te^^f'^'i>; -^rs^-^-^r^-'i ■^«i-^--iMV" »*,,ft,ft^M*,T- ;Sjii5'«;«^^^.^,^^' ■ifMrn ..-r ---^/^//Cr' fer',^ . ■,• .-;^^^:,-^,-■. .. ^:^f ■s*..^5&-.; ^'•^.A.A«'^:'i,|«Mi|> «t»^^''^i ii^p^- UNIVERSITY LIBRARY UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS AT URBANA-CHAMPAIGN The person charging this material is responsible for its renewal or return to the library on or before the due date. The minimum fee for a lost item is $125.00, $300.00 for bound journals. Theft, mutilation, and underlining of books are reasons for disciplinary action and may result in dismissal from the University. Please note: self-stick notes may result in torn pages and lift some inks. Renew via the Telephone Center at 217-333-8400, 846-262-1510 (toll-free) orcirclib@uiuc.edu. Renew online by choosing the My Account option at: http://www.llbrary.uluc.edu/catalog/ NO NAME. NO NAME. BY WILKIE COLLINS, AUTHOR OF "THE VOMAN' IK -R-HITE," "THE DEAD SECRET,' ETC., ETC., ETC. IN THREE VOLUMES. YOL. I. LONDON: SAMPSON LOW, SON, & CO., 47 LUDGATE HILL 1862. [r/ie Right of Translation is Reserved; and the Privilege of Dramatic Adaptation teas been Secured by the Auikor.^ [(^■^ ^k LOXDOX: PRINTED BY VTlf.LIAM rLOWES AND SONS, STAMFORD STREET AND CHARING CROSS. V. I /C^. TO FEANCIS CAER BEARD ; (fellow of the kotal college of surgeons of ekgland) m remembrance of the time when the closing scenes of this story were written. PKEFACE. The main purpose of tliis story is to appeal to the reader's interest in a subject, which has been the theme of some of the greatest writers, living and dead — but which has never been, and can never be, exhausted, because it is a subject eternally interest- ing to all mankind. Here is one more book that depicts the struggle of a human creature, under those opposing influences of Good and Evil, which we have all felt, which we have all known. It has been my aim to make the character of " Magdalen," which per- sonifies this struggle, a pathetic character even in its perversity and its error ; and I have tried hard to attain this result by the least obtrusive and the least artificial of all means — by a resolute adherence, throughout, to the truth as it is in Nature. This design was no easy one to accomplish ; and it has Vlll PREFACE. been a great encouragement to me (during the publication of my story in its periodical form) to know, on the authority of many readers, that tlie object which I had proposed to myself, I might, in some degree, consider as an object achieved. Kound the central figure in the narrative, other characters will be found grouped, in sharp contrast — contrast, for the most part, in which I have en- deavoured to make the element of humour mainly predominant. I have sought to impart this relief to the more serious passages in the book, not only because I believed myself to be justified in doing so by the laws of Art — but because experience has taught me (what the experience of my readers will doubtless confirm) that there is no such moral phenomenon as unmixed tragedy to be found in the world around us. Look where we may, the dark threads and the light cross each other perpetually in the texture of human life. To pass from the Characters to the Story, it will be seen that the narrative related in these pages has been constructed on a plan, which differs from the plan followed in my last novel, and in some other of my works published at an earlier date. The only PREFACE. IX Secret contained in tliis book, is revealed midway in the first volume. From that point, all the main events of the story are purposely foreshadowed, before they take place — my present design being to rouse the reader's interest in following the train of circumstances by which these foreseen events are brought about. In trying this new ground, I am not turning my back in doubt on the ground which I have passed over abeady. My one object in following a new course, is to enlarge the range of my studies in the art of writing fiction, and to vary the form in which I make my appeal to the reader, as attractively as I can. There is no need for me to add more to these few prefatory words than is here WTitten. What 1 might otherwise have wished to say in this place, I have endeavoured to make the book itself say for me. Barley Street, THE FIRST SCENE. COMBE-KAYEN, SOMERSETSHIRE. YOL. I. THE FIEST SCENE. CHAPTER I. The hands on the hall-clock pointed to half-past six in the morning. The house was a country residence in West Somersetshire, called Combe-Raven. The day was the fourth of March; and the year was eighteen hundred and forty-six. No sounds but the steady ticking of the clock, and the lumpish snoring of a large dog stretched on a mat outside the dining-room door, disturbed the mysterious morning stillness of hall and staircase. Who were the sleepers hidden in the upper regions ? Let the house reveal its own secrets ; and, one by one, as they de- scend the stairs from their beds, let the sleepers dis- close themselves. As the clock pointed to a quarter to seven, the dog woke and shook himself. After waiting in vain for the footman, who was accustomed to let him out, the animal wandered restlessly from one closed door to another on the ground floor ; and, returning to his mat in great B 2 4 NO NAME.. perplexity, appealed to the sleeping family, with a long and melancholy howl. Before the last notes of the dog's remonstrance had died away, the oaken stairs in the higher regions oi the house creaked under slowly-descending footsteps. In a minute more, the first of the female servants made her appearance, with a dingy woollen shawl over her shoulders — for the March morning was bleak; and rheumatism and the cook were old acquaintances. Receiving the dog's first cordial advances with the worst possible grace, the cook slowly opened the hall door, and let the animal out. It was a wild morning. Over a spacious lawn, and behind a black plantiition of firs, the rising sun rent its way upward through piles of ragged grey cloud ; heavy drops of rain fell few and far between ; the IMarch wind shuddered round the corners of the house, and the wet trees swayed wearily. Seven o'clock struck ; and the signs of domestic life began to show themselves in more rapid succession. The housemaid came down — tall and slim, with the state of the spring temperature written redly on her nose. The lady's-maid followed — young, smart, plump, and sleepy. The kitchen-maid came next — afflicted with the face-ache, and making no secret of her suffer- ings. Last of all, the footman appeared, yawning dis- consolately ; the living picture of a man who felt that he had been defrauded of his fair night's rest. The conversation of the servants, when they assem- bled before the slowly-lighting kitchen fire, refeiTcd to a recent family event, and turned at starting on this NO NAME. O question : Had Thomas, the footman, seen anything of the concert at Chfton, at which his master and the two young ladies had been present on the previous night ? Yes ; Thomas had heard the concert : he had been paid for to go in at the back ; it was a loud concert ; it was a hot concert ; it was described at the top of the bills as Grand ; whether it was worth travelling sixteen miles to hear by railway, with the additional hardship of going back nineteen miles by road, at half-past one in the morning — was a question which he would leave his master and the young ladies to decide ; his own opinion, in the mean time, being unhesitatingly, No. Further inquiries, on the part of all the female servants in succession, elicited no additional information of any sort. Thomas could hum none of the songs, and could describe none of the ladies' dresses. His audience accordingly gave him up in despair ; and the kitchen small-talk flowed back into its ordinary channels, until the clock struck eight, and startled the assembled ser- vants into separating for their morning's work. A quarter past eight, and nothing happened. Half- past — and more signs of life appeared from the bed- room regions. The next member of the family who came down stairs was Mr. Andrew Vanstone, the master of the house. Tall, stout, and upright — with bright blue eyes, and healthy florid complexion — his brown plush shooting- jacket carelessly buttoned awry ; his vixenish little Scotch terrier barking unrebuked at his heels ; one hand thrust into his waistcoat pocket, and the other 6 NO NAME. smacking the banisters cheerfully as lie came down stairs humming a tune — Mr. Vanstone showed his character on the surfiice of him freely to all men. An easy, hearty, handsome, good-humoured gentleman, who walked on the suhny side of the way of life, and who asked nothing better than to meet all his fellow- passengers in this world on the sunny side, too. Esti- mating liim by years, he had turned fifty. Judging him by lightness of heart, strength of constitution, and capacity for enjoyment, he w^as no older than most men who have only turned thirty. " Thomas !" cried Mr. Vanstone, taking up his old felt hat and his thick walking-stick from the hall table. "Breakfast, this morning, at ten. The young ladies are not likely to be down earlier after the concert last night. — By-the-by, how did you like the concert, your- self, eh ? You thought it was Grand ? Quite right ; so it was. Nothing but Crash-Bang, varied now and then by Bang-Crash ; all the women dressed within an inch of their lives ; smothering heat, blazing gas, and no room for anybody — yes, yes, Thomas : Grand's the word for it, and Comfortable isn't." With that ex- pression of opinion, Mr. Vanstone whistled to his vixenish terrier ; flourished his stick at the hall door in cheerful defiance of the rain ; and set off through wind and weather for his morning walk. The hands, stealing their steady way round the dial of the clock, pointed to ten minutes to nine. Another member of the family appeared on the stairs — ]Miss Garth, the governess. NO NAME. 7 No observant eyes could have surveyed Miss Garth without seeing at once that she was a north-country- woman. Her hard-featured face ; her masculine readi- ness and decision of movement ; her obstinate honesty of look and manner, all proclaimed her border birth and border training. Though little more than forty years of age, her hair was quite grey ; and she wore over it the plain cap of an old woman. Neither hair nor hea'd-dress was out of harmony with her face — it looked older than her years : the hard handwriting of trouble had scored it heavily at some past time. The self-possession of her progress down the stairs, and the air of habitual authority with which she looked about her, spoke well for her position in Mr. Yanstone's family. This was evidently not one of the forlorn, persecuted, pitiably dependent order of governesses. Here was a woman who lived on ascertained and honourable terms with her employers — a woman who looked capable of sending any parents in England to the right-about, if they failed to rate her at her proper value. " Breakfast at ten ?" repeated Miss Garth, when the footman had answered the bell, and had mentioned his master's orders. " Ha ! I thought what would come of that concert last night. When people who live in the country patronize public amusements, public amuse- ments jeturn the compliment by upsetting the family afterwards for days together. You're upset, Thomas, I can see — your eyes are as red as a ferret's, and your cravat looks as if you had slept in it. Bring the 8 NO NAME. kettle at a quarter to ten — and if you don't get better in the course of the day, come to me, and I'll give you a dose of physic. That's a well-meaning lad, if you only let him alone," continued Miss Garth, in soliloquy, when Thomas had retired ; " but he's not strong enough for concerts twenty miles off. They wanted me to go with them, last night. Yes : catch me !" Nine o'clock struck ; and the minute hand stole on to twenty minutes past the hour, before any more foot- steps were heard on the stairs. At the end of that time, two ladies appeared, descending to the break- fast-room together — Mrs. Vanstone and her eldest daughter. If the personal attractions of Mrs. Vanstone, at an earlier period of life, had depended solely on her native English charms of complexion and freshness, she must have long since lost the last relics of her fairer self. But her beauty, as a young woman, had passed beyond the average national limits ; and she still pre- served the advantage of her more exceptional personal gifts. Although she was now in her forty-fourth year ; although she had been tried, in bygone times, by the premature loss of more than one of her children, and by long attacks of illness which had followed those bereavements of former years — she still preserved the fair proportion and subtle delicacy of feature, once associated with the all-adorning brightness and fresh- ness of beauty, which had left her never to return. Her eldest child, now descending the stairs by her side, was the mirror in which she could look back, and see NO NAME. 9 again the reflection of her own youth. There, folded thick on the daughter's head, lay the massive dark hair, which, on the mother's, was fast turning grey. There, in the daughter's cheek, glowed the lovely dusky red which had faded from the mother's, to bloom again no more. Miss Vanstone had already reached the first maturity of womanhood : she had completed her six-and-twentieth year. Inheriting the dark majes- tic character of her mother's beauty, she had yet hardly inherited all its charms. Though the shape of her face was the same, the features were scarcely so delicate, their proportion was scarcely so true. She was not so tall. She had the dark-brown eyes of her mother — full and soft, with the steady lustre in them which Mrs. Vanstone's eyes had lost — and yet there was less interest, less refinement and depth of feeling in her expression : it was gentle and feminine, but clouded by a certain quiet reserve, from which her mother's face was free. If we dare to look closely enough, may we not observe, that the moral force of character and the higher intellectual capacities in parents, seem often to wear out mysteriously in the course of transmission to children? In these days of insidious nervous ex- haustion and subtly-spreading nervous malady, is it not possible that the same rule may apply, less rarely than we are willing to admit, to the bodily gifts as well? The mother and daughter slowly descended the stairs together — the first dressed in dark brown, with an Indian shawl thrown over her shoulders ; the second 10 XO NAME. more simply attired in black, with a plain collar and cufFs, and a dark orange-coloured ribbon over the bosom of her dress. As they crossed the hall, and entered the breakfast-room, Miss Vanstone was fall of the all-absorbing subject of the last night's concert. "I am so sorry, mamma, you were not with us," she said. " You have been so strong and so well ever since last summer — you have felt so many years younger, as you said yourself — that I am sure the exertion would not have been too much for you." " Perhaps not, my love — but it was as well to keep on the safe side." " Quite as well," remarked Miss Garth, appearing at the breakfast-room door. " Look at Norah (good morning, my dear) — look, I say, at Norah. A per- fect wreck ; a living proof of your wisdom and mine in staying at home. The vile gas, the foul air, the late hours — what can you expect ? She's not made of iron, and she suffers accordingly. No, my dear, you needn't deny it. I see you've got a headache." Norah's dark, handsome face brightened into a smile — then lightly clouded again with its accustomed quiet reserve. " A very little headache ; not half enough to make me regret the concert," she said, and walked away by herself to the window. On the far side of a garden and paddock, the view overlooked a stream, some farm-buildings which lay beyond, and the opening of a wooded rocky pass (called, in Somersetshire, a Combe), which here cleft NO NAME. 11 its way through the hills that closed the prospect. A winding strip of road was visible, at no great distance, amid the undulations of the open ground ; and along this strip the stalwart figure of Mr. Vanstone was now easily recognizable, returning to the house from his morning walk. He flourished his stick gaily, as he observed his eldest daughter at the window. She nodded and waved her hand in return, very gracefully and prettily — but with something of old-fashioned formality in her manner, which looked strangely in so young a woman, and which seemed out of harmony with a salutation addressed to her father. The hall-clock struck the adjourned breakfast-hour. When the minute-hand had recorded the lapse of five minutes more, a door banged in the bedroom regions — a clear young voice was heard singing blithely — light rapid footsteps pattered on the upper stairs, descended with a jump to the landing, and pattered again, faster than ever, down the lower flight. In another moment, the youngest of Mr. Vanstone's two daughters (and two only surviving children) dashed into view on the dingy old oaken stairs, with the suddenness of a flash of light ; and clearing the last three steps into the hall at a jump, presented herself breathless in the break- fast-room, to make the family circle complete. By one of those strange caprices of Nature, which science leaves still unexplained, the youngest of Mr. Vanstone's children presented no recognizable resem- blance to either of her parents. How had she come 12 NO NAME. by her hair? how had she come by her eyes? Even her father and mother had asked themselves those questions, as she grew up to girlhood, and had been sorely perplexed to answer them. Her hair was of that purely light-brown hue — immixed with flaxen, or yellow, or red — which is oftener seen on the plumage (5f a bird than on the head of a human being. It was soft and plentiful, and waved downward from her low forehead in regular folds — but, to some tastes, it was dull and dead, in its absolute want of glossiness, in its monotonous purity of plain light colour. Her eye- brows and eyelashes were just a shade darker than her hair, and seemed made expressly for those violet-blue eyes, which assert their most irresistible charm when associated with a fair complexion. But it was here exactly that the promise of her face failed of perform- ance in the most startling manner. The eyes, which should have been dark, were incomprehensibly and discordantly light : they were of that nearly colourless grey, which, though little attractive in itself, possesses the rare compensating merit of interpreting the finest gradations of thought, the gentlest changes of feeling, the deepest trouble of passion, with a subtle trans- parency of expression which no darker eyes can rival. Thus quaintly self-contradictory in the upper part of her face, she was hardly less at variance with esta- blished ideas of harmony in the lower. Her lips had tlie true feminine delicacy of form, her cheeks the lovely roundness and smoothness of youth — but the mouth was too large and firm, the chin too square and NO NAME. 13 massive for her sex and age. Her complexion partook of the pure monotony of tint which characterized her hair — it was of the same soft warm creamy fairness all over, without a tinge of colour in the cheeks, except on occasions of unusual bodily exertion, or sudden mental disturbance. The whole countenance — so remarkable in its strongly-opposed characteristics — was rendered additionally striking by its extraordinary mobility. The large, electric, light-grey eyes were hardly ever in repose ; all varieties of expression followed each other over the plastic, ever-changing face, with a giddy rapidity which left sober analysis far behind in the race. The girl's exuberant vitality asserted itself all over her, from head to foot. Her figure — taller than her sister's, taller than the average of woman's height; instinct with such a seductive, serpentine suppleness, so lightly and playfully graceful that its movements suggested, not unnaturally, the movements of a young cat — her figure was so perfectly developed already that no one who saw her could have supposed that she was only eighteen. She bloomed in the full physical maturity of twenty years or more — bloomed naturally and irre- sistibly, in right of her matchless health and strength. Here, in truth, lay the mainspring of this strangely- constituted organization. Her headlong course down the house stairs ; the brisk activity of all her move- ments ; the incessant sparkle of expression in her face ; the enticing gaiety which took the hearts of the quietest people by storm — even the reckless delight in bright colours, which showed itself in her brilliantly-striped 14 NO NAME. morning dress, in her fluttering ribbons, in the large scarlet rosettes on her smart little shoes — all sprang alike from the same source ; from the overflowing physical health which strengthened every muscle, braced every nerve, and set the warm young blood tingling through her veins, like the blood of a growing child. On her entry into the breakfast-room, she was saluted with the customary remonstrance which her flighty disregard of all punctuality habitually provoked from the long-suffering household authorities. In Miss Garth's favourite phrase, " Magdalen w^as born with all the senses — except a sense of order." Magdalen ! It w^as a strange name to have given her ? Strange, indeed ; and yet, chosen under no extraordinary circumstances. The name had been borne by one of Mr. Vanstone's sisters, who had died in early youth ; and, in affectionate remembrance of her, he had called his second daughter by it — just as he had called his eldest daughter Norah, for his wife's sake. Magdalen ! Surely, the grand old Bible name — suggestive of a sad and sombre dignity ; recalling, in its first association, mournful ideas of penitence and seclusion — had been here, as events had turned out, inappropriately bestowed? Surely, this self-contra- dictory girl had perversely accomplished one contra- diction more, by developing into a character which was out of all harmony with her own christian name ! "Late again!" said Mrs. Vanstone, as Magdalen breathlessly kissed her. Is'O KAME. 15 *' Late again I" chimed in Miss Garth, when Mag- dalen came her way next. "Well?" she went on, taking the girl's chin familiarly . in her hand, with a half-satirical, half-fond attention which betrayed that the yomigest daughter, with all her faults, was the governess's favourite — " Well ? and what has the con- cert done for you ? What form of suffering has dissi- pation inflicted on your system, this morning ?" "Suffering!" repeated Magdalen, recovering her breath, and the use of her tongue with it. "I don't know the meaning of the vrord : if there's anything the matter with me, I'm too well. Suffering ! I'm ready for another concert to-night, and a ball to-morrow, and a play the day after. Oh," cried Magdalen, dropping into a chair and crossing her hands rapturously on the table, " how I do like pleasure 1" " Come ! that's explicit at any rate," said Miss Garth. " I think Pope must have had you in his mind, when he wrote his famous lines : " Men some to business, some to joleasure take, But every woman is at heart a rake." " The deuce she is 1" cried Mr. Vanstone, entering the room while Miss Garth was making her quotation, with the dogs at his heels. " Well ; live and learn. If you're all rakes, Miss Garth, the sexes are turned topsy-turvy with a vengeance ; and the men will have nothing left for it, but to stop at home and darn the stockings. — Let's have some breakfast." " How-d'ye-do, papa ?" said Magdalen, taking Mr. 16 KO XA]VIE. Vanstonc as boisterously round the neck, as if he be- longed to some larger order of Newfoundland dog, and was made to be romped with at his daughter's conve- nience. " I'm the rake Miss Garth means ; and I want to go to another concert — or a play, if you like — or a ball, if you prefer it — or, anything else in the way of amusement that puts me into a new dress, and plunges me into a crowd of people, and illuminates me with plenty of light, and sets me in a tingle of excite- ment all over, from head to foot. Anything will do, as long as it doesn't send us to bed at eleven o'clock." Mr. Vanstone sat down composedly under his daughter's flow of language, like a man who was well used to verbal inundation from that quarter. *'If I am to be allowed my choice of amusements next time," said the worthy gentleman, "I think a play will suit me better than a concert. The girls enjoyed them- selves amazingly, my dear," he continued, addressing his wife. " More than I did, I must say. It was altogether above my mark. They played one piece of music which lasted forty minutes. It stopped three times by the way ; and we all thought it was done each time, and clapped our hands, rejoiced to be rid of it. But on it went again, to our great surprise and mortification, till we gave it up in despair, and all wished ourselves at Jericho. Norah, my dear ! when we had Crash-Bang for forty minutes, with three stop- pages by the way, what did they call it ?" " A Symphony, papa," replied Norah. "Yes, you darling old Goth, a Symphony by the NO NAME. 17 great Beethoven !" added Magdalen. '•' How can you say you were not amused ? Have you forgotten the yellow-looking foreign woman, with the unpronounce- able name ? Don't you remember the faces she made when she sang? and the way she curtseyed and curt- seyed, till she cheated the foolish people into crying encore ? Look here, mamma — look here, Miss Garth !" She snatched up an empty plate from the table, to represent a sheet of music, held it before her in the established concert-room position, and produced an imitation of the unfortunate singer's grimaces and curt- seyings, so accurately and quaintly true to the original, that her father roared with laughter ; and even the footman (who came in at that moment, with the post- bag) rushed out of the room again, and committed the indecorum of echoing his master audibly on the other side of the door. " Letters, papa. I want the key," said Magdalen, passing from the imitation at the breakfast-table to the post-bag on the sideboard, with the easy abruptness which characterized all her actions. Mr. Vanstone searched his pockets and shook his head. Though his youngest daughter might resemble him in nothing else, it was easy to see where Mag- dalen's unmethodical habits came from. " I dare say I have left it in the library, along with my other keys," said Mr. Vanstone. *' Go and look for it, my dear." " You really should check Magdalen," pleaded Mrs. Vanstone, addressing her husband, when her daughter VOL. I. c 18 NO NAME. had left the room. "Those habits of mimicry are growing on her ; and she speaks to you with a levity which it is positively shocking to hear." " Exactly what I have said myself, till I am tired of repeating it," remarked Miss Garth. "She treats Mr. Vanstone as if he was a kind of younger brother of hers." " You are kind to us in everything else, papa ; and you make kind allowance for Magdalen's high spirits — don't you ?" said the quiet Norah, taking her father's part and her sister's, with so little show of resolution on the surface^ that few observers would have been sharp enough to detect the genuine substance beneath it. "Thank you, my dear," said good-natured Mr. Vanstone. " Thank you, for a very pretty speech. As for Magdalen," he continued, addressing his wife and Miss Garth, "she's an unbroken filly. Let her caper and kick in the paddock to her heart's content. Time enough to break her to harness, when she gets a little older." The door opened, and Magdalen returned with the key. She unlocked the post-bag at the sideboard and poured out the letters in a heap. Sorting them gaily in less than a minute, she approached the breakfast-table with both hands full ; and delivered the letters all round with the business-like rapidity of a London postman. " Two for Norah," she announced, beginning with her sister. "Three for Miss Garth. None for mamma. One for me. And the other six all for papa. You lazy old darling, you hate answering NO NAME. 19 letters, don't you ?" pursued Magdalen, dropping the postman's character, and assuming the daughter's. " How you will grumble and fidget in the study ! and how you will wish there were no such things as letters in the world ! and how red your nice old bald head will get at the top with the worry of writing the answers ; and how many of the answers you will leave until to-morrow after all ! The Bristol TJieatre's open, papa,'' she whispered, slily and suddenly in her father's ear ; " I saw it in the newspaper when I went to the library to get the key. Let's go to-morrow night !" While his daughter was chattering, Mr. Vanstone was mechanically sorting his letters. He turned over the first four, in succession, and looked carelessly at the addresses. When he came to the fifth, his atten- tion, which had hitherto wandered towards Magdalen, suddenly became fixed on the post-mark of the letter. Stooping over him, with her head on his shoulder, Magdalen could see the post-mark as plainly as her father saw it :— New Orleans. "An American etter, papa!" she said. "Who do you know at New Orleans ?" Mrs. Vanstone started, and looked eagerly at her husband, the moment Magdalen spoke those words. Mr. Vanstone said nothing. He quietly removed his daughter's arm from his neck, as if be wished to be free from all interruption. She returned accordingly to her place at the breakfast-table. Her father, with the letter in his hand, waited a little before he opened it ; her mother looking at him, the while, with an eager c 2 20 NO NAME. expectant attention, which attracted Miss Garth*s notice, and Norah's, as well as Magdalen's. After a minute or more of hesitation, Mr. Vanstonc opened the letter. His face changed colour the instant he read the first lines ; his cheeks fading to a dull, yellow-brown hue, which would have been ashy paleness in a less florid man ; and his expression becoming saddened and overclouded in a moment. Norah and Magdalen, watching anxiously, saw nothing but the change that passed over their father. Miss Garth alone observed the effect which that change produced on the attentive mistress of the house. It was not the effect which she, or any one, could have anticipated. Mrs. Vanstone looked excited rather than alarmed. A faint flush rose on her cheeks — her eyes brightened — she stirred the tea round and round in her cup in a restless impatient manner which was not natural to her. Magdalen, in her capacity of spoilt child, was, as usual, the first to break the silence. " What is the matter, papa ?" she asked. "Nothing," said Mr. Vanstone, sharply, without looking up at her. "I'm sure there must be something," persisted Magdalen. " I'm sure there is bad news, papa, in that American letter." " There is nothing in the letter that concerns y(?w," said Mr. Vanstone. It was the first direct rebuff that Magdalen had ever NO NAME. 21 received from her father. She looked at him with an incredulous surprise, which would have been irresistibly absurd under less serious circumstances. Nothing more was said. For the first time, perhaps, in their lives, the family sat round the breakfast-table in painful silence. Mr. Vanstone's hearty morning appetite, like his hearty morning spirits, was gone. He absently broke off some morsels of dry toast from the rack near him, absently finished his first cup of tea — then asked for a second, which he left before him un- touched. " Norah," he said, after an interval, " you needn't wait for me. Magdalen, my dear, you can go when you like." His daughters rose immediately ; and Miss Garth considerately followed their example. When an easy- tempered man does assert himself in his family, the rarity of the demonstration invariably has its effect ; and the will of that easy-tempered man is Law. " What can have happened ?" whispered Norah, as they closed the breakfast- room door, and crossed the hall. " What does papa mean by being cross with Me ?" exclaimed Magdalen, chafing under a sense of her own injuries. " May I ask what right you had to pry into your father's private affairs ?" retorted Miss Garth. *' Right ?" repeated Magdalen. " I have no secrets from papa — what business has papa to have secrets from me ! I consider myself insulted." 22 NO NAME. " If you considered yourself properly reproved for not minding your own business," said the plain-spoken Miss Garth, " you would be a trifle nearer the truth. Ah! you are like all the rest of the girls in the present day. Not one in a hundred of you knows which end of her's uppermost.'* The three ladies entered the morning-room ; and Magdalen acknowledged Miss Garth's reproof by banging the door. Half an hour passed, and neither Mr. Vanstone nor his wife left the breakfast-room. The servant, ignorant of what had happened, went in to clear the table — found his master and mistress seated close together in deep consultation — and immediately went out again. Another quarter of an hour elapsed before the break- fast-room door was opened, and the private conference of the husband and wife came to an end. " I hear mamma in the hall," said Norah. ^' Per- haps she is coming to tell us something." Mrs. Vanstone entered the morning-room as her daughter spoke. The colour was deeper on her cheeks, and the brightness of half-dried tears glistened in her eyes ; her step was more hasty, all her move- ments were quicker than usual. " I bring news, my dears, which will surprise you," she said, addressing her daughters. " Your father and I are going to London to-morrow." Magdalen caught her mother by the arm in speech- less astonishment ; Miss Garth dropped her work on her lap; even the sedate Norah started to her NO NAME. 23 feet, and amazedly repeated the words, "Going to London !" " Without us ?" added Magdalen. ''Your father and I are going alone," said Mrs. Vanstone. '' Perhaps, for as long as three weeks — but not longer. We are going" — she hesitated — "we are going on important family business. Don't hold me, Magdalen. This is a sudden necessity — I have a great deal to do to-day — many things to set in order before to-morrow. There, there, my love, let me go." She drew her arm away ; hastily kissed her youngest daughter on the forehead ; and at once left the room again. Even Magdalen saw that her mother was not to be coaxed into hearing or answering any more questions. The morninof wore on, and nothincr was seen of Mr. Vanstone. With the reckless curiosity of her age and character, Magdalen, in defiance of Miss Garth's pro- hibition and her sister remonstrances, determined to go to the study, and look for her father there. When she tried the door, it v/as locked on the inside. She said, " It's only me, papa ;" and waited for the answer. " I'm busy now, my dear," was the answer. " Don't disturb me." Mrs. Vanstone was, in another way, equally in- accessible. She remained in her own room, with the female servants about her, immersed in endless pre- parations for the approaching departure. The servants, little used in that family to sudden resolutions and unexpected orders, were awkward and confused in 24 NO NAME. obeying directions. They ran from room to room mmecessarily, and lost time and patience in jostling each other on the stairs. If a stranger had entered the house, that day, he might have imagined that an unexpected disaster had happened in it, instead of an unexpected necessity for a journey to London. Nothing proceeded in its ordinary routine. Magdalen, who was accustomed to pass the morning at the piano, wandered restlessly about the staircases and passages, and in and out of doors when there were glimpses of fine weather. Norah, whose fondness for reading had passed into a family proverb, took up book after book from table and shelf, and laid them down again, in despair of fixing her attention. Even Miss Garth felt the all-pervading influence of the household disor- ganization, and sat alone by the morning-room fire, with her head shaking ominously and her work laid aside. " Family afiiiirs ?" thought Miss Garth, pondering over Mrs. Vanstone's vague explanatory words. "I have lived twelve years at Combe-Raven ; and these are the first family affairs which have got between the parents and the children, in all my experience. What does it mean ? Change ? I suppose I'm getting old. I don't like change." NO NAME. 25 CHAPTER II. At ten o'clock the next morning, Norah and Mag- dalen stood alone in the hall at Combe-Raven, watch- ing the departure of the carriage which took their father and mother to the London train. Up to the last moment, both the sisters had hoped for some explanation of that mysterious " family busi- ness " to which Mrs. Vanstone had so briefly alluded on the previous day. No such explanation had been offered. Even the agitation of the leave-taking, under circumstances entirely new in the home experience of the parents and children, had not shaken the resolute discretion of Mr. and Mrs. Vanstone. They had gone — with the warmest testimonies of affection, with farewell embraces fervently reiterated again and again — but without dropping one word, from first to last, of the nature of their errand. As the grating sound of the carriage-wheels ceased suddenly at a turn in the road, the sisters looked one another in the face ; each feeling, and each betraying in her own ^vay, the dreary sense that she was openly excluded, for the first time, from the confidence of her 2G KO NAME. parents. Norali's customary reserve strengthened into sullen silence-=-she sat down in one of the hall chairs, and looked out frowningly through the open house- door. Magdalen, as usual when her temper was ruffled, expressed her dissatisfaction in the plainest terms. " I dont care who knows it — I think we are both of us shamefully ill-used !" With those words, the young lady followed her sister's example, by seat- ing herself on a hall chair, and looking aimlessly out through the open house-door. Almost at the same moment, Miss Garth entered the hall, from the morning-room. Her quick observa- tion showed her the necessity for interfering to some practical purpose ; and her ready good sense at once pointed the way. " Look up, both of you, if you please, and listen to me," said Miss Garth. "If we are all three to be comfortable and happy together, now we are alone, we must stick to our usual habits and go on in our regular way. There is the state of things in plain words. Accept the situation — as the French say. Here am I to set you the example. I have just ordered an ex- cellent dinner at the customary hour. I am going to the medicine-chest, next, to physic the kitchen-maid ; an unwholesome girl, whose face-ache is all stomach. In the mean time, Norah, my dear, you will find your work and your books, as usual, in the library. Mag- dalen, suppose you leave oif tying your handkerchief into knots, and use your fingers on the keys of the piano instead ? AVc'll lunch at one, and take the dogs NO NAME. 27 out afterwards. Be as brisk and cheerful, both of you, as I am. Come, rouse up directly. If I see those gloomy faces any longer, as sure as my name's Garth, I'll give your mother written warning, and go back to my friends by the mixed train at twelve forty. Concluding her address of expostulation in those terms, Miss Garth led Norah to the library door, pushed Magdalen into the morning room, and went on her own way sternly to the regions of the medicine- chest In this half-jesting, half-earnest manner, she was accustomed to maintain a sort of friendly authority over Mr. Vanstone's daughters, after her proper func- tions as governess had necessarily come to an end. Norah, it is needless to say, had long since ceased to be her pupil ; and Magdalen had, by this time, com- pleted her education. But Miss Garth had lived too long and too intimately under Mr. Vanstone's roof to be parted with, for any purely formal considerations ; and the first hint at going away which she had thought it her duty to drop, was dismissed with such affectionate warmth of protest, that she never repeated it again, except in jest. The entire management of the house- hold was, from that time forth, left in her hands ; and to tho^e duties she was free to add what companion- able assistance she could render to Norah's reading, and what friendly superintendence she could still exer- cise over Magdalen's music. Such were the terms on which Miss Garth was now a resident in Mr. Van- stone's family. 28 KO NAME. Towards the afternoon the weather improved. At half-past one the sun was shining brightly ; and the ladies left the house, accompanied by the dogs, to set forth on their walk. They crossed the stream, and ascended by the little rocky pass to the hills beyond ; then diverged to the left, and returned by a cross-road which led tlirough the village of Combe-Raven. As they came in sight of the first cottages, they passed a man, hanging about the road, who looked attentively, first at Magdalen, then at Norah. They merely observed that he was short, that he was dressed in black, and that he was a total stranger to them — and continued their homeward walk, without thinking more about the loitering foot-passenger whom they had met on their way back. After they had left the village, and had entered the road which led straight to the house, Magdalen sur- prised Miss Garth by announcing that the stranger in black had turned, after they had passed him, and was now following them. " He keeps on Norah's side of the road," she added, mischievously. "I'm not the attraction — don't blame m^." Whether the man was really following them, or not, made little difference, for they were now close to the house. As they passed through the lodge- gates, Miss Garth looked round, and saw that the stranger was quickening his pace, apparently with the purpose of entering into conversation. Seeing this, she at once directed the young ladies to go on to the house with NO NAME. 29 the dogs, while she herself waited for events at the gate. There was just time to complete this discreet ar- rangement, before the stranger reached the lodge. He took off his hat to Miss Garth politely, as she turned round. What did he look like, on the face of him ? He looked like a clergyman in difficulties. Taking his portrait, from top to toe, the picture of him began with a tall hat, broadly encircled by a mourning band of crumpled crape. Below the hat was a lean, long, sallow face, deeply pitted with the small- pox, and characterized, very remarkably, by eyes of two different colours — one bilious green, one bilious brown, both sharply intelligent. His hair was iron- grey, carefully brushed round at the temples. His cheeks and chin were in the bluest bloom of smooth shaving ; his nose was short Roman ; his lips long, thin, and supple, curled up at the corners with a mildly-humorous smile. His white cravat was high, stiff, and dingy ; the collar, higher, stiffer, and dingier, projected its rigid points on either side beyond his chin. Lower down, the lithe little figure of the man was arrayed throughout in sober-shabby black. His frock-coat was buttoned tight round the waist, and left to bulge open majestically at the chest. His hands were covered with black cotton gloves, neatly darned at the fingers ; his umbrella, worn down at the ferule to the last quarter of an inch, was carefully preserved, nevertheless, in an oilskin case. The front view of him was the view in which he looked oldest ; meeting 30 NO NAME. him face to face, he might have been estimated at fifty or more. Walking behind him, his back and shoulders were almost young enough to have passed for five-and- thirty. His manners were distinguished by a grave serenity. When he opened his lips, he spoke in a rich bass voice, with an easy flow of language, and a strict attention to the elocutionary claims of words in more than one syllable. Persuasion distilled from his mildly- curling lips ; and, shabby as he was, perennial flowers of courtesy bloomed all over him from head to foot. " This is the residence of Mr. Vanstone, I believe ?" he began, with a circular wave of his hand in the direc- tion of the house. " Have I the honour of addressing a member of Mr. Vanstone's family ?" " Yes," said the plain-spoken Miss Garth. *' You are addressing Mr. Vanstone's governess." The persuasive man fell back a step — admired Mr. Vanstone's governess — advanced a step again — and continued the conversation. " And the two young ladies," he went on, " the two young ladies who were walking with you, are doubtless Mr. Vanstone's dauofhters? I recoo^nized the darker of the two, and the elder as I apprehend, by her likeness to her handsome mother. The younger lady " "You are acquainted with Mrs. Vanstone, I sup- pose ?" said Miss Garth, interrupting the stranger's flow of language, which, all things considered, was beginning, in her opinion, to flow rather freely. The stranger acknowledged the interruption by one of his NO NAME. 31 polite Lows, and submerged Miss Gartli in liis next sentence as if nothing had happened. "The younger lady," he proceeded, "takes after her father, I presume ? I assure you, her face struck me. Looking at it with my friendly interest in the family, I thought it very remarkable. I said to myself — Charming, Characteristic, Memorable. Not like her sister, not like her mother. No doubt, the image of her father?" Once more ]\Iiss Garth attempted to stem the man's flow of words. It was plain that he did not know Mr. Vanstone, even by sight — otherwise, he would never have committed the error of supposing that Magdalen took after her father. Did he know Mrs. Vanstone any better ? He had left Miss Garth's question on that point unanswered. In the name of wonder, who was he ? Powers of impudence ! what did he want ? "You may be a friend of the family, though I don't remember your face," said Miss Garth. " What may your commands be, if you please ? Did you come here to pay Mrs. Vanstone a visit ?" "I had anticipated the pleasure of communicating with Mrs. Vanstone," answered this inveterately eva- sive and inveterately civil man. "How is she?" " Much as usual," said Miss Garth, feeling her re- sources of politeness fast failing her. " Is she at home ?" "No." "Out for long?" " Gone to London with Mr. Vanstone." 32 NO NAME. The man's long face suddenly grew longer. His bilious brown eye looked disconcerted, and his bilious green eye followed its example. Ilis manner became palpably anxious ; and his choice of words was more carefully selected than ever. " Is Mrs. Vanstone's absence likely to extend over any very lengthened period ?" he inquired. '^It will extend over three weeks," replied Miss Garth. " I think you have now asked me questions enough," she went on, beginning to let her temper get the better of her at last. " Be so good, if you please, as to mention your business and your name. If you have any message to leave for Mrs. Vanstone, I shall be writing to her by to-night's post, and I can take charge of it." *' A thousand thanks ! A most valuable suggestion. Permit me to take advantage of it immediately." He was not in the least affected by the severity of Miss Garth's looks and language — he was simply re- lieved by her proposal, and he showed it with the most engaging sincerity. This time, his bilious green eye took the initiative, and set his bilious brown eye the example of recovered serenity. His curling lips took a new twist upwards ; he tucked his umbrella briskly under his arm ; and produced from the breast of his coat a large old-fashioned black pocket-book. From this he took a pencil and a card — hesitated and con- sidered for a moment — wrote rapidly on the card — and placed it, with the politest alacrity, in Miss Garth's hand. NO NAME. 33 " I shall feel personally obliged, if you will honour me by enclosing that card in your letter," he said. " There is no necessity for my troubling you addition- ally with a message. My name will be quite sufficient to recall a little family matter to Mrs. Vanstone, which has no doubt escaped her memory. Accept my best thanks. This has been a day of agreeable surprises to me. I have found the country hereabouts remarkably pretty ; I have seen Mrs. Vanstone's two charming daughters ; I have become acquainted with an honoured preceptress in Mr. Vanstone's family. I congratulate myself — I apologize for occupying your valuable time — I beg my renewed acknowledgments — I wish you good morning." He raised his tall hat. His brown eye twinkled, his green eye twinkled, his curly lips smiled sweetly. In a moment, he turned on his heel. His youthful back appeared to the best advantage ; his active little legs took him away trippingly in the direction of the village. One, two, three — and he reached the turn in the road. Four, five, six — and he was gone. Miss Garth looked down at the card in her hand, and looked up again in blank astonishment. The name and address of the clerical-lookino^ stranorer (both written in pencil) ran as follows : — Captain Wragge. Post-office. Bristol. VOL. I. 34 NO NAME. CHAPTER IIL When she returned to the house, Miss Garth made no attempt to conceal her unfavourable opinion of the stranger in black. His object was, no doubt, to obtain pecuniary assistance from Mrs. Vanstone. What the nature of his claim on her might be, seemed less intel- ligible — unless it was the claim of a poor relation. Had Mrs. Vanstone ever mentioned, in the presence of lier daughters, the name of Captain Wragge ? Neither of them recollected to have heard it before. Had Mrs. Vanstone ever referred to any poor relations who were dependent on her? On the contrary, she had mentioned of late years that she doubted having any relations at all who were still living. And yet, Cap- tain Wragge had plainly declared that the name on his card would recall "a family matter" to Mrs. Vanstonc's memory. Vv^hat did it mean? A false statement, on the stranger's part, without any intelli- gible reason for making it? Or a second mystery, following close on the heels of the mysterious journey to London? All the probabilities seemed to point to some hidden connection between the "family affairs" which had NO NAME. 35 taken Mr. and Mrs. Vanstone so suddenly from home, and the " family matter " associated with the name of Captain Wragge. !Miss Garth's doubts thronged back irresistibly on her mind, as she sealed her letter to Mrs. Vanstone, with the captain's card added by way of enclosure. By return of post the answer arrived. Always the earliest riser among the ladies of the house, Miss Garth was alone in the breakfast-room when the letter was brought in. Her first glance at its contents convinced her of the necessity of reading it carefully through in retirement, before any embar- rassing questions could be put to her. Leaving a message with the servant requesting Norah to make the tea that morning, she went upstairs at once to the solitude and security of her own room. Mrs. Vanstone's letter extended to some length. The first part of it referred to Captain Wragge, and entered unreservedly into all necessary explanations relating to the man himself and to the motive which had brought him to Combe-Raven. It appeared^ from Mrs. Vanstone's statement that her mother had been twice married. Her mother's first husband had been a certain Doctor Wragge — a widower with young children ;"and one of those chil- dren was now the unmilitary-looking captain, whose address was " Post-office, Bristol." Mrs. Wragge had left no family by her first husband ; and had afterwards married Mrs. Vanstone's father. Of that second mar- riage Mrs. Vanstone herself was the only issue. She D 2 36 NO NAME. had lost both her parents while she was still a young woman ; and, in course of years, her mother's family connections (who were then her nearest surviving relatives) had been one after another removed by death. She was left, at the present writing, without a relation in the world — excepting perhaps certain cousins whom she had never seen, and of whose existence even, at the present moment, she possessed no positive know- ledge. Under these circumstances, what family claim had Captain Wragge on Mrs. Vanstone ? None whatever. As the son of her mother's first husband, by that husband's first wife, not even the widest stretch of courtesy could have included him at any time in the list of Mrs. Vanstone's most distant relations. Well knowing this (the letter proceeded to say), he had nevertheless persisted in forcing himself upon her as a species of family connection ; and she had weakly sanctioned the intrusion, solely from the dread that he would otherwise introduce himself to Mr. Vanstone's notice, and take unblushing advantage of Mr. Vanstone's generosity. Shrinking, naturally, from allowing her husband to be annoyed, and probably cheated as well, by any person who claimed, however preposterously, a family connection with herself, it had been her practice, for many years past, to assist the captain from her own purse, on the condition that he should never come near the house, and that he should not presume to make any application whatever to Mr. Vanstone. NO NAME. 37 Readily admitting the imprudence of this course, Mrs. Van stone further explained that she had perhaps been the more inclined to adopt it, through having been always accustomed, in her early days, to see the captain living now upon one member, and now upon another, of her mother's family. Possessed of abilities which might have raised him to distinction, in almost any career that he could have chosen, he had nevertheless, from his youth upwards, been a disgrace to all his relatives. He had been expelled the militia regiment in which he once held a commission. He had tried one employment after another, and had discreditably failed in all. He had lived on his wits, in the lowest and basest meaning of the phrase. He had married a poor ignorant woman, who had served as a waitress at some low eating-house, who had unexpectedly come into a little money, and whose small inheritance he had mercilessly squandered to the last farthing. In plain terms, he was an incorrigible scoundrel ; and he had now added one more to the list of his many misde- meanours, by impudently breaking the conditions on which Mrs. Vanstone had hitherto assisted him. She had written at once to the address indicated on his card, in such terms and to such purpose as would prevent him, she hoped and believed, from ever ven- turlnof near the house ao^ain. Such were the terms in which Mrs. Vanstone concluded that first part of her letter which referred exclusively to Captain Wragge. Although the statement thus presented implied a weakness in Mrs. Vanstone' s character which ]\Iiss o5 KO NAME, Gartli, after many ycai-s of intimate experience, bad never detected, she accepted the explanation as a matter of course ; receiving it all the more readily, inasmuch as it might, without impropriety, Le commu- nicated in substance to appease the irritated curiosity of the two young ladies. For this reason especially, she perused the first half of the letter with an agreeable sense of relief. Far different was the impression pro- duced on her, when she advanced to the second half, and when she had read it to the end. The second part of the letter was devoted to the subject of the journey to London. Mrs. Vanstone began by referring to the long and intimate friendship which had existed betv»een Miss Garth and herself. She now felt it due to that friend- ship to explain confidentially the motive which had induced her to leave home with her husband. Miss Garth had delicately refrained from showing it, but she must naturally have felt, and must still be feeling, great surprise at the mystery in which their departure had been involved ; and she must doubtless have asked herself why Mrs. Vanstone should have been associated with family affairs which (in her independent position as to relatives) must necessarily concern Mr. Vanstone alone. AVithout touching on those affairs, which it was neither desirable nor necessary to do, Mrs. Vanstone then proceeded to say that she would at once set all Miss Garth's doubts at rest, so hv as they related to herself, by one plain acknowledgment. Her object in NO NAME. 39 accompanying her husband to London was to see a certain celebrated physician, and to consult him pri- vately on a very delicate and anxious matter connected with the state of her health. In plainer terms still, this anxious matter meant nothing less than the possi- bihty that she might again become a mother. When the doubt had first suggested itself, she had treated it as a mere delusion. The long interval that had elapsed since the birth of her last child ; the serious illness which had afflicted her after the death of that child in infancy ; the time of life at which she had now arrived — all inclined her to dismiss the idea as soon as it arose in her mind. It had returned again and again in spite of her. She had felt the necessity of consulting the highest medical authority ; and had shrunk, at the same time, from alarming her daughters by summoning a London physician to the house. The medical opinion, sought under the cir- cumstances already mentioned, had now been obtained. Her doubt was confirmed as a certainty ; and the result, which might be expected to take place towards the end of the summer, was, at her age and with her constitutional peculiarities, a subject for serious future anxiety, to say the least of it. The physician had done his best to encourage her ; but she had under- stood the drift of his questions more clearly than he supposed, and she knev/ that he looked to the future with more than ordinary doubt. Having disclosed these particulars, Mrs. Vanstone requested that they might be kept a secret between 40 NO NAME. lier correspondent and herself. She had felt unwilling to mention her suspicions to Miss Garth, until those suspicions had been confirmed — and she now recoiled, with even greater reluctance, from allowing her daughters to be in any way alarmed about her. It would be best to dismiss the subject for the present, and to wait hopefully till the summer came. In the mean time they would all, she trusted, be happily reunited on the twenty-third of the month, which Mr. Vanstone had fixed on as the day for their return. With this intimation, and with the customary mes- sages, the letter, abruptly and confusedly, came to an end. For the first few minutes, a natural sympathy for Mrs. Vanstone was the only feeling of which Miss Garth was conscious after she had laid the letter down. Ere long, however, there rose obscurely on her mind a doubt which perplexed and distressed her. Was the explanation which she had just read, really as satisfac- tory and as complete as it professed to be ? Testing it plainly by facts, surely not. On the morning of her departure, Mrs. Vanstone had unquestionably left the house in good spirits. At her age, and in her state of health, were good spirits compatible with such an errand to a physician as the errand on which she was bent ? Then, again, had that letter from New Orleans, which had necessitated Mr. Vanstone's departure, no share in occasioning his wife's departure as well ? Why, otherwise, had she looked NO NAME. 41 up SO eagerly the moment her daughter mentioned the post-mark. Granting the avowed motive for her journey — did not her manner, on the morning when the letter was opened, and again on the morning of departure, suggest the existence of some other motive which her letter kept concealed ? If it was so, the conclusion that followed was a very distressing one. Mrs. Vanstone, feeling what was due to her long friendship with Miss Garth, had apparently placed the fullest confidence in her, on one subject, by way of unsuspiciously maintaining the strictest reserve towards her on another. Naturally frank and straight- forward in all her own dealings. Miss Garth shrank from plainly pursuing her doubts to this result : a want of loyalty towards her tried and valued friend seemed implied in the mere dawning of it on her mind. She locked up the letter in her desk ; roused herself resolutely to attend to the passing interests of the day ; and went down stairs again to the breakfast-room. Amid many uncertainties, this at least was clear : Mr. and Mrs. Vanstone were coming back on the twenty- third of the month. Who could say what new revela- tions might not come back w^Ith them ? 42 NO NAME. CHAPTER IV. No new revelations came back with tbem : no anticipa- tions associated with their return were realized. On the one forbidden subject of their errand in London, there was no moving either tlie master or the mistress of the house. AVhatever their object might have been, they had to all appearance successfully accomplished it — for they both returned in perfect possession of their every-day looks and manners. Mrs. Vanstone's spirits had subsided to their natural quiet level ; Mr. Van- stone's imperturbable cheerfulness sat as easily and indolently on him as usual. This was the one notice- able result of their journey — this, and no more. Had the household revolution run its course already ? Was the secret, thus far hidden impenetrably, hidden for ever? Nothing in this world is hidden for ever. The gold which has lain for centuries unsuspected in the ground, reveals itself one day on the surface. Sand turns traitor, and betrays the footstep that has passed over it ; water gives back to the tell-tale surface the body that has been drowned. Fire itself leaves the con- KO NAME. 43 fession, in ashes, of the substance consumed in it. Hate breaks its prison-secrecy in the thoughts, through the doorway of the eyes ; and Love finds the Judas who betrays it by a kiss. Look where we will, the inevitable law of revelation is one of the laws of na- ture : the lasting preservation of a secret is a miracle which the world has never yet seen. How was the secret now hidden in the household at Combe-Raven, doomed to disclose itself? Through what coming event in the daily lives of the father, the mother, and the daughters, w^as the law of revelation destined to break the fatal way to discovery? The way opened (unseen by the parents, and unsuspected by the children) through the first event that happened after Mr. and Mrs. Vanstone's return — an event which presented, on the surface of it, no interest of greater importance than the trivial social ceremony of a morn- ing call. Three days after the master and mistress of Combe- Raven had come back, the female members of the family happened to be assembled together in the morning-room. The view from the windows looked over the flower-garden and shrubbery ; this last being protected at its outward extremity by a fence, and approached from the lane beyond by a wicket-gate. During an interval in the conversation, the attention of the ladies was suddenly attracted to this gate, by the sharp sound of the iron latch falling in its socket. Some one had entered the shrubbery from the lane ; 44 NO NAME. and Magdalen at once placed herself at tlie window to catch the first sight of the visitor through the trees. After a few minutes, the figure of a gentleman became visible, at the point w^here the shrubbery path joined the winding garden-walk which led to the house. Magdalen looked at him attentively, without appearing, at first, to know who he was. As he came nearer, however, she started in astonishment ; and turning quickly to her mother and sister, proclaimed the gentleman in the garden to be no other than " Mr. Francis Clare." The visitor thus announced, was the son of Mr. Van- stone's oldest associate and nearest neighbour. Mr. Clare the elder inhabited an unpretending little cottage, situated just outside the shrubbery-fence which marked the limit of the Combe-Raven grounds. Be- longing to the younger branch of a family of great antiquity, the one inheritance of importance that he had derived from his ancestors, was the possession of a magnificent library, w-hich not only filled all the rooms in his modest little dwelling, but lined the staircases and passages as w^ell. Mr. Clare's books represented the one important interest of Mr. Clare's life. He had been a widower for many years past, and made no secret of his philosophical resignation to the loss of his wife. As a father, he regarded his family of three sons in the light of a necessary domestic evil, which perpetually threatened the sanctity of his study and the safety of his books. When the boys went to school, NO NAME. 45 Mr. Clare said "good-bye" to them — and "thank God " to himself. As for his small income, and his still smaller domestic establishment, he looked at them both fi'om the same satirically indifferent point of view. He called himself a pauper with a pedigree. He abandoned the entire direction of his household to the slatternly old woman who was his only servant, on the condition that she was never to venture near his books, with a duster in her hand, from one year's end to the other. His favourite poets were Horace and Pope ; his chosen philosophers, Hobbes and Voltaire. He took his exercise and his fresh air under protest ; and always walked the same distance to a yard, on the ugliest high-road in the neighbourhood. He was crooked of back, and quick of temper. He could digest radishes, and sleep after green tea. His views of human nature were the views of Diogenes, tempered by Rochefoucault ; his , personal habits were slovenly in the last degree ; and his favourite boast was, that he had outlived all human prejudices. Such was this singular man, in his more superficial aspects. What nobler qualities he might possess below the surface, no one had ever discovered. Mr. Van- stone, it is true, stoutly asserted that "Mr. Clare's worst side was his outside " — but, in this expression of opinion, he stood alone among his neighbours. The association between these two widely- dissimilar men had lasted for many years, and was almost close enough to be called a friendship. They had acquired a habit of meeting to smoke together on certain even- 4G NO NAME. ings in the week, in the cynic-philosopher's study, and of there disputing on every imaginable subject — Mr. Vanstone flourishing the stout cudgels of assertion, and Mr. Clare meeting him with the keen cdged-tools of sophistry. They generally quarrelled at night, and met on the neutral ground of the shrubbery to be reconciled together the next morning. The bond of intercourse thus curiously established between them, was strengthened on Mr. Vanstone's side by a hearty interest in his neighbour's three sons — an interest by which those sons benefited all the more importantly, seeing that one of the prejudices which their father had outlived, was a prejudice in favour of liis own children. "I look at those boys," the philosopher was ac- customed to say, " with a perfectly impartial eye ; I dismiss the unimportant accident of their birth from all consideration ; and I find them below the average in every respect. The only excuse which a poor gentleman has for presuming to exist in the nineteenth century, is the excuse of extraordinary ability. My boys have been addle-headed from infancy. If I had any capital to give them, I should make Frank a butcher, Cecil a baker, and Arthur a grocer — those being the only human vocations I know of which are certain to be always in request. As it is, I have no money to help them with ; and they have no brains to help themselves. They appear to nie to be three human superfluities in dirty jackets and noisy boots ; and, unless they clear themselves off" the community by KO NAME. 47 runnirig away, I don't myself profess to see what is to be done with them." Fortunately for the boys, Mr. Vanstone's views were still fast imprisoned in the ordinary prejudices. At his intercession, and through his influence, Frank, Cecil, and Arthur were received on the foundation of a well-reputed grammar-school. In holiday-time they were mercifully allowed the run of Mr. Vanstone's paddock ; and w^ere humanized and refined by associa- tion, indoors, with Mrs. Vanstone and her daughters. On these occasions, Mr. Clare used sometimes to walk across from his cottage (in his dressing-gown and slippers), and look at the boys disparagingly, through the window or over the fence, as if they were three wild animals whom his neighbour was attempting to tame. " You and your w^ife are excellent people," he used to say to Mr. Vanstone. " I respect your honest prejudices in favour of those boys of mine with all my heart. But you are so wrong about them — you are indeed ! I wish to give no offence ; I speak quite impartially — but mark my words, Vanstone : they'll all three turn out ill, in spite of everything you can do to prevent it." In later years, when Frank had reached the age of seventeen, the same curious shifting of the relative positions of parent and friend between the two neigh- bours, was exemplified more absurdly than ever. A civil engineer in the north of England, \\ho owed certain obligations to Mr. Vanstone, expressed his willingness to take Frank under superintendence, on 48 NO NAME. terms of the most favourable kind. When this pro- posal was received, Mr. Clare, as usual, first shifted his own character as Frank's father on Mr. Vanstone's shoulders — and then moderated his neighbour's pa- rental enthusiasm from the point of view of an im- jJartial spectator. " It's the finest chance for Frank that could possibly have happened," cried Mr. Vanstone, in a glow of fatherly enthusiasm. " 3Iy good fellow, he won't take it," retorted 3Ir. Clare, with the icy composure of a disinterested friend. " But he shall take it," persisted Mr. Vanstone. " Say he shall have a mathematical head," rejoined Mr. Clare ; " say he shall possess industry, ambition, and firmness of purpose. Pooh ! pooh ! you don't look at him with my impartial eyes. I say, No mathe- matics, no industry, no ambition, no firmness of pur- pose. Frank is a compound of negatives — and there they are." " Hang your negatives !'' shouted Mr. Vanstone. " I don't care a rush for negatives, or affirmatives either. Frank shall have this splendid chance ; and I'll lay you any wager you like he makes the best of it." " I am not rich enough to lay wagers usually," re- plied Mr. Clare ; " but I think I have got a guinea about the house somewhere ; and I'll lay you that guinea Frank comes back on our hands like a bad shilling." " Done !" said Mr. Vanstone. " No : stop a minute ! NO NAME. 49 I won't do the lad's character the injustice of backing it at even money. I'll lay you five to one Frank turns up trumps in this business ! You ought to be ashamed of yourself for talking of him as you do. AYhat sort of hocus-pocus you bring it about by, I don't pretend to know ; but you always end in making me take his part, as if I was his father instead of you. Ah, yes ! give you time, and you'll defend yourself. I won't give you time ; I won't have any of your special-plead- ing. Black's white, according to you. I don't care : it's black, for all that. You may talk nineteen to the dozen — I shall write to my friend and say Yes, in Frank's interests, by to-day's post." Such were the circumstances under which Mr. Francis Clare departed for the north of England, at the age of seventeen, to start in life as a civil engineer. From time to time, Mr. Vanstone's friend communi- cated with him on the subject of the new pupil. Frank was praised, as a quiet, gentlemanlike, interesting lad — but he was also reported to be rather slow at acquir- ing the rudiments of engineering science. Other letters, later in date, described him as a little too ready to despond about himself; as having been sent away, on that account, to some new railway works, to see if change of scene would rouse him ; and as having benefited in every respect by the experiment — except perhaps in regard to his professional studies, which still advanced but slowly. Subsequent communications announced his departure, under care of a trustworthy foreman, for some pubhc works in Belgium ; touched VOL. I. E 50 ^^0 NAME. on the general benefit he appeared to derive from this new change ; praised his excellent manners and address, which were of great assistance in facilitating business communications with the foreigners — and passed over in ominous silence the main question of his actual pro- gress in the acquirement of knowledge. These reports, and many others which resembled them, were all con- scientiously presented by Frank's friend to the attention of Frank's father. On each occasion, Mr. Clare exulted over Mr. .V^anstone ; and Mr. Vanstone quar- relled with Mr. Clare. "One of these days, you'll wish you hadn't laid that wager," said the cynic philoso- pher. "One of these days, I shall have the blessed satisfaction of pocketing your guinea," cried the san- guine friend. Two years had then passed since Frank's departure. In one year more, results asserted them- selves, and settled the question. Two days after Mr. Vanstone's return from London, he was called away from the breakfast table before he had found time enough to look over his letters, de- livered by the morning's post. Thrusting them into one of the pockets of bis shooting-jacket, he took the letters out again, at one grasp, to read them when occasion served, later in the day. The grasp included the whole correspondence, with one exception — that ex- ception being a final report from the civil engineer, which notified the termination of the connection be- tween his pupil and himself, and the immediate return of Frank to his father's house. While this important announcement lay unsuspected NO NAME. 51 in Mr. Vanstone's pocket, the object of it was travel- ling home, as fast as railways could take him. At half-past ten at night, w^hile Mr. Clare was sitting in studious solitude over his books and his green tea, with his favourite black cat to keep him company, he heard footsteps in the passage — the door opened — and Frank stood before him. Ordinary men would have been astonished. But the philosopher's composure was not to be shaken by any such trifle as the unexpected return of his eldest son. He could not have looked up more calmly from his learned volume, if Frank had been absent for three minutes instead of three years. " Exactly what I predicted," said Mr. Qare. '' Don't interrupt me by making explanations; and don't frighten the cat. If there is anything to eat in the kitchen, get it and go to bed. You can walk over to Combe-Raven to-morrow, and give this message from me to Mr. Yanstone : — ' Father's compliments, sir, and I have come back upon your hands like a bad shilling, as he always said I should. He keeps his own guinea, and takes your five ; and he hopes you'll mind what he says to you another time.' That is the message. Shut the door after you. Good-night." Under these unfavourable auspices, Mr. Francis Clare made his appearance the next morning in the grounds at Combe-Raven ; and, something doubtful of the reception that might await him, slowly approached the precincts of the house. It was not wonderful that Mao^dalen should have uHWi^rj;. Of ILUHOIS. ^ 2 52 NO NAME. failed to recognize him when he first appeared in view. He had gone away a backward lad of seventeen ; he returned a young man of twenty. His slim figure had now acvjuired strength and grace, and had increased in stature to the medium height. The small regular features, whicli he was supposed to have inherited from his mother, were rounded and filled out, without having lost their remarkable delicacy of form. His beard was still in its infancy ; and nascent lines of whisker traced their modest way sparely down his cheeks. His gentle wandering brown eyes would have looked to better advantage in a woman's face — they wanted spirit and firmness to fit them for the face of a man. His hands had the same wandering habit as his eyes ; they were constantly changing from one position to another, constantly twisting and turning any little stray thing they could pick up. He was undeniably handsome, graceful, well bred — but no close observer could look at him, without suspecting that the stout old family stock had begun to wear out, in the later gene- rations, and that Mr. Francis Clare had more in him of the shadow of his ancestors than of the substance. When the astonishment caused by his appearance had partially subsided, a search w^as instituted for the missing report. It was found hi the remotest recesses of Mr. Vanstone's capacious pocket, and was read by that gentleman on the spot. The plain facts, as stated by the engineer, were briefly these. Frank was not possessed of the necessary abilities to fit him for his new calling ; and it was NO NAME. 53 useless to waste time, by keeping him any longer in an employment for which he had no vocation. This, after three years' trial, being the conviction on both sides, the master had thought it the most straight- forward course for the pupil to go home, and candidly place results before his father and his friends. In some other pursuit, for which he was more fit and in which he could feel an interest, he would no doubt display the industry and perseverance which he had been too much discouraged to practise in the profession that he had now abandoned. Personally, he was liked by all who knew him ; and his future prosperity was heartily desired by the many friends whom he had made in the north. Such was the substance of the report, and so it came to an end. Many men would have thought the engineer's state- ment rather too carefully worded ; and, suspecting him of trying to make the best of a bad case, would have entertained serious doubts on the subject of Frank's future. Mr. Vanstone was too easy-tempered and sanguine — and too anxious as well, not to yield his old antagonist an inch more ground than he could help — to look at the letter from any such unfavourable point of view. Was it Frank's fault il he had not got the stuff in him that engineers were made of? Did no other young men ever begin life with a false start? Plenty began in that way, and got over it, and did wonders afterwards. With these commentaries on the letter, the kind-hearted gentleman patted Frank on the shoulder. "Cheer up, my lad!" said Mr. Van- 54 NO NAME. stone. "Wo will be even with your fiithcr one of these (lays, though he lias won the wager this time 1" The example thus set by the master of the house, was followed at once by the family — with the solitary exception of Norah, whose incurable formahty and reserve expressed themselves, not too graciously, in her distant manner towards the visitor. The rest, led by Magdalen (who had been Frank's favourite play- fellow in past times) glided back into their old easy habits with him, without an effort. Pie was " Frank '^ with all of them but Norah, who persisted in address- ing him as "Mr. Clare." Even the account he was now encouraged to give of the reception accorded to him by his father, on the previous night, failed to disturb Norah's gravity. She sat with her dark hand- some face steadily averted, her eyes cast down, and the rich colour in her cheeks warmer and deeper than usual. All the rest, Miss Garth included, found old Mr. Clare's speech of welcome to his son, quite irre- sistible. The noise and merriment were at their height, when the servant came in, and struck the whole ■ party dumb by the announcement of visitors in the drawing-room. '' Mr. Marrable, Mrs. Marrable, and Miss Marrable ; Evergreen Lodge, Clifton." Norah rose as readily as if the new arrivals had been a relief to her mind. Mrs. Vanstone was the next to leave her chair. These two went away first, to receive the visitors. Magdalen, who preferred the society of her father and Frank, pleaded hard to be XO NAME. 55 left behind; but Miss Garth, after granting five minutes' grace, took her into custody, and marched her out of the room. Frank rose to take his leave. "No, no," said Mr. Vanstone, detaining him. " Don't go. These people won't stop long. Mr. Marrable's a merchant at Bristol. I've met him once or twice, when the girls forced me to take them to parties at Chfton. Mere acquaintances, nothing more. Come and smoke a cigar in the greenhouse. Hang all visitors — they worry one's life out. I'll appear at the last moment with an apology ; and you shall follow me at a safe distance, and be a proof that I was really engaged." Proposing this ingenious stratagem, in a confidential whisper, Mr. Vanstone took Frank's arm, and led him round the house by the back way. The first ten minutes of seclusion in the conservatory, passed with- out events of any kind. At the end of that time, a flying figure in bright garments, flashed upon the two gentlemen through the glass — the door was flung open — flower-pots fell in homage to passing petticoats — and Mr. Vanstone's youngest daughter ran up to him at headlong speed, with every external appearance of having suddenly taken leave of her senses. " Papa ! the dream of my whole life is realized," she said, as soon as she could speak. " I shall fly through the roof of the greenhouse, if somebody doesn't hold me down. The Marrables have come here with an invita- tion. Guess, you darling — guess what they're going to give at Evergreen Lodge !" 56 NO NAME. " A ball," said Mr. Vanstone, without a moment's hesitation. *' Private Theatricals ! ! !" cried Magdalen, her clear young voice ringing through the conservatory like a bell ; her loose sleeves billing back, and showing her round white arms to the dimpled elbows, as she clapped her hands ecstatically in the air. " The Rivals, is the play, papa — the Rivals by the famous what's-his-name — and they want me to act ! The one thing in the whole universe that I long to do most. It all depends on you. Mamma shakes her head ; and Miss Garth looks daggers ; and Norah's as sulky as usual — but if you say Yes, they must all three give way, and let me do as I like. Say yes," she pleaded, nestling softly up to her father, and pressing her lips with a fond gen- tleness to his ear, as she whispered the next words. " Say Yes — and I'll be a good girl for the rest of my life." " A good girl ?" repeated Mr. Vanstone — " A mad girl, I think you must mean. Hang these people, and their theatricals ! I shall have to go indoors, and see about this matter. You needn't throw away your cigar, Frank. You^re well out of the business, and you can stop here." " No, he can't," said Magdalen. " He's in the business, too." Mr. Francis Clare had hitherto remained modestly in the background. He now came forward, with a face expressive of speechless amazement. "Yes," continued Magdalen, answering his blank NO NAME. 57 look of inquiry with perfect composure. '^ You are to act. Miss Marrable and I have a turn for business, and we settled it all in five minutes. There are two parts in the play left to be filled. One is Lucy, the waiting-maid ; which is the character I have undertaken — with papa's permission," she added, slily pinching her father's arm ; '' and he won't say No, will he ? First, because he's a darling ; secondly, because I love him and he loves me ; thirdly, because there is never any difference of opinion between us (is there ?) ; fourthly, because I give him a kiss, which naturally stops his mouth and settles the whole question. Dear me, I'm wandering. Where was I just now ? Oh, yes ! explaining myself to Frank " " I beg your pardon," began Frank, attempting, at this point, to enter his protest. " The second character in the play," pursued Mag- dalen, without taking the smallest notice of the protest, " is Falkland — a jealous lover, with a fine flow of language. Miss Marrable and I discussed Falkland privately on the window-seat while the rest were talking. She is a delightful girl — so impulsive, so sensible, so entirely unaffected. She confided in me. She said, ' One of our miseries is that we can't find a gentleman who will grapple with the hideous difficulties of Falkland.' Of course I soothed her. Of course I said, Tve got the gentleman, and he shall grapple immediately.' ■ — ' Oh heavens ! who is he ?' — ' Mr. Francis Clare.' — 'And where is he?' — ^In the house at this moment.' — ^ AVill you be so very charming, Miss 58 NO NAME. Vanstone, as to fetch him?' — *I'll fetch him, Miss Marrablc, with the greatest pleasure.' I left the window-seat — I rushed into the morning-room — I smelt cigars — I followed the smell — and here I am." " It's a compliment, I know, to be asked to act," said Frank, in great embarrassment. "But I hope you and Miss Marrable will excuse me " "Certainly not. Miss Marrable and I are both remarkable for the firmness of our characters. When we say Mr. So-and-So is positively to act the part of Falkland, we positively mean it. Come in, and be introduced." " But I never tried to act. I don't know^ how." " Not of the slightest consequence. If you don't know how, come to me, and I'll teach you." " You !" exclaimed Mr. Vanstone. " What do you know about it?" " Pray, papa, be serious ! I have the strongest internal conviction that I could act every character in the play — Falkland included. Don't let me have to speak a second time, Frank. Come and be introduced." She took her father's arm, and moved on with him to the door of the greenhouse. At the steps, she turned and looked round to see if Frank was following her. It was only the action of a moment ; but in that moment her natural firmness of will rallied all its resources — strengthened itself with the influence of her beauty — commanded — and conquered. She looked lovely : the flush was tenderly bright in her cheeks ; the radiant pleasure shone and sparkled in her eyes ; NO NAME. 59 the position of her figure, turned suddenly from the waist upwards, disclosed its delicate strength, its supple firmness, its seductive serpentine grace. " Come !" she said, with a coquettish beckoning action of her head. " Come, Frank !" Few men of forty would have resisted her, at that moment. Frank was twenty, last birthday. In other words, he threw aside his cigar, and followed her out of the greenhouse. As he turned, and closed the door — in the instant when he lost sight of her — his disinclination to be associated with the private theatricals revived. At the foot of the house-steps he stopped again ; plucked a twig from a plant near him ; broke it in his hand ; and looked about him uneasily, on this side and on that. The path to the left led back to his father's cottage — the w^ay of escape lay open. Why not take it ? While he still hesitated, Mr. Yanstone and his daughter reached the top of the steps. Once more, Magdalen looked round ; looked with her resistless beauty, with her all-conquering smile. She beckoned again ; and again he followed her — up the steps, and over the threshold. The door closed on them. So, with a trifling gesture of invitation on one side, with a trifling act of compliance on the other : so — with no knowledge in his mind, with no thought in hers, of the secret still hidden under the journey to London — they took the way which led to that secret's discovery, through many a darker winding that v^as yet to come. 60 NO NAME. CHAPTER V. Mr. Vanstoxe's inquiries into the proposed theatrical entertainment at Evergreen Lodge were answered by a narrative of dramatic disasters ; of which Miss Marrablc impersonated the innocent cause, and in which her father and mother played the parts of chief victims. Miss Marrable was that hardest of all born tyrants — an only child. Slie had never granted a constitutional privilege to her oppressed father and mother, since the time when she cut her first tooth. Her seventeenth birthday was now near at hand ; she had decided on celebrating it by acting a play ; had issued her orders accordingly ; and had been obeyed by her docile parents as implicitly as usual. Mrs. Marrable gave up the drawing-room to be laid waste for a stage and a theatre. Mr. jMarrable secured the services of a respectable professional person to drill the young ladies and gentlemen, and to accept all the other responsibili- ties, incidental to creating a dramatic world out of a domestic chaos. Having further accustomed them- selves to the breakinf]^ of furniture and the staininof of walls — to thumping, tumbling, hammering, and NO NAME. 61 screaming ; to doors always banging, and to footsteps perpetually running up and down stairs — the nominal master and mistress of the house fondly believed that their chief troubles were over. Innocent and fatal delusion ! It is one thing in private society, to set up the stage and choose the play — it is another thing altogether, to find the actors. Hitherto, only the small preliminary annoyances proper to the occasion, had shown themselves at Evergreen Lodge. The sound and serious troubles were all to come. " The Rivals " having been chosen as the play. Miss Marrable, as a matter of course, appropriated to her- self the part of " Lydia Languish." One of her favoured swains next secured " Captain Absolute," and another laid violent hands on " Sir Lucius O 'Trigger." These two were followed by an accomo- dating spinster-relative, who accepted the heavy dra- matic responsibility of " Mrs. Malaprop " — and there, the theatrical proceedings came to a pause. Nine more speaking characters were left to be fitted with representatives ; and with that unavoidable necessity the serious troubles began. All the friends of the family suddenly became un- reliable people, for the first time in their lives. After encouraging the idea of the play, they declined the personal sacrifice of acting in it — or, they accepted characters, and then broke down in the effort to study them — or they volunteered to take the parts which they knew were already engaged, and declined the parts which were waiting to be acted — or they were afflicted 62 NO NAME. with wctak constitutions, and mischeviously fell ill when they were wanted at rehearsal — or they had Puritan relatives in the background, and, after slipping into their parts cheerfully at the week's beginning, oozed out of them penitently, under serious family pressure, at the week's end. Meanwhile, the carpenters ham- mered and the scenes rose. JMiss Marrable, whose temperament was sensitive, became hysterical under the strain of perpetual anxiety ; the family doctor declined to answer for the nervous consequences if something was not done. Renewed efforts were made in every direction. Actors and actresses were sought, with a desperate disregard of all considerations of personal fitness. Necessity which knows no law, either in the drama or out of it, accepted a lad of eighteen as the representative of " Sir Anthony Absolute ;" the stage-manager undertaking to supply the necessary wrinkles from the illimitable resources of theatrical art. A lady whose age was unknown, and whose personal appearance was stout — but whose heart was in the right place — volunteered to act the part of the sentimental " Julia," and brought with her the dramatic qualifica- tion of habitually wearing a wig in private life. Thanks to these vigorous measures, the play was at last sup- plied with representatives — always excepting the two unmanageable characters of " Lucy " the waiting-maid, and *' Falkland," Julia's jealous lover. Gentlemen came ; saw Julia at rehearsal ; observed her stoutness and her wig ; omitted to notice that her heart was in the right place ; quailed at the prospect, apologized, NO NAME. 63 and retired. Ladies read the part of " Lucy ;" re- marked that she appeared to great advantage in the first half of the play, and faded out of it altogether in the latter half ; objected to pass fi'om the notice of the audience in that manner, when all the rest had a chance of distinguishing themselves to the end ; shut up the book, apologized, and retired. In eight days more the night of performance would arrive ; a phalanx of social martyrs two hundred strong, had been con- vened to witness it ; three full rehearsals were abso- lutely necessary ; and two characters in the play were not filled yet. With this lamentable story, and with the humblest apologies for presuming on a slight ac- quaintance, the Marrables appeared at Combe-Raven, to appeal to the young ladies for a " Lucy," and to the universe for a " Falkland," with the mendicant perti- nacity of a family in despair. This statement of circumstances — addressed to an audience which included a father of Mr. Yanstone's disposition, and a daughter of Magdalen's tempera- ment — produced the result which might have been anticipated from the first. Either misinterpreting, or disregarding, the ominous silence preserved by his wife and Miss Garth, Mr. Vanstone not only gave Magdalen permission to assist the forlorn dramatic company, but accepted an invita- tion to witness the performance for Norah and himself. Mrs. Vanstone declined accompanying them on account of her health : and Miss Garth only engaged to make one among the audience, conditionally on not being 64 NO NAME. wanted at home. The '' parts " of " Lucy " and " Falkland " (which the distressed family carried bout with them everywhere, like incidental maladies) were handed to their representatives on the spot. Frank's faint remonstrances were rejected without a hearinof ; the days and hours of rehearsal were care- fully noted down on the covers of the parts ; and the Marrables took their leave, with a perfect explosion of thanks — father, mother, and daughter sowing their expressions of gratitude broadcast, from the drawing- room door to the garden-gates. As soon as the carriage had driven away, Magdalen presented herself to the general observation under an entirely new aspect. " If any more visitors call to-day," she said, with the profoundest gravity of look and manner, ^' I am not at home. This is a far more serious matter than any of you suppose. Go somewhere by yourself, Frank, and read over your part, and don't let your attention wander if you can possibly help it. I shall not be accessible before the evening. If you will come here — with papa's permission — after tea, my views on the subject of Falkland will be at your disposal. Thomas ! whatever else the gardener does, he is not to make any floricultural noises under my window. For the rest of the afternoon, I shall be immersed in study — and the quieter the house is, the more obliged I shall feel to everybody." Before Miss Garth's battery of reproof could open fire, before the first outburst of Mr. Vanstone's hearty NO NAME. 65 laughter could escape his lips, she bowed to them with imperturbable gravity ; ascended the house-steps for the first time in her life, at a walk instead of a run ; and retired then and there to the bedroom regions. Frank's helpless astonishment at her disappearance, added a new element of absurdity to the scene. He stood first on one leg and then on the ether ; rolling and unrolling his part, and looking piteously in the faces of the friends about him. " I know I can't do it," he said. "May I come in after tea, and hear Magdalen's views? Thank you — I'll look in about eight. Don't tell my father about this acting, please : I should never hear the last of it." Those were the only words he had spirit enough to utter. He drifted away aimlessly in the direction of the shrubbery, with the part hanging open in his hand — the most incapable of Falklands, and the most helpless of mankind. Frank's departure left the family by themselves, and was the signal accordingly for an attack on Mr. Van- stone's inveterate carelessness in the exercise of his paternal authority. " What could you possibly be thinking of, Andrew, when you gave your consent?" said Mrs. Vanstone. " Surely my silence was a sufficient warning to you to say No?" " A mistake, Mr. Vanstone," chimed in Miss Garth. " Made with the best intentions — but a mistake for all that." ''It may be a mistake," said Norah, taking her YOL. I. F 66 NO NAME. now father's part, as usual. *' But I really don't sec h papa, or any one else, could have declined, under the circumstances." " Quite right, my dear," observed Mr. Vanstone. " The circumstances, as you say, were dead against me. Here were these unfortunate peojjle in a scrape on one side ; and Magdalen, on the other, mad to act. I couldn't say I had methodistical objections — I've nothins: methodistical about me. What other excuse could I make ? The Marrables are respectable people, and keep the best company in Clifton. What harm can she get in their house ? If you come to prudence and that sort of thing — why shouldn't Magdalen do what Miss Marrable does? There! there! let the poor things act, and amuse themselves. We were their age once — and it's no use making a fuss — and that's all I've got to say about it." With that characteristic defence of his own conduct, Mr. Vanstone sauntered back to the greenhouse to smoke another cigar. " I didn't say so to papa," said Norah, taking her mother's arm on the way back to the house, " but the bad result of the acting, in my opinion, will be the familiarity it is sure to encourage between Magdalen and Francis Clare." " You are prejudiced against Frank, my love," said Mrs. Vanstone. Norah's soft, secret, hazel eyes sank to the ground ; she said no more. Her opinions were unchangeable — but she never disputed vvitli anybody. She had the NO NAME. 67 great failing of a reserved nature — the failing of obsti- nacy ; and the great merit— the merit of silence. " What is your head running on now," thought Miss Garth, casting a sharp look at Norah's dark, downcast face. "You're one of the impenetrable sort. Give me Magdalen, with all her perversities ; I can see day- light through her. You're as dark as night." The hours of the afternoon passed away, and still Magdalen remained shut up in her own room. No restless footsteps pattered on the stairs; no nimble tongue was heard chattering here, there, and every- w^here, from the garret to the kitchen — the house seemed hardly like itself, with the one ever-disturbing element in the family serenity suddenly withdrawn from it. Anxious to witness, with her own eyes, the reality of a transformation in which past experience still inclined her to disbelieve. Miss Garth ascended to Magdalen's room, knocked twice at the door, received no answer, opened it, and looked in. There sat Magdalen, in an arm-chair before the lono^ lookino^-oflass, with all her hair let down over her shoulders ; absorbed in the study of her part ; and comfortably arrayed in her morning wrapper, until it was time to dress for dinner. And there behind her sat the lady's-maid, slowly combing out the long heavy locks of her young mistress's hair, with the sleepy resignation of a woman who had been engaged in that employment for some hours past. The sun was shininf? ; and the ffreen shutters outside the win- dow were closed. The dim light fell tenderly on the F 2 QS KO NA3IE. t.vvo quiet seated figures ; on the little white bed, witli the knots of rose-coloured ribbon which looped up its curtains, and the briij^ht dress for dinner laid ready across it ; on the gaily painted bath, with its pure lining of white enamel ; on the toilet-table with its sparkling trinkets, its crystal bottles, its silver bell with Cupid for a handle, its litter of little luxuries that adorn the shrine of a woman's bedchamber. The luxurious tranquillity of the scene ; the cool fragrance of flowers and perfumes in the atmosphere ; the rapt attitude of Magdalen, absorbed over her reading ; the monotonous regularity of movement in the maid's hand and arm, as she drew the comb smoothly through and through her mistress's hair — all conveyed the same soothing impression of drowsy delicious quiet. On one side of the door were the broad daylight, and the familiar realities of life. On the other, was the dreamland of Elysian serenity — the sanctuary of un- ruffled repose. Miss Garih paused on the threshold, and looked into the room in silence. Magdalen's curious fancy for having her hair combed at all times and seasons, was among the peculiarities of her character which were notorious to everybody in the house. It was one of her father's favourite jokes, that she reminded him, on such occasions, of a cat having her back stroked, and that he always expected, if the combing were only continued long enough, to hear her purr. Extravagant as it may seem, the com- parison was not altogether inappropriate. The girl's ]S'0 XA3IE. 69 fervid temperament intensified the essentially feminine pleasure that most women feel in the passage of th.e comb through their hair, to a luxury of sensation which absorbed her in enjoyment, so serenely self-demonstra- tive, so drowsily deep, that it did irresistibly suggest a pet cat's enjoyment under a caressing hand. Inti- mately as Miss Garth was acquainted wdth this peculiarity in her pupil, she now saw it asserting itself for the first time, in association with mental exertion of any kind on Magdalen's part. Feeling, therefore, some curiosity to know how long the combing and the studying had gone on together, she ventured on putting the question, first, to the mistress ; and (receiving no answer in that quarter) secondly to the maid. "All the afternoon, Miss, off" and on," was the weary answer. "Miss Magdalen says it soothes her feelings and clears her mind." Knowing by experience that interference would be hopeless, under these circumstances, Miss Garth turned sharply and left the room. She smiled when she was outside on the landing. The female mind does occa- sionally — though not often — project itself int'» the future. Miss Garth was prophetically pitying Magda- len's unfortunate husband. Dinner-time presented the fair student to the family eye in the same mentally absorbed aspect. On all ordinary occasions, Magdalen's appetite would have terrified those feeble sentimentalists, who affect to ignore the all-important influence which female feeding 70 NO NAME. exerts in the production of female beauty. On this occasion, she refused one dish after another with a resolution which implied the rarest of all modern martyrdoms — gastric martyrdom. " I have conceived the part of Lucy," she observed, with the demurest gravity. " The next difficulty is to make Frank con- ceive the part of Falkland. I see nothing to laugh at — you would all be serious enough if you had my responsibilities. No, papa — no wine to-day, thank you. I must keep my intelligence clear. Water, Thomas — and a little more jelly, I think, before you take it away." When Frank presented himself in the evening, ignorant of the first elements of his part, she took him in hand, as a middle-aged schoolmistress might have taken in hand a backward little boy. The few attempts he made to vary the sternly practical nature of the evening's occupation by slipping in compliments sidelong, she put away from her with the contemptuous self-possession of a woman of twice her age. She literally forced him into his part. Her father fell asleep in his chair. Mrs. Vanstone and Miss Garth lost their interest in the proceedings, retired to the farther end of the room, and spoke together in whis- pers. It grew later and later ; and still Magdalen never flinched from her task — still, with equal perse- verance, Norah, who had been on the watch all through the evening, kept on the watch to the end. The dis- trust darkened and darkened on her face as she looked at her sister and Frank ; as she saw how close they sat NO NAME. 71 together, devoted to the same interest and working to the same end. The clock on the mantelpiece pointed to half-past eleven, before Lucy the resolute, permitted Falkland the helpless to shut up his task-book for the night. "She's wonderfully clever, isn't she?" said Frank, taking leave of Mr. Vanstone at the hall-door. " I'm to come to-morrow, and hear more of her views — if you have no objection. I shall never do it ; don't tell her I said so. As fast as she teaches me one speech, the other goes out of my head. Discouraging, isn't it? Goodnight." The next day but one was the day of the first full rehearsal. On the previous evening Mrs. Vanstone's spirits had been sadly depressed. At a private inter- view with Miss Garth, she had referred again, of her own accord, to the subject of her letter from London — had spoken self-reproachfuUy of her weakness in admitting Captain Wragge's impudent claim to a family connection with her — and had then reverted to the state of her health, and to the doubtful prospect that awaited her in the coming summer, in a tone of despondency which it was very distressing to hear. Anxious to cheer her spirits, Miss Garth had changed the conversation as soon as possible — had referred to the approaching theatrical performance — and had re- lieved Mrs. Vanstone's mind of all anxiety in that direction, by announcing her intention of accompany- ing Magdalen to each rehearsal, and of not losing sight of her until she was safely back again in her father's house. Accordingly, when Frank presented '2 xo NA:\rE. Inmsclf at Combc-llaven on the eventful mornino- there stood Miss Gartli, prepared-in the interpolate"! character of Argus— to accompany Lucy and Falkland to the scene of trial. Tiie railway conveyed the three, in excellent time, to Evergreen Lodge; and at one o'clock the rehearsal bee-an. NO NAME. CHAPTER YI. i " I HOPE Miss Vanstone knows her part ?" whispered Mrs. Marrable, anxiously addressing herself to Miss | Garth, in a corner of the theatre. \ " If airs and graces make an actress, ma'am, Mag- j dalen's performance will astonish us all." With that I reply, Miss Garth took out her work, and seated her- j self, on guard, in the centre of the pit. i The manager perched himself, book in hand, on a i stool close in front of the stage. He was an active j little man, of a sweet and cheerful temper : and he « gave the signal to begin, with as patient an interest in I the proceedings as if they had caused him no trouble j in the past, and promised him no difficulty in the future. The two characters which open the comedy of The Rivals, " Fag," and the " Coachman," appeared j on the scene — looked many -sizes too tall for their , canvas background, which represented a " Street in ' Bath" — exhibited the customary inability to manage ' their own arms, legs, and voices — went out severally | at the wrong exits — and expressed their perfect ' approval of results, so far, by laughing heartily behind the scenes. "Silence, gentlemen, if you please," re- , 74: NO NAME. monstratcd the clicerfal manager. " As loud as you like on the stage, but the audience mustn't hear you off it. Miss Marrable ready ? Miss Vanstone ready ? Easy there witli the ' Street in Bath ;' it's going up crooked ! Face this way, Miss Marrable ; full face, if you please. Miss Vanstone •" he checked himself suddenly. " Curious," he said, under his breath — *' she fronts the audience of her own accord !" Lucy opened the scene in these words : " Indeed, ma'am, I traversed half the town in search of it : I don't be- lieve there's a circulating library in Bath I haven't been at." The manager started in his chair. " My heart alive ! she speaks out without telling !" The dialogue went on. Lucy produced the novels for Miss Lydia Languish's private reading from under her cloak. The manager rose excitably to his feet. Marvellous ! No hurry with the books ; no dropping them. She looked at the titles before she announced them to her mistress ; she set down " Humphry Clinker " on "The Tears of Sensibility " with a smart little smack which pointed the antithesis. One moment — and she announced Julia's visit ; another — and she dropped the brisk waiting-maid's curtsey; a third — and she was off the stage on the side set down for her in the book. The manager wheeled round on his stool, and looked hard at Miss Garth. " I beg your pardon, ma'am," he said. " Miss Marrable told me, before we began, that this was the young lady's first attempt. It can't be, surely ?" " It is," replied Miss Garth, reflecting the manager's NO NAME. 70 look of amazement on her own face. AVas it possible that Magdalen's unintelligible industry in the study of her part, really sprang from a serious interest in her occupation — an interest which implied a natural fitness for it? The rehearsal went on. The stout lady with the wig (and the excellent heart) personated the senti- mental Julia from an inveterately tragic point of view, and used her handkerchief distractedly in the first scene. The spinster-relative felt Mrs. 3Ialaprop's mis- takes in language so seriously, and took such extraor- dinary pains with her blunders, that they sounded more like exercises in elocution than anything else. The unhappy lad who led the forlorn hope of the company, in the person of "Sir Anthony Absolute," expressed the age and irascibility of his character by tottering I incessantly at the knees, and thumping the stage ] perpetually with his stick. Slowly and clumsily, with constant interruptions, and interminable mistakes, the I first act dragged on, until Lucy appeared again to end | it in soliloquy, with the confession of her [^assumed sim- plicity and the praise of her own cunning. , Here, the stage artifice of the situation presented j difficulties which Magdalen had not encountered in | the first scene — and here, her total want of experience ! led her into more than one palpable mistake. The j stage-manager, with an eagerness which he had not \ shown in the case of any other member of the com- | pany, interfered immediately, and set her right. At j one point she was to pause, and take a turn on the j 70 NO NAME. stage — she did it. At aiiotliLM', she was to stop, toss her head, and look pertly at the audience — she did it. AVhen she took out the j)aper to read the list of the presents she had received, could she give it a tap with her finger (Yes) ? And lead off with a little laugh (Yes — after twice trying)? Could she read the differ- ent items with a sly look at the end of each sentence, straight at the pit (Yes, straight at the pit, and as sly as you please) ? The manager's cheerful face beamed with approval. He tucked the play under his arm, and clapped his hands gaily ; the gentlemen, clustered together behind the scenes, followed his example ; the ladies looked at each other with dawning doubts whether they had not better have left the new recruit in the retirement of private life. Too deeply absorbed in the business of the stage to heed any of them, Mag- dalen asked leave to repeat the soliloquy, and make quite sure of her own improvement. She went all through it again, without a mistake, this time, from beginning to end ; the manager celebrating her atten- tion to his directions by an outburst of professional approbation, which escaped him in spite of himself. " She can take a hint T' cried the little man, with a hearty smack of his hand on the prompt-book. " She's a born actress, if ever there was one yet !" "I hope not," said Miss Garth to herself, taking up the work which had dropped into her lap, and looking^ down at it in some perplexity. Her worst apprehen- sion of results in connection with the theatrical enter- prise, had foreboded levity of conduct with some of the KO NAME. 7< o-entlemen — she had not baro^ained for this. Mag:- dalen, in the capacity of a thoughtless girl, was com- paratively easy to deal with. Magdalen, in the cha- racter of a born actress, threatened serious future diffi- culties. The rehearsal proceeded. Lucy returned to the ^tage for her scenes in the second act (the last in which she appears) with Sir Lucius and Fag. Here, again, Magdalen's inexperience betrayed itself — and here once more her resolution in attacking and con- quering her own mistakes astonished everybody. "Bravo!" cried the gentlemen behind the scenes, as she steadily trampled down one blunder after another. *' Ridiculous !" said the ladies, '* with such a small part as hers." " Heaven forgive me !" thought Miss Garth, coming round unwillingly to the general opinion. " I almost wish we were Papists, and had a convent to put her in to-morrow." One of Mr. Mar- rable's servants entered the theatre as that desperate aspiration escaped the governess. She instantly sent the man behind the scenes with a message : — "Miss Yanstone has done her part in the rehearsal : request her to come here, and sit by me." The servant re- turned with a polite apology : — " Miss Vanstone's kind love, and she begs to be excused— sbe's prompting Mr. Clare." She prompted him to such purpose that he actually got through his part. The performances of the other gentlemen were obtrusively imbecile. Frank was just one degree better — he was modestly incapable ; and he gained by comparison. " Thanks 78 NO NAME. to Miss Vanstone," observed the manager, who had heard the prompting. " She pulled him through. We shall be flat enough at night, when the drop falls on the second act, and the audience have seen the last of her. It's a thousand pities she hasn't got a better part!" " It's a thousand mercies she's no more to do than she has,'' muttered Miss Garth, overhearing him. "As things are, the people can't well turn her head with applause. She's out of the play in the second act — that's one comfort !" No well-regulated mind ever draws its inferences in a hurry ; Miss Garth's mind was well regulated ; therefore, logically speaking. Miss Garth ought to have been superior to the weakness of rushing at conclu- sions. She had committed that error, nevertheless, under present circumstances. In plainer terms, the consoling reflection which had just occurred to her, assumed that the play had by this time survived all its disasters, and entered on its long-deferred career of success. The play had done nothing of the sort. Misfortune and the Marrable family had not parted company yet. When the rehearsal was over, nobody observed that the stout lady with the wig privately withdrew herself from the company ; and when she was afterwards missed from the table of refreshments, which Mr. Mav- rable's hospitality kept ready spread in a room near the theatre, nobody imagined that there was any serious reason for her absence. It was not till the ladies and KO NAME. 79 gentlemen assembled for the next rehearsal, that the true state of the case was impressed on the minds of the company. At the appointed hour no Julia appeared. In her stead, Mrs. Marrable portentously approached the stage, with an open letter in her hand. She was naturally a lady of the mildest good breeding : she was mistress of every bland conventionality in the English language — but disasters and dramatic in- fluences combined, threw even this harmless matron off her balance at last. For the first time in her life Mrs. Marrable indulged in vehement gesture, and used strong language. She handed the letter sternly, at arm's length, to her daughter. " My dear," she said, with an aspect of awful composure, " we are under a Curse." Before the amazed dramatic company could petition for an explanation, she turned, and left the room. The manager's professional eye followed her out respectfully — he looked as if he approved of the exit, from a theatrical point of view. What new misfortune had befallen the play ? The last and worst of all misfortunes had assailed it. The stout lady had resigned her part. Not maliciously. Her heart, which had been in the right place throughout, remained inflexibly in the right place still. Her explanation of the circumstances proved this, if nothing else did. The letter began with a statement : — She had overheard, at the last re- hearsal (quite unintentionally) personal remarks of which she was the subject. They might, or might not have had reference to her — Hair ; and her — Figure. 80 NO NAME. She would not distress Mrs. Marrable by repeatiii^]^ them. Neither wouhl she mention names, because it was foreign to her nature to make bad worse. The only course at all consistent with her own self-respect, was to resign her part. She enclosed it accordingly to Mrs. Marrable, with many apologies for her presump- tion in undertaking a youthful character, at — what a gentleman was pleased to term — her Age ; and with what two ladies were rude enough to characterize as her disadvantages of — Hair, and — Figure. A younger and more attractive representative of Julia, would no doubt be easily found. In the mean time, all persons concerned had her fidl forgiveness ; to wliich she would only beg leave to add her best and kindest wishes for the success of the play. In four nights more the play was to be performed. If ever any human enterprise stood in need of good wishes to help it, that enterprise was unquestionably the theatrical entertainment at Everm-een Lodfje ! One arm-chair was allowed on the stage ; and, into that arm-chair, Miss Marrable sank, preparatory to a fit of hysterics. Magdalen stepped forward at the first convulsion ; snatched the letter from Miss Marrable's hand ; and stopped the threatened catastrophe. "She's an ugly, bald-headed, malicious, middle- aged wretch," said Magdalen, tearing the letter into fragments, and tossing them over the heads of the company. " But I can tell her one thing — she shan't spoil the play. I'll act Julia." " Bravo !" cried the chorus of gentlemen — the NO NAME. 81 anonymous gentleman who had helped to do the mis- chief (otherwise Mr. Francis Clare) loudest of all. " If you want the truth, I don't shrink from owning it," continued Magdalen. "I'm one of the ladies she means. I said she had a head like a mop, and a waist like a bolster. So she has." " I am the other lady," added the spinster-relative. " But I only said she was too stout for the part." "I am the gentleman," chimed in Frank, stimulated by the force of example. ^-'I said nothing — I only agreed with the ladies." Here Miss Garth seized her opportunity, and. addressed the stage loudly from the pit. "Stop! stop!" she said. "You can't settle the- difficulty that way. If Magdalen plays Julia, who is. to play Lucy ?" Miss Marrable sank back in the arm-chair, and gave- way to the second convulsion. " Stuff and nonsense!" cried Magdalen, "the thing's simple enough. I'll act Julia and Lucy both toge- ther." The manager was consulted on the spot. Suppress- ing Lucy's first entrance, and turning the short dialogue about the novels into a soliloquy for Lydia Languish, appeared to be the only changes of importance neces- sary to the accomplishment of Magdalen's project. Lucy's two telling scenes at the end of the first and second acts, were sufficiently removed from the scenes in which Julia appeared, to give time for the necessary transformations in dress. Even Miss Garth, though VOL. I. G 82 NO NAME. she tried hard to find tlioni, could put no fresh obstacles in the way. Tlie question was settled in five minutes, and the rehearsal went on ; Maordalen learning: Julia's stage situations with the book in her hand, and an- nouncing afterwards, on the journey home, that she proposed sitting up all night to study the new part. Frank thereupon expressed his fears that she would have no time left to help him through his theatrical difficulties. She tapped him on the shoulder coquet- tishly with her part. " You foolish fellow, how am I to do without you ? You're Julia's jealous lover ; you're always making Julia cry. Come to-night, and make me cry at tea-time. You haven't got a venom- ous old woman in a wig to act with now. It's my heart you're to break — and of course I shall teach you how to do it." The four days' interval passed busily in perpetual re- hearsals, public and private. The night of perform- ance arrived ; the guests assembled ; the great dramatic experiment stood on its trial. Magdalen had made the most of her opportunities ; she had learnt all that the manager could teach her in the time. Miss Garth left 'her when the overture began, sitting apart in a corner behind the scenes, serious and silent, with her smelling-bottle in one hand, and her book in the other, resolutely training herself for the coming ordeal, to the very last. The play began, with all the proper accompaniments of a theatrical performance in private life ; with a NO NAME. 83 crowded audience, an African temperature, a bursting of heated lamp-glasses, and a difficulty in drawing up the curtain. "Fag," and "the Coachman," who opened the scene, took leave of their memories as soon as they stepped on the stage ; left half their dialogue unspoken ; came to a dead pause ; were audibly entreated by the invisible manager to " come off ;" and went off accordingly, in every respect sadder and wiser men than when they went on. The next scene disclosed Miss Marrable as " Lydia Languish," grace- fully seated, very pretty, beautifully dressed, accurately mistress of the smallest words in her part ; possessed, in short, of every personal resource — except her voice. The ladies admired, the gentlemen applauded. No- body heard anything, but the vv^ords " Speak up, Miss," whispered by the same voice which had already entreated Fag and the Coachman to " come off." A responsive titter rose among the younger spectators ; checked immediately by magnanimous applause. The temperature of the audience was rising to Blood Heat — but the national sense of fair play was not boiled out of them yet. In the midst of the demonstration, Magdalen quietly made her first entrance, as " Julia." She was dressed very plainly in dark colours, and wore her own hair ; all stage adjuncts and alterations (exceptino- the slightest possible touch of rouge on her cheeks) ha vino- been kept in reserve, to disguise her the more efiec- tually in her second part. The grace and simplicity of her costume, the steady self-possession with which G 2 84 NO NAME. she looked out over the eager rows of foccs before lier, raised a low hum of approval and expectation. She spoke — after suppressing a momentary tremor — with a quiet distinctness of utterance which reached all ears, and which at once confirmed the favourable impression that her appearance had produced. The one member of the audience who looked at her and listened to her coldly, was her elder sister. Before the actress of the evenino^ had been five minutes on the stafje, Norah detected, to her own indescribable astonishment, that Magdalen had audaciously individualized the feeble amiability of " Julia's " character, by seizing no less a person than herself as the model to act it by. She saw all her own little formal peculiarities of manner and movement, unblushingly reproduced — and even the very tone of her voice so accurately mimicked from time to time, that the accents startled her as if she was speaking herself, with an echo on the stage. The effect of this cool appropriation of Norah's identity to theatrical purposes, on the audience — who only saw- results — asserted itself in a storm of applause on Magdalen's exit. She had won two incontestable triumphs in her first scene. By a dextrous piece of mimicry, she had made a living reality of one of the most insipid characters in the English drama ; and she had roused to enthusiasm an audience of two hundred exiles from the blessings of ventilation, all simmering together in their own animal heat. Under the circum- stances, where is the actress by profession who could have done much more ? NO XA3IE/ 85 But the event of the evening was still to come. Magdalen's disguised reappearance at the end of the act, in the character of " Lucy " — with false hair and false eyebrows, with a bright-red complexion and patches on her cheeks, with the gayest colours flaunting in her dress, and the shrillest vivacity of voice and manner — fairly staggered the audience. They looked down at their programmes, in which the representative of Lucy figured under an assumed name ; looked up again at the stage ; penetrated the disguise ; and vented their astonishment in another round of applause, louder and heartier even than the last. Norah herself could not deny this time, that the tribute of appro- bation had been well deserved. There, forcing its way steadily through all the faults of inexperience — there, plainly visible to the dullest of the spectators, was the rare faculry of dramatic impersonation, expressing itself in every look and action of this girl of eighteen, who now stood on a stage»for the first time in her life. Failing in many minor requisites of the double task which she had undertaken, she succeeded in the one important necessity of keeping the main distinctions of the two characters thoroughly apart. Everybody felt that the difficulty lay here — everybody saw the diffi- culty conquered — everybody echoed the manager's enthusiasm at rehearsal, which had hailed her as a born actress. When the drop-scene descended for the first time, Magdalen had concentrated in herself the whole in- terest and attraction of the play. The audience politely 86 *N0 NAME. applauded Miss Marrable, as became tlic guests as- sembled in her father's house: and good-humouredly encouraged the remainder of the company, to help them through a task for which they were all, more or less, palpably unlit. But, as the play proceeded, no- thing roused them to any genuine expression of interest when Magdalen was absent from the scene. There "w^as no disguising it : Miss Marrable and her bosom friends had been all hopelessly cast in the shade by the new recruit w^hom they had summoned to assist them, in the capacity of forlorn hope. And this on Miss Marrable's own birthday ! and this in her father's house ! and this after the unutterable sacrifices of six weeks past ! Of all the domestic disasters which the thankless theatrical enterprise had inflicted on the Marrable family, the crowning misfortune was now consummated by Magdalen's success. Leaving Mr. Vanstone and Norah, on the conclusion of the play, among the gitests in the supper-room, Miss Garth went behind the scenes ; ostensibly anxious to see if she could be of any use ; really bent on ascertaining whether Magdalen's head had been turned by the triumphs of the evening. It would not have surprised Miss Garth if she had discovered her pupil in the act of making terms with the manager for her forthcoming appearance in a public theatre. As events really turned out, she found Magdalen on the stage, receiving, with gracious smiles, a card which the manager presented to her with a professional bow. Noticing Miss Garth's mute look of inquiry, the civil I NO NAME. 87 little inan hastened to explain that the card was his own, and that he was merely asking the favour of Miss Vanstone's recommendation at any future opportunity. " This is not the last time the young lady will be concerned in private theatricals, I'll answer for it," said the manager. " And if a superintendent isVanted on the next occasion, she has kindly promised to say a good word for me. I am always to be heard of. Miss, at that address." Saying those words, he bowed again, and discreetly disappeared. Vague suspicions beset the mind of Miss Garth, and uro-ed her to insist on lookino- at the card. No more harmless morsel of pasteboard was ever passed from one hand to another. The card contained nothing but the manager's name, and, under it, the name and address of a theatrical agent in London. " It is not worth the trouble of keeping," said Miss Garth. Mao^dalen cauo^ht her hand, before she could throw the card away — possessed herself of it the next instant — and put it in her pocket. "I promised to recommend him," she said — "and that's one reason for keeping his card. If it does no- thing else, it will remind me of the happiest evening of my life — and that's another. Come !" she cried, throwing her arms round Miss Garth with a feverish gaiety — " congratulate me on my success !" " I will congratulate you when you have got over it," said Miss Garth. In half an hour more, Magdalen had changed her 88 NO NAME. dress ; liad joined the f^uests ; and had soared into an atmosphere of congratulation, high above the reach of any controlling influence that iMiss Garth could exercise. Frank, dilatory in all his proceedings, was the last of the dramatic company who left the precincts of the stage. He made no attempt to join Magdalen in the supper-room — but he was ready in the hall, with her cloak, when the carriages were called and the party broke up. " Oh, Frank !" she said, looking round at him, as he put the cloak on her shoulders, " I am so sorry it's all over ! Come to-morrow morning, and let's talk about it by ourselves." "In the shrubbery at ten?" asked Frank in a whisper. She drew up the hood of her cloak, and nodded to him gaily. Miss Garth, standing near, noticed the looks that passed between them, though the disturbance made by the parting guests prevented her from hearing the words. There was a soft, underlying tenderness in Magdalen's assumed gaiety of manner — there was a sudden thoughtfulness in her face, a confidential readi- ness in her hand, as she took Frank's arm and went out to the carriage. AAliat did it mean ? Had her passing interest in him, as her stage-pupil, treache- rously sown the seeds of any deeper interest in him, as a man ? Had the idle theatrical scheme, now^ that it was all over, graver results to answer for than a mischievous waste of time ? The lines on Miss Garth's face deepened and NO NAME. 89 hardened : she stood lost among the fluttering crowd around her. Norah's warning words, addressed to Mrs. Vanstone in the garden, recurred to her memory — and now, for the first time, the idea dawned on her that Norah had seen consequences in their true light. 90 NO NAME. CHAPTER VII. Early the next morning Miss Garth and Norah met in the garden, and spoke together privately. The only noticeable result of the interview, when they pre- sented themselves at the breakfast-table, appeared in the marked silence which they both maintained on the topic of the theatrical performance. Mrs. Vanstone was entirely indebted to her husband and to her youngest daughter for all that she heard of the evening's entertainment. The governess and the elder daughter had evidently determined on letting the subject drop. After breakfast was over, Magdalen proved to be missing, v/hen the ladies assembled as usual in the mornin