumed, " In this town 
 alone there is room for half-a-dozen more 
 churches, even if in those now existing 
 the work appointed were duly done. 
 Sometimes in my little parish I seem over- 
 done — overdone by the weight of work 
 laid on me, and yet it is but a type of the 
 
THE BISHOPS CARES INCREASE. 311 
 
 whole county — nay, of the whole kingdom ; 
 a seething mass of ignorance and heathen- 
 dom — souls lost to Christ, ears that never 
 heard of God. I do not think, my lord, 
 that of those who stand in such high places 
 as yourself there ever was more needed 
 than there is now. If I, with my small 
 stewardship, sometimes fear that I shall fall 
 short when my reckoning is claimed, what 
 must it be to those like you T 
 
 The Bishop felt uncomfortable, and. a 
 little concerned for Mr. Thornton ; he did 
 not feel inclined to say that much learning 
 had made him mad, but he thought it not 
 impossible that much piety had. Piety 
 was an excellent thing in its way ; he .had 
 always thought so, done his best to incul- 
 cate it in his sermons, and, without pre- 
 suming too much on his own merits, he felt 
 he might say, also in his life. But there 
 might be too much of a good thing, an 
 over care for others' souls which might 
 endanger one's own sanity; of all the 
 
312 OUT OF II ER SPHERE. 
 
 " isms " which had entered the Church and 
 were doing so much harm now-a-days, 
 surely the worst, or at least the most dan- 
 gerous, was fanaticism. 
 
 " Poor man !" thought the Bishop, and 
 edged a little further away. " Means well, 
 I've no doubt, but is perfectly carried away 
 by excess of zeal. I wonder where he was 
 educated — St. Bee's or Durham are more 
 likely to send out men of this stamp than 
 either Oxford or Cambridge." 
 
 There the Bishop was wrong — if he had 
 kept himself as well posted up in Univer- 
 sity matters as he should have done, he 
 would have known that Oxford claimed 
 Harold Thornton as one of her sons, that 
 he had taken his degree with the highest 
 honours, that he might have droned away 
 his life pleasantly enough as a Fellow, had 
 he so chosen, have enriched himself as a 
 Don of the highest classical reputation by 
 taking pupils, have certainly had, in good 
 time, a well-paid professorsliip in his Ahua 
 
THE BISHOFS CARES INCREASE. 313 
 
 Mater offered him, had not a sense of duty 
 called him away, had he not felt that not 
 thus could he do his Lord's work, that with 
 souls not merely hungering for the bread 
 of life, while there was no man ready to 
 give it them, but, far worse, perishing for 
 food, and yet unconscious of their need of 
 it, lost in vice, and sin and darkness, some 
 one must go forth and try and rouse them 
 — some one who felt that this was his work 
 above all other, and who was ready t(i do 
 it for the sheer love of God and good, with- 
 out troubling himself as to whether or no his 
 material recompense in this world would 
 be a little more or less. So he had gone 
 forth — so he had worked. A scholar, who 
 had put his scholarship away from him 
 whenever, with the untaught creatures 
 whom he had to deal with, it had stood in 
 his way ; a gentleman, who had put from 
 him the likings, almost the instincts of his 
 class, and gone where he met with foul 
 smells and loathsome sights, coarse words, 
 
314 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 unseemly jokes, rudeness, irreverence and 
 sometimes insult. A man of refined and 
 intellectual tastes who, as far as he could, 
 had crushed them — dealt with himself as 
 hardly as any ascetic monk of old — and 
 devoted the money and the time which their 
 indulgence would have cost him to the fur- 
 therance of ends that he esteemed as infi- 
 nitely higher. No wonder his bishop failed 
 to understand him, especially now when his 
 utterances were sharpened and embittered 
 by the pain gnawing at his heart. Harold 
 Thornton was an anachronism ; he should 
 have lived in the times when men went to 
 the stake or rotted in prisons for their prin- 
 ciples ; his fervour, his self-denial, the glo- 
 rious half craze of his enthusiasm were out 
 of date now, it was not his bishop only who 
 looked on him with a pitying wonder. 
 Well, thank God, in the Church and out of 
 the Church, there are men as much behind 
 (or before ?) their time as was ever Harold 
 Thornton at his maddest ; perhaps the Bis- 
 hop, too, only after quite another manner, 
 
THE BISHOFS CARES INCREASE. 315 
 
 was nearly as much out of fashion as the 
 unhappy soul beside him. With all our 
 materialism, our stesnn engines, our ma- 
 chinery, our v/onderfully complicated civili- 
 zation, I think we are a little in earnest 
 too. We say strange things, and startling 
 ones, but are they not sometimes the out- 
 come of a spirit that will no longer seek to 
 gain heaven by dull decorum — mete out 
 religion by rule and line, or say to the poor 
 soul hungering and thirsting after righte- 
 ousness, " Thus far in thy search for it shalt 
 thou go, and no further." 
 
 "I think things have been suffered to 
 fall a little behind in some places," said the 
 Bishop. " My predecessor suffered greatly 
 from ill-health, but it is of no use being 
 premature. We must be so very careful in 
 our movements, or we shall do more harm 
 than good." 
 
 " One or two of us have been doing what 
 we can in this town," said Mr. Thornton. 
 " I should like to tell your lordship a little 
 of our movements. They have not met 
 
316 OUT OF HER SPUE HE. 
 
 with much success as yet, but some of us 
 are new to the work, and the population 
 with whom we have to deal is a difficult 
 one to understand, with the crudest notions 
 of right and wrong, the most elementary 
 ideas, or none at all, of sacred things — but 
 we have made a beginning — yes, I think 
 we have made a beginning, though only on 
 a small scale/' And then he began to speak 
 of open air preaching, ragged schools in the 
 poorest parts of the town, home missions 
 to its dark and narrow alleys, bible 
 women, and scripture readers, weekly ser- 
 vices, house to house visitation, prayer- 
 meetings, midnight services ; till the Bis- 
 hop's head was fairly turned — the Dissenters 
 could have done no worse — or better — and 
 Mr. Thornton wound up a recital of almost 
 superhuman efforts, which must have cost 
 more, both in time and money, than the 
 Bishop would have thought could possibly 
 have been found in such a place, by observ- 
 ing : " And it is all so little ! When I think 
 of the vice and the paganism raging around 
 
THE BISHOPS CARES INCREASE. 317 
 
 lis, I feel as if we were trying to shut yonder 
 ocean out when it is raging its fiercest by 
 such embankments as children build of 
 sand." 
 
 *' I think you are doing a great deal, a 
 very great deal, Mr. Thornton," said the 
 Bishop, encouragingly. " But you should 
 take care of your own health. It seems to 
 me you are working too hard (killing him- 
 self," thought the Bishop, '^ I believe these 
 kind of people always do ; but, bless me, I 
 hope I shan't be expected to encourage 
 that sort of thing in the diocese. I am 
 persuaded it would do more harm than 
 good)." 
 
 " One can ask no better than to spend 
 and be spent in such a cause," was the 
 answer, "if only one could see some little 
 result of all one's labours. Sometimes that 
 seems too much to hope for — as if one must 
 be satisfied to work in the dark and never 
 have one glimpse of light to show how the 
 work has progressed. One must wait till 
 
318 OVT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 the end — if only one could think that then 
 — then one might see some small result for 
 all one's toil ; one sheaf garnered for the 
 harvest ; one soul gathered within the 
 golden gates ! and yet sometimes my heart 
 turns sick and faint within me, when I think 
 that even that may be denied — that at the 
 last — at the last I shall find I, like so many 
 more, have been but an unprofitable ser- 
 vant — a lifetime's labour lost, the sum total 
 of the reckoning I shall have to give !" 
 
 There was a light in his eyes as he spoke ; 
 a hungry, despairing look that had some- 
 times come there since that serious illness 
 of his. He was never satisfied with himself, 
 never content with what he had done. It 
 was almost a monomania, this unquiet con- 
 science ; and his domestic misery aggravated 
 it." If a man cannot serve those of his own 
 household, whom, then, can he serve ?" he 
 would sometimes ask himself, despairingly : 
 and now, even as he sat there, his wife came 
 by, leaning on Audley Dale's arm, and 
 
THE BISHOFS CARES INCREASE. 319 
 
 looking brighter, happier, younger, than he 
 had seen her look for months. 
 
 If the Bishop had been keener sighted 
 than he was, he would have learned some- 
 thing from the involuntary twitch of the 
 hand, the passionately-compressed lips of 
 the man by him. After all, it was not 
 heaven only that could move him. But 
 he saw nothing of this, only a handsome 
 woman, who made him an elaborate, a too 
 elaborate, curtsy — a little of her s^age 
 training would cling to Mrs. Thornton still 
 — as his son introduced her to him. The 
 Bishop became gracious as he heard her 
 name. He saw a ready means of extricat- 
 ing himself from the over-zealous man by 
 his side, and showing a little kindly con- 
 sideration, too. "I have been having a 
 long talk to your husband, Mrs. Thornton,'' 
 he said. "I think he overworks himself. 
 You must take care of him — you must, 
 indeed. Overwork in anything — even in 
 our sacred office — is injurious, and some- 
 
320 OUT OF HER SPHERE. 
 
 times defeats the very ends it is meant to 
 gain. You will have Mr. Thornton ill, if 
 you do n't mind, and nobody ought to be 
 ill in this bracinof Wearmouth air." 
 
 Then the Bishop walked away, feeling 
 satisfied that he had been very gracious in 
 the matter, but hoping devoutly he should 
 never see Mr. Thornton again. Rather 
 Mr. Street, with his myths, Mr. Hartley, 
 with his slang, than that. Maurice had 
 tried his father sorely ; but oh ! if he had 
 been like Mr. Thornton, would not that 
 have been a sorer trial still ? Then he 
 thought of Mrs. Thornton. " Showy looking 
 woman. Wherever did he meet with her ? 
 The last lady in the world I should ever 
 have taken for a clergyman's ^ife. But a 
 man so eccentric as Mr. Thornton is so 
 likely to have done just what no . other 
 would do even in his marriage." 
 
 END OF VOL. I. 
 
 BLLLISG, PaiNTBB, GOlLDFOaD, SUBBEY. 
 
^rr;iijj| a »; i B tt| 
 
 UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOI9-URBANA 
 
 3 0112 045828867